Blind Melody: Second Chance Romance (Muse & Music Book 3)

by J. R. Rogue

  “Yes!” Sera hops a little when she answers. “We can go together! Ours passed a couple of years ago, and I think I’m finally ready to have one again.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say, my heart thudding in my chest.

  “Yeah. It sucked. We just couldn’t replace him right away, the way some people do. And getting a new dog won’t replace him. He was a one-of-a-kind dog, so sweet and gentle. He was a husky.”

  “Oh, I love them,” I say, wondering what I’ll get. I don’t have a particular breed in mind.

  “Have you ever had one?” she asks.

  “No.”

  “Well, they’re beautiful, but a pain in the ass. Artax was so smart, and he got out of every yard we put him in. Escaped every kennel. One time, I put him in a spare room and he tore the carpet up near the door.” Sera laughs.

  “Good god.”

  “Yeah. He was a mess, but I loved him so damn much. He wanted to be free to roam. It’s in a husky’s blood.”

  “I must have been one in another life.” I smile, looking at Sera, and we both laugh.

  The silence keeps us company for a while, just the padding of our feet on asphalt. The sound of the birds.

  “Heard from Hunter?” Sera asks, finally.

  “Not really. I see his tweets, his IG posts. Sometimes I like them. Sometimes he likes mine. So it’s not a total freeze-out. But, we don’t text.”

  Well, I don’t text back, but Hunter has been texting me. I don’t admit that, and I wonder if she knows. If he has told her.

  “Maybe you should get ahold of him.” I know she sees Hunter for who he is. She sees his faults and his commitment issues.

  It’s nice to have a friend who will give it to me straight. It’s nice to have a friend again.

  “Sometimes, I need my space from him. It was like that before, when we were friends. Sometimes I would mute his stuff on social media because I couldn’t look at his face. Or he would send me a song and I would tear it apart, looking for something in there that I thought he might’ve been unable to say. And after those days, I would have to go months pretending he didn’t exist. It’s better that way.”

  I never told anyone why I would freeze him out. I would just say Hunter was annoying, that I didn’t look at his posts anymore. Or that he pissed me off and we didn’t talk that much anymore. Joanne never questioned me on it, but I’m sure it was black and white. I wasn’t fooling anyone.

  “But you know he exists. It always comes back to that, right?” Sera asks.

  “Yeah.” I’m not sure I can be that reckless again. It was harmless before, more or less. But now? After I’ve spent hours getting to know him, the real him? Not so harmless.

  “Are you writing?”

  “Yes,” I answer. And I’m less proud.

  “About him?” she asks, going in for the kill.

  “Yes.”

  “He would love that.” She laughs.

  “Yeah, it would feed his ego nicely.”

  “Behind that ego is someone who wants to settle down. He just can’t get out of his own damn way,” she says.

  “I think behind that ego is a fuckboy.” I’m not sure I believe my words. Maybe not entirely, but a part of me does. Sometimes the anger in my belly comes out. I lose everything I love about him and turn to this. “You can’t turn a fuckboy into a book boyfriend.”

  “You can turn anyone into a book boyfriend if you’re a good enough writer.” Sera smirks.

  I know she’s a good enough writer. But me? I’m not sure I can put aside my own ego long enough to dig into the depths of what Hunter has done to my heart. But maybe it’s time. I can’t lie and write him as unforgettable anymore.

  “I’ll take that challenge.” I hold out my hand, and Sera shakes it as we walk.

  “I still think you should give him a call. He always comes to Nashville off and on. He was here for a Predators game last weekend.”

  “I saw.”

  “He came over to the house, too,” Sera continues.

  Sera and Chace live in Belle Meade, Tennessee. A city we both know I could never afford. I’ve been to their house a few times since I decided to settle in the state. I guess they know an orphan when they see one. My mother promises to visit my new place, but Hawaii is a little far away for her to just pop over. She’s promised to see me next year, though.

