24. Brooks
24
brOOKS
The sun was beginning to rise, the lake taking on a soft pink and gold tone as the sky above it changed. Brooks grabbed a coffee, then slipped out onto the back deck and started toward the dock. Even at home in LA, he often got up for the sunrise, taking his coffee on the beach.
Spending the day before with Maddie had almost been the perfect antidote to the worst hangover Brooks had had in . . . well, five years.
Even though he’d said they’d part as friends, there was a finality when she’d dropped him off that he couldn’t shake. He’d wanted to call her back. Text her. Tell her to stay.
But he’d just let her drive off instead.
There was other damage he’d needed to turn his attention to.
He still didn’t know how he would make it up to Kayla, though. Or Audrey. He’d let them both down, and even though he’d let himself get distracted by Maddie’s company, the problem wouldn’t solve itself.
Even now, he couldn’t stop thinking of Maddie as he made his way onto the dock. She’d texted late last night, apologizing for failing to get the wreckage video from Fred Strickland’s ice cream shop. As though she needed to apologize.
She’d done more for him than most of his so-called friends.
Like the way she’d shown up two nights ago. Put up with him. Stayed with him. Looked after my sweet niece.
He didn’t deserve that sort of kindness from her. From anyone, really.
Because that’s all it was, too. She’d turned down anything more, even while amid a hot and heavy kiss. And before that, she'd maintained a distance when they’d been wandering shops on Main Street. Somehow, it still felt like she kept getting him to spill more of his guts, while keeping her own history tightly under wraps.
The only reason he’d even found out about her ex was because of that run-in at the café.
Prick.
How dare he humiliate Maddie like that? Even if Josh hadn’t known Maddie was going to be at her own step grandmother’s place for breakfast, once he’d seen her, he shouldn’t have made a show of things.
To his surprise, he wasn’t the only one who’d thought of coming out to the dock. As he neared the Adirondack chairs, he spotted Cormac, sitting low in one, scrolling through his phone.
“I didn’t know you were up,” Brooks said, taking the chair beside him.
Cormac stretched, slipping his phone into his pocket. “Right back at you. Am I in your way here?”
In your way. Because this was “his” place. And Brooks had made that clear by kicking Cormac out.
“Look, man, I really owe you a huge apology.” Steam rose from his coffee cup, and he watched it dissipate in the soft light.
“Nah, you’re fine. I mean it. I just wanted to make sure you and Audrey were okay. Sorry for getting Maddie involved.”
“You don’t have to apologize for anything.” Brooks leaned back in his chair despite the dew there. “You were right to call her. And Kayla.”
Cormac closed his eyes, leaning his head against the back of the chair. “You know I think of Kayla like my own sister. And my own sisters would have killed me if I did nothing in that situation.” He gave a light chuckle. “Family. The best and worst pain in the ass on the planet, right? No matter how many times I think I’m happy I left, they reel me right back in here, too. And now that my dad is sober and Mom’s happy . . . it’s hard to remember why I wanted to leave.”
“You think you could settle someplace like this? Move back here?” Brooks gave Cormac a skeptical look. “It’s so . . . small, don’t you think?”
“I don’t know.” Cormac sighed and stretched his legs out. “It’s not about the size of the place. It’s about who’s there. Nashville makes sense for me, especially as a musician. God knows I couldn’t get the same amount of work here. But I do sometimes wonder if I really want the life I’ve built there for forever.”
Cormac’s eyes reflected the hint of pink in the sky. “When was the last time you bothered to put up a Christmas tree?”
Brooks frowned at him. A Christmas tree? “I don’t know. In my place, or when I’ve gone to spend Christmas with Kayla? I don’t think I’ve ever put one up in my place.”
“Exactly.” Cormac shrugged. “Me neither. Because what’s the point, right?” He turned his face toward Brooks. “But maybe that is the point. Maybe I miss it.”
“Putting up Christmas trees?” Brooks raised a brow. How in the hell was this even a discussion?
“No, numb nuts. Having a reason to put one up.” Cormac stood, then stretched. “Like I said before, we’re not in our twenties anymore. The hangover was bad, wasn’t it?”
Brooks grimaced. “Worst damn hangover of my life.”
Cormac nodded. “Yeah. Things change. We’re changing. Even a fish that stops swimming still gets pulled by the current. Nothing you can do about that.” He shoved his hands in his pockets. “Anyway. I’m gonna head on in and leave you to the sunrise.”
Brooks watched him go, and he furrowed his brows, still thinking about the damn Christmas tree question.
