Nashville Nights

by Alicia Hunter Pace

  • • •

  Her feet heavy with every lift, Sera ascended the porch stairs slowly. Her hands hadn’t stopped shaking since Tyler told her they needed to talk. She fumbled with the zipper on her purse. Snagging it, she had to close it up to get it back on track before trying again.

  The talk wasn’t anything like she’d imagined. Instead of dumping her, he told her he was staying. That should have made her ecstatic, but the fact that he was doing so because she needed him shot anger straight through her heart. She’d been clear about not wanting his pity and all along that was exactly what he’d been doing.

  Opening the door with a shove of her shoulder, the weight of the tears gave way. Streams rolled over her cheeks. She didn’t bother to wipe them away. Her wounded pride was the least of her worries.

  Dropping her purse inside the door, she pummeled down the hall to Tyler’s room. Closing and locking the door behind her, she sank to the floor. Sobs, deep within, sneaked to the surface. She jammed her fist to her eyes, trying to absorb the wetness. It didn’t help—as soon as she moved them away, the moisture collected again.

  And to think she’d been starting to feel whole again. She’d begun eating more and sleeping better. She was able to maintain focus and keep on task. She laughed. She smiled. And she’d cried—something she rarely let herself do. The tears hadn’t stopped falling since Tyler arrived. She’d felt all the things she’d been keeping buried inside. It was coming back to her. She was coming back. Unfortunately, Tyler didn’t see that. All he saw were her wounds and she was afraid that was all he was ever going to see.

  Standing with purpose, she grabbed the suitcase sitting on the floor by the closet and tossed it onto the bed. Then, picking up the pile of clean clothes that sat on top of the dresser, she started packing his suitcase.

  • • •

  Tyler jostled the doorknob. “Sera, open the door.”

  No answer. He knocked, then tried to open it.

  “Sera, open the damn door.”

  Nothing came. Giving the door a whack with the palm of his hand, he tried again. “Sera, open the door and talk to me.”

  After several more minutes of pleading and pounding, he gave up. Sliding down the wall to the floor, he sat, trying to figure out a way to make this right. The repeated stress of the day caught up with him. His whole body, inside and out, ached as if his zest for life was drained. There was no reason to keep wasting what little energy he had left trying to get Sera to open the door and talk to him. She was being unreasonable again. No matter what he said, he wouldn’t be able to rationalize his decision with her now. Time and space were her only friends at times like this. When she calmed down, she’d be easier to talk to. Unfortunately, time was of the essence. “Can you at least tell me what you’re doing in there?”

  She didn’t answer right away. He thought for sure she’d continue to ignore him. A few minutes passed.

  “Packing,” she finally said, so low he barely heard. “I won’t let you do this.”

  “Don’t you think I should have a say in what I do?”

  “Did you think to consider my thoughts when you decided that I needed you to stay here and babysit me?”

  Hearing her more clearly, he knew she was just on the other side of the door. So close, yet so far away. “I’ve been doing nothing but thinking about what was best for you since I saw you standing out in the yard. The fact that we are having this conversation shows that.”

  “This isn’t what’s best for me. Jesus, Tyler! I carry enough guilt. I don’t need you adding to it.”

  He stood, leaning sideways against the door. If he could just get her to open up. “You have nothing to feel guilty about. It’s my choice.”

  “You’re making that choice because of me.”

  She was there. Two inches of wood was all that divided them. He wanted to reach out and touch her. No, he needed to. He needed her. “I did it for me.” He waited for a response. When nothing came, he continued. “I didn’t do it because you need me. I did it because I need you.”

  Forever seemed to pass. The drawn-out silence had Tyler wondering what Sera might be thinking or if she’d listened to anything he’d said. Finally he heard the click of the lock. He stepped back as the door eased open.

  She stood, her arms wrapped around her stomach, on the other side of the threshold. The streaks of red painting her cheeks burned his gut. Stepping in, he scooped her to him, planting his face in the crook of her neck. He breathed her in, holding her close, never wanting to lose the feeling of having her in his arms.

