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“Here, take these. They’ll help with the spasms.”
Ruth swallows her pills, and thanks Reed for getting them for her. Then she tells me she’ll be waiting for me in the living room. She tells Reed to bring a pot of coffee with him when he comes and to serve the cheesecake on the good plates.
Once the dishes are finished, Reed heads down the hallway and grabs a guitar for me. A ghost of a smile touches his perfectly proportioned lips as he walks back into the living room, handing it to me.
Damn him to hell with his aesthetically pleasing genes.
The way he smiles at me, all sexy-like with hooded eyes and softly parted lips, makes for a very dangerous combination of substances. He’s crack and I’m suddenly an addict.
This can’t be normal, or healthy.
Ruth is seated on the other sofa with a cushion resting on her lap. “So, what are you playing for me tonight, Brinley?”
“Yeah Brin, what are you playing?” mimics Reed, flopping down beside her. “An original? Or maybe you should play something of Cold Neptune’s. Wouldn’t be the first time you’ve done a cover of one of our songs, would it?”
What the hell?
He’s just ambushed me, and I didn’t even see it coming.
“Why, you little –” I stop myself from spraying him with the torrent of bitter words that want to explode from my mouth. I bite my bottom lip instead, my teeth sinking so deep into the skin I can taste blood. “What I mean to say is, that’s very presumptuous of you, Reed, to think I know all the lyrics to your songs straight off the top of my head. Oh, wait. I do. I wonder why that is?”
Reed scoffs and swipes his coffee mug up off the table. “This got any whiskey in it?”
“No,” replies Ruth, looking rightfully confused. “What am I missing? What’s going on?”
“Nothing!”we both say in frustrated unison.
But Ruth’s not buying it for a second. Her eyes dance between me and Reed, and I don’t like that we’re making her uncomfortable in her own home. She’s been nothing but gracious to me, and I feel bad for making her feel uneasy.
“Everything’s fine,” I tell her with a genuine smile that seems to ease her concern. “What about a new song I wrote? It’s still a little rough. I haven’t played with it for a while, so this will be good practice.”
“Sounds wonderful.”
I swing the guitar up onto my lap and strum a few notes just to get a feel of the foreign instrument. It’s funny how your own guitar always feels like home in your hands, yet playing someone else’s guitar feels like driving someone else’s car. It takes a while to get used to it.
“Okay, so this is a love song, of course. Or maybe I should really define it more as a breakup song. It’s called ‘Never Again.’ It’s raw, but I’m sure you’ll get the gist.”
I strum the first few notes of the introduction and then sing the first line. By the time I’m through with the first verse, I’ve completely forgotten there’s anyone else in the room, and I feel myself slipping away into my own little world.
The chorus reaches the crescendo, and I let my head fall back on my shoulders to open my airways and the words fall freely from my lips, lifting in volume, lifting in the euphoria that singing always brings me, and when I’m done with the second verse and the chorus that follows that, I hum softly until my feet find solid ground and my eyes sluggishly open.
I take a deep breath and exhale slowly, not entirely sure what to expect.
Thankfully, when I look up, I notice Ruth has tears in her eyes, both hands covering her mouth. Reed is sitting beside her, staring back at me.
Ruth suddenly turns, slapping her son sharply across the shoulder.
“Shit, Mom!” he yelps, rubbing his arm. “What the hell was that for?”
“You didn’t tell me she could sing like that! Good god, Reed. You could have warned me. Look at me, I’m a blubbering mess!”
“She’s good, yeah.”
“Good is not the word for it. Brinley, sweetheart, you are absolutely amazing.”
“Thank you,” I say, feeling my cheeks burn under their close scrutiny.
“No, thankyou. I haven’t felt so much emotion to a song since Reed wrote ‘Three Two One.’ Have you heard that song? Oh, goodness, what am I saying? Of course you have. It’s brilliant, don’t you agree?”
