I still don’t have an answer, but I know that couch-surfing on her futon isn’t it.I want to be able to take care of myself and weather storms as they come.I don’t want to be dependent on anyone for a handout.My pride has taken a beating lately, and I’d like to keep a few shreds of it intact.
“Just ...take it easy tonight, sugar.I got a vested interest in making sure you’re whole and healthy.”
Boone’s words wrap around me, and a warm feeling glows in my chest.Don’t get used to it, I order myself.
“I’ll be fine.”I turn away, glancing at Esteban as an excuse.He’s watching us both silently, which isn’t normal for him.
“Crackerhead,” he squawks before lifting one wing.
“I’ll be back for him as soon as I can.”
A smooth smile slides across Boone’s face.“You think I won’t hold the bird hostage?You don’t know me very well then, sugar.No matter what you think, we’re just getting started.”
10
Ripley
“We needsomeone to test the sound system,” Hope says as I slide behind the bar, ready to work.“Want to go put it through its paces?”
I glance around the mostly empty bar.Only a few people are drinking this early, and most of the staff are still getting ready for the place to open.
“You mean like, ‘Testing, one, two’?”I ask her.
Hope grins.“I sure as hell don’t.You know exactly what I mean.It’s open-mic night.We need to make sure someone with surprising pipes doesn’t blow out our eardrums if there’s feedback.”
Bartenders who can sing are a dime a dozen in this town, so I know I’m nothing special, but even so, I never do it in public.When Gil Green gave me that pink kid’s guitar twenty years ago, I would stand onstage at the Fishbowl when Pop wasn’t around and belt out my favorite Patsy Cline and Reba songs.Mama would clap and yell for an encore, but once we heard any sound that indicated Pop was coming back, the guitar would get hidden away until it was safe again.
When Mama died, any aspirations my nine-year-old self had died with her.I still played the chords on that guitar, but I never stepped onstage and pretended to perform again.After the way the press dragged my family through the mud, I never wanted to be in the spotlight.And I’ve done a great job screwing that up lately.
But this one time ...it can’t hurt anything.I might be a little rusty from only singing in the shower or my car, but why not?A thrill zips through me as I remember how much I loved playing and singing for Mama.
I scan the bar again.Eight people.Safe enough.
Hope grins like she knows she’s won.
“Fine.I’ll do it.You gonna pick?”I almost regret asking, because I wouldn’t put it past her to suggest something crazy.
“Nah, give it a go with whatever.”
I cross toward the stage where the sound crew set up everything for open-mic night instead of the house band instruments.This is about one voice and whatever instrument the person brings with them.As I step up onto the raised platform, I wonder if anyone has ever been discovered at the White Horse.It has been a fixture in Nashville for years, so it wouldn’t surprise me, but the chances have to be slim to none.And also completely irrelevant.I’m a bartender, not a nine-year-old with a pipe dream.
I take the microphone off the stand with a sweaty hand and flip it on.I go through the usual round of “Testing, one, two”anyway, and Hope gives me a thumbs-up from the bar.
Now what?I lean back, resting my butt on the tall stool in the middle of the stage.A song that has run through my brain so many times over the last few years rushes back to me.I can picture the video of the girl fighting with her drunk of a father, wishing a tornado would blow it all away.
Very fitting, so I launch into Carrie Underwood’s “Blown Away.”
I’m probably crazy to sing ita cappella, but in this moment, I don’t give two shits what anyone thinks.The song and the story wrap around me and transport me somewhere else, on the outside looking in on all those times my father told me I wasn’t good enough.All the times he called my mother a whore and told me I was just like her.
I just want it all to blow away.
But unlike the song, there’s not enough rain in Nashville to wipe the sins from that bar.It will never be clean again.
I lose myself in the lyrics, belting them out with everything I have, not caring if I’m off-key, because I feel every last word down to my soul.
When I whisper the lastaway, I finally open my eyes.The bar is silent.Every single person in the room is on their feet, their mouths agape, staring at me.
One of the waitresses starts a slow clap, and everyone else joins in as someone yellsencore!