Chapter 19
CHAPTER 19
D eclan—two weeks later
“Dad.” Alex waves a hand in front of my face and I swat at it like a fly.
“Alex, I told you. I’m setting up my lesson plans.” Which I should have done ages ago, but Daughtry’s leaving hit me harder than a super flu. Her not responding to any of my texts or calls is the painful back to back whammy of getting norovirus and a broken leg at the same time. I’m an unmixed suspension of exhausted and heartbroken in a too-small test tube, but I still have to be a parent.
Joy.
“School starts tomorrow. You should be getting ready, too. Do you know where your backpack is? I’m not listening to fifteen minutes of you ransacking your room at seven thirty tomorrow morning when we need to leave.”
“I found it two days ago.” He taps on my skull. “Are you even processing in there? ”
I ignore him and focus on my lesson plan spreadsheet. Who am I kidding? Will anyone give a fuck if I phone it in for the first few weeks? Ninety seven percent of the kids I teach will never remember anything I say.
“OMG, Dad, you’re spiraling again. Pay attention.”
“I’m not spiraling,” I grumble, turning to Alex. He has his music player and headphones in one hand. “What is it you need?”
“I don’t think Daughtry’s songs are about Uncle Ciaran.”
I sigh aloud, earning me an eye roll. “I don’t want to talk about this.”
“But you have to!” Alex thrusts his music player at me. “Just listen.”
I don’t want to. I can’t. For the first week after she left, all I did was listen to her music and leave her panicked voice memos, none of which she returned. Week number two meant I formally avoided my heartache and any mention of its cause. “Daughtry left. She was here for less than a minute. Why is this a big deal?”
“Because she made you happy, and you deserve to be happy, and now you’re miserable, and even Mom thinks you should do something about it.”
“You told your mom about this?”
“Of course. I tell Mom everything.”
Of course he does. “Why does she care?”
“Because she does.” Things are so simple for nine year olds. All he needs is some pseudo-Greek mythology and a few magic wands, and Alex is right at home. “Please. Just listen to the songs.”
“I’ve heard the songs. I’ve read the interview.” The interview in which she essentially admits that Ciaran is the one who got away. The songs about how funny and special my brother is. It’s almost enough to make me want to move out of the fucking house. Or force Ciaran to return to his own .
“You hear, but you don’t listen.” Alex unplugs the headphones and taps a button on his music player. Daughtry’s voice filters through the speakers, and even though it’s a recording, my body’s reaction is immediate. It’s almost like I can smell her again. I threw out the panties. No way I want to hold on to them when I can’t be with her.
“Isoamyl acetate, watch me move, I’ll watch you wake…” Daughtry’s voice is clear and strong and gorgeous.
Alex hits the stop button. “Did you hear it?”
“She sounds amazing.” I glance at the square-shaped photo of her on the screen and a thousand things shatter into fractals in my body. “She still needs to wear a sweater for these photos.”
“Ugh, Dad! She says ‘isoamyl acetate.’ That’s banana ester, right?”
Pride surges within me, and I crush him into a hug. “I can’t believe you know that. I could die happy right now.”
“You’re completely missing the point.” Alex wrestles himself out of my grasp. “Didn’t you hear what she said? She talks about you tutoring her. That’s what the entire ‘Chemistry’ song is about, how she wishes you would look up and see her.”
That gives me pause. That can’t be right. Can it?
But Alex isn’t done. “And then in ‘Heartbreak,’ she sits there eating pancakes and thinking about the one who got away. ‘Grape Crush?’ She talks about how she dances only for one guy. It wasn’t Uncle Ciaran, it was you the whole time.” He claps his hands in triumph. That’s my son, a self-satisfied Sherlock Holmes. “That is why we have to go see her. So you can get her back.”
I hold up my hands. “That doesn’t happen in real life, Alex. There’s no getting her back. It’s not like we were together— ”
A hand taps me sharply on my shoulder. “Declan Foster, do not lie to your child,” Mom says, walking past me and standing protectively behind Alex. “Of course you were together. Why do you think I kept asking you to do things, like drive her places, or bring her groceries? Heck, I even asked Maddy Olmstead to pretend she had rented out her apartment to someone else, just to get Daughtry here. She’s a grown woman, of course she could have done those things herself, but I’ve always known how you felt about her.”