I’ve never cared that I don’t put one up. Hell, last year he’d “celebrated” Christmas in Cabo. Alone, despite Kayla’s wishes. Started the morning off with a swim.
Not that it had felt like Christmas.
But Cormac’s nonsensical thoughts bothered him, too.
When he’d started his career, he’d been in college. The world “ahead” of him.
Now he was thirty-four, and there was no next thing.
“Well, howdy. Looks like you found your way to the lake after all,” a man’s voice came from the side, just out of his peripheral vision.
Brooks whirled around, spilling his coffee. Peter, the old man who’d driven him to Cormac’s place that first day, was trolling by in a small pontoon, fishing gear on the deck beside him. His blue eyes twinkled as he brought the vessel closer to the dock.
“Good morning.” Brooks wiped the coffee that had spilled onto his hand on his jeans.
He smiled. “Did I sneak up on you? Sorry about that.”
“Just a bit.”
“So did you solve those problems yet? Gotta admit, you still look like you’re walking around with a fifty-pound weight on your shoulders.”
Brooks searched his memory. He had told the man more than intended, that’s right. So much had happened since the beginning of the week that he’d nearly forgotten Peter and his chattiness. “Not yet. If anything, I might have made them worse.”
Peter gave him a sympathetic look. “The offer still stands if you want to go fishing. I’ve got to pick up a friend of mine a little down the ways from here, but you’re welcome to come along.”
“Right now?” Brooks looked back at the still house behind him. Kayla and Audrey were still asleep. He couldn’t just take off in a fishing boat impromptu—could he?
“No time like the present.” Peter brought the pontoon closer to the dock. “Hop on board.”
He could just say a polite no and be done with it. He’d thrown out the man’s number already and hadn’t felt an ounce of regret over it.
But now that Peter was here again . . . something about it felt a bit like fate, tugging him forward.
Brooks nodded. “Yeah, all right.”
The smile on Peter’s face widened, then he docked the pontoon. “You know, I didn’t catch your name the other day,” he said as Brooks left his coffee mug on the dock and climbed on board.
“Brooks.” He held out his hand for Peter.
Peter took it between his own two hands, the palms of his hands rough and callused. “Nice to meet you. Officially. Glad we ran into each other again. Take a seat.”
Brooks sat down on a bench and Peter started forward again, the lake smooth as they cut across it. Funny how he’d spent so long living near the water but had never been fishing out there or any of the many gorgeous places he’d traveled.
The last time he’d been fishing, he’d been a small boy and his father had taken him.
The memory had been soured by his father’s choice to leave them—like all memories of his father—and it had been a long time since he considered himself to be “outdoorsy” in any genuine sense. He enjoyed being outdoors, of course, swimming and running, particularly. But all the other things that outdoorsy folk did—fishing, climbing, hiking, camping—were not his style at all.
He’d much rather eat the fish after a trained chef fileted and prepared it than to catch the damn thing.
He half expected Peter to talk his ear off as he’d done the other day, but he was quiet, his pleasant face scanning the water.
At last, he pulled over toward another dock, where another old man sat in a lawn chair. He frowned at Brooks, giving him a suspicious look. “Who’s the straggler?”
“That any way to treat my guest?” Peter chuckled and met Brooks’s eyes. “Brian isn’t a morning person. Just give him an hour. He’ll come around.”
Brian harrumphed and climbed onto the pontoon. “You’re ten minutes late.”
“You keep complaining, and I’m gonna let you off, circle around a bit, and make it another ten minutes.” Peter held out an old-fashioned lunch pail toward him. “Bernadette packed you some apple turnovers and a ham, cheddar, and egg bagel sandwich. You can give the extra sandwich to Brooks.”
Brian gave Brooks the side-eye. “Now I’m sharing my food with him?”
“No, I’m sharing my food with him. You haven’t eaten already, have you, Brooks? My wife makes the best breakfast sandwiches in the world.”
“No, sir.”
“Polite, this one,” Brian said, still eyeing him with suspicion as he set the lunch pail on his lap. “Where did you say you were from?”
“Eat your sandwich before you say anything else, Brian. Your sugar is probably low—you’re extra cranky this morning,” Peter said with an eye roll.
Brian and Peter had an ease in their banter that spoke of a lifelong friendship. Maybe a case of opposites being friends, but sometimes that made for the best friends. Cormac was a lot more laid-back and friendly than Brooks was, come to think of it.
“You go fishing often?” Peter asked Brooks as he stopped the boat in the middle of the lake.
