by Abby Jimenez
“Like either of us could ever get pissed at you.” I smiled.
She smirked and we sat and watched Jason adjust his microphone stand. He sang a few verses to test his equipment and he tipped his head toward me, his lips to the mic, and winked. I blew him a kiss and his grin got so big I could hear it in his voice.
Lola—Nikki—joined him for the big cities, by our invitation. She’d be here tonight. She was actually pretty cool. She was mostly producing these days and doing really well. She only performed with Jason, and the two of them collaborated on writing most of his songs—except for the ones he wrote about me. Those just poured out of him.
He set his guitar down on its stand and walked over to us, pulling out his in-ear monitor. He put his hands on the arms of my chair and leaned down to kiss me. “Are you comfortable, sweetheart?”
“Yeeeess.” I smiled against his lips.
He put a hand to my belly and I moved it to the left, where the baby was kicking, and his eyes gleamed.
“She likes the music,” I said.
He held his hand to my wiggling stomach and grinned. “Are you hungry?”
“Always.”
“Almost done.” He leaned down and kissed my stomach. “Twenty more minutes,” he said to my baby bump. He reached down and ruffled Tucker’s head, then jogged back out to his sound check.
Zane chuckled after him. “You know, it wouldn’t kill you guys to be slightly less adorable.”
I smiled at her. “Probably not. But why risk it?”
We survived our last show of the tour and had a late dinner with my parents. Then we headed home—well, our version of home. A mini mansion we rented in Woodland Hills. It was close enough to Kristen and Josh for when we were in town between tours. It was gated and safe and we had a place to keep our stuff while we were on the road.
Both of us preferred Ely to LA. Jason’s fame was harder on us in California. We couldn’t really go out without getting approached.
Ely was small, and nobody there cared who he was. Everyone there had grown up with him. There was no paparazzi, and I’d gotten really close to Patricia over the past three years. With the baby coming, it would have been nice to live near her. But Kristen and Josh took priority for me, and whatever took priority for me took priority for Jason. So Woodland Hills it was.
Jason smiled at me from the limo seat across from me. “I have a little surprise for you.” He grinned.
I narrowed my eyes at him. “What surprise? I didn’t like the last one.”
He chuckled. “What? When I told you I want to get pregnant again right away?” He crossed over to sit next to me and leaned in to kiss me, putting a hand on my belly. “I just love you like this,” he breathed against my lips.
I jerked my head back. “And did you love all the barfing?”
“Well, no. But look how sexy you are right now…” He put his face into my neck and trailed his mouth across my skin.
“There is nothing sexy about this, Jason. I’m swollen and starving. I have to pee constantly.”
He laughed into my neck. “I think I can convince you.”
Yes, he was very good at convincing me to do things. Like getting me to agree to marry him just forty-eight hours after we got back together. I’d been wearing a ring since two days after the Forum.
“What if I had said no?” I’d asked.
“Then I was going to go into plan B.”
“Which was what? Subterfuge? Tell me I’m just your girlfriend but really we’d be engaged the whole time?”
He’d laughed. “No. Unwavering, unrelenting persistence.”
I hadn’t said no, of course. But I’d made him wait a year to marry me. I didn’t want something rushed. I wanted a real wedding—and I’d kept my last name. I wanted my own identity.
We’d gotten married at the Glensheen mansion in Duluth, on the shore of Lake Superior—home of the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald. Tucker had worn a tuxedo Kristen had made for him, and he sat at our feet as we’d said our vows. Oliver had been our ring bearer. Ernie, David, Zane, and Josh had stood next to Jason, and Kristen had stood next to me—the way it was always going to be.
“So what’s your surprise?” I asked, closing my eyes as he kissed my neck.
“It’s at home.”
We stopped at Forest Lawn like we always did when we came to town so I could visit Brandon. Jason usually stayed behind in the car to give me some privacy, except for one time, right before we were married. He’d asked to have some alone time at Brandon’s grave.
He’d spent a half an hour there while I watched from the car. He didn’t tell me exactly what he’d said. Only that he was thanking him, and letting him know he was going to take good care of me.
It meant a lot to me that he’d told him that.
Jason and I both gave blood on Brandon’s birthday, a tradition we vowed to keep for the rest of our lives.
When we pulled up to the curb in front of the house, Kristen and Josh were out front with their kids and Stuntman Mike. “My surprise?” I beamed at Jason. We weren’t supposed to see them until tomorrow.
He winked.
I got out and Kristen ran to me. I hadn’t seen her in five months.
“Look at you and your sex injury!” she said, putting her hands on my belly. “Does Jason know what this baby is about to do to his favorite playground?”
“Yes. And can you believe he wants to do it again right after this one comes out?”
She arched an eyebrow. “That’s eighteen months without raw cookie dough and real coffee. Has he met you?”
We both laughed.
Jason and Josh hugged, slapping each other on the back. They saw each other as much as I saw Kristen. The guys flew out to Minnesota for the deer and duck openers and we’d all spent a week in Ely right before the tour so he and Jason could go ice fishing. They were practically best friends. Kristen said they were having a bromance.
