“Let’s talk about life on the road.”
I raked my hand across my jaw, trying to conjure up a way of explaining how shitty and dark those years were without offending my fans. After a brief phone call that morning with my publicist, he’d given me a list of canned responses, telling me to tell my fans only what they wanted to hear. “Life on the road was fun, but it was also a little lonely. After the roar of the crowd dies down and everyone goes home for the night, it was just me, my guitar, and a tiny little bedroom in the back of a tour bus. Gives a man a lot of time to think.”
Dakota glanced down at her notes and shifted in her seat. “You’ve sold over one hundred million albums in the last decade. That’s got to feel surreal for you.”
“It does,” I said. “Most days I don’t feel like I deserve the kind of success that’s followed me all over the world, but there’s no denying it. It’s a part of me now.”
She rattled off a few more statistics and named some specific platinum songs I’d had before re-crossing her legs and leaning into me. “What does a man who’s had more success than he’s ever dreamed of do when he’s reached the top? What’s next for you?”
“I’d like to think I’m on a slow decline back to normal. I plan on writing songs and fading into the background. My heart’s my compass, and my compass is pointing back home to Darlington, Kentucky.” I placed my hand over my chest. “The quiet life awaits me.”
“Your final performance is in a couple weeks. Madison Square Garden,” she said with an amused journalistic lilt. “Tickets for that show sold out in seven minutes.”
“Yeah, I’m definitely feeling the pressure there. But it’s going to be a good show. I promise my fans that. They won’t forget it. And the show will be broadcast live on Pay Per View for those who can’t attend.”
“You’re known for being very tight-lipped when it comes to your personal life,” she said. “What are some things you can share with the viewers at home that they might not know about you?”
“I’m just a simple man,” I said with a half-smirk. “There’s not much to me besides dust and bones and a determined kind of personality. Once I get my mind set on something, there’s really no changing it.”
“Like your retirement,” she said with a modest laugh. Something about being interviewed by her was calming, though I suspected part of it was her delivery. Her voice was sweet enough to dissolve tension and her eyes held a trusting sparkle. Interviews had been the bane of my existence for the bulk of my career, but she made this one feel easy.
“Exactly. No talking me out of that,” I laughed, rubbing my hand across my knee.
“Cut,” a voice yelled. “Let’s take five.”
Harrison appeared out of the darkness, approaching Dakota and leaning into her ear. Her face fell and then tightened as her eyes shot in my direction.
“I’m not doing that,” she said. “No.”
Harrison slipped a hand into his pocket, like he was trying to pretend her objection didn’t rattle him. “As your producer, I’m telling you to ask these questions. It’s your job, Coco.”
“No.” She leaned away from him, our gazes still locked. “Not like this. It’s my interview, and I will not be taking it in that direction.”
Harrison disappeared into the background as someone else counted us in and Dakota turned herself back on like the flip of a switch. She continued asking me general questions, and I continued giving general answers, trying my best to guess what the masses wanted to hear.
“And that’s a wrap,” a man said, stepping out from behind the cameramen and pulling the headset off his head. “Good job, everyone.”
Dakota pulled the mic pack off and sat her notes aside.
We stood to leave, and I grabbed the hook of her elbow, pulling her into me and leaning into her ear. “Meet me in my dressing room in twenty minutes.”
I changed into jeans and a t-shirt and my favorite pair of boots and washed my face, hunching over the sink and waiting for that knock that would bring me my Dakota. It wasn’t but ten minutes until she just walked right in, shutting the door behind her.
“You wanted to see me?”
“I missed you, Dakota,” I said, walking toward her one slow step at a time.
“You didn’t call.”
“Neither did you.”
“I didn’t know what to say.”
“I wanted to give you a little space, that's all.” I reached for her hip, placing my hand in the scooped out indentation just below her waist and pulling her into me. “They say absence makes the heart grow fonder.”
“Absence can make the heart do all kinds of things.”
“Want to get out of here?”
She bit her lip, nodding slowly and bending to my will. We bolted out of the studio, dashing down Midtown and heading south with no particular destination in mind. Crowded sidewalks filled with five o’clockers forced us to dash and dart, dip and weave, and finally I grabbed her hand and pulled her closer to me, making us like a rock holding strong against the stream. The rest of the world would have to go around us.
Taxi horns flooded our ears and diesel fumes filled our lungs as city smells wafted up from sewer grates. What beauty Dakota ever saw in that kind of thing was beyond me. I gazed up at a sea of tall buildings and skyscrapers, blocking the view of the perfectly sunny sky above and making it feel just a shade darker than it should’ve been at that time of day.
“How long are you in town?” she asked.
“I leave tomorrow morning.”
A deafening silence contrasted against the city symphony around us. “I’ll be back next weekend for the show. You going to come?”
We found an empty bench, and Dakota pulled me to it, wrapping my arm around her when we sat down. “I don’t know. Addison’s wedding is that weekend.”
An empty, crinkled potato chip bag skirted and skipped down the curb followed shortly by a sheet of newspaper. Up ahead, a man with a clipboard was flagging down anyone who dare walk past him, asking if they had just five minutes for a quick survey.
“Excuse me. I’m really sorry to both y’all,” a woman said from behind the bench. We whipped around to see a middle-aged mother with three children all dressed in head-to-toe University of Texas apparel. “You’re Beau Mason, right?”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said, offering a smile and pulling my arm away from Dakota.
The woman pulled out her phone and handed it to Dakota. “Would you mind taking a picture of us?”
Dakota obliged her as I posed between the woman and her smiling kids.
“We’re huge fans of yours,” the woman gushed, her hands shaking slightly as she took the phone back. “We just love your music.”
“Thank you. I appreciate that.” I waited for them to leave before sitting back down with Dakota, though in the distance, I saw a group of college-aged girls huddling and staring as they walked our way. “Take me to your apartment, Dakota.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven