Behind the Strings

by Courtney Giardina

That guitar hadn’t been played in years. It just sat there, closed up in its case in the corner of my bedroom. My dad had given it to me for my sixteenth birthday. Well, he didn’t actually give it to me, he had it delivered. Along with it came a note with an apology, like every year before.

  “Not at all,” I said. “I bet it needed a serious tune-up.”

  “That it did,” he said, “but I think I got it.”

  “It sounded beautiful to me,” I said.

  Jesse pointed to the kitchen, where he had already set a mug out for me next to a freshly-brewed pot of coffee. Mornings like this after nights like last I could get used to. He began to play again as I poured coffee into my cup and settled down next to him.

  “That sounds amazing,” I said.

  “You like it? I made it up this morning. I was feeling inspired.”

  “Oh were you?” I asked. “Is it a love song?”

  He smiled. “A writer never tells his secrets.”

  He asked me if I wanted to play along with him and was a bit surprised when I told him I had absolutely no idea how to actually play guitar. I could tell he was confused at how I could have a guitar I’d never played.

  “Remember how I told you my dad wasn’t around much?” He nodded. “To make up for important dates or events he missed, he used to send me gifts. I guess he thought it would make up for it. That guitar was one of them. My sixteenth birthday. I don’t even remember where he said he was. All the excuses began to jumble together after my tenth or eleventh birthday, I think.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” he said. “Why did he leave?”

  “Have you ever heard of the Black Horizons?” I asked. I could see the mixed emotions on his face. “My dad is a musician, or he was, I don’t even know what he does anymore. There was nothing that he cared more about than being on that stage. The Black Horizons were at the peak of their popularity when my mom got pregnant. Even a little baby like me couldn’t keep Jack Coleman from the one thing he loved more than anything in the world.”

  Jesse’s shoulders sunk and he leaned back into the arm of the couch. Jack Coleman was talented, there was no denying it. Anyone who grew up in this industry would know that, so I’m sure it wasn’t easy for him to hear he wasn’t as successful in other areas of his life as he was on that stage.

  “Celia, I’m so sorry.”

  “It’s okay. I think you get so used to it, that you stop getting disappointed.”

  He placed the guitar down on the coffee table and scooted over to me. I felt both of his arms pull me into him as he held me. His lips were cold when they touched my forehead.

  “My dad died when I was seven,” Jesse said. I looked up to see him blinking back tears. “He fought a hell of a fight, but in the end the cancer won.”

  “I’m so sorry. I had no idea.”

  “I don’t talk about it a lot. After he died, the Johnny Cash songs he used to play…I stopped listening to them for a long time. I stopped listening to anything. I was angry. I thought that shutting music out of my life would make the pain go away. I thought it would stop hurting if I let go of the one thing that reminded me of my dad.”

  I was dumbfounded at the words coming out of Jesse’s mouth. It was as if he was reading a chapter from the book of my life. My eyes filled with tears for both him and me. Though we had lost our fathers in two different ways, we still lost them and that loss had caused us to run from something we loved dearly. But, somehow we found it in us to make our way back to it and to each other.

  “The year that Johnny Cash died,” Jesse said, “I remember pulling out an old vinyl and I played the song ‘I’m Gonna Try to Be That Way.’ It was my dad’s favorite. I could’ve sworn as the song played that it was my dad’s voice I heard. I cried like a baby for a good hour after that and then I made a promise that I would try really hard to be the kind of man my dad would’ve wanted me to be. And that man loved music. So I picked up a guitar and I haven’t put it down since.”

  I kissed his cheek softly. “I am beyond certain that your dad is looking down on you right now, smiling.”

  He wiped a tear from his cheek and held me tighter. “I miss him every day. There’s things in my life I wish I could call him up and talk to him about, and moments I wish he could be here to share with me. Time, you know…it’s a fragile thing. It’s a shame when some people don’t see it like that.”

