Behind the Strings (7 page)

17

That kiss consumed me for that entire week that followed. I felt incredibly guilty for my actions and was so angry at myself for what I had done that I couldn’t even bring myself to tell Jaycie right away. I kept it bottled up inside and let it eat away at me. It wasn’t a secret that there was a time Logan wished we could be more than friends. I know it’d been years since he said it, but I could see it in the way he looked at me that it was still there. I didn’t want him to think that kiss meant more than what it was, a lapse in total emotional judgment to rid my mind of my deadbeat father.

I had never been confused about where Logan and I stood, not until now. But that whole night that it happened seemed out of the ordinary for me. My excitement when I saw Jesse, the intimate thoughts going through my head, and then the kiss. It was all a big jumbled mess and I had wrestled alone with it long enough. It was time for a voice of reason to help me make sense of it all.

“What a beautiful day in the neighborhood,” Jaycie sung as she waltzed through my door. It was mid-afternoon on Saturday. The two of us were trying to stick to our promise of going out beyond the scope of work. “Are you hungry?”

“I’m starving,” I said, standing from the couch.

“Good,” Jacyie said, “let’s go get lunch. I’m totally in the mood for some pizza.”

“And beer?” I asked.

“I thought that was a given.”

I grabbed my keys and the two of us headed downtown, where I swerved my car into a side street space right outside the heavenly smell of pepperoni and marinara. The sounds of live music filled the air for blocks. We could hear it loud and clear even as we stepped through the door of the pizza shop.

As soon as we sat down I blurted it out: “I kissed Logan.”

It wasn’t the most graceful way for me to talk about what happened, but it was eating me up inside and I needed to get it out. I needed someone to answer what I’d been asking myself.

Beer sprayed from Jaycie’s nose, and as she cleaned herself up she seemed to replay the words in her head. It took her a minute to catch her breath before she asked me the expected when, where, why and how.

“The night of Kat Moore’s party. Something happened and I was frustrated.” I glossed over what that
something
was and continued on. “He walked me to my car and it just happened. One minute we were hugging each other goodbye and the next I was watching him lean in. I didn’t stop him and he kissed me.”

“Did you kiss him back?” She asked, leaning in closer to me. Her eyes were wide.

“I think so. I mean, I don’t really know, it all happened so fast. I didn’t pull back immediately, I know that.” I leaned my forehead on my fingertips. I pressed my eyes closed and shook my head.

“I feel like you’re regretting it,” Jaycie said before taking her first oversized bite of her slice.

“More like trying to figure out why it happened.”

“How did you feel afterwards? Was it a cloud nine, out-of-the-park kind of feeling?”

I was mid-bite when she asked, so it took a minute for me to answer.

“I don’t think I would describe it that way. It was…sweet. And in the moment it made me forget what was going on around us, but I didn’t forget to breathe because I was so enchanted by it. It didn’t leave me floating my way home,” I explained. “And there’s more.”

“Oh boy.”

She prepared herself this time by taking a quick sip before I went on to tell her about Jesse. I hadn’t mentioned him before tonight, so I did some quick backstory before telling her about all the impure thoughts I had had when I turned around to find him with Logan.

“Oh, Celia, you are a hot mess.”

“Thank you,” I said, tossing a black olive in her direction.

“You know I love you, I really do, but it seems to me like you have a serious case of boy fever right now. You’re all over the map. I think you might need to back away for a bit and figure out what the hell you’re doing.”

I took a long sip of my beer as I held onto those words. I didn’t really answer any of the questions I had before, but at least Jaycie was there to help me talk them out. It was clear my feelings were all scrambled and I needed to spend some time working through them.

“Oh, I love this song,” Jaycie said as the melody of an old George Strait song strummed through the entrance as the front door opened, floating in from the venue next door.

“His voice actually sounds pretty amazing,” I said. “We need to go over there.”

Jaycie sighed heavily. “We’re not working today, remember?”

“Only for a minute,” I said, leaning closer to the window. George Straight had now turned into classic Rhett Akins and the voice was still as intoxicating. Whoever it was, I needed to see them and I needed to see them now. I threw my belongings into my oversized purse, stood and tossed some cash on the table. “Follow that voice when you’re done eating. I’ll meet you there.” I ran out without turning back.

It was my job to find the real, true, raw talent in this ever-growing city of aspiring musicians, the ones who sometimes get overlooked today because of the miracle of overproduction used on those who would otherwise be mediocre. Sometimes I’d walk this area for miles, listening to song after song, but nothing would stand out. And then there would be days like today, where I hear it and I know it’s special. The voice, the song, and everything that came with. I needed to find the person behind those vocals.

18

I stood in the doorway of one of the most infamous bars in Nashville with the afternoon breeze grazing the back of my neck. A large crowd was gathered inside, so I waited for the song to end before pushing my way through. Rhett Akins was one of my favorite songwriters to this day and I wanted to enjoy each and every lyric. One thing I had always loved about this industry was the way an artist brought a song to life. It was mesmerizing, the feeling that comes over you when a line in a song is so true to reality that it captivates your heart and heals your soul.

