16. 16
Hayes
Now
L ast night, after I dropped Annabelle off at her friend’s house, I came back to my condo and helped myself to a few fingers of whiskey, ignoring the incessant buzzing from my phone.
Sitting on my balcony, drinking and thinking, the hours slowly ticked by until I finally rolled into bed in the wee hours of the morning.
I needed time to process what had happened before I started talking to friends about it. And receiving their unsolicited opinions. We’re as close to family as you can get without sharing blood, so they won’t hold back telling me what they think.
Last night was such a fucked-up, wonderful turn of events. In finding Annabelle again, I feel as though I’ve uncovered a vital part of myself that had been missing. Over the years, I’ve lost track of who I wanted to be, but Annabelle makes me want to be the best man I can be.
Someone worthy of her. Finding her and feeling the same magnetic force that I felt at Tank's put things in perspective.
I realized how empty and shallow my life has become.
Music, drinking, meaningless hookups. But none of those things fill the void that resides within my chest. Not like Annabelle does.
A year ago, she provided me inspiration, but now… Now that I've found her again, she'll become my future. I know it in my gut.
My phone lights up with another notification. Rubbing the sleep from my eyes, I sit up in bed and grab my phone from the nightstand. Reading the messages, I realize my friends are none too happy with my delay in responding to them. Tough shit.
Rowdy
Man, I’m so glad you found Annabelle. LMK how it goes.
You okay? Is everything good between the two of you? We’re here if you need us.
Dumber/Josh
Shit, I’m still in shock. Did you find Anna?
Rowdy
Don’t leave me hanging, man. All good?
Bailey
OMG! Fill me in. I can’t believe you found her!!! Yippee!
Dumb/James
Want to meet for drinks tomorrow? I’m here for you. Love you, brother.
Rowdy
Hayes, can you fucking let me know you’re alive? Bailey won’t stop harassing me. Give me something, man.
Seriously, proof of life is required. Bailey’s driving me fucking crazy.
Bailey
Ruston Hayes! Are you alive? Did she kill you and leave you in a ditch somewhere? ANSWER ME!
Char
Congrats. But please tell me there won’t be any photos in tomorrow’s paper of your reunion.
Charlotte’s text makes me chuckle. Rather than responding individually, I send a text to our group chat.
Me
All good. Sorry for not getting back to y’all last night, but I needed some time to think. Meet for dinner and drinks tonight?
Within seconds, my phone chimes with a flood of incoming texts agreeing to dinner.
Pushing that from my mind, I plan how to weasel my way into Annabelle’s life.
After making a quick call to order some food, I drive over to the K-Country radio station building and park facing its front doors.
My plan may not work, especially if she works remotely, but I’m hoping that my patience will pay off and I can catch her on her way to lunch.
I wait in my truck. The proper, gentlemanly thing to do would be to go inside and meet her, but I don’t want to make it weird or difficult for her at work if someone sees us together, especially since she’s not expecting me.
I’ve only been waiting for twenty minutes when she strolls out wearing a red coat with her blonde hair snapping around her face in the wind.
Pulling my baseball cap over my head, I hop from my truck and stride toward Annabelle.
When I call her name, she looks almost as shocked as she did last night.
But today when she sees me, her face lights up after her initial surprise.
“I was hoping I could take you to lunch.”
“Lunch,” she repeats slowly.
Glancing at Annabelle’s friend, the same one who busted us on the front porch last night, I offer my hand and introduce myself.
“I’m Laura,” she twitters as she shakes my hand, holding it for just a second south of awkward.
“You’re more than welcome to join us, too.”
“No, no. That’s okay. Thanks though,” she smiles, looking a little starstruck. “I’ll catch up with you later, Anna.”
After Laura walks to her car, I ask, “So? Lunch?”
Annabelle grins, popping her dimples. “Well, since you ran off Laura, I suppose I can go to lunch with you.”
Walking her to my truck, I explain my plan, “I figured grabbing lunch would be the easiest time for you to meet, since you wouldn’t need to arrange a babysitter for Grace and Claire.”
“I appreciate that… and I’m impressed you even remember my daughters’ names. ”
Opening the passenger door of my truck, I gesture for her to hop in. Unlike last night, she fastens her own seatbelt, and I have mixed feelings about it. I’m glad she’s in a better frame of mind today, but it would have given me a good excuse to invade her personal space again.
“I’d planned on taking you for a picnic lunch at a nearby park, but the weather’s a little cooler than I’d like. If it’s too cold, we can eat in the truck.”
