Chapter 3
SUMMER
Six weeks ago…
“Tell me… why… this was a good… idea again?” my best friend pants.
I never notice our height difference until she’s having to jog alongside my giraffe legs to keep up. The merch line already snakes past the concession booth, and I’m not compromising between the opening song of this concert and my new nightshirt. I drag her by the hand.
“Because we’re thirty-one, single, and it’s Rhett Dawson,” I explain.
I have no idea what part of this spontaneous trip she’s referring to, but knowing her, maybe the whole thing?
“What… is your… obsession… with this man?”
I stop dead in my tracks. It takes her rebounding off my body for her to realize it too. The ballerina bun that was once neatly wound into a tight knot at her crown now has four dozen flyways spiking in every direction.
“First of all, he’s a hot musician from our hometown. How often does someone from Boise, Idaho, become famous? But also… did you even watch those videos I sent you?”
It’s a rhetorical question, really. If she did, she’d know. I open my phone camera, press our heads together, and say, “Smile.”
One look at the photo has me pinching the bridge of my nose. Her expression is a mixture between an animal caught in headlights and a teenager asked to sit through a piano recital.
No, it’s okay. She’s been living under a rock. She doesn’t have a clue about those Levi’s that paint his thighs or how his voice drips like honey when he gets to the chorus or what a thrill it would be to wear his face.
It’s not until she says, “Okay, that’s creepy,” that I realize I’m muttering out loud.
My eyes snap back to hers, and I continue closing in on the line. She returns to her marathon sprint.
“I’m just saying… this feels… like something… a twenty-year-old would do.” She crashes into me a second time when I stop at the edge of the line and whip around.
“Jules, a country music concert?” I squint at her and then turn over my shoulder.
Standing on my tiptoes, I lean from side to side.
Dammit, she slowed me down. There’s a gigantic line already, and now I’m going to be stuck justifying the next twenty-four hours to someone who spends Friday nights at home eating microwave popcorn for dinner.
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with getting a babysitter and going out in your thirties.
“You don’t get out enough.” She deserves this. And frankly, after the hellish week of divorce papers I’ve had to deal with, I do too.
She nods. “I’m aware. But what if Henry has one of his episodes at bedtime because Jake forgets to leave the hall light on? Or if he tries to make pizza for dinner instead of his peanut butter banana? Or—”
She’s talking so fast I can hardly keep up, except for that last part.
“He’d eat a peanut butter banana over a piece of pizza?
” Asking this question brings me back to her reality.
This isn’t just a night out. It’s a plane ride away from her son.
Even though I have no one to answer to anymore, I won’t even begin to understand what it’s like worrying about a child all the time. Not to mention, one with autism.
“Not helping, Sum.”
“You’re right, I’m sorry.” I grab her by the arm and look into her eyes. “Did you leave a note for Jake?”
I expect it when she nods. The woman is more prepared than Santa Claus. She has to be.
“Okay, then it’s fine. It’s one night.” I shrug to make my point, even if I still feel guilty at seeming so nonchalant. I care about the stress this is causing her.
Her eyebrows pinch together, and I give her arm a gentle squeeze, listing off all the things she already knows but may need to hear again.
“Jake is Henry’s father. He’s spent the night with him plenty of times before, and if he faces something unexpected, he’ll figure it out. He gets to go out all the time. You deserve to have a little fun too!”
She chews on a fingernail for a second and then presses said finger into my sternum. “I’m sending you my therapy bill this month.”
I grin. “Sounds like the perfect way to spend my divorce settlement.”
She laughs.
I wrap an arm around her shoulder. “And you know how else I plan to spend it?”
“On popcor—”
“On a T-shirt with another man’s face on it,” I cut her off. “It’s called self-care, babe.” I kiss the top of her head.
“Aren’t those two things in the same category?” she argues.
I twist her to face me. “For the next twenty-four hours, everything is self-care. Give me your phone.”
She eyes me in the way only a person you’ve been best friends with for the better part of a decade would. She knows I’m going to turn it off before I even do.
I extend my arm toward her, palm flat, fingertips wriggling. “Give it.”
She snatches it from her purse, taps at the keyboard, and powers it off before handing it over.
“Good girl. T-shirt, then popcorn.” I take a step forward in line.
