“Look who’s here,” the man says, smiling slightly. He looks somewhere around our age, maybe right in the middle. He has a curiously handsome look — a mix of sculpted bones, fine lips, and heavy, masculine brows. But there’s more on his face than beauty. I can almost see a cloud above him.

“Were you going to play?” Brandon asks.

“I was.”

“Don’t let us stop you.”

“It’s just an acoustic version of something I’m trying out.”

“Try it on us.”

“It’s not ready.”

“Gavin,” Brandon says, his voice both knowing and firm.

I don’t really understand what passes between the two men, but Brandon’s simple statement of the performer’s apparent name carries obvious weight that I can’t see or hear. I get the feeling of an old argument or at least an ongoing one, in which Brandon thinks he knows best — and Gavin, against his will, reluctantly agrees. It’s the way Dad used to tell me I needed to study when I wanted to go out, and being a good girl deep down, I had to admit he was right.

So Gavin, onstage, takes the stool and lays a beautiful blond-wood guitar across his lap. The house lights don’t dim, and the stage lights don’t change to give him a quiet spotlight. There aren’t any amps, not even a mic. It’s just us and Gavin.

The song is beautiful. I’ve never heard it before, but it shifts something deep inside me. The lyrics aren’t especially sad, but still I find myself tearing up. I brush moisture from my eyes, minding my makeup, halfway through. Brandon looks over and gives me a knowing smile. There’s something he’s saying to me, but about Gavin and his song as well.

I listen until the final note then sit there somehow wounded. I don’t understand my reaction. But when people say you can hear an artist’s soul in his music? Yeah. That’s what Gavin’s song does to me.

He sets down the guitar then approaches our table. Brandon introduces us. Gavin doesn’t sit, and I get the distinct impression it’s because he’s embarrassed.

“Amazing, Gavin,” Brandon says.

“It’s just an adaptation.”

“It’s a good adaptation. Tell me you’re rehearsing so you can play it when the place reopens.”

“I can’t. It’s one of Grace’s.”

“Doesn’t make it not worth playing. In fact, that makes it more worth playing.”

I look from one man to the other. The air still has that curious feeling of empty. I feel unseated. My heart is yearning for something, but it doesn’t know what. Something vague and ephemeral maybe, like the emotion I heard inside the song. I look at Brandon to snap me out of it, but the feeling only grows stronger.

“Not yet,” Gavin says.

“She wouldn’t want this,” Brandon tells Gavin. “This. Here. What you keep doing to yourself.”

“I know.”

But there’s not much more to say, apparently, because Gavin makes vague little motions as if he needs to get back to pressing business. Finally, Brandon decides to grant mercy and tells Gavin thanks, he’ll see him later. I also thank Gavin, feeling more deeply than I maybe should, and shake his hand. He gives another of those sad smiles and leaves, not even retrieving his guitar from the stage.

“That man,” Brandon says, shaking his head.

“What about him?” I ask. “What’s his story?”

I feel something. I look down. Brandon’s finger just brushed mine by accident. Because I’m the girl and can get away with such things, I put my hand over his, feeling the roughness of a hard life under my palm. It’s supposed to be a gesture of reassurance, but we both know it’s not. My heart hammers hard enough in my chest to make me almost dizzy, and I fight the urge to make a telltale swallow.

“What is it, Brandon?”

Instead of answering, he leans in. Just a little.

I lean in too. Then I feel his other hand on my leg. It’s not too much, just enough. At any point we could back off, laugh, and pretend this is all nothing.

“What is it?” I ask again, my voice quieter.

His hand, on the table, turns over and squeezes mine. We move closer, and there’s nobody in the closed club’s main room to see.

Brandon’s phone vibrates. He breaks contact and straightens, and I’m left feeling naked, my breath too short.

He turns the phone to show me the screen.

“From Bridget. She and a friend returned my truck to the lot.” A friendly, no-big-deal smile, as if we hadn’t just been inches from kissing. “Isn’t that nice of her?”

“Peachy,” I say.

“I guess I’d better get you home.”

I straighten the rest of the way up as Brandon rises, the moment gone. But my body missed the message, and I can still feel my pulse everywhere at once.

“Come on,” he says, leading the way.

I follow, hot and bothered, unsure whether I’ve just been saved from something foolish or denied something wonderful.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Riley

WE’RE OUT THE DOOR AND back onto the street when Brandon stops under a street light. The sidewalks aren’t deserted but are fairly still; it’s a summer evening in Old Town and there’s plenty still going on, but much of it is indoors around the Overlook’s corner. A few people pass us, and I try to focus on each one. I imagine them as people who know my father, who know me, and whom I need to prove wrong. I was eighteen when I left, yes. But now I’m twenty-two and have a degree. I’m ready to move on. To become more. And no matter what Mason James thinks, I can.

“What?” I ask him.

He looks momentarily uncomfortable then glances up the street, toward the restaurant, presumably toward his truck — which, until five minutes ago, I’d assumed was a car.

“Maybe we should get you an Uber.”

“Can’t you take me home?” I shouldn’t have said that because it sounds demanding and perhaps a bit whiny, but I’m not quite ready for this evening to end. It should, by all measures. But I want more time. More chances for happy accidents like what almost happened inside the club.

“I have that early meeting.”

“But it’s just past ten.”

He sighs, then looks back at me and says, “It’s not a very nice ride.”

“What?” Then I understand. “You mean your car?”

“My truck.”

“Right.”

He looks so uncomfortable. I want to take his hand and, as in the club, tell him that whatever it is, it’ll be all right.

But instead of saying anything, he walks ahead. I scramble to keep pace.

“I had something come up,” he says.

“What do you mean?”

“I’ve been meaning to get a new car. But I had something come up.”

I look ahead. There’s only one parking lot in sight, and just one truck in the lot. Even from here I can see the rust. The thing is dark gray, but it might once have been black or even blue. It’s difficult to tell in the scant light, but it’s not hard to see that’s the subject of Brandon’s worries.

“Oh,” I say. “Of course.”

“Some stuff with Bridget. I had to help her out.”

He’s embarrassed. It breaks my heart. I want to smile, but can’t bring myself to do so lest he think I’m being patronizing.

“I told you about my friend Moochie when you asked about the Johnny Rotten picture, right?” I say.

“No.”

“And his car?”

Brandon gives a confused little shrug. “No.”

“It was a huge brown shitbox Buick. Because it was so messed up to begin with, he wasn’t picky about running into things. Like parking meters.”

I can tell I’m on thin ground, bringing up a crappy car story that makes it clear we both think his truck is crappy, too. But Brandon laughs a little.