Chapter Fourteen Collin
“I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Will you marry me?” I asked, looking up and feeling more nauseous than I should.
“Yeah, that should work.”
I frowned. “That should work?” I repeated, standing from my kneeling position and slipping the ring into my pocket.
“What do you want me to do?” Logan replied, looking uncomfortable. “Knock you to the ground and smother you with kisses?”
I winced. “Do you think that’s what she’ll do?”
“Oh yeah,” Logan said with a smirk. “I think Carly has been waiting for you to ask her this question since about a week after you two started dating.”
I dusted my pants off and tried to rationalize away a nagging feeling of unease.
I was about to propose to Carly, the girl I had been seeing for the last year and a half.
Although she could sometimes be a bit dense, she was kind and attractive and loyal, and I enjoyed her company.
So why was I dreading it? Maybe it was because she wasn’t. ..
“Hey, as much as I love standing in as your girlfriend while you practice proposing, we’ve got to start getting ready for the show,” Logan said, interrupting my thoughts.
I nodded and helped him break down and pack up his drum set, which took up half of the front room in our tiny apartment.
We could have chosen a place a little farther out of the city which would have given us more space for less rent, but Logan insisted on being “in the middle of it all.” I didn’t mind it much, except for on Saturdays when our neighbor hosted dance parties all night long.
After we graduated from NYU, it only made sense that Logan and I would keep living together because we had become such good friends.
We had our differences, but for the most part, the past several years had been pretty fun.
We finished packing up the set, grabbed everything we could carry, then headed out the door and started carefully descending seven flights of stairs with our first load. About halfway down Logan missed a step and almost fell over the railing.
“The adventures of seventh floor living,” Logan said after he had steadied himself.
“The view almost makes risking our lives every day worth it,” I joked.
We reached the curb and Logan pulled out his phone.
“Marco says he’ll be here in about five minutes,” he said, breathing heavily. “How about I wait here for him while you go up and get the rest?”
I raised my eyebrows. “Why do I always have to do twice the work?”
“Well,” Logan replied, “you clearly like working out because you’re at the gym all the time, so I’m just giving you an opportunity to do something you love.”
I shrugged. “I like going to the gym. It helps me think. Sometimes I write songs in there.”
Logan chuckled. “Hm, I can’t wait to hear the bench press love song.”
“Hey, you never know. It might just be a hit.”
Logan laughed for a bit before giving me a pointed look. I sighed and headed back up to our apartment, taking the steps two at a time and nearly running into Mrs. Simmons, our elderly downstairs neighbor.
“So sorry!” I exclaimed. “Are you alright?”
“Oh, I am more than alright,” she said, waggling her eyebrows suggestively. “Mr. Finlay, you are welcome to slam your body into mine at any time, if you know what I mean.” She looked me up and down and gave me a very deliberate wink.
“Okay, have a nice day,” I said, laughing nervously, then ran up the rest of the stairs a little faster than I needed to. Interacting with inappropriate older women was just one of the many charms of living in Manhattan.
By the time I made it back down to the curb, Marco had already arrived and they were loading the van.
“Is Logan making you do all the work again?” Marco asked as he grabbed a bag from me and placed it expertly in the back of the van.
“It would be an off day if he wasn’t,” I replied.
“Hey!” Logan exclaimed defensively. “We all have our token character traits. That’s what makes this band work.”
Marco snorted. “So, you’re the lazy one...”
“I prefer to be described as the delegator,” Logan interjected.
“Collin is the pretty one...”
I shook my head and laughed. “Please, you’re making me blush.”
“And I am the Tetris master.” Marco stepped back to admire his work. All of our gear was packed snugly into the van with a slim space left to fit a keyboard.
“So what does that make Jeremy?” Logan asked.
“The Canadian one,” Marco replied. “Let’s go pick him up.”
We climbed in the van and headed over to Jeremy’s place in Queens.
A couple years ago, we all decided to buy a vehicle for the band, mainly so we’d have a way to transport all our gear around when we had gigs.
It had become really difficult and awkward to try and cart our stuff around in the subway or in taxis.
Marco kept the van most of the time because his building had the most affordable parking.
Marco was our bass player, and Logan and I had met him back at college in one of our classes.
We met Jeremy when we went on our first tour to Canada.
He played the keyboard. He didn’t really contribute much musically, except for adding some texture every once in a while.
