Tonight we’ll finish the song, and then it’ll be done. Clean lines, clear boundaries, no complications.
I just have to make it through the day without touching the piano keys, without wondering if the harmony we found extends beyond music, without remembering how his voice sounded when he promised to be here as long as I’d let him.
The afternoon stretches ahead, full of ordinary tasks that should keep me busy. Should keep me from thinking about tonight, about seeing him again, about whether finishing the song will feel complete or just the beginning of missing something I told myself I couldn’t want.
I turn on the house music and get back to work, drowning out the melody in my head with classic country and the comforting noise of preparation. But even with the distractions, I can still feel where his hands touched my skin, still taste the whiskey-warm kiss that started everything.
Lily will be home in a few hours, and I need to have dinner planned, the normal rhythms of motherhood that ground me in what matters most. She’s the reason I built walls in the first place, the reason I chose safety over possibility, responsibility over risk.
As I make a grocery list and plan our evening routine, part of me wonders what example I’m setting. What I’m teaching her about women and music and the courage it takes to let people hear your voice.
Darian and I will finish the song and put this behind us.
By the time evening comes, maybe I’ll have convinced myself that boundaries are enough. That finishing the song will satisfywhatever hunger last night awakened. That I can go back to being the woman who manages other people’s music and sleeps alone and never has to worry about whether someone will still be there in the morning.
Maybe by tonight, I’ll believe that story.
darian
. . .
My car idlesoutside The Songbird while I try to find the words for what I’m about to ask. Three days have passed since Rye and I finished the song, since she drew lines in the sand and I agreed to respect them. Three days of keeping distance while the melody we created together won’t shut up in my head.
But sitting in Zara’s kitchen yesterday, watching her fold baby clothes while Stormy and Willow argued over who knows what and Levi came in from the barn smelling like horses and hay, something clicked. The easy intimacy of a family that chooses each other daily, the way they’ve built something real and lasting without the industry’s toxic bullshit—I want Rye to see that. I want her to understand what I’m falling toward.
The song we wrote captures something raw and true between us, even if she insists on treating it like a business transaction. Two harmonies finding each other, creating something neither voice could manage alone. What we built together sounds like the beginning of something, not an ending.
My phone buzzes with a text from Zara:Ranch dinner Sunday. Bring Rye.
I stare at the message, thumb hovering over the keyboard. Zara doesn’t invite people lightly. She’s protective of the life she and Levi have created, careful about who gets access to their sanctuary. The fact that she’s asking about Rye means she’s been listening to my not-so-subtle questions about family dynamics and reading between the lines.
She’s not exactly the family dinner type.
Neither were you. Bring her anyway.
It’s complicated.
Everything good is complicated. Sunday at six.
I lock my phone and stare at the venue’s windows. Light glows from inside where Rye’s probably doing inventory or cleaning things that don’t need cleaning, using work to avoid thinking about us. I’ve learned that’s how she copes with stress.
The memory hits me suddenly: three days ago, watching her lean into the microphone during our final recording session. Eyes closed, voice finding every nuance of the melody we’d crafted together. For four minutes and thirty-seven seconds, all her barriers disappeared. Just two people creating something that mattered.
Then the song ended, and she was back to business. “That’s good. We’re done.”
But the way she touched my back as I packed up my guitar suggested maybe we weren’t quite done. Maybe she felt it too—the pull toward something deeper than collaboration.
I grab my guitar case and head toward the venue entrance. Jovie holds the door open with her hip while she carries out trash bags, purple streaks in her hair catching the late afternoon light.
“Well, look what the cat dragged in,” she says, grinning. “Thought you’d disappeared after your recording session.”
“Just giving her space.”
“Space.” Jovie sets down the bags and crosses her arms. “You musicians are all the same. Create something beautiful with a woman and then vanish.”
“I’m not vanishing. I’m right here.”
“Because you want something.”
