Chapter Thirty
Thirty
Big city, small comfort
Dixie
I’ve made the right decision.
That’s what I tell myself while waiting for wardrobe fittings and glancing at my phone like an idiot.
But I can’t shake the feeling that somewhere along the way, I’ve left the best part of myself behind.
Maybe I’m coming down with something. A flare. Bubonic plague. Scabies. Don’t know, don’t care.
I’m tired all the time, even though I don’t sleep in the van or spare rooms anymore.
A musician who’s just been booked on a cruise gig has sublet her East Nashville apartment to me for five months.
The neighborhood is artsy and hip, full of quirky shops, coffee places, and bars.
My days are pretty much the same: get up, squeeze in writing time, and then head into the studio to lay down rough versions of my songs to test arrangements.
I spend time with a sound engineer and the vocal coach the record label has hired for me. Meet with the PR and marketing teams where everyone argues. Should I lean into the small-town-preacher’s-lover vibe? Hone my scrappy origin story? Own the RA?
Later, I’m told, there will be photo shoots for press kits and album art, but right now I have wardrobe fittings, styling sessions, and constant opinions about my “look.” I think about texting Slate when the makeup artist shares a nugget like: “Fans love authenticity—but also contour.” He’d die.
I have a social media posting schedule and more meetings with my new manager, Rachel, to go over release timelines, PR, and next steps.
Discussions about touring, radio promotion, and which single to push first (“Hot for Preacher,” everyone says).
I can’t remember how I did things in Wickham Hollow.
I wrote an album there. I went viral. But now it feels like some perfect dream I can’t get back to, no matter how hard I try. I can’t go back, not even in my dreams.
Dad lobs question-jabs at me about dating a bona fide preacher but gives up when I don’t respond. I’m too tired to fight with him.
Today I have an industry event at the sleek, upscale hotel connected to the Country Music Hall of Fame. A valet in a dark jacket opens my door. Rachel sent a luxury car to pick me up, as this is a no-vans kind of place.
“Thanks.” I get out and sort of stop. Am I in the way? Yeah, probably. Do I care? Probably not. My attitude’s totally ready for superstardom. “Wow. Shiny, huh? You know, you should hand out sunglasses.”
The valet shuts the door. “Ma’am.”
Jesus Christ, I can hear him thinking. I don’t get paid enough.
Or maybe he’s heard everything already.
I’m right, though. The bright Tennessee sunshine bounces off every polished surface and reflective window of the hotel’s glass-and-steel exterior.
It’s basically a massive tower. Would they let me shoot a music video here where I’m an imprisoned country music princess and they hire a flannel-shirt-wearing hero to climb up the walls to rescue me?
I mentally flip the script. Stick hero dude in the tower and do the climbing myself.
“I ain’t lettin’ down my hair,
I’m pullin on my boots,
I brought a rope and a light and a stubborn truth.
You’re the one up in that tower,
Thinkin’ love ain’t got no power—
But, darlin’, fairy tales ain’t through,
This time I’m the one
Climbin’ to you.”
“Dixie!” From the snap in my manager’s voice, she’s said my name more than once.
She points to the glass doors below the porte cochere. Yeah, yeah. I’m going.
The Omni is one huge-ass hotel. Glass and stone and people who smell like they bathe in expensive soap.
You either belong here—or you don’t. There’s no in-between.
A valet opens the door before I can touch the handle.
Another one’s already got my guitar case and is wheeling my gear around like it’s some fancy room service cart instead of the half-busted road rig I’ve had since high school.
Rachel’s beside me, talking a mile a minute. Probably getting ready to drag me by my hair if I freeze up.
“Showcase at eleven fifteen. You’re opening. Three songs. Play something upbeat first—I’m thinking ‘Walk Me Home and Kiss Me Good Night.’ Then play something with heart. Not too much edge, but enough to make them remember you.”
Super. Word salad for breakfast. My favorite.
I nod. “Got it.”
The lobby’s all echoes and marble floors.
There’s some kind of weird art installation on the wall that probably means something deep and meaningful.
Everyone looks polished. Calm. Like they were born wearing suits and holding lattes.
I can’t tell if they’re hotel guests, music executives, or backup dancers, but they’ve all got the same expression: bored and successful.
Rachel keeps going.
“Lunch with that SiriusXM guy after. Smile like you want to marry his playlist and have its babies. Then suite 1421 at three for the influencer thing. Keep it stripped down, acoustic. Maybe ‘Hot for Preacher’ if it feels right.”
