Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
LEE HAZLEWOOD, “THESE BOOTS ARE MADE FOR WALKING”
“What the fuck, Sunday Morning?” The next afternoon, Isaac threw open the door to the farm stand.
There were no customers, but I don’t know if he knew that before spewing his expletive.
Fuck was the crudest of all swear words. Not only did I not say it, I didn’t think it.
Until Isaac …
Everything he said to me was replayed on an endless loop.
“I’ve been coveting the fuck out of you since Easter Sunday.”
He knew I knew about his dad and the mystery mistress. Wesley must have known it was me.
I gulped, grabbing a rag to wipe the counter that was already clean .
“You won’t touch my guitar again.”
My heart stopped.
Isaac rounded the corner of the counter and ate up every inch of my personal space while plucking a black permanent marker from the cup of pens by the register. He removed the cap with his teeth. I had never seen him so angry.
I gasped as he grabbed the neck of my T-shirt and stretched it down my chest.
Never— ever— in the history of my eighteen years on earth had I felt so shocked and utterly speechless as my boyfriend’s older brother wrote ISAAC’S on the swell of my left breast. As quickly as he charged into the shed and vandalized my boob with a permanent marker, he capped it and stomped out the door while grumbling, “What the fuck is wrong with you?”
He didn’t give me a chance to answer before slamming the door shut. It wasn’t Wesley’s affair.
Thank God.
Breathing heavily, I straightened my shirt and pressed a hand over the graffiti on my boob. Then I cupped my other hand over my mouth and released something between a laugh and a cry.
I wrote “Sarah’s” in tiny letters on the inside of Isaac’s guitar case, where it was nearly impossible to see unless you were actively looking for it. I did it because it made me feel like the guitar was mine. I was just a young woman with big dreams making a tiny mark in the music world.
It was stupid but also no big deal. How on earth did he see it?
I didn’t use a permanent marker. The punishment didn’t fit the crime.
“Oh my gosh!” I ran into the bathroom and grabbed a wad of paper towels and soap to wash the marker from my boob. My skin burned and bloomed red and raw as I scrubbed it like a dirty Russet potato, but the ink didn’t fade. Panic set in. It was summer. I went to the pool on the weekends, and Matt was counting down the days until the end of my imaginary period.
“Hello?”
I jumped, adjusted my shirt, and tossed the towels into the trash bin before opening the door. “Hi,” I said in a high-pitched voice to Beverly Whitmore.
Her fingers caressed the floral scarf holding her long red and gray hair away from her face. “I preordered half a steer. Do I pick it up here?”
I knew there was not half a steer in the tiny deep freezer.
“Did you try the house?” I asked.
She nodded. “No one answered.”
“Mrs. Cory is out of town this week,” I said.
And her husband is cheating on her .
“Um, let me see if I can find Mr. Cory.” I locked the register drawer, even though I didn’t think Beverly was there to rob the place, and then I jogged down the lane. I was scared to check the house again. What if Wesley was in the bedroom with the mystery mistress again? Surely not at three in the afternoon on a Wednesday with Isaac on the farm.
“Hello?” I called, inching up the stairs.
Nothing.
I ran out to the machine shed. “Mr. Cory?” I called, opening the door.
“What is it?” Satan popped his head around the corner, wiping grease off his hands with a rag.
I scowled. “ Not you.”
“I’m Mr. Cory.” He lifted his eyebrows.
“You’re something, but not a Mister. Barely a human.”
“I feel your anger. It’s frustrating when someone does something so ruthless and unimaginable.”
“What is your problem? How did you even see that? And it was not remotely close to what you did to me. And this won’t come off, YOU BIG JERK!” I yelled, jabbing my boob.
“If revenge isn’t memorable, then it’s not really revenge. Is it? That will be on there for a while. It will be memorable,” he said.
“Your brother is going to see it.” I fisted my hands at my side. “What am I supposed to say?”
“Tell him the truth. You wrote your name on something that was mine, so I wrote my name on something that’s yours. He’ll be pissed off because he only sees himself, and you’re nothing more than an accessory to his dreams. And I know this because you fucking fell in love with a guitar. And my brother has thousands of dollars saved up, but he’s never given you the one thing that makes your heart sing. He doesn’t see you. How can you take off your clothes for someone who doesn’t. Fucking. See. You?”
I slowly shook my head, but I couldn’t speak past my heart in my throat. It was easier when nobody saw me. Invisible people didn’t feel vulnerable.
Isaac made me feel everything .
Finally, I cleared my throat and composed myself. “Beverly Whitmore ordered half a steer. I was looking for your dad.”
