In Your Dreams (Falling #4) (17 page)

I tilt my head, not understanding.

“That’s how the music started,” she says, leaning back again, this time falling flat against her bed and pulling her knees up, turning and lying on her side to face me. She’s beautiful this way.

“Before my freshman year, I went to see a specialist who suggested I try singing as a form of therapy,” she says. “I’d already played the guitar since I was nine, so he thought it might come easier that way.”

“And did it?” I ask.

“Not at first,” she says, pulling the familiar black notebook from her night table where she had set it and flipping through a few pages before stopping and tossing the open booklet to me. It’s the song I heard her sing to her brother the other day. It’s quirky and sweet, nothing but rhymes—almost like something my sisters used to sing in the street playing jump rope.

“This is Lane’s song,” I say, giving her a half smile. She reflects my expression and closes her eyes in fondness.

“It is,” she says. “That one came so easy. I think because it’s about him, and it made me think of him and these silly words he and I like to say. I wrote it to help him with bad dreams, stringing together all of our favorite things. And then I played it with my guitar, and for the first time ever—for as long I can remember speaking words—everything came out fluid. It was like water. So easy.”

“That’s amazing,” I say, the nagging feeling triggering thoughts…memories.

Murphy lays flat against her hand, her other arm falling over the edge of the bed, tickling the strands of carpet below, her fingers delicate just as she is with her guitar.

“My therapist said it’s common—for stutterers. When you’re trying to just say what’s in your head, it’s too much. It’s like the intersections in your brain that work on forming sentences and actually speaking them get overloaded, a kind of traffic jam. It causes all of these misfires in your brain and your mouth just mimics it,” she says.

“You said it’s exhausting. And sometimes…” I don’t finish, because I don’t want her to think I notice. It isn’t noticeable, really. It’s only that now that I know…I see it.

“When I get nervous. Like…really nervous. Which…being on stage makes me, like,
way
nervous,” she says, closing her eyes and tucking her chin. I watch her lashes open slowly, blinking, before the grays open fully on me. “
You
make me nervous.”

I don’t react. I work hard not to react. After a second or two, I offer a crooked smile and lean my head.

“I shouldn’t make you nervous,” I say.

She shrugs.

“You do,” she says, her eyes piercing me. She makes me nervous, too.

I swallow, and I know she sees it.

“So, what’s exhausting?” I ask, wanting to get us both off the hook. She’s not so anxious though. She seems comfortable with the silence. This is one of those moments where she’s in charge. I pull my knees up and prop her book against my legs, flipping through more pages because
I’m
the one folding.

“The performance of it all,” she says. “It’s not like you can sing all the time. I mean…I guess you could. But then you’d be like one of those people in musicals that gets dropped into the real world and only knows how to function while singing, but everyone looks at you weird because…
duh!
There really isn’t singing in the real world.”

I laugh at her, closing her book and sliding it in front of me on the floor.

“You’re amazing, you know that?” Her smile while lying down is better than the one she gives while standing. I lock the vision of it away and pray to see it closer one day.

“Are you
trying
to make me stutter?” she giggles.

“Maybe,” I smirk.

She breathes in slowly, rolling on her back and stretching her arms over her head. The black T-shirt she’s wearing rides up enough that I see her sides and bare stomach above her low-slung jeans, and I think to myself how far I’ve come. Any other girl, some other place and time, and I would be switching gears right now, capitalizing, because I always get the girl. I just don’t always
keep
the girl. They learn things, grow tired of me, or, more often, I am bored and done before anything has a chance. It’s never been the right girl, really. But Murphy…she’s a
keep
kind of girl. And this whole thing started because she hates me, so patience is necessary. But I have had my hand on that stomach. I’ve felt how warm her skin is through layers of fabric. I bet her skin is searing bare.

Patience isn’t a virtue. Patience is a murderer of six-foot-one fools desperate to kiss girls who sing like angels and look like my dreams.

“I pretend it’s all a performance,” she says finally.

“What’s a performance?” I ask.

“Life,” she says, falling to the side again.

Her eyes—they’re tired. I see it now.

“I think that’s true for all of us,” I say, exhaling and sliding down enough that only my head is propped against her wall. She throws a pillow to me, and I tuck it behind my neck. “Thanks.”

Every fiber of my body wants to crawl up next to her. But I can’t. Because she would think it’s all about the seduction. For once…it’s not. So, instead, I’m content staring at her, imagining how her lashes feel on my cheek, how her lips feel when my teeth tug on them, how her body reacts when I drag my hand from her bellybutton to her neck.

