Out of the Blues (23 page)

I laughed because he expected me to. “You’re going to do fine, just fine,” I told him because I was glad it wasn’t me.

“Kilby,” he said after a long sigh. “It’s going to be okay. You know that, right? If it’s supposed to be…it will be.”

“Yeah,” I said and then we said goodbye and I walked the phone back to the wall and stood there holding the damned thing like I didn’t know what to do with it.

Darlene came and took the receiver from my hand and hooked it back on the base. I folded her into my arms and cried like a fucking girl on her shoulder.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Mason takes up fence mending.

I went up to Napa and apologized to my boss for abandoning my job. I guess they were worried about me. Glory was pregnant, obviously pregnant. I’d only been gone for almost three months. She hugged me and gave me a present she’d bought for me for Christmas. Then she handed me the things from my desk and told me she’d miss me. And somehow that didn’t bother me as much as I thought it would.

I cleaned out my apartment. The furniture wasn’t mine; I just had clothes and a few things, a bike and my car. I didn’t want the Prius, not after having a real car with a backseat big enough to have sex in. I packed all of my suitcases in the trunk of the Charger and stood there holding the keys and looking at the blue car that was in my space. The guy next door came out. I’d seen him several times over the past couple of years. We were ‘hey neighbors’. I didn’t have a clue what his name was.

“Hey,” he said, slinging a backpack over his shoulder. He was nice looking, not as tall as me, whipcord thin from all of the biking he did, dark hair, and a nice smile. He smiled at me a lot now that I thought about it. “Haven’t seen you in a while.”

“I’ve been down in…away, I’ve been away…working.” I didn’t want to say I’d been living in a hotel with my father and going to therapy and not rehab because I wasn’t a drunk. I was just fucked up.

“You look good,” he said, smiling a little brighter. I’d lost weight, I was too thin. Maybe the heroin chic look did it for him. “Like you’ve been really biking, we should go sometime.”

Was he asking me out? “I, uh, I’m, that’s, I mean, I’m moving away, to the east coast. I have a new job.” I had no idea why I was stammering and yeah, he’d totally just asked me out.

“That’s too bad, I should have asked a long time ago.” He fiddled with the helmet he held. I’m sure I was keeping him.

“Yeah,” I said because maybe he should have. Maybe I would have said yes, maybe, I don’t know. He was nice looking I supposed, but his eyes were the wrong color.

“Missed chances.” He put the helmet on and was about to walk away. I’d never seen him with a car. I’m not sure if he had one. He rode the bike everywhere.

“Missed chances. Sure.” I kept looking at the Prius and wondering why I’d ever thought I’d like having such a little car. I was really not the green kind of person. I was a Georgia good old boy. I needed a truck and some mud…and well, no, I liked the Charger though. Maybe a big truck to make love in with a man who wasn’t compensating…and…shit. “Hey, Gabe. Your name is Gabe, isn’t it?”

He smiled again and stopped on his way over to where he’d left his bike chained to the post in front of his parking space. “Gabriel. And you’re Mason Foxworth.”

I hated that I didn’t know his name. I was a lousy neighbor. “Yeah, that’s me. I, uh, would you…the Prius. I can’t take it with me. Would you like it? I mean, I don’t know if you don’t have a car for a reason.”

“Because I’m working my way through school and, well, car payment or food. I like to eat.” He seemed wary now.

“Yeah, I can see that. I mean, the car. It’s paid for. I bought a new one, I just…” I tossed him the keys. He caught them and looked from me to the car. It was only a couple of years old. I think I drove it maybe a grand total of five thousand miles back and forth to work and once or twice out to the vineyard I did some work for. It mostly just sat in my space and collected pollen. “I’ll send you the title when I find it.”

“Are you kidding me?” Gabe looked at me with eyes gone really wide with disbelief.

“Not that I’m aware of,” I said, but before I could finish he stepped back up onto the sidewalk and kissed me, full tongue and everything kiss. I think maybe I might have kissed him back and whimpered. “Kilby,” I was damned sure I said that.

He sighed and stepped back, holding the keys. “Oh how I wish my name was Kilby. He’s a lucky man, I’m thinking.”