As the puppet I’ve made her, I twist her shoulders yet again to face the glorious display of pressed cotton tees with a dangerously good-looking man in a cowboy hat on the front. The corner of my mouth kicks up.
Rhett Dawson, you’re coming home with me tonight.
Forty-five minutes later we’re stuffed into the upper-level tier of the Bridgestone Arena listening to a cover of “Save a Horse, Ride a Cowboy.”
“Damn, he can sing!” Jules shouts, and knocks off the trucker hat she bought as a souvenir for Henry with her lasso arm. She’s breathless as she bends over to pick it up and wedges it in her folded seat.
I don’t even have to say it. Seeing her let loose is all the I told you so I need.
“Yes. He. Can.” My eyes trace a path from his cowboy boots to that tight smolder he carries across his mouth.
I know every other woman in this arena is probably doing the same thing, but deep down, it feels wrong to be gawking at someone who lost their fiancée six months ago.
Ever since he walked out on this stage, I’ve found myself analyzing his every move because of it, the news report coming back to me…
Country music sensation, Rhett Dawson, loses the mother of his child in a fatal accident early Saturday morning.
A fifty-five-year-old male driver operating a red sedan crossed the median and hit the female jogger at an intersection.
According to authorities, the investigation determined that the driver suffered a medical emergency, lost consciousness at the wheel, and was pronounced dead at the scene.
Emergency responders transported twenty-nine-year-old Eliza Blackwood to Nashville General Hospital with serious injuries.
Medical professionals were unable to save her after less than twenty-four hours in the ICU.
Both families are asking for privacy at this time as they grieve the loss of their loved ones.
The fact that he’s up there at all is a testament to what a strong person he must be.
Unlike me. It’s taken twelve years to face the reality that I’ve been anything but strong when it comes to my husband.
I knew the morning after we got married, when he said, “That’s what you want to do with your life?
” to something I’d been dreaming of, that I made a big mistake.
We’d known each other for six weeks. Six weeks! At nineteen, that felt like a lifetime. So, when he popped the question, I said yes—dove headfirst into a life-altering decision, just like I always do.
I frown.
“Do I make bad judgment calls?” It sounds like it’s coming out of nowhere, but truthfully, it’s been on my mind the entire flight here. I’ve just been pushing it away.
“What? No! I’m sorry I wasn’t on board before but look at me now! I got my popcorn. You got your shirt. All is right in the world.”
I don’t believe her. “I do, don’t I. It’s okay, you can admit it. I won’t be mad.”
She stops dancing. “Who are you, and what have you done with my best friend?”
I stop dancing too, my mood nosediving. “I’m impulsive. That’s always been my problem.”
“Is this a bad judgment call?” Jules waves her arm, showcasing the massive stadium with glittering lights we’re standing in.
“Not this. Brian. The steady stream of jobs.” I drop into my chair, the weight of it all hitting me at once.
She maintains eye contact, worry sinking her eyebrows together as she feels around for the edge of her own seat and folds it open next to me.
“Okay… yeah. We can call Brian a mistake. He’s an idiot who never deserved you. But the jobs? Sum, we wouldn’t have met if you hadn’t worked at the nursing home when my grammy got sick.”
I cringe at the memory of sour-smelling bedpans. There wasn’t a single second I loved about being a CNA. I didn’t even give them notice. I just stopped showing up one day. She tugs on my arm when shame causes me to hide my face.
“And what about those priceless birth photos you took of Henry that I love so much? I wouldn’t have them if you hadn’t tried photography.”
I chuckle. “Tried being the key term. It lasted six months.”
Every client always wanted a posed photo. If I wanted to take pictures of statues I would have worked at a museum.
“No. It didn’t,” she argues, her voice slipping into a scolding tone. “You continued to use that talent with your blog and your Etsy shop, even standing in that damn T-shirt line back there so you could document this night.”
She’s not wrong. That was one skill that transferred to several other creative outlets, none of which made all that much money though.
That has always been the problem. Well, Brian’s problem.
He hated when I’d try new things and drop them if they didn’t work the way I hoped they would.
He’s always called my life privileged, and he’s right.
But now I’m no longer married to a spouse with a stable income. He’s required to pay alimony for a while, but eventually, I’ll need something, and I don’t trust myself to choose what that is when I’ve clearly gotten it wrong every single time.
