Page 116 of The Song We Lost

I nod slowly. “Okay.”

Noah grabs a guitar immediately and Jackson reaches behind him for his. Cole surprises everyone by picking up the one I gifted him last Christmas, as Sadie squeals.

The first chord floats into the night, soft and somehow familiar. The sound settles over the fire like a memory. I close my eyes for just a second before singing.

“I’ve stood on a thousand stages…” My voice comes out quieter than it does on stage. Less polished. More… mine. “Sang through heartbreak, sang through healing…” The words feel different here, like a confession.

Jackson’s harmony slips in beside mine on the next line, low and steady. “Sang through every lonely night…”

It fits so easily it almost startles me. Like breathing.

The fire cracks softly in front of us. Light flickers across faces I’ve loved my entire life.

“When my voice was shaking…” I sing.

Jackson joins me on the next line. “You sang every word.”

Noah grins and strums louder.

“And when the world got louder…”

Jackson glances at me, his voice warm beside mine. “You were the loudest heard.”

Something in my chest loosens, as we move into the chorus together. “There’s no place I’d rather be…”

The words hang in the cold air for half a second. Everyone here knows that line. Knows where it came from. Knows the moment it shattered something between Luke and me.

For a heartbeat I feel it again.

That stage.

That video.

That moment the world watched my marriage break.

But then Sadie starts singing with us. “Than right here where you’re with me…”

Her voice is off-key and joyful. Cole chuckles and joins in. This song hasn’t been released, I shared it with them after it was written on that bus… But I didn’t know they learned it.

“Every voice, every heart, every memory…”

Noah adds harmony that is technically wrong but enthusiastic.

“Lighting up this melody…”

I glance across the fire. Rose has tucked herself into Thomas’s side. His arm wraps around her shoulders while she leans into his chest. She’s smiling. But there are tears shining in her eyes. She knows what that line cost me. What Luke and I lost when those words left his mouth. And yet…

She sings it anyway. Soft and proud. “There’s no place I’d rather be…”

Jackson lets the last note ring out on his guitar. The sound drifts out across the orchard. Across the dark fields beyond the barn.

Noah immediately launches into another progression.

“Alright,” he says. “Now that we’ve emotionally destroyed ourselves…”

Sadie laughs so hard she nearly chokes.

“Jackson! You need to sing for me!”