Chapter 15
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
I let Callie pick our next meal and immediately regret it when she chooses salads. Not because I don’t like salads—we practically live on this stuff—but I’ve never felt more like a museum exhibit as I do right now.
“What?” I ask as her weird smug stare follows yet another bite of lettuce from the container to my mouth. My fork dangles in the air like it’s not sure if it’s about to get an award or written up by the principal.
“Nothing. Just enjoying the moment.” She even leans back in her chair like she’s settling in for a show.
I narrow my gaze at her. “And what moment is that? Enjoying a meal with a super hot rockstar, or watching me eat vegetables?”
Her sly grin could go either way. “It can’t be both?”
“You’re acting like my mom again.” That threat worked before, but she’s unfazed this time.
“Good. You need it. Vitamins, Casey. You need vitamins.”
“There are vitamins in fries.”
“What would TJ say?”
My fork nearly falls from my hand. She really does remember everything. I’m in deep trouble if this romance becomes a thing.
“TJ… Don’t remind me. Please.”
Her arms cross in an attempt to level up on the mom-stare. “What? You know I’m right.”
“Right about what?” another voice says from behind.
I swear Luke has an alarm that goes off when food enters this suite.
He grabs the unopened container and drops to a chair at the table.
“TJ would want you to consume a well-balanced meal,” Callie explains in her apparent quest to turn salad into my next fight with Luke.
“TJ Barringer?” Luke directs at me.
Guess we’re going there since…. We’re already there.
To my surprise, Luke huffs a laugh as he opens his lunch. “How does she know TJ?”
“I don’t,” Callie says, way too late to turn this train around. “Only by reputation.”
“Oh, really? Interesting,” Luke muses.
I try to read his face, but he’s not giving anything away.
“She was with me when TJ called about the new tracks,” I explain, studying his every movement.
He hesitates for just a moment before digging into his salad.
Still can’t get a read.
“Not to mention you guys talk about him. I remember stuff,” Callie chimes in.
“Don’t we know it,” I grunt.
Callie’s glare is inversely correlated to Luke’s smirk.
At least I’m not the only victim of her otherworldly recall.
“Heard you kids working again,” Luke says when the conversation dies.
I glance at him in shock. I don’t know which rocks me more, the fact that he spoke when he didn’t have to or the fact that it was about music.
I stay casual, not wanting to break the spell. “Yeah, Callie has a lot of good ideas.”
“Oh, please,” she huffs in a dismissive tone. “I sit there and offer moral support while you work your magic.”
I return a playful warning look that’s also kind of… not.
“Those aren’t my lyrics,” I point out.
“They’re not lyrics, they’re verses,” she quips. “It’s a poem.”
“Not anymore,” Luke cuts in.
She stiffens and lasers a look at him. “Wait, whose side are you on anyway?”
Luke lifts the corner of his mouth. “Sorry, hon, but poetry set to music is called a ‘song.’”
She tries to play it off, but a late smile betrays her. “Fine, whatever.”
“Accept it, Callie. You’re a songwriter now,” I say.
I don’t know why this is so hard for her to grasp.
“No, I’m not. Wait. Really? But…”
I shrug and offer a quick smile before facing Luke. “I’m having trouble with the hook into the chorus, though.”
I wince at my stumble into our old routine. The words came out before I could stop them. It’s Callie’s fault. She’s swept away so many of the eggshells, my brain forgot they were there.
I wait for Luke to seize up and run. Instead, he says, “Let’s hear it.”
I go still, like my head and limbs don’t know what to do with that.
He lifts a brow, and I haul my brain back into gear.
“Okay, yeah, sure,” I stutter as I get up from the table.
I grab the guitar from the living room, certain when I turn around he’ll be gone. Or I’ll find myself on the couch sleeping because this is a dream.
But there’s no corporeal body on the couch and Luke is still at his seat when I return. His eyes track me with casual interest, like we’re backstage or on the bus, messing around with new ideas.
