by Roni Loren
“No. You’re not seeing it clearly. You’re just in a rut, honey,” Kincaid said, her sassy country-girl accent coloring each word with concern. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. It can happen to the best of us.”
“Oh, please. When in your life have you ever been boring?” Taryn asked with an eye roll her friend couldn’t see. Kincaid was the definition of the life of the party. She could probably turn a seminar on time-shares into a hot ticket.
“It’s happened. I swear,” she said dramatically. “I had a stretch where I worked so much that I was in bed with a guy and found myself telling him how the cornices on his windows would raise the value of his house.”
Taryn laughed. “Oh no.”
“Yes, you better believe I took myself on a vacation two weeks later,” Kincaid said with a huff. “If I’m thinking about cornices when I have a naked man literally on top of me, it’s a code red. That needed the Bahamas.”
“I don’t have time to go to the Bahamas.” She didn’t have time to get a pedicure, much less take a trip to an island that served umbrella drinks.
“I know, but maybe you just need to take a break or shake things up a little,” Kincaid suggested. “Try some new things. Meet some new people. Hell, move to the city. I could get you a good deal on a condo. I know an agent who works the area near the university.”
“Move to the city?”
“Sure, why not? You’re young and single. You can move where you want.”
Taryn’s eyes drifted to the loft apartments in the building on the other side of the street. The big plate-glass windows shone bright with interior lights at this hour, different versions of home being displayed in each—a modern minimalist look with bizarre artwork on white walls and a couple sitting at a dinner table, another apartment with a collection of African masks above the couch in a funky display, and yet another with a cat perched in the window and a woman drinking coffee or tea in a chair nearby.
Move to the city? Not that the thought didn’t sound glamorous. Taryn had always been captivated by the idea of living downtown in some big city. The buzz of life all around her. Restaurants and shops just a quick walk away. It was so far from her reality in Long Acre, three streets over from her parents in a boring ranch-style rental house, that she couldn’t even wrap her head around it.
Even though she worked in Austin, she’d never lived anywhere else but the small town an hour outside of the city. Growing up, she’d had dreams of going to college in New York, of traveling, of seeing all the things the world had to offer. But after the shooting and her mom’s decline, those options had become so far out of reach as to be laughable. Now, even the simple lofts in downtown Austin seemed downright exotic.
“That’s not even a remote possibility,” she said to her real-estate-agent friend.
“Fine, but maybe try to loosen the border restrictions on your life a little. I know you have a lot on your plate, but sometimes you just need to go out, do something crazy…examine some cornices from beneath a sexy guy.”
Taryn snorted. “There will be no cornices tonight.”
“Doug’s loss. But look, I’ll see you on Sunday at the charity run. We’ll do some brainstorming,” Kincaid said resolutely.
“We’re also supposed to start training for the university’s 10K run that you agreed to do with me. We need to figure out a schedule,” Taryn reminded her.
“Hold up. Did I actually agree to that?” Kincaid asked, her voice getting higher-pitched at the end. “Like with a yes?”
“Yes.”
“Was I sober? Because I don’t think it counts if I wasn’t.”
“Stone cold,” Taryn said, shaking her head. “Don’t try to back out of it now. You said you were, and I quote, ‘eating like a bear preparing for hibernation and needed to get your ass off the couch.’”
“I would never say such a thing, but we’ll talk about it after the ‘Let’s find excitement’ brainstorming. That’s more important. I am not friends with boring people, so I know there’s a wildly fascinating woman on the other end of this phone. We just need to bring her out a little. Because I could give a shit if some dude finds you interesting, but Lord, if you’re boring yourself, it’s intervention time, sugar.”
Taryn smiled and leaned against a light post. “I’m not sure there are interventions for this but thanks.”
“Yep. And sure there are. I’m on it. See you on Sunday.”
