Chapter 4 #2
The smart answer would be no, of course. Because it would be too messy—I’m a mess right now, my life is a mess. And this woman seems like someone who stays away from messy. But I’m afraid the smart answer might not be the one I’m leaning toward.
“I owned a restaurant with my ex-wife,” she tells me, untucking her leg from under her thigh and letting it hang in the small space between our stools.
“My wife, at the time. Christy. Things with the restaurant were going great, but things with us weren’t.
And I stayed focused on work and ignored the problems until I found out she’d been cheating on me. A lot.”
“Oh my god, I’m so sorry.” My fingers reach out without my permission, finding her knee.
Touching her bare skin flusters me, but I try not to show it.
I want her to know I’m listening, and that I understand how much that sucks.
“That’s such a shitty thing to do to someone. How long were you married?”
Hearing she was with a woman doesn’t even surprise me, so maybe I am picking up on the correct signals. But I’m also right in thinking she should avoid me. She doesn’t deserve another mess.
“Six years.” She glances down at where my fingers are still grazing her knee, and I pull my hand away, pretending I want to take a sip of my cider. “I’ll never make that mistake again.”
“Marriage?” I ask.
She huffs a laugh. “Dating. Love. Any of it. I don’t know.”
“That’s sad,” I say before I can think better of it.
Thankfully, she laughs again and doesn’t seem offended. “Maybe. Or maybe it’s smart. I really don’t see myself being able to get close to someone that way again and trusting they won’t fuck me over.”
I can understand that. Being in the music industry, I always need to be wary of who I can trust and who’s only looking out for their own interests instead of mine. But when it comes to relationships, I’m more unguarded. Some might say na?ve, even.
“I’ve had my heart broken plenty of times,” I tell her. “Granted, never by someone who promised me ‘until death do us part,’ but still. No matter how many relationships don’t work out for me, I can’t imagine I’ll ever stop trying. The right person has to be out there.”
Did I say person?
Was I supposed to say man?
“Oh, so you’re a hopeless romantic,” Addison comments, thankfully ignoring my ambiguity.
That’s something I’ve been called my entire life. Some people treat it like a positive personality trait, while others make it sound like a negative. I’d expect her to fall in the latter camp, but her tone surprisingly didn’t indicate that. If anything, she sounded completely neutral.
“It’s hard to deny it when I’ve written dozens of love songs,” I admit. “And even more breakup ones.”
“I’ll be honest,” she says, “I haven’t listened to much of your music.”
That makes me laugh. “Luckily, it’s not a requirement for talking to me.”
“Oh, good. I thought there’d be a quiz.”
I laugh again, and it feels really good. I haven’t had much to laugh about recently. All I’ve done is mess around on my guitar, trying to write music while wondering if it’s pointless. If my career is over.
“So that was my sad story,” she says. “Now it’s your turn.”
And just like that, any lingering traces of laughter are sucked right out of me.
This was our deal, though. So I shift uncomfortably in my seat, averting my gaze to my half-empty glass as I work out what to tell her.
It’s hard to believe she truly doesn’t know anything about me or the recent scandals that have sent me into hiding.
I’m fully aware that the world doesn’t revolve around me, yes.
But when you’ve spent almost a decade living your life under a giant media spotlight, it can sure feel like that sometimes. And not in a good way.
Every time you make a mistake, for example, and the critics, both professional and amateur, come out in droves trying to cancel you.
She waits silently, giving me time, but I can feel her eyes on me. I came here to hide, so her interest should scare me. But it doesn’t. Actually, she’s making me feel like maybe what I really want is to be seen. Seen for who I am outside of the spotlight.
After taking a gulp of my drink for courage, I look up to face her.
Then I do my best to sum up my career and explain how I wound up in my current situation.
I stumble over my words a little when I tell her the part about getting photographed kissing a random woman.
But if this revelation shocks her, she doesn’t show it.
Her eyes are nothing but kind as she listens, her unpleasantness toward me when I first showed up having morphed entirely into something else. Something that feels patient, gentle, and understanding.
When I tell her how my fans are now questioning not only my sexuality, but my music, feeling like I’ve been lying to them the entire time, I expect her to ask if I have been.
Instead, she frowns deeply and says, “People aren’t entitled to know your personal life just because they like your music.
And if they need art to fit into some neat little box that makes them comfortable, and have it spoon-fed to them in order to understand it, then maybe they’re not the ones who are meant to appreciate it. ”
For a few moments, I stare at her, my lips parted but no words coming out.
Because she admitted to not listening to my music, and yet it sounds like she’s taking me more seriously as an artist than anyone has in a long time.
And maybe it shouldn’t feel this good, because how would she know if she doesn’t listen?
But again, she’s making me feel seen. Like she doesn’t need to hear the songs because she sees who I am.
Not Riley Rowland, America’s Country Sweetheart.
Just Riley.
The girl who’s always had big feelings and big dreams, and who let one lead her to the other.
Or maybe I’m making up fantasies in my head here like I have a tendency to do. Maybe the combination of my near isolation, the alcohol, her chocolate brown eyes, and her exposed collarbone has made my mind all fuzzy.
Didn’t she say getting close to someone is a mistake she’ll never make again? I might be trying to figure some things out about myself, but that’s something I need to do on my own. This woman I met less than a week ago can’t help me.
I focus on the first thing she said, about my fans not being entitled to my personal life.
“The thing is,” I tell her, “for my whole career, I’ve been letting people into my personal life.
I’ve taken my publicist’s advice, playing coy when I’m asked about my relationships in interviews.
But I put everything out there in my songs.
I give the little details that I know fans will pick up on.
