A dark melody, p.1
A Dark Melody, page 1
a dark melody
SAMANTHA BUTTERFIELD
Copyright © 2024 by Samantha Butterfield
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
To all those who feel undeserving, you are worth it.
contents
Author Notes
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
author notes
A Dark Melody has some triggering content. Its center character struggles with an eating disorder, uses drugs, self-harmed and has been abused and raped. All these topics are talked about, some in great detail, others just passing. On top of those triggers, there are some detailed sex scenes.
Please take care and read with caution.
one
Low music is playing in the background as I make my way through the small crowd backstage. The doors to the venue just opened and you can hear the low hum of the crowd of fans gathering in front of the stage. There are still a few hours before I’m meant to take the stage and close out the concert.
I head to my dressing room, making my way past the A-lists and B-lists with backstage passes and the other bands’ members that fill up the backstage area.
I pass two other rooms, looking for the one with Abbey Dark written on it. The first one says Key Failures, the opening band, and the second says Haunting Memories, the second band on the concert bill.
The tour consists of the three of us bands. Technically, I’m a solo artist with a backing band that plays with me, but the point remains. A three-band tour is kind of small, but it gives us longer set times since, from my understanding, none of our bands are small or unknown. We are all fairly big in our own right, all signed to the same label. Not that I’ve heard of the other bands. I try to keep to myself.
I push open the door with my name on it and drop my back on the couch. Scanning the room, I noticed it's not much different from the other dressing rooms I’ve become used to. There is a couch, a table with a mirror on it, a bench in front of it, a full-length mirror on one wall, and a bathroom- which, of course, had a lock on it.
I start to set up my things to get ready for the show. I had to make sure to look like a glamorous rockstar, after all. Had to look just sexy enough to draw in the crowds, but not too sexy that I’d be considered trashy. Being considered trashy would be bad for the label.
I’ve been signed to Veritas since I was sixteen. With them, I have released three full-length albums and two shorter albums. At 23 years old, I am almost a millionaire.
Being a famous rock star has its perks. I know I’m very fortunate to have the opportunities I have. The most amazing thing about it all? I get to do what I love in front of sold-out crowds, night after night. I feel incredibly lucky to have been discovered. Even better, I have landed a wonderful contract with Veritas, one of the biggest record labels in the business.
I have a talent many others only dream of having. I am grateful that I was gifted with my voice. I can sing better than almost anyone out there. I know my voice is extraordinary. It’s all anyone ever talks about.
Plus, I’m hot. Or I was, anyway. I was quite gorgeous, until I started starving myself and throwing up everything I ate. Then, I lost too much weight, and I became a skeleton. I lost my figure, my black hair started to fall out, and my once round face became too angular. You could see my ribs. You could wrap an arm around my waist and touch the other side. My bones protruded from under my skin. My flesh was pulled too tight over my bones.
It wasn’t until I got down to just under one hundred pounds that the press started to comment on my diminishing frame that the label started to care. I tried to cover the increasing changes in my body. I claimed they were from all the touring, so they decided to cut back on touring. They started watching me closely, checking on my health constantly, and that’s when I switched to forcing myself to throw up. I couldn’t get away with not eating anymore while I was being watched like a hawk.
Despite their efforts, I was still losing weight, and they finally sat down to talk with me.
They threatened to have me committed. There were talks to put me on a conservatorship. They were going to strip away all my self-control. They were going to send me away, force-feed me with tubes and shit. Then, someone proposed another plan. A test run of a conservatorship until I gained a substantial amount of weight and kept it on for some time.
My manager, Sue Cox, will be glued to my side until I weigh 120 pounds. I have to stay at that weight for three months before they will consider lifting this restriction. She gets say over what I eat, and when. She will watch me pee, watch me change, and ultimately have control over my life.
All this happened almost a year ago. Now, I weighed somewhere in the low 100s. My hair had begun to grow out, and my face was getting some of its fullness back. I was still skinny, but you could no longer see my bones protruding from under my flesh.
To say I missed it wouldn’t be true. It wasn’t about being skinny. I didn’t care about the being thin aspect of it all. I didn’t starve myself because I was concerned about being the prettiest, tiniest person in a room, like many other women. I did it because I enjoyed the feeling of being empty. I enjoy feeling hollow. I crave the hollow feeling in the pit of my stomach. Every time my stomach growls and burns from being empty, I feel joy. I like the feeling of emptiness that fills my soul with each hour that goes by without eating.
I hated throwing up, but after I was done, the feeling of emptiness would come back, encouraging me to do it anyway. The desire for the hollow feeling overrides my hatred of hurtling my guts up. I would push my fingers down my throat with no regard given to what it did to my throat or vocal cords.
Honestly, it didn’t do as much harm as I thought it would, but people started to put the pieces together when I started sounding a little rougher.
It was Sue who first questioned me about it.
