“Am I supposed to be impressed?” Harrison tried not to inject too much scorn into his voice. “I wouldn’t let my worst enemy live here.”
“It’s Mom and Dad’s trailer.” Gage took a beer out of the fridge, pried off the cap with the old-fashioned bottle-cap remover screwed under a cabinet, and shoved the bottle in Harrison’s hand. “I’m fine here.”
Harrison took a long swig. “Change is hard for you, I know. But this place should have been condemned when I left it. I sold it to the owner of the park for fifty bucks, did you know that?”
“No.”
“He said he’d use it as his man cave. Emphasis on cave.”
“He made a profit then. I bought it back from him for a hundred dollars.” Gage, unperturbed, as always, went back out to the sitting area. “The couch still pulls out.”
“Oh, God. I can’t even imagine what the mattress must be like. Let me see the rest.”
If his old bedspread was still there—
Yes. It was. Red ribbed cotton from Sears. Mom had bought it at Goodwill. The other twin had a blue quilt with little moons all over it. That had been Gage’s.
“Don’t tell me you kept Mama’s floral bedspread.” Harrison stalked to the bigger bedroom where their parents had slept. Yep, nothing—nothing—had changed. Except for the fact that half the rear wall of the trailer, not visible from the driveway, was covered in a plastic tarp and duct-taped down.
He turned. “You really have to move.”
Gage looked unfazed. Then again, he always did. “I sleep in our old room. I don’t come in here.”
“The place is clean, I’ll grant you that,” said Harrison. “But it’s uninhabitable.”
“That’s a relative term. If we were on Survivor right now and ran across this trailer in the jungle, we’d be celebrating our great find. We’d move in out of the elements and win the competition.”
“We’re not in a jungle. You could own a home, a nice one, and you could invite people over. No one’s gonna want to visit. You definitely can’t bring your girlfriend here.”
“She’s moved away, and she wasn’t a girlfriend. She lived next door, and we were friends with benefits.”
“The benefits obviously took place at her house.”
“Yeah, so?”
“What about other friends? Don’t you need some?”
“I have plenty. I see them every year at the National American Crossword competition and I talk to them online every day.”
“That’s awesome. But what about having people over? An honest-to-goodness girlfriend, maybe? You can’t do that here.”
It was the first time since he’d crossed the threshold into the trailer that Gage’s face showed some change in expression. His mouth opened a fraction, and he got crinkles around his eyes. It was a genuine wince.
“See?” Harrison got closer, in his face. “See? You know you want a girl around here. Someone you can cook a romantic dinner for.”
Gage’s mouth thinned. “I have little chance of that. Biscuit Creek’s population is minuscule, and single women, ages twenty-five to forty, number less than fifty.”
“Oho.” Harrison chuckled. “So you keep track.”
“Of course. I’m a bachelor. I try to stay attuned to the social scene.”
“That’s staying attuned? I call it sitting back and missing out. You need to join in.”
“How?”
How? Did he ask how? Harrison took a subtle breath. “By getting your ass out of this trailer,” he said in a tight voice, his arms crossed over his chest. “You’re moving out, Gage. And I’m not giving you a choice.”
There went his long weekend in the Hamptons. He’d have to stick around here a few days and help Gage find a new place.
“No. I’m staying.” Gage walked ramrod-straight back into the sitting room. The TV came on. ESPN. His second favorite love was baseball.
Harrison was desperate for something to kick. His brother was so smart—a genius—yet the simplest things just went right over his head.
His phone chirped. “What?”
It was Dan. “I drove this woman’s piece-of-crap car all the way back from Atlanta.” His Boston accent was thick. “The AC doesn’t even work. She could’ve warned me.”
“Sorry. Google Maps got you to the right place?”
“As far as the sign with the giant tomato. After that, I was on my own. I was worried some southern people might come out of the woods with their hunting rifles and shoot me for trespassing. Or offer me lemonade. I wasn’t sure which. They do both down here, right?”
“You’re an idiot. Some southern people. As if we’re from another planet.”
