Chapter 43 Jonah
JONAH
The first thing I notice when I get home from seeing my dad is that the house is dark and even the Christmas lights are off.
I was out later than I thought I would be, as it took us a while to get all the wood put away into the garage, and I stayed and chatted with my mom a bit afterwards.
Maybe Winnie went to the Wilson’s for dinner.
I unlock the door, and flick on the lights.
It’s cold, like she hasn’t been home for hours.
I wander into the bedroom and my heart stops.
The closet doors are open, and the shelves and rails are bare.
The nightstand is empty, too. Gone are her skincare products and jewelry, her piles of scarves and brightly colored sweaters.
Her collection of jeans. Her pink boots.
My first thought is that someone kidnapped her. But as I race into the kitchen, a white piece of paper on the dining table catches my eyes, and I realize how irrational that thought is. If someone kidnapped her they wouldn’t have packed up all her clothing.
I don’t have to open the paper to know what it says.
She left.
Still, I unfold it, my hands shaking.
The words knock me a step back, and I’m forced to sit down.
Dear Jonah,
The first thing I need you to know is that I love you. The second thing is that I never wanted to leave. I wanted to be married to you forever.
But if I don’t divorce you and go back to Alabama with my parents, they’re going to drag your name through the mud. They threatened to spin lies about how we got married. They’ll say you coerced me and took advantage of me for money—that you abused me. They’ll drag your family into it, too.
I can’t let them do that. Not when it could ruin your music career before it even starts, and not when your family finally has some space to heal after your mom’s cancer.
I know you’ll be angry with me for doing this. I know you’ll think I should have stayed and that we could have fought them together. But I can’t ask you to do anymore for me than you already have. I can’t ask you to risk your career, and your family’s happiness and peace, just for me.
You’ve protected me enough.
It’s time that I protected you.
With all my love,
Winnie
I flip the page. Behind it are divorce papers. It’s fairly formulaic, and must have been drawn up by her parents’ lawyers. Winnie’s name is signed in dark ink on the last page. There’s a spot for mine right next to it.
I set Winnie’s note to one side, and then rip the divorce papers in two, letting them fall to the ground.
I don’t spare them another glance as I get up from the table and start to pace.
I don’t know what my next move is, exactly, but I’m not getting divorced from the woman I love.
Not when it’s clear she still loves me back.
And I’m not even angry at her for leaving. I could never be angry at her for doing what she thinks is the right thing—for doing something I’d probably do myself if I was in her shoes. She’s trying to protect me and it’s an impulse I know well. I’d do anything to keep her safe.
But what she doesn’t understand is that the thing I want more than anything else—more than a successful career in music, more than peace—is her. I’d be happy never playing the guitar again, never singing again, if it meant I had forever with her.
I feel anger surge in me regardless though, and it’s entirely for her parents.
They’re conniving, abusive, controlling, evil people and I’m done with them fucking up Winnie’s life.
In a way, it makes sense that she agreed to go back with them.
They’re master manipulators and she’s their child.
She might think they’re all powerful, but I know better. I know we can beat them.
I start pacing again, my feet wearing a track into the carpet.
Think, Jonah, think, I urge myself.
There must be some way that we can have it all.
That we can have each other. But my thoughts quickly become scattered as the stress of this situation dawns on me.
Winnie is heading back to Alabama today.
She might already be there. She might be in that house, with those awful people, having her every move watched yet again.
Her every calorie counted. Her voice dampened.
“Fuck,” I shout, allowing myself one moment of rage.
I scrub a hand over my face, and then I grab my phone from my back pocket. I won’t be able to do this on my own, and there are plenty of people here who care about Winnie. Together, we’ll be able to figure something out.
“Candice?” I say when she answers.
“Yes?” Her voice is sharp, like she can already tell something is wrong.
“I need you. All of you. Winnie is gone.”
By the time the horse rescue crew arrives at my house, I’m oscillating between fear and rage every few minutes. Candice’s face is a welcome sight in my doorway, and she just reaches out and hugs me, no questions asked.