She asked if I had an eating disorder after another dozen blood tests to find out why I was dropping weight so rapidly. She questioned me about my eating habits. She would order pizza and cheeseburgers to be delivered to my dressing room before and after shows, apparently thinking that would solve some of the issues. There were only so many times I could say I wasn’t hungry before she started to press the issue.
She is the reason I had to resort to bulimia in the first place. That didn’t seem to matter. The minute my voice began to sound off, rough around the edges and full of gravel- she forced me to admit it. I had an eating disorder.
Well, actually, she caught me in the act. Just walked into the bathroom without knocking. Yanked on the door handle and came right in, when I had two fingers shoved down my throat.
I tried to play it off, like there was somehow a reason to have two fingers shoved into my money makers, but there was no use. The cat was out of the bag now, and there would be no putting it back in.
Somehow, the whole thing played out well for her. She got a nice raise and unanimous control over my life.
Now, the bathroom doors were locked, so I couldn’t get in to “purge,” as they called it. I couldn’t use the bathroom without her being present or timing how long I was in there, like I was a parolee who just got out of prison.
She made sure I ate at least three square meals a day. Though, it was often more like four. Breakfast, lunch, dinner, and an after-show meal to ensure I got the proper amount of nutrition. Sue would give me this run down whenever I gave her a look or complained.
I guess I couldn’t complain too much. She also got me drugs, the ones I needed so desperately for survival.
Xanax was prescribed to me because of anxiety. Of course, I only had one appointment with a therapist. The record label couldn’t have me in constant therapy. That would look bad for them and me, but they could keep one appointment under wraps. Not that I was complaining. I didn’t want to see a shrink any more than they wanted me to.
My mind is not a can of worms I want to open.
So, Sue keeps me well drugged up as needed. I get Xanax every night before bed and Coke every time I start to feel like I am low on energy. She calls it my pick me up.
Again, I can admit I am lucky. I don’t have that bad of a setup, all things considered. It could be worse. I am still living out my dream, getting to sing my heart out on stage almost every night.
Yet, still, I am unhappy.
Some would say ungrateful, but that’s not the case.
I’m just in a constant state of misery.
We are halfway through another long, gruesome tour in the middle of summer. I guess I should be thankful it isn’t a stadium tour but smaller indoor venues instead, so at least I’m protected from the sun and heat. Still, a thirty-date tour is a lot to handle for anyone, regardless of their mental health.
While I enjoy singin
g, it was also hard to do it so many nights in a row. I mean, technically, they aren’t in a row. There are days in between most shows, but being stuck on a tour bus in the heat waiting for the next date also isn’t fun.
Add in being under lock and key with constant security. It isn’t always fun or as glamorous as people might think.
Singing is my dream. The only thing I know I’m good at, but having to play the part of sexy rockstar is a full-time job. I have a lot to deal with. I’m constantly in the headlines for something, and it’s never on purpose or for a good reason.
It’s always rumors and gossip. Who am I fucking? When? Am I pregnant? Am I addicted to drugs? Stumbling drunk again? Am I dating this guy or that guy? Am I cheating on someone? Am I dying? Wasting away? Losing my edge? Do I have an eating disorder?
It was an endless torrential stream of rumors with some half-truths thrown in, but still. The endless scrutiny of my life is tiresome. I don’t get much privacy, and now, with the arrangement with Sue, I get even less.
It isn’t just the touring. When I am off the tours, I am constantly being set up on dates on the occasion I am single. I’m forced to go to events, such as award shows, charity events, and other bands’ shows. If it wasn’t those, there would be photo shoots and ad campaigns. Interviews where they always asked who I was dating and what I was wearing. Like my decisions somehow made a difference in the grand scheme of things.
Maybe that’s why I am in a constant state of misery. My dream came true when I got the contract of a lifetime, but I didn’t know what I was signing up for. I didn’t know I was signing away every ounce of privacy I had. I didn’t know I was signing up to have my life put under a microscope.
I guess I was fooled by the media, just like they use me to fool other kids into following this path. I thought it would be fun. I believed it would be glamorous, just singing on stage to sold-out shows and attending wild parties with other famous people. I had no idea there would be more than just singing involved. No one tells you how much control you lose when you sign a record deal.
I’m sure a therapist would say that’s why I starve myself, to gain back some control, some semblance of normal in my life. They were probably right.
In my mind, it would always be that beautiful, hollow feeling I had when my stomach was empty.
I’m putting the finishing touches on my makeup while I throw myself a pity party when Sue walks in, without knocking, of course. The knocking seemed to have stopped the day I got caught. Thankfully, she has been away most of the day, doing damage control over the latest rumor. The press would like everyone to think I was knocked up with Tyler Manson’s love child after we were seen talking a few months ago.
My forced weight gain has people assuming I am pregnant.
