Drive Me Sane (15 page)

He’d nearly choked when she came out of her room wearing a snug fitting pair of low-waisted jeans. Spinning around, his eyes trained in on the firm roundness of her back end. “What do you think?” she’d asked.

“I think if that top was cut any lower, you’d be changing.”

The sleeveless yellow shirt perfectly accented the tan she’d gotten at the lake, but more than the ass-hugging pants or the cleavage-bearing top, the strappy black heels adorning her feet were what he favored most. She’d never been a heels kind of girl, but the look was definitely good on her and he couldn’t wait to get them off when they got home.

Merv made his way over when he saw them. “Hey. Glad you two came by,” he said, clearing the bottles left by the previous inhabitant into a gray tub.

“Looks like you’re busy,” Tyler said, looking around.

Merv let out a long breath. “You have no idea. Had a waitress get a job at the Save-A-Lot and quit on me yesterday. People talk about this town not having jobs and then when you need someone, nobody wants to work.”

“Good business, though,” Tyler answered back.

“That you’re right about,” Merv said. “Hey, you up to playing a short set tonight?”

• • •

Sera saw an old gleam sparkle in Tyler’s eyes when he agreed that he would, a gleam that intensified as he walked to the stage when Merv announced to the crowd that he had a surprise for them.

A roar of whistles and clapping resonated through the bar when his name was mentioned. For a town that didn’t have much, Tyler gave them something to boast about. They loved him. Yet few treated him differently. The older generation and those they’d gone to school with saw him as one of them. It was the younger kids, like the ones who’d shown up at Roy’s and the few at the Dairy Freeze who he’d signed autographs for, who looked at him with envy. Somehow, Sera didn’t think he went as unnoticed when he was out on the road. He hadn’t said much about the attention he received, just the exhaustion of moving around, but she supposed the constant interruptions could be tiring after a while too.

She watched him walk to the stage with ease. Talking momentarily to the house band, he adjusted the microphone into position and gave the crowd a loud, “Hello, Cobb City.” The bar erupted in a howl before quieting down when the beat of a drum indicated the start of a song. Then Tyler opened his mouth and belted out the first notes and in that moment she saw no worries or cares. Not even the stress from the visit with his father was there. Tyler, the rock star, was on stage. He even looked the part. Newly shaved, wearing stone-colored jeans and a white T-shirt, he exhibited his youth as he stood with a guitar slung over his shoulder. Every note, every beat, every tap of his foot, illustrated the sheer contentment pouring out of him. He loved what he did, but it was more than that. He had the ability to embed that love into one’s soul and let them feel it too. Just like he’d done to her.

• • •

Sera counted up the days in her head as she lay in bed. Considering that the day was over and not counting Monday, because Tyler would be leaving early that morning, they had two more full days together. She wanted to make the best of it, but the anxiety of him leaving was starting to wear on her.

Turning to the side, she pressed her lips to his forehead. After riling the crowd at Merv’s for more than an hour, they’d come home. He’d practically keeled over with exhaustion when they got into bed. She, on the other hand, couldn’t make her mind quit wondering long enough for her lids to slide down. It wasn’t just Tyler keeping her awake. She had a lot more floating through her head. She’d made more progress in the last three weeks than she had in over a year and she wanted to keep pushing forward. Was even contemplating buying a car and getting a job so she could keep busy when he was gone. Of course that meant she’d have to start driving, which she wasn’t ready to do yet. The whole concept was frightening. What if when he left, everything went back to the way it was before? What if she hadn’t made any progress at all and Tyler was merely a short vacation away from all her problems? She might fall right back into the pit of huddling in the house and thinking of Rollins day in and day out. The idea was sickening.

Concerned for what his departure might bring, she was even considering his request to join him on tour. The offer seemed ideal, except she’d be dependent on him in so many ways. The financial aspects didn’t bother her so much. She had money saved that would get her through. It was her emotional instability that had her concerned. Being unable to drive was the biggest issue. She couldn’t expect him to be at her disposal twenty-four/seven. He was a busy man and busy men didn’t need needy girlfriends tagging along. That alone made her point for the second problem. She didn’t want to need Tyler. She wanted to be his equal, because that was the only way to keep their relationship fair without the struggle of taking and giving.