Annabelle pats my hand. “I’m sure it’ll be fine outside, Hayes.”
“If it gets too cold, let me know and I can warm you up.” Luckily, my joke lands and Annabelle laughs.
When I turn on the truck, Willie Nelson's voice flows through the speakers.
I tap in a few words on the dashboard and pull up a Taylor Swift playlist on Spotify.
Some song I've never heard comes on. I look over to Annabelle, expecting she'll be pleased that I remembered she liked Taylor Swift, but she has an uncomfortable grimace on her lips.
"Want me to change it to a different playlist? I thought you liked—"
"I did. I do," she amends quickly. "I love Taylor Swift. It's just this song. I don't like this particular song. Sorry."
"No need to apologize, Yankee." I see the song title, loml , and add it to my databank of facts about Annabelle as I skip to the next song. Unlike loml , Lavender Haze is met with a smile.
I drive to a nearby park that surrounds a pond.
It’s chilly outside, just nippy enough that most people aren’t hanging out at a park, so we have the place to ourselves.
After handing Annabelle a blanket to carry, I lug the picnic basket over to a scenic spot overlooking the pond.
Once we’re settled, I unpack the contents of the basket.
“Hayes, you brought enough food to feed a small army!”
I lift one shoulder. “Wasn’t sure what you liked, and I didn’t want to send you back to work hungry. ”
“Foodwise, I like most anything. Except beets. They taste like dirt. Oh, and oysters. They’re slimy and gross, and the thought of eating one makes me want to gag. Grace and I call them sea boogers.” She pretends to shudder. “What about you?”
“I’m a typical guy. I’ll eat anything, especially if I don’t have to make it myself.”
“Not a cook, huh?”
Handing her a plastic plate, I motion for Annabelle to help herself.
“Never had the opportunity to learn. My mom wasn’t around much growing up because she worked two jobs to make ends meet.
I went to college and lived in the dorms all four years, so I ate my meals in the dorm cafeterias.
Then we worked our asses off to make Outlaw successful, crisscrossing the states, and we ate whatever cheap shit we could afford, mostly ramen noodles and food from the McDonald’s dollar menu. ”
“Did I just get the abridged version of the Ruston Hayes autobiography?”
I chuckle. “You sure did.”
“Where’d you go to college?”
“Rowdy and I played football at Southern Alabama. Got offered a scholarship, which is the only way I could afford school.”
“That explains the muscles.”
Smirking, I tease, “You checking out my muscles?”
Ignoring my attempt at flirting, Annabelle asks, “Where’s your dad in all this? You never mentioned him.”
“I don’t know,” I admit, grateful that the pain of having an absent father has lessened a lot over the years. “He left when my mom got pregnant, and I don’t know much about him.”
Annabelle looks up from her food, intrigued. “You were raised by a single mom? ”
“Yes, Annabelle, I was. She sacrificed a lot to raise me alone.”
“Hmm,” is all she says, but I think that disclosure earned a point in my favor. If she’s hung up on our lives being different, it must help that I have some understanding of her life as a single mother, even if it’s from the child’s perspective. "Tell me more about Outlaw."
"We started Outlaw in high school. Just writing songs and playing around for fun.
Mostly because the girls loved that we were in a band," I admit with a smile.
"Then, when high school graduation rolled around, we went our different directions.
Josh still had another year of school before he graduated.
James started working as a mechanic, and Rowdy and I went to college.
But during school breaks, we'd always get together for jam sessions.
Then, after college, we started taking it more seriously.
That's when we recruited Charlotte to be our manager, and she worked her ass off lining up small gigs that led to larger gigs and then eventually a record deal. "
I stuff a huge bite of my grilled ham and cheese sandwich into my mouth as Annabelle lifts a spoonful of baked potato soup to her lips. God, those lips.
When I finish chewing, I ask another question. “I still can’t believe you work at a country radio station. How did my Rolling Stones-loving gal land that gig?”
She rolls her eyes with a grin. “Jeez, Josh gave me hell for that last night, too. I work in advertising sales, so I sell commercial airtime, not music. And FYI, my office is in the K-Country building, but I work for its parent company.”
“Speaking of Josh,” I begin, both uncomfortable about broaching the topic and grateful that Annabelle provided me with an opportunity to segue into this question. “How’d your date with him come about last night? ”
“Jealous, Hayes?” She arches an eyebrow, toying with me as her dimples appear.