I stop near a pillar and shift my weight. My boots feel too loud on the marble. “Is the embroidered top okay?”
Rachel blinks at me. “Better than flannel.”
A beat later, she adds, “And no fringe. I’ll text you the itinerary.”
I nod again. Apparently that’s my only setting today.
There’s a woman across the lobby with a platinum blowout and snakeskin boots. She doesn’t look at me. Neither does the guy beside her wearing a VIP badge and a sullen expression.
My phone buzzes like an angry paper wasp in my back pocket. I fish it out, thinking it’s the promised itinerary.
JACK: You didn’t have to do that.
JACK: But you did.
JACK: Thank you. The roof’s going to hold up this time.
Another buzz.
JACK: I hope you’re holding up, too.
He’s sent a picture of Georgia Peach glaring from her perch on a stack of Jack’s books.
JACK: She hasn’t acknowledged the roof money, but she did claim the higher ground.
I didn’t tell him I was wiring the money. Just sent it. Twenty-five grand. If this music thing’s about to go somewhere big, the least I can do is fix the roof before it falls on his head.
I don’t write back. I don’t have the words yet. But I keep the message open, thumb pressed against the screen like I’m holding his hand through it.
The elevator dings. Rachel’s already in it, holding the door with her arm. Surprise: She’s still talking. What would happen if you put her and Slate in the same room? Would they cancel each other out? If his fascination with Dee ever dies, maybe I should fix them up.
“Hot for Preacher” is on the set list, but stuck in the middle. They want something more radio-friendly at the end. Something “sticky.” I have no idea what that means, but I nod anyway.
I step in beside Rachel. My reflection catches in the mirrored wall. Hair curled. Eyes tired. Lip gloss I didn’t pick. I don’t look bad. Just not entirely like me.
Rachel starts rattling off timing cues and sound check logistics. I listen for about thirty seconds, then cut in.
“Hey,” I say. “Wait up a minute.”
She stops mid-sentence. “Yes?”
“Let me end with ‘Hot for Preacher.’ I want to close on something that really sounds like me.”
Rachel nods. “Sure. That one’s testing well.”
I give her a half smile. “Good. I hope I do, too.”
The doors slide shut.
* * *
Texting Dee is 100 percent accidental.
I’m taking pictures of my fancy hotel room. It’s free—the record label’s put me up here so I’ll be fresh for this week’s industry bullshit. It’s a bucket list kind of room and I need to remember it. I feel more like washed-up diva than Dixie Pearl. I’m tired and just off.
The problem isn’t that I can’t imagine Jack here.
Hell, my imagination’s already seen him sprawled on the bed, stepping out of the shower, pointing out the stars twinkling over Nashville.
He’d remember the night we met, when I said I believed in astrology, because Jack doesn’t forget shit like that.
He’s wrecked me for anyone else. I don’t want to move on.
But I have.
I just got back from the label dinner, still in my makeup and heels I can’t feel my toes in. This hotel room looks like it belongs to someone with a lifestyle and matching luggage, not a girl who’s held her granddaddy’s guitar case together with electrical tape.
I miss that guitar.
I miss Jack.
I meant to go back to Wickham Hollow for a weekend. Then the label booked promo. Then I didn’t text. Then it got easier not to go.
I don’t do things for myself anymore. Don’t reach out to the people I left behind in Wickham Hollow. I’ve left one or two of his last messages unread. Not on purpose, just… I don’t know what to say.
And then he stopped texting every day.
We didn’t have a big fight. There wasn’t some dramatic goodbye. Just space—and silence—that stretched out too long without permission. He didn’t ask me to stay, but I didn’t ask him to come with me.
I miss him.
I’ve written dozens of songs about heartbreak and loneliness and putting on my walking boots to start over.
Start big. Longer, richer, deeper songs.
Because I don’t care if I’m wearing my heart on my sleeve.
Don’t care if the record label tells me they aren’t commercial.
Don’t even care if they chart or make the album cut.
Ironically, the less I care, the more people love my music.
They can’t get enough of it. So I make money and I’m starting to get recognized, becoming a star.
And I feel so empty, it doesn’t mean jack shit, because Jack isn’t here with me.
I love my Preacher Man. I sure blew that pit stop in Wickham Hollow.
I should’ve spent it convincing him to take a chance on life with me, and instead I turned him into a soundtrack.
Now I’ll hear him every day for the rest of my life and it’ll never be as good as the real thing. Never be as good as Jack.
I take a photo of the bathroom. The towels are folded like origami and there’s a rainfall shower I don’t know how to turn on.