Sitting up on the edge of the bed, she reached for her first sleeping pill in days.

• • •

Tyler woke with a shift in the mattress. Seeing Sera on the edge of the bed, he asked, “You all right?”

“Yeah. I can’t sleep.”

“Something wrong?”

“No. Just one of those nights.”

“Come here.” He reached out, pulling her back into his arms. “Want to talk about it?”

“I’m restless, is all.”

Running his hand through her hair, he said, “Then why don’t you talk me back to sleep?”

“Am I that boring?” She scoffed, lifting her head from his chest and throwing him a teasing smile.

“Baby, anything but. Your voice is soothing, though.”

“I think I want to buy a car.”

The quick shift in conversation had him spinning. Buying a car seemed pointless if she wasn’t going to drive it. Unless she was trying to tell him she was ready to give it a go again.

“Did you hear me?” she asked.

“I did. It seems kind of silly, though, to buy a car when you’re not driving.”

“I’m going to ask Merv for a job. I’ll need a car to get back and forth to work. So, I guess I’ll have to start working on the driving issue.”

“I’m not comfortable with you working at Merv’s.”

“I’ve got to do something, Tyler. I can’t sit around here every day.”

“Then come with me.”

The talk with Bradley hadn’t gone well that morning. Actually it had gone worse than he’d imagined. Bradley was very honest in his thoughts. He believed canceling the tour was a career-ending move and that Tyler would be throwing away his talent, not to mention damaging his reputation. He was still waiting to hear back from all the other people who had a hand in putting his tour together—most importantly, his label, but it didn’t sound good. Maybe if he could talk Sera into coming, they could somehow make it work for now, and then in February they could start concentrating on putting down roots.

“Don’t start on that again,” she said.

“I’m not starting anything, I’m simply telling you how I feel.”

“And I feel I’m not ready.”

“Fine,” he relented, in no mood to argue. “We’ll go look at cars, then.”

Tyler stood with his heart pounding in his ear. Knuckles white, the paper in his hand shook as he reread the last sentence.
I don’t understand how you can love someone who nearly killed you.

He’d come home from a trip to the grocery store not finding Sera anywhere in the house. He did find her bedroom door open and mail strewn across the bed. The return addresses were all the same: Lucas Rollins of Welch, West Virginia. Picking up a picture tucked underneath one of the envelopes, he stared at a camouflage-clad man smiling widely at the camera. There was nothing but sand in the background. Turning it over, he saw the name Rollins written in Sera’s handwriting on the back. His hand shook. The picture wobbled up and down. Then, giving it a fling, it fell to the bed.

Turning his attention back to the letter in his hand, he saw his name and read on.
Do you think Tyler loves you? He chose his career over you. He left you when you needed him. I was there. I was there for you, not him.
His
jaw tightened. The son-of-a-bitch was making presumptions he knew nothing about. Teeth gritted, he glanced back down at the pile of letters, seeing another picture. Pulling it out, he saw Sera’s arm locked around Rollins. Both were dressed in their desert uniforms, both smiling just as profoundly. His gut rolled.

“Hey, I didn’t hear you come back.”

Tyler’s head snapped up at the sound of Sera’s voice. His eyes met hers, just as she realized what he held.

“What are you doing?” she snapped, snatching the letter and picture from his hand.

He had no explanation. It was wrong to intrude on her privacy, but he hadn’t been able to help himself when he saw the opened letter sitting there. “He was in love with you?”

Sera stuffed the single sheet of paper back into the empty envelope. Her eyes shifted from the letters laid out to the cardboard box sitting next to her bed.

“He didn’t love me,” she said. Bending over, she began stacking the letters into a pile.

“He said he loved you, Sera.” His eyes filled with hatred for a man he didn’t know.

“Apparently you didn’t get to the one where he called me an ungrateful bitch.”

She gathered the mail, shuffling it in her hand.

“He said I almost killed you.”

“He said a lot of things.” She blew the accusation off.

“Dammit! This isn’t funny.”

“No, it’s not,” she barked back. “I walk out on the back porch to take a call from Uncle Roy and I come back to you snooping through my things.”