“Not really.” He was regretting having come out here. What in the hell possessed me?
“We’re not going to have to teach you how to bait a hook, are we?” Brian asked with a grimace.
Peter tossed an anchor from the back of the boat. “Everyone’s got to start somewhere.” He moved over to the front and set another anchor. “Don’t listen to Brian. He acts like he’s been doing this his whole life, but the man raised cattle. Retired to be a security guard at the local airstrip they like to call an airport. Wasn’t until recently that we both found ourselves with more time in the morning and not a damn thing to do. Gets harder to sleep when you’re our age. Those nighttime bathroom trips end up making four in the morning seem like a good time to get up. You a morning lark, Brooks?”
“Not really. My career requires me to stay up late a lot.”
“What do you do for a living? Bouncer?” Brian looked him up and down, his arms focusing on Brooks’s built biceps, then the tattoos.
“Musician, actually.”
“I play the trombone,” Brian said, chewing slowly. “Not a hell of a whole lot I can do with the trombone these days, though. Kids don’t appreciate good brass instruments in what they like to call music.”
Peter took a parchment-wrapped sandwich from the lunch pail and handed it to Brooks. “Take a bite.” He winked. “I promise there’s not a better breakfast sandwich in the world. My wife makes her own bagels.”
“I can’t take your breakfast,” Brooks protested, holding it back toward Peter. “I’ll be fine.”
“I already ate one before coming here.” Peter took out a thermos. “Besides, a good cup of coffee is all I need in the morning to get me going. Want some?”
“I’m good. And thank you.” He took a bite. Damn. It was good. Peter’s wife was apparently a very talented cook. And the ham wasn’t deli ham like he’d expected, but thick-cut slices of smoked ham.
Content to enjoy his sandwich in silence, he watched the breeze rippling through the trees surrounding the lake. So many more had changed color even since he’d arrived, and the whole place shimmered with one last breathtaking show before the coming of winter. He relished the peacefulness of it, the silence.
He couldn’t remember the last time he’d started a conversation with a stranger . . . even when he’d met Maddie, their situation had forced them to talk. But to go out of his way to talk to someone he didn’t know or wasn’t introduced to? Not for ages.
Maybe that made him a snob. He’d always considered himself an introvert, but even he could see the pathetic side to his social skills if he gave it enough thought.
He just wanted to be left alone. Live and let live.
Which doesn’t make me sound too different from a grumpy old man, come to think of it. “Have you lived here all your life?” he asked Peter.
“Where, the lake? Yeah, he’s Brandywood’s own Nessie,” Brian quipped with a grin. Maybe the food was lessening his crankiness.
“Brian and I were both born and raised here. Got suckered into staying, I guess.” Peter sat across from Brooks and lifted a fishing rod. “How’re you liking our small town? Probably a change of pace from Los Angeles, yeah?”
“To be honest, I just made it into town yesterday for the first time. But I enjoyed it.”
“Oh yeah? Where’d you stop?”
“More like where didn’t we stop?” Brooks smiled at the memory. “The woman who showed me around seems to know every nook and cranny of the place. If I hadn’t been feeling under the weather, I probably would have eaten my weight in pastries.”
Brian shook his head, a knowing look coming to his eyes as his lips spread in a smile. “Oh, you did it now, sonny. Tasted our food. Spent time with our women.” He ribbed Peter. “Did you see the way his face changed? He’s a goner for sure.”
A goner?
Brooks laughed. “How so?”
“Tell him. You saw that look,” Brian said to Peter, taking out an apple turnover. He split it in half and handed it to Brooks.
“Brian, I’m never gonna be able to convince him to come fishing again if you keep yammering on like this.” Peter opened his tackle box. He pulled out a tub of bait, then smiled at Brooks. “You met a woman, after all.”
Met a woman. Maddie’s flustered face after he’d crashed into the store came to mind. Then he saw her tentative smiles when he’d offered parts of himself. Her ferocity when she stood up for him when in that café.
Then her hurt when I told her I was done with anything to do with her.
“He met a woman.”
What did that phrase even mean? The attraction was clearly there.
Tentativeness, too.
“I don’t know if I’d call it that. We’re friendly.” Brooks finished the sandwich, then took the rod and bait Peter offered him. He didn’t really know what he was doing, but he wasn’t about to look like a moron either.
“Friendly is the first step. Is she a looker?” Brian asked shrewdly, still munching on his turnover. Brooks got the feeling he came more for the gossip and food than the fishing, but who was he to judge? He had no reason to be here.
