How to Kill a Rock Star Read Online Free PDF Page B

obviously in my genes.
    Hey, there’s something else we have in common. We’re both orphans.”
    As Paul walked by me, his pain inexplicably gone, the phone started ringing and he froze in place, wide-eyed and anxious.
    “If it’s for me,” he said, nodding at the phone. “I’m not here.”
    I was hoping it would be Michael. I picked up the phone and said hel o. Without saying hel o back, the girl on the other end announced herself as Avril. She pronounced it with a French accent. Then, in what sounded like Long Island twang, she said, “Who are you and why are you answering Paul’s phone?”
    I wasn’t the least bit surprised that Paul Hudson had intrusive girls with names like Avril cal ing him. I was, however, bothered by it. In my mind, Avril looked like Kel y: big-boned, thick-lipped, with one of those perpetual y baffled expressions that bored men find so attractive.
    “I’m Michael’s sister,” I told her.
    “Michael who? Burke, Caelum, or Angelo?”
    “What?”
    At her wit’s end, Avril said, “Bass player, guitarist, or drummer?”
    “Guitarist.” I covered the mouthpiece with my hand, turned to Paul and said, “Everyone in your band is named Michael?”
    He nodded. “Weird, huh?”
    “Put Paul on,” Avril said.
    Without thinking, I held the phone toward Paul, impel ing him to throw his hands up in a silent, berserk protest as he took the cal .
    While Paul spoke to Avril, I took a shower. I couldn’t get my mind off of Michael. I wanted to help him, but I had less money than he did. Stil , I knew how much the band meant to him, and I didn’t think I could watch him walk away from that. He’d spent years taking care of me. The least I could do, for once, was to take care of him.
    I came out of the bathroom and the pizza, which smel ed like dog food, was out of the oven. Paul was trying to slice it with a metal spatula. He told Avril to hold on and whispered, “You’re not going to bed, are you?”
    “I start work tomorrow. I have to get up early.” I closed my bedroom door but could stil hear Paul talking. He was defensive with Avril, answering questions like a man being interrogated for a crime he had actual y committed. After he hung up he went into his room and started talking again.
    Unless he’d snuck someone in through his window, which would have been impossible, he was talking to himself.
    His solo conversation went on for about five minutes.Then there was a buzzing noise I guessed was someone trying to get into the building. I heard Paul walk to the door, fol owed soon thereafter by a flirtatious female voice in the living room.
    I sat on the bench in front of my window while Paul and the girl whom I assumed was Avril retreated to his room.
    Ludlow Street, as much as I could see of it, looked like it was lit from the inside out.
    Across the hal , Paul was either fucking the girl or murdering her, I couldn’t tel which.
    I smel ed mothbal s.
    The afghan was going to have to go.
    Michael was seated, al six feet plus four lanky inches of him. His long, taffy legs were hanging over the arm of the couch, and he had a piece of pizza on a plate in his lap.
    It was the morning after my arrival in New York. I was expected at work by ten, it wasn’t even eight yet, and I’d just returned from a scorching run to Battery Park and back, trying not to get lost and hoping Avril would be gone when I got home.
    Running was a hobby I’d picked up after Adam left. I’d read that it was a proven mood enhancer, and I had been trying to get it to enhance my mood ever since.
    When I came in, Michael was picking beans off of his pizza, making a little pile of what looked like rabbit poop on the side of his plate. He had an impassive, stoic air about him, and as he put the plate down, stood up, and walked toward me, he moved with languid momentum that, coupled with his height, was more reminiscent of an old history professor than a prospective guitar god. He’d also been cursed with a head of hair