It wasn’t until I had elbowed past a couple dozen people that I realized I had heard that voice before. When I finally made it to the front of the stage, I saw that same “
just rolled out of bed
” black hair, jeans, and baggy t-shirt that had stood in front of me once before. This time, though, he had no drummer, no bass; it was just him up there with a little acoustic to back him up. He looked down for a second and smiled at me, then pulled the guitar strap off of his shoulder and stood for a quick break.

“Celia, hey!” he said, hopping off the stage towards me.

“Hey,” I said.

Maybe it was because the last time I saw him I had been wearing stilettos and was distracted by the desire he brought out in me, but Jesse Rockford was much taller than I remembered him. And maybe it was his voice singing my favorite song that made him much more attractive than I remembered as well, but as he stood there in front of me with that same single dimple on his right cheek, I felt the strength in my knees begin to weaken.

“You sound amazing up there,” I said.

He motioned for us to move towards the bar. My mind was still reeling at the fact that Jesse was the man behind the voice I had heard through the windows of a pizza shop, so much so that I didn’t even hear what he had ordered for us. By the time two bottles were placed in from of us, Jaycie had found her way to me and squeezed onto the stool between us. She wasted no time introducing herself.

“I’m going to assume that you are the man we were in search of?” she asked.

“Well, I guess that depends on why you were looking for me,” Jesse said.

She reached out her hand to him. “Jaycie Wright.”

“Jesse Rockford.”

With her hand still in his she turned her head toward me, her brows lifted. I lowered my head so Jesse wouldn’t see me smirk, then grabbed the drink in front of me for a sip. He ordered one more for Jaycie and took his to go.

“You ladies hanging around for a bit? I’ll be done in about an hour.”

Neither of us had anywhere to be that day so we sat at the bar as Jesse started up again. I couldn’t help but swoon over the way he closed his eyes during his original ballads and hopped up off his stool during the upbeat covers like “Dust on the Bottle” and “Cruise
.
”
I recorded a few minutes of his performance partly so I could go back and reference should Frankie let me do a write-up on him and partly so I could go back and watch it again…and again.

Once the last few chords of “Cruise” faded Jesse thanked the crowd and hung around awhile to immerse in conversation and pose for pictures. Every now and then I would see him look in our direction and I would do what I did best: look right through him as if I didn’t care at all.

“Remember what I said about taking a step back for a while?”

I nodded.

“I changed my mind. You may need to get on that,” she said, pointing at Jesse, “and I mean that figuratively and literally.

I blushed at Jaycie’s insinuation and the thought of how long it had been.
The last one was a guy named Graham. It had to be about seven or eight months ago at least.
He was now the drummer of a very big-name artist who shall remain nameless.
He was irresistibly charming. I felt his eyes on me all evening at an awards show after party, and right when I had slipped my jacket on to call it a night I saw a shadow emerge from behind me. The words “
Want to get out of here?”
came off his lips and the warmth of his breath on my neck made my heart race. I nodded and before I knew it I was straddling him in the back of a black SUV. I woke up in his hotel room the next morning well before he did and it took me over twenty minutes to find all the pieces of my wardrobe. The walk of shame was no different than how it was when I was in college. My hair was a mess, my dress half-zipped and my heel straps undone as I hailed a cab back to my car.

Little did I know I left so much of an impression on Graham that he ended up calling me at work the week after. That phone call turned into many more and led to a hot and heavy couple of months that ended with a few gallons of chocolate peanut butter ice cream on the couch for an entire weekend, but eventually I got over it. He was dating some Italian model now, and that whole I’ll-never-be-good-enough, daddy-issues complex I always tell my mother I don’t have? Well, on days like today it tended to ring pretty true. In my head, I couldn’t imagine why a guy like Jesse Rockford would ever want a girl like me.

“That is crazy talk, Jaycie,” I finally said.

“It is not. Gosh, Celia, you’re so naive when it comes to this kind of stuff. He wants you and you need him.”

Jesse came over to us again after he was done mingling and thanked us for hanging around. Jaycie offered to buy him a drink and the three of us sat there at the bar for a long while talking. Jaycie was right; I wasn’t sure what I would do without her. I was pretty good at interviewing artists, but for some reason tonight I couldn’t think of a thing to say. She carried most of the conversation and I learned that Jesse had co-written some of my favorite songs.

“You know, Celia over here would love to do an interview with you for our blog. You interested?”

“Sure,” he said.

“Great. Maybe you two can exchange numbers and set something up.”

I shot her a look. My eyes dug deep into her. I didn’t break a smile. I knew what she was doing. She may have had a plan, all right, but not for an interview. Tonight Jaycie was not a columnist extraordinaire, but a wannabe matchmaker who knew damn well she was stepping on my toes with a pair of seriously stealth high heels. At that moment I wanted so badly to be angry, but it was no use; that smile Jesse wore as he typed my number into his phone made it impossible. He said he would text me soon to set something up.

“Yeah, sure, no hurry,” I said.

We hugged outside of the bar and when he could no longer see us Jaycie pinched me. I returned the gesture with a slight slap on the arm. That was the perfect sentiment of our friendship. We both knew exactly what we were saying to each other without needing to say a word.