“I slip sometimes,” she says. I wait for her to explain. “Like in the studio, when we were recording. That’s why it was so hard. My nerves. And it’s why I only play at Paul’s. It took me forever to be able to play there. It still happens, though. I know you’ve heard it.”

“It’s not bad,” I say, and I mean it. It isn’t. If she hadn’t told me, I probably would have just always thought it was part of her quirkiness, cute nerves that get the best of her sometimes. Stage fright, maybe.

“It’s bad enough. Who wants to hear a girl sing and sound like a skipping record,” she says, and I hate that she’s frowning.

“I don’t know,” I say, lifting myself up on my elbows again. “But that’s not what people hear when they listen to you.”

“What do they hear?” she asks, her mouth crooked in question.

“God. Faith. Soul. It’s spiritual,” I say.

She laughs my words off instantly.

“You’re corny,” she says.

I laugh with her, because yeah…I get how that sounds. “I know, but seriously,” I say, “you’re a gift.”

Her laughter fades. She sits up again, her legs dangling from the side of her bed. Gray finds me fast and holds me hostage. I submit with nothing but the truth.

“And you’re beautiful,” I say. No smile, no pursed lips. All I do is look at her, because she is.

“Casey,” she breaths.

“You are.”

Silence falls over us again, more comfortable than before. I could sit like this for hours, just looking, and it’s so strange how content I am.

“Murphy? Murphy!”

Lane’s voice echoes from a few doors down, breaking up what might have been my favorite full minute of breathing ever. It was definitely my most honest minute ever. And I didn’t have to say a word.

“Sorry, I’ll be right back,” Murphy sighs, flashing a bashful smile as she gets up from her bed and steps around me. I pull my legs in and crane my neck to watch her walk down the hall, doubly pleased when she shakes her fingers loose at her sides. I look at my own hands and see that I’m clenching my fists too.

With a silent laugh, I pick up her photo book and move to my knees, gliding over to her small bookcase and sliding the book back into it’s spot. She has a few songbooks in here, and I wonder if each is full, or if there are more gems waiting for someone to read them and declare them as worthy of her voice. As beautiful as her singing is, her writing is even more. Hell, there are artists I hear working all day at the studio that don’t hold a candle to her writing ability. But they have swagger—and it gets them anything they want, even million-dollar contracts and the attention of all the right people in the industry. This business is ninety-nine percent confidence, and that’s what’s killing Murphy.

I let my finger trace along a few more spines, stopping at the final four set of books, which I recognize immediately, because I just looked at the yearbooks in Houston’s house a week ago. I tip the first one out and flip through a few pages until I find her freshman picture. It’s young and barely recognizable, her cheeks rounder and her hair pulled back tightly in a ponytail. I skip through a few more pages without seeing her, and put her yearbook back, taking out the senior one I’d looked at before.

My hand knows right where to go, because I look at the picture so often, and I push down on the crease, exposing all of the image so I can take in her eyes. There are a few notes scribbled on the page with arrows pointing to other people in the drama club picture with her.

“You were great!” one reads.

“You’re going to be a star,” another says.

I smirk because, yeah…if I have anything to do with it, she is.

I flip through a few more pages, noticing the one of me at the talent show, rapping and pointing to people in the crowd. Looking back on it, I wasn’t very good. But it didn’t matter, because…well…swagger.

After flipping a few more, I get to the blank pages in the back, and there are only a few signatures left. Some people just signed names. One guy drew a picture that she’s semi-scribbled out. I can tell what it is, though—I’m pretty sure I was friends with Mr. Cock and Balls. I flip a few more, and then there’s a rush that hits me like morphine in the spine.

In your dreams!

~ Casey Coffield

My heart isn’t beating. I think if I don’t move soon, I won’t be able to, because blood is no longer circulating in my body.

I’m a dick.

I’m a massive, unbelievably self-centered, insensitive dick.

The stutterer.

The girl in the freshman picture.

She wanted to sing in the talent show.

I repeated every word she said as she tried to sing it during her audition.

When she pulled out, I took her spot.

I was amazing.

Everyone loved me.

I’m a fucking dick.

I hear her laughing with her brother less than twenty feet away, and my eyes are red and my veins are full of adrenaline. I have to leave. I can’t fix this. And those gray eyes are going to haunt me.

My mouth is watering as I shove the book back onto the shelf, aligning it so nothing looks out of place. I grab my hat from the ground and slide it over my head, holding my palms to my eyes and stretching out my mouth that wants to scream obscenities.

