Incidental Happenstance (24 page)

            “I’ve got to go!” she exclaimed, winded. But it was obvious that Bo wasn’t moving. Finally, she climbed over Dylan and Tia to escape out the other side of the half-moon booth, jabbing Tia in the thigh with the tip of her spiked heel. She winced at the pain, and Dylan’s hand was there immediately, covering her protectively. Penelope nearly tripped getting out of the booth, and made a less than graceful exit. Bo and Dylan shared a smile and a knowing look.

            Penelope brushed down her skirt and tried to regain her dignity. She wasn’t used to being rejected this way. She wasn’t used to being rejected at all, and it really pissed her off. None of this had gone the way she’d planned it, and it was all because of that stupid bitch, that little girl who was way out of her league and taking all Dylan’s attention when it should have been hers and it wasn’t fair, not fair at all, and she wouldn’t be put off this way.

             “Goodbye, Miss Valentine.” Dylan replied coldly. “I’ll see you in September.” Penelope tossed Tia a hateful glare before quickly approaching the table of football players, her hand out in greeting and the sweet smile planted once more on her face.

            Dylan immediately turned to Tia. “Look at me,” he said, putting his finger under her chin and forcing her to meet his gaze. “Don’t you for one minute worry about a single word she said,› he whispered to her. “She doesn’t have a fraction of the class you have, and she knows it. I’m here with you tonight because I want to be—she couldn’t hold a candle to you.”

            Tia looked up at him and fought the emotions that raged inside her, but he could see the deep shadow in her eyes. Penelope’s words had hurt her, and she pulled away from him, stiffening under his touch.

            “It’s true, you know,” she said sadly, “pretty much everything she said.”

            “Now I won’t hear any talk like that,” Bo interjected. “Come on, little lady, it’s time for you to give me my birthday dance.”

            Tia looked down at the table, “Sorry Bo, but I don’t really feel…”

            “Nope. Won’t take no for an answer. Give her up Dylan; I need to talk some sense into this little thing.” He slid out of the booth and came around to the other side of the U, taking Tia’s hand in his, pulling her up to him and putting his arm around her shoulders. She looked back at Dylan, who shrugged. “Can’t argue with the birthday boy,” he said, raising his eyebrows.

            Tia felt deflated as Bo led her to the little dance floor. He wrapped his big arms around her and she sank into him, not quite trusting her own legs. Bo took her face in his huge hands, pulling her up to meet his dark eyes, which blazed with intensity. “Listen, little girl,” he said scolding her with his voice. “I heard what she said to you, and I watched your face literally fall off your head.”

            A single tear slid down her cheek, and he caught it with his fingertip, wiping it away. “It’s true, Bo. Everything she said. I don’t know what I’m doing here—I’m way out of his league.”

            “Hey now,” he soothed. “I’ve known Dylan for a long time, and I can tell you, he doesn’t have a league. He’s the most down to earth person I know, and believe me; he’s got it something bad for you.” He settled his hands on her hips and swayed with her to the music. “Have you heard the story about how he and I met?”

            “He told me tonight actually,” she answered, “while we were hiding out from Little Miss Hollywood.”

            “Well, I’ll bet his version and mine are a little bit different. Tell me, did he make me out to be the hero of the story? The one with all the talent who graciously allowed some skinny little white boy to play with his band?”

            Tia smiled a little, in spite of herself. “Yeah, it was something like that,” she said.

            “Well let me tell you the real story,” he said as Tia settled into the comfort of his bulk and they continued to sway to the music. “It was a Friday night, you see, and my band and I were sitting around a table in a little pub outside London after a gig—and I’m talking a very little pub
way
outside of London. He bought us a round and asked if he could join us, and started gushing about our performance—mine in particular; he said he’d never seen a drummer with such a huge stage presence.” He leaned down and whispered in her ear, “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m kind of a big guy.”

            “The thhad crossed my mind,” she smiled in spite of herself, feeling her mood slightly lifted.

