Heartbreaker

by Melody Grace

She pauses by the pier to lean over the stroller with her nephew, lifting him out and swinging him in the air. I can see it now, how much he looks like Lottie. But I swear, the world nearly dropped out when I thought he might be hers. I knew she would have moved on - hell, we both should have by now – but there’s a difference between knowing something in theory, and being faced with her gorgeous, lush body and imagining it under some other guy’s hands.

  Not on my watch. Every second I spend with her is a battle not to yank her closer and kiss her until she’s gasping for more. Last night I came close, damn, so close to taking her straight to bed. Now I wonder if I was a fool not to take that chance when I had it.

  She wants me, and fuck if I don’t need her more than ever.

  My cell phone keeps ringing, so I finally turn away from the past and answer. “Kyle, what part of ‘vacation’ don’t you understand?”

  “Man, you’re going to want to get on a plane and come right back when you hear what I’ve got lined up for you.” My manager sounds pumped, but then he always does. Kyle is two parts Jerry Maguire, and one part your annoying kid brother who just won’t quit. But he’s the best in the business, the one who took a chance on me from the start.

  “I’m not interested,” I try to interrupt, but Kyle keeps steamrolling.

  “SNL, baby!” he whoops. “They want you as the musical guest this weekend!”

  I take a breath. Saturday Night Live? It’s a big deal, the kind any musician would kill for. Millions of viewers, a guaranteed boost in sales. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned on the road, it’s that there are some things more important than another number one hit.

  Like the girl in the cut-offs walking away from me, her tanned legs making me crazy for just a single touch.

  “Sorry,” I tell him. “Tell them to book someone else.”

  Kyle groans. “Come on, man, you’re killing me! I already turned down another leg of the tour so you could have a break, but this is one night. One tiny studio show. You could be on a plane and back in Beech Bay by Monday.”

  “Oak Harbor,” I correct him, heading back towards town. “And you know it’s never just one night. You’ll be hounding me back into the studio before I’ve had a chance to breathe.”

  “Yeah, well your third album won’t write itself,” Kyle grumbles. “And you know this one’s the big kahuna. The debut got you cred, the follow-up was the smash, and then this one’ll take it to the next level. Total world domination. Just look at Adele!”

  I have to appreciate his faith in me. He’s the one who found me playing at an open-mic in Austin and swore I could make it all the way to the top. Still, when it comes to the grind, Kyle doesn’t get it. He stayed in LA through most of our tour, working the business end and only flying out to a few big shows, so he doesn’t know what it takes out of me. He doesn’t know how I give my all to an audience, and then get right back out there and do it again the next night, and the next. “Unless you want the whole record to be about insomnia and the inside of a tour bus, you’re going to have to give me some time.”

  “I get it, refilling the creative well. Look, I’m on your side. You wouldn’t believe the way the label’s hounding me. But I told them, I said ‘Finn’s gone fishing’. That’s why this SNL gig would get them off my back.” His voice turns pleading. “Buy us some time for this vacation of yours.”

  “Don’t act like I’m bailing on you,” I warn him. “I’ve been out there for two straight years, and it’s not just me. My band was about ready to kill you by the time I called it, and they still might if I drag them back before they’ve had a chance to recover.”

  “So we make it a solo show.” Kyle keeps pushing. “You, acoustic, unplugged—”

  “I’m hanging up on you.”

  “No, no, wait!” Kyle calls. I reluctantly lift the phone back up. “I’ll see if I can push them a couple of weeks.”

  “A couple of months,” I correct him.

  “Same thing. Whenever you’re done getting back to your roots. What are you doing down there, anyway?” Kyle asks. “You swore you’d never step foot back in that town.”

  I think of Eva in my arms last night, and how her body pressed against me, her mouth demanding everything. I meant what I said to her: this isn’t over, not by a long shot.

  “I’ve got my reasons.”