“Well, you kinda are. A girl named Weezie met me out front. She didn’t even know me, but she talked my ear off, quite frankly. She wanted to know what the worst part of my job was. And the best. And then she asked me who I’d have to dinner if I could invite five people over, living or dead.”
“Did she try to give you a strawberry milk shake?”
“No.”
“You missed out.” Harrison paused a beat. “Did you meet her sister?”
“Yes, and her fiancé, too. They were running out the door to a party, so we only exchanged hellos. She didn’t look too happy, to tell you the truth. She was smiling, but I could sense some tension.”
A deep, secret part of Harrison reveled at this news. But he put the lid on the feeling quickly. “You? Mr. Insensitive Clod?” he said easily.
Dan chuckled. “Yeah, well, I had some help. The talkative sister told me the fiancé’s leaving tomorrow and won’t be back until two days before their wedding.”
“For real? That would suck pretty bad, I guess, if you’re a girl.” Poor True … although Harrison didn’t want to feel sorry for her when she was marrying such an ass.
“He’s a smart cookie, getting away from all the craziness.” Dan released a big sigh. “Hey, I can see why you drove her home. She’s a looker. But the guy made it very clear she’s taken.”
“Sheesh. I know that. What’s it to you anyway?”
“I need you to focus.”
A black cloud in Harrison’s head started pouring buckets over his imaginary parade, which was already limping along pretty poorly. “Any particular reason you’re bringing this up now?”
“You betcha,” said Dan with sickening good cheer.
Harrison dreaded the answer. He knew the answer, but he’d pretend he didn’t. Why not buy himself a few more seconds of denial? “Yeah, well, maybe we can talk later. I’m kinda busy right now—”
“The studio called,” Dan interrupted him. “Again. They want to know when they can expect the first batch of songs.”
Right. Songs. They needed more. Now. So why wasn’t Harrison writing any? He didn’t know. Which pissed him off. “I told them.” He jetted a breath. “Soon.”
“Soon isn’t good enough anymore,” Dan shot back. “You’ve been saying that for a year. You’re gonna lose momentum if you keep this up. Think of all the people who rely on you, buddy. We need product.”
Harrison’s bristles went up. “You know how hard I work,” he said quietly. “I don’t need you tightening the screws. Leave that to the studio. And if you ever call my songs product again, I’ll be forced to kick your ass.”
“Desperation drove me to it,” Dan protested. “I just don’t know how much longer I can hold them off.”
“It’s what I’m paying you to do.”
The sound of crackling paper came over the line. “You and I both know I’m the best in the business”—Dan was obviously eating a Big Mac or something like it—“but there’s a limit to my talent. Okay? I’m admitting that. Help me out here, Harrison, please—if you don’t want me to say the other P-word again.”
Product.
Harrison hated that designation. But it was true—he couldn’t keep playing the same songs forever, even if they were number one hits on the country charts and climbing the pop ones, too. “Okay,” he said. “I g
et it.”
“Stay here in Biscuit Creek.” More crackling.
“I was already going to stay a couple extra days. Help my brother find a new place to live.”
“That’s good—good. But stay longer.”
“No.” Harrison stared at the duct-taped wall. “That’s crazy.”
“No, it’s not. You need to get out of your regular life. Biscuit Creek is where you wrote your first hit song.”
“Wrong. I wrote that in a Motel 8 in Atlanta after I left home.” Brokenhearted and depressed. Thinking his life was over. That was what real country songs were about. Country singers might be crossing over into the pop realm, and now into the rap world with hick hop, but beneath a real country anthem there was always a broken heart.
“Still. You got your inspiration in Biscuit Creek. Right?” Dan was persistent.
“Yeah, I guess I did.” From True. From his mama’s eyes. And from the salty brown-green waters of Biscuit Creek itself.
“Well, see if you can get it back. You been workin’ too hard, bro. Your soul is tired.”
Harrison shut his eyes. Dan had hit the nail on the head. It was the main reason Harrison put up with him. “I’ll stay maybe a week.”
