Page 39

“That was very rude, Mugsy. I wish you’d try to get to know Eve a little—”

She treated him to her fiercest scowl. Even tossed over her shoulder while in motion, it was enough to singe his eyebrows. “That’s what you’re worried about right now?”

“It’s one of the things.” He could have listed the rest of his top five, but they were loud enough inside his head without giving them extra air.

Was he going to make a fool of himself in front of Jean?

Would it be worse to say no and look like a coward?

Did his father not know him at all, or did he just not care about Charlie’s feelings?

Was everyone going to stare at Charlie and think Smithson did it better ?

“There you are!” Throwing an arm around Charlie’s shoulders, his father herded him closer to the stage.

Maybe he thought Charlie would make a break for it if he didn’t keep a tight hold.

At least they didn’t stop for the usual round of, “this is my son, Charlie. I prefer to speak for him, so he doesn’t embarrass me,” introductions, since his dad was in a hurry.

“Uh, Dad? Can I talk to you?” Charlie asked, nodding at the wine importer his father had just pointed out.

“No time. We need to get you in place.”

“About that. Are you sure it’s a good idea? Me going up there.”

His father waved this off. “Smithson already pointed that out. Change of plans.”

“Oh.” Charlie would not have described the feeling in his chest as relief, exactly. It was too mixed up with the uncomfort able awareness that his dad didn’t think he could stand on a stage and read someone else’s words.

“Stay right here,” Mr. Pike said, angling Charlie’s shoulders so the light from the stage caught his profile. “Adriana’s up next.”

“Adriana Asebedo?”

“Yes, Charlie.” His father managed to sigh without dropping his smile as he nudged him forward. “People will want to see your reaction.”

“I thought you wanted me to get with Emma.”

“Smithson said we’d get more social media capital out of pushing the Silent Storm angle.”

That sounded like Smithson. Crass. Calculating. Wrong. “I don’t know, Dad—”

Mugsy tapped him on the shoulder, shaking her head. Charlie took that to mean don’t bother, because Mr. Pike was too deep in the zone to hear what he had to say.

“Let’s hope this doesn’t turn into a mosh pit,” Mr. Pike joked.

Philip Koenig smiled politely. Either they didn’t have mosh pits in Denmark or he didn’t find it funny.

Charlie scanned the crowd, trying to see if Jean was still standing where he’d left her. An elbow poked him in the side.

“Quit frowning, son. We’re having fun.” Mr. Pike led the applause as Adriana took the stage.

Charlie was close enough to see her eyes ping-pong back and forth, almost as if she were nervous. That didn’t seem possible for someone who had played sold-out arenas all over the world, but Charlie knew some fears didn’t respond to logic. He smiled at her, just in case. None of this was her fault.

“I hope it’s okay I brought my guitar.” Adriana flashed her dimples, and the crowd laughed.

She was charming in a way that reminded Charlie why he’d liked her in the first place.

Adriana was good at making you feel like you were seeing something special and private, like the inside of a geode, even though she was also sparkly on the outside—and like tonight, there was almost always a much larger audience than one.

“You all have inspired me with your lyrical stylings, so I thought I’d try out something new.

” She looked down as she strummed a single chord.

“It’s hard to find the words to speak what’s in your heart, but I’m going to give it a shot.

” When she raised her head, her eyes were bright.

“Sending this out to a special someone who’s here with us tonight. ”

The whispers started even before Adriana fixed her gaze in Charlie’s direction. There were a few gasps and one aww that seemed to come from the spicy-cocktail guy.

“ Honey baby ,” she began, not quite singing.

“ You said you had to go

I begged you to stay.

You said we had our fun

I asked for another day.

If I travel the world and don’t find another you

Will you still tell me what I feel isn’t true ?”

She paused to strum another melancholy chord.

“ Time didn’t fade this hunger.

And we’re not getting any younger.

Give me a chance to be part of your life.

You don’t have to make me your wife.

I just want to be near you, as much as I can .”

Her voice was stronger now, the tempo increasing as she sang the final line.

“ I came all this way to tell you, honey baby, I’m your number one fan .”

She flashed another wistful smile, plucking a delicate melody on the guitar. Sergeant Cowboy chimed in on the harmonica, the fiddler adding a piercing vibrato.

After a final flourish, Adriana placed her palm over the strings, silencing the guitar before hurrying off the stage to a burst of thunderous applause.

Charlie’s dad clapped him on the back. “What a moment. They’ll be talking about that for years. Good work, son.”

“I just stood here.”

“And that was perfect,” his father agreed. “We made the magic happen.”

All around them, misty-eyed beverage moguls chattered like squirrels, watching Charlie with varying degrees of subtlety.

When he turned, ready to escape attention he neither wanted nor deserved, Charlie came face-to-face with Mugsy.

If the rest of the audience looked like their hearts had melted, his oldest friend was a block of ice.

“Are you okay, Mugsy?”

She blinked twice. “I have to go.”

Charlie would have followed, but Mugsy was a former all-state track star who still ran twenty miles a week. He didn’t have a prayer of catching her.

“It’s going to be hard to top that. My word.”

Charlie wanted to tell his father he was laying it on too thick until his dad said, “Maybe we should call it a night?” and Charlie nodded in full agreement.

“Not so fast.” Mr. Koenig gestured at the stage. “It appears the lovely Eve has something to say.”

From behind the microphone, her eyes met Charlie’s. It was only a moment, but he felt scorched by the contact. Not in a sexy way.

It’s not what you think , Charlie tried to convey with heated eye contact of his own. But Jean refused to look at him. Lowering her mouth to the microphone, she spoke in a husky monotone.

“I call this ‘You Mess With the Bull, You Get the Horns.’”

After smoothing a hand across her forehead, she began.