With a deep breath, I step through her door and move toward her brother’s room, my keys dangling from my thumb as if this is all nonchalant, as if I’m leaving because something came up or I have somewhere better to go. I force the idea in my head that I am not running away when in fact that is
all
that is happening now. I’m running away, because I’m a dick.

Life is performing.

I’m on stage in five, four, three…

“Hey,” I say, leaning into Lane’s room. He smiles and waves, and I feel like a fraud.

She turns her head toward me, her fingers working on a knot in a pair of rollerblades. I can’t look at her eyes, so I focus on that knot and her fingers and the color of the wheels. Orange. They’re orange.

“Sorry, I promised him I’d fix these earlier and I forgot. He’s meeting a friend, so it will just be a minute…”

“Actually,” I interrupt, cheating and finding her innocent eyes waiting. I look away the second our gazes touch, and I know she notices. I see enough to see her smile fall. I swallow, holding my phone up.

“It’s Houston. He needs some help with Leah, so I’ve gotta go. But…I’ll call you,” I lie. I’m a horrible liar, so I keep it simple. I say the words I’ve said to every other girl I’ve ever wanted to run from. Only this is different. This one—it burns.

“Oh.” She knows.

“Thanks, though…for…just thanks,” I stammer. My eyes fall to my feet and I pat the frame of the door, quickly putting one foot in front of the other and leaving without even acknowledging the goodbyes her mom and dad give as I head through the door.

I run away.

Because that’s exactly what assholes like me do when they’re caught.

Fuck.

I
’m clearly not built
for boys and drama. One minute, my tummy was full of butterflies, and I wanted to freeze time and take back all of the eye rolls and sighs I’d given Casey Coffield over the years. Then he left just as quickly as he came, with an incredibly fake reason—and I wanted to choke him for being ridiculous and wasting my time.

And for making my heart flutter.

And for getting my hopes up.

For having hope that I was anything more than a project in the first place.

This is not how things progressed with the nerdy librarian and the guy who was way more into his bass guitar than me while we were dating last year. I thought those relationships were weird, because…well, the guys were weird. But now, I’m thinking
that
is normal, because
this…
it’s weird.

Of course, this is also not a relationship.

This is Casey Coffield, and honestly, this could all just be a convenient stop along the way taking over my songs and making them his and getting the credit for them. I don’t really think that’s what he’s doing, but that’s where my mind keeps going.

Thank god for Paul’s tonight. I need it to clear my head. I also think I might try something new.

When Casey blew out of my house all twitchy and neurotic, I locked myself in my room and finished writing. The music came fast. This tune that’s been stuck in my head for months was perfect. That song I was so embarrassed about—it isn’t sexy at all. It’s angry! And it’s snubbed and maybe a little bit of a women’s anthem.

I called it
Tease
, but I wrote a little note to myself underneath the title that says
Fuck you, Casey Coffield.

I talked my friend Sam into coming tonight. She works Saturdays because she’s the lowest on the totem pole at the paper, and she takes all of the classified ad calls that come in. But the paper isn’t far from Paul’s. I’ve already requested to go on last, which is good, because I’ve been practicing the new song out here in the alley, and it’s only getting better.

My phone buzzes with a call, so I stash my pen in my mouth and tuck my notebook under my guitar strings, sitting on a crate and resting my instrument on my leg so I can talk.

“Hey girl. I’m bringing some of the office people. I hope that’s okay. They’re dying to see my famous friend,” Sam giggles. I pause, taking note of the male voices in the car with her.

“How many?” I ask.

“Just Cam,” she says, her voice trailing up on the end, which signals that it is
not
just Cam. He’s the guy she’s been flirting with at work. He’s kind of her boss, and it’s wholly inappropriate, but when I tell her she just giggles. Sam and Cam—that alone should be a deterrent for her. “And then his best friends work a few buildings over and they usually commute together, so I invited them.”

“How many friends?” I shouldn’t be nervous. They aren’t anyone to me, and Paul’s is familiar. But they’re
unfamiliar.
And I’m not sure what that will do to the vibe here—my shelter.

“Four?”

She says it like a question.

“That doesn’t sound like a very big number, Sam. Surely you can count that high,” I say, and I’m being a bitch. But Sam knows my issues. She’s known me since high school. She’s the other half of the Helen Keller picture—she was my fucking Annie!

I hear the phone rustling, and I can tell that she’s covering it with her hand and trying to move to a more private place. I thought they were in a car, though, so I don’t know what that place could be.

“They’re good guys, Murph. And they’re excited to see you. I talk about you all the time when we go out to lunch. When they found out Cam and I were coming tonight they just sort of tagged along,” she whispers. I hear a whistling sound in the background and that all-encompassing round of masculine laughter that comes along with a frat party.

