Chapter 12 Rye
rye
. . .
The melody haunts me through breakfast. Through Lily’s chatter about her upcoming field trip to the Country Music Hall of Fame. Through loading the dishwasher and pretending the mundane task requires my complete concentration.
I heard him playing last night.
Not just playing—creating something that wrapped around the spaces I thought I’d sealed shut. Something that reminded me why music used to matter more than safety.
“Mom?” Lily watches me from across the kitchen table, her cereal spoon suspended midway to her mouth. “You’re doing that thing again.”
“What thing?”
“That staring-at-nothing thing. Like when you’re trying to remember lyrics.”
The observation hits too close to home. I turn to wipe down counters that don’t need cleaning. “Just thinking about inventory for the venue.”
“Sure you are.” Her tone carries that pre-teen wisdom that sees through adult deflection.
I turn to rinse my coffee mug in the sink. “Just a busy week at the venue.”
“Okay.” Lily returns to her cereal, but I catch her small smile. “Can I go to Grandma’s after camp? She said she’d help me with my song.”
“What song?”
“A new one I started working on. About the bird who forgot how to sing.”
My throat tightens. “Yeah, sweetheart. You can go to Grandma’s.”
After dropping Lily at camp, I drive to The Songbird on autopilot. The venue sits quiet this early, morning light exposing every imperfection the evening shadows usually hide. I unlock the door and step inside, breathing in the familiar cocktail of old wood, spilled beer, and possibility.
The wall Darian repaired looks better than it has in years. Smooth, professional work that didn’t need doing by someone who owes me nothing. I run my fingers along the fresh paint Jovie must have applied after I left yesterday, the surface still slightly tacky.
In my office, I try to focus on next week’s lineup. Three emails wait from musicians wanting slots, but their bios blur together. My mind keeps drifting to that melody. To the way it seemed to know things about me I haven’t admitted to myself.
By ten o’clock, I give up pretending to work. The venue doesn’t open until four, and my restlessness feels like electricity under my skin. I need coffee. Or air. Or something to stop this relentless replaying of music I wasn’t supposed to hear.
I grab my keys and head for Maggie’s Diner, the one place in Nashville where anonymity still exists. Where servers don’t ask questions and coffee comes black and strong enough to dissolve whatever’s eating at you.
The bell above the door announces my arrival to mostly empty booths. The morning rush ended an hour ago, leaving only the dedicated newspaper readers and unemployed philosophers. I slide into a booth near the back, facing the door out of habit.
“Coffee?” The server, a woman named Denise who’s worked here longer than I’ve been alive, doesn’t wait for an answer before pouring.
“Thanks.”
“Food?”
“Just coffee.”
She nods and moves away, understanding the universal language of someone who needs to sit with their thoughts. I wrap my hands around the mug, letting the heat seep into my palms while I try to understand why I can’t stop thinking about a melody played by someone I told to stay away.
The bell chimes again.
Darian walks in.
Of course he does. Because Nashville might sprawl across miles, but the musician’s world shrinks to a handful of venues and diners where coffee doesn’t taste like disappointment.
He spots me immediately. Hesitates. I watch him weigh his options—acknowledge me or pretend we’re strangers. The fact that he’s considering it irritates me more than his presence.
“You can sit down,” I call out, my voice carrying across the mostly empty space. “We’re adults.”
He approaches slowly, like I might change my mind. “I didn’t know you’d be here.”
“I know.” I gesture to the opposite bench. “Sit. Denise makes everyone nervous when people stand around.”
He slides in across from me, and Denise appears with the coffee pot before he’s fully settled.
“Coffee?”
“Please.”
She pours, studies us both with the assessment of someone who’s seen every kind of human interaction, then disappears again.
“The wall looks good,” I say, because someone needs to say something.
“Jovie did the painting.”
“I know.” I take a sip of coffee that’s still too hot. “Thank you. You didn’t have to—”
“I wanted to help.”
“Why?”
The question hangs between us. He turns his mug in slow circles on the table, watching the coffee swirl. “Because I understand what it’s like when something you’ve built starts falling apart.”
“Your band.”
He nods. “Among other things.”
“It must be nice to be able to walk away when it gets too hard.”
The words come out sharper than intended. His jaw tightens, but he doesn’t defend himself. “Sometimes walking away is the only way to survive it.”
“And sometimes staying and fighting is.”
“Is that what you’re doing? Fighting?”
“Every day.” The admission surprises me. “This venue, this life—I fought for all of it. Still am.”
“I wasn’t trying to make things harder for you.”
“I know.” I stare into my coffee. “That almost makes it worse.”
“Why?”
Because kindness without agenda terrifies me more than cruelty with purpose. Because the melody you played last night knew things about me I’ve kept locked away. Because you make me remember who I was before I decided safety mattered more than music.
“It’s complicated,” I say instead.
“Most real things are.”
Denise appears with the coffee pot, refilling both mugs without being asked. The interruption gives me time to study him. He looks tired, but not the exhaustion of sleepless nights. This goes deeper—the kind of tired that comes from fighting battles with yourself.
“I heard you playing,” I admit. “Last night. At the piano bar.”
His head snaps up. “Murphy’s? I didn’t see you.”
“I didn’t go in. I was walking around after I closed and heard . . .” I trail off, unable to name what I heard. “It was beautiful.”
“It was just something I was working through.”
“About her? Your ex?”
“No.” His eyes meet mine. “Not about her.”
The weight of what he’s not saying presses against my ribs. I should leave. Should maintain the boundaries I set for good reasons. But something about sitting across from him in this worn booth, both of us raw from our respective battles, makes pretense feel pointless.
