The sound of my own heart fills my ears. I steady my voice not to show emotion, though.

"Devon. Have you been calling me all morning?" I ask.

"Indeed. I have a business proposition for you."

Rage burns a path straight to my head. Business? Does he think I'll do business with him? "The only thing I want to hear from you is what happened to my brother the night he died."

There's a pause on the other end. Then Devon, his voice gentler than before. "It was an accident, just as we always said."

"Then I have nothing else to say to you. Stop calling me."

"But I need to talk to you, it's urgent."

"You are going to make me repeat myself? Fine. There is only one thing I want to talk to you about, and it's obviously not why you called. Goodbye."

"Wait, Avery," he says. "Don't hang up. Just listen to me."

I pause, torn between throwing my phone against the wall and wanting to know what he could possibly have to say after all this time.

Devon Orlando—my older brother's best friend from when they met in the park at five until my brother died eight years ago at age twenty-three. I can't breathe. I'm twenty-three years old, the same age as he will always be. My fingers dig into the sides of the phone and I hold back the tears.

Devon, one of the two brothers with super-rich parents who lived in the sprawling mansion two blocks over from us, but it might as well have been on a different planet. Nothing of his life resembled mine—not the schools, the cars or clothes, the advantages, the rules. Nothing.

And to think, I felt sorry for him when I was little and watched him and his brother, from behind trees or curtains, because his parents never had time for him. His dad had been in banking and his mother was basically into herself, leaving him and his younger brother shuffled constantly between nannies and boarding schools.

During the summer months, they ran wild with my brother. I envied them so much. Older than me, having so much freedom. There was a whole group. The Orlando boys were the rich ones, but there were some very different boys from the other side of the lake, too.

"Are you still there?" Devon asks, wrenching my head back to the present.

"Talk fast," I say.

"I need a singer at my club, you're hired. Come in this morning, or afternoon if you can't get here right away, to sign the contract, and we'll have you start as soon as possible."

I laugh.

I fucking laugh. The nerve of this guy.

"I fail to see the humor," he says.

"You fail to see everything that is right in front of you." I shake my head, wishing he was here in person, so I could flip him the finger.

"Let me see if I've got this correct," he says coldly. "You are broke and can't pay any of your bills on time, you have no prospects in the music industry and no call-backs for your auditions. In a few weeks time, you'll be homeless because you are estranged from your parents and have no friends who can take you in. You need me. I need a singer."

Now my heart stops. I don't even know where, or how, to begin to reply.

Devon Orlando. He breaks me again and again. My life was a promise, long ago, and I had a caring, fun-loving family, a future in classical singing. He broke me as easy as he would break a twig when he let my brother die.

"Is that why you called me?" I ask, breathless. "To remind me that I'm failing at everything I try?"

"I'm being honest with you," he says.

"Take your honesty and choke on it." I can't believe it. My heart pounds.

A familiar ache spreads through my chest, but it's sharper than usual. He's sharpened it, as if he wielded my pain like a knife.

Before he can respond, I continue. "I'm not asking for you help. I will never ask you for help. Let me be perfectly honest—I would rather freeze to death under a bridge than have your help."

I hang up.

He calls me out of the blue to be honest about how my life is in shambles and informs me that I'm going to work for him?

Hands shaking, I drop the phone. I'm going to be sick.

My legs give out and I slide down the wall to the nasty, mildewed carpet. My chest constricts and no air will go in my lungs, but at the same time, I'm hyperventilating. There's no air, but I can't stop filling my lungs. Star bursts explode in my eyes. My stomach ties in knots.

Panic attack. Panic attack. Panic attack.

I purse my lips and remember my exercises. Picture the lakeside beach. The sun umbrellas and little waves. The fishy-smell of the hot, wet sand. Pure summer.

Calm. Peace. Quiet.

You're safe, Avery, I whisper to myself. You're safe.

*** ONC: 800 words. Thanks for reading - hit the star and have a great day! ***