“Are they drunk?” I ask. I can already feel my pulse racing.

“No…not…not really,” she giggles.

“What the hell, Sam! Are you drunk?”

“No,” she says, and her effort to hold in her chortle loses and she snort laughs. “Okay, okay. We got a party bus.”

“What? A fucking bus?” I’ve set my guitar on the ground in my case and am now hunched over, rubbing my head and thinking of a good place to throw up.

“It’s not
really
a bus. That’s just what they call it. It’s more of a limo, actually. It’s fully stocked. Cam paid for it. It’s fun; you should come out with us after you’re done. Oh…hey, we’re almost there. I’ve gotta go!”

My mouth is held open when she hangs up before I have a chance to tell her not to bother coming. It wouldn’t matter. This disaster snowball is already rolling.

My arms are sweating. And I can feel the saliva overtaking my tongue. I lean forward more and spit, which is gross and totally ungirly, but it’s better than retching.

My phone buzzes against my leg, and I consider tossing it into the garbage bin across the alley. I pinch the bridge of my nose instead, feeling a migraine threatening to break through and turn this evening into the most awesome nightmare ever when I focus on the text message that kicks off a whole new conflict of emotions in my belly.

It’s Casey.

I need to talk to you.

That’s it.

I need to talk to him too. I’m not going to. I just
need
to. I need to tell him to quit fucking with my head, and to not leave me hanging after saying things like I’m beautiful and special and…he called me beautiful, goddamn it!

“Murph? You out here?” I hear the smack of the door around the corner and soon my friend Steph is standing under the lights of the neighboring restaurant back entrance.

“I’m here,” I say, raising a hand and palming my phone. “I was just working out a few new things.”

“You look like you’re getting sick,” she says. Steph has seen my not-so-great performances. She just thinks its stage fright. If that were my only demon.

“Yeah, that too. I’ll be all right, though. I’ll be in in a few minutes.”

Her feet shuffle in the gravel and I plaster a huge smile on my lips to look at her, because if she comes over to check on me, I’m not so sure that the fake grin will do the trick close up.

“All right. Well, your friends are here,” she says.

My stomach rolls.

“Awesome,” I say, holding up a thumb.

She chuckles and turns toward the door, her guitar hung around her back all Johnny-Cash style. Steph is hip like that. She looks like Joan Jett, but sings country. Maybe I can convince Sam to lie and tell her crew of boyfriends that Steph is really
me
on stage. Knowing that won’t work, I bend forward and spit one more time, saying a quiet prayer that the contents in my stomach stay put, then close up my guitar case and head inside to Paul’s. At this point, my performance is going to be whatever it’s going to be. I shove my phone into my back pocket and pretend I never saw Casey’s message in the first place, because really? I can only handle one hot mess at a time.

Almost an hour passes between Steph’s session and the one right before mine. I’ve been hanging out in the back, pacing between Sam’s table of misfits and the line of performers for the night at the bar.

I’ve never met Cam before, but he hugged me. So did his cousin Ted—I think that was his cousin. They look nothing alike, so they may have been messing with me. I’m pretty sure Ted isn’t even his name. It doesn’t matter really, because I don’t care who any of these guys are. I’m
hopefully
never going to see them again. I’m most certainly never going to hug them again.

I’m next, so I haven’t been back to their table for the last ten minutes. I shouldn’t have ever visited them at all, but I wanted to see Sam, and I knew she wanted me to meet Cam—who is still a horrible idea. At least he’s nice. They were all nice, in that very drunk kind of way. They were really excited about hearing me sing, and they promised shouts and cheering, which I begged against. They didn’t hear my begging, so I’ve been spending the last ten minutes contemplating faking the flu so I can get out of going on and being stared at and cheered for by the drunk table of five.

“Everyone take two to get another drink and then get settled for our girl Murphy Sullivan. She’s sort of a crowd favorite here at Paul’s, so if this is your first time, you’re in for a treat,” says Eddie, the Paul’s announcer. He’s the manager, and I think he might be in his seventies. He wears a three-piece suit every Saturday, because he says anything less would be an insult to “these fine paying patrons.”

I love Eddie. He’s a little gruff at first. He doesn’t like to mince words, and he’s always right to the point. But he’s also fiercely loyal, and because he likes me, I know I’ll always have one man in my corner.

“You’re the big finale tonight, sugar,” he says, stepping off the stage and resting a palm on my shoulder with a small squeeze. I smile and nod, but internally I feel every trigger that happens when I faint. If only I could
actually
pass out. That might get me out of this.