“ Across a sea… a sea of grass .

I rode a lonesome cowboy, who showed his ass .

Kissing at midnight, chasing that happy trail.

He pretended I was the only one he wanted to nail .”

She paused to let the hooting die down before continuing.

“ Turns out he was a filthy liar,

And now I want to set him on fire.

All that’s left are bitter regrets .

Why into my pants… did he I let? ”

Charlie was spellbound. Even when she sounded like Yoda, Jean was the fiercest person he’d ever met. Watching her gave him a sharp thrill, like hiking to the top of a mountain and struggling to catch your breath while the view blew your mind: pleasure and pain, all wrapped up together.

She glanced at him before launching into the next verse.

“ I wish I could tell you how he played me for a fool.

But it’s too big a mystery why I trusted that tool. ”

Charlie started to raise an arm to get her attention, wanting to interject, but Jean had her eyes closed, cradling the microphone with both hands.

“ Yeehaw. Flippity-flap. Git along little doggy.

You’re just a child and your diapers are soggy .”

Raising one arm, she snapped twice before leaving the stage.

It hit Charlie in waves. She was going. She thought the worst of him. She would be gone.

Distantly, he heard his father’s voice calling after him.

“Where are you going, son? There’s someone I’d like you to meet—”

He didn’t turn back. Onward and upward. All the way to the stage.

The only good thing about standing on a raised platform in front of a rambunctious crowd was that the light was in his eyes, so he couldn’t see all the faces staring back at him. Also, it meant he’d made it this far without falling on his face. That was one fear overcome.

“Hello,” Charlie said, wincing when the sound echoed across the crowd. “The title of this poem is… ‘Untitled.’” Because he hadn’t paused long enough to come up with a name—much less any words to go with it.

“Okay, well. Thank you for listening.”

“Is that part of the poem?” someone yelled from the darkness. Charlie suspected it was Smithson.

“No. That was just me. Thanking you.” Except not Smithson. “This is the poem. Right after this.” He took a deep breath.

“ I like snakes.

And some people.

Especially the one who… my heart did take.

My feelings for her are more than double.

They’re treeple .”

Charlie gave serious thought to diving off the back of the stage and rolling across the grass until he landed in the creek.

Why had he convinced himself he was capable of this?

Jean might not even be listening. She could be back in her wagon by now, well out of hearing range.

There was nothing for it but to go on. And pray for a power outage.

“ When we’re together, I’m like the open prairie.

Wide and rolling and endless. With lots of… plants.

If you think I like being alone, on the contrary!

Until she came along, I didn’t understand the meaning of romance .”

“Nice one,” Sergeant Cowboy called. “Steady on.” Charlie nodded his thanks for the support.

“ If there’s a tree in the garden with only one piece of fruit,

I’d give it to her — and that’s the truth.”

Bending, Charlie slapped his thighs a few times, because he thought he’d seen that in a movie once. Then he pretended to crack a whip before saying, “ Rawhide !”

Hopefully that was cowboy enough.

As he walked off stage on wobbly legs, people clapped.

It was better than booing, though most likely their guests felt obligated to applaud because of who he was.

They would have done the same if Charlie had been the type of seven-year-old who wanted to put on a show for his parents’ guests after dinner, as opposed to fleeing to his room.

His mother was the first to reach him. She folded him into a hug, then leaned back to search his face, still holding on to his shoulders. “Oh honey, I had no idea. Is it Mugsy? I thought you knew she preferred women.”

“Of course I know that. It’s Mugsy.”

Mrs. Pike looked confused.

“I mean Mugsy is Mugsy. My best friend. It would be strange if I didn’t know something that important about her.”

“Yes, Charlie, but you’re not always tuned in to that kind of thing.”

He added that to the stockpile of unflattering beliefs his parents held about him. “Well, I wasn’t talking about Mugsy, so you don’t have to worry. If you’ll excuse me, there’s someone I need to find.”

Charlie detoured around another group of aging businessmen in pristine cowboy boots. Where was she?

“Somebody’s whipped,” Smithson called after him. Charlie ignored him, doubling back to see if he’d missed Jean in the crowd.

A couple decked out from head to toe in rhinestone-encrusted leather veered toward the refreshment table, and Charlie found himself face-to-face with Philip Koenig.

“Charles,” he said, in his stateliest, you’ll-never-guess-what-I’m-thinking manner.

“Mr. Koenig,” Charlie replied, unable to bring himself to use the other man’s first name.

“It is an act of bravery to put your heart on the line.” Mr. Koenig raised his beer. “I commend you.”

Charlie saw his father approaching, expression shifting when he overheard Mr. Koenig.

“Didn’t know you had it in you.” Mr. Pike playfully punched Charlie’s arm. “That was fire, as the kids say.”

“I wasn’t talking about Mugsy,” Charlie hastened to inform him, in case both of his parents were confused on that score.

“I should hope not,” Mr. Koenig said. “Emma would be so disappointed.”

“Who knows which way the wind is blowing with these crazy kids?” Mr. Pike shook his head. “I’m sure we both played the field in our day. Make hay while the sun shines, am I right, Phil?”

The answering smile was enigmatic.

“Young love.” Mr. Pike raised his glass. “Shall we toast to that, Phil?”

“I’ll drink to love at any age,” the other man replied.

“I have to go,” Charlie said, because he couldn’t drink to love without Jean.

And Jean, he was forced to conclude after finishing another circuit of the crowd—including the apple pie station, bathroom line, coat check, sound board, backstage area, and an awkward hug from Sergeant Cowboy—was gone.

The last dregs of adrenaline ebbed away. He’d gone all in, making a desperate bid to impress someone who’d already left. Once again, his best wasn’t good enough.

Too little and too late , Charlie thought. The story of his life.