19

After that run-in with Jesse, I was more confused than ever. Before watching him up on that stage all I could think about was Logan, but now it was different. Now all I could see in my mind was Jesse’s smile. The way his eyes closed on the high notes and how his hands glided along the strings of his guitar. Every now and then these thoughts would be interrupted with my lips upon Logan’s and I would remember how incredibly screwed-up I was.

It was a gorgeous Monday in Nashville and instead of cooping myself up in the office, I decided to type away at a corner table outside of Soulful Grinds. In the middle of recapping Kat’s party, I looked down to find a text from Logan.

What ya writing about?

I looked around the patio, but didn’t see him anywhere. I leaned around the corner to peer through the windows, but didn’t find him inside either. Then I heard a whistle coming from behind me. As I turned, I found him waving from my front porch.

“What are you doing here?” I asked, crossing the street to meet him.

“I came to say goodbye. Gotta hit the road again.”

“Already?” I felt a twinge in my heart when I asked. I sunk onto the porch swing, filling the open space next to him. Not that I wasn’t aware it would be coming soon. A musician’s life was the road. Clearly I was used to the coming and going and the being gone more than not, but this was the first time that it really hit me who Logan had become.

“I’ll be back soon. Next week for a bit longer this time.”

He reached his hand out for me to hold it and pulled me in for a hug. I closed my eyes while my head lay on his shoulder. I thought about that kiss. I thought about this goodbye and I thought about tomorrow when he would no longer be around to hold me. I thought about every tomorrow after that and that this is how it would be should I let anything happen between us. I thought about Jesse and how he too hoped to one day stand in Logan’s shoes. I didn’t know if it scared me more to think I would fall for someone that one day might never come back or that I could potentially feel the same kind of pain my mother had.

I sometimes think that she still waits for him. That she still wants him to walk through her door and say he’s back and that he’ll never leave. As far as I know, she never dated after he left. Men had asked her out, plenty of them. We’d be in the grocery store and they’d strike up a conversation with her. I even heard her politely decline a few invitations from my teachers. I don’t think it will ever be too late for her, that she still holds out hope that one day he’ll see what he left for never replaced what he gave up.

“Hey, you okay?”

Logan’s voice pulled me from my deep thoughts. Whatever he had been saying, it had missed me entirely.

“Yes, I’m fine. I was just thinking.”

“About?”

I didn’t know where to start, so I didn’t answer. I just stood up from the swing and walked over the railing. Logan followed, placing his hand softly at my waist as I looked up into those soulful brown eyes.

“Talk to me, please,” he said. “Is it about the other night?”

“Logan?” I asked, diverting his question. “How come you never called?”

“Called when?”

“After you left. You threw everything at me all at once and then you walked away and you were gone. Like it was so easy to let go.”

“Celia…” he started, then paused to sigh, putting his hands to his head and stepping backwards, avoiding my eyes. “That was the hardest thing I ever had to do, believe me. When I walked down those stairs that night, I knew if I looked back I wouldn’t go. When I told you I wanted to be with you, I meant it. Somewhere between the little girl in pigtails and the woman who stood in front of me that night…something changed. I saw you as more than my friend. You were the reason I woke up in the morning. The person my world revolved around. You were it for me, but I saw it so clearly when those tears fell from your eyes. You were so lost and broken. I think deep down inside I knew you had to figure things out on your own. That there was so much for you to fix and I couldn’t do it for you.” He still couldn’t look at me. His eyes were fixed on the horizon in front of him. “Hurting you was the last thing I ever wanted to do. Please don’t be angry at me.”

I stared at the same horizon. Afraid that if I looked in his direction I wouldn’t be able to say the words. “I’m not angry. I just realized the other night, when Rick was talking about the Black Horizons, that I have no idea where my father is. It’s been so long, I can’t imagine he would know what I even looked like. If I passed him in the street tomorrow I guarantee you he wouldn’t even know I was his daughter. And if it wasn’t for
Behind the Strings
practically twisting my arm to go to your concert, you would have no idea where I was, too. Even though I’ve spent the last two years walking the same the streets as you, we would be strangers.”

“But we’re not,” he said, placing his hand under my chin and turning me towards him. “I guess I always thought that if I heard your voice or saw your face, that I would let all of this go and come back to Hamden, or worse, that you would come to me out of guilt, and I couldn’t do that to either of us. By shutting you out I thought I was doing us both a favor, but I guess I realize now, I did exactly what your father did. I left you. I hurt you.”

“No, Logan. You will never be like him, and I know that. You are kind and thoughtful. You were there for me in every moment that he wasn’t and no matter what, I want you to know that I will be forever grateful to you for that. It would probably take me a million lifetimes to repay you for what you were to me back to then.”

“Well, then I guess it’s a good thing I don’t plan on going anywhere. Well, figuratively speaking, anyway, since I do actually have to go.”

The smile on his face wanted me to believe everything he was saying. And I did. I never wanted to lose him again. I wrapped my arms around him and squeezed him tightly against me. We didn’t say anything for the rest of the time we sat there, but we didn’t really need to. I think we both only wanted to know that everything was okay between the two of us and somehow the silence confirmed that.