Taryn exchanged goodbyes with her friend and pushed away from the light post, feeling a little better and trying to decide which was the best way back to her car. She should probably circle the block. She’d just given Kincaid a speech about preparing for a run but hadn’t exercised beyond walking back and forth across the classroom in ages. She started walking and reassessing the rest of her night. Maybe tonight she would take a break, skip the statistics compiling, and just go straight to the James Spader movie.
Taryn turned the corner and, after half a block, passed a small bar with an open door. Her steps slowed. The sidewalk sign outside the door advertised open mic night at the Tipsy Hound, and the initial guitar chords of an old Green Day song she used to love drifted out to her, mixed with the clink of beer bottles and muffled conversation. Unable to stop herself, Taryn paused to listen and leaned into the doorway to peek inside.
The bar was tiny and only half full, but the skinny guy onstage commanded the room with a single spotlight, bright-purple hair, his acoustic guitar, and a song about walking lonely roads and empty streets. Taryn listened to the opening verse of the song, her fingers curving against her purse strap as if holding the neck of a guitar, her muscle memory playing chords along with him. “Boulevard of Broken Dreams” had been one of the songs she’d secretly taught herself to play on the guitar in high school. It had contained the proper amount of angst. Taryn mouthed the lyrics.
“Want to come in?” an upbeat male voice asked from the dark interior.
Taryn startled and squinted as a guy with a backward baseball cap and long, red hair stepped into the light of the doorway. He had an apron tied at his waist and a pen behind his ear, but somehow she got the sense he was in charge.
“No cover charge,” he added. “And if you want to perform, the audience favorite wins fifty bucks and a free beer.”
“Perform?” she asked, unable to hide the incredulity in her voice.
He shrugged. “Sure. I mean, you were singing.” He nodded toward her shoulder and wiggled his fingers. “And air-guitaring.”
Had she been? “Um, no, thank you. I mean, I can’t.”
“Sure you can. Anyone can,” he said with an easy smile. “That’s the beauty of open mic night.”
She shook her head, her shoulders tightening. “No. I don’t have a guitar or anything and—”
“We have a loaner up there.” He cocked his head toward the stage. “You play?”
Taryn’s gaze jumped to the stage. Did she play? No. Not in over a decade.
But this weird urge to say Yes, I do and sure I’ll play zipped through her like a firecracker. What in the hell was that? Maybe the combination of wine and her conversation with Kincaid had been too much. It was making her think insane thoughts. Taryn stepped back and lifted her palm. “No, I haven’t played since I was in high school. I better be getting home.”
“Aww, come on. I know that look. You want to.” He swept a hand toward the stage where the guy was finishing his song. “Take a shot. I bet you’ll remember more than you think. Plus, Mo’s the last of the night, and I could stand to sell a few more beers. Give it a whirl. It’s technically nineties night so anything from that decade is welcome, but, as you can see, even if you pick something off theme, you’re fine. Boos and hecklers aren’t allowed here.” He tapped his name tag, which had Kaleb typed in blue letters and a logo with a droopy bloodhound on it. “The Tipsy Hound needs to be true to its mascot. People are friendly here. And drunk. Bu
t mostly friendly.”
Taryn swallowed past the dryness in her throat, and her heart thumped faster than the rhythm of the music. Was this what Kincaid was talking about? Stepping over the borders of her normal life and walking into completely unknown territory? Taryn had played guitar all through high school, but she’d never performed in front of anyone outside of church. Her parents never would’ve approved of the songs she played or the ones she wrote in the privacy of her room because they thought music was a distraction.
“Okay,” she heard herself say.
Okay??? Her stomach dropped, her mouth betraying her and saying the opposite of what she’d intended to say.
“Great!” Kaleb said. “All right, what’s your name? I’ll do an intro when Mo’s done.”
“Uh…” What am I doing? What the hell am I doing? “James.” She cringed inwardly at the fake name. James Spader really needed to get out of her head. “With a z.”
With a z? What the hell? Like that made it less weird?