Isaac tossed the rag aside. “I’ll get it.” He walked past me without making eye contact.
After work, I returned the key and money bag, but I didn’t linger in case Wesley was entertaining his mistress. On my way to my car, I saw Isaac in the pasture, working on a fence. He defiled my breast, so I should have climbed into the car and hightailed it out of there, but I was the moth, and he was the flame. So I trekked toward the pasture.
“Where’s your dad?” I asked.
“He ran to town. Why? What do you need?” He tossed the wire cutter aside and glanced up at me while wiping his sweaty brow with his partially rolled-up sleeve that exposed his tattoos and muscly forearms.
“We’re low on ones and fives for the register.”
That was a tiny lie or at least a stretch, but I blurted out the first thing that came to me.
“Ya ever heard of a bank? They can exchange large bills for small bills.”
“I don’t take the money with me.”
He gathered his tools and tossed them into a bucket. “Because you can’t be trusted.”
“Is that a question? It better be a question. And the answer is... Yes. Of course, I can be trusted. I’m way more trustworthy than you are.”
“How do you figure?” He toted the bucket and a spool of steel wire toward the machine shed.
“Everyone trusted you not to write your name on my boob, but you couldn’t control yourself.”
Isaac looked over his shoulder, giving me a slow-growing smile. His teeth looked extra white because he was so tan, and he had dirt smudged along his scruffy face. I plucked a stem of hay and pulled off the seeds, scattering them with the wind as I tried to keep a straight face.
He redirected his gaze to the barn. “He doesn’t deserve you,” he mumbled.
I barely caught it, but I didn’t think he meant for me to hear it.
“Would your dad write his name on my mom’s boob?”
“I’m not sure. Why don’t you ask him?” He opened the door to the barn.
“Don’t you think you should apologize? You’ve had all day to contemplate your insane response to what I did to your old guitar case.”
He dropped the bucket and the spool of wire before slowly turning toward me. “How old are you?”
I parked a hand on my hip. “Eighteen. Duh, you know that.”
Pursing his lips to the side, he studied me. “That guitar case is maybe ten years old. So it looks like the excuse is mine, not yours. I just scribbled my name on your old tit. Why are you acting so insane ?”
“Stop,” I snorted, covering my mouth. “I’m serious. This isn’t going to come off for a long time.”
Isaac lifted his shirt and wiped his face, drawing my gaze to his tight abs.
“Well, maybe you’ll just have to keep your tits covered until it comes off.”
“What if Matt sees it?”
Isaac glanced at his watch. “What if some girl I like sees your name on the inside of my guitar case?”
I narrowed my eyes. “Who?”
“Sunday Morning, you’re not the only girl who looks at me that way.” He smirked, strutting past me to the door .
Again, I followed him as he headed to the horse barn. “I only look at you with pity because you’re so obnoxious, and everyone knows it.”
“You look at me like Matty’s not getting the job done.”
“What’s that supp—” I caught it too late, but Isaac couldn’t let anything slide.
“And just like that, you proved my point all by yourself.” He filled a bucket with feed for his horse and carried it to the stall.
I watched him, letting my response die because I didn’t want to talk about Matt or my boob, for that matter. I wanted to know why their father was cheating on their mother. It angered me and broke my heart at the same time.
“I’m sorry I wrote my name on your guitar case.” In case God was still disappointed over the loss of my virginity, I thought showing Isaac kindness might get me back into His good graces.
He grunted while grabbing a broom to sweep the stall. I couldn’t decipher the meaning behind his grunt.
“Are you going to apologize to me for writing on my boob?”
“No.”
Maybe I wasn’t supposed to apologize with any expectations—unconditional love and all that kind of godly behavior. But I wasn’t God; I was human. And I expected something in return.
“Why?” I tried to act unaffected by his stubbornness.
“Because I’m not sorry.”
My mouth fell open in a silent gasp. “In that case, I take back my apology.” I pivoted and marched out the door and straight to my car. “Because I’m not sorry,” I said in a mocking tone with my nose wrinkled. “Jerk.”
“Matt’s on the phone!” Gabby yelled upstairs after I took a long bath.
Isaac’s name wasn’t leaving my skin anytime soon despite the nail polish remover I tried. It lightened it, but it didn’t completely remove it.
“Hey!” I said, sitting on the edge of my bed, wrapped in a fluffy pink terry cloth robe and my hair swaddled in a towel.
My summer wasn’t off to the best start, and I blamed all three of the Cory men.
“How’s work?”
I hugged a knee to my chest. “Fine. How do you like the campus?”
“I love it so much. We’re attending a game tomorrow. And I’m having dinner with the assistant coach. Sarah, this feels like a dream.”
