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I've been here in the Ranch Lands for a year, and going to the Tipsy Cow is one thing that has saved my sanity. Dancing may sound like a lame thing to do, but it's fun. The bands are usually good. The music's loud. And I don't even drink that much. I just do the line dances, which are great because I don't even need a partner. I don't need to talk to anybody. I don't need to worry about good pickup lines or making the right kind of eye contact, being smooth, because God knows – I'm not.
Line dancing, it's a solo sport most of the time. I can just keep my hands on my hips, eyes on my feet and get lost. Sometimes that's where I want to be.
Life hasn't exactly panned out as I planned. What 29-year-old man ever plans on living at home, moving back to their bedroom, their own twin-size bed? Not many, but my mom needs me and maybe I need her.
Regardless, when I pass Annie's Roadside Diner, I decide to turn in, thinking a burger and fries sound mighty good right about now. Probably could use a shower and a fresh shirt, but hell. I must have missed the dinner rush because the place is damn near empty. I've never come in here this time of day. The few times I have come here, it's been for a cup of coffee in the morning, maybe some hash browns and eggs with Austin.
Right now, though, the sun is filtering through the windows and most of the booths are polished clean. There's a few old men sitting and eating what looks like pot roast and potatoes and I smile, thinking I can see myself doing the same 40 years from now.
"Can I help you?" a woman asks, coming in from the kitchen. The moment she sashays through those swinging doors, my cock gets woken in a way it hasn't in one hell of a long time.
This woman, well, she is all sorts of sunshine, the kind I thought I'd been feeling all damn day here in September out in the fields. But the sunlight I felt is nothing like her: long chestnut hair, wavy in ways that just make you ache to run your fingers through it, big cheeks and a pink-lipped smile. Looks like she's been kissed by the sun in a way that makes me want to kiss her, too, just to see if she tastes like honey, to see if she tastes as sweet as she looks.
I swallow. "A table for one," I say.
"You want a table, a booth, or the counter?" she asks, hand on her hip, reaching for a menu that's tucked next to the cash register. She's a slender thing, the kind of girl you could wrap your arm around and hold close, the kind of girl you get scared of letting go of in case she gets lost or loses her way.
But that's all first impressions. It changes when I tell her the counter's fine and I sit down, and she stands behind that counter, handing me a menu, and I see into her eyes. And then I realize something that I hadn't understood at first glance.
She is not the kind of girl who's going to get lost. Not at all. She's not the kind of girl who needs you to wrap her in an arm. She doesn't need you to protect her or hold her.
She's the kind of girl who has eyes filled with fire.
And maybe at first glance I thought it was sunshine that was filling her face, but it's more than that. It's bigger than the sun. Whatever is driving this girl forward, it's bigger than a planet, bigger than the solar system. The only thing I can figure is it's love, and that right there breaks my goddamn heart because it makes me think she's already fallen, already been caught, already been found, held, taken.
I look down at her ring finger and it's empty, and it makes me think, well damn, maybe I got a chance. But I don't doubt she's already in love, loved.
I look at the name tag on her polyester dress. Paisley.
The light bulb goes off. I know that name.
I know her, of her, at least. Paisley Cassidy.
She knows it before I even need to say it. She knows that she's been seen, found, that I know who she is because Paisley Cassidy is a name that gets tossed around this town.
Not because she's been used up and dried out. No, because Paisley Cassidy is a tragedy, a story of heartbreak and loss.
Paisley Cassidy has loved, does love, but it's not a man who has her heart.
Paisley
He's looking at me like he knows me, and after reading my name tag, I'm guessing he knows more than I wish he did.