I felt my face flame up. “I…maybe…don’t know. I…ah, anyway. I have to go. I…enjoy the car.” I left him standing on the sidewalk tugging his helmet off. I knew he was going to take the car out. I had no idea if there was any gas in it. I couldn’t remember the last time I filled it up. Hell, it might not even start after three months. It was a Prius Hybrid. Maybe it would get him to where he was going. I climbed into the packed full Charger and started her up. I had no idea where I was going, and I had all the time in the world to get there. I was homeless and jobless with a wide open country to explore.

I ended up back at Cody’s house after a couple of days of avoiding that eventuality. Doug had contacted a realtor the day after I’d had my breakdown in the rain. He couldn’t put the place on the market until I was ready to sign the contracts, but he had a walk through and, well, there was nothing left in the house. He’d cleaned out and donated everything that didn’t mean shit. The piano was all that was left. It was too big to move out. I knew that there was more. I walked through the stark contemporary mausoleum to what had been Cody’s bedroom. The safe in the wall was all that was left. I had never opened it even though I’d had the combination for years. It wasn’t hard. Doug could have figured it out if he’d thought about it long enough. It was mine and Harper’s birth date.

I opened the thing after eight years of avoiding it. I didn’t know what was inside. Nothing about his safe was written into his will. His lawyers assumed he’d taken everything out, but it wasn’t empty. There were files and boxes and so much stuff it was hard to work my fingers in to bring something out. I started with a stack of manila envelopes. The pile fell out while I was trying to read the words on the top one. I caught everything and started a stack on the floor.

The boxes and packages and more envelopes came next. So many envelopes and large rectangular padded mailers. So much shit in one little safe. I sank down on to the floor and wondered if I was going to find something that would send me back to that place I was a couple of weeks ago where the edge of the deck may as well have been the edge of the cliffs over the ocean not that far away. Most of the envelopes had my name on them. One or two had Cody’s agent’s name written in Sharpie with a phone number. I remembered Mr. Adkins, he was a nice man who loved the hell out of Cody. He gave me candy bars and didn’t care if I got chocolate on the leather chairs. “That’ll wash, don’t worry about it, kid,” he’d said when Cody fussed. One of the boxes had Harper’s name. I found letters addressed to me and Harper, one for Doug. I didn’t find anything for Arden. After what Doug had told me, I guess I wasn’t surprised.

I went out to my car for one of the empty tote bags I had left in the trunk and bagged everything up. I couldn’t read the letter addressed to me. I wouldn’t read the things addressed to other people. I put the tote in my car and left the safe open. I made one more pass through the house and then left. I would never come back. I knew this, sitting out here in the winter sun, I would never come back here.

My next stop was the realtor in town. I signed the paperwork to put the house on the market and handed over the keys. Her people would take care of the place until it sold. She didn’t expect it would take long. The location was in high demand, and well, it was Cody Gillette’s house. There were people who would pay top dollar just to live where they thought he’d died.

I didn’t correct her. I mean, seriously, the media had, had a field day with his death, almost as bad as when Cobain died. Speculation as to why he was in a rundown farmhouse in rural Georgia was right up there with the drug overdose rumors.

Too much of my life was still back there, but I was moving on. I had to.

I sat in the car outside the realty office and watched as the sun went down. I pulled the tote bag off the floor and went through the envelopes. I found the padded mailer with the agent’s name. It said ‘Call Mr. Adkins’. Not deliver to him. I guess maybe I would give it all over to Cody’s lawyers except for the family letters, but this one, I didn’t know what to do with this one.

I didn’t know if Mr. Adkins was even still an agent or if he was still alive. Hell, the number might not work. It was written more than eight years ago. Who the hell had the same number for eight years in this age of revolving cellphone contracts?

I called anyway. Hell, I didn’t even know where the area code was, could be east coast for all I knew. He picked up after three rings. “Hello, Mr. Adkins. Sorry to call so late. I’m Mason—”

“’Bout fucking time you called me, kid, Cody told me to expect you eight years ago. You better be in Nashville. If you’re not in Nashville, you best be on your way.”

“I, uh, no, Sir. Sorry, I’m not calling about that. I was…Cody left a package for you.”

“The last album tracks most likely, never did get those. Well, then, that’s two birds with one stone. Shag ass, kid. Don’t make me come looking for you.”