  I head back to the house, admiring its stately glory. I knew from the look on Eva’s face as she walked up the front path this was the place I’d take. I’d have rented a shack on the cliffs if she’d smiled the way she did when she opened the front door here, but this is better. Not bad for a kid who grew up in a rundown house on the wrong side of the tracks, barely one step up from a trailer. I guess I should be used to it by now, the zeros in my bank account. Kyle tells me the way the record is selling, I could buy myself a private jet and still have plenty left over for change. But a part of me still feels like I’m living paycheck to paycheck and working every last dollar to get by.

  I head up the path – and find someone waiting for me on the front steps. Sheriff Keller. “Bill.” I stop, wary right away. “Everything okay?”

  “Don’t worry, son,” he chuckles. “This is a personal visit, not business.”

  I give him a wry smile. “You know me, nothing to hide.”

  Bill snorts, probably remembering the days I spent thumbing my nose at the law in this town. He always cut me a break because he was friends with my dad. They served together back in the day, and I dread to think what kind of juvie record I’d have under my belt if he hadn’t looked the other way. “How’s Marcie?” I ask. “And the kids?”

  “Oh, you know.” Bill rolls his eyes. “My youngest just discovered boy bands, and Chris came back from school with a ballpoint pen tattoo. Whole damn thing’s infected now. Serves the kid right.”

  “I can give him the name of a real tattoo artist, if you like.”

  Bill glares. “Don’t you go giving him ideas.”

  I wonder what brought him out here. Bill just strolls to the end of the porch and looks around. “Nice place you’ve got here. I heard they fixed this place up.”

  “Yup.”

  “Staying long?”

  “A couple of months, maybe.” I keep watching him. “You want something to drink?”

  “No thanks, son.” He sticks his hands in his pockets, looking awkward. “You been by the graveyard yet?”

  Every bone in my body turns to lead. I slowly shake my head.

  “I know you couldn’t make it back, but we did it up right.” Bill says, somber. “A soldier’s burial, had some of the boys down from Fort Bragg. It wasn’t a twenty-one gun salute, but it was something. I saved the flag for you, if you want to come by--”

  “No. Thanks,” I add, through gritted teeth.

  Bill clears his throat. “Look, it’s none of my business, but I told your dad I’d keep an eye out for you, after he went.”

  I wonder whose idea that was. I’m guessing Bill’s, because my pop never gave a damn how I was doing while he was still alive. But I know Bill’s only trying to help, so I keep my tone even, hiding the anger in my blood. “As you can see, I’m doing just fine.”

  He nods thoughtfully. “And we’re all real proud of you.” He waits another moment, but I don’t offer anything more, and eventually he sighs. “Well, you just let me know if you change your mind. I still have some of his things: memorabilia, old mementos he wanted you to have.”

  My fists stay clenched at my sides. “Keep them.”

  Bill nods again, his expression regretful. “Take care. And watch that speed limit,” he adds, turning to leave. “No more drag racing down Main Street!”

  I watch him go, frozen in place there on the porch with every muscle in my body clenched and alert until he gets back into his patrol car and slowly drives away.

  I slowly exhale, forcing myself to relax.

  He means well, I remind myself. Hell, he probably thought he was doing me a favor, stopping by with word from my ol
d man. He always did try to help. Back in the old days, he was the one who kept Hank out of jail, scraping him off the sidewalk at three in the morning to cool off in the drunk tank. Bill meant well, I know, but sometimes I wonder if he wasn’t complicit in the whole damn thing. Maybe my father might have been forced to shape up if he saw any real consequences.

  But then I remind myself my dad had plenty of chances to change. He was scarred too deep, broken in ways nobody could fix. Back then as a kid, I didn’t understand. After mom left, I thought at first I was the one failing him, always making him mad, provoking that whiplash rage that would make him fly off the handle and reach for his belt. I tried so damn hard to keep things quiet, tip-toing around him like an intruder in my own home, scared he would leave me, too. By the time I was old enough to realize it wasn’t my fault, I dove headlong into anger instead. I was so damn mad at him for driving mom away, for drinking himself into an early grave, for never being the father other kids got to have. I’d see the town fathers out around, standing on the sidelines during ballgames, or showing up to parent-teacher nights at school, and it would hurt like hell, the deep-down, empty ache. I was left to struggle alone with that ticking time-bomb getting drunk in the next room. Meanwhile there were men like Bill, who somehow managed to put scars of war behind them, to show up and be decent for their family.

