Our knees are practically touching as we sit cross-legged across from each other, our guitars cradled in our laps. Huck’s working through a bridge of one of those merry “this is my hometown dive bar” kind of country songs everyone loves and Drake is known for. I’m trying to power through the third stanza of an emotional ballad about my parents’ divorce. It’s not my usual fare, but this is my second album and I’m hopeful I’ll get a little more rein to write something with some emotional heft.
We work perfectly together, swinging back and forth between his song and mine, flipping the switch flawlessly. It’s always been like this with Huck. I said magic and I wasn’t exaggerating. It’s unlike anything I’ve ever experienced with someone else. His creativity is the other half to mine.
Or something like that. Tequila always makes me feel … more.
So does Huck.
“Hmm?” he says, looking up from his notebook.
“Hmm?”
He grins, and it’s a loose, happy-filled kind of thing. Like I said, more. “You said ‘so does Huck.’ What do I do?”
I sink back, startled. “Oh. I forgot already. I think the tequila is getting to me.”
He lifts his own tumbler and takes a long sip and I’m drawn to the way his tongue reaches out to lick his lips as he puts down his glass.
“I was actually just thinking that this is my favorite,” I tell him half honestly.
“The sipping tequila?”
“Ha. No. You were right about that. It’d be better in a margarita with some salt around the rim.” I push my hair behind my ear, feeling flush, but also brave and more than a little fond of the man in front of me. “I mean writing with you. Sitting around getting drunk and writing songs. It’s magical, you know?”
Huck’s head dips to the side and his blue eyes crinkle in the corners as he takes me in. He nods slowly. “Yeah, it is.”
“I don’t have this with anyone else. It’s special.”
Something flashes in Huck’s gaze and he continues to meet my eyes. Eventually he says, “It is.”
From somewhere, my familiar text notification chirps out and I straighten with a blink. I clear my throat, feeling uncertain. Something just happened, but I don’t know what it was. “That’s probably Drake.”
Huck nods, returning to his paper. “Probably.”
I bite my lip, watching him, but he’s focused on his notes, and I give up. The moment is broken. The magic is gone.
24
CRAIG
LIKE A WRECKING BALL
Drake never understood that the key to creating good music is to listen to everything. The man refuses to listen to anything but contemporary country, out of fear of contaminating the creative well or whatever. But that, along with so much else Colter subscribes to, is such bullshit. You go stale and lose your sense of what culture is reacting to in the moment. What’s hitting the hardest. What is striking the proverbial chord. Whatever is making people feel. Not to mention, the history of the thing. Decades of hard-won wisdom and creativity all lost because you don’t want to come off sounding “too folksy.”
Clichéd as it may sound, I’ve always used music to get in touch with my emotions. I don’t have a name for something until I hear it. The more I listen, the more feelings I have. The more feelings I have, the better a songwriter I become.
Sometimes it’s the words, but not always. That’s why cover songs are so impactful. Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor wrote the song “Hurt” and it was fucking genius. But I didn’t weep until I heard Johnny Cash’s wizened baritone sing the lyrics. Eddie Vedder’s “Just Breathe” is grunge perfection. It defines an era of grimy ballads. Still, it wasn’t until Miley Cyrus sang the chorus that I fully felt the gutting pain of holding back.
Drake never understood any of this. It’s like he sees making music as a multiple choice quiz when it’s actually been an essay test the entire time.
Multidimensional, multifaceted, nuanced. Open to interpretation.
It’s a shame he never took the time to figure it out. If he had, maybe he wouldn’t be freaking the fuck out that my “cover” of “Jonesin’” has flown up the charts in the weeks since Arlo helped me lay it down all official like.
He wouldn’t have teams of legal advisors combing through the online speculation about the extra verse. Wouldn’t need to double and then triple down on his efforts to get me to sign away my cowriting rights weeks before the final decision on Best New Song nominations goes live.
If only he’d stopped at “Jonesin’.”
I don’t feel guilty anymore. After all, he brought this upon himself. I gave him plenty of notice. Too much, even.
But that doesn’t mean I feel good about it. Knowing I’m the subject of so much outside conjecture about things between me and someone I used to call a friend is uncomfortable, to say the least. Also, I’m sleeping with his ex-fiancé. Sure, it was years ago that they were together, and he was the asshole who walked away, but it almost feels like I’ve won the lottery out from under him, and when the rest of the world finds out, it’s gonna look … complicated.
If there is one thing Lorelai and I have never been, it’s complicated. Easy as Sunday morning, more like.
So it’s a good thing I’m picking her up on my bike and taking her to this new place out of town and away from prying eyes. Not that there’s anything for people to pry into aside from multiple (friendly) orgasms over the course of a few weeks and the nearly complete duet I wrote for her and Coolidge. Even if I wanted more, which, let’s be clear, I do, that would definitely fall outside the purview of “friends with benefits.”
Arlo gave me a sort of litmus test of what constitutes “FWB (friends with benefits)” behavior. It goes something like “If you met a woman in a bar and took her back to your place, would you then also…”
It’s not a great test, honestly, because Lorelai and I have been close friends for a long time and we also live at the same address. So obviously we don’t act like strangers in a bar, but Arlo’s explanation was “maybe so, but you also don’t date your friends, so that’s where to draw the proverbial boundaries,” and I’m trying to remain true to the spirit of the thing. Take tonight, for example. Yes, I am taking her out to dinner because we already made plans and need to eat anyway, so who cares if we do it together? But I’m taking her on the back of my bike, so it’s not like we can hold hands or talk about our days or whatever. And the restaurant is a hole-in-the-wall barbecue joint. In fact, calling it a restaurant is even a stretch. More like a roadside stand with a couple of weathered picnic tables and plastic baskets full of wet naps. I would never take a real date there.
After, if we end up at my place or hers, and more orgasms ensue, great. Fine. Excellent. I’m not planning on it, though.
LORELAI: What is the dress code for tonight?
I bite back a sigh and make a mental note to have Arlo explain his litmus test to Lorelai.
CRAIG: I’m picking you up on the bike. So whatever that means.
LORELAI: I was hoping you’d say that. The shortest skirt I own, then.
I can’t tell if she’s kidding, so I let it go.
CRAIG: And before you ask, we’re just getting BBQ. Nothing fancy.
LORELAI: At that little shack outside town you keep going on about? FINALLY. I’ve been waiting for-the-fuck-ever for you to take me!