For the Love of a Lush (Lush No. 2) (27 page)

"You all right?" he asks, worry furrowing his brow.

I nod slowly.

"Panic attack," he tells me succinctly. "What happened?"

I wipe away a single tear that’s forced its way out of the corner of my eye. I refuse to cry. I refuse to give myself the satisfaction.

"It’s okay. I’m all right. Thank you for helping."

He looks worried. "Yeah. You know I’ll always help however I can. How is it, this whole thing with Mel and Joss? You fine with that?"

"Yes," I tell him firmly. "Absolutely. I’m really happy for them. I know he loves her, and they’re super happy."

He nods and looks thoughtful for a moment. "And you and Walsh?"

"There is no me and Walsh," I tell him.

"Aw, Tam. There will always be a you and Walsh."

"No, Colin. Old habits just die hard. That’s all."

T
HE NIGHT
progresses and everyone gets a decent meal. Leanne’s marinade is delicious, and Mike manages not to overcook the meat. I sit with Colin and Mel. Joss splits his time among the three of us—Mel, really—and Walsh. I can see how hard he’s trying to engage with Walsh, and while Walsh isn’t shutting him down, he’s also not opening up much. I feel like telling Joss not to worry, that Walsh won’t open up to me either. Maybe Joss and I are both old habits that need to be jettisoned.

Mel can tell that there’s something wrong with me, but I’m not going to get into it with her here. She’ll have to take my word that I’m okay—even though I’m not. As it grows dark, we all quiet down, everyone looking at the fire and lost in their own thoughts. Out of the blue, Mike stands up and marches off toward the house. I wonder what the hell he’s up to. I know if he just had to pee he’d have done it in the bushes five feet from the rest of us because that’s how he is. I raise an eyebrow at Colin, but he shrugs, indicating that he doesn’t know any more than I do.

Mike returns a few minutes later with an acoustic guitar, Colin’s bass, and a pair of drum sticks. As he hands the stuff to Walsh and Colin, he tells Joss, "I’d have gotten you a megaphone, but we’re fresh out." Joss laughs, and Mike smiles at him for the first time all night.

Walsh pulls his chair over to a big boulder and tests out his sticks on the surface of the rock.

"No rock-star moves on that kit," Joss tells him. "You’ll snap those sticks for sure."

Colin stands up and straps the bass on while Mike tunes up his guitar. "What have you got for us, boss man?" Mike asks Joss.

Joss smiles wryly. "I’m nobody’s boss these days. Maybe Walsh should choose?"

Walsh looks thoughtful. Then he flashes a sizzling look at me. “
Your Air
,” he says and starts the count in.

I close my eyes as the guys play the opening chords of the song. Without an amp for the bass and a real drum kit, the lower registers are faint, and it’s the guitar and Joss’s voice that ring out in the dark night. The music washes over me, rolling across my skin as if it were human fingers touching me.

This song has always been bittersweet for me. It’s a beautiful ballad, but it was written at that hardest point in my life—after I slept with Joss, before Walsh got out of rehab. I never asked who Joss wrote it for. I didn’t want to know, but tonight, I open my eyes and watch him as he sings, his eyes on my sister the entire time. There is such tenderness in his gaze that I decide he wrote it for her—the idea of her—before he ever knew she was out there waiting for him.

Walsh is tapping out the rhythm on the rock in front of him, his eyes firmly trained on the empty night before him rather than any of us. I look at the hard set of his jaw and the stiff stance of his shoulders, and I hear his words again.
"Is that what we are? An old habit?"

I realize I can’t do this anymore. I can’t keep waiting, hoping, forcing, begging. He’s not going to come back to me. Whether it was my fault or his or some awful combination of the two of us, Walsh and I are done. We were done months ago. I was just too stubborn to accept it.

As the song ends and the guys congratulate each other, I lean over to Mel. "I’m going. I’ll talk to you tomorrow," I tell her quietly.

She looks at me, concern etched in her beautiful features. "Are you sure?" she asks.

"Yeah," I say, holding my index finger up to my lips to indicate that I want to go quietly.

She nods, and I stand up and slip away into the night.

Walsh

A
S MUCH
as I want to go after Tammy when she takes off, I don’t. I stay and we sing a few more songs, getting more relaxed with each one. When I close my eyes, I can almost forget the last year. I can almost recapture that feeling I used to get when I’d jam with my brothers. It was that one space in the world where I wouldn’t think or worry about anything else. Every other thought would leave my mind. It was just me, the guys, and our music. Sheer perfection. If only I could feel like that all the other moments of my life. Then I wouldn’t crave booze so damn much.

Mel’s gone inside the main house to help Leanne clean up dishes, so once Mike leaves to put the instruments away in the bunkhouse, I ask Joss and Colin to have a seat with me near the fire. I’m getting a two-for-one special tonight, so I need to take advantage of it.

"You guys know that Ronny’s my AA sponsor, right?" I dive right in.

They both nod, and Colin tells me how much he liked Ronny when he met him earlier.

"Yeah, he’s a good guy, and I’ve been working my steps. I, uh… I fucked up a few weeks ago. On Easter Sunday no less. Got myself a fifth of J.B. and spent a few hours on a park bench."

Joss and Colin are both obviously shocked, and in a way, it makes me feel better—that they believe in my ability to stay sober so much they’re surprised to hear I fell off the wagon. I haven’t had that kind of confidence in myself, but maybe it’s time for a change.

"What happened, man?" Joss asks, the worry apparent in every line of his face.

"I made a bad choice," I tell him, stripping it down to the most essential truth. "But now I’m making a good one. Part of working my steps is to make amends to those I harmed when I was drinking. That’s what I’m doing here with you two right now."

