Chapter 20
BOBBY
“Goddamn it, pay attention or you’re gonna take out a whole fucking tree!” Brutal bellows, his voice echoing through the row. The row I’m not remotely close to hitting with the Gator.
I spin around, doing a doughnut before aiming the vehicle toward the far side of the plot we’re checking. So far, it’s looked great. No bugs, good growth, and better than average production.
All of which should put me in a good mood. But I’ve been feeling strangled by my own skin these last few days.
I’ve worked, same as always. I’ve gone into town to have dinner with Willow, same as always. I’ve slept at her house, same as always. We’ve made love, same as always. And I’ve left early to get home to start my day all over again, same as always.
It’s exactly what I want, so I should be as happy as a pig in slop.
But there’s something gnawing at me, making me prickly and even more of an asshole than usual. Brutal can feel it, and I know Willow can feel it.
She’s been so sweet, comforting me through the ‘loss’ of my dream by telling me how amazing I am, that Jeremy will regret not signing me, and that another opportunity will come along. I feel like shit taking her kindness when it’s based on a lie, but I can’t tell her the truth.
The sour-tongued truth is, I’d do anything for you.
“Shit! Pull over,” Brutal orders. He’s pointing at a particular tree with one hand and hanging on to the dash with the other as I squeal to a stop.
Well, the Gator would’ve squealed if I wasn’t on moist grass.
But the irrigation keeps everything watered, so it’s more of a power slide that sends us forward in our seats before popping us back.
Brutal’s huff is one of annoyance, a sound that might as well be the soundtrack to my life given how many times I’ve heard it. He hops out and plucks a pear from the tree he indicated.
“I forgot Mama Louise asked for one of these. Run it up to her, will ya? I’ll check this row and the next till you get back.” He puts the green pear in the cup holder on the dash, knowing full well it won’t stay there with the way I normally drive this thing.
“Sure thing. Back in a few,” I say, spinning out again to head toward the house.
I swear I hear Brutal yell out, “Take your time, asshole.”
The Gator races across the land, bumping and catching a tiny amount of air as I fly over the acres. The wind blows away my swirling thoughts for a brief moment of respite, the speed making me feel like I’m racing toward something and away from it all at once.
At the main Bennett house, I park out front and bound up the porch, pear in hand. I don’t knock, we’ve been told not to bother, and barge right on in to find Mama Louise.
“Mama Louise?” I yell.
Her head pops around the doorway to the kitchen. “What’s wrong?”
I can see why she’d think that. We’re busy, working sunup to sundown, and she doesn’t see much of us mid-day. She’s busy too with her own list of chores that keep this place running smoothly. Honestly, her job is probably harder than any of ours. I don’t know how she does it.
“Nothing. Sorry, didn’t mean to scare ya. Brutal said you asked for a pear sample from the back acre. You thinking of doing something with ’em?”
Her brows furrow together, turning the lines on her forehead into grooves. In confusion, she repeats after me, “A pear?”
Comprehension dawns on her face, then mine.
“You didn’t want a pear, did you?” I growl.
Her grin is full of unreleased laughter. “No, can’t say that I did. But I’m guessing you’ve been a bit of grump and Brutal thought a few minutes away from you would be nice.”
She’s as blunt as a battering ram, and I can’t help but argue. “I’m not that bad.”
One of her brows quirks and her lips purse. That’s all the rebuttal she needs. “Follow me.”
She crooks a finger, and I follow her into the kitchen, where she’s grabbing two glasses out of the cabinet.
“Is this the part where you ply me with your special sweet tea to make me spill my guts about what’s got me in a mood?” I know I’m being rude, but I can’t find it in me to tone it down, not even for Mama Louise.
She grabs a blue pitcher from the refrigerator and fills the glasses, setting one in front of me. “No, it’s not even two o’clock in the afternoon and my special sweet tea is for evening drinking only.”
“It’s so bad, you can only do it in the dark?”
She swats my shoulder, but not angrily. “Filthy boy. Drink that water. You need it after the morning in the field, and if Brutal needs to be clear of you for a few minutes, you’re not sitting around like a bump on a log. You can help me work.”
I grunt but swallow down the cool, refreshing water.
“Good. Follow me,” she orders again, and like a good dog, I do.
Outside, her garden is thick and lush. She’s definitely got a green thumb, gifted with getting things to grow tall and hardy. Like her sons. Like us Tannens, even though we were full-grown when she pulled us out of our too-small pots and replanted us in richer soil.
“We’re weeding the garden and harvesting anything that looks ready.” All business and no mushy stuff, we get to it.
It’s quiet as we work, and I find myself humming. After a bit, Mama Louise hums along with me, picking up the melody from Dig Down Deeper.
“That one new?” she asks.
She’s broaching the subject carefully, casually, as if I won’t catch on to our conversational topic if she doesn’t spell it out for me in bold, exclamation marked statements like Shayanne is prone to do.
“Yep.” That’s all she’s getting from me, today or any other day.
“It’s pretty.”
I wait for the questions that don’t come—what’s wrong? Why are you grumpy? Wanna talk about Nashville?
The answers—Nothing. Same as always. No.
But we’re silent. I dig into the earth, feeling its cool graininess in my hands. Mama Louise lets me avoid her unasked questions for a long while.
Finally, she’s had enough and stops, resting her dirty hand on her face to shield her eyes from the sun.
“If you’ve gotten so grumpy that Brutal is ditching you, we should probably figure out what we’re doing tomorrow too. You thinking we should can some bourbon carrots or weed the yard? Both gotta get done, so I’ll let you choose.”
