“My postcards,” I answer, flipping them around, putting them back in their Ziploc sandwich bag for safe keeping.
“Can I see?” Dean stands and walks up behind me, peering but not prying over my shoulder. I take the postcards out,leaving the letter in the bag, and hand him the stack. He sifts through them, carefully handling each, reading the messages before he flips to the next one. Dean doesn’t say anything about them, but he hands them neatly to me and I lock them away in their baggie.
“Do you want to get ready and we’ll find something to eat before the concert?” He asks.
“Yes, please.” I go back to my suitcase and think about what to wear tonight. I select my last clean sweater—the black one with the white pearl beads on the collar—and my last clean pair of blue jeans. I’ll have to see if I can find a laundry facility somewhere…or I’ll just wash them in the tub. I leave Dean sitting in the armchair, playing the daily crossword.
In the bathroom, I adjust my ponytail and I stare at my face in the mirror. Even though I look less ghostly than I usually do this time of winter, I still feel like my face could use some color. Flashes of Dean’s hands on me turn my cheeks pink in no time. I change my sweater and pants and fold my old clothes neatly in a pile and place them on the counter.
I walk up to the doorway and push the door open just a crack to get a peek at Dean. He’s right where I left him, legs crossed, dark hair falling over his forehead, eyes focused on his phone. He looks like something holy and untouchable.
I want to plaster my hands all over him. He looks up from his phone, and I step out from behind the door.
“McKinney. You look beautiful.” Dean’s voice is scratching in a way I’ve never heard before. He grins and I want him to swallow me whole—I don’t even know what to say. It’s probably been years since someone’s called me beautiful. It makes my heart ache in a bittersweet way. He stands and in two strides, he’s handing me my tote bag. “You ready?”
“I’m ready.”
While I was ready for the lackluster food at the Pic-a-Lilli Pub, I wasn’t ready for the sheer volume of people who would be there. After eating, Dean and I wade through the already gathered crowd surrounding the stage. We reach the middle of the crowd when Denny Twenty, the band comes on stage.
Dean stands behind me, only a hand on my shoulder. I keep my eyes on the dark, moving figures fifty feet in front of me. A man picks up his guitar, the rest of the band following suit, a spotlight turns on, blinding the crowd. The microphone squeals with feedback as the guitarist picks it up from the stand.
“To Andy,” Denny says, and the crowd roars. “Who taught me in more ways than one.” The opening chords of Andy's song,I WAS HER LOVER, begin. It’s been ages since I’ve heard this song—and I know it by heart. It’s easily Andy’s most human song and Denny’s gravelly voice does it a unique justice.
The lines that always hit me the most are towards the end of the song. I mouth them as Denny sings them. “You say, ‘Where’ve you been all my life?’/ I tell you, ‘You are my muse, not my vice’/ What’s the difference? You ask / What’s the difference when you’re gonna be in a casket?”
Andy wrote those lines after a fight we had well before he died about whether he could name the album after me. Now that he’s gone, I question the difference between a bad habit and a source of inspiration—although Andy’s point rings true. It doesn’t matter when you’re dead as a doornail in a casket.
We sway to the hypnotic guitar riffs that make up the end of the song, and the next song is an original roots revival Denny Twenty I don’t recognize, but it’s just as good as Andy’s music. This song is mellow but rhythmic and it makes me want to dance—rightfully so, the rest of the crowd is already bopping and swinging.
The band plays more of their own music, and then some more of Andy’s songs, before doing a cover of Cars and Telephones by Arcade Fire. It’s an interesting song choice, as it’s not explicitly indie-folk rock or something that Andy played on tour. The band harmonizes well with Denny, the small crowd hums quietly, absorbing his energy.
Denny does a solo cover on the acoustic guitar, and Dean’s grip on my shoulder tightens. He’s moved by Denny’s grating vocals and performance, but I just feel like another soul adrift in the crowd, watching the figures on the stage from someone else’s eyes.
“Andy wrote this song for his wife.” It’s not until I hear my name come out of Denny’s mouth that I zip back up into my own body. “Wherever you are tonight, Madeline, this song is for you.”
I gasp as Denny sings the opening lines to Madeline, and my heart sinks a thousand feet straight to my feet, through the floor, into the bedrock of the Earth. This song always hits me like a freight train, barreling at me, hundreds of miles per hour, unable to change its course until it’s far too late. And usually, it’s Andy I can’t help but picture in the song lyrics.
But as Denny sings, all I can think about is Dean, and the way he’s draped across my shoulders, holding me steady in the darkness, notes of the harmonica solo filling the air. In the past, I’d be crying by now, drowning in a river of existential quicksand about my own mortality. When Dean looks at me, he sees me. The last stanza comes at me like a fireball from a flamethrower.
I'll never forget you,
I know it'll be hard
Since there's no one else around,
I'm insane enough to think that
there's more to life than this
(Get a move on now, Madeline)
I’ll never forget you, Andy, but you’re right. There’s nothing like a crowd singing your song, your name on their lips. There’s more to life than this.
13
“You up for a night cap?” Dean asks me. It’s a little after 10 o’clock, and my body is tired, but I’m still riding the post-concert high, electric guitars buzzing in my mind.
“What did you have in mind?” I ask.
