Chapter 6
Chapter Six
June 2024
J ames was back in London. Despite the season and the bright sun across the rest of the Northern Hemisphere, the city of his birth was glossy with rain. A thick blanket of clouds pulled through the glass skyscrapers and cuddled against the cozy pubs. It was only fifty-two degrees.
But James was accustomed to the moodiness of London. It suited him. It suited the music he often listened to. Wearing his new noise-canceling headphones, he waded through the streets, listening intently to the brand-new album of a musician he was set to interview next week. Frank Baxter. He was a little bit older than James, but his lyrics were inspired; his take on the movement of a song was different from anything James had heard. It gave James hope for something. Maybe it was just hope for his creative future and career.
James paused at a crosswalk and waited as a massive red double-decker bus went by. James was always extra careful in London. He’d spent so much time in America at this point that he’d grown accustomed to people driving on the right side of the road rather than the left. He had no desire to be run over. There were still so many things he needed to do.
The dampness was getting to him. His bones felt weary. He ducked into a pub called The Three Pigeons and sat at the ornate wooden bar, warming his hands. It was a little past six at night, and the pub filled up with people leaving work and meeting friends. A balding man in the corner kissed his girlfriend with reckless abandon; it was the sort of passion James thought was faked. But what did he know about passion?
He’d once known, he remembered. He’d once understood.
The bartender poured James a beer. It was crisp and cold and good, but it warmed his insides after his long walk.
He pulled his phone from his pocket to find several texts from Taylor. She was back in New York, taking summer classes at Pratt University. She sent a selfie of herself in the library, plus the text: All my friends are outside enjoying their lives, and I’m HERE. Miserable.
James laughed to himself. His heart ballooned with pride.
It was hard to believe that it had already been two years ago that Taylor had left New York to travel across the country with her boyfriend Aiden’s metal-rock band, Bad Habit. At the time, James and Nancy hadn’t known what to make of it. Our daughter! She needs to be in school! But true to Taylor, she’d found a way to squeeze the most life and artistry out of that time.
It was a new type of world, James knew. He didn’t always know what to make of it. But just as soon as Taylor left for tour, she began posting videos, blogs, status updates, and photographs that captured what life on the road was like in the 2020s. She was sort of like a music journalist, but with her own take on things, her own creativity spun into it. As Bad Habit continued across the country, she asked for personal interviews with the bands they toured with, and she even left Bad Habit for a period to play bass for an all-girl rock band whose full-time bassist broke her hand playing volleyball.
Taylor was soon just as famous as Bad Habit.
Bad Habit’s fame continued with Taylor’s.
Now, in the summer of 2024, Taylor Atkinson was something of an It-girl. She had nearly a million followers on Instagram and TikTok, and she’d been featured in several fashion and lifestyle magazines. Girls wanted to wear what she was wearing. Men wanted to date her.
But Taylor was a romantic, James knew. She was still head over heels for Aiden. And now that Aiden and Bad Habit were in New York City, recording a new album and chilling out after two years of nearly nonstop touring, Taylor had decided to stay in the city, too. That was why she’d enrolled in classes at Pratt. That was why she was trapped at a library. Because she still saw validity in education.
James was now accustomed to musicians he interviewed asking him, “Wait, is Taylor Atkinson your daughter?”
“She always lands on her feet,” James and Nancy had begun to tell each other when they spoke on the phone every few weeks. “We have to trust her.”
James and Nancy had both come around on Aiden, too. He’d seemed greasy and tired and useless during that first meeting. But the truth was, he was a driven musician who rarely drank alcohol. You had to be driven to make it in this industry. James knew that.
The bartender put another pint on the bar. “All right, mate?” he asked James.
“Sure thing,” James said.
“Gloomy as all get-out, ain’t it?”
James laughed. “I prefer it.” He sipped his beer. “I moved to New York many years ago. It doesn’t suit me. My skin needs the rain.”
“New York? You like it over there?” The bartender dried a pint glass and put it on a shelf.
What could James say about New York? It captivated his imagination. It had an energy and a pulse he couldn’t fully fathom, and sometimes he couldn’t sleep because he felt the city churning around him.
“It’s great,” James said instead.
“I dated an American girl once,” the bartender said. He was maybe thirty, thirty-one, with a bubbling of pimples along his jawline. “She was fun. Loud.”
James laughed.
“Have you taken up with an American lady over there?” the bartender asked.
James rubbed his own jaw, remembering his pimples of long ago. When was his last one?
“I married one,” James confessed. “We’ve since divorced, though. We didn’t make it more than five years.”
“That’s too bad,” the bartender said.
James wondered how many people spoke about their divorces in pubs across England. “I was dating another woman recently,” he explained. “She was a book editor at a major publisher. Very smart. Much smarter than me.”
“But you broke things off?”
James’s heart thudded at the memory. “We cut things off about six months ago. It was messy and complicated. We needed room to breathe and think.” He sipped his beer. “Not long after that, I came back here.”
“To breathe in the rain,” the bartender said.
“Something like that.”
In the corner, the balding man had begun to kiss his girlfriend again. It was bizarre. They had no shame!
“I wasn’t sure if we were really in love,” James offered of his relationship with Kinsey. “I wondered if we were just pretending. Maybe we were going through the motions of romantic love.”