“I used to write,” I hear myself say. “Songs. Real ones, not just venue schedules and inventory lists.”
“What happened?”
“Someone I trusted took my words and made them his. Told me I was his muse, then left with three notebooks full of my life turned into his album.”
“Your daughter’s father.”
“How did you know I have a daughter?”
“The other night at the venue, you mentioned needing to get home to her.”
“Right.” I laugh, but there’s no humor in it. “But no, it wasn’t him. Someone else I foolishly trusted.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. It taught me valuable lessons about trusting musicians with anything that matters.”
“Including me.”
“Especially you.”
“Why especially me?”
Because you understand music the way I used to. Because you looked at that room full of people and sang to the ghosts instead. Because when you play, I remember what it felt like to believe songs could save us.
“Because you’re actually talented,” I say. “The mediocre ones are easier to dismiss.”
He’s quiet for a moment, processing this. “Is that supposed to be a compliment?”
“It’s supposed to be the truth.”
“The truth.” He leans back in the booth. “Okay. Truth is, I can’t stop thinking about that harmony we played. The one you didn’t write down.”
My chest tightens. “That was just—”
“Real. It was real, Rye. Whatever else you want to call it, it was two people making something that mattered.”
“Music isn’t enough.”
“No,” he agrees. “But it’s something.”
“Something that complicates everything.”
“Or maybe something that makes the complications worth it.”
I want to argue, to maintain the walls that keep me safe. But sitting here with morning light streaming through windows that need cleaning, watching him turn his coffee mug in endless circles, I’m tired of pretending music doesn’t matter.
“I threw away my lyrics last night,” I admit. “Tore them up and tossed them in the venue trash.”
Something flickers across his face. Guilt? “Why?”
“Because they were about things I can’t want. About someone I can’t let in.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“Does it matter?”
“I think it does.”
Denise appears again, this time with a plate of toast neither of us ordered. She sets it between us. “You both look like you need to eat something. Don’t argue.”
She walks away before we can tell her we aren’t hungry. Darian picks up a piece of toast, tears it in half, offers me one piece. The gesture is so simple, so devoid of expectation, that I take it.
We eat in silence, two people who’ve said too much and not enough. The toast tastes like comfort and possibility, like maybe sharing something small doesn’t have to lead to losing everything.
“I have an unfinished song,” I say suddenly. “Something I started years ago but could never complete.”
“Play it for me.”
“I don’t play anymore.”
“Then sing it.”
“Here?”
“Why not? The place is almost empty.”
I glance around. He’s right—just us and two old men reading newspapers at the counter. Still, the idea of singing in daylight, without the protective darkness of a venue, makes my hands shake.
“I can’t.”
“You can. You just won’t.”
“Same thing.”
“No, it’s not.” He leans forward. “Can’t means unable. Won’t means afraid.”
“Maybe I have good reasons to be afraid.”
“Maybe you do. But fear’s not a great songwriter.”
The challenge in his voice sparks something defiant in me. Before I can think better of it, I clear my throat and hum the opening bars. Soft, barely audible, but the melody flows like it’s been waiting.
“I built these walls with careful hands . . .” My voice cracks on the first line, but I push through. ”Each brick a lesson learned too well . . . Kept out the storms, kept out the pain . . . Kept out everything else as well . . .”
I stop, face burning, unable to meet his eyes. The silence stretches until I hear him humming. The harmony slides underneath my melody like it was always meant to be there, like he’s heard this song before even though I’ve never sung it for anyone.
“How do you do that?” I whisper.
“Do what?”
“Know where the music wants to go.”
“Same way you knew where to build the walls.” His voice is gentle. “Practice.”
I finally look at him. His eyes hold something I don’t want to name, something that makes me feel seen in ways I’ve spent years avoiding.
“This doesn’t change anything,” I say.
“I know.”
“I still can’t—”
“I know that too.”
“Then why are you here?”
“Because sometimes the music is enough. Even when nothing else can be.”
Denise returns with the coffee pot, but I shake my head. “I should go.”
“Rye—”
“The venue needs prepping. Tonight’s a full lineup.”
I slide out of the booth, drop cash on the table for both our coffees and the toast. He doesn’t try to stop me, doesn’t argue about the check. Just watches me as I gather my things.
“That song,” he says as I turn to leave. “It needs a bridge.”
“They all do.”
“No, I mean . . . I think I know what it might sound like. If you ever want to hear it.”
I pause at the door, hand on the handle. “I told you. I don’t write anymore.”
“But you just sang.”
“That was a mistake.”
“Was it?”
I leave without answering, but the melody follows me. His harmony follows me. The memory of sitting across from someone who understands the weight of music follows me all the way back to The Songbird.
Inside the venue, I stand in the empty main room, staring at the stage where he played that first night. Where he bled truth into three songs and reminded me what music could do when you stopped protecting yourself from it.
My phone buzzes with a text from Mom: Lily wants to know if she can show you her song tonight. I told her you’d love to hear it.
I type back: Of course.
Because maybe that’s how it works. Maybe you rebuild yourself one shared cup of coffee at a time, one harmony that shouldn’t fit but does, one piece of toast in a diner where nothing fancy happens but everything real does.
Maybe.
But probably not.
Still, as I start prepping the venue for tonight, I catch myself humming. My melody. His harmony. The bridge I swear I can almost hear, waiting just outside my reach.
The Songbird settles around me, familiar and safe. But safe doesn’t feel like enough anymore. And that melody—our melody—keeps pulling at something I thought I’d buried.
Not yet.
Maybe not ever.
But for the first time in years, never doesn’t feel quite as certain as it used to.