I patted his thigh excitedly. “And look where it’s taken you! You’re playing ACL!”
He smiled and nodded, but it looked a little forced. I waited to see if he’d explain, but he stayed quiet.
“Where did you want it to take you? What’s the big dream?”
He shrugged. “I don’t have something concrete like you do. I want to make music that’s true, music that moves people the way other musicians have moved me. I guess I want to stand out on a stage one day and hear a crowd singing something I wrote.”
“It’ll happen. You’re going to do that and more. Hell, you moved me into being reckless when I heard you sing that first time.”
He glanced over at me with a smile on his face. “My voice, huh? Not my winning personality?”
I looked up, pretending to think. “You’ll never really know…”
We drove into a neighborhood so pristine, it might as well have been a postcard. The houses weren’t huge, but the grass was all a uniform length and they all looked the same, built of the same materials at the same time just in alternating floor plans.
There was no chaos here. Only yard signs proudly denoting the sports affiliations of the children of each household and the ever-present sound of leaf blowers.
I rarely felt inferior about my upbringing anymore. There was no shame in coming from bumfuck nowhere.
But we’d come from different worlds.
We were still from different worlds.
We pulled into a driveway and a lovely blonde woman came running out of the house, not even waiting for Zane to put the truck in park before pulling his door open.
He hopped out and she pulled him into a long hug like he was her whole world.
I didn’t know who I was more jealous of. No one had loved me like that since Matt died.
His mom released him and finally got a good look at his face. She gasped. “Honey, what happened?”
Zane looked away, trying to brush it off. “It was a misunderstanding.”
His mom cupped his face. “Someone’s fist colliding with your face is never a misunderstanding.” She finally caught sight of me, so I got out of the truck and walked around to meet her.
I saw her putting it all together, her son who’d never been in a fight suddenly having a black eye, a much older mystery woman who was likely the cause. In the seconds she appraised me, I saw all of the conclusions she drew flit across her face and none of them were wrong.
I was one of her son’s more questionable decisions.
I wasn’t good for his long-term prospects.
You don’t have to look at me like that, Linda. I’m aware.
I suddenly didn’t want him to tell her. It wasn’t worth stressing this poor woman out when we hadn’t even talked about how we would make things work when I needed to head back to LA. There was no need to introduce me as anything to him. What would it even accomplish?
Zane said, “Mom, this is Maia.”
She finished scrutinizing me, missing nothing, and pursed her lips. But it was gone in a flash, hidden behind a polite Southern smile.
I extended a hand and blurted, “I’m Zane’s PR manager. Missed the bus, so your son was kind enough to give me a ride. He’s such a good kid.”
What the fuck just came out of my mouth?
Her smile of relief validated all of my concerns.
Zane’s expression was gutted but he covered it quickly.
I faltered, wondering if I’d made a big mistake, but dismissed it.
