Half-Truths

by Randileigh Kennedy

  We packed our stuff and drove to my parents’. My grandmas were cooking lasagna, and judging by the cars in our driveway, a few of my aunts, uncles, and cousins were joining us.

  “Will you give me a minute?” I asked nonchalantly as we pulled up to the curb. “Maybe you can rummage through your trunk or check the engine while I make sure everyone’s on their best behavior.”

  “Check the engine? It’s a rental car.” He laughed. “You’re really worried about this?”

  “Not worried per se, but I’ve been gone a long time. These people aren’t used to being involved in my personal life. I just think it would save us a little embarrassment if I could warn them first that I’m bringing someone.” I clasped my hands together as if to say, “Please?” and he laughed again.

  “I’ll get our stuff out of the back, but you have only a ninety-second head start.”

  I quickly jumped out of the Jeep and flew into the house, startling everyone as I ran in.

  “Look, I have a guest tonight,” I said, somewhat out of breath from my sprint. “Please, please don’t embarrass me. That especially goes for you,” I emphasized, pointing directly at Warren.

  “Why are you singling me out?” he said with a playfully accusatory tone.

  “This is important to me, Warren, please,” I said as Sawyer stepped up to the door. He knocked lightly, and I opened it quickly. Everyone’s eyes turned toward him.

  “Oh, my, he’s gorgeous, dear,” my grandma Sarah said loudly, getting up from the couch to give Sawyer a hug. It was as if she’d completely ignored my warning. “Look at how tall he is. You would make adorable children.”

  “And that face wouldn’t hurt the gene pool either,” Grandma Sally added. I was pretty sure my cheeks had turned beet red. “Those muscles,” she continued.

  “These are my adorable, yet deaf, slightly senile grandmas,” I said through gritted teeth, completely mortified by their welcome. I glanced over at Warren, urging with my eyes for him to be polite and normal.

  “The Uber driver,” Warren said warmly, getting up to shake Sawyer’s hand.

  “Right, yes.” Sawyer laughed. “I heard there was an intense game of Monopoly happening here tonight?”

  “I can see you’ll fit right in here,” Warren said politely. “With all your muscles and everything.”

  “Warren,” I scolded. He put his arms up in surrender and laughed.

  “Hey, you bring the Uber driver home, you get what’s coming to you. That’s all I’m saying,” he shot back. I glanced up at Sawyer, trying to gauge whether he looked uncomfortable, but his warm, sincere smile suggested he was okay.

  We sat around my parents’ huge dining room table and said grace. We piled heaping scoops of lasagna and breadsticks onto our plates, and everyone drilled Sawyer for more information. He hung in there like a champ and answered everyone’s questions. It wasn’t nearly as painful as I’d expected it to be. It was nice.

  After dinner we played games as promised, and I loved watching Sawyer with my family. Everyone laughed and got along well, and my heart felt full. I wished my parents were home. I knew my dad would’ve loved every minute of this. But for now, this was good.

  Eleven o’clock came around, and the crowd started getting tired. I couldn’t help but notice how happy Sawyer looked.

  “That was really fun tonight,” he said sincerely as we walked to his Jeep. I could tell by the way my grandmas were hugging him goodbye that he had passed whatever test they’d offered.

  “Sorry about all the baby comments from Grandma Sarah.” I laughed. “Her filter has been broken for years. She just kind of says whatever’s on her mind. We’re trying to get that fixed.”

  “They’re all wonderful people,” he said with a hint of nostalgia. “I hope you realize how very lucky you are to have them. All of them. They’re really great.” I was sad for him in that moment. It looked as though he felt some kind of agony over realizing he didn’t get to have these experiences himself. Here I was, fighting so hard to distance myself from home, for no other reason than my pride, yet this was all some other people were fighting for.

  “They can be your family too,” I said quietly, wrapping my arms around him. “You can borrow my grandmas anytime you want. They already want to send you back to Nashville with homemade pies. Like those will travel well in your suitcase . . .”

  He tilted up my head toward him. “Thank you,” he replied sincerely. “For letting me into your world. I get it, you know. Why you’re such a mess when you talk to your dad, the way you’re trying so hard to make them all proud of you. You don’t see it, do you?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The way they see you,” he continued. “You’re so worried about letting people down, but they don’t see you like that. They see that you’re happy, and I think that’s all that matters to them. All the pressure you put on yourself—they don’t even know that exists. They just want you to smile at them the way you do. That’s enough for them.”

  His words resonated with me more than he probably realized. It was something I’d always struggled with. I didn’t have any easy, obvious talents. My brother was the athletic one, and although I did well in school, I was never going to be top of my class or out to cure cancer or solve some unsolvable equation. Ironically my only strengths were in my head, and other than getting them out on paper, I felt I had little else to offer the world. That always ate at me, even as a child. Sawyer was right: the fight I constantly had with myself about being good enough was likely just one-sided.

  “You’re good for me,” I said softly, leaning into him.

  “Does this mean you’re going back to the hotel with me?” He smiled a devilish smile. “This is my last night in Mountain Ridge. Doesn’t that call for a late-night dance party?”