That’s an awful lot of confessions when my ears are ringing from her rebuke. “But, Mom—”
“Please. You think I really believed that you were just over my chili? I’m your mother. I could see the way you two looked at each other. You were right at the time not to make your move, but for Cripes sake, you’re both in your thirties. Get over it and at least call her.”
Like that thought hasn’t occurred to me on average a thousand times a minute since she walked out the door. “I don’t even know where she is.”
My mom rolls her eyes and shows me her phone screen, where there’s a photo of Daughtry singing on stage. “Nashville. They’re only there until tomorrow night, so you’d better get going.”
“I have school—”
My mom huffs. “You can miss one day of school in your entire life. Pack a bag and go get her.”
“I’m coming, too.” Alex disappears before I can stop him. “I’ve already packed your bag, Dad!” He calls down the hallway.
Perfect. Now I understand what it feels like to be ganged up on. “This is not some zany road trip comedy, Mom.”
She pats me on the shoulder. “Yes, it is. By the way, Ciaran is driving you to the airport. You two need to talk. ”
Since I have absolutely no say in the matter, fifteen minutes later Alex and I are in Ciaran’s car with plane tickets my mom purchased.
“So, you have a layover?” Ciaran asks, focused on traveling the roads through our little peninsula.
“Yeah. Due to the vagaries of air travel, it’s in Atlanta. So we fly past Nashville, and then back.” I shake my head in bewilderment. “I have no idea how this does not negatively impact my carbon footprint.”
“It totally does. You can’t get off the hook for that. But then again, you’re doing it for love. Go you, man.” He punches me in the arm, a little harder than he has to.
I rub the muscle. “You’re not upset?”
“About Daughtry? No. We had our time. Honestly, I think even back then I knew how you two felt about each other. But since I was eighteen and a hormonal idiot, I didn’t know how to deal so I just ignored it.” He shrugs. “I’ve grown since then.”
“Sure you have.” I punch him back, for the sake of retribution.
Ciaran glances into the rearview mirror, and I follow his gaze. Alex stares out the window with his headphones in place, no eye makeup today but he wears teal and neon pink nail polish. It looks awesome.
“Look, Declan,” Ciaran says, not making eye contact with me. As his older brother, I know none of this can be good. The last time I saw Ciaran’s confession face, he told me he’d “accidentally” stolen my car and then “accidentally” drove it into the lake. “About Josie.”
Oh. Right. “What about her?”
“I promise you, I never flirted with her or anything. She reached out to me after your divorce, but I told her I didn’t feel that way about her. I tried to let her down easy. I’m sorry.” He turns to look at me, but there’s a tractor driving ten miles an hour down the road, so I smack his hands and he pays attention to the road again. “I really am. I don’t ever want to be in the middle of your relationships. You’re the greatest, and you deserve someone who sees that. Like Daughtry.”
Hmm. I don’t like forgiving Ciaran. I never quite forgave him for the Car Meets Lake incident, either. But maybe in this one instance, I can yield a little. My marriage ending wasn’t really his fault. Ciaran was a metaphor for Josie, a possibility that something could be better. I feel bad for her, that he didn’t reciprocate her feelings, but I’m also really proud of her. She went after happiness, even though it was difficult. Even though she didn’t know it would work out.
And it has. Josie is still in our lives. Alex is a great kid, and he has an entire network of people who love him.
He’ll have one more if I can do this and get Daughtry back. Josie was right. We can both have something more, but only if I’m brave enough to fight for it.
“Do you need me to pull over?” Ciaran asks. “You look like you’re going to throw up.”
“I’m not going to throw up,” I snap. “I was just thinking. About Josie and Daughtry.”
Ciaran snorts. “Those two are going to get on like gangbusters. You have a type , man.”
“Oh, do I?”
“Yeah. Smart, cool women who are way hotter than you will ever be. Or than you deserve.” His eyes twinkle, the way they always do when he’s being a jackass. Still, he’s my brother, and I suppose some part of me—deep, deep, deep down—loves that about him.
It doesn’t fix everything that’s broken in our relationship, but it’s an opening salvo .
I sniff twice. This is the most honest conversation I’ve ever had with my brother, and it makes me hella uncomfortable. “Thanks. Now can we please talk about something else? My ovaries are starting to ache.”