“Never. It gets better every time.” I smiled.
A couple of words here, a few strands of lyrics there, and suddenly my journal was full of whole-ass songs I’d written. When I showed Stetson, he couldn’t believe it.
“You’ve had these in here this whole time?”
They hadn’t been there the whole time, because for a while that journal had been nothing but a place to catch my thoughts, and then Stetson came to town and inspired my thoughts to morph into something more complete. Into songs.
“That’s pretty cool. I’m one lucky girl to be surrounded by the two of you,” she said, pulling me from my memories. One thing I’d learned about Ruby was that she was wise beyond her fourteen years of life, a characteristic I admired dearly.
“I think we’re the lucky ones.” I grinned back as the warmth covered us both.
Over the last year, Ruby and I had become close. Lucy had voluntarily signed over parental rights about six months after everything came out. Jackson and Rebecca had made it bluntly clear in their will that god forbid something ever happened to them, Ruby’s birth parents would always have the opportunity to have parental rights, if interested, as long as they were deemed suitable and fit.
From the moment I told Ruby I was her birth mother, that was all I could’ve dreamed of.
“I love this place,” Ruby said, once again bringing me to the conversation inside of the car. Her hand danced outside of the window as her thick hair got lost in the wind. “It almost feels like heaven.”
“It always has,” I agreed.
“Makes me feel close to Mom and Dad and makes the missin’ them feel a little less hard.”
I angled my body toward Ruby as soon as the Jeep rolled to a stop, in awe of the girl that sat before me. “They’d be proud of you,” I said.
“They’d be proud of you too.”
We shared a silent smile before both hopping out of the car.
“I’ll go see if Uncle Stetson needs help getting the horses ready.”
“Perfect. I’m supposed to be getting a call here in the next couple of minutes, but it shouldn’t take too long.”
“Okay!” she shouted back before I lost sight of her.
My phone rang.
“Hello.”
“Hi, this is Nora with Country Music and Company, is this Scarlett?”
“It is. Yes. Hi, Nora, how are you?”
“I’m great, excited to get to chat with you. Just so you know, I’m going to record our call, if you’re good with that.”
“That’s perfect,” I responded.
“Ms. Carson, or should I say soon-to-be Ms. Walker?” The diamond ring on my hand sparkled in the sunlight. “Your articleDon’t Ever Let Your Fire Go Outhas gripped an entire audience. Everyone’s rootin’ for you and Stetson, but especially you,” she insisted. “What made you decide to finally share your own story?”
“Please, call me Scarlett.”
“Scarlett,” she repeated.
The rocking chair on George’s front porch creaked as I slowly swayed back and forth, pride exuding from every fiber of my being. “My whole life, all I’ve ever wanted to do was tell other people’s stories—through poems, lyrics, however I could—and I think deep down that desire stemmed from the hope that one day I would be able to tell the world mine,” I said, smiling. “I hadn’t told my story because up until recently, the story had a lot of holes, so it didn’t feel like it was ready to be written.”
“I assume you’re referring to your daughter?” she politely asked.
“Yes. That. Among other things,” I responded.
“In the article you wrote that you’d hoped your story wouldshow others that there is beauty in being lost and being lost is never permanent.You go on to say that you shoulddo your best to enjoy being lost because it makes the being found that much better.Does that mean you no longer feel lost yourself? If so, what would tell your seventeen-year-old self?”
