Chapter 23 #2
“We were kids. Of course we had fun, but we’ve been back in Celestial for years and nothing has happened.” He pulls me closer and touches his soft lips to my cheek. “I’m seeing Luna now. I’m not interested in revisiting the past.”
I knew Silas had said something in passing, but we haven’t talked about the status of our relationship.
As much as I try to tell myself he’s just saying this to push Kayleigh away, I know Tate would never compromise my feelings to get to her.
My heart practically leaps out of my chest, and hope I didn’t know I would ever feel about a man races through my veins.
“Oh…you’re…oh!” Her face crumbles as she stutters over her words. “I didn’t know. I’m so sorry. Wow! Tate, in a relationship again. Who would’ve thought?”
His arms cage me in as the heat of his breath grazes the side of my face. “Not me, that’s for sure.”
“Well, congratulations,” she says. “I know coming back home wasn’t something you were thrilled about, but I’m glad it’s working out in the end.”
The challenge behind her eyes fades, and the bitchy luster of her perfect smile dims. She remembers to check her posture a second too late, and her shoulders fall under the weight of a crestfallen heart.
The jealousy I felt only moments ago morphs into sympathy.
She might be unpleasant, and this conversation has been nothing short of painful, but to have Tate, even for a second, and lose him? I can’t help but feel sorry for her.
If that happened to me, I’d be mad fifteen years later too.
“It was nice meeting you,” I say, and surprisingly, it’s only a half lie. “Maybe I’ll see you around sometime?”
“It’s Celestial. I’m sure you will.” Her smile wavers before she walks away, and she looks so much younger without the catty slant to her eyes.
“Was it just me,” I begin once she’s gone, “or was that incredibly awkward?”
“It wasn’t just you.” He turns me around so we’re face-to-face and so close, our noses touch. “Now you can see why all my orders are to-go and I like to stay inside more often than not.”
“I can imagine that it gets old fast.”
“You’d imagine right,” he says. “I was over it the first time it happened…twelve years ago. It doesn’t matter how much time has passed; something like this always happens. Someone is always standing nearby, waiting to remind me of the past.”
The band onstage takes a bow and says their farewell for the night. Sweat-covered cowboys and cowgirls pour into the bar area, eager to rehydrate with whiskey and beer after a busy night of line dancing just in time for Kacey Musgraves’s crisp voice to fall out of the speakers.
I intertwine our fingers together, pulling Tate with me as I start walking backward. “If they’re always watching, then the least we could do is give them a show.”
I expect him to fight me on this and pull me back to the bar, but his onyx eyes warm and his hand tightens around mine as we walk onto the now-empty dance floor.
The hush that falls over the Whiskey Rose is deafening, and my skin burns with the heat of all the gazes glued to us.
My cowboy boots clack against the hardwood floors as he pulls me closer and drops his arms around my waist. We sway together, his eyes never leaving mine, as Kacey makes him promise not to be too good to be true.
I’ve never loved being the center of attention, but wrapped in Tate’s arms, everyone around us falls away and it’s just me and Tate in the middle of the room.
One song turns into another, and eventually, people stop staring and join in.
Their quiet chatter blends with the country voices floating through the speakers, but my attention never leaves Tate.
His hand settles on the curve of my back like it was designed to be there. “I don’t think I’ve danced like this since high school.”
“I’m not sure I even did this in high school.” I loved the idea of a coming-of-age romance moment as much as anyone, but reality never quite lived up to the hype for me.
Until now.
“Probably for the best,” he says. “Kayleigh did teach me to dance, but she left out the part where I missed a count and almost broke her toe.”
“Ouch.” I shudder at the thought. I saw the pictures of Tate in high school in his parents’ house—he was far from scrawny. “That does alter the story a little bit though.”
Not that I blame her. A clunky teenage boy not paying attention and stepping on your toes isn’t nearly as much fun as the romantic tale she tried to weave.
“That’s how all the stories in Celestial feel. So close to the truth that you can’t be sure what’s real and what’s not. At least this time she spun it in my favor.”
He’s hinted at the gossip in Celestial more than once, and I’ve been around long enough to hear whispers here and there.