Eddie passes and I stand, swapping places with my guitar case, pulling the strap around my body and adjusting while I hold the pick between my teeth. And because I haven’t been tested enough in life, my nightmare gets exponentially worse the second I turn around.

“Don’t swallow that,” Casey says.

He’s wearing the same thing he was in when he walked out of my house this afternoon. Even the damn beanie that I tried to steal away is in its place, on his head. His smile is stupid and lopsided, and I want to spit the pick out of my mouth at his face, but I know I can’t spit hard enough. With my luck, it would probably just get stuck on my lower lip.

“You didn’t have to come watch me tonight,” I say, turning my attention to the stage. It’s so empty and inviting—nothing but a stool and a mic under dim lighting. This is why I like it here.

“You didn’t write back, and I need to talk to you,” he says, before both of us are distracted by the countdown happening a few tables away. And my fan base has just upped their blood alcohol content again.

“Hey, I know her, right?” My eyes dart to his, and the stupid smirk on his mouth.

“Oh sure,
her
you remember,” I say with a roll of the eyes.

Sam was like a bridge in high school—she was a cheerleader because she loved gymnastics, but she also loved theater, so we hung out a lot. She and I always clicked, and when we found out we were going to the same college, we signed up to room together. We’ve never talked about Casey, because there was never anything to talk about. Even now, she just knows him as that guy from high school who it turns out works for a record label now and might hook me up. I don’t tell her about the butterflies. I don’t tell her, because they aren’t supposed to be there, and clearly Casey would prefer them to go away, too.

I can feel him looking at me as I straighten my flowing blouse and tank top over my jeans, pulling the wrinkles free from my guitar strap. I pledge to keep my eyes focused on the stool, on my next mission—the next fifteen minutes that will be over soon. But then the son of a bitch talks and gets in my head again.

“I just meant from that picture. That’s the girl in the picture with you, from Helen Keller,” he says.

I give in and look at him, and his eyes are squinted and his mouth slightly askew. That’s his pondering face—he’s pondering if I’m jealous.

Well, I am. Good for you, Casey Coffield—I’m a mess of a jealous girl with a crippling disorder that I literally have to punch in the face every time I want to touch my dream. Thanks for the distraction, though.

“I’m on,” I say, shaking my head and stepping up the side stairs opposite Eddie.

My senior citizen friend points a finger at me with raised brows, asking if I’m ready. No, I’m not—but I give him a thumbs-up anyhow, because nothing is going to get magically better in the next few seconds.

Eddie announces me as the last open-mic performer for the night, and I walk to my tiny island of a stool while my drunken best friend and her fraternity chant my name and pound their fists on the table. The scene is comical. It must be, because other people are laughing.

I search the front row tables for familiar faces, but there aren’t any. Only laughing faces. And my ears quiet with the hum of stress that’s now taking over my nerve endings.

“H…H…Hi,” I say, feeling the pull.

I stall by pretending I need to adjust the mic, siting on the stool with my legs crossed and pulling the slender stand close to my body. I twist the coupling in the middle and lower it too far on purpose so I have to adjust it back to where it was. It’s a ruse, and I’m pretty sure everyone knows it.

My hearing clears, but only long enough to hear one of Sam’s friends whistle and call out my name. I chuckle, but it’s pretend.

“Thank you,” I say, my voice soft in the mic.

Why did I pick a new song to do? I should stick with my tried-and-true set. My guitar is tuned for something entirely different though. I spend long seconds staring at the strings, debating changing, and searching for something clever to say—a story to tell—to amuse the small crowd here while I fix my guitar for a different song.

“I just need…” I start, looking out, but only seeing lights. That’s why I love Paul’s—because I can’t see people—the lights blind. Only tonight, I hear people I can’t see. It’s worse. There’s a whistle again, and my eyes fall to my trembling hands, and my guitar slips, knocking the mic stand forward. I grab it in time, but the large wailing sound of a typical sound check deafens.

My heart hurts.

I’ve battled this so many times—even in recent years. I always keep my shit together. I can defeat it. I don’t cry. I won’t cry.

“I’m…” Nothing comes next.
I’m sorry.
That’s what I’m supposed to say. My voice is supposed to come out charming. I’m supposed to be approachable and friendly. I should smile, but I can’t even feel my face. The words are locked away.

“Murphy,” someone says, louder than a whisper. “Murphy,” my name is called again.

I lean forward and cradle my guitar, giving myself this one second to decide to bolt or keep fighting.