I hugged Kimmy and Sarah, Kristen and Josh’s adopted daughters. They were nine and eleven now.
Two years ago Josh had gone on a fatal heart attack call at work. The man who’d died was the grandfather and sole guardian of his two granddaughters. Kristen and Josh stepped in as emergency foster parents. The girls’ adoptions had been finalized just a few months ago. They were amazing kids.
“How have you guys been?” I asked, scooping Oliver up into a hug.
“Oh, you know, just doing the married thing, eating tacos with that one special person for the rest of our lives. How was the tour?” Kristen asked.
“Piece of cake. Glad it’s over, though.” I straightened from my hugs with Oliver and put my hands on my lower back as I walked to the gate.
“Are you gonna autograph my cookbook for me?” Kristen asked.
I laughed. “Sure.”
I’d published a cookbook. Slow Cooker Recipes by The Huntsman’s Wife. I’d developed most of them in the bus, on tour. All the recipes had conversions for wild game. And I painted on tour too. I had a two-year waiting list for my artwork.
I’d made the road my home. Being on tour was as easy to me now as breathing.
I started to punch in the code to the gate, but it wasn’t working. I wrinkled my forehead. “This thing’s broken.”
“You’re at the wrong house,” Jason said from behind me.
I looked back through the gate. No. This was the house. The same one we’d rented for the last three years.
I turned around, confused. Kristen was beaming at me. I looked over her shoulder at Jason and Josh, watching me from the curb. They stood next to each other and grinned like conspirators.
“What’s going on?” I asked, looking back and forth between them.
Kristen looked giddy. “You moved.”
“What?”
She smiled. “So did we.”
“You moved? When? Where?”
The three of them looked at each other like they were trying to decide who should answer me. Jason volunteered. He stepped up and took my
cheeks in his hands and kissed me. “To Ely.”
I gasped and whirled on Kristen. “What?”
Jason grinned. “We bought houses next to each other. A hundred acres combined. Private. Safe. A room with a lake view for you to paint and a recording studio for me.”
“We needed the bigger place,” Josh said, putting an arm around his smiling wife.
Kristen looked at her husband and he grinned at her. “Josh quit the fire department. He got a job with the Forest Service in Minnesota. And…” She paused. “Our surrogate’s pregnant.”
“What?” I breathed.
“She’s due in three months,” she said, beaming.
I put my hands over my mouth. “We get to have babies together?”
She nodded, her eyes tearing up. “I’ll be able to snowshoe to your house in a blizzard to borrow a cup of frozen milk.”
I laughed, taking turns hugging them all through tears. I ended with my husband and put my face into his chest. He put his lips to my ear, his arms wrapped around my back. “Trying to keep all my promises.”
All I could do was nod. The baby kicked between us, and I felt so much happiness my heart threatened to burst.
When I pulled away, he kissed me, his eyes a little misty. “Come on, we have a plane waiting. It’s time to go home.”
A NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR
*The identifying details of the following have been changed out of respect for privacy.
I have a very close childhood friend who was widowed in her twenties when her young husband passed away suddenly.
Before the tragedy, my friend was fiercely driven and independent. She was working in a career she adored and was thriving. Two years after her husband’s death, she was still withdrawn and isolated. She’d stopped doing things she loved. She couldn’t hold down a job. She had anxiety and panic attacks. She’d disappear for weeks at a time in her isolation, and I couldn’t get her on the phone or get her to open the door. She didn’t have any close friends anymore, and her relationships with her family were strained. She refused to go to counseling.
It seemed like so much of the state of her life had some colossal ripple effect. The lack of self-care, the refusal to socialize or seek therapy, the junk food she ate because she couldn’t bring herself to cook for one, the unhealthy habits she picked up to cope with the stress and anxiety of her loss.
I now know that my friend was most likely suffering from a condition called complicated grief, also known as persistent complex bereavement disorder. It’s most common when the death is unexpected or particularly traumatic and the person lost is very close to you.
When I started writing The Happy Ever After Playlist, I never in my wildest dreams thought I’d get it published. Writing was just a hobby, and this book was more for me than anything else—a cathartic exercise, my own way of working through the confusing, shattered aftermath I was witnessing, a way to make my friend better, even if it was just fiction—because nothing I did in real life seemed to help her. I felt like a helpless bystander, and I wanted so much for something or someone to reach her beyond the wall of sadness she’d put up around herself. So I made up a fictional universe and a fictional widow who lived behind a wall of grief, and I sent in Tucker to retrieve her. But the rest had to be her.
It took active participation on my friend’s part and people around her who never gave up trying to make her whole again, but just like in the book, eventually she decided to pursue healing and happiness. She’s finally found joy in life again. I wish it would have happened sooner—but I’m grateful it happened at all. Because for a very long time, I was afraid it wouldn’t.