            “So anyway, he tells us he’s a fairly accomplished guitarist—that’s what he said, ‘fairly accomplished,’ and he says he would be honored if he could have the chance to jam with us. I look around at my boys, and they’re all smirking and shaking their heads, looking at this little punker boy with his messy, spiky hair and ripped jeans, but I figured, what the hell? We had a practice set up the next day at the pub we’d be playing that night, so we decided to humor him. We all figure that there’s no way this boy—he couldn’t have been more than twenty then—was going to be able to keep up with our bluesy sound, and guessed we’d jam for an hour or so and laugh about it later.

            “So he shows up with his guitar slung over his back and I say, ‘Show us what you got, Little Strummer Boy,’ much to the amusement of my boys. Dylan says, ‘You guys just go ahead and play, and I’ll jump in.’ We all smiled at each other, and pounded into a song. Dylan listens for about eight bars, eyes closed, nodding his head, and then dives in, perfectly matching the tempo and the sound. We all looked at each other, our eyes poppin’ out of our heads—we’d never thought that kind of sound could come from an acoustic guitar or blend so perfectly with what we were trying to do musically. It was like he could draw a mood out of his instrument, an actual emotion, and we were completely blown away.”

            “It was because of his mom, and her art studio,” Tia commented.

            “Exactly!” Bo agreed. “So after a couple more tunes, we were thoroughly impressed, and I asked him if he did vocals. And I tell you, when that boy opened his mouth and started to sing, I knew he was going to the top. Instantly. His voice—well, you know—it was honest, open, and he could weave the lyrics as well as he could the guitar.” Tia nodded—she knew exactly what he meant. 

            “We asked him to join us on the stage that night, and from the look on his face, you woulda thought we’d invited him to the queen’s castle for tea. He honestly didn’t realize how good he was, and thought we were doing him a favor. But that night, on stage, he just took over the show—not intentionally, but just by being himself—and the audience loved it. He joined us for the rest of the tour, which was only four more shows; but by the end of that week, I knew I wanted to work with him again.  Not only was he a great musician, but I liked him as a person too, and knew he’d be a great friend. I practically begged him to come back to the states, and left him with all my numbers and a promise that I could hook him up with a place to stay and some steady work if he did.”

            Tia settled into him and listened with interest—she knew so little about Dylan in his younger days, and loved hearing Bo talk about him with such admiration.

            “It was weeks before he called, but when he finally did, I managed to convince him to give it a shot. He slept on my couch for six months, working in a music store during the day, bartending in the early evenings and playing gigs at night. It was obvious to me who the talent was—hell, I like to think of myself as a pretty good beat man, but we all know that drummers don’t do solo tours—a good band needs a good front man. Dylan had it all—talent, good looks, charisma—but he was just humble enough not to fully realize it, which kept him honest. I knew I could go to the top with him. We even wanted to name te band for him;” he added, “we wanted to call it the
Dylan Miller Experience
, because being with him
is
an experience, and we all knew it would be him that took us all the way. But again, the man is humble. He shook it off, said it was just incidental happenstance that we all met the way we did, and the name just stuck.”

            Tia understood the ‘experience’ part perfectly. “He has so much respect for you, though, Bo—you know that.”

            “I do, and that’s another reason why I love the man. But the point of the story is that Dylan doesn’t put himself on a pedestal like so many other famous people do. He doesn’t think he’s better than anyone else—he’d be just as happy playing in little pubs as he is playing on the big stages. It’s about the music for him, always has been. He’s never gone in for all that Hollywood bullshit. Hell, he lives in Colorado, for chrissake, on a ranch in a tiny little town. He’s never tried to be some hotshot celebrity—he purposely avoids that scene as much as he can. And he keeps us humble, too, knocking us back down to Earth if things start going to our heads. He’s our reality check, in a way. Why do you think he goes out in disguise? He misses being a normal person. It’s just that singing and music are in his blood and he doesn’t have a choice but to do it. The celebrity just comes along for the ride.”

            Tia whispered, “Oh, I know all that, Bo, I do. It’s one of the things I like so much about him; that he’s so down to earth and open. But what does it matter anyway? I’m living in a fantasy world here. He’ll be gone in a couple days and then what?”

