Chapter 6 #2
Liam lets me stew. When we pull over at a food truck with a few benches at a small park in East Nashville, he climbs out and walks to my side. He opens my door, leans his hands on the roof. My eyes catch on the strain of his muscles, my nose on the scent of his eucalyptus deodorant.
“Nobody listens to it but me.” His voice is low, gently placating. He would sometimes use that voice during sex, and now my body is a can of soda bumping down a staircase.
Grudgingly I meet his eyes. “Promise?”
Liam nods.
“Those songs are bad.”
He smiles. “You calling my taste in music bad?”
“I’m calling it outdated. I can do better now.”
“Can you.” He’s taunting me.
“You’re infuriating.”
“You’ve mentioned before.” He reaches over my body, sending a zip of nervous anticipation through me, and unbuckles my seat belt.
We’re almost nose to nose. “Fight with me after we eat, Paige. I just worked a twenty-hour day, and I have a feeling I’m going to need my strength for this.
” His eyes flick to my mouth, and then he retreats.
I climb out of the truck and chew on my lip while I read the menu. We order individually, and then we settle onto opposite sides of a dark picnic table while we wait. Liam rests his elbows on its surface and links his hands in front of his mouth, surveying me warily.
“Why are you looking at me like I’m a chessboard?” I ask.
His eyebrow hitches. “I saw that you graduated.”
“Yep. This past spring.”
His eyes dance with something like I told you so.
“Don’t do that,” I warn.
“Do what?”
“Gloat.”
“I didn’t say a word.”
“You didn’t have to. I can read you.”
“Like a chessboard?”
I roll my eyes and Liam smirks.
“How’s your family?” he redirects.
“Good.” My steely resolve cracks at his mention of them. “Zara’s been working at a publishing house in New York City. She’s gotten two promotions.”
Liam nods. “Maren’s still a hotshot lawyer up there too, right?”
“Yep.” I start counting on my fingers. “Candice got engaged to her longtime girlfriend about a year ago and their wedding is coming up. Folly moved in with me when my roommate moved out—she’s pregnant, by the way; Folly, not the old roommate—but before that, she was in this small fishing town about an hour north of Cabo offering surfing lessons to rich vacationers. ”
“That tracks. And your dad?” Liam probes, the words leaving him slowly, like he’s not sure if he should ask. I can’t tell if it’s because his own father is gone, or because he knows my relationship with mine was … inconstant.
“Still abroad, living on a co-op with his French farmer wife. She’s nice. I last visited them two years ago.”
Liam nods, absorbing all of this. “No boyfriend, though.”
“No. I’ve dated a bit, but…”
Liam’s jaw goes tight as he looks away from me. “Yeah,” he gets out. “Me too.”
Is there a word for the process of thawing, followed by the blunt exposure of a cold snap? That’s what this conversation feels like.
“You dated someone for a few months, though,” I say. It was notable to me because it lasted that long. “Brenna?”
Liam nods, still not meeting my eyes. “She deserved someone who was going to love her better than I could.”
It’s something I’d expect Liam Bishop to have said when he ended things.
Even when he was in college, he’d let girls down that way.
No fuss, no frills. I can’t be what you need from me, and I can’t let you settle for less than what you need.
Liam isn’t in the habit of crossing his own boundaries or bending his own rules.
The food truck chef calls our names. He gets up to grab our tacos and returns with two trays, napkins, hot sauce, a couple of frosty cans of Coke. While I ordered only two tacos, Liam ordered five, and he scarfs them down like a starved man before I finish my first.
“I forgot how fast you eat,” I say with a smile.
He wipes his mouth with a napkin and takes a glug of Coke. “I forgot how slow you eat.”
“This pace is normal,” I protest. “You’re going to wind up burping and bloated.”
“And you’re going to wind up wrinkled and geriatric by the time you finish.” He eyes my second taco hungrily.
“I saw food in the lounge.”
“I normally don’t even have time to piss during a show. My mid-twenties have been defined by chronic purposeful dehydration.”
I laugh at that, which makes him grin. “What about your family?”
He pauses for another swig of Coke. “Both of my sisters are pregnant again. Kayla’s due first, next February. My mom is focused on the grandkids, which is fine by me. I don’t get back to Savannah more than once a year anymore.”
“How on earth will you maintain favorite-uncle status?”
“I have it all planned out,” Liam says. “When the youngest is eight years old, I’m going to get them all VIP tickets to the show of whatever artist defines their generation.”
“Lofty,” I note.
“You have to be lofty if you’re also absent,” Liam notes.
