Page 4 of Paint Our Song (Cloverlily #1)

T hey pass by the spot where he found Calvin, and the small crowd has already dispersed. Calvin’s quiet, his eyes out the window, though Miles is glad he’s stopped moving around so much. As if afraid to spook him, he leaves him to his silence.

It’s not until they’ve gone a few blocks that Calvin speaks up.

“It wasn’t like this last time,” Calvin murmurs. “The town was a lot… quieter. It’s a weekday morning; I really didn’t think I’d get recognized. I think it may also be because… um. My band’s trending right now.”

“Yeah, you’re all over social media,” he says. “There are also more tourists in town because of the new big grand hotel in town. Camilla Hotel, have you heard of it?” Unfortunately, the tourists were flocking to town specifically because of the popular hotel chain. The inn wasn’t benefiting from the influx of tourists at all.

“Sure. They’ve got establishments all over the country. They’re actually one of our sponsors. ”

Ouch. “They’re selling the idea of Ridgeford quite well.”

“It is a nice town. It should have had much more exposure a long time ago, though I did prefer it when there weren’t as many tourists. Your inn’s still quiet, though. Which is great.”

Miles can’t help but think that he’s slowly becoming more at ease. Very gradually. Which is good, because it makes Miles feel more at ease as well. Still… ouch , again. Yeah, their inn’s quiet, and that’s really the real issue, isn’t it? They’re not able to keep up with the competition.

Calvin peers at him and asks, “Did I say something wrong?”

His grip tightens against the wheel, and he squints at the street sign up ahead. A few more minutes until they get to the bank. “No.”

A beat passes. Calvin continues to peer at him. “You’re annoyed.”

“Not at you.”

“At Camilla Hotel?”

Fuck, is he being that transparent? “Yeah. It’s nothing. You don’t want to hear me vent.”

“You can, if you want to.”

It wouldn’t hurt. He can’t believe he’s going to let Calvin Lowe, of all people, see this side of him. “Well, uh. Our inn’s going under. That’s the gist of it, really.”

“Why?” Calvin asks.

He asks, as if it were so simple. Miles tries to explain, anyway. “We’re not getting enough bookings, we had to let go of a lot of our staff, and we’ve got—fuck. We’ve got overdue loans to pay. I didn’t know until yesterday because my mom didn’t want to tell me. That’s why I’m heading to the bank. It took forever trying to convince her to let me pay out of my pocket.”

“Oh.” Calvin scratches his neck. “Sorry. That was tactless of me to say your inn’s quiet. So, uh. Your mom hid it from you?”

“Yeah. She seems okay with letting it go, but I can’t. I need to step up. That’s why I’m in town for now.”

“Is that why you’re taking a break from painting commissions?”

How’d he know that? “Yeah. I dropped everything to come here, which is stupid because I don’t know anything about running the inn.”

“Don’t you, really? You seemed to know what you were doing at the front desk yesterday, and in the dining room.”

“Even if I yelled your name and wouldn’t back off when you didn’t want to order food?”

The corner of Calvin’s lips quirk upward. “Yes. Anyway, the inn means a lot to you, doesn’t it?”

“Definitely.”

“Then you should do what you can. You don’t want to look back and wonder if you could’ve done more.”

Calvin’s words do a funny thing to his chest. Maybe Gabby’s right. He isn’t that bad.

“So, you don’t have a plan on how to turn things around yet?” Calvin asks.

“Nope. Absolutely no plan. I’m not exactly a planning type of guy.”

Calvin waves a hand toward Miles’s phone, which is resting on the compartment between their chairs. “We can brainstorm and make a list together. You mind if I open up your notes app? ”

What the actual fuck? Miles takes a moment to compose himself, because this is so far from what he actually expected. What he expected was a tense car ride with someone who didn’t want to have anything to do with him, and had only chosen him over a group of people pointing phones in his face.

He clears his throat. “Sure. There’s no passcode.”

Calvin takes his phone and unlocks it. “You should put a passcode—oh.”

“What?”

“Nothing.” His voice is low and tense. Puzzled, Miles sees him swiping away a window that was open to an article about the band’s break-up. Oops. Miles forgot he had that open.

“…Sorry.”

Calvin shrugs and opens the note app. “Okay, so. Pay off your loans, though you’ve got that one done. Get more bookings. Do you have any ideas for that?”

“Absolutely nothing.”

“… Okay. Research on how to get more bookings, then. Get more staff. You should probably also study your financial projections so you know what milestones to hit. What else do you need to take care of while you’re in town?”

Feeling dizzy, Miles thinks about it for a good while. “My mom wants to retire.” His chest tightens when he says that, but it’s about time for her to think about herself, too. “So I guess I need to figure out how the inn’s going to run without her. Plus, Gabby’s taking classes so she can apply for upper hotel management somewhere, so we’re going to lose someone who basically knows everything about the inn.”