  When I looked up at him his lips pressed gently against mine. I could tell that he was sad for me that my dad chose to love something else more. And I could see in his eyes the way he loved his own father. He reached over and picked the guitar up again and held it out for me to take. I hesitated at first, but he told me to trust him. And this time, without question, I did, so I took the guitar into my hands.

  “Okay, now you want to place your left hand here and your fingers here…here…and here.”

  He placed a guitar pick in my right hand and helped me glide it over the strings. He was patient with me that morning as I learned from him. We’d master one chord, then move on to the next. We were in our own little world that Sunday morning. There were no expectations, no interruptions and no time limits. The two of us were everything that we needed to be to one another as we sat behind those strings. We were safe and free of any obligation.

  Once I had learned a few chords, I took a break and handed the guitar back to Jesse. “Can you play me a song?”

  “You mean your song?” he asked.

  “Do I have a song?”

  He didn’t answer. He just smiled and pulled the paper on the table close to him and started to sing.

  I’ve been so many places

  On the road chasing dreams

  I’ve seen so many faces

  I get lost in the scene

  I lowered my coffee mug into my lap as I watched his fingers play. It was perfect in every way. The music, the melody, the rhythm and the moment. I saw the smile on his face grow as he sang the rest of it, his eyes closed tight.

  But now that I found you

  It don’t matter if the sun is shining or the clouds are storming

  I know where I belong

  When I wake up next to you

  On a Sunday morning

  I learned forward when he was done and pressed my lips against his. If there was one single moment since the two of us had met that I wished I could bottle up and keep forever, this right here was the one.

  40

  It was the weekend before Thanksgiving and I was getting ready for dinner with Jesse. From the way he fumbled his words during the invite, I could tell he too understood that the bubble we had been living in would no longer exist once Logan came home. I stuck by my decision not to tell him about Logan’s feelings for me. My plan was to tell Logan as soon as he came back into town what had been going on. I went over my speech in the bathroom mirror a couple of times, but I never could find the right words. I knew anything I was going to say would break the heart of a guy who had always protected mine. I had put myself in a difficult situation and I had no one to blame but myself. I should’ve been honest with Logan from the beginning, but I couldn’t change that now, I could only fix it going forward and hope that not too much damage had been done.

  Jesse’s Mustang had pulled up to the curb and I was so anxious I didn’t even give him time to be a gentleman. I stepped outside immediately and walked right to the car.

  We held hands the whole way to the restaurant, but the conversation was restrained. Thank goodness for the radio. I sang along with it, flipping stations during songs I didn’t know, trying to keep myself occupied until we arrived.

  I didn’t know if it was a good or bad thing to pull up to one of the fanciest restaurants on this side of Nashville. I thought it could go both ways. Fancy restaurants are no place for scenes, so if he was ending things, I would have to keep my composure. The other way to look at it was we were celebrating the start of something real. Jesse had made it impossible for me to figure out.

  “It’s gorgeous i
n here,” I said as Jesse slid me into my chair.

  On Jesse’s request the waiter pulled out a bottle of fine red wine and gave his little speech about why we should open the most expensive bottle they had. I was perfectly fine with a glass of the ordinary stuff, but Jesse insisted.

  I slid my wine glass closer to the edge and let the waiter pour.

  “Should we cheers to something?” I asked.

  “What should we cheers to?” he asked. His body was stiff. He sat straight up in his chair, seemingly unable to relax.

  “To being here,” I said. He smiled, remembering our first night out alone.

  He took a sip from his glass and cleared his throat. “Celia…” he said.

  It was amazing how many people had said my name in the last twenty-four years. My mother, Logan, old boyfriends or whatever you want to call them, teachers, bosses, and so many others. And when they did it sounded so ordinary. It was just my name…but not when Jesse said it. When Jesse said it, he held everything I was for that second. My heart, my soul, my world, my smile, he had it all every time it rolled off his tongue. It threw me into this everlasting state of being that I almost missed the rest of what he was saying. Thankfully he pulled my hand into his and brought me back.

