Falling into You (Falling #1)(59)

“Kids are awful in high school.”

“No kidding,” he says with a bitter laugh. “I didn’t really mind them, honestly. It was shit with my parents that killed me. They just thought I wasn’t trying hard enough, that I was exaggerating my problems to get out of school or something. And they expected me to toe their line, follow their plan. And that plan included college. All I wanted was to work in a garage, build cars. Play my guitar. That wasn’t acceptable.”

I’m starting to understand. “So when graduation came…”

“My dad was insisting I had to apply to all these colleges, Ivy League and everything.” He laughs, and this laugh is mirthless, full of bitterness and old rage. “Fucking college? I barely graduated high school. I could barely read. I hated school. I was fucking done. I told him this, and he just didn’t care. He’d pull strings so my bad grades wouldn’t matter. Finally, I knew I had to make him understand. I remember the day like it was yesterday. Clear, sunny, beautiful day in June. I’d been graduated for a couple months and was spending all my time in the garage, working on my Camaro. He wanted me to be applying to Harvard and Columbia and Brown, and I wasn’t doing it. It was a constant fight. I finally hashed it out with him on the dock. I told him I wasn’t going to college, not ever. And Dad’s reply? ‘Then you’re on you’re own.’ He’d pay my way, support me, rent me an apartment and all that, if I went to college. If not, he wouldn’t give me red cent.” Colton pauses, and I can see this is the hardest part. “It got ugly. He…we fought, like bad. He called me names, told me I was just stupid and lazy. He was angry, I get that, but…it still fucking scarred me for me life. All I ever wanted was his approval, for him to see that I had other skills, that I was smart in other ways. He just couldn’t. Like I said, the fight got ugly. Turned physical. He hit me, I hit him. I ran. Left my car, my Camaro I’d spent fucking years building from scratch. Left all my shit. Grabbed a backpack and some clothes and all the money I had. Bought a bus ticket to New York. Never looked back. Of course, the bus cost pretty much every dollar I had, so by the time I got to the city, I was flat broke, a basically illiterate seventeen year-old kid with anger problems and no plan, no money, no friends, no car, no apartment, nothing. Just a backpack with some crackers and a change of clothes.”

The pain in his voice is heartbreaking. I see him in my mind’s eye, a scared, angry, lonely kid forced to fight just to survive. Too proud to go back home, even if he could have. Hungry, cold, alone, living on the streets.

“Colton…I’m so sorry you had to go through that.” I hear my voice crack.

He lifts my chin. “Hey. No tears. Not for me. I made it, didn’t I?”

“Yeah, but you shouldn’t have had to suffer like that.” He just shrugs dismissively, and I push back to glare at him. “No, don’t shrug it off. You’ve accomplished so much. You survived. You got yourself off the street. You built a successful business from nothing. You did all that on your own, despite your learning disability. I think it’s incredible. I think you’re incredible.”

He shrugs again, rolling his eyes, clearly uncomfortable. I put my hands on his face, loving the feel of his rough stubble under my palms.

“You’re smart, Colton. You are. You’re talented. I’m amazed by who you are.”

“You’re fucking embarrassing me, Nelly.” Colton wraps his arms around me and pulls me roughly against his chest. “But thanks for saying so. It means more than you know. Now. Did you get in or not? I’m sick of talking about my shit.”

I hold the letter up behind his back, reading it over his shoulder. “Yeah. I got in.”

“There was never a question. Proud of you, Nelly-baby.”

I smile into his chest, breathing in his scent.





*





I swallow hard. I’m not sure if I can do this. I clutch the neck of my guitar and try not to panic.

“Ready?” Colton’s voice came from beside me. His knee nudges mine.

I nod my head. “Yeah. Yeah. I can do this.”

“You can do this. Just follow my lead and sing the harmony, okay? Just strum the rhythm like we practiced and let everyone hear that angel voice of yours, okay?”

I nod again, and flex my fingers. I’ve never performed in public before. I mean, I’ve busked a few times, alone and with Colton, but that’s different. This…this is terrifying. We’re on a stage in a bar, and there’s close to a hundred people all watching, waiting for us to start. They know Colton, they’re here for him, and intrigued as to who I am. No pressure.

“Hey everybody. I’m Colt, and this is Nell. We’re gonna play some music for you, is that alright?” There’s applause and some catcalls. Colton glances at me and then back to the crowd. “Yeah, I know she’s gorgeous, boys, but she’s off limits. We’re gonna play some Avett Brothers to start, I think. This is ‘I Would Be Sad’.”

He starts off with a complex string-picking arrangement that echoes the banjo of the original. I come in on cue with a simple rhythm-strum and wait for the harmony cue. The rhythm is easy and I’ve practiced it so many times I don’t even have to think about it, so I hit my cue no problem. They’re floored. My voice provides a perfect counterpoint to Colton’s, my clear alto weaving around his rough rasp and together I know we have them in a spell.