Chapter Nineteen
Nineteen
Girl wrote a song
Dixie
Three more days of living with Jack Carter and I’m losing my damn mind. In the best possible way.
Like, who knew a preacher could make scrambled eggs look sexy? This morning I watched him crack shells one-handed, and I almost climbed him like a tree. The man has no idea what he’s doing to me, which makes it worse. Better. Both.
I’ve been walking around his little rectory in a permanent state of “what the hell is happening to me” mixed with “please don’t let this end” and a healthy dose of “I am so screwed.” Not in the fun way.
Well, definitely in the fun way, too, because Jack’s a big believer in making up for lost sexy times.
I’m humming fragments of the song I’ve been working on since the fair.
Hallelujah for the mess we are, small-town sinners ’neath Southern stars…
The chorus is solid, but the bridge isn’t right.
Something about found family, about how broken people can still lift each other up.
It’s dancing just out of reach like a word on the tip of my tongue.
Jack is out doing his daily rounds, which means he’s busy being disgustingly useful to everyone in a fifty-mile radius.
He texts me updates throughout the morning like some kind of good-deed live blog.
He delivered groceries to one of his seniors because her hip is acting up.
Then he fixed a leaky sink for someone whose landlord is allergic to basic maintenance.
By lunch, he’s been roped into moving furniture for someone’s college-bound daughter and now he’s reading to an old guy at a nursing home.
Each text ends with some variation of “Thinking about you” or “Can’t wait to get home,” which should be cheesy but instead make my stupid heart do flip-flops like a gymnast.
I’m taking a break from scribbling lyrics when my phone buzzes. River and Pine are swinging through Wickham Hollow on Friday night. Do I want to meet up for a drink?
My thumb hovers over the keypad. I guess they’ve got my location from my social media.
It’s no big deal. Should I ask Jack to come with—introduce him to my people, show him off like some kind of trophy boyfriend?
The other part of me, the smarter part, knows that River and Pine are a lot.
They’re road-hardened, industry-cynical, and have about as much filter as a microphone with a broken pop screen.
Jack doesn’t need my Nashville chaos shoved in his face, complete with war stories about pay-to-play gigs and the kind of dive bars where the health inspector has given up and gone home.
Sure, I text back finally. One night of old life can’t hurt, right?
When their truck pulls into Southern Comforts’ parking lot, I’m waiting by the front door like some kind of eager puppy.
River leans out the passenger-side window, waving a cowgirl hat and yelling at Pine to “Pull over right now, goddammit!” with loud enthusiasm.
Classic River—subtle as a freight train and twice as loud.
River’s a year or ten older than me, blonde, with a fresh blowout and flippy, curled ends.
She sings with Pine and has pipes that could make angels weep—or at least make drunk guys in honky-tonks chuck their wallets at the stage.
Of all the musicians I’ve met on the road, she’s also the only one still with her original partner.
Pine loves her to death, which is either really sweet or really codependent, depending on how you look at it.
Pine rolls his eyes as he climbs out. “You sure are in the middle of nowhere.”
He’s grown even more weathered since the last time I saw him, like someone left him out too long in the sun. Still broad-shouldered, still shoving his longish hair beneath a cowboy hat, but the beard’s new. It doesn’t quite hide the deepening lines around his mouth.
“We’ve played worse,” River announces, hopping out of the truck.
Familiar gear crams the bed. “Cumberland Country Live? Remember that shit show? They stuck us in the middle of a run-down arena with like twelve drunk guys in the audience. Plus, the rodeo had just been through and they hadn’t bothered cleaning up the literal shit.
As long as the beer’s cold and the bathroom doesn’t require a tetanus shot, this place is paradise. ”
She throws her arms around me and hugs it out.
Pine crunches around the truck and looks me over when River lets go. “So, this is where you broke down. It sure isn’t Nashville. How long are you stuck here?”
I paste on my best fake smile. “Parts are on their way from Mexico.”
I actually like these guys. We’ve spent weeks on the road together, doing door deals where we get by on a percentage of ticket sales.
We talked about maybe co-writing or recording a track, but my voice and River’s don’t work so well together.
Plus, country radio would rather play the same three dudes on repeat than risk putting two women back-to-back.
River is already sizing up Southern Comforts. “You play here? Do they do pay-to-play or offer guarantees?”
“Strictly karaoke,” I say.
She makes a face. River is the one who keeps her eye on the money. Pine just has his eye on his next drink and his next complaint about the industry.
“It’s not like I got to pick where my van died.” I lead them toward the door. “Sometimes life happens in the middle of nowhere.”
“Wow.” River stops dead in the doorway. “Welcome to the taxidermy palace.”
She mouths a silent yeehaw and Pine snorts. Southern Comforts does look like someone looted a hunting lodge and decorated with the evidence.
“Those things are expensive,” I say lightly. “They sell for serious money on eBay.”
Slate, who is behind the bar looking like he’d rather be anywhere else, definitely hears us. His scowl is Grand Canyon levels deeper than usual as he glowers at Pine and River with all his crusty, grumpy heart. I may wink at him, just to mess with him.
“You know him?” River asks.
“Sure. He’s the local ogre.” I say it loud enough for Slate to hear and he dials the scowl intensity up from ten to infinity.
“Does he bite?”