  “I feel like this is cliché, but I’ve honestly never met anyone like you. When I’m with you, the whole world disappears around me and there is nowhere else I’d rather be. And when I’m not with you, there’s not a second in any day that goes by where I don’t picture your smile or hear your laugh.”

  My eyes began to water. I blinked back the tears that so desperately wanted to escape. My lips quivered the deeper into the conversation he got. I watched the way his eyes never left mine. The way he wet his lips in his moments of pause and the way he squeezed my hand when he struggled with what to say next.

  “I want to be honest about all of this.” He let out a heavy sigh and took another sip from his glass. “I want to be with you, and I mean in a way that is more than just tearing your clothes off and having you wake up naked in my arms. Not that I want that to stop, because believe me, I don’t, but I want so much more than that.”

  I placed my other hand on top of his. I took a deep breath to give me an extra second to gather my thoughts. All of this it felt so right. I wanted him and us and everything that came with it.

  “Everything you said, I feel the same way,” I said.

  “You have no idea how good it feels to hear you say that,” Jesse said. He pulled his hands from mine and leaned back in his chair. The look on his face shifted. I could tell by the way his smile faded that something else was on his mind. “If we’re going to do this, Celia, I want to do this the right way. We need to tell Logan.”

  “I know,” I said. I leaned in toward him. “I know we do, and I am going to. As soon as he gets home I’m going to tell him everything. I promise.”

  “We can do it together.”

  “No. This is something I have to do myself,” I said.

  “And you’re sure that you want to do this?” He waved his finger back and forth between the two of us.

  “I’ve never been sure of anything in my entire life.” I said, letting out a chuckle. “But I’ve also never felt this way about anyone before and I am absolutely positive that I don’t ever want it to go away.”

  We both smiled. Jesse raised his glass and I lifted mine to meet it. As I took another sip of wine, I sensed a strange feeling in my stomach. A flutter if you will. It was the first time I had felt those kind of butterflies. I wasn’t nervous or afraid, I was excited. I couldn’t stop smiling. I felt like one of those ventriloquist dolls whose face was frozen in one emotion: happiness.

  “There’s something else that I wanted to say to you tonight, Celia,” Jesse said.

  “Sure, what is it?”

  “I’ve never honestly said this before, so forgive me if it’s not the most graceful attempt. These last couple of months have been more than I imagined. I love the idea of what we are and what we can be. I love thinking about what we’ll do next and I think I’m falling in love with you, Celia.” He took a quick pause to clear his throat. “Actually…I think I have already fallen in love with you.”

  I bit my lip, brushed my hair behind my ear and stared down at the table. I tried to find the words inside of me. Something to give to Jesse to hold on to, but was it going to be what he wanted to hear? Did I love him? How do you even know? Do you just feel it? All of these questions rushed through my head as Jesse patiently waited.

  I replayed the words again in my head and this time I remembered something. It must have been a memory I’d blocked out because I’d never even thought about it until now. I couldn’t have been more than five, all tucked into my bed with a book in my hand. I reached out to hand it to someone…my dad. My dad was there, but he wouldn’t take the book. He said he was sorry and that he had to go, but promised he’d make it up to me. He backed away as I asked him to stay, and right before he turned off the light, he said one last thing: “I love you, Celia.” Then he was gone.

  I knew it would come. My dad was always going to be there, in my mind, waiting to ruin things. In the good moments of my life he would remind me how it all could go wrong. In the moments that I was happy, he would be right there to take it all away. I hated him for that and I always would. I should’ve been smiling. I should’ve said it back by now, but because of him I couldn’t. He had stolen from me all the innocence no one should ever lose.

  “It’s okay,” Jesse said. The smile that once graced his face was gone. “You don’t have to say anything.”