  Sera and Chace’s home is clean and white, and as immaculate as their downtown Nashville apartment. I can feel their hearts everywhere they are. “Where do you think his heart is?” I ask.

  “What do you mean?” Sera replies.

  “Georgia or here?” It’s the question I need an answer to. The one that plagues me, because I don’t know that he’ll ever have an answer for it.

  “I don’t think it’s that simple,” she says, hurting my heart.

  I sigh. “Yeah. I don’t either. I keep hoping I’ll tell someone our whole saga and ask that question, and magically, they’ll give me the answer I want.”

  “What answer do you want?” She raises an eyebrow at me.

  “That’s the problem. I don’t know that either.”

  “If you could snap your fingers,” Sera snaps her own next to me, “and things would be with you and Hunter however you want them to be. What would that look like?”

  We walk in silence for a while. How many scenarios have I imagined? How many of them plausible? How many would he balk at?

  “We would come home to each other every night. I would know his daughters. They would know I love their dad, and he loves me. I wouldn’t be replacing anyone in anyone’s mind. We would all just love one another. We would be…” I struggle for the word. I have such a sticky relationship with it.

  “You would be a family.” Sera places her hand on my shoulder.

  “Yeah, that. A family. Whatever it means.” We would figure it out, the way my father never tried to.

  “That’s the thing. It can mean whatever you want it to mean,” Sera replies, knowingly.

  “I guess I need to figure out what it means to me.”

  “I think I know what it means right now.” Her husky voice is higher, excited.

  “What’s that?”

  “It means we’re gonna go to my car, and you’re going to adopt a dog. So many rescue places are open today. It’s Saturday. It’s warm. Let’s go get you a dog.”

  It’s perfect, and it’s scary. I have the money for pet insurance for my apartment. I have the money for the adoption fee. I have a hole in my heart that needs to be filled. I keep pouring words into it, but it’s getting bigger and bigger.

  “Okay,” I say. “Let’s do it.”

  I’m Just Here To Love You

  Sonnet

  I wasn’t steady, wasn’t someone you could rely on, after my separation from my ex-husband. I spent days in bed. I lost any love I had for my job. I thought about never waking up. My dog stayed with my ex-husband, because he was steady. He was someone you could rely on, always.

  When you love someone, or something, you want what’s best for it, no matter the pain it may cause you. That’s why I left my ex-husband. It’s why I left our dog with him. He was a caregiver, and I was barely hanging on.

  We pull up to the PetSmart, and when Sera parks, I crane my neck to see the cages lining the storefront.

  “I hate this. I always want to take them all home, so I avoid these.” I clench my fists in my lap, close my eyes.

  “I know. But today, you can take one of them home. And that’s enough.”

  There’s a hole in my chest. This aching part of me that wants to know something relies on me. “I’m going to buy it a Christmas sweater,” I say, opening my eyes.

  “I’m sure they’re in stock already.” Sera laughs.

  “Thank god for consumerism.” It’s November, and Christmas stuff has been in some stores since August.

  “Get a big enough dog, and you can just let it wear one of the ones you own,” Sera jokes, now close enough with me to know I own way too many Christmas sweate
rs.

  “Good idea.” A big dog it is.

  We exit her vehicle, walking up to the cages slowly. It’s sunny out, so I shield my eyes, scanning the barking dogs. Tears spring, and it’s unexpected.

  “What’s up?” Sera asks, hanging back.

  “I don’t know, it’s just a lot. There are too many.” This is one of those moments in life where I would wish I had a drink to calm myself beforehand. But I can’t rely on that anymore.

  Sera grabs my arm, leading me to the end. “Just one cage at a time. You can do this.”

  It’s torture—walking the cages, judging the dogs on their cuteness. I thought this would be a fun experience, but it proves to be nothing but torture. I want to take them all home. I want to love them all. When we reach the end of the line, I start walking back to Sera’s vehicle.

  “What’s wrong?” she asks, trailing me.

  “I can’t. I just can’t,” I say, my voice shaky.

  She unlocks her vehicle, and we get in. The silence—a sharp contrast from the barking outside—envelops us.