Tyler Manson is some guy in a famous boy band. The press loves the idea of us together. A boy band singer with a rock star? It was so taboo. Why would a good-boy band guy like the bad, edgy rock star?
Of course, we didn’t even kiss. The press just liked to cause drama. All we did was speak for a few minutes at one of my shows.
“Abbey,” Sue says, breaking me out of my thoughts.
“Yeah?” I assume she wants to know if I was a good girl while she was away. She will probably ask if I ate all my lunch since she couldn’t be there to watch me eat every bite.
I had two bites, if that. I rarely have opportunities to cheat the system like I did today, so of course, I had to take the opportunity while it had nicely presented itself wrapped in a pretty red bow.
“Need a pick me up?” She asks, walking behind me. I lock eyes with her through the mirror. My blue eyes stared into her dark brown eyes. Her sharp brown bob looks nicely tucked into place behind her ears. Her thin, bare lips form a straight line as she looks me over in the mirror.
I wasn’t expecting a pick-me-up today. We just had a two-day break, but I wouldn’t say no. Doing coke burned calories. Which, why they let me use something as damaging as coke, I haven’t the slightest idea. I just hope they never catch on that I am rigging the system.
“Sure, I could use a pick-me-up,” I say. Anything to make this night more bearable.
She pulls a small glass vial from her pocket. She sets it on the small table next to me. “Pace yourself this time. We don’t need another bloody nose incident.” She is referring to the show in Chicago a few days ago, where my nose started to bleed right before taking the stage. They had to push my start time back by ten minutes and cut two songs.
“Did you eat lunch?” She asks the question I know she’s been dying to ask since she walked in.
“Yes.” I lie. Two bites of a sandwich and some bile were all that was in my stomach. She didn’t need to know that. This is the emptiest I’ve felt in weeks.
Her lips press together, forming a tight line against her face for a moment as she studies me in the mirror. I run a brush through my hair as she watches me, probably wondering if she should believe me or not.
“Maybe avoid the booze before the show,” She says instead, “Haunting Memories is about to take the stage, so you have about ninety minutes until show time.” Her voice is flippant as she takes a step toward the door, her business casual shoes clapping on the floor. “Might want to come out of hiding and mingle a little. Have some fun.”
“Yeah. Okay.” I say, still watching her reflection in the mirror.
“See you out there.” She says, clearing up any confusion I could have that she meant that as a recommendation. She meant her words as a direct order.
Running my fingers under my eyes, I remove any last-minute eyeliner smudges. I picked up my lipstick and put on one last coat of the beautiful matte red color before picking up the vial Sue left on the table.
The best part about getting my drugs from my manager was I could always count on them being pure. Plus, the vials she had always came with a little spoon attached to the top, saving me from needing a straw or a key.
I sniff two small spoonfuls before sliding the rest of the vial into the pocket of my skirt.
I stand up to use the full-length mirror to do one final check before going out.
I’m wearing a black miniskirt. I adjust it slightly. The black halter top I’m wearing barely restrains my tits and shows off most of my pale, flat stomach. The whole look is topped off with fishnet stockings and black heel boots.
My dyed, jet-black hair is straightened and hangs just past my shoulders, held in place with a ton of hair spray so not a strand will go out of place.
My eye shadow is done smokey. Normally pink lips are painted a bright ruby red.
The girl in the mirror certainly looks the part of a rock star. Now it’s time to go out there and play the part.
Time to be charming, flirty, and eccentric. Time to be the life of the party. To smile, laugh, and get along with everyone.
My chest tightens, and my lungs constrict too fast. I ball my hands into a fist. I can’t do this. I don’t want to do this.
My breathing comes in ragged gasps. Heart pounding in my chest, a mixture of the coke and panic.
I would take a heart attack right now, joyfully. But I’ve never been that lucky.
I hold my breath and count to ten, letting it out in a slow, steady exhale, as the therapist told me to.
I don’t have a choice. I have to go out there. I have to play the part. It is expected of me, required of me.
I’ve done this hundreds of times before. I can do this.
I look in the mirror one last time, forcing my lips to curl into a smile. I let out a deep breath. I can survive this.
I walk to the door and open it, stepping out into the hallway. Marching down the hall with my head held high, I steadfastly ignore the bathroom behind me. Sue would surely know if I went in there and scold me.
I wander around the backstage area, mingling with some of the people I sort-of-know. I make small talk over the sound of the second band playing. I smile. I laugh at their jokes. I play the part well. No one can tell I don’t want to be here.
Bottles of liquor get passed around, and I take sips to avoid adding fuel to the pregnancy rumors. Everything starts getting fuzzy, and I realize that somehow, I have lost track of how much alcohol has been consumed. My stomach starts doing somersaults, the alcohol and bile doing some kind of waltz in it. The lack of food wasn’t helping. I should’ve listened to Sue about staying away from the booze, but it was too late now.
