Page 1 of Levi

Chapter 1: Levi

The driver’s name is Carl and he doesn’t want to stop at the liquor store.

“My instructions are to take you straight to the property, sir,” he says.

“Your instructions came from a woman named Janice who books town cars from a desk in Nashville,” I tell him. “Janice doesn’t care if we stop. Janice went home hours ago.”

Carl looks at me in the rearview mirror. He’s been doing that since the airport, quick glances between the road and my face, trying to place me. He won’t. Nobody recognizes me without the stage lights and the black cowboy hat. In the back of a town car at midnight in the Florida Panhandle, wearing a black t-shirt, jeans, and three days of not shaving, I’m just another guy who needs a drink.

“There’s a place on the left,” I say. “Half a mile. Pull over.”

“Sir—”

“Two hundred dollars. Cash. For a five-minute stop. Nobody will know. Easy money.”

Carl puts on his blinker.

The liquor store is empty. A woman behind the counter is watching a reality show on her phone with the volume up. She doesn’t look at me when I walk in. I find the tequila aisle, grab two bottles from the middle shelf with labels I recognize, and set them on the counter.

“ID?” she says.

I hand her my license. She glances at it, glances at me, hands it back. No recognition at all. Country music star Lee Streeter doesn’t buy his own liquor at midnight in a rundown store. Lee Streeter has people for that and my driver’s license says my name is Levi Mason anyway.

“Have a good night,” she says.

I nod, though I will not be having a good night.

Carl turns off the main highway onto a two-lane road. I’ve only been to this part of Florida once before. I played in Panama City Beach at a smaller festival years ago, in an amphitheater that smelled like sunscreen. I don’t remember much of the show because I was drunk before I walked on stage. The crowd was nothing but a wall of phone screens and noise.

That’s all I know of the Florida Panhandle. Stages, booze, and the back of a tour bus with the shades pulled down. I never even got a chance to put my toes in the sand.

We pull up to a wrought-iron gate with a glowing keypad. Carl rolls down his window and punches a code that my manager’s assistant sent in a text. The gate swings wide.

Everything past the gate is solid white. White buildings lined up on both sides, landscaping so perfect I’m pretty sure it’s fake plants. Just white buildings and white walls going on for blocks, like somebody bleached an entire town and then abandoned it at sundown.

I’ve got a real bad feeling about this place.

I lean forward in my seat and tap him on the shoulder. “Hey Carl! Carl, I need you to be honest with me. Is this a cult commune? Or a rehab place? I’m not liking the vibes it’s putting out. Where the hell are we?”

“30A,” Carl says, as if that’s supposed to mean something to me.

It doesn’t. Never heard of it.

“Thirty-eight? You mean like an area code?”

“No,” Carl says. “The number thirty, then ‘a’ as in attitude. It’s the name of the road we’re on. 30A is a big tourist destination here in the Florida Panhandle. If anyone asks you where you’re staying, tell them 30A and they’ll know it.”

I lean back in my seat. “If you say so. I thought I was staying in Panama City Beach.”

“You’re a fifteen-minute drive from there. Panama City Beach is a different world.”

The rental house is at the end of a cul-de-sac. Gulf-front. Three stories of white and glass. The floor-to-ceiling windows on every level reflect Carl’s headlights as we pull up. Carl pops the trunk and I get my bag, my guitar case, and the two bottles in a paper sack. He hands me a slip of paper with a code for the front door.

“Your manager’s office said to call if you need anything,” he says.

“Alright,” I say. I won’t be calling anybody tonight.

Carl pulls away. The tail lights shrink down the street and the gate closes behind them. I’m standing in the driveway after midnight holding a guitar case and enough tequila to get through tonight, but not nearly enough to get through tomorrow.