  Finally, Sera speaks. “Which one are you thinking about right now?”

  One of the dogs jumps into my mind. I see his face, his name on the cage. “How did you know that would work?”

  “It works with a lot of things.” She laughs. “Which dog?”

  “The black one. With white on his face,” I say. It’s been proven that animals with black coats, both dogs and cats, are the least likely to be adopted. And a universal truth is that older dogs are not adopted as much.

  The dog looked like a mixed breed—black coat, definitely a pit bull in his bloodline, around forty pounds. He was sitting in the back of his cage, quiet. Observing.

  I want to take him home. I want to take him on walks. I want to rub his belly and let him sleep at the foot of my queen-size bed.

  “Well, then,” Sera reaches over and grabs my hand, squeezing it, “let’s go get your boy and bring him home.”

  When we get back to my place, we have two pet carriers to unload from the back of Sera’s vehicle.

  When we went inside to get everything my new dog would need, we saw the cats up for adoption. After reading everything about both animal’s history and finding out both were okay with the other species, I came home with two raven-coated pets.

  “You’re going to bring him over on Sunday, right?” Sera asks, grabbing the cat carrier, holding Edgar Allan Purr.

  “Yes,” I assure her before she leaves.

  We have plans for a Sunday dinner at her home in Belle Meade, and she has a large fenced-in yard.

  I’m nervous about owning pets again. Attachments often lead to heartbreaks. The walls need to come down, I know this. And baby steps are the right move.

  He’s six years old. He has scars. He’s recovering from separation anxiety. He tears kennels apart. Well, he was tearing kennels apart. They say he’s getting better at it.

  It happens a lot; people think they want a pet, but they just want the idea of a pet. It’s a beautiful idea. A furry loved one who will be there no matter what. But you have to give them discipline. You have to give them exercise. You have to help them through their trauma. And a lot of animals up for adoption have some sort of trauma in their lives. Even if it’s just that someone gave them up. I know that feeling.

  My new dog had been abandoned. Abused. Given up more than once. He’s been through a few foster homes, waiting on his forever home.

  Now here we were, in my living room.

  “This is it, buddy. You and me, forever. You’re not going back unless you eat the cat,” I say, stroking his ear. As if on cue, my new kitty, Edgar, runs out, attempting to grab the dogs’s tail, then runs away.

  “He’s getting the lay of the land. Your turn.” I kiss the dog’s face, then stand. I walk to the couch, giving him space.

  He doesn’t stay in the middle of the room. Instead, he walks to the couch. When I sit, he wedges himself between my knees, his face on my thigh. His eyes are big, brown. He closes them when I stroke the side of his face.

  “What are we going to name you, babe?” The name on his kennel was ridiculous. I can’t call him Kevin.

  The dog opens his eyes, but they are little slits. If he were a cat, he would be purring. I can see how happy he is to have the undivided attention of a human.

  I think of the foster homes. The humans he thought were forever that didn’t work out. I think of all the chances Hunter and I had that didn’t lead to what we wanted it to lead to.

  “Seven,” I say, smiling when the dog wags his tail. “Let’s call you Seven. Because this is it. This is your last chance. This is the one that sticks. Forever.”

  His tail wags faster and faster, brushing along the carpet beneath him.

  Lost In The Music

  Sonnet

  Downtown Nashville isn’t like I left it. I was younger, then. Reckless and drunk and hurting. I’m older now. Hurting, and pretty sober.

  I can only change one of those things.

  My phone buzzes in my hand as I walk up to the bar, so I pull it to my face.

  Sera: I can’t make it down there. Don’t kill me. Kat needed me to come by.

  I don’t ask why. It’s not my business, and to be honest, I need more friends. I need other people I can count on. I can’t make Sera my go-to for everything. That’s too much responsibility for someone. And Brooklyn can be hard to get ahold of; she wasn’t lying when she said she hates cell phones.

