“We were kids with dreams too big for Texas skies,
You went your way, I went mine,
But every song I sang was just a disguise,
For the melody you left behind…”
When the last note slipped into silence, it felt like the world held its breath.
“Steph…” he breathed, voice low and raw.
“I know.” I swallowed hard. “I can’t record that one.”
His brow creased. “Why not?”
“Because it’s ours,” I said softly. “Some songs aren’t meant for the world. Some songs are…personal. Private. Just for the person who inspired them.”
Something shifted in his face—something soft, something unbelievably tender.
Like the words hit a place in him he kept locked up from everyone else.
He crossed the room slowly, like he didn’t want to startle me, like he wasn’t sure if he was allowed to touch me. Then he knelt beside my chair, his hands reaching for mine with a kind of quiet reverence that made my throat close.
His fingers laced through mine, warm and steady.
“You’re going to be okay,” he said, and it wasn’t a promise. It was certainty. The kind forged in fire and grief and history. “You’re going to be more than okay. You’re going to be brilliant again.”
A breath hitched in my chest. “How do you know?”
He let go of one hand—only one—and lifted his fingers to my cheek. Slow. Careful. Like he was touching something breakable. Something sacred.
His thumb brushed the faint yellowing bruise by my temple. Not pity. Recognition.
“Because you’re you,” he said, voice thick. “You’re the girl who wrote songs on napkins at truck stops. Who played until her fingers bled because there was something you needed to say. That girl is still in there, Steph. And she’s coming back.”
I leaned into his palm—just barely—but enough. Enough for him to know it was okay.
Enough for me to feel the heat of him grounding me.
My gaze fell to the notebook on the coffee table, blank pages waiting. To the guitar in my lap, already molding to my hands like an extension of myself. To this man kneeling at my feet, who believed in me more fiercely than I believed in myself.
Something inside me cracked open.
He must’ve seen it—felt it—because he leaned in. Not to kiss me. Not like that. Not yet. Instead, he pressed his lips to my forehead—slow, warm, devastating.
A promise.
A vow.
A lifeline.
My eyes fluttered closed, breath trembling out of me, and for the first time since LA, I felt…safe. Wanted. Seen in that way only he could see me.
“Lee…” I whispered.
His forehead stayed lowered to mine for a beat longer, his breath mingling with mine. Just an inch, and our lips would touch. And this fragile, beautiful thing we’d been tiptoeing around for the better part of two decades would take over. “I’m right here,” he murmured. “I’m not going anywhere.”
And God help me, I believed him.
