The packing tape's horrible screeching noise drowned out my own. "No," I said firmly. I didn't trust myself to say anything more. The words were all bunched up there on the tip of my tongue, ready to tumble out in a word-vomit flood of vulnerability.

I stared at the brown cardboard like it was some sort of ancient tome that needed deciphering and counted back from ten. But even that couldn't keep the tide of hurt from rushing in. Fuck, I had had it—it. The kind of love that lasted a lifetime, and I set it aside over worries about how it all looked.

And he loved me enough to let me.

"Why are you laughing?" Angel demanded.

"I didn't realize I was," I said, wiping the hysterical tears aware. "Just something Jax and I did at the wedding. We're idiots when you get us together."

"So get together tonight!" Angel was nothing if not persistent. "We can get you an extra ticket. It's be like our last hurrah as roommates, you taking me to meet the rock god you grew up with." She shivered with excitement. "Those eyes of his, are they really that blue in real life?"

"They really are."

"How about his body, have you ever seen him with his shirt off up close? Oh God, never mind, I can tell by your face that you have. How about his …" Her voice dropped down to a conspiratorial whisper." …cock? Have you seen that?"

"I once walked in on him as he was getting out of the shower …" It was true, anyway.

"Oh my God!" She whipped out her phone and started texting. "Seriously Lily, we are making this happen tonight. I don't care if I have to drag you by your hair …"

"No," I said. I meant to sound firm, but it sounded more like a shout. She looked up at me, stricken, as I tried to compose myself. "No," I repeated, softer this time. "I really want to get finished packing tonight."

"But why are you moving? You never really explained that. Just came back all weird and quiet and said I have to find a new roommate. How could you do that to me, by the way? What if they're a complete weirdo?"

I ignored the second part of her question as I sought to answer the first. "I'm moving because… it's hard to put in words. Have you ever had a change in your life that's so drastic you can't believe it's not immediately visible to everyone who sees you?"

Angel was silent for several seconds. "When my cat died back in high school, I was, like, a wreck for months. Started wearing black and everything."

I nodded encouragingly. "Yeah, so you started wearing black. I'm moving to a place I've never seen before." Or so I believed. I was heading upstate, to a writer's retreat in the Catskills.

That's what I told Angel, anyway.

But what I didn't say was that I wasn't actually sure about that. I might just spend some time on the road for a while. Find someplace quiet to lick my wounds. The road was calling me. My dad, of all people, would understand, but he was still on his extended honeymoon with Annie. So the only person I could talk to about this extraordinary change inside of me was my soon-to-be-ex-roommate. This was the most we had spoken in a year.

Angel was trying hard to understand. I had to give her that. "That's totally nuts," she finally exhaled.

I laughed and taped another box. "It is," I agreed. "But I need to do it. I'll go crazy if I don't."

She leaned back and stretched her legs out on the bed. "Well, I'm going to hate you forever for telling me this today, of all days. Are you dead certain you won't come and get me and my friends backstage?"

I paused and looked down at my hands. "Believe me, I'm the last person Jaxson Blue wants to see tonight."

*****

When Angel finally left for the show, the apartment was finally quiet. I had just taped shut the last box in my bedroom when my cell phone buzzed so loudly I almost had a heart attack.

When I saw the caller ID, I looked at the time. 10:20 p.m. I couldn't help but smile. "Hey, Dad, you had better not be calling me on your honeymoon!"

My dad's familiar rumble sounded more relaxed than I had ever heard him. A month in Bora Bora with your soulmate would do that, I guess. "Just landed at JFK, actually," he said. "Thought we might be able to swing by and see my baby girl."

I had to shake my head at his impeccable timing "Dad, I don't actually have a place anymore. I'm moving out as we speak.”

"You're what?"

"Moving out."

My dad was silent for a moment. Then he grunted in affirmation. "Ah. Okay. Where're you headed?"

I grinned even wider. "I'll fill you in once I have all the details," I told him, suddenly eager to pick his brain about life on the road. "Maybe I could meet you for dinner in Queens, or something?"

I heard him mumble something, and then the sounds of a slight scuffle. Annie's voice suddenly filled my ear. "Lily! You're going to see Jax tonight, right? We can go out afterward."

"I'm… not going to this show. No," I faltered.

She held her silence a beat longer than necessary. Just long enough for my heart to sink into my stomach. "He had three shows in New York," she said frostily.

"I know."

"What the hell happened with you two?"

My heart leapt into my throat. "What?!"

She huffed and must have moved to a quieter part of the airport because suddenly her voice was as clear as if she were standing right in the room with me, her voice ringing in my ear. "It's clear you love him. Why did you leave?"

As my brain still stumbled to process what Annie had just said, my dad snatched the phone back from his wife. "You two got a good thing. Take it from a guy who spent his whole life runnin' away from what's good, Liliana."

"You're not runnin' anywhere now, old man," I heard Annie drawl in the background.

"Not until you give me back my balls," my dad growled back at her, earning a round of her rich, smoky laughter. He got back on the phone with me. "Every father wishes this sort of thing for his daughter."

My mind simply refused to process what I was hearing. "…this… sort of thing?"

"I saw the way he looked at you while you were dancing at the reception. And Lily, maybe I don't deserve to have wishes for you after being absent from your life so long. But the best a father can hope for his daughter is that she ends up with a guy that looks at her like that. Like she's the only thing in the world."

"You knew?" I bleated.

My Dad growled. "I may be an old road dog. I've abused my brain with too much booze, and I don't hear too good from too much rock and roll. But my eyes still work just fine. And I can see that you love him." He hesitated. "Why, I have no idea… ow." I could hear Annie smacking him and laughed through the freely flowing tears. "Okay, he's a smug little shit, but you bring out the best in him. And he makes you happy. I'm not ever going to stand in the way of that again."

The sounds of the Annie grabbing for the phone filled my ear. "I've already talked with my publicist about it. We can spin it. He's already working the dark and edgy thing. My guess is this only adds to his career." She paused. "If that's what you were worried about."

"That was… part of it."

"Honey, we all got rock and roll in our blood. It's our job to shake things up, be the bad guys. Hell, scandal is my middle name."

I stammered something that sounded vaguely like speech as she continued. "I'll be proud to call you my daughter, Lily. Guess this'd make you doubly so."