  But I was never first for my father. I ranked somewhere below a bottle of Jack Daniels, and bitter memories of the past. We co-existed for as long as possible under the same roof, coming to blows a fair few times. I was counting down the days until my escape. I’d stick around long enough to graduate, and then be gone from that silent house. I had it all worked out.

  And then came Eva.

  I unlock the door and head inside. What hits me first is the silence. Not tense, or angry, like the way my old place used to be whenever my old man was waiting drunk and bitter in the next room. This is all warmth and sunshine, the rays falling through the big windows and lazily melting over bare wooden floors. It feels the way a home is supposed to, the way Eva’s house did whenever I’d stop by: somewhere to laugh and talk like a real family, not two strangers trapped together out of loathing and twisted DNA. No, this is a real home. Never mind the memories still sleeping out back by the creek.

  This morning, though, I know that those red-hot memories are dangerous territory, so I take a sub-zero cold shower to get my head clear and thinking straight. But all the cold water in the world can’t shake the heat when I think about Eva – about the curves of her gorgeous body, and those ripe lips just begging for a kiss. And more.

  Damn, she’s not the innocent girl I used to know, and it’s sexy as hell. She’s grown up. I don’t just mean her knock-out body, but the look in her eyes, too. Five years ago, she almost seemed surprised by the force of our passion, but kissing her last night, I saw she knew exactly what she was doing. How to drive me crazy. How to leave me panting for more. In the bright light of day, she can try to deny it, but we were about ten seconds away from tearing each other’s clothes off and fucking right there in the street.

  So why the hell did I stop?

  Because this matters. Because when I take Eva again, all the way, I want her to be begging for it. No going back. She’s the reason I’m here, after all.

  Kyle was right. I swore I’d never come home again. I didn’t think there was anything, or anyone, worth coming back to. Eva would be long gone the minute she hit graduation, off to drama school in New York, or Chicago, maybe. One of those big-city schools she would talk about with such excitement, those nights I held her in my arms and listened as she painted a picture of the future. Me, I had a different path in store. I spent my first couple of years after leaving town drifting around, working bartender gigs and construction in Austin, and Oakland, and Kansas City. I didn’t know where I was heading. I just knew I needed to put as much distance between me and Oak Harbor as possible – far enough to keep me from turning around those dozen times I hit rock bottom and driving back home for her.

  It wasn’t easy, staying away. I tried drinking myself into oblivion, and screwing every last girl who looked my way. I was desperate to forget the laughter in Eva’s eyes, or the way she’d curl her body around me. Looking back, it’s a miracle I didn’t drink myself into an early grave – or get pushed in there by some vengeful guy whose woman spent the night in my bed. But even then, I knew it couldn’t last. I would hear my old man’s voice in my head, taunting me, saying I was a loser, just like him. I was proving him right, every time I rolled home drunk, and none of it came close to filling the aching space where my heart used to be. Hell, nothing made me feel a damn thing at all, until one night I put the bottle aside and picked up my guitar instead, and managed to pour all my hurt and guilt and damn self-loathing into a song.

  That was the moment it all turned around. That was when I saw a light at the end of the tunnel – and maybe even a way to earn Eva back, one day. I gigged solidly around town, playing any dive bar or coffee shop that’d have me, until finally Kyle happened to stop by a show one night – and the rest is history. But Eva was never far from my mind. After the record started building, and I’d play a show in a new city every other night, I would wonder if she was out there. Maybe just a few blocks away, or even standing in the crowd. Was she living her dreams, becoming a great actress the way she’d always wanted? Did she still hate me for leaving her without that goodbye, or did she understand I’d had no choice, and that giving her a future on her own was the only noble thing I could do? I swear I thought I saw her a hundred times over, a thousand-volt shock to my heart every time. It was worth it just to imagine she was out there, experiencing everything she wanted from the world.