  I know Sera isn’t used to me asking her to go out. But, I just wanted out of my apartment. I just wanted to hear music—live music. I miss it. And associating it with Hunter ruined it for me for a while. Especially in Nashville, which is why I’ve avoided downtown since moving here. Until now.

  I walk into Rosewood Bar, nerves shot, and pass the singer on the stage as I head to a small round table against the wall. This is a test. I need to know I can sit here and enjoy myself without the use of a crutch. No alcohol, and apparently, no friend.

  The voice behind me is solid, raspy, and familiar.

  I take a seat, turning to the singer. It’s Andrew. When he locks eyes with me, he nods. I knew he played downtown on occasion, but I didn’t know where. My mind wanders, wondering if he knows his sister had to go see Kat for some reason.

  When the waiter comes by, I get a Sprite, no liquor mixed in.

  For the next hour, Andrew plays songs I know, once popular when he was much younger than me—the kind of songs Hunter would play here. Garth and George. Tracy and Tim. Keith and other solid nineties influences.

  When he ends a slow rendition of a Garth song, he stands. “Thank you for having me. You can find me on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. I’m here every month or other month. I hope I run in to y’all again, especially you assholes in the back.” He points to a table in the back, and they holler in return.

  The person coming on after him is on stage now, shaking Andrew’s hand and chit-chatting with him. When he takes the mic, he smiles. “Thank you so much, Reese, for warming everyone up here for me.”

  My brow furrows, and I lock eyes with Andrew. “Reese?” I mouth.

  He walks over to me, smiling and saying hi to people as he goes.

  “Rosewood, what are you doing down here?” He looks at the sign on the wall pointedly. Rosewood Bar.

  “Oh, just having a drink.” I nod to my virgin drink. “Listening to some dude named Reese sing.”

  He sets his guitar down. “Yeah, that’s my name.”

  “I’m confused,” I reply.

  “Reese Andrew Taylor.” He smirks, sitting down.

  “Oh.”

  “Before I left Missouri, I started going by Reese when I sang. But Sera can’t call me anything but Andrew, no matter how many times I ask her.”

  “Reese is a better name,” I say, cocking my head. It’s a beautiful name. And I know how hung up one can get on one.

  “It is.”

  Andrew, or Reese, or whatever his name is, sits with me fo
r a half hour. I worry someone I know will show up. But he never does. So Andrew and I laugh and talk. He’s different when he isn’t with a group of people. I find out Sera went to see Kat because she couldn’t get her smoke detector to turn off.

  When closing time is called out, Andrew calls an Uber for me and one for himself. I don’t have a car downtown, because I don’t trust myself to drive in the crazy traffic, not even while sober.

  Andrew and I sit outside on the sidewalk and wait together, with the sound of drunk happy people as our background music. I almost envy the tourists. Almost. The laughter I’ve felt in my chest tonight has all been natural, real, and stemming from genuine emotions. Andrew distracted me from my father, his heavy presence still lingering in Nashville, and Hunter.

  “So, when’s the last time you talked to Hunter?” Andrew asks, finally, pulling me from my thoughts.

  “Are you his wingman?” I joke.

  “I’m his friend.”

  “How much has he told you about us?”

  “He told me about you before I ever met you. So, seeing you at the cabin was a big shock. You were just this girl he talked about. You were never supposed to be real because Hunter Hart was never supposed to fall for anyone. We just knew he had this idea of a woman he had on a pedestal. You were just the muse, and muses are often not that great in reality. We romance the shit out of people.”

  “Is Kat better in a song?” I ask, wondering if Hunter has turned me into any while we’ve been apart.

  “No. She is the song.” My heart leaps at his words. I want that.

  “Hunter and I wrote the skeleton of one in the mountains, but we can never finish what we start together. I want him to make me a song. To really make me one.”

  “He has.” At this, Andrew looks up at a big truck stopping in front of us.

  “What the fuck…” I stand. I want to run, but I have nowhere to run. Jesus Merry Christmas.

  Hunter opens the door. The dinging of his truck wakes me up even more.