Following Me (21 page)

Her eyes focused in on Brennan as
he walked onto the stage, carrying an acoustic guitar.  Her body tensed as she
stared down at him.  She could hear murmurs coming from the women in the
audience as he plugged in his guitar, adjusted the microphone, and sat down on
the chair.  Everyone was noticing what Devon had just realized moments ago.  He
looked great up there.  He had taken off the blue button-up that he had arrived
in, and now, he was just wearing a fitted green T-shirt with his dark jeans.

If she didn’t know him better,
she would have thought he was completely comfortable up there.  But his hands
twitched as he plucked at a chord, and she watched his lips move as he muttered
to himself.  He had an easy, lazy look to him that helped him appear more
relaxed than he was.  She wished she could do something to calm his nerves.

After Brennan finished his
adjustments, he leaned forward toward the microphone.  “Good evening.  I’m
Brennan Walker.  A couple of you out there might have seen me up here before. 
I’m sure a few of you booed me off stage the first time I tried this.  Thanks
for coming back and giving me another shot.”

The crowd chuckled. 
That was
a good sign.
  Devon found herself rooting for him.

“For those of you who are new to
the open mic routine, you picked a damn good night to be in the house.  I’m
playing a selection of original tunes, and I hope you like them.  This first
one is titled ‘Headstrong.’”

Devon wasn’t sure what she had
been expecting, but whatever it was could
never
compare to this.  She
knew music.  She had grown up around music, dated musicians, and listened to
every genre imaginable.  Her heart craved music.  And that was exactly what she
was getting tonight.

Brennan’s voice wasn’t the best
out there.  He wasn’t a master on the guitar.  He didn’t have the stage
presence of the artists she had encountered at home.  But he had a certain
quality about him that seemed superior to all of that.  It was like when she
had tried to tease apart her feelings toward him, and all she had discovered
was that she couldn’t.  That was what his music was like.  It was more an
emotion than anything, like the way she felt when she got butterflies in her
stomach, or when she rode a roller coaster, or when she caught the first
glimpse of the horizon across the ocean.  It was all and none of those things.

And maybe she was the only one in
the room feeling that
.  But wasn’t that what made art so beautiful in the
first place?
 She could stand in one place and experience the same thing as
a hundred other people, and everyone would come out of it with something
different.  She felt like she was soaring, and the world was flying beneath her
feet.  Brennan’s smooth voice was music to her ears, and music brought her
home.

When the song ended, Devon
realized her eyes were closed, and she slowly opened them.  As her vision
adjusted to the dim lighting, she focused down on Brennan.

What are you doing to me?
she wondered.

The crowd cheered, and Devon
followed, clapping her hands hard.

“He’s good, right?” Garrett
leaned over, so Devon could hear him.

“Yeah!  Wow!” she said, wearing
the biggest smile on her face since she had been in Chicago.

“You should have come to his last
performance.  The audience gave him a standing ovation at the end.  I don’t
know what it is about the guy, but everyone goes nuts for his music.  Hadley
even cried at the end of his last show, and he only played for like fifteen
minutes,” Garrett told her.

“He’s good.  I should know,” she
said with a laugh.  “I know music.”

“You should pitch him to the
people you know,” Garrett suggested.

Devon wrinkled her nose.  “I
don’t know people, except for my parents.”

“I’m sure you can think of
someone,” Garrett prodded.  “His music made you smile brighter than you have
since you got here.  Anything that can put that pretty smile on your face
should be playing on the radio.”

Devon blushed at his words. 
“Thanks,” she said, staring back down at Brennan.

She probably did know someone. 
Most of her contacts were with country music, and he clearly didn’t sing
country.  In any case, she could likely get him an in…if that was what he
wanted.  It would be something worth thinking about…maybe.

Before she could think about it
any further, he started the next song.  The next two were ones that Garrett
knew from previous shows.  He told her that Brennan normally added a couple
originals in here and there among the covers he did.  Garrett had never been to
a gig where Brennan did all originals.  Devon couldn’t imagine the show any
other way.  No one else’s music would have felt right.

As Brennan’s short set drew to a
close, Devon found she didn’t want it to end. 
How could it be so close to
being over already?
  It felt like he had just started.

“I want to thank you all again
for coming out.  This is my last song for the night, and it’s kind of personal
to me.  It’s about loss, pain, and silence…about how hope blossoms in the
smallest of packages and in the least likely of circumstances.  This one is
titled ‘Moving Forward’,” he said into the microphone, his eyes seemingly
finding her in the crowd.

As he played the first few
chords, his eyes never strayed from her.  She wasn’t even close to the stage,
but he seemed to know right where she was.  Amy and Hannah sighed heavily next
to her.

As soon as the lyrics started
flowing from his mouth, Devon could tell the song was different from the
others…more personal.  She hadn’t thought it possible, but this song was better
suited to him than the others.  He couldn’t have described the lyrics any
better than in his introduction.

