Leaving Amarillo(92)
“What in the world are you even talking about? Nana and Papa chose to raise us. We could’ve went into foster care when Mom and Dad died or gone to live with Aunt Sheila in Oklahoma. They wanted us, Dix. So whatever parallel you’re trying to draw here is moot.”
“Moot?” I say, smirking at him and glad for the tension to be easing out of the room.
“Yes, moot,” he confirms, folding his arms over his chest. “Now let’s go.”
I shake my head, then stand and open the front door for them. “I love you, big brother. I wish you the absolute best of luck—both of you. Really. But I have things I need to handle here. Go ahead and see this Barry guy and let me know how it goes. If he decides you desperately need a fiddle player in the band, I’ll see what I can do. But right now I’d just be in your way.”
The stare-down continues for several minutes until I flick my wrists toward the door in a shooing motion.
They both walk outside reluctantly, as if I’ve sentenced them to death. It’s ridiculous since they’ve played without me several times and done just fine. After the showcase in Nashville, I’m grateful I never had to actually see any of those times for myself, but at least I know they can manage without me. And it feels good knowing that they care—that they want me even if record execs don’t.
I sit on the porch swing and pull my legs to my chest, giving them both my biggest, bravest smile. “Call me and let me know how it goes, okay?”
My brother leans down to hug me goodbye and lingers before pulling away. “You don’t have to do this, Dix. I really believe once he sees how great you are he’ll be glad we have a fiddle in the band.”
“You are going to blow him away, Dallas. You don’t need me.”
I start to ask what songs Dallas plans to play for the label executive when a startling and life-altering truth occurs to me. I’m having one of those moments—a glazed-over-eyes, out-of-body moment when the mysteries of the universe make complete sense and everything seems brilliantly connected by a grand design for one split second. It happens so quickly I almost miss it.
The lyrics I’ve been writing for Gavin came together the night Papa died. As much agony as I was in, something clicked for me when I realized that there is more to love than the fleeting instances of happiness—more than hugs, and violin lessons, and comfort. My parents, Nana, Papa, Dallas, and even Gavin—especially Gavin—have taught me a valuable lesson that it took losing them to realize.
Love isn’t just about the good. It’s fortified by the bad. I know how much I loved my parents and how much they must’ve loved me by the permanent stab I feel at having lost them, of living in a world without them. The same is true for my grandmother and granddad. And even though they aren’t gone forever, when Dallas and Gavin walk out that door, it will be the biting teeth of loss that I feel. Because that’s the other side of love. The pain and the loss and the missing. It’s real and it’s powerful—as undeniable and inevitable as a natural disaster that touches down leaving a path of permanent destruction in its wake.
It’s dangerous to love, to allow yourself to be loved. But I dared to fly too close to the flames and I’ve decided it’s better to burn—to have that all-consuming powerful kind of love that scars you for life even if it only lasts a little while, than to play it safe forever.
The last two lines I need to finish the song I’ve been working on are blazing to life behind my eyes when I grab my brother’s arm.
“Wait,” I say, squeezing him tightly. “Wait right there. Don’t move.”
Darting into the house, down the hallway, and into my room, I dig into my still half-packed bag until I find my notebook. Yanking a pen from my desk drawer where I used to do my homework, I pull the cap off with my teeth and write down the last two lines of the song I’ve been tinkering with, with a furious urgency before I lose them.
As soon as it’s complete, I feel as if someone has lifted the weight of all the world’s pain and suffering from my soul. Finishing a song always has a powerful effect on me, but this is different. This one I wrote for the people I love more than life itself. The people I would sacrifice my heart and soul for a thousand times over.
Tearing the paper carefully from the notebook, I fold it down once and carry it to where my brother is waiting on the porch.
“For you . . . For both of you,” I say, handing it over to him. Dallas, being the King of Impatience that he is, opens it immediately and reads the lyrics my heart wrote while I stand there feeling exposed.
When he looks up from the page and back at me, the love and gratitude brimming over in his eyes touches me somewhere deep inside.
“I love you, Dixie Leigh. I should say it more.” His voice hitches, and he stops, probably sensing that it’s in danger of breaking as am I. “With everyone we’ve lost, I should tell you every day.” He shakes his head as if disgusted with himself. “Christ. I should—”
“I know, Dallas. Me, too.” I fling myself at him in one last goodbye hug, knowing he has to go now or I will cry and he will never leave. By the time our affectionate embrace ends, I’m not just letting him go. I’m practically pushing him off the porch.
Gavin stands awkwardly behind my brother and waits for him to head toward the truck before speaking to me.
“You really staying home to deal with your granddad’s affairs? Or is it something else?”