But the guy didn’t flinch. “Unisex. I like it. Cool.” He waved a hand. “Come with me. I’m Kaleb, by the way, owner and operator.”
She needed to turn around. There was no way she was actually doing this. But her feet moved forward as if an invisible hand was pulling her puppet strings. Her hands were sweating, and she couldn’t catch her breath. She felt disconnected from her body in a way that was disconcerting. Still, she kept moving.
The stage got closer.
The other song ended. Kaleb smiled at her.
Holy shit. She was doing this.
Chapter
Two
I can’t do this. Don’t do this. Run! The commands ran through Taryn’s brain like scared mice, but her feet stayed rooted to the floor beside the stage. A smattering of applause followed Mo’s performance, and then Kaleb hurried up the few steps to the small, battered stage.
“Tonight, we’ve got one more for you,” he said into the microphone. “A newcomer who’s probably a little scared of y’all, so give her some love and order another drink in her honor. Please welcome Jamez with a z!”
Taryn was going to throw up. Literally, all the shrimp she’d eaten at dinner to stave off the boredom were going to make a reappearance right there onstage. But Kaleb was already handing her the well-worn but freshly strung acoustic guitar. He pulled a pick from his pocket. “Stage is all yours.”
Her feet felt like they’d been dipped in cement, but she took the instrument and walked to the stool. A few people clapped. Ice cubes clinked against glasses. Taryn couldn’t look at anyone. She sat on the stool, crossed her ankles, and stared down at the guitar, half wondering how it’d appeared in her hands. Maybe she’d fallen on the sidewalk outside the restaurant, hit her head, and this was some sort of concussion dream.
She had no idea what song to play. No idea if she could still play at all. And the single spotlight felt like it was burning her skin and exposing every damn insecurity she had.
She cleared her throat, and the microphone amplified the sound, making her jump. She licked her lips. “I’m sorry. I haven’t done this in a really long time.”
Someone from the back whistled their encouragement.
Don’t freak out. Don’t freak out. She was totally freaking out. Taryn fitted her hand to the neck of the guitar and tried to focus. Nineties songs. She needed a song she knew by heart and that wasn’t too complicated on the guitar. She scrolled through her mental playlist and landed on one that used to fill her angsty teenage heart with all the feels. She took a breath and dared a glance upward, not knowing who she was in this moment, but in too deep to bail now. She didn’t make commitments she didn’t keep. She lined her fingers up for a G chord and tested it. The sound was pure and well-tuned and vibrated through her with familiarity. That gave her a small bit of comfort. Guitars never changed, even if she had.
No more delaying.
She forced herself to look out at the audience and put her mouth closer to the mic. “My sister used to like this one. I hope y’all do, too.”
Taryn took another deep breath and forced her hands to move as she played the opening chords to “What’s Up?” by 4 Non Blondes. She was trembling all over as if an electric current were moving through her. Looking at the few faces at the table closest to the stage was too much, and she missed the cue to start singing. She closed her eyes and went through the opening chords again, willing herself to just get the words out. A few verses and this temporary bout of insanity would be over.
Finally, her voice pushed past the dam of nerves in her throat and filled the small space of the bar. She sang the first lines about time passing and still not making it up the big hill of hope. Her voice felt rusty and trembled a little, and her fingertips were tender against the strings, but she kept going, eyes squeezed shut, the lyrics racing up from the vault in her mind to the surface.
Songs from her childhood were like that—old friends who never quite left her, even when she’d forgotten they existed. The words came back as though they’d just been waiting in line to be sung. She sang louder and steadier as she went, and before she knew it, she’d reached the climax of the song and was belting the tough high notes, her voice coming out gritty against her throat.
Taryn was lost for a moment, transported back to her bedroom that shared a wall with her younger sister’s. When Taryn played and sang, Nia would slap her hands against their shared wall at the end of each song, her own version of a crowd demanding more. Her sister who always listened to Taryn sing. Her sister who, no matter how mad she got over whatever siblings got mad about, never revealed to their parents Taryn’s secret plan to be a songwriter. Her sister who believed in her.