“She’s gorgeous. But it’s not going to go anywhere.”
“And why’s that?” Peter asked him. He finished baiting his hook, then scanned the water.
“To begin with, I don’t think either of us is looking for anything—that’s if she’s even interested. I’m not from here, she loves it here, and I’ve got a lot I’m currently dealing with. Life would need to slow down a lot more for me, and I don’t see it happening.” If anything, with the threat of lawsuits, trying to find a new label, starting over again with management, and making new contacts, he’d have to work even harder.
Brian gave a slow shake of his head. “Life doesn’t slow down, young man. Ever. If anything, it just keeps going faster and faster until all of a sudden, you’re creeping on eighty and you’re not sure when in the hell you got here. You wait for the right time for anything, and that time’ll pass you right by.”
Now he sounded like Cormac.
“Have you asked the woman if she’s interested?” Peter cast his line out into the water, then sat.
Ask her? What was he supposed to say? Do you like me, circle yes/no/maybe? They’d kissed in her apartment. She’d shut it down when things could have progressed. That was a clear enough sign.
She defended you to her sister, who she clearly loves very much.
“I can usually tell when a woman is interested,” Brooks said with a chuckle. If anything, women made it a little too painfully clear to him. Did they usually talk this much while fishing? Didn’t it scare away the fish?
“That’s a no.” Brian started in on the next apple turnover. “He hasn’t asked her. Probably hasn’t told her he’s interested either. That’s the problem with young people.”
“I’m not that young,” Brooks answered with a roll of his eyes. “And as a matter of fact, I did . . . tell her I was interested.” The manner of his delivery had been less than ideal, though. Telling her he’d fantasized about sleeping with her probably hadn’t been the best way. Fucking bourbon had screwed him on that one.
Brian gave a protracted sigh. “Listen, spring chicken. You have to a woo a woman. Bring her flowers. Make her feel special. You can’t just offer her the sausage and think you’ve done your part. Most women think it’s ugly anyway, so you got to give her the pretty things first.”
Brooks had heard plenty of so-called locker room talk before, but this was . . . this was something else . He tried not to laugh. “I’ll keep that in mind, Brian.”
As though it could really be that easy. He didn’t deserve a woman like Madison Yardley, and all the fame and fortune in the world couldn’t make up for what he lacked. Bringing her into his problems and crazy life was unfair and selfish.
But if I truly had a choice, I wouldn’t be walking away from her.
“Sorry about this idiot,” Peter said with a shake of his head. “He’s lost his filter.”
Brian cackled. “You’re assuming I had one in the first place.”
Brooks looked back toward the shore, as though expecting to see the house he’d rented, which had long since left his sight. “What sort of advice do you have about how to handle an angry sister?”
“Oh, that’s a rough one.” Brian leaned back in his chair, relaxing. “Depends on what you did. I’ve had some friends who haven’t spoken to their siblings in years. Those grudges go deep.”
“I got drunk while watching my four-year-old niece.”
Oof. Amazing how horrible that sounds. How had he ever thought it was a good solution to his problems in the first place?
Both Brian and Peter cringed.
“That’s a tough spot to fix.” Peter reeled his line back in, then cast it again.
“It doesn’t make it any better that she was asleep and it was at night, does it?” He already knew the answer to that, though. He hated himself for it. So much.
“Circumstances matter.” Peter gave him a sympathetic look. “And it sounded like you had a lot you were dealing with when you arrived in town. But your sister has every right to be angry. Have you talked to her about what you’re going through?”
Nope. Because how can I complain to Kayla when she’s dealing with her own bad news? Mike wasn’t just a problem for Brooks, and Kayla didn’t need anything else to worry about. She’d come to him before the concert because of that.
But he’d also never gone to Kayla with any issue. That wasn’t the type of relationship they had.
“No, I haven’t,” he admitted. “To be honest, I don’t think it’s that simple.”
“Simple is often the best. You never know. It might be worth a try,” Peter said.
Brooks leaned forward, taking the bait, and letting the conversation lapse naturally into the comfortable silence of the water lapping against the sides of the pontoon. Could they be right?
Was straightforward conversation what he needed with Kayla?
After a lifetime of complexity, simple seemed so dubious.
Then again, what did he have to lose at this point?
If he didn’t try, he might lose the only people in the world he cared about.
And then he’d really know the meaning of rock bottom.
Fuck. When did life become so complicated?
Scratch that.
When will it stop being complicated?