She felt like her heart was
breaking as he sang about a loss she could understand.  She felt a stabbing
sensation in her body as she experienced his pain.  The words made her feel like
she wasn’t alone with the dreaded silence from which she suffered.  And
finally, she could feel her heart being stitched together.  The needle wasn’t
gentle, and the thread would heal the wounds in time, but there was hope that
the scars would heal.

When the song came to a close,
Devon felt tears welling in her eyes.  The song was painful.  It actually
caused her physical discomfort to even hear it, but that made it even better. 
People who had ever willed themselves to silence needed the hope from Brennan’s
song.  Maybe it would help mend their hearts, too.

Brennan stood as the house came
down with applause.  People were on their feet.  Some people were swiping at
their eyes from the emotional song.  But Brennan never broke eye contact with
Devon, and her eyes never left his gaze until he was ushered offstage for the
next performer. 
That poor soul.

“I don’t know how he does it,”
Garrett said, nudging Devon lightly.  “Look, you’re even crying.  I thought we
talked about this.  No more crying from you.”

Devon laughed through her tears
and sniffled.  “Right.  Right.  No more crying,” she said, wiping under her
eyes.

“If I had a voice like that and
could play guitar, I could bag so many girls,” Garrett said with a fake dumb
expression on his face, making fun of all the guys who actually talked like
that.

“I’m sure he does,” Devon said,
laughing softly at his joke.

If Brennan’s advances toward
Devon were any indication, he was surely getting exactly who and what he
wanted.

“Who?  Brennan?” Garrett asked
incredulously.  “No way.  That guy is a saint.  Girls are magnets for
musicians, and he manages to fend them off like a lion tamer.”

“No way is he a saint,” Devon
said, rolling her eyes.  “I don’t believe it.  Half the girls at work like
him.”

“Well, you ask him then,” Garrett
said with a shrug.  “I’ve known a lot of guys with musician complexes.  He
doesn’t have one.”

“Oh,
you’ve
known guys
with musician complexes?” Devon asked, again rolling her eyes to the ceiling. 
They
could never compare to what she had seen.

“All I’m saying is that Brennan
could sleep with any girl here tonight, and he won’t bring any one of them
home.  At least, I’ve never seen him do it.”

But he brought me home,
she
thought.  She wasn’t going to stick around to find out if it would happen with
someone else.

She could see Brennan backstage
now, sliding his button-up back on.  Soon, he would be back at their table. 
She couldn’t face him.  That song had struck home.  The lyrics were so personal
and so touching that she felt like he had spoken directly to her.  It was as if
she had opened up her notebook filled with lyrics and let him read the pages
with her heart laid bare in the words.  She was the one moving forward, pushing
through the pain to find herself once more.  And it was then that she felt like
the final song had been about her, like it had been written for her.  She
couldn’t prove it, and she didn’t want to.  She couldn’t get more entangled in
him than she already was even if Garrett said he wouldn’t make a move…another
move.

She would be interested in
pursuing her little sliver of hope but not under these circumstances.  It
wouldn’t be fair to him, or her, or Reid.

She needed to leave before she
did something stupid.

“I’m actually not feeling all
that well, Garrett.”  Devon put her hand on her forehead again.  “I wanted to
see Brennan’s show, but I think we should probably go.  I’ll see him at work
this week, and I’ll talk to him there.”

“You sure?” Garrett asked,
clearly confused.

“Yeah, I’m ready to go home,”
Devon said, feeling like that wasn’t an appropriate name for the apartment she
was living in.

She had found her home in
Brennan’s music.

“FUCK,” DEVON CRIED, impatiently
tapping her pen back and forth on her leg on the train.

An old lady sitting down near
Devon glared at her.  Devon didn’t have the patience for it right now.  She was
late for work.  It was the first time she had ever been late.  What made it
worse was she knew that Jenn was going to be in today.

She hadn’t meant to be late.  No
one ever intended to be late.  But she had managed to sleep right through her
alarm.

Last night had been the worst
dreams she’d ever had.  She had woken up twice in the middle of the night with
the exact same dream that she’d had a dozen times already, the one where she
was being chased through campus.  She shuddered even thinking about it.  Then,
this morning, it had raided her sleep once more and held her hostage through
her alarm.  Each time she had awoken drenched in sweat or crying her eyes out,
remembering the feel of the man’s hands on her as she lay sprawled face-first
on the bed.  Her hands were shaking now at the thought.

She hadn’t had time to shower or
cover up the dark circles under her eyes, and she was pretty sure she looked
like shit.  It would be just another thing Jenn would love about her showing up
late. Jenn didn’t necessarily have a code for appearances at her restaurant,
but her idea of looking nice certainly involved a shower and makeup.  Devon had
done what she could with her mess of hair tangled from her trio of nightmares. 
Although she would have normally preferred to tame her waves with her
straightener, she had only had enough time to run her fingers under the faucet
and comb them through her hair.