  “You need to go,” she whispered, tears streaming again.

  He firmed his hold around her waist. “I need to be here.”

  “No,” she declared.

  “Then come with me,” he asked, his voice breaking. “Maybe I’m a selfish bastard for asking, but come with me. Please.”

  Stepping back, she wouldn’t look at him. “I can’t. If you don’t leave, I will.”

  He called her bluff. “Where will you go?”

  “My mom’s.”

  His eyes cast to the floor before looking back up. Sincerity reflected back at him. She would find a way to Chicago tonight if he stayed and that was the last place he wanted her. He was pretty certain Sylvia couldn’t provide the support Sera needed. Closing his eyes, he turned to the side. His throat balled tightly. Nodding forward, he said “Tomorrow. I’ll leave tomorrow.”

  “Tonight,” she answered, handing over his suitcase. “Tomorrow will only make this harder. I need you to leave tonight.”

  Chapter 25

  It wasn’t Tyler’s beautiful lashes puddled with moisture Sera kept thinking about. Nor the hurt she felt when his eyes went askew every time she looked at him. The way his mouth twisted in a knot as he gathered the rest of his things stabbed at her heart, but she could push that aside too. It was the picture of the back of his head, as he walked out the door, that she couldn’t rid her mind of.

  The haircut he’d needed three weeks ago was now long overdue. The dark strands had lost the curl to their ends, but still hung in a thick wave. It was the only wave she got. He didn’t kiss her goodbye or so much as bid a farewell hug. He stood in the doorway for a moment, letting her take in all his hurt and confusion, before saying, “Don’t do this. Fight for us, Sera.” She nearly did. Her mind said go, but her feet stayed planted, and when she had no response, he shut the door and left.

  He called twice, breaking her heart further each time the phone rang. The first call came roughly two hours after he left. The other she assumed was when he arrived back in Nashville. Both voicemails asked that she please talk to him. She was tempted, very tempted. She wanted to hear his voice more than anything and not through a recording. She wanted to know that he was going to be okay, but doing so would accomplish nothing at this point. He would ask her to come again and she’d refuse. Then they’d argue their points until it turned into a yelling match—or worse, a repeat of three years ago.

  There were two text messages when she woke. Again, he asked her to call and again, she chose not to. They both needed space to put their lives into perspective and remember what was important—his career and her recovery. Keeping hope that if they both kept that in mind, they might still have a future together, she made herself get out of bed and face the day. She forced down a bowl of cereal, barely tasting her favorite brand. A shower gave her some energy, but she lost the will to do much after that and ended up on the couch the biggest part of the day. Taking turns staring at the ceiling and doodling on a pad of paper, she cried off and on for hours, until she was sure she couldn’t cry anymore.

  He didn’t call that night, but he sent another text late.

  Busy day tomorrow. Radio Interview with WTEN in the morn. Meetings afterwards. Leaving in 2 days. We need to talk. I love you.

  Each time he reached out, she lost some of the willpower to keep distant. She missed the low, soothing sounds of his voice that lulled her to sleep and his high-pitched cackle that made
her laugh. She grieved for memory of the way his eyes crinkled together when he was being sarcastic or funny, and how her skin tingled from his touch. Her body ached from the loss of being surrounded in his arms. The knotting and cramping of her stomach kept her from eating anything further after breakfast, any hunger blinded by the sorrow. The tightness in her shoulders exuded up into her head. The haze from little sleep and perpetual tears left her in a fog. She hadn’t felt this disturbed since returning from overseas and she wasn’t sure that she’d been this physically distraught then. Rollins hadn’t crossed her mind in days, and all her worries of slipping back into the austerity of his memory seemed for naught now. The only thing fueling her misery was not being with Tyler.