“Not to state the obvious, but why can’t you promote Gabby to hotel manager? Wouldn’t that be hitting two birds with one stone?”

“Oh my god.” Miles’s eyes widen and he gapes. Why the hell didn’t he think of that? He really does zone out when stressed and forgets to see the bigger picture. “Oh my god! Holy shit! You’re right.”

Calvin stares at him with a baffled expression, mutters something under his breath, and types more things into his phone. He puts the phone back in between them as Miles is parking in front of the bank.

“You’re going to stay in the car?” Miles opens his dashboard compartment and grabs the paper labeled “Payment Overdue”.

“Yeah… is that okay?”

“Sure.”

Fortunately, the bank isn’t crowded, and he’s able to finish everything up in a matter of minutes. When he gets back to his car, Calvin’s on his phone. His attention snaps up as Miles opens the door. “I’ll call you back,” Calvin says, quite tensely, and then hangs up. It doesn’t seem like he even waited for the other person to answer.

“Brown Sugar’s a few blocks away, then we can head back to the inn,” Miles says.

“Okay.” Calvin’s phone beeps a few times. He grimaces, and Miles watches as he puts it to silent mode and shoves it in his pocket rather aggressively. When he notices Miles staring, he says, “My band mate.”

Who, exactly? Miles would ask if it was any of his business. “You can answer it if you’d like.”

He makes a disgruntled sound. That’s a no, then. Miles starts the car.

For a while, they’re both silent again. Strangely, these bouts of silences aren’t as awkward as they first were. If anything, it feels more natural now, and Miles wonders if Calvin notices that as well. Feeling bold, Miles says, “Do you want to talk about your band?”

A sigh, though not an unkind one. Exhausted, rather. “Thanks. Maybe some other time, though. Everything’s still raw.”

It must be like going through a breakup. Relationship breakups, friendship breakups, they’re all awful. Calvin’s going through a breakup with three other members of his band, and everyone was watching every second. Must be horrible. At least with him and Matthew, there were only the two of them to witness it.

Miles changes the subject. In a teasing tone, he asks, “How’d you know I was taking a break from commissions? Did you check my social media?”

“Yeah,” Calvin says, and Miles almost drives up the curb in surprise. “I was trying to get in touch for a commission.”

“What?” Miles’s jaw drops.

“Sent an email, and you didn’t reply, so I thought of searching for you when I came to town because your paintings are all over the inn. I assumed they knew how to get to you. I didn’t realize you were on break until I saw your post last night about it, though.”

“You emailed me?” He sounds like a goddamn parrot, but his shock won’t let him think straight.

Calvin runs a hand through his hair. “Doesn’t matter now. If I knew you were on break, I wouldn’t have emailed.”

“I see,” Miles squeaks. Awesome. He squeaks. Any attempt to look cool was nowhere on the agenda. “Someone at the gallery manages my inbox. Maybe they missed it. What did you want a painting of?”

His shoulders stiffen. “Phoenix stadium. It’s where my band had our first concert.”

Miles tilts his head. He usually works with cozier aesthetics—gardens, balconies, even kitchens. “I don’t know if I’d do a good job painting a stadium.”

“No, not the stadium. Not exactly.” Calvin sounds embarrassed, and Miles waits patiently. “We have some pictures from back then in the green room, right after we got off the stage. I wanted that in your style.”

“Oh. Okay. Yeah, I get what you’re saying.” Aesthetic and cozy paintings of everyday scenes from a wide angle—that’s what he does. He draws couples in their kitchen, children opening their presents, friends having coffee in a cafe. Miles gets it now; why Calvin wanted him specifically for this. He’s been described as an artist who makes ordinary moments extraordinary, which is funny to him, because none of the moments he paints is ever ordinary. Cloverlily backstage, after their first concert, is definitely not ordinary. “Is it a goodbye gift to your band mates?”

With an exhale, Calvin says, “Yes, I suppose so.”

That’s not what Miles wanted to hear, and he knows it’s even harder for Calvin to say it. “You could have mentioned that right off the bat, you know.”

“You’re on break. ”

“Still would’ve been cool to know.”

Calvin exhales, and it suspiciously sounds like a laugh. “It felt weird to bring up that I wanted to meet you, after… well. We didn’t have a great first meeting, did we?”

“When you called me a jackass?”

There’s a beat of silence. “I didn’t call you that.”

“At the gas station,” Miles says.

A pause. Calvin closes his eyes and makes the loudest, most exasperated sigh he’s ever heard. Miles is pretty sure there isn’t any oxygen left in his lungs by the time he’s done, which can’t be pleasant. “I wasn’t the one who left you the note, Miles.”