I’m not sure I’ve ever been as nervous as I am when I pluck a few test chords.
My hands are shaking as I clear my throat and launch into the verse and chorus of what we have of the mirror song.
My fingers struggle with the pick, my voice strained like I’m back in kindergarten at my first violin recital.
Except it’s not a strict violin instructor and overbearing father sitting in the audience judging me. It’s my entire past, present, and future on the line. Everything I am and want to be.
If Luke hates it, I’ll be heartbroken.
If he runs away again, I’ll be crushed.
Either way, this ends with me in pieces.
I almost play through the song a second time, just to avoid the moment when the music stops and I have to face the pain of the inevitable.
I can’t even look at Luke while I wind down the final chorus.
I know it will rattle me, and I’m not going to let nerves ruin this chance to have him back into the music with me, as brief as it might be.
Too soon, the song comes to an end. It has to. It’s not formed enough to be the barrier I need. That’s the whole point.
When the final chord rings out, I dampen the strings to cut it off in a silent confession that I know it’s not finished. I still can’t look at him. It will be even harder to see his disapproval or hasty retreat.
So instead, I find an invisible scratch in the table to examine, while he examines me.
The silence that follows is brutal, but I expected nothing less. It’s the next part I don’t know what to do with.
When I hear his inhale like he’s going to speak, my own breath freezes in my lungs.
“It’s good, Case. Really good. I see what you mean about the hook, though. Try throwing the F-sharp minor in after the A and add an extra two beats to the break.”
…
What?
It takes a moment for the words to register. When they do, a burst of warm excitement floods through me.
“You mean, bring the chorus back in late on the offbeat?” I say.
I finally dare to check his face.
For the first time since Elena’s death, he looks like my co-writer. My best friend and brother.
Emotion burns behind my eyes, and I blink it back.
“Exactly,” he says. “Plus, the minor at the end of the bridge will give it a bigger cut. Hanging on the four was fine, but I think the two will give you more depth.”
His eyes lock on mine to speak the real conversation. Our mouths are talking about music, but our hearts are somewhere far beyond that.
“Case, the chorus is killer.” His eyes flash like he knows the magnitude of what those words mean to me, and loves me enough to give me this gift. “Really, really good.”
I can’t speak. I never in a million years expected this. I was just hoping he wouldn’t run away. Instead, he’s done the opposite.
He’s taken a step back to me.
Still speechless, I’m relieved when he offers a small smile like he understands. He turns to Callie to give me time to process and recover.
“You, too, Callie. I know those are your words,” he says in a gentle voice.
“Mostly. Casey changed them around a bit and added some.”
Although less flustered than I am, she seems affected as well. Of course she would pick up on the significance of what’s happening. She might not know music jargon, but she reads people better than anyone.
“Yeah, but you understand that’s not because there was anything wrong with the original,” Luke continues, sounding more and more like the confident icon I remember. “They just have to flow with the music. It’s all a give and take in the process.”
Her smile finishes the unspoken part of their exchange. “Of course. He made it better, there’s no question.”
I’m still trying to wrap my brain around what’s happening when Luke turns to me.
He motions toward the guitar. “Can I see that?”
I stare at him. At the guitar. My brain short circuits.
I want to give it to him, but it’s like I can’t figure out how.
How do you hand a king his scepter?
I cradle the guitar in both hands and lift it toward him. Even then, part of me thinks he’ll refuse it. That this is all some cruel joke. A punishment for disrupting his despair with my hope.
But Luke pulls it into his arms.
I don’t move, barely breathing as he traces the strings like he’s forgotten what they feel like. As if he’s just recovered a lost limb he never thought he’d get back.
It’s almost easier to believe he’d regrow an arm than what I’m seeing now.
Slowly, his touch transforms from exploratory to determined. There’s purpose in him again as he positions the guitar into the place it’s had in his life for as long as I can remember.