His real value was that he acted as our band manager, booking gigs and selling tracks and merchandise.
The arrangement was mutually beneficial.
He got to fulfill his dream of being in a band, and we got to make a living doing what we loved.
It really had been a great few years. We had toured in places I’d always dreamed of visiting, like Iceland, China, and Great Britain.
I had even gotten to visit my grandparents in Scotland and persuaded them to reconnect with my father.
And while the band hadn’t really “made it big,” we had a loyal fanbase and were making decent money.
Life was great, and yet, I kept getting the feeling that something was missing.
Maybe that’s why I was about to propose to Carly.
I thought that perhaps being married would fill that void.
We pulled up in front of Jeremy’s building where he was waiting for us, holding his keyboard close to his chest as if someone was going to run by and steal it.
“It took you guys long enough,” he complained as he climbed in the van. “I was freezing out there!”
“Well, you could wear a coat like a normal human being,” Logan replied.
“I don’t want to wrinkle my clothes,” he said, smoothing down a hideous, silky plaid shirt. He turned to me. “Hey Collin, is Carly going to be at the show?”
“Yeah, she always is,” I responded. “Why?”
“Her neighbor was getting rid of some red cowboy boots that I really wanted. She said she’d give them to me the next time she saw me.”
“Are you going to wear them tonight?” I asked.
“Of course! It completes the outfit!”
The rest of us just nodded and didn’t say anything. Over the years we had just learned not to comment about Jeremy’s fashion choices.
“Have you proposed to her yet?” Marco asked, looking at me in the rear view mirror.
“Not yet. I’m planning on Friday night.”
“Ooh, that’s right!” Jeremy exclaimed, clapping his hand on my shoulder. “Congratulations on taking the next step, lover boy! But she better not Yoko Ono the band. Not when I’ve got big things in the works.”
Logan snorted. “How about we work on being as successful as the Beatles first, and then we can worry about girls breaking up the band.”
*****
“You were so good tonight!” Carly exclaimed, her bubbly voice carrying over the noise of the crowded taco shop.
“You have to say that because you’re dating me,” I teased, winking at her before taking a bite of my taco.
Carly blushed and took a sip of her drink, all the while keeping her hazel eyes on me.
I smiled at her, but I got the unnerving feeling that she was studying me.
Her short brown hair fell just below her chin, framing her narrow face.
After the show she and I had walked a few blocks to grab a late bite to eat. I always got hungry after performing.
Carly set down her drink. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Sure.”
“You know the last song you guys played?”
I shifted uncomfortably in my seat. “You mean, Glorious Mess?”
“Yeah,” she replied with a sly smile. “Did you write that song about me?”
I had another bite and took my time chewing it before I responded.
“No, I wrote that song about a friend I had a long time ago when her parents were going through a divorce,” I said, trying to sound nonchalant.
“It’s not really the most flattering song,” I added. “What made you think it was about you?”
Carly shrugged. “I love that song. I think it’s one of your best, so I guess I was hoping it was about me. And when you talk about her being under her mother’s desk, I thought it might be a metaphor for when I need to take a little time for myself every once in a while.”
I swallowed back a laugh. That line would have been a good metaphor, but it really was just about a girl under a desk.
I thought back to when I wrote the chorus of that song on the roof of my apartment building in Chicago.
The lyrics ran through my mind, and I couldn’t help but be filled with memories of the girl who inspired them.
She could have the whole world, the moon and stars,
Fantastic vacations and fancy cars,
But she shuts the world out and dreams of Mars
Under her mother’s desk.
She closes her eyes as her life falls apart,
Smiling with a broken heart,
And quietly loses herself in art,
Her life is a glorious mess.
I knew I shouldn’t have introduced that song to the band, but everyone seemed to like it, and now we played it all the time. I should have known better than to give myself a constant reminder of Glory Parker.
“Are you still good for Friday night?” I asked Carly, attempting to pull myself out of my bittersweet nostalgia.
“Of course!” Carly replied. “I can’t wait!”
“Good. I’m hoping it will be a really special night.”
Carly’s smile grew so big that it almost hurt to look at. I reached across the table and grabbed her hand, giving it a squeeze. It was time to move on from the girl I had stopped writing years ago. The girl who I had never met. It was time to move forward with the girl in front of me.