Before everything happened between us, I didn’t want to pry and I definitely didn’t want to push.
But now? Now I feel safe enough to ask him the questions that have been skirting around my brain for the last few weeks.
I only hope he feels safe enough to answer.
“What happened?” I ask. “I know your family are basically the local celebrities around here, but there’s something different about the way people look at you compared to Silas.”
His muscles go taut and his jaw clenches, but his eyes go soft.
It’s as if his mind is at odds with his body, and I can see his brain working and feel his heart beating.
I’m waiting to see which side wins as the beginning chords of the next song play and Garth Brooks’s familiar voice drifts over the room in the way only his voice can, and all of a sudden, I forget what I asked and why I asked it in the first place.
The tricky thing about grief is, even in the best-case scenario—if there is such a thing—it’s not a straight line.
Some days are good, some are bad, and a lot of them are both.
The line goes up and down and back up again until eventually, the lows aren’t as low and highs are even higher.
The problem for me isn’t that the line has been too low or even that it’s moved too slow; it’s that there hasn’t been a line at all.
My grief has been so elusive, so fleeting, I’ve spent months trying to capture the dark cloud hovering overhead.
I’ve prayed for the skies to open and rain down the emotions that have evaded me for so long.
Like if maybe the numbness began to wear off and I could feel anything at all, I might finally be able to move forward. Not just run away.
I’ve been waiting for the moment it would finally come. I just didn’t think the storm would roll in when I had blistered feet, a whiskey-clouded mind, and the full attention of a good man.
“Hey,” he says, and the concern in that one little word is the only thing louder than the song forcing its way into my soul. “Are you alright?”
I nod my head and hold on to him tighter.
“I’m okay, I’m okay,” I repeat, unsure who I’m trying to convince, myself or Tate. “I’ll be okay. It’s just…”
It’s just that when you’re used to feeling nothing, even a hint of emotion has the power to knock you off-balance, and right now, I’ve lost my equilibrium altogether.
His eyes narrow and he watches me closely. “Just what?”
“My mom.” Those two words alone cause my chest to go tight. My head swims with every sharp, labored breath, and the tears that have long run dry nip at my sinuses. “She loved this song.”
Realization crosses his face and chases away all thoughts of rumors and secrets.
His hand leaves my back, and before I can even process what’s happening, the humid night air is filling my lungs and noise from the honky-tonk is muffled behind us.
I didn’t finish the single drink I ordered, but it’s like my feet aren’t connected to my brain.
After I stumble the second time, Tate takes over so that I’m in his arms and my offending feet are no longer on the ground.
His pace doesn’t slow, and his boots kick up the loose gravel of the packed parking lot until we reach his truck in the very last row.
He opens the door for me and makes quick work of setting me on the passenger seat. “Seat belt, baby,” he whispers before touching his mouth to mine. “I’ll have you home soon.”
Maybe it’s because he asked so nicely or maybe it’s because the lump in my throat hasn’t fully dissipated yet, but for once, I forgo giving him a hard time and do what he asks.
I reach for my seat belt with shaky hands. “Thank you.”
He leans in and tucks a stray curl behind my ear. “You never have to thank me for this,” he says.
If there’s anything I should thank him for, it is this, but he closes my door before I can tell him he’s wrong.
Tate hurries to the driver’s side and the engine rumbles to life beneath me as he throws the truck into gear. He pulls out of the parking lot, and songs that I hear, but don’t listen to, play on the radio while Tate makes his way through the quiet streets.
I roll down the windows the moment Celestial fades away and the empty highway spreads out in front of us.
The warm breeze dances against my skin and rustles my curls.
Stars wink and the moon shines above us, nothing but the bright headlights cutting through the heavy, dark night.
I close my eyes and push away the grief I’m not ready to feel, searching for the numbness to come back.
And just as my heart rate slows and my breathing returns to normal, Tate’s raspy voice turns my attention back to him.
“When we get back to your place, I want to tell you.”
I sit up and look at him, but it’s hard to tell what he’s thinking under the glow of his dashboard. “Tell me what?”
“Everything,” he says. “I want you to know everything.”