Everyone piles into the living room and kitchen, with Beau and Nathan on stools near the island, Jenny, Candice, and Lila on the couch, and Tomás in the armchair. I don’t sit. I can’t sit. If I sit down, I’ll feel like I’m not doing anything to fix this.
“Tell us what happened,” Candice says.
I wordlessly hold the note out to her. She scans the page, her face dropping into a frown.
“Fuck them,” she grits out, throwing an apologetic look at Lila.
“That’s what I said.”
She passes Winnie’s note around and everyone reads it in turn, grave looks on their faces. Jenny actually has to blink back tears, and Candice rubs her back. Lila looks up at her mom with concern, and I see Jenny struggle to smile down at her.
“I just…I just can’t believe she’s back with them,” Jenny manages to say.
“It’s awful.” I’ve never heard charming, boisterous Nathan sound so dejected.
“You’ll get her back.” Beau’s voice is firm, and I lock eyes with him. He gives me a small nod, as if to tell me that he believes I can do this. I nod back.
“Yes, but how?” Tomás looks up from the note, finished with it. “Winnie told me enough while we worked together for me to know that her parents are crazy. Do we even know where she lives?”
“Yes. I wrote her hundreds of letters over the years, and her family hasn’t moved. They’re still in the same house,” Candice says.
Right. Candice and Winnie used to be pen pals. Of course she knows her address.
“Okay, that’s step one,” Beau says calmly.
“But what’s step two? What’s to stop them from doing exactly what Winnie says they will in their note? They could ruin you.” Nathan knows the importance of reputation better than anyone else here.
“I don’t give a shit about that,” I say viciously.
“I’m not saying you should.” Nathan shrugs. “But we can be smart about this. We can win.”
“I’ll think on the plane.” I flip open my laptop on the kitchen table.
“I’m coming with you,” Candice says.
“Of course.”
I click on the internet browser, and an unknown email inbox loads.
A quick scan tells me that it’s Winnie’s.
She must have left it open when she used my computer to buy herself a new dress.
There are a few emails from her parents with dramatic subject lines, all unread, and some others that look to be junk.
And at the top of the list, there’s one from the Morning Joe, with the subject line, “We’d love to have you on our show!” I click on it just to see if it’s real—to see if one of the most popular morning shows in the country really wants to have Winnie on.
A quick read through tells me that they do—badly.
They want to hear Winnie’s story, in her own words.
They want to know why she disappeared, and what she’s been up to.
It’s clear that they want to sensationalize it a bit, but that makes sense.
She was beloved and well known—an all American princess with millions of followers.
At this point, everyone wants to know what happened to her.
A plan starts forming in my mind. It might be insane, and it might not even work, but I have to try.
“Nathan, come look at this,” I say. Out of everyone here, he’s the one with the most public relations experience. He’ll know if this has a chance of working.
He hops off his chair and comes to stand behind me, reading the email over my shoulder.
“Oh, this is good.” He leans in and scrolls to see more of it. “Yeah, Winnie should go on this show.”
“We both should.”
“Yeah, you’re right. That’s even better. It will make you both seem sympathetic—”
“Because it will show everyone that what’s between us is real.
She’ll also get the chance to tell the world about who her parents really are.
Winnie is easy to love. She’ll have the hosts and the audience eating out of her hand in no time.
There’s no way they won’t side with her.
Her parents will be left with nothing and once everything they’ve done is out in the open, they won’t have anymore ammo left to fire at her. ”
Nathan lets out a whistle. “Ruthless. But perfect. If I need a new publicist, I know who to call.”
We fill everyone else in on the plan, and then Candice and I book flights to Birmingham, scheduled to leave tomorrow morning.
Nathan helps me draft a response to the Morning Joe, and when they call me immediately, he acts as my publicist on the call, helping me negotiate terms that will work.
If things weren’t so fucking bleak, if Winnie weren’t gone, I’d probably laugh at it.
By the end of the evening, we have a solid plan in place. I try my best to sleep that night, knowing that I’ll need my energy for tomorrow. But every time I close my eyes, all I can see is Winnie’s face.
I will get you back. I will come for you, I silently promise, over and over again, until sleep finally takes me.