The bartender chuckled. “I’ve had the same thought before. But I always come to the same conclusion. How does anyone know what’s fake and what’s real? Life passes anyway. And it’s better to feel something. Don’t you think?”
James raised his eyebrows. The bartender was making a whole lot of sense. Where had he been six months ago, when he and Kinsey had cried quietly at her kitchen table and agreed “something wasn’t right”?
When James had told Nancy he was going to London for a while, she’d said, “You’re running away from her, aren’t you?”
Nancy knew him better than anyone. That was not always an easy thing.
James paid for his two pints and stepped back into the rain. It was eight thirty, and he was starving. He trudged through the city streets, thinking about his damp flat, the one he’d rented from a friend when he’d come back to London. He had five more days left here before he was needed back in Manhattan. He was set to interview the musician he’d been listening to all day prior to his gig at Madison Square Garden.
Playing Madison Square Garden was an enormous feat. James wondered if the musician was ever nervous about that. Or if he ever pinched himself and thought, I made it.
Maybe nobody ever thought they really made it, not in this business.
James decided not to go home. He couldn’t take it. He was an awful cook, and whatever he made for himself would depress him. So he cut into an Indian restaurant, where he was seated at a table with a view of the street. The server recognized him from his bi-monthly visits and asked, “The usual?” James agreed. He didn’t want to bother with the menu.
James texted Taylor back, hoping his words would motivate her to keep studying. But he knew she was heading back out on tour this autumn—this time actually playing bass in Bad Habit because their bassist had gotten kicked out of the band for saying offensive things on social media. As Taylor explained it, Bad Habit had a no-tolerance policy against that behavior.
He hoped she’d get her degree one day. But he also wanted her to live as much as she could.
We only get one life.
Suddenly, his phone flashed with Kinsey’s photograph. She was calling.
James couldn’t breathe. When was the last time he’d spoken to her? They’d gone no contact after the breakup, choosing to make things clean.
But just now, he’d been talking about her to the bartender. It was as though he’d mentally called her.
James’s hands shook. He answered the phone. “Hello?”
“You answered.”
James closed his eyes. Her voice brought him back to their two-year-long relationship—breakfasts and sleepovers and trips to Maine, long conversations about books and movies and music, concerts and laughter. They’d built a life together that was almost too easily abandoned. Why had they killed it? He couldn’t remember right then.
“How are you?” James asked.
“Where are you? It sounds loud,” Kinsey said.
“I’m at a restaurant,” he said.
“By yourself?”
Was she fishing to see if he had a girlfriend in London?
“I’m alone,” he said. “Indian food.”
“You always said New York’s Indian couldn’t stack up to London’s.”
“I still say that.” James laughed.
Maybe she was calling because she suspected he was coming back for the gig at Madison Square Garden.
“How are you?” James asked again.
But again, she evaded the question. “How’s the weather over there?”
“It hasn’t stopped raining in six months,” he said.
“You’ve been there for six months.”
“Exactly,” James said.
Kinsey laughed softly. It was a beautiful sound. James wanted to record it.
“Listen, I’m coming back to New York next week,” he said, trying to keep his voice easy. “I’m interviewing Frank Baxter for Spin magazine before his gig at Madison Square Garden.”
“I wondered if you were going to do that,” Kinsey said. “I know how much you like him.”
“It’s a dream come true to cover him,” James said. He tugged at his collar. “Maybe you could come with me. I have a guest list and backstage passes for the gig.”
Kinsey took a breath. He tried to picture her. Was she in her office at the publishing house, sunlight pouring through the big glass window? Did she have a healthy summer tan from her runs in Central Park?
He suddenly needed to see her. Desperately.
“I don’t know,” Kinsey said after a long pause.
“No pressure,” James assured her. “But I think it would be fun. We always had fun at gigs together.”
Kinsey sighed. James could feel the ache in her heart. It was the same as his.
“Maybe we can grab dinner beforehand?” Kinsey offered. “I have something to tell you.”
James felt a lurch in his stomach. Something to tell you.
It can’t be. I thought I was so careful. I thought we were so careful.
It was as though history was repeating itself.
All at once, it was twenty-plus years ago. All at once, he was receiving a phone call that had pulled him back to New York City and changed his life forever.
She must be pregnant, James decided. It’s the only explanation.
What am I going to do?
But James kept his voice steady. “That sounds good. You pick the place, and I’ll call and make a reservation.”
“No need. I can make the reservation,” she said.
James took a staggered breath. If she’s pregnant, then what? I’ll just move back to Manhattan. I’ll co-parent. Again. The kids are great. Really, they are. Taylor will be a brilliant older sibling. Nancy will laugh at me, but I deserve to be laughed at.
Children are a joy.
Or maybe Kinsey and I can make a go of it again. Maybe we can find a way to be happy. We loved each other, didn’t we? Sort of?
“So I’ll see you next week,” Kinsey said.
“Looking forward.” James’s voice was overly bright.
They hung up the phone right as the server arrived with James’s usual—butter chicken with extra spice. His heart hammered. He wasn’t sure if he could eat anything.
I have something to tell you.
“Can I take this to go, actually?” he asked in a meek voice.
He didn’t feel very well.
Change was coming.