“I was a professional musician,” I explained. “Spent years touring with my band. The only time we stuck around a place was when we were recording a new album. I was in a long-term committed relationship with my guitar and our music. It never seemed fair to bring anyone into that world and all the excess and vices that went with it.”
“Like drugs and partying?”
“For some of my bandmates, definitely,” I said. “For me, it was thrill seeking and seeing how close to the edge I could push without winding up in pieces.”
“That would be scary.”
“Exactly. So why do that to someone, since I wasn’t going to stop? I wanted to be scared because it added to the rush. The problem was it took a bigger and bigger rush to make me feel anything until it got to the point where I was just reckless. When the band fell apart, I didn’t have a plan or anything to fall back on. Just my old girl over there. Which is why you found me playing on that platform.”
The whistle blew, a sure sign that we were about to be underway.
“How long has it been since your band broke up?”
“Two years,” I explained. “I’ve been bumming around the country ever since, hopping trains, though nothing like this one. Usually, I climb in an open freight car and scramble out before I get caught. It’s been a while since I was on one legally.”
“Whoa, that’s…”
“Illegal, I know.”
“I was gonna say cool,” he replied.
“It’s had its moments,” I said. “Hey, why don’t you let me grab a shower and change, then I’ll be happy to answer any other questions you have for me.”
“Okay,” he replied. “Watch your head. It’s cramped in there, but there are plenty of towels and they’re soft too. I love that because I hate scratchy ones.”
“You’re not the only one,” I replied as I started digging in the bag at my feet, pulling out clean clothes and my toiletry kit.
“Can I ask one more question before you get in?”
“Sure.”
“What was the name of your band?”
Damn, I should have seen that coming. He was going to look it up, I just knew it. Did I really want him watching the old concert footage and interviews that were still floating all over the internet?
Some of my stage dives were epic. Legendary even. I’d once scaled a rotating festival camera just to dive off into a pit in the middle of my drummer’s solo. Recklessness in action, but at least he’d have the chance to see firsthand the man I’d been and the life I led. Gathering everything, I met his gaze.
“Savage Destruction,” I replied before disappearing into the shower.
The moment the warm water cascaded over me I groaned, especially when it started heating up. Warm showers were a luxury, hot ones were rare, as I soaped up my hair, I couldn’t decide if I was lucky he’d happened along or a god damned fool for saying yes and hopping yet another train, though in decidedly less dramatic fashion than normal. Pete was going to be confused as hell when I stopped showing up. Damn, that or he was gonna think he’d driven me off with his pressing questions and the advice I always refused to take.
It might have been cramped in here, but I’d have showered in a pine box if it offered the kind of water pressure they had.
I stayed in longer than I needed to, first to scrub every inch of myself, twice, but also to put a bit of distance between me, his questions, and the point-blank way he’d asked if I’d wanted to be a Daddy.
If my life had been different or I’d been a better man back then, I’d have known what it was like to have a boy of my own a long time ago. Truth was, I’d been as selfish as I’d been considerate, not wanting to give up my reckless ways or put someone else through the terror of watching some of the stunts I’d pulled.
Sometimes I’d thought about finding someone as wild as I was, only there was no way in hell I’d have been able to stand on the sidelines and watch them pull the shit I pulled.
That was the kind of fear I’d always tried to avoid.
Hypocritical, maybe, and probably a double standard, but I’d never have wanted to see the person I loved risking their lives the way I did time and again. All in the hopes of feeling something besides emptiness, loss, and a longing I’d never taken the time to adequately analyze.
Burying it was easier.
But after seeing the way Payden had put himself out there on the platform, knowing he might be rejected, I had to wonder if maybe the easy path had been me being a coward, refusing to open myself up to yet another loss.
The question now was, could I be better than that, given this unexpected opportunity to connect with someone who deserved a better version of me after what he’d just been through.