According to Bridges to Recovery, it is estimated that between 10 to 20 percent of those who have lost a loved one will experience an extended period of complicated bereavement. Complicated grief can affect you physically, mentally, and socially. Without treatment, complications include depression, suicidal thoughts, PTSD, increased risk of heart disease, cancer, or high blood pressure, and substance or alcohol abuse.
Getting counseling soon after a loss may help prevent complicated grief. Hospice will have resources available. Talking with others and seeking support from friends and family and support groups may also help. Medications are available to assist with depression and sleep disorders associated with the condition.
If you or anyone you know is suffering from unresolved grief, please seek help—it can get better. My friend wants me to tell you that.
♫THE HAPPY EVER AFTER PLAYLIST
♪ In the Mourning | Paramore
♪ affection | BETWEEN FRIENDS
♪ Middle of Nowhere | Hot Hot Heat
♪ ocean eyes | Billie Eilish
♪ Give Me a Try | The Wombats
♪ Future | Paramore
♪ Talk Too Much | COIN
♪ This Charming Man | The Smiths
♪ A Beautiful Mess | Jason Mraz
♪ Soul Meets Body | Death Cab for Cutie
♪ Name | Goo Goo Dolls
♪ Electric Love | Børns
♪ Make You Mine | PUBLIC
♪ Maybe You’re the Reason | The Japanese House
♪ I Want It All | COIN
♪ Girlfriend | Phoenix
♪ I Feel It | Avid Dancer
♪ The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald | Jaxon Waters
♪ Misery Business | Paramore
♪ Superposition | Young the Giant
♪ White Winter Hymnal | Fleet Foxes
♪ Everywhere | Roosevelt
♪ Into Dust | Mazzy Star
♪ burn slowly/i love you | The Brazen Youth
♪ 26 | Paramore
♪ Broken | Lund
♪ Blood in the Cut | K.Flay
♪ A Moment of Silence | The Neighbourhood
♪ Mess Is Mine | Vance Joy
♪ Holocene | Bon Iver
♪ Diamonds | Ben Howard
♪ Big Jet Plane | Angus & Julia Stone
♪ Do I Wanna Know? | Arctic Monkeys
♪ Yes I’m Changing | Tame Impala
♪ Little Black Submarines | The Black Keys
♪ i don’t know what to say | Bring Me the Horizon
♪ Keep Your Head Up | Ben Howard
♪ Bottom of the Deep Blue Sea | Missio
♪ Ful Stop | Radiohead
♪ About Today | The National
♪ It’s Not Living (If It’s Not With You) | The 1975
♪ fresh bruises | Bring Me the Horizon
♪ Somebody Else | The 1975
♪ If I Get High | Nothing But Thieves
♪ Proof | Jaxon Waters
♪ The Huntsman’s Wife | Jaxon Waters
Acknowledgments
The biggest of all thank-yous to my agent, Stacey, for reading the query for this book and knowing it was something special the second she laid eyes on it. It was the start of a whole new chapter of my life! And thank you to Dawn Frederick of Red Sofa Literary for letting me be a part of your author posse.
Thank you to my incredible editor, Leah, for not only knowing what this book needed, but knowing how to explain it to me in a way I understood so I could make it the fabulous read it is today.
Estelle, you’re a fucking marketing genius.
All the love to the team at Forever who beta read this, championed it, worked on the cover, figured out the title, and helped it reach readers: Beth, Amy, Lexi, Elizabeth (I adore this cover!), Mari, Mary, Ali, Rachel, Suzanne, and all the many others.
A huge thank-you to my crit buddies on Critique Circle and beyond: Joey Ringer, Hijo, Tia Greene, Shauna Lawless, Debby Wallace, J. C. Nelson, Jill Storm, Liz Smith-Gehris, G. W. Pickle, Dawn Cooper, Andrea Day, Lisa Stremmel, Lisa Sushko, Michele Alborg, Amanda Wulff, Summer Heacock, Stacey Sargent, George, Jhawk, Abby Luther, Patt Pandolfi, Bessy Chavez, Mandy Geisler, Teressa Sadowski, Leigh Kramer, Stephanie Trimbol, and Kristyn May.
*Waves at Lindsay.*
Thank you, Patty Gibbs, for giving me some publicist behind-the-scenes inf
o, and Jason from Ely Outfitting Company for letting me use the name of your outfitter (yes, it’s a real place! Go see it and let them show you the most pristine wilderness in the world!).
An extra big thank-you to Kim T. Kao (Book Bruin) and author Leigh Kramer for beta reading this in the eleventh hour.
A special mention to Dawn Cooper for being my number one! This book has changed a lot since the first draft and you were there for all of it, in every way possible. Not only would this book not be the same without you, but I would not be the same author without you. Those plot walks are everything.
To my oldest daughter, Naomi Esella, the musician, who got a big mention in the last book’s acknowledgments and who said I’d probably forget to thank her for all the music stuff she helped me with in this one—thank you! (I showed you again, you salty bitch.)
And lastly, thank you to my husband. He’s my number one fan and none of this would be possible without his patience, support, and love.
Many thanks to all these wonderful supporters!
Kristina Aadland
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