Like they know I was wearing that red dress with the gold earrings the night Jason Arnetto left me there alone at his film premiere afterparty. ”
“Who?” Addison asks, her face screwing up in confusion. Apparently, she’s not too familiar with popular actors either.
“One of my exes. A real one, not PR,” I clarify. “He kind of sucked.”
But that song won a Grammy, so was the heartache worth it?
I wish I could say for sure.
I shake my head. “It doesn’t matter. What I’m saying is, if I didn’t want everyone to know about my personal life, shouldn’t I have kept the details out of my songs?”
She shrugs. “I think good music is in the details. And maybe you kept those details in because you’re not only writing your songs for the masses. Aren’t you also writing them for yourself?”
She’s left me at a loss for words once more.
When I started out writing songs, I was writing them for myself.
That was back when there was no one else listening, except occasionally my family.
Once I became famous, though—once I knew millions of people were listening—did I let that change the way I approached my music?
I certainly let my manager shape my image. I hid some real relationships from the paparazzi, and I went along with PR relationships because I was promised it was the best way to keep people interested in me and sell my albums.
But I thought that’s simply how the entertainment industry works.
I thought it was okay because my integrity was in my music.
I believed that was where I was always being honest. Yet whenever my label asked me to write a catchy breakup song about a guy I was never really dating, I did it.
I drew from real emotions, but I let the public believe the songs were about whoever and whatever they wanted them to be about.
If I was really writing for myself, would I have done that?
Fucking hell. All this self-reflection isn’t what I signed up for today. It’s probably time to get out of here.
Dodging her question that she probably didn’t intend to be as tricky as it was, I throw back the rest of my cider. Then I fake a smile and say, “I should get going so I don’t miss the shuttle back to the inn.
Truthfully, I was planning to call my brother and have him take me back, then maybe have dinner with him there. But it’s a good way out of this conversation. Because yes, I liked feeling seen at first, but I wanted her to see me as cool. Not see me spiraling.
“I can give you a ride,” she offers, taking the last sip of her drink before standing up.
“Oh, no, it’s okay.” I stand too, ready to bolt out of here.
“You shouldn’t have to wait for the shuttle,” she presses, her hand finding my lower back as we turn toward the exit. “I live that direction anyway.”
Now it feels like it would be rude not to accept, so I thank her and follow her outside.
I let her stay half a step ahead of me as we walk to her car, and my eyes keep drifting between the knife and flowers tattoo on her calf and the black bra strap she’s showing off with her off-the-shoulder shirt.
A part of me aches to tuck a finger underneath that strap and slowly slide it down her shoulder.
But a bigger part of me is terrified of that idea.
Not only because I would have no clue what to do next, but because I’m not sure what acting on these newfound desires would mean for me.
Or for my career that is already hanging on by a thread woven out of songs about men.
As we’re approaching a bright blue Subaru Crosstrek, she hits the button on her key fob to unlock it. Then she stops beside the passenger door and pulls it open for me. The gesture takes me by surprise enough that I hesitate, a confusing little giggle bubbling up out of me as I stare at her.
I’m immediately mortified, because what the heck was that?
This whole afternoon has felt almost unreal to me. And now she’s standing there holding the car door open for me and looking undeniably hot. It was one thing when she grabbed the door as we walked into the bar, but this gesture makes our afternoon together seem more like a date.
But it wasn’t.
Before I can recover my senses, she lets out a dry laugh. “Yes, I drive a Subaru. I’m a lesbian cliché, okay? Just get in.”
It takes me a second to catch up, and then I want to tell her that I wasn’t laughing about her choice of vehicle.
I was only laughing because I’m an awkward, nervous mess when in the presence of a woman I’m attracted to, apparently.
But I’m not going to explain that, so I give her what I hope is a friendly smile and get in the car, letting her shut the door after me.
I’m relieved that I can focus my gaze out the window now. It helps me avoid the temptation to keep checking her out.
The drive to the inn is short, so it doesn’t feel weird that we don’t talk during it. My mind becomes preoccupied with all the things that brought me here, and for the first time, I wonder if maybe I was wrong in thinking Mayweather would be a good place to hide. I’m feeling very exposed today.
And I guess it’s hard to hide from myself in the place where I grew up. The place where I was probably my most authentic self before I had the rest of the world’s eyes on me.
That doesn’t mean I was wrong in coming here, though. This is starting to feel like a refresh. Maybe that’s what I really need more than a place to hide.
After pulling up the inn’s long driveway, Addison puts the car in park and twists in her seat to face me. “Are you okay?”
Oh, so I guess she did notice me being quiet.
I haven’t felt truly okay since before all the shit went down with Skyler’s coming out.
But looking at the inn—with the white, wraparound porch, the sprawling green lawn and sunflowers lining the pathway, the golden summer sun shining brightly behind the building—things don’t feel as dark as they did the night I got drunk in that bar.
Unclicking my seatbelt, I nod. Then, because this woman has somehow, in such a short time, made me feel like I can trust her, I tell her, “I was thinking about why I left Nashville and came here. I thought I was hiding out. But I’m starting to feel like maybe I’m looking for something too.”
“What are you looking for?”
I tug at the hem of my dress. The only thing I should be looking for is how to get my good reputation and my fans back. But it feels like I’m looking for something else.
I’ve been struggling to write new songs, so maybe I’m looking for inspiration. Or I guess I might be looking for myself. Sort of seems like I got lost somewhere along the way in all the fame and PR.
“I’m not entirely sure,” I admit. “Thanks for the ride.”
She nods, and I turn away from her to open my door. I cross in front of the car, heading for the inn’s front steps, but I don’t make it far before I hear her call out, “Hey!”
Turning back around, I see she’s got her window rolled down. And for a second, she just smiles at me. Then she says, “Whatever it is you’re looking for, I hope you find it.”