“I wasn’t snooping.”

“Then what do you call it?”

Looking away, he felt shame, yet didn’t regret what he’d done. “I was curious.”

“Well, then, you know what? Be curious all you want.” She slung the letters to the floor. A heap puddled at his feet. The door frame rattled as she turned and left.

• • •

Sera didn’t know exactly how much time passed before her bedroom door opened. Long enough for Tyler to read all of what Rollins had written and then some. Enough time for her to gather her wits and be ready to explain any questions Tyler might have. She didn’t so much care that he’d read them. She hated that he’d picked up that one in particular, but any of the others didn’t bother her, because once he got through them, he would see Rollins didn’t like her, much less love her. What made her mad was that he’d taken a piece of something and assumed he knew all about the relationship she and Rollins had. What they’d had was so complex she didn’t understand it most of the time.

Hearing the back door slam, she got up to see where Tyler had gone. He was at the tree line before she spotted him. His leveled shoulders and brisk stride told her everything she needed to know. He wasn’t curious. He was mad. Scary, angry mad.

“Tyler,” she yelled, bounding down the steps. The drizzle from the threatening showers hit her arm. “Tyler,” she yelled louder as he disappeared into the woods. Taking off in a jog, she slipped on the damp grass and tumbled in a low hole. “Shit,” she muttered, getting up. The pressure she put down on her foot caused a slight limp. “Tyler!”

Passing the line of trees outlining the outer edges of her uncle’s property, her eyes scanned the thicket for movement. The ground sloped upward from there. Her ankle throbbed with tenderness every step she took. Paying little attention, her ears strained to hear. Nothing came. “Tyler, please,” she begged.

Taking a rest, she sat down on the ground, twisting her ankle to loosen it up. It would likely be sore the rest of the day, but it wasn’t sprained. “I don’t know what you’re upset about.” She wasn’t sure where Tyler was or if he could hear, but she talked anyway. “I wish you would talk to me, though.”

“Like you talk to me?”

She glanced to the right where the voice had come from. The dark brown shirt he’d put on that morning blended perfectly with the poplar tree he was slumped against. Getting up, she covered the twenty steps between them, then knelt down on both knees. “What’s wrong?”

He stared off in the distance. The dampened shirt clung to his thick chest, and trickles of rain beaded at the tips of his hair.

“You probably think I deserve your silence, and maybe I do. But I can’t fix this if I don’t know what’s wrong,” she said.

“So he was the guy?” Tyler asked with bitterness.

Determined to be forthcoming and honest, so not to make this worse, she answered. “Yes.”

“I read every one of them. Some of them twice.”

“I left them there for you to read.”

“No, you threw them at my feet, mad because I invaded your privacy.”

She sat back on her heels. “I was throwing them away. I wasn’t reminiscing like you think. I just … I wanted to read through them one more time before I burned them.”

“God, I hope you weren’t reminiscing about the day I almost killed you.”

“You didn’t almost kill me.”

“He thinks so.” He wedged his legs up between his stomach and arms, forcing a barrier between them. “Shit, Sera. You were thinking of me when it happened.”

Moisture pooled in the corner of her eyes. “I never wanted you to know that.”

“He knew it.”

“I felt guilty for not being more aware and for what happened. I felt I owed him an explanation.”

“So what he wrote was true? The train whistle you thought you heard made you think back to the night I asked you to marry me?”

She swallowed hard. “Yes.”

“Fuck.” Tyler kicked out his legs. “I don’t know what I’m more pissed about. The fact that I’m responsible for all you’ve gone through, the fact you had feelings for this guy, or the shit he wrote about you.”

“You’re not responsible. It happened, Tyler. Even if I had been focused like I was supposed to be, nothing would have changed that. And he’s hurting. He can’t help the way he feels.”

Tyler laughed dryly. “So you can stay guilt ridden over it, but I can’t?”

“I hold myself accountable for what happened when we got back, not for what happened over there.”

“He loved you.”

Meeting his gaze, she shook her head. “No, he didn’t. He cared for me. We latched on to each other because we shared a common tragedy, but we didn’t love each other.” Needing some kind of harmony, she reached out to touch his knee. “I accepted that. He didn’t.”