Page 52 of Catcher

I drag a hand over my jaw. “She’s in my head,” I mutter. That’s about as close to a confession as they’re getting, and it’s enough.

“Welcome to the fuckin’ club,” Nova says, lifting his glass.

“Yeah,” Kiwi laughs. “Every one of us thought we were too hard for that shit.”

“Then boom,” Fender adds. “Shot right in the ass with an arrow.”

Laughter breaks around the table. The kind of laughter that tastes of smoke, whiskey, and something you don’t have to fake.

“Here’s to women,” Riggs says, raising his glass. “The only things tougher than us.”

“And meaner,” Everest adds.

“And somehow still worth it,” Wick mutters.

Glasses lift.

We knock them back.

The burn settles in my chest and sits there, waiting to see what else I’m going to let myself feel tonight.

The conversation fades after that. Not awkward or forced. Simply that rare kind of quiet that only shows up when nobody in the room needs to prove a damn thing.

I lean back and let the moment settle into my bones. My shoulders are loose but not relaxed. There’s a difference. My eyes catch on Fender’s acoustic guitar propped against the wall, and something low in my gut goes tight.

I stare at it longer than I should. Maybe if I leave it alone, it’ll leave me alone. But that isn’t how shit works. The things that know where to hurt you don’t stay quiet just because you ask nicely. So I reach for it as though it might bite.

The wood is warm from the room, smooth under my palm, worn in all the places hands have held it hard. Scratches by the sound hole, a nick along the edge, old lacquer, dust, and smoke. It reminds me of bars, back porches, and men who had something to say but needed strings to get it out. My thumb drags once over the body, and the motion hits me somewhere behind the sternum.

I sit there a second with it across my lap, forearm resting over the curve, fingers curled near the strings. My jaw locks, then unlocks. I swallow and feel it all the way down. Nobody says a word, and that almost makes it worse.

And it isn’t the weight of the guitar that gets to me.

It’s everything hanging off it, the porch, my brother’s voice, and the version of me that still knew how to sit still without feeling haunted when we played.

My fingers move before I can talk myself out of it. A slow pull across steel strings, the sound sharp and bare in the semi-quiet room. I flinch almost without moving, shift my hand, and try again. This time, the note lands cleaner.

I’m slow with it, feeling for the strings. My fingertips remember before the rest of me does. The first chords come out rough, my shoulders are tight, and my breath is shallow. Then something in my hands loosens, enough to keep going.

I close my eyes and find the chords to “Waiting Around to Die.” Low and stripped down, as if the song knows exactly how ugly a man can feel when he’s left alone with himself.

The room goes still.

Not casual silence, but the kind that presses against your skin. I feel their eyes on me without looking up, so I keep my stare pinned to the strings because meeting theirs would crack this open wider than I’m ready for. My heartbeat kicks hard once, heavy enough that I feel it in my wrists.

I keep playing anyway. I let it come out ugly where it needs to. Let the notes drag over everything I keep clamped down tight. The part of me that’s tired as hell of acting like none of it gets in. It’s not pretty, but it isn’t meant to be. It’s just a man sitting in the back of a bar with his brothers, bleeding where nobody can see it except they probably can.

When the last note thins out, my fingers still on the strings on instinct, like I need to choke the sound before it says too much. My palm stays flat against the body of the guitar. I don’t move. Don’t look up. My throat feels scraped raw, and there’s a hard pull behind my ribs as if somebody reached in there and twisted them.

Silence hangs in the air, thick as smoke.

Then Kiwi lets out a low whistle through his teeth. “Damn,” he says, quieter this time.

Nobody else says anything right away.

They don’t need to.

Because they heard what I didn’t say.