30. Chapter 30
CALL ME.
Graham hadn’t called. His finger hovered over the button at the hotel while Lindsey threw up and whenever he was alone in a bathroom stall, but he never pushed it.
He didn’t want to hear Helen’s voice for the first time in years next to someone flushing yesterday’s meals down the crapper.
Also, and more importantly, the subtext of an all-caps message in the middle of the night after he said he needed to see her was she didn’t want him to come.
Until he made up his mind, he wasn’t going to let her try to change it.
Today’s letter suggested swinging down to the coast to get the most out of Texas on the way to Austin. Graham had no intention of veering from his dad’s jagged black line, which was already an eight-hour drive filled with stomach bile, Elvis Presley, and Houston at rush hour.
They would’ve made it to Hog Heaven if, still more than three hours from Austin, Jase hadn’t complained about a headache and Lindsey hadn’t begged for a break.
As irritated as he was, cutting the day short gave Graham another night to think before barreling into town and doing something he might regret.
Today, sober and with many, many miles to second-guess himself, the idea of showing up at Helen’s door wasn’t as exhilarating as it had been after he opened the letter.
He could do it. He could actually see her.
And it scared him to death.
Graham exited the highway outside Houston, pulled into the first hotel he could find, and walked across the street with Jase to get food at a Mexican restaurant. There was a blended pink margarita on the rusted patio table in front of him before he realized Jase ordered a round of drinks.
“Today was rough,” his brother said over the jumpy mariachi music.
“What?” Graham was turning the sticky pages of a menu without reading a word.
“I can’t get the smell out of my nose,” Jase said. His margarita, Graham saw, was not pink or blended. “Are we waiting for her, or—”
Graham checked his phone and found a new text from Lindsey. “No, she wants me to bring her food back to the room.”
After the waitress took their food order, he put the address he knew by heart into his phone. He was a hundred and eighty-five miles from Helen’s front door.
“She can put them down, though, I’ll give her that,” Jase said.
“What?”
“Your girlfriend.” Jase dipped a tortilla chip in the bowl of salsa between them. “She killed the mint juleps last night. I’m surprised she’s still alive—”
“I think I might go see Helen.”
Jase blinked, chewing on his chip.
“She’s in Austin,” Graham explained.
Jase swallowed and blinked again. “I know.”
“I might go.”
“You’re not serious.”
Graham wrung his twitchy hands together, then shook them out.
“I am. I might be. It’s stupid, right? We’re going to be this close. I mean…why not?”
“Are you really that dumb that you need me to explain?”
Graham looked around the outdoor dining area for Lindsey in case she’d decided to join them. “I think I’ve got to do it.”
“No, you don’t got to do it. You want to do it.”
“Dad wanted me to do it.”
“Bullshit.” Jase swatted the idea away.
“Then why would he bring us here? You think he really cares about some stupid biker bar? He knows this is where Helen lives. Why would he tell me he thought we should be together before he…”
Died. The word dissolved like ash on his tongue.
“…Look at Farmer Pederson. You didn’t think meeting him was a coincidence.”
“Don’t do that,” Jase warned.
“What?”
“Suddenly act like what happened in Kentucky meant anything to you. You’re just trying to use Dad to justify wanting to go bang your ex.”
“I don’t want to go bang her. And who even says that anymore? Bang.”
“Plow. Rail. Fuck.” Diners frowned in their direction. Jase lowered his head and voice. “Whatever. You want to go fuck your ex-girlfriend and you’re using any excuse to do it. It’s been, what? Two years? Get over it, Graham.”
“That’s rich coming from the man whose relationships end once the vibrating bed runs out of quarters.”
“Hey, at least I’m not pretending to be something I’m not. What are you?”
Graham looked away. The lowering sun was bleeding bright orange into his eyes. A couple hours west, Helen might’ve been looking at the exact same view.
What are you?
“I feel her in my bones, Jase,” he said. “Have you ever needed someone this much?”