“I’m sure they don’t blame you, with how much you travel for work.”
Liam tilts his head at me, a depth in his eyes he doesn’t want to expand upon out loud.
Maybe they do blame him.
My mind tilts back to the weekend I met his family. It wasn’t exactly smooth, but I’d assumed things had changed somewhat over four years.
“Anyway,” he murmurs.
“Anyway,” I echo.
“How goes the songwriting?”
I push my second taco over to his side of the table and pop the tab of my soda. Liam doesn’t hesitate before grabbing the taco and bringing it up to his mouth.
“There’s a music executive at Stillwater who’s interested in signing me.”
His chewing halts. I track the movement of his jaw as he swallows. “Paige, that’s incredible.” After a few seconds he adds, “I always knew you’d be here one day.”
“Here, at this late-night taco joint with you?”
“Here, at the cusp of what you were meant to do with your life.”
Even as his words thrill me, I can’t ignore my lingering frustration. It spills out audibly into my next sentence. “He wants me to rewrite my lyrics first.”
Liam frowns. “All of them?”
“Basically.”
He chews, swallows, then says, “Screw that guy. Find someone else to work with.”
I shake my head. “No, he’s right. My songs aren’t about anything. They’re just empty words. I need to write music that comes from something real.”
Liam stares at me, and I watch the dots connect in his brain. “This is where the heart breaking comes into play?”
I nod, wondering how to phrase this in a way that freaks him out the least.
“I’ve got this friend from school, Harry. I trust his opinion. And he says the best song I’ve written is the one I wrote about … about you. Four years ago.”
Again, that possessive triumph flits across Liam’s expression. “The song you wrote about me? I know of at least three, from back then. They’re all on my CD.”
“This one isn’t from back then,” I say. The songs I wrote back then aren’t in the same realm of sophistication as my newer stuff and will never see the light of day.
“I wrote it in school. It’s angry and emotional and …
meaningful,” I finish. “Problem is, I haven’t written anything quite that meaningful since, and I think when I finished that song, I sort of locked the ability away.
Buried it, snuffed it out. But if I want this music rep to take my lyrics seriously, I need to write more songs like that one.
Which means I need to feel the way I felt while I was writing it. ”
Liam’s smirk swallows his face. “I’m your muse?”
“Appears that way.”
“So this entire reunion,” he says, gesturing back and forth between us, “is so you can tap back into our connection for your art.”
“You do owe me,” I say quickly, willing the proclamation to remain true even as doubts creep in.
Liam’s amusement melts into a glare. “I don’t see it that way.”
“And that,” I bite out, “is the entire summary of our problems.”
“If anything,” he goes on, eyes flinty, “I think you owe me. How’s that college diploma treating you?”
“Well, I’m still a broke waitress, so things haven’t changed much since we were friends.”
Liam scoffs. “You and I were never friends, Paige.”
I know what he means, but the comment stings, nonetheless.
“I’m sorry,” he says, voice low, while his fingers wring around his napkin. “I didn’t mean it like that. Of course we were friends.”
I roll out my shoulders, try to reset my expression to neutral. “We tried to be friends, anyway.”
“We were,” Liam insists. “We were friends first.” I catch his eyes across the table, heavy with memory. “But we were also falling in love. Even from the beginning.”
“You’re right,” I admit, exhaling. “Which brings me back to what I’m asking you for. Begging.”
He leans forward, shifting his weight onto his elbows while he fights to stay serious. “If you’re begging, I’m listening carefully.”
Act now, think later.
I search for the right words. The whole point of everything is finding them.
“Make me fall in love with you, Liam. You can end things afterward if you need to. I know your lifestyle isn’t conducive to a relationship, and I’m not demanding one. I just … need to remember how it felt to write that song. With all my feelings at the tips of my fingers.”
Stunned disbelief stretches out from him. “This is insane.”
“I know.”
“You need to become the most emotional version of yourself?”
I smile. “Basically.”
He pauses. “You’re seriously convinced I’m the only one who can help you with this?”
“I’m convinced you’re the one who can help me the best.”
Liam looks sideways, his lips pinched. “Paige. I was serious about why I cut things off with Brenna. You said it yourself. My lifestyle, all the moving, the late nights, the constant shows. I wouldn’t be a good long-term partner to you.”
“Which is why I’m giving you an easy out. I’ll fit myself into your world for a couple months, and after, you can dump me. I can take it.”
An entire relationship cycle, I think, somewhat mournfully. I’m not only in this for the part that’s painful, but I won’t ignore it either.
“But love doesn’t work that way,” Liam argues with a near growl.