"Dude," Colin mutters. "You don’t owe us anything."

"I do though, man. My drinking affected everyone in the band, everyone in my life for a long time, and especially toward the end. And I’m sorry for that. I’m sorry for all the days you had to haul my hungover ass out of bed to practice. I’m sorry for all the times you had to clean up after me when I puked in your cars or your bathrooms or your beds. I’m sorry for embarrassing you by being a drunken fool in front of other people at every party and event we went to for years running." Now I turn to Joss. "And I’m sorry for nearly drinking myself to death in front of you and making you feel that you’d lost your only family. You watched out for me my whole life, and whether that was the best thing for me or not, you did it with the finest intentions. You loved me like a brother, and no brother deserves what I put you through."

The three of us are silent for a long time after that. Finally, Joss pins me with a stare right in the eyes and asks, "And have I?"

I look at him questioningly.

"Have I lost my only family?"

I give him a small smile. "I think you’re about to make a new family," I tell him, feeling a pang of regret in my heart.

"And you’re a part of it. Any time you want to be. Any time you’re ready. You’re an important part of that."

I nod my head, not ready to answer him yet but ready to consider the possibility. He seems to understand, and he stands as he puts his hand out. I stand too, and we clasp hands, pulling each other in for a brief hug.

"Thanks for the cookout, brotha’," Joss says, smiling. Then he turns to Colin, who’s watching us with a thoughtful expression on his face. "Get your ass up here," Joss tells him as he reaches his hand down.

Colin grabs Joss’s hand and stands. They hug then give each other a couple of friendly dude punches to get everyone back to normal.

"I’m taking Mel to Dallas tomorrow. She wants to shop for bridesmaid’s dresses or some crap." He rolls his eyes. "But I’ll be around the day after. Maybe we can do breakfast before you go to work?"

"Breakfast of champions," Colin taunts, recalling what we named our post-party early morning greasefests.

"Yep. Let’s do it," I reply. "I’ll get Mike. We’ll see if we can eat all the eggs in the diner."

After Joss leaves, we break down the setup for the night. As soon as the campfire is out and Mike and Colin have taken off for a visit to The Bronco, I hop in my truck and head straight to Mrs. Stallworth’s house. I’m agitated, and I know I shouldn’t be. I should have a sense of closure, of peace from unloading my guilt to Joss and Colin, but something is simmering inside me, a foreboding, an inkling that a seismic shift is coming, and I don’t like it. I also don’t like that Tammy left early tonight. The idea was for all of us to be with each other, and that includes her. She’s always been as much a part of the band as any of us. Without her there, it felt like a piece of the puzzle was missing.

I pull up to the boarding house and hop out, charging up the front walk, ready to tromp upstairs if necessary to get her to talk to me. But there she is, in the dark, on the same porch swing I was sitting on last night. I stop abruptly as I get to the top of the stairs.

"Hi." I sound like a dumb-ass fifteen-year-old.

"Hi," she replies quietly.

I lean against the post next to me, watching her. "Why’d you leave?" I ask, trying to act like I don’t care all that much.

"It was time. It
is
time."

"What’s that mean?" That feeling of foreboding grows stronger.

She sighs deeply. "It’s time for me to go home, Walsh. I’m going to go back to Portland with Mel when she leaves."

I swallow. She doesn’t mean what I think she does. "Okay. So when will you be back?"

"I’m not coming back."

My heart speeds up, and I feel the shaking start in my hands. Fuck, fuck, fuck. I wasn’t prepared for this. I’m not ready yet. I’m trying to get there, trying to become the person she needs so that I can have her back. But I’m not there yet.

"What about the tour? Jenny’s plans? You aren’t going to bail on her, are you?"

She huffs out a breath. "No. Of course not. I’ll be in and out of Austin and Dallas all summer, but I won’t be back here, and I won’t be bothering you again."

Shit. "You’re not bothering me, Tammy—"

"You can barely look at me, Walsh!" she exclaims as she stands and faces me. Her arms are crossed tightly around her middle as if she can hold herself together by sheer force. "You spent the night with me and then went out and got
drunk
."

There is so much anguish in her voice I take a step back, physically pushed by the impact of her emotions.

"You said you loved me then left me standing alone at that diner. You made me come in a parking lot and then told me to leave town. You punched a man who touched me then referred to me as ‘an old habit.’ You’re either so hot you’re going to incinerate us both or so cold I’m risking frostbite. I can’t take it anymore. This was a mistake. One. Big. Mistake. I’ve fought too hard to get well after what happened last summer. I can’t keep doing this and lose myself again."

She presses her hand over her mouth. To stop herself? To control herself? I’m not sure. I hear her gasp even with the barrier she’s erected, and I can see her struggling to regain her composure. I’m gutted. Utterly and completely gutted. She’s right—I know she is—but I can’t control it. One minute, I want her so hard I’m blinded by the haze of lust. The next, I can’t breathe unless I get as far from her as possible. I am hot and cold, confused and sick, and I don’t fucking know how to make it better.

"Tammy, please." I reach for her.

"No!" she says sharply. "Don’t touch me. Please," she warns more softly.

I drop my hand back to my side. "I’m not sure what to say. I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt you." My voice is so quiet it’s almost a whisper.

She nods. "I know. That’s not who you are—you’re not hurtful. But you were right when I first got to town. We’ve damaged each other too much. It’s not healthy, and we have to stop." She pauses and takes a deep breath. "I’ll call the attorneys in the morning and have them draw up paperwork to return your money."