When I hung up I had an address and a direction and a case of the shakes. Nashville, I was going to Nashville because…I didn’t believe in fate.

Fate didn’t fucking exist and I wasn’t in love and I wasn’t a musician…and fuck Cody for…just every damned thing.

I backed out of the parking lot and drove.

I was heading east.

I just didn’t know it until I hit the Nevada state line.

And maybe there was something to this fate thing…not that I was going to tell anyone. I stopped for coffee and I sat staring at that damned package. I didn’t know there were any final album plans. I didn’t know Cody had laid down any new tracks…I opened the envelope and pulled out several cd jewel cases. I put one in the CD player and let Cody’s bluesy voice lead me home.

Chapter Thirty

Kilby out-standing in his field.

“We have about six weeks before we need to start breaking the north field,” Hank said. I wasn’t listening. We were working in the tractor barn. Two tractors down and time was running out. Fucking Ground Hog day and the snow was starting to melt already.

“Uh, huh,” I said. Not listening.

“The sky is purple,” he said and I grunted.

“Means more snow, moron.”

Hank laughed. He hummed to himself as he worked on the ‘new’ tractor that wasn’t even ten years old yet. Fucking thing had to pick now to break down when we were already one tractor short.

“You should really think about buying another new tractor. I hear the current models have air conditioning and Wi-Fi.”

“What the fuck do we need Wi-Fi for out in the field?”

“Don’t know. Cows might be into the beefcake of the month sites. You never know about them heifers.”

I laughed. “Turn the bull lose. He’ll make ‘em forget there are Beefcake of the month sites…are there beefcake of the month sites?” I looked over to where he stood grinning at me.

“You’d be the one to know,” he said, smiling, like it was something we talked about. We didn’t.

“You and Darlene talk too much.”

“So, you’re saying Darlene and I shouldn’t talk so much. Thank you, I’ve been trying to tell her that for months. She just won’t look at what is right in front of her nose.”

I laid my wrench down and picked up my grease rag. The sun was on the way down and the temp was dropping. There was snow in the clouds now that I looked. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

Hank did the same. He wiped his hands down the front of his coveralls. I didn’t have that luxury. I hated wearing coveralls. “You’re distracted. That’s what I’m talking about. I’m talking about Darlene and you always going in to town to the dances. Every time there’s a church dance or a mingle at the community center, she drags you out.”

“Uh, okay…and what the fuck does that have to do with the price of tea in China?” I said, not following. I’d thought he was just trying to get my goat because Hank had always been good at getting my goat. Even back in elementary school, he’d been the one to mess with me until I spilled my guts or until we were rolling around punching each other’s lights out. Guess that’s what best friends were good for, that and stepping in to help run a farm when he had bigger dreams, like the NFL, but that was not going to happen and this was…well, I didn’t have a clue right now.

“See, that’s the thing, you don’t see her. I thought sure, it’s Kilby. He’s seeing someone and that’s good. I mean, after you came home, you looked like death and piss and a bad wind would have you going full-out commando on us. I thought, okay, it’s Darlene, but it’s not Darlene. She was only taking you so she could meet other guys, and here I was, not interfering because it’s you and I want you to be happy, even if I have to…well, she’s a great girl and…are you expecting company?” He was on a roll and then I was confused, but then again that whole thing was confusing. I followed his gaze past me down to the trail to the house and the black Charger that was driving slowly up to the house.

“No, I’m not expecting anyone.” I couldn’t take my eyes off the car. His had been a rental, couldn’t possibly be the same car, and couldn’t possibly be. “Must be lost.”

“Must be,” Hank said and went back to talking about Darlene and how he was waiting and how I wasn’t listening.

I
wasn’t
listening. I was wiping my hands and watching the sandy blond head emerge from the car. He didn’t wear a hat. His hair was pulled back in a haphazard bun on the back of his head. He stood holding on to the door and looking up at the house.

I dropped the rag and started down the trail. Hank and the nonsense he was spewing forgotten. I might have started to run, just in case. He couldn’t possibly be here. I didn’t know why he was here, but I didn’t want him to leave.

He turned and saw me. I felt like I was moving in slow motion, like this was a dream and I’d wake up. He closed the door and started to walk toward me. I slowed because I heard Hank yell out behind me and Darlene came out on the front porch to see what the dog was barking at.