His left hand loops around the frets. His right rests on the strings.
He draws in a deep breath as he braces himself.
We all do. And when the first note comes out, I almost choke on a swallow.
That note leads to another, and a third, and a fourth.
Soon, his fingers are dancing on the strings with a confidence that transports us back to a basement, a tour bus, a stage.
I can see the lights, the crowd. Luke at the mic, owning that stage like it’s the only thing that matters.
Sweeny beside him, his guitar wailing the melody that’s drifting toward me now.
“Sweeny’s lick,” I breathe out.
Luke’s gaze flickers to mine. A flash of convoluted emotion skims his blue-green irises. Joy, pain, relief, confusion. He doesn’t know what to do with what’s happening any more than I do.
But he’s still here.
He’s still fucking trying.
“For the bridge. I think we just layer rhythm for the chorus. Maybe some killer reverb on the ‘hello’ vocal?” His casual tone betrays the monumental shift that’s happening inside him, inside all of us.
I swallow the rush of emotion exploding through me. “Definitely. I was thinking even a tight band-pass filter on the second line.”
A stuttered breath betrays the internal storm Luke is wrestling with. “Yeah, that could work too. I’m hearing it.”
I feel Callie’s shock and excitement beside me. She remains silent through the entire exchange, as if sensing the words we’re saying isn’t the conversation we’re having.
Luke and I continue to discuss production ideas as a weak translation of the real work of art being formed in our hearts. Somewhere along the line, our cover becomes real. The song we’re pretend writing takes a turn into viable ideas I’m itching to explore.
“How easy do you think it would be to get into Jackson Street tomorrow?” I blurt out. “I know we haven’t used them in a while, but Julian’s a pro.”
Luke’s expression doesn’t change. “I don’t know. TJ might be able to get you in. You want to lay some of this down?”
I try to read him. Could I dare to hope he’s feeling any of the excitement that comes with new ideas as well? We used to get high off that rush.
“Thinking about it,” I say. “I mean, why not? It’s out there now. Might as well see what it sounds like. Wish we were home and could just use our own stuff, but Jackson Street is cool. Julian has gear we can use, right?”
Luke still isn’t giving me any clue about where his head is. “Probably. He’s got his studio guys, too, if you want to mess around. You might need to give him a heads up though so he can get them in. Send TJ a work tape. He’ll lose his mind.”
Another question is pounding at my skull. A week ago I wouldn’t have dreamed of asking. I’m still terrified, but I will never forgive myself if there was a chance to bring him all the way back and I didn’t take it.
His eyes broadcast the rejection before I can even ask, and my heart drains into my stomach.
His apologetic look stings more than the resentful ones I’ve grown accustomed to, because this look tells me how much it’s hurting him to hurt me. How much he wants to give this to me but can’t.
He tears his gaze away. “I can’t, man. You know that. I just… You’ve got my support on this.”
A consolation prize that does the opposite.
“Yeah, no, of course,” I grit out. “It would have been…”
Impossible. Fucking impossible.
“No, yeah,” I say through a harsh laugh, mostly at myself for the absurd hope.
I don’t know what the hell I was thinking.
“Good luck, though. I think you have something,” Luke says in another unintentional dagger through the heart. He’s trying to soften the blow, and when he rests his hand on my shoulder as he passes, it feels like a third-degree burn.
I want to reassure him, but I can’t. My heart is too broken. My hope too shattered to pretend otherwise .
Once he’s gone, I have this overwhelming need to disappear as well.
“I should go call TJ and see if he can set something up,” I mutter.
I can’t look at Callie. She’ll make me stay and drag the poison out, but I’m not ready to hand it over. I need it to hurt. I need it to sink in and make its mark.
“Casey…”
I get up from the table. “It’s fine. Not a big deal. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
Pulling out my phone, I head toward the office to make the call.
It’s only when I lock myself inside with the chair that I realize what I’ve done.