  Chapter 26

  The six o’clock alarm was a cruel awakening after battling another night’s sleep. More bouts of crying kept her up late into the night and when she couldn’t drift off even after the tears dried up, she reread Tyler’s last text and spent the next thirty minutes Googling the radio station he’d mentioned.

  Now, at precisely seven thirty, she sat balled up in the corner of the couch waiting for the eight o’clock morning show to start. She’d already downloaded an app to her phone so she could hear the interview. Her ears perked every time a song came to an end, thinking he would be there. Five minutes after eight, she started worrying that maybe there was another WTEN in some nearby city other than Nashville and when the host announced yet another song, she dropped her phone into her lap. Unable to sit there through the torment, she was just about to get up, when he chimed back in. “Up next, Tyler Creech is in the studio to tell us what it was like meeting George Strait for the first time.” Her heart skipped into a fast rhythm as her hands clutched her phone snugly to her ear.

  It was a sweet kind of torture when she heard the host welcome him on air. The seconds ticked by until his deep raspy sound echoed through the room. She hung on every word, internalizing everything from the pitch of his voice to the answers he gave. He was barely on air five minutes—long enough to discuss the record, his recent hit, and how much he enjoyed what he did, before they took a break. It seemed like the commercials went on forever before they came back on and Tyler told his story of meeting George Strait while in the bathroom at the recording studio. Another break followed, tantalizing her already frazzled nerves. Then the interview wrapped up with news of the tour before the first notes of her heartbreak began to play when “Box of Regrets” was introduced over the radio.

  Eyes flooding, she buried her head into the arm of the couch. She had hoped to hear enthusiasm for the journey he was about to embark on. She wanted proof that what she had done was right. But all she heard was the same stressed-out Tyler who had shown up at Roy’s three weeks ago and left two days before.

  They were both losing. He was miserable. She was miserable and for what reason? What’s wrong with things being easy? He’d asked her that the second night out by the train tracks. And hadn’t she promised herself that if she ever found happiness again she’d embrace if fully? So what if she needed him? He needed her too.

  Knowing he was busy, she beat the temptation to reach out immediately and instead tried to keep busy while she waited for his call. The day was long. No amount of laundry or cleaning took her mind off of him. He was there and always would be.

  By nine that night, she’d almost given up, but then her phone rang.

  Tingling with anticipation, she answered. “Hey.”

  The hope quickly dispelled when he answered back, “Hey.”

  The ragged texture of his voice was alarming. Call it intuition, but she knew something was definitely wrong and it wasn’t just the strain between them. “Is everything okay?”

  “I’m fine, but . . . ”

  That was all she needed to hear for the worry to start. Anything Tyler might have said directly afterwards was rebounding off her eardrums. A pain stabbed down her neck through her shoulder stirring up the unsettled nausea. Doubling over, she sat down at the kitchen table, trying to make sense of what he was saying. She opened her mouth to ask, but the burning in her throat forced her to clamp it closed.

  “But what?” she finally let out, then stopped when the heaves of her chest captured her breath.

  “I’m okay. It was just a little accident.”

  “What kind of accident?” she expelled with a whimper.

  “A deer ran out in front of me and I swerved, rolling into a ditch. My truck isn’t nearly as lucky as the deer.”

  “But you’re okay?”

  “Yeah. It’s just a broken foot and a good-sized bump on my head. They’re keeping me overnight just to make sure.”

  “Where?”

  There was hesitation in his voice when he said, “Lake Cumberland Regional.”

  Gaining some ground on the shock of learning he was back in Kentucky, she stood, already on the move. Pulling out the junk drawer next to the refrigerator, she fumbled through it looking for the spare set of keys Roy told her was there.

  “Sera, I’m sorry . . . ”

  “Stop!” she blubbered through falling tears. She did not want to talk to him. What she had to say couldn’t be done over the phone. She had to see him for herself, so she knew he was all right. Tucking the keys down into her pocket, she shot through the kitchen and living room, grabbing her purse on the table by the door. “I can’t talk to you about this right now.”