  I looked back at my parents’ house. Lights were being shut off, and it looked like everyone was calling it a night. My dad was supposed to arrive home the following morning, so I figured there would be a lot of people around, questioning where I was. I knew I was an adult and it shouldn’t matter, but something about being back in my parents’ home made me feel like I needed to follow the “rules.” I felt guilty about sneaking off with a boy late at night like this, as if I was still sixteen with a curfew.

  “We have plenty of time for that once we get back to Nashville,” I replied flirtatiously. “I’m not sure I have it in me to explain myself to all these people when I magically reappear in the morning.”

  “I understand.” He leaned in to kiss me.

  I kissed him back, and we said good-night. He lingered, touching my face. He slowly brushed back my hair, and I moaned. “Once I get you back home, I am going to devour you,” he breathed into my ear. “We’re going to spend endless nights lying under the stars. Just you and me.”

  “Soon enough.” I smiled and kissed him one more time. “Then life will return to normal.”

  “There is nothing normal about the life we’re going to have, Whitley Rose,” he said as he climbed into his Jeep.

  “No?”

  “No.” He shook his head. He smiled and it melted me.

  “How do you talk me into these things? Don’t pull away,” I instructed him, tapping on his door.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m grabbing a bag,” I responded playfully. “Give me two minutes.” He grinned, and I knew he felt the same way I did. I felt a pull every time I was near him. It was hard for us to separate, no matter how I tried to talk myself out of it. I’d meant what I said: he was good for me in so many ways.

  I quickly ran back inside to pack a bag. As I headed back out, a voice in the dark living room surprised me.

  “He seems nice,” Warren said sincerely, turning on a lamp by the sofa.

  I was startled for a moment but relieved once I realized it was him. “Thank you for not embarrassing me in front of him.”

  “The grandmas had that handled,” he teased. “I couldn’t make it worse. When are you going bac
k to Nashville?”

  “In just a few days, once Dad is home and settled,” I stated, starting to feel excited about my upcoming meeting with the record label. “I have a pitch meeting scheduled with Kip’s label. As long as Dad seems to be recovering okay here, I’ll go. What about you? You’ve missed a lot of class. I know it’s just a summer session, but still.”

  “I’m flunking out anyway.” He sighed.

  “What? Since when? Why didn’t you say anything?” I wanted to run back out to Sawyer, but I couldn’t just leave this conversation.

  “It’s been a rough few semesters.” He groaned. “I couldn’t tell them. Not with everything going on over the past couple weeks. Mom and Dad are going to kill me when they find out.”

  “What’s going on? Do you want to talk about it?”

  “I’m just not into it,” he said honestly. “I’m not even sure about my major. Or school in general right now. It’s not working for me.”

  “Well, I know a thing or two about that.” I giggled.

  “Exactly. Thanks for that, by the way. There’s so much pressure to live up to now that you’ve already fallen off the success wagon,” he continued. “We can’t both be college dropouts. It will kill them slowly.” His joke was somewhat ill-timed, but I knew what he was saying.

  “Stop it. I haven’t completely failed yet. There’s still time.” I grinned. “What else do you want to do?” I questioned. My brother and I had been close growing up, but obviously we’d grown apart while living far away from each other these past few years.

  I heard Sawyer’s Jeep idling in front of the house, and I felt torn about what to do.

  “We can talk about it later. You can go.” Warren chuckled, motioning me out of the house. “We can have this pity party some other time. I hear his car out there. I’m not an idiot. I know you’re sneaking out. I’ve covered for you before. Maybe not much has changed, huh?”

  “I am not sneaking out,” I scoffed, as if we were teenagers all over again and I was hiding something. “I can come and go as I please. I don’t live here anymore.”

  “Right. You tell the grandmas that in the morning when they ask what you’ve been up to all night. Just go. We can talk about what disappointments we’ve become later over orange sherbet.”

  I waved goodbye and slipped quietly out the door. I climbed into Sawyer’s Jeep. My brother was right: maybe I hadn’t reached my full potential . . . yet. But in this moment, I didn’t care. Sitting in this passenger seat with Sawyer, under the stars, with no real place to be—it honestly felt as close to “making it” as I had ever felt before. Surely nothing could change this feeling.

  “Before we call it a night, are you up for something?” I asked suggestively.

  “Whatever that face of yours means right now, the answer is yes.” He grinned. “Just tell me where to go.”

  “I know the perfect place.” It wasn’t an address I could type into his GPS, so I told him where to turn.

  “Want to give me any hints?” he mused.

  “I think it’s time for a long drive down a short road.”

  “That sounds like the beginning of a song. It also sounds like this could be either the best night of my life or a suicide mission,” he teased, unsure what I was getting at.