“This place is huge,” he said when I stopped in front of him. “I thought I was at the wrong address.”

“And you thought you’d find a little white clapboard farmhouse and a couple of cows? Me with a hoe?” I had to smile as guilt crossed his face.

“Maybe,” he said slowly, a smile spreading just as slowly.

“You thought I was poor, and…”

“Perfect. I thought you were poor, and perfect…farmboy. I had this whole fantasy image of you in overalls with no shirt on underneath.” His smile faded replaced by a pink tint, followed by a shiver. “Fuck, it’s freezing out here.”

I walked closer to him and crowded him. I had to look up to him. I’d forgotten that little detail.

“So you had fantasies about me, being half-naked?” I needed to know if we were going back to where we were when we met. I don’t know if I could handle living that life again. I wanted him, I needed him. This much was painfully obvious, but body and mind….I’d have to deal with my body if he—

“I think, I might, maybe be…gay. I, maybe…for you. I don’t know. I…can’t stop thinking about you. Even when Gabriel kissed me, all I could think about was you and not just in barely hanging on overalls. I mean, yes, but…four days…” he was babbling. I loved that about him. From the first moment I met him, I loved the way he chattered when he was nervous or dealing with people who drove him bonkers. I was doing both, making him nervous and driving him bonkers. “I’m…moving to Nashville. I needed to…I mean, I left and I did it badly and I just wanted to know…” he paused and dragged in a deep breath.

“Nashville?” I had to ask because my brain snagged that one word and wouldn’t move on. “You’re moving to Nashville?”

“I’m…writing music and Cody’s agent wants me nearby. He says…I just, Kilby, if, you know? Can we date? I mean, I want to know if what we…if it was real or if…I don’t know. I can’t leave it like I left it. I need to know. Tell me and I’ll go away. Tell me it was just a fling, just sex. Tell me I’m at the wrong address. Just tell me something.”

“It’s going to snow,” I said because my brain was fried, or something just as bad.

“Is it? Not sure I know how to drive in snow. I’ve never driven in snow.” He didn’t look at the sky. I walked closer still and his gaze stayed glued to mine. He licked his lips and gulped. I saw his Adam’s apple bob. I wanted to lick it, I wanted to lick all of him.

“Then you shouldn’t drive back, might be dangerous. The roads ice over.”

“Okay.” He didn’t back up when I came boot to loafer with him.

“You’re not dressed for the cold.”

“You’re wearing too many clothes.” He tilted one corner of his mouth up in a smirk like he knew we were playing a dangerous game of cat and mouse. I wasn’t sure who was the cat and who was the mouse, I didn’t care either.

“I’m dirty,” I told him. He didn’t look down at my hands or at my clothes. Maybe he’d seen the grease on me as I walked up.

“I don’t mind dirty.” His words were a mere whisper.

“That’s good because there’s lots of dirt on a farm and on the farmboy.”

“I like dirt on…” he didn’t finish. I cradled his face in my hands, gently, because I was afraid if I grabbed him and threw him to the ground and had my wicked way with him, he’d run. He’d already run once. I couldn’t handle losing him a second time. I closed my eyes and felt his sigh on my lips. “Kilby,” he whispered just before I kissed him. I waited, counting his breaths, for him to return my kiss. Two, that’s all, because he had to catch his breath to even do that many.

He wrapped his arms around my neck and I stood on my toes and kissed him. I didn’t give a shit if my whole entire crew saw. I wasn’t going to live a lie. I couldn’t live a lie, not anymore.

“I fell in love with you,” I told him when our lips parted. I still held his face cradled in my hands. He still hugged me to him. “I haven’t changed my mind.”

“I’m sorry I ran, I’m sorry.” He brought his hands up to my face and we stood like that, staring at each other. I could see the same fear in his eyes that I saw in November, but it wasn’t the same. It was the same fear I had. “I thought I’d fucked up the only chance I’d ever have.”

“You didn’t,” I told him, wanting to kiss him again.

“I had so much that I had to deal with, wasn’t just you, wasn’t you at all. I was running from myself…I would have told you when you said you were falling for me…I was falling too.”

“I know.” I did know, I’d been there. “I understood.”

He nodded. “We can date, get to know each other and maybe…go from there.”