  Until I ran into a guy from school in a bar one night, and heard Eva was right back where we started in Oak Harbor. No big acting plans, no wild adventures. She was here, and I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why. I booked my ticket that same night, despite the darkness I left behind in this town. Nothing could have kept me away from her, but now that I’m back, I have more questions than ever before – and a bad feeling about those shadows in her clear, hopeful eyes.

  So what happened? Because this isn’t the girl I used to know. The girl I remember is sharp and wild and breathless and hungry, that shy exterior hiding a heart so deep and true it could renew even my tired and lonely bones. She drove me crazy with desire and awe, made me want to be a better man, enough to turn my back and put her first, even when it broke my heart to go. Leaving didn’t make a damn bit of difference: that girl has haunted me every night since I left this town. In the crowd of every show, living in the lyrics of every last song I write. I’ve kept her with me in my mind and heart, waiting for the day I could catch even a glimpse of her again.

  But now I’m back, everything’s changed.

  I didn’t see it that first afternoon. I was too busy trying not to drag her into my arms and kiss her until the years and leaving didn’t matter anymore. She’s still more beautiful than any girl has a right to be, still shy and smart-tongued and generous to a fault. But now I’m through the first glance shock of having her right here in real life again, something doesn’t add up. She was so cool and contained last night at Dixie’s, like she was weighing every word before it left her lips, watching me steadily with those heartbreaker eyes. Maybe this ice queen act is just for me. Hell, I know I deserve it after the way I left things last time around. But then I see it again; the spark in her eyes, the teasing edge to her perfect lips, hints that the old Eva isn’t gone forever. It’s the only thing that gives me hope, and the reason I had to kiss her again. I had to break through those careful defenses and know for sure the passionate, wild girl I knew is still beneath the surface.

  That, and the fact that all I’ve wanted in the world for five long years is a chance to taste her sweet mouth again, to feel her undone and panting in my arms.

  Where she belongs.

  Maybe it’s a shot in the dark, and I’m only dredging up painful me
mories for the both of us, but I can’t help hoping that maybe, just maybe, there’s still a chance for me to change the ending to this tragedy I wrote.

  Seven.

  EVA.

  I wake full of energy, determined to get things back to normal. Finn’s games are just a distraction, I remind myself, sending me down the rabbit hole of memories and long-forgotten desire. I was doing just fine before he waltzed back into town, and I’ll be even better when he waltzes back out– off to his new life in the spotlight again.

  A kiss means nothing. Child’s play. Hell, we got up to way worse when we were teenagers, and now I’m a grown woman, it shouldn’t even be a blip on my radar.

  But damn, what a kiss that was.

  I shower and dress in some cutoffs and a sweater, then set about planning my day. Lottie teases, saying I’m old before my time, but I love the quiet solitude of my routine here, getting things in order and enjoying the silence before the week ahead. Usually I dive straight into chores, but today, I find myself heading for the mudroom downstairs, and the old trunk I’ve been hauling from housesitting gig to housesitting gig all year.

  My acting crate.

  I lift the lid, and feel a strange pang of wistfulness in my chest. It’s all here, from the printed pages of my very first role in the school play, to the old vintage books I’d order online and then learn by heart, muttering the great monologues in my dark bedroom at night until the words were printed deep on my soul. I fish out an old velvet cloak, musty now, from my turn as Lady Macbeth in the senior play. I remember mom recording it, proud in the front row. How that audition reel got me my big break at drama school in New York. I still know those lines better than anything, how it felt to be onstage captivating the room with every word.

  “Out, out damn spot,” I whisper under my breath.

  It’s funny how my speech impediment never tripped me up on-stage. I was still stumbling through my sentences when a teacher assigned us a poem to learn for class. I was so nervous getting up in front of the class, I wanted to die. They would all laugh at me, I just knew it. But when I opened my mouth, the words came out perfectly, so clear it’s like I didn’t have a problem at all. It was like a ray of sunshine cutting through the darkness of all my pain and insecurities. I realized that I could recite other people’s words without hesitation. There was something about having a script that gave me the confidence I needed. That’s when I fell in love with acting. Bringing someone else’s character to life, I could speak clearly, fearlessly. No stumbling, no stammering, no hot flush of shame. I was good enough.