  “There’s a spot up here”—I motioned up the dirt road—“where you can see everything. You can see all of Mountain Ridge from one spot, even the lake. It’s magnificent. I thought maybe you could finally read some of these.” I pulled two notebooks out of my bag, and Sawyer’s lips curled into a smile. I’d never let anyone read them before—not my family, not even Brie. They were too personal for that. But that was the thing with Sawyer. I didn’t feel any judgment from him. This was a big step for me. Usually I let people read only what I wanted them to see. Even working with Chris, I showed him only the songs that I thought suited him. There were hundreds of others he would never know. The notebooks in their entirety were all too private, but for some reason, the thought of Sawyer reading my words didn’t terrify me. I felt a closeness to him I hadn’t experienced before, and this seemed like the only way I could truly show him that, even if I was just confirming for myself what he meant to me. He probably didn’t know what a big deal it was to me, but I did.

  We parked at a small pullout, and Sawyer’s eyes lit up, no doubt in awe of the view. This was the perfect time of night for it. Most of the homes were dark, and people were asleep. The casino lights twinkled with all their magic and luster, and the lake sparkled under the moon. It was the perfect place to completely bare my soul to someone, and I couldn’t imagine a better man to do that with.

  Chapter 17

  I woke up early in Sawyer’s hotel room, wrapped in billowing white sheets. I smiled, wondering if these were the same sheets he’d used to build the fort in the park. I pictured that image of him—the pride on his face at what he’d done. It would stick with me forever, no matter what else we experienced moving forward.

  The clock on the nightstand read a few minutes after seven. I knew I had to get going soon. My family was expected home in just a few hours, and I didn’t want to be running into the house minutes beforehand in front of all my relatives. I got up and took a warm shower, feeling rejuvenated and excited about this day. As Sawyer and I had spent time together over the past couple of weeks, I realized he was piecing me together along the way, and I was so grateful. Now that everything seemed to be less chaotic, I felt different—as if he had completely restored me. Last night he read my songs. We stared out into the brilliant landscape, and I felt completely unbroken. I was falling hard for him, and I knew there was no stopping it now.

  I hated that he had to get back to Nashville before me, but I understood it. He had obligations and responsibilities, and we couldn’t shrug those off forever.

  He was still sleeping when I finished my shower. I didn’t want to wake him, but I also didn’t want to just walk out without saying goodbye. I crawled across the bed, slowly trailing my fingers delicately up his arm. He smiled before he even opened his eyes.

  “I know you’re not leaving me right now,” he said softly, pulling me into him.

  “I have to.” I laughed. “I have to get home before the entire house is up.”

  “Your grandmas are pretty sassy. I don’t think they care where you’ve been.” He kissed me slowly, and I knew it would be hard to get out of this room. “Besides, I think they like me. I’m pretty sure I’ve been approved.”

  “Oh, yeah? What makes you think that?”

  “Really? I was accosted in the living room while you were off grabbing the games from the bedroom. The conversation started with an awkward ‘if I were fifty years younger,’ so that’s pretty telling. Not to mention that rogue hand I felt on my thigh while I was stuck in Monopoly jail. I don’t even know who that hand belonged to, but I’m pretty sure that’s a dead ringer for a thumbs-up by anyone’s standards.”

  “That was my hand.” I laughed, pushing him down into the bed. “Forget my grandmas. What about me? How do you know I’ve approved of you yet?”

  “Because you can picture it all.”

  “What do you mean?” I narrowed my eyes.

  “Us. You can picture us. We’ll be back in Nashville, and I’ll take you to the cabin. We’ll spend all our weekends there. We’ll sit on the dock with our feet in the water. You’ll be writing in your journal while I’m reading the paper, obviously. We’ll dip in the water when it’s hot and float on our backs to enjoy what’s left of the summer sun. And when fall comes, we’ll build canopies and fires and wrap ourselves in blankets under the stars.”

  “Go on.” I lay down next to him.

  “Come winter we’ll be tangled up in fluffy feather down blankets all the time, out by the old cabin fireplace, drinking Boone’s to keep our blood flowing while working on a best-of-twenty-five-game Monopoly tournament. Then spring . . . Oh, that’s the best of what’s to come.”

  “I like this story. Don’t stop,” I interjected as h
e paused. His words sent tingles throughout my entire body, and I wanted to lie here forever staring up at this ceiling as his fingers intertwined with mine. As much as I loved music, the sound of him talking about us was somehow better than any melody I’d ever heard.

  “In spring I want to build a little boathouse next to the dock,” he explained with a boyish excitement in his voice. “I’m going to hang a hammock in there so you can relax and write while I do all the hard work. And it’s going to have a skylight so we can sleep under the stars even when it’s raining.”

  “Oh, yeah?”

  “Yes. We’ll just lie there, you and me, listening to the sound of the rain on the roof. You’ll write songs about me instead of about all the heartache you’ve known, because you’ll have forgotten that anything sad before me existed.”

  I looked over at him and he was smiling back at me. I loved everything about the emotion in his eyes when he spoke.

  “Is all of that true?” I whispered. His lips were inches away from mine.

  “If you want it to be,” he replied quietly. “Just think: even if all of that is only half true, imagine what a good life that could be.” He pulled me into him, and the strength of his arms and the tenderness of his hands were the only truth I needed right now.

  ***

  I made it back to my parents’ house a little later than I intended to, but I didn’t care. My heart was full, and I made no apologies for it.