A-ha. “Who said anything about a note?”

Calvin ignores that question. “Anyway. I thought you were messing with me.”

“What do you mean?” He’s not trying to be difficult, nor is he playing dumb. “When I was singing your song outside the inn? Why would you think that was me messing with you? I didn’t even recognize you.”

“Never mind.”

Well, now he’s too curious to let this go. “Tell me.”

“It’s stupid.”

“I’m sure it isn’t,” Miles says, genuinely.

After another moment of hesitation, Calvin says, “Some stupid website preemptively announced our band was breaking up, and I was getting notifications on my phone all day from strangers tagging me and messing with me. When I got to the gas station, some teenagers asked if I wanted to make a statement about it for their vlog or whatever. I ignored them, and they started egging me on.”

“Oh!” Now that Calvin’s said that, he does remember those teenagers. He had sung along with them. Miles also remembers the guy in front of him glaring at him, then shoving items back on the shelf and barging out the door. Now that he racks his brain, that person had been… Fuck, it might have been Calvin.

Yeah, it was definitely Calvin.

Calvin adds, “You were singing with them.”

“I liked the song.” Miles’s face heats up. “Didn’t realize they were messing with you. Didn’t even realize it was you.”

“For someone who paints for a living, you don’t really focus on details, do you?”

“I’ve been told. So, you’re saying the note wasn’t even for my parking? It was because you thought I was making fun of you?”

“I didn’t leave you the stupid note.” Calvin makes a move to shove him, then seems to think better of it. “I changed my mind. Drop me off right here.”

Miles ignores that and instead says, “So, that’s why you were so pissy about me humming your song outside the inn! I thought the noise annoyed you. Did you still think I was messing with you? Did you recognize me from the gas station?”

Calvin is quiet for too long. Then, instead of confirming any of Miles’s accusations, he says, “Are you calling our music noise?”

“What… no!” Miles splutters. A part of him is impressed with Calvin’s ability to deflect, though he’s mostly horrified. “How’d you even get that from what I said? Oh my god, who hurt you?”

“Okay, relax,” Calvin says. “I’m kidding. ”

Miles’s grip tightens on the steering wheel, and he focuses on the road ahead. Brown Sugar’s at the end of the street. It’s part of a two-story apartment building with the bakery on the ground floor; its front windows are wide and clean, its awning striped with maroon and white, like Miles had last seen it.

“I would love to paint for you.” Miles parks in front of the bakery. “But, yeah, I need to focus on helping my family out.”

“I get it,” Calvin says. “But if you’re ever back to taking commissions, let’s talk.”

Let’s talk— Calvin says it so casually, as if it’s no big deal, as if he’s literally not part of a band that Miles has been obsessed with for years.

He tells Calvin he’ll be quick and gets a slight shrug in return.

The bells on top of the doors chime when he enters, and Matthew, who’s by the cash register, immediately looks up.

Matthew’s eyes widen when they land on him. “Oh, hey. I didn’t know you were in town. You here to pick up the boxes?”

“Hello. Yeah.”

He looks the same as last time they saw each other—thick red hair, tall, broad-shouldered, sharp jawline, and still unsure of how to act around Miles. Despite Matthew’s attempted nonchalance at seeing Miles, he fumbles with the door to the back room. He comes out with six boxes stacked in his arms, and Miles rushes to take half from him.

“How long are you staying?” Matthew asks, leading the way outside. He opens the door with a shoulder.

“Indefinitely. Until the inn’s back on its feet. ”

“… I see.” There’s something unspoken there. Matthew probably knows as much as he does that’s not going to be easy.

When Calvin spots them carrying all the boxes, he gets out of the car. “Those are going in the backseat, right? I’ll put your mom’s socks away.”

He opens the backdoor and reaches in to toss said socks to the floor. It would be embarrassing if Miles wasn’t already so spent by how peculiar this morning’s been. Miles grimaces and says, “Thanks. My silly mom, really.”

“Aren’t you…?” Matthew stares at Calvin. “You’re from Cloverlily, right? Jesus, please tell me Miles didn’t kidnap you.”

“For your information, he got into my car willingly.” It was a choice between him and a small crowd of fans, but he doesn’t need to know that. “Calvin, this is Matthew. He’s our supplier for baked goods.”

“Hello.” Calvin helps them with the boxes, and Miles takes a moment to take this in. He can’t believe Calvin Lowe, of all people, is helping to stack boxes of baked goods into the back of his car. And he made him a checklist—a plan for the inn. And accompanied him to the bank. And also touched his socks twice that day.

It’s so… fucking bizarre.

Miles wouldn’t mind another morning like this.