“Come on, man. I’m willing to fend the studio off another month.”
“I’ll think about it.” No way was he staying a month.
“The music will come. It will.” Dan sounded serious but calm. “And from now on, I’m going to watch out for you better. We got caught up in the hype, the fun. But you need time and space to breathe.” Dan tried to sing the chorus of Faith Hill’s big hit, “Breathe.”
“Your jokes suck.” Harrison was still looking for something to kick or punch. “And you can’t even sing.”
“Hey,” Dan said, all peppy and annoying, “it was a hit for a reason. And so are your songs. See you later. I’m not gonna call you. You call me if you need anything. But I swear, if I hear from you before the month is up—”
“What? What’ll you do?”
“I’ll kick your ass.”
“You couldn’t kick my little pinkie.”
Dan chuckled. “Just don’t get into trouble, okay? I’ll need you back fresh.”
“Right.” Harrison threw the phone against the wall. But not before Dan disconnected first. The loser. They refused to say bye to each other on the phone. Just like in the movies. Dan could have at least let Harrison hang up on him. He was paying the guy enough to get that one little thrill.
He fell back on the bed and stared at the ugliest ceiling he’d ever seen. God, he was pathetic. He had no excuse, either. Except that when you were on the road with the same old people all the time, you developed little ways to entertain yourself because there was nothing else to do away from the spotlight.
Except write songs.
Idiot.
But apart from that … hanging out in a local pub was out. So was going to the movies. So was visiting a museum or eating out at a restaurant—not unless you wanted a lot of hassle from fans seeking autographs and the occasional picture while they were groping your butt, trying to jump in your lap, or kissing you.
All he could do was spend money. He’d written lots of big checks to charities he had no personal connection to and had a closetful of cowboy boots, leather jackets, and sunglasses. He’d accrued three houses—in Nashville, Vail, and LA—and five collector cars and was looking at a sixth in England. An old Studebaker owned by Elton John. But even buying cars was getting boring. Who’d he have to show them off to? Dan?
There was no escape from the same old same old. None. Not even in Biscuit Creek, where just this morning a girl caught a glimpse of him at the stoplight between Black Oak and Main and fell onto the street crying and screaming, “Harrison Gamble! Is that you?”
The same old same old was really bad here in Mom and Dad’s trailer with a brother who couldn’t seem to live in the present. What were they gonna have to do? Carry the old TV with them wherever he forced Gage to move? Rip down those kitchen curtains and hang ’em up in the new place?
“Shyeah,” Harrison said, in the worst funk of his life since he’d last left Biscuit Creek—maybe this place was bad luck, huh?—then stood up from the edge of his parents’ bed and had a couple of brilliant ideas despite himself.
CHAPTER NINE
The next day, a few hours after the ladies of St. George’s left Maybank Hall with a pickup truck bed filled with baskets of tomatoes, True was at the Starfish Grill, reading a Dick Francis book behind a menu in the back booth, away from prying eyes. She felt prickly. Upset. Worried. The opposite of what the brides in the magazines looked like.
But she made sure you’d never know it, looking at her. She was dressed for lunch, in a crisp blue-and-white-striped Brooks Brothers blouse and red pencil skirt with navy pumps, all cobbled together from her college wardrobe and the Junior League shop in Charleston. She’d spent extra time fixing her hair, flat-ironing it so that it curled demurely on the bottom.
And her makeup—Revlon, all of it—she’d applied sparingly, except for the classic red lipstick she’d used on her lips. Mama’s pearl necklace and earrings almost completed the ensemble. But the final touch was the classic Coach messenger bag in navy blue, a 1970s find in Honey’s trunk that True had restored with oil and a great deal of love.
She was southern-girl chic, and no one was going to figure out that she was all manner of bridal crazy, least of all Penn, her future mother-in-law.
Carmela, curvaceous and sexy in a pink leather dress with a heart-shaped neckline, slid into the other side of the booth and grinned. “I’ve got exactly ten minutes before I have to get back to the shop,” she said. “How was the shower?”