I didn’t answer, not right away and he started to back up. I wouldn’t let him go. “Or you can stay. Nashville isn’t far away. Rent is really high in the city. I have this huge house…and…a piano. It needs tuning.”

He cocked his head and that half-smirk of his became a full-fledged honest to goodness Mason Foxworth diva smirk and my heart fucking went tripping out of my chest.

“I’m not that easy. You can’t just flash your big…piano at me and expect me to…” he moaned as I pulled his body flush to mine. “I am so fucking easy.”

“My piano isn’t small either.” I grinned and kissed him again, hot and nasty, catching him around his waist when his knees gave out.

“So, does that mean I’m holding supper while you boys get reacquainted?” Leave it to Darlene to remind me I was about to do something stupid in front of God and everyone.

“That would be awesome, thanks,” Mason shouted back, surprising me. His mouth on mine was hungry and not for food. I devoured him because I had to make sure he was real and not just some figment of my overheated imagination.

“About damned time,” Darlene shouted over the blood pounding in my ears. “Hey, Hank, you need to be taking notes. This is how you should be treating me, none of that half-assed martyr shit you’ve been trying. You want to ask me out, then ask. Now, it’s fucking freezing out here, I’m going to my house to get warm. Dinner is on the stove. See you boys tomorrow.”

I was aware that the sun had disappeared over the ridge and the chill on my cheek was from a snowflake, but I was warm and well… “Welcome to the family, Mason Foxworth, everyone here is fucked in the head just so you know up front.”

He smiled up at me in the fading light. “Guess that means I’ll fit right in.”

I could only nod and hold on to him with all my heart. “I love you, I loved you from the first moment I saw you.”

He closed his eyes and touched his forehead to mine. “I think maybe I…when you smiled that day, I think I fell for you then. Fate, fucking fate. I don’t know what I’m doing. I have a lot of shit to work out, I’ve been seeing a therapist…but I want to be with you. I never stopped wanting to be with you, even when I thought I’d fucked it all up.”

“You’re here. It’s enough and that’s all I need.”

He nodded and I saw the glimmer of tears in his eyes. “Okay, yeah. I’m going to be a rock star and I’m in love with a farmboy and it’s a lot to adjust to.”

“Country is the new rock, everybody knows that. Rock died with Cody Gillette.”

“I’m not a country singer,” he said, his voice going up a couple of octaves.

I laughed.

“You keep telling yourself that,” I said, taking his hand and leading him to my house.

“I am not going to be a country star.” He linked his fingers with mine and opened the door for me.

I smiled again and closed the door behind us, locking it, just in case anyone had any ideas. He stood in the bright light of my mudroom with grease smudged over his cheeks and his eyes blazing with fire. “Mason,” I said, reaching for him again.

He stepped into my arms and pulled my hat from my head. “Kilby.”

“Just be you, baby, that’s the man I love. The one who can sing a kid’s song to his sister and have me in tears, the one who can sing a song about losing everything and rising from the blues that built him, that’s who you are. You keep feeling everything in here and be true to what you feel. I’ll be here, however you need me to be. We’ll figure this out.” I held my hand over his heart. I felt it stutter and race at my touch.

“And if I want you naked and bent over that washing machine?” He ran his hands down my face to the buttons on my coat, pulling each one free as he went.

“That can be arranged.”

He kissed me, this time I was the one whose knees gave out. Somehow, we made it up to my bed. We left a trail of clothes and broken knickknacks along the way. Dinner was cold when we came downstairs, snow fell outside, he still had grease on his face, and my heart in his hands. I was home, this was home. Fate brought me back here and sent me to this man.

“Pumpkin pie, fuck me, I could marry that woman just for this pie,” he said when I fed him in front of the fireplace.

“Not if you’re marrying me, there’s no room in the bed.”

He sat very still. I didn’t know why I said that. He took the plate from me and set it on the coffee table. Before I knew what he was doing, he had me pinned to the floor, my wrists trapped in his long-fingered hands. He hovered over me, his eyes filled with the fire that warmed us. “I think I like that arrangement.” He lifted my arms above my head and slid his knee between my legs. “Love you so much, Kilby. I’ve never loved anyone before, I’ve never wanted anyone like I want you. I want it to be…I want to be your only.”