The memory hit Taryn like a gut punch, and the song left her just as quickly. Her eyes popped open, her chest tight and her skin burning hot. She didn’t know where she’d ended the song but the words were gone. In the silence, she felt frozen. But before the next blink, the small crowd erupted in applause with a few whoops for good measure. The sounds were foreign to her ears and too much to handle. The room spun in her vision.
She quickly got to her feet, almost knocking the stool over in her haste, and set the guitar in the stand. She hurried toward the side of the stage in her uncomfortable heels and down the steps, brushing past Kaleb, who was trying to get her attention. She needed to get out of there. Right. The hell. Now.
“I think it’s pretty obvious who our winner is tonight,” Kaleb called out from somewhere behind her. “Jamez with a z, come on back up here!”
Taryn bumped hard into the edge of a table in the dark and yelped. She reached out and grabbed the back of a chair to keep herself upright but stumbled anyway, her ankle turning and her shoe slipping off.
“Hey, easy there,” said a deep voice. A hand cupped her elbow, steadying her. “You okay?”
No. “I need to get out of here.”
The man released her but stayed near. She couldn’t see anything but his broad outline in the dark. “But you won. There’s money—”
“I need my shoe.” She could hear the hysterical note in her voice but couldn’t help it. The bar felt too small, the memories too smothering. “Where’s my shoe?”
“Hey, it’s all right. Head on outside for some air,” he said, his voice strong but soothing, like a cop trying to talk someone off a ledge. “I’ll find your shoe and bring it out to you, all right?”
The offer was a godsend. “Thank you.”
She zeroed in on the door and hobbled toward the light, ignoring the repeated calls from the stage for her to come up and collect her prize. She stumbled outside and took a deep breath. She pressed her back to the side of the building and tilted her head against it, trying to regain control of her body.
A minute or two later, footsteps sounded to her left, and the calming voice was back. “There you go. You’re okay. Just catch your breath,” the man said. “I have
your shoe, and I told them you’re not coming back in. You can take as long as you need.”
Taryn rolled her lips inward and gave a little nod, but didn’t open her eyes. “Thank you.”
The man didn’t say anything else, giving her space, but she could sense his presence, smell the mountain spring of his laundry detergent and the faint tang of beer. She probably looked like a lunatic. She should’ve stuck with boring.
Finally, after a few more breaths, she opened her eyes and turned her head to thank the stranger, but the words got lodged in her throat like dry bread. The guy was broad-shouldered and as solid as the wall she was leaning against, his muscular body not at all concealed by the forest-green T-shirt he was wearing. Her gaze flicked upward, finding dirty-blond hair pulled back into a man bun and light eyes that looked gray in the moonlight. Some weird zip of familiarity went through her, like déjà vu, and a sick awareness twisted her stomach. She knew those eyes.
But that wasn’t possible. Those eyes belonged to a dead teenager, a killer. Her mind was playing tricks.
The guy handed her the high-heeled shoe she’d lost and a crisp fifty-dollar bill. “Your prize winnings.”
Taryn took the items with a shaking hand. Her brain was having some sort of attack. Singing that particular song had triggered something, opened a door. Memories were trying to surface and were blending with reality. Memories she had no interest in handling right at this moment. She forced herself to focus on the handsome stranger, pick out the features that did not look like Joseph Miller. The strong jaw covered in scruff, the full bottom lip, the faint scar through one eyebrow, the slightly crooked nose. Plus, Joseph hadn’t been sexy. This guy had sex appeal in spades.
She swallowed past the panic. Not him. Not him. “Thank you. I’m sorry.”
He frowned. “What are you apologizing for?”
She blinked, her thoughts scattering like dropped pennies. “I don’t know.”