“I’m over here convincing you to go to a concert on a weeknight because I have no one to go home to, no real responsibilities. Let’s face it, Jules, I’m terrible at calling the shots in my own life.”
When she doesn’t say anything it feels like a confirmation. My shoulders slump. I don’t know where my confidence went.
“You should do it for me,” I say.
“Yeah. Okay.” She rolls her eyes at the same time mine grow three sizes.
“No, that’s it!” I grab her by the shoulders. “Jules… there is no one in the world I trust more than you. You’re the perfect combination of stable and brilliant. Maybe I just need some guidance for a while.”
“You’re asking for a single mother—a nursing student who lives off caffeine—to call the shots for you,” she reminds me.
“Yes.”
“Someone who will turn you down the next time you suggest, on a whim, to leave her kid for a country music concert.”
“Yes?” I question what she’s saying this time.
“I’m gonna go use the restroom and give you some time to come back to your senses,” she says, tucking her purse against her side and squeezing her way toward the aisle.
“I’ll come with you,” I offer, but she swipes her hand in the air.
“We’ll call this a test. I’m making the decision. You stay and enjoy those stars in your eyes.” She winks at me. “I’ll be right back.”
She disappears up the stairs, and I turn my attention back to the stage. Who wouldn’t have stars in their eyes watching those hips sway, watching him tip his cowboy hat? I’m not sure god has given a better gift than that, to be honest.
It’s several songs later when I’m wondering where she is that it hits me. Her phone. I shuffle through the contents of my purse. That minx! In the midst of my breakdown, she managed to snatch it back.
I check the stairs at the exact moment she happens to be hustling down them.
“Sum, I gotta go. It’s Henry. He’s being difficult for Jake, and he wants to FaceTime. It’s too loud in here to do that.”
She’s clinging to her purse strap and gnawing on her bottom lip. I hate seeing her like this. I just wanted her to have one night of no worries, and the only way I can give her that now is by getting her back to the hotel where it’s quiet. I scoot toward the aisle.
“You should stay. I’ll Uber,” she argues, but I shake my head.
“I got what I came for.” I spread my arms wide, showcasing my merchandise.
She laughs and lets me follow her.
We take the stairs as the lights dim, and I glance over my shoulder one last time to catch that sexy cowboy picking up his guitar. He strums a single chord, and the hair on my arms stands at attention.
He’s about to play my favorite song.
According to Julia, the only thing better than staying clear ’til the encore of a concert is leaving without the droves of people. Other than a few restrooms and concession stand lines, the hallways are completely empty. She seems more at ease.
Even with cement walls and steel doors in the way, I expected to hear the swell of music on our way out of the building.
So far, nothing. The February breeze bites at my skin and tornadoes my long blonde hair in a scarf around my neck.
I peel it away from my face and twist it up in a clip I find in the side pocket of my purse.
“I’m sorry I made you leave early,” Julia says again.
“It’s all right.” I sigh for dramatic effect. “Maybe I’ll roam the streets of Nashville. Find myself a hot cowboy who daylights as a veterinarian to take me out on a date.”
“Why does veterinarian feel out of place in that sentence?”
“What? I like a guy who likes animals.” I smirk because the only guy who has ever really been in my life definitely did not.
My attempt at humor doesn’t make Julia feel any better, and I don’t want her to torture herself anymore over this, so I shimmy and make a joke to get her to laugh. “You were just ready to sleep with me and Rhett Dawson tonight. No sense in being ashamed about it.”
Hotels in downtown Nashville are not cheap. We opted for one on the outskirts of the city with a single queen bed to save on costs. The sleeping together part of that sentence is accurate, just not the sexual innuendo.
My joke works. She giggles, but then her eyes widen.
“Dang it. I forgot Henry’s hat!”
I recall her stuffing it between her folded seat. It must have fallen through the crack and onto the floor when she sat during my come-apart. This is my fault.
I shuffle through gum wrappers, hair ties, several tubes of lip gloss, and crumbs before I pull out our rental car keys from the bottom of my purse. I toss them in the air, and she catches them.
“I’ll go get it and meet you at the parking garage.” I turn around before she can stop me and make a break for the window-covered building that looks like a UFO landed on top of it. The one—as I was about to discover—with the no re-entry policy.