True thought hard. “Nice?”
“That’s the world’s worst word. May no one ever remember me as Nice Carmela.”
“But you are nice.”
“I know.” Carmela sighed. “But I want to be remembered as Bold Carmela. Or Talented Carmela. Or even Bad Carmela.”
“Yeah, well, I’m Lightweight True.” She’d felt so out of place at the mansion on the Battery, not because the owners were crazy rich but because she didn’t really know anyone. “I overdid it with the champagne to have a little fun with Dubose and to forget he’s leaving. But it didn’t work.”
Carmela lifted a dark Italian brow. “Did you think about anyone else while you were at the shower? Someone whose name begins with H?”
“Of course.” True was mortified to admit it, but she couldn’t lie to Carmela. “I wondered why he pops up at the weirdest times, like an unlucky genie. But I’m glad he’s gone.”
Carmela leaned in close. “You’re a bad liar,” she whispered.
“I’m not lying,” True insisted.
Carmela narrowed her eyes.
“All right, I am.” True put her face in her hands. “But who cares? I’m getting married. This isn’t high school anymore. This is real life.”
“Tell me how Dubose was last night.”
“Distracted, checking his BlackBerry.” True had felt embarrassed, too. For a smart lawyer, he could be woefully lacking in good manners. “The only time he really paid attention to the party was when the hostess started talking about a recently married couple they all knew from college who’d already filed for divorce and were fighting over property.”
“Ugh. Real nice topic for a wedding shower.”
True had thought the same thing. “I did my best to act interested. But I wasn’t. I wished I were with you instead.” She grabbed Carmela’s fingers and squeezed. “We’ve hardly seen each other.”
Carmela squeezed back. “I know. You’re busy being a farm girl. And I’m running a dying business.” She stretched out her long legs, the better for them both to admire her new platform heels, and eyed the restaurant entrance. The walls were covered in black-and-white photos of old shipwrecks. “You think Prince Charming is out there looking for me?”
“Of course,” True said right away. Somewhere out there
was a man who’d appreciate Carmela’s truth speaking and huge heart even more than her fantastic body and sultry looks.
Carmela’s cat-eyes were hopeful. “I’ll get Roger to bring over some water with lemon.” Roger was the seventy-three-year-old busboy at the Starfish. “And I hope you and Penn have a fabulous lunch, even if she won’t buy anything from my store. Maybe you can work on her.”
“You mean, drug her,” True said drily. “It would be the only way I could get her in there. General Sherman burned down her ancestral home during the Civil War. Your last name is Sherman, you’re from New York, and your store is called Southern Loot. She doesn’t have a sense of humor. At all. Plus, there’s a store selling southern-themed items on every street corner in Charleston County.”
“Those are pretty good reasons,” said Carmela. “But she’s the queen bee around here. If she comes in, so will everyone else. Maybe she’ll want one of my Mississippi Mud Pie kits. I got in a whole case.”
Carmela was nothing if not an optimist.
When True was alone again, she inhaled a cleansing breath and focused on being happy.
Happy.
She tapped her foot.
Happy …
Shoot. She was still miserable. Maybe it was because she was always a little afraid to talk to Penn—although the woman was going to be her mother-in-law, so she needed to get over that. Right then, as a matter of fact. Penn was at the door, dressed to the nines, as always, in a cream-colored suit with gold buttons True had seen in a window in at the St. John store in Charleston. She could buy a small used tractor for the price of that suit. Or a hundred yards of new fencing for the back field where the deer feasted on her strawberries.
Carmela stayed with Penn on her way to the table and held her own. She always did. She winked at True. “You guys have fun.”
You guys. True closed her eyes for a second. She’d told Carmela never, ever to call Penn a guy. Penn simply didn’t get it.
Carmela suddenly realized her mistake. “Oh, and if you ever get a hankering,” she went on nervously, “for some delicious southern treats or treasures, I reckon you can visit my shop, Dr. Waring.”
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