  “Jesse…I care about you, I really do.” I paused. “Love is just something that’s never really been in my vocabulary, and it’s going to take some time.”

  He squeezed my hands and told me we were in no rush. That we had all the time in the world. I knew he meant it. I held onto his hand so tight. I held on to the hope that he was right, that we did have all the time in the world and that someday I would be able to say it back.

  Even if the night didn’t quite turn out the way that Jesse envisioned, it was still a step in the right direction. After weeks of being in limbo, tonight had made it official. He was mine and I was his. This thing called life; we were going to do it together. It felt amazing having somebody by my side, holding my hand, loving all of me, the good and the bad.

  41

  The one thing I adored most about Jesse was how he could make me smile without even saying a word. I swear, the sexiest thing about a man is the way he can make a woman smile even when she thinks there is nothing to smile about. He didn’t let me feel guilty about anything. The whole ride back to my house he just held my hand, and his touch was all I needed.

  We walked up to the house hand in hand. We knew we had a long way to go from here, especially with telling Logan, so we made a pact: tonight we were going to cherish us. We were going to live in our own little world until the morning came, and then we’d figure out how to face reality. The only problem for us was that reality had a plan of its own.

  I was so distracted that I didn’t notice at first. It wasn’t until I had turned the key that I realized we weren’t alone. Startled, I jumped back into Jesse’s arms as a shadow on the porch moved into the light.

  “Logan,” I said as he stepped closer. My body tensed. Immediately, it became hard to breathe. “What are you doing here?”

  “I got back early and wanted to see you. I’ve been waiting out here all night.” His words were sharp. His eyes were glaring and he stood frozen in front of the porch swing.

  I looked over at Jesse, who wouldn’t look up; he scuffed his shoe across the deck, hands stuffed in his pockets. Logan looked back and forth between the two of us. I was stuck in the middle of both of them, waiting for whatever was going to come out of his mouth next.

  “So, how long has this been going on?” he asked, pointing at the two of us.

  “Logan…” I said.

  “How long?” he snapped back at me.
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  “A couple months,” Jesse said as he stepped in and grabbed my hand. “We were going to tell you.”

  Logan walked closer to us. His eyes were fixated on mine. The color washed from his face and his lip started to tremble. My body wouldn’t let me stand, I leaned on the side of the house.

  “Well, isn’t that cute,” Logan said with his glare, taunting us.

  Jesse pulled his hands from mine and moved towards him, but Logan jerked away. When Jesse started to talk, Logan shot his hand out. “Don’t you dare say a word to me.” He emphasized every word, his voice growing louder with each of them.

  “Logan, buddy, please, can we just talk about this?” he pleaded.

  “What is there to talk about?” his said.

  His voice was no longer calm. He pushed Jesse out of the way. He was now only inches from me.

  “You knew, then, didn’t you?” he asked, looking me dead in the eye.

  Jesse looked at me, but I didn’t look back. I knew what Logan was talking about, but he didn’t. And just as much as Logan was thrown for a loop, Jesse was about to be, too. I had a plan. A plan I thought would fix it all, but now here I was, watching it all go up in smoke.

  “Twenty-four years, Celia. Twenty-four years I have never been anything but loyal and honest with you. So I’m going to ask you one more time.” His voice was stern. “When I told you I loved you, were you already screwing my friend behind my back?”

  “When he what?” Jesse asked. His mouth dropped open. He shook his head, but never took his eyes off me.

  “It wasn’t like that,” I said. “I wanted to tell you. I tried that day, but I couldn’t.”

  He didn’t care what I had to say at that point. I knew he was hurt and he had every right to be. I looked at Jesse out of the corner of my eye; he was still trying to process it all as well.

  “And you,” he said, spinning around to look at Jesse. “You wrote a fucking song with me, about her?” Jesse nodded.

  “We didn’t plan any of this. I’m really sorry, man, I am,” Jesse said.