“That’s awesome.”
“I miss you.”
I grinned. “Really?”
“Yes.”
“Where’s your mom?” I asked.
“She’s at the pool.”
“Have you talked to your dad?”
“My mom has. Why? Is everything okay?”
“Yep. It’s fine. Since you called me, I’m just curious if all the Cory men are as considerate as you.” I rolled my eyes. That sounded weird, even for me.
“My dad is. But I don’t think Isaac is.” Matt laughed.
“Isaac’s a little considerate. He let me take his guitar home last night. ”
Oh my gosh! Am I defending Satan?
Why did I defend him? Isaac's behavior was indefensible, and I kept forgetting that I seriously disliked him.
“What did you have to do in exchange? Clean out the sheep stalls for the next week?”
“I don’t know yet. I think he’s waiting and plans on lording it over my head for the summer.” I tried to return the same laugh as if Isaac was just being Isaac and not the guy who was coveting me and writing on my boob.
“You’re probably right,” Matt said with a long sigh followed by a long pause. “I miss you,” he murmured.
“I miss you too,” I replied on instinct. He hadn’t been gone that long, so I wasn’t drowning in my tears yet.
“I can’t wait to get back and get my hands on you.”
I wasn’t sure his brother’s name would be erased from my boob. But being the pleaser that I was, I replied, “Me too.”
Our first encounter didn’t involve removing my dress, so while Matt had felt my breast over my dress, he had yet to see me fully naked.
“Is everything okay? You seem quiet.”
“I’m good. Are you good? What about your mom? Is she good?”
Matt chuckled. “We’re fine. You’re acting weird. Why are you acting so weird?”
“I’m not. I just have a lot on my mind.”
“You mean what we did?”
I bit my thumbnail. “Yeah. And other things. Like, I want to go to Nashville. What do you think my parents would say if I told them I wanted to skip college for now and move to Nashville to sing even though I didn’t get accepted to Vanderbilt? ”
He laughed a little. “Well, I think they’d tell you what I overheard your mom telling my mom.”
“What’s that?”
“Your parents were relieved you didn’t get accepted because they don’t have the money to send you there.”
I frowned.
“And I think your father will lose his mind if you go to Nashville.”
“Well, I’m an adult. They don’t have much say in the matter.”
“We know you’ll do exactly what they tell you to.” He laughed again, and it irritated me more than it normally would have since Isaac pointed out Matt’s lack of focus on my dreams. And I was tired of being such a pleaser to everyone except myself.
“Not this time,” I said.
“Where are you going to sing?”
“I don’t know. Wherever. I feel like I need to be where things are happening to stand a chance of being discovered.”
“How will you support yourself if your parents refuse to do it?”
“Duh. I’ll get a job during the day.”
“You know I love you, and I think you’re a great singer, but have you considered how incredibly rare it is for a no-name to show up in Nashville and actually make it big?”
“About as rare as it is for a rancher’s son from Devil’s Head, Missouri, to play in the big leagues.”
“Sarah …”
“Matt,” I mocked him.
“Your parents are never going to approve of this.”
“Well,” I chuckled, “they were never going to approve of what we did in your car, but we did it anyway. Do you regret it?”
“That’s different.”
“It’s not. We made our own decisions no matter what anyone thought. And we did it because we had a passion that mattered more than anyone’s opinion. That’s how I feel about music. Writing, playing, singing it. How am I supposed to go to college when I have no idea what I could possibly want to do in life besides play my music?”
“That’s not true. You thought about accounting.”
“Matt, I had to think of something to get our guidance counselor off my back about planning my future. I don’t want to be an accountant.”
“That’s why your parents suggested a community college. You can get prerequisites taken while you figure it out.”
“Prerequisites for what? My parents suggested community college because I didn’t get good grades like you.”
“Sarah,” Matt sighed. “Give it a year at a community college. You might decide music is more of a hobby.”
“It’s not a hobby. It’s my dream. I want you to say that you think my dreams are important.”
“Of course, I think your dreams are important.”
“Then why are you trying to talk me out of following them?”
“I’m not. I’m only trying to help you set realistic expectations, so you won’t be disappointed.”
I gripped the phone tighter. “So you already think it’s a foregone conclusion that I won’t make it if I go to Nashville? And you want me to prepare to be disappointed? Wow. Thanks, Matt.”
“Fine, Sarah. What do you want me to say? You’re going to be a big star? You’re going to have sell-out concerts across the country? Then, sure, I’ll say it. You’re going to be the biggest star of our generation. No need to go to college. Happy?”
“You’re an asshole.”
Click.