“I can’t. Brutal and I have another row to check.”
“Then you’d better get yourself in a better mood, mister. Pull that weed,” she directs, pointing at a big one I missed with my distracted mind elsewhere.
I yank on it hard, taking out my frustrations on the weed that’s grown where it shouldn’t be. A lot like me. I’ve grown tall and hardy here in Great Falls, and it’s a great . . . garden. But what if I’m meant for another, bigger garden of my own? Like Nashville.
The weed gives way suddenly, and I go sprawling on my ass in the dirt. Knees bent, I rest my arms on them and let my head fall.
“They offered me the record deal,” I whisper. I shouldn’t confess to this. It’ll ruin everything, but I can’t stop it from affecting me and that’s ruining me too.
Mama Louise doesn’t so much as slow down with her weed pulling. “Of course they did. The question is . . . why did you say they didn’t?”
I blink in confusion. “Wait, you knew I got an offer?”
She stops, her eyes boring into me. She’s always had kind eyes, blue and fringed with dark blonde lashes, but now, those eyes are looking at me as if I’m dumber than the tomato plants.
“Of course they’d want you. Your songs are amazing, poetry like nothing I’ve ever heard. You’ve got the voice of an angel” —I snort in disbelief, but she steamrolls over me— “mixed with the grit of the devil. It’s beautiful, Bobby. A gift.”
I let her compliments sink in. Most folks, I simply brush their praise off. But not hers. Mama Louise’s means something to me.
“Thanks.” That’s as far as I get for a long while as I search for the words to explain what happened. Mama Louise doesn’t rush me, as if she knows this is difficult for me.
Finally, the story comes.
I tell her how intimidating the office was, with a whole room full of people judging me.
I tell her about the crowd at the Bar and how I won them over, which felt amazing.
She smiles at that, nodding like ‘I told you so.’ I tell her about working with Miller and Rory, deeper stories than I told at the dinner table.
“Miller made me feel like I could really do something. I mean, I know I can sing. And I write all the time. But it was like with the tiniest push, it was all on a higher level. One I didn’t know I was capable of.
What if there’s more that I’m capable of?
” I wonder aloud, not meaning to say that last part.
“I’m sure there is. You can discover it yourself, though. Or book some time with this Miller fellow yourself if you want to. I’m sure he does private appointments. Everyone does for the right price. It only matters if it’s worth it to you.”
I mull that over for a second.
“They had conditions for the contract offer,” I tell Mama Louise.
She frowns. “What sort of conditions?”
This is the harder part, the confession about what I’ve done.
“Jeremy said I needed a band, and that was fine by me. Then he started talking about my image. They wanted to turn me into some sort of bad boy manwhore.”
“Man-what?” Mama Louise repeats, just shy of a shriek.
I nod, not willing to repeat the word in front of her. She might’ve not corrected my language once, but she’ll damn well do it if I say whore again. “Exactly what you’re thinking. They wanted me to be single . . . to break up with Willow.”
“And you said no.” Her voice is flat, not belying what she thinks about that, good or bad.
“I tried. Jeremy told me to think real hard before I answered either way. I told him no on Wednesday. It’s the right thing to do.”
“Well, I’ll say that I don’t know a thing about music, other than what I like to listen to on the radio.
But I reckon those people do, so they might be right about the way to make the most of your voice.
The question is . . . do you care what they say?
Right or wrong, contract or not, what do you want, Bobby? ”
I can’t answer that. I should be able to.
It should be the easiest answer in the world—the contract that so many people, me included, dream of for so long.
But on the other hand, I’ve never known love like this, and I’ve been searching my whole life.
Some people search even longer than I have. And I won’t give that up lightly.
“You’re choosing Willow over the deal.” It’s not a question, it’s a statement.
“Yeah.” I am. She’s everything, way more important than this deal. And I’ll still have music, just not the big stadiums and bright lights. I can sing at Hank’s, and it’ll be enough. It always has been.
“You sure?” Mama Louise is giving me an out, telling me it’s okay to choose either way, but my decision has already been made. Now, it’s just time to live my happily ever after with it.
“I am.”
“Good,” she says with a smile. She seems .
. . pleased? But that can’t be right. “You deserve to get what you want, Bobby. Lord knows, you kids have been through enough, and you deserve to have something go your way for a change. I really and truly thought it was going to be this deal, but . . .” She sighs, looking up toward the sky for a moment as if there are answers to be found in the cloudless sky.
“If your dream changes, if it looks different than it did when you were eighteen and didn’t have a clue about how hard life can be and what’s really important, that’s okay.
And getting what you want now over what you wanted then is still a good thing. I’m happy for you.”
I’m looking down, letting her words wash over me and soothe the hurt, all of them—losing Mom, losing my innocence, losing Dad, not when he died but before that when he truly checked out on us, and even losing this opportunity.
I feel her grubby finger on my chin, forcing me to lift up and meet her eyes. “I’m proud of you, Bobby.”
Fuck. I didn’t know I needed to hear that, especially about this. Choosing Willow was easy, automatic, and I know she’s what I truly want. But that doesn’t mean not choosing the deal doesn’t hurt like a motherfucker.
“Thank you,” I grit out.
She nods, like that’s that. “Get that one too, will you?” She points to another weed.
And this time, when I pull at it and it refuses to come loose, I wonder if maybe, instead of my being stuck in Great Falls, this weed could be Willow putting down roots here with me?
The weed gives way, but there’s another one right next to it so I keep going, clearing Mama Louise’s garden long after she goes inside and leaves me to my thoughts.
Root into me, stay by my side. We’ll grow together, two as one.