            “Listen. I can’t predict the future, but I can tell you that the boy is in deeper than even he realizes. I know I’m the jokester and the prankster of the band, but I’m also kind of the bartender —I hear more of their shit than I care to, sometimes,” he said with a sarcastic chuckle. “Dylan’s my best friend in the world, Tia, and I know him better than anyone. I see the way he looks at you—the way you look at each other. I hear the way he talks about you and see the way he lights up when you walk into the room. He’s never dedicated a whole show to one person, and he played every song you wanted, even the one that was hardest for him play. You’re bringing out all the things in him that he thought he’d lost, and I for one appreciate it. Damn, I don’t know what’s gonna happen tomorrow or the next day or next month, but I do know that you have to make the most of every minute and let it work itself out. Don’t give up the time you do have worrying about time you might not get later. That would be a waste.”

            Tia hugged him tight. “You’re right, Bo, I know you’re right. I just don’t know what I’m even doing here, and I’m scared.” She looked up into his face and stretched up on her toes to kiss his cheek. “Thanks,” she whispered. “You’re pretty great, you know that? I’m so glad I could come to your party.”

            “Me too,” he grinned back, giving her a little squeeze.

            Dylan appeared beside them. “I really think I need to cut in, mate,” he said to Bo.

            “But of course,” he replied, bowing and offering him Tia’s hand. She stepped into Dylan’s arms and he held her close, pressing his lips against the top of her head. “I’m so sorry, Tia, I’m so sorry.”

            “Fr what? For being you? You can’t apologize for that Dylan. You didn’t do anything.”

            “No, but she hurt you, and that really pisses me off.” She felt him stiffen, and heard his exhale as he tried to tramp down the anger that still coursed through him. “You do know, don’t you, that you’ve got more class in your little finger than she could ever hope to have? She’s got nothing on you. You’re the one I want to be with.”

            Tia sighed wistfully. “I just can’t help but think…”

            He interrupted her. “Don’t think that way. I know it’s hard, it’s hard for me too.” He ran his fingers through her hair and gently pulled her head back to meet his eyes. “Bloody hell,” he said, clearly aggravated. “This isn’t at all the way I wanted to ask you this, but I don’t know how else to…”

            She looked up at him with uncertainty in her eyes as he paused before continuing. “I had Jessa look into something. I wanted to know the latest time I could leave Chicago and still get to Cleveland in time for Monday’s show. It looks like I can catch a private flight at 3:00 and still make it in time for sound checks.”

            Tia looked up at him, not quite understanding. “Damn it,” he continued, glaring over at Penelope who was now perched on the quarterback’s lap. “She’s really fucked this up. Listen. Never once since I met you did I consider you a potential notch in my bedpost, or anything even close to that.” He pulled away slightly and ran his fingers through his own hair, grunting with agitation. “Shit, I don’t know what I’m doing here. This isn’t fair to you, and it damned sure isn’t fair to me, but I really do care about you, Tia. I know I just met you yesterday, but you’ve kind of gotten under my skin.” He cradled her face in his hands and stared deep into her. “I want to spend as much time as I can with you before I have to go. Part of me knows that it’ll just make it even harder, but I really like you, and I want every minute I can get.” She smiled up at him, and he planted a soft kiss gently on her lips.

            “I got a suite at the Hilton for tomorrow night. It’s two bedrooms, and I swear it isn’t about trying to get you into bed.” He kissed her again. “Although I’d be lying if I said I haven’t thought about it. A lot.” He looked frustrated as he glanced over at Penelope again, still blatantly flirting with the quarterback and continually looking back to see if Dylan had noticed. “I just want to spend as much time with you as possible. I want to have breakfast with you and have you be the last person I see before I leave Chicago.” Tia’s eyes widened as she took it all in. He thought about being with her a lot? He got a suite at the Hilton and wasn’t leaving until Monday afternoon? Her stomach was doing flips and turns while her mind imagined what that could lead to.