Somewhere in the Middle

In a Platonic Way

Evie tapped the key card in her palm, already anxious about what she might find when she opened that door.

She was putting it off for as long as possible. She'd already waited till the very last minute to leave her room, checking and rechecking her bag—she only had one—and her bathroom. But it was as empty as she'd found it when she closed the door behind her.

So, she followed her usual order, and knocked on Greg's door first, smiling when she heard his muffled affirmation that he was up.

"You've got half an hour," she called through the door.

"Then why couldn't I sleep for another twenty minutes?" he called back.

Evie shook her head, grinning as she said, "Up. Now."

She only had time to hear him groan in response before walking away from his door.

Her stomach jolted a little as she moved onto Lucas' room, just as it always did. Then, it gave a quick stab as she passed Jamie's door on the way. But the pangs were distracted when Henry walked out of his room just one door down from Luke's.

"Morning, Evie," he said, wheeling his small suitcase out behind him. He looked freshly showered, his wet, dark hair combed neatly away from his face. And he smiled brightly at her.

Henry was always so pleasant, no matter the time of day—even when it was six in the morning.

"Morning Henry," she said with a smile of her own. "Did you sleep well?"

"Like a baby," he said, and Evie had to look up as he got closer. Like Pete, Henry was tall and broad—a sturdy man if there ever was one. And it was easy to forget it because he was always sitting behind the wheel of the bus. "How 'bout you?"

Truth be told, Evie hadn't gotten a good amount of sleep. Her mind was turning over too many possibilities about what had made Jamie leave last night.

Was it her? Something she'd said the night before? Maybe she'd opened up too much. Maybe he didn't care that she'd grown up with just her mother and her grandmother looking after her. Maybe he didn't want to know how hard it had been when her grandmother died seven years ago. Maybe he didn't care that Evie's father never reached out.

But she didn't think any of that was any reason for him to leave without a word. Nor did she think it was anything that might set him off on a drinking binge.

Besides, he'd smiled a lot. More times in the space of the hour and a half that they'd talked than she'd seen combined since she started on the tour. That had to mean something.

Didn't it?

No, it couldn't have been her, she'd determined. He'd seemed nothing but content. Happy, even. It had to have been something else. Words exchanged with Greg before the show, maybe—words she hadn't heard. Or even something Pete had said. Jamie didn't seem to have the same kind of quick reaction to Luke. Luke couldn't make anyone angry, she'd thought with the hint of a smile.

Or maybe it was something different entirely. There was no question he'd lived a life before the band—and from hearing the music he'd written, and from what Luke had already told her about his family, she knew it wasn't a pleasant one. Maybe he'd heard from someone he didn't want to. Maybe an ex had reached out, and it had angered him. Or made him sad. Evie knew enough to know that Jamie's apparent anger was actually just a front for a lot of pain.

And she hated to think that something like that could've set him off again. Because he didn't deserve it. She knew that now, and she wished he could understand it for himself.

But Evie didn't say any of that to Henry. All she said was, "Yeah, I slept well, too."

Henry smiled. "Good. We all need as much rest as we can get."