  Chapter 27

  Taking a deep breath, Sera sat behind the wheel of her uncle’s Toyota Corolla. She hadn’t driven in more than two years, had tried once when her commanding officer demanded that she follow an order to do so. Her refusal had earned her a trip to get a psych eval, and that was the beginning to the end of her time in the military.

  Since then, it was her stubbornness that stood in the way. No one, not even the army, was going to make her drive until she was ready—except Tyler. She was so mad at him now that the initial shock had worn off. Aside from the roughness in his voice, he sounded fine. And he had called, therefore he was capable of moving around, so he couldn’t have been terribly injured. But she wouldn’t be okay until she saw for herself.

  She sat idling the car for a few moments, waiting for the right moment to let go of all the past. As soon as she turned the key, she knew it was gone. All the fears, all the guilt, she had nothing left to hold her back. That had been the biggest problem all along: fearing that if she moved on, somehow she was betraying Rollins who hadn’t been able to do that. Tyler was right; there wasn’t any reason life couldn’t be simple. Pulling down the gear, she let her foot off the break and felt the car roll forward. Someday, she hoped Rollins would be able to understand that too.

  The first hour of the drive should have only taken forty-five minutes. Cars blew past her on the highway. A few even honked their horns when she wouldn’t speed up. Someone in a Subaru flipped her the bird as they sped out around into the adjacent lane. If her hands hadn’t been knuckle-clutching the wheel, she would have returned the gesture. She didn’t care. There was a slow lane for a reason and she wasn’t doing much under the speed limit anyway.

  She did better the second half of the drive when the main interstate turned into a two-lane highway. She thought a lot about both Rollins and Tyler in that last thirty minutes. Two men who were both carved deeply in her heart, but only one of them she loved. At least loved in a way she didn’t want to live without. How unfair she’d been to use her condition as an excuse to deny a love that was once in a lifetime. Well, in their case, twice in a lifetime and she sure as hell wasn’t going to push her luck with a third.

  Sliding the car to a stop between two white lines, she killed the ignition and threw the keys in her purse, making sure to hit the lock button before she dashed inside. She didn’t slow down until forced to wait on the elevator. After hitting the up button twice, she turned around, ready to take the steps to the third floor. A ding and parting of the doors had her turning back around. Stepping on, she was thankful it was empty as she tried to rein in
her breaths.

  Every door she passed, she looked at the number, knowing full well Room 325 was still several doors down the brightly lit hallway. Pausing before coming to the end, she combed a hand through her tangled hair, embarrassed for the way she looked, and heard several voices bellowing from inside the door on the right. Confirming it was the right room, she stepped in.

  Her eyes immediately surveyed the man lying in the bed. Making sure all limbs were intact, her gaze traveled down the patterned gown, catching on the large blue air cast swaddled around his right foot, then back up to the gauze taped to his forehead.

  “Hey,” she said when Tyler saw her standing there.

  “Hey,” he answered back with a beaming smile.

  There were two other men in the room. A man wearing a baseball cap and jeans sat in the corner, while one dressed in a suit stood at the head of the bed. She gave them each a nod hello before taking a spot next to Tyler.

  “Sera, this is my manager, Bradley.” Tyler pointed to the man standing on the opposite side of her. “And that’s Jayson, my drummer, over there in the corner.”

  Both men said their own hellos. She smiled back appropriately, suddenly feeling like an outsider.

  “I didn’t think he’d pull something like this just to get out of the tour,” his manager said, interrupting the awkward moment.

  Tyler grinned. Sera didn’t return the sentiment. Her eyes grew wide with suspicion. Surely Bradley was joking. Tyler wouldn’t have gone to these lengths just so he could cancel the tour. Before she could ask though, Jayson stood, saying he was headed out, with Bradley following behind.

  When the two men were gone, she sat down on the edge of the bed, clasping her hand around Tyler’s. “Please tell me he was joking.”

  He chuckled. “Yes, sweetheart, he was joking.”