I shrug. Honestly, I’m not sure if River’s joking, and I also can’t tell if I just hurt Slate’s feelings. Which is weird, because since when do I care about hurting his feelings?
I don’t have time to figure it out because River steamrolls ahead. “So, I hear you’ve got a man!”
“What?”
River beams like I just announced I’m pregnant with twins. “I wanna be a bridesmaid!”
“What?” I say again, because apparently my vocabulary’s shrunk to one word.
Pine barks out a laugh and heads to the bar to order Jack and Cokes. When River yells after him to bring back a pitcher as well, he lifts a hand and carries on.
River drags me toward a booth. A few regulars nod as we pass, and I nod back like we’re all part of some weird small-town secret society.
“Dixie freaking Pearl!” River throws an arm around me. “Girl, ‘Hot for Preacher’ is blowing UP.”
I’ve been watching the numbers climb all week, but my stomach still drops. “How blown up are we talking?”
“TikTok,” Pine says, dumping glasses on our table. Coke sloshes everywhere. “You’re viral. Like, actually viral. My sister’s youth group is obsessed.”
He looks way too pleased about this.
“Wait—fully viral?” My heart hiccups. Probably a heart attack. I knew my song was picking up steam, but I hadn’t checked the numbers since yesterday. “How viral?”
“The song!” River is digging her phone out. “That one you posted on Instagram where you tell some guy to shove his proposal up his ass? Someone mashed it up with footage of this sexy priest from a Netflix show, labeled it ‘Hot for Preacher,’ and now it’s everywhere. I thought you named it that!”
“I didn’t.” My palms are sweating. I’m definitely having a heart attack. “I didn’t name it anything.”
She’s scrolling through her screen like a woman possessed. “You’ve got fan accounts now. Look—@PreacherManUpdates has fifteen thousand followers posting theories about who inspired it.”
Pine leans over her shoulder. “Think that Google Earth screenshot of his church is legit?”
My stomach falls through the floor. Fan accounts? Google Earth? This is way beyond anything I’ve imagined or even my agent has talked about. “Show me.”
The fan account has everything: screenshots of our town website, photos of the chapel, even a blurry picture of Jack at the hardware store looking like he has no idea he’s about to become internet famous.
The caption reads: “PREACHER MAN SPOTTED? Sources say this is the inspiration behind @dixiepearlmusic’s viral hit .
” No wonder River and Pine knew where to find me—the whole world knows.
“I should delete it,” I say. “Take it all down.”
“Are you insane?” Pine stares at me like I suggested burning money. “You’ve got a song in the top one hundred.”
River tries to high-five me. “Congrats, Mama. It’s your best song. Real, dirty, catchy as hell.”
“Don’t.” The word comes out sharper than I mean it to. “Don’t talk about him like that.”
Pine shrugs. “Are you touring it? You should come with us. We’ve got Asheville tomorrow—they’re paying half the door. Just say you’re our merch girl.”
“Crash in our hotel room,” River adds. “Or find another preacher to put you up. Wait—” She’s zooming in on something. “Tell me this isn’t him. The church site has a ‘meet the pastor’ page.”
She flips the phone around.
Jack smiles at me from the screen, all kind eyes and button-down shirt.
“Oh my God,” Pine practically yelps. “He’s hot in a ‘bless me, Daddy’ kind of way.”
“Did you do him in the chapel? Was he a virgin?” River’s voice gets higher with each word. “Did the town throw holy water on you? Like, you walked into the diner and someone slapped a scarlet letter on your boobs?”
They’re cracking up, buzzed on drinks and the smell of low-level fame. Normally, I’d be right there with them, talking shit and laughing at the absurdity of it all. This is our language—music, mess, and making fun of everything. We’ve all dreamed of internet fame and winning at music life.
But—
Jack isn’t a joke. He’s the guy who makes me coffee and gives me chances. Who lends me a bed and anything else I need. Who sees me at my worst and somehow still likes the person he sees.
And I turned him into a song. Worse, I let the internet turn him into a meme.
“He’s a good man,” I say, and the words feel weird coming out of my mouth.
“Oh, honey.” River raises a brow. “You caught feelings, didn’t you?”
I shake my head. Not really. Sip my drink to stall.
“You sure?” Pine smirks. “Because you’ve got that look. The one songwriters get when they write something that’s gonna bite them in the ass.”
They howl with laughter.
And I laugh, too, because that’s what I do.
But inside, I’m freaking out. Has Jack seen it? He said he wasn’t going to look, but what if he did? Will he ever look at me the same way again?
Or worse—will he look at me at all?
I tell them I need to pee and escape before I say something I can’t take back, leaving them to argue over the ancient jukebox.
Outside, the air’s cool and the street is dead quiet. I pace behind the bar, gravel crunching under my boots, trying to remember how to breathe.
Fuck, I didn’t mean for it to blow up like this.
I didn’t call it “Hot for Preacher.” I didn’t hashtag it or turn it into a meme or echo some thirst-trap Netflix priest. That isn’t the point.
I just needed to write something. Anything.
And now it’s a punch line. A TikTok trend. A joke to go with cheap well drinks.
The back door opens and I flinch. But it’s just Slate taking out a trash bag.
He frowns. “Okay?”
I nod my head. “Fine. Be right back.”
I’m such a liar.