Leaving Amarillo(97)

“Dude. Stop. No.” I shake my head because no f*cking way am I going to let my mistakes hold him back. “Do your thing. Kick ass and take names. I have to take care of me, you take care of you.”

Dallas nods. “You’ve always had my back. I appreciate that, but I understand. I don’t know if I’d be willing to risk it if our roles were reversed, and I’m sure as hell not going to ask you to.”

Dallas is a good friend. A great friend. A brother from another mother. I owe him the truth.

“Yeah. There’s more. I would suggest sitting down or backing up because if you punch me, you might hurt your hand and playing guitar at your show in Omaha will be a bitch.”

“Dude, you’re on probation. I’m not going to punch you for—”

“It’s about Dixie.”

He sits.

All I can do is man up and tell him the truth. So I look him right in the eye and do that.

“I love her, Dallas. I f*cking love her and I swear to God, I didn’t mean for this to happen. I didn’t even know it could happen. You were right, what you said last year, about my shit and her not needing that. You were right to tell me to keep my loser f*cking hands off her when we were kids, too. But that was a promise I couldn’t keep.”

There is visible movement in his jaw. “I’m going to need a little more clarification than that,” he says evenly.

I pull in a deep breath that has more to do with courage than oxygen. “I’m in love with your sister—maybe I always have been. I broke the promise I made you when we were kids and the one I made you last year in about a dozen different ways and as sorry as I am for that, I wouldn’t take it back if my life depended on it.”

I wait a beat for his reaction, wondering if my life does depend on it. A dozen emotions play across his expressive face. He’s a lot like her, I realize. Neither of them has a poker face for shit.

Finally he seems to settle on a look of concern seasoned with determination. “I saw how you were at the funeral and after. Whatever you do, just be sure you mean it, Garrison. If this is just jealousy over McKinley, maybe shove that shit down deep and keep it to yourself.”

“It’s not,” I answer abruptly, picturing McKinley with his arms around her in her kitchen. “But I’m not opposed to tearing his greasy f*cking hands off if I ever see him touch her again, either.”

Dallas gives me a half grin until he sees that I’m dead serious. Then his expression shifts to one of amused interest.

I shake my head and lift my hands in a gesture of helplessness. “She’s my Bluebird, Dallas. I need to go home and get my shit straight so that I can be the kind of man she deserves.”

“I can see that you care about her, and that’s great. Really. I believe you’ll protect her from your own bullshit like you promised—because otherwise I’d have to kill you here and now. But the nicknames or putting your hands all over her in front of me, that shit ain’t gonna fly. Ever.”

“I’ll try my best. But I think we both need to go ahead and accept the fact that what Dixie wants, Dixie gets. From me at least. I can’t put you first anymore.”

“It’s like you’re breaking up with me, Garrison. Do I get breakup sex?”

“You wish,” I tell him as I stand to pick up my bag.

“You leaving because you don’t want to risk going to jail or for her?”

There’s a good question. I give him the most honest answer that I can. “Both.”

Sliding my phone into my pocket and lifting my bag onto my shoulder, I ask him to make sure someone gets my drum kit home. Most likely I’ll have to hitchhike back to Amarillo.

Dallas promises that he will and leans on the wall by the door.

“You’re not a bad guy, Gavin. And I trust you with my own life. But if you hurt my sister, you’re f*cking—”

“I know. I won’t. Or I’ll do everything in my power not to.”

“You have to tell her,” he says with a straight face. “All of it. Maybe not all at once, but eventually.”

“I know. I will. I need to get my shit handled and then, I swear to God, I will tell her everything.”

The lines etched into his face fade noticeably. “When I saw you with her in the alley at the showcase I thought it was like—”

“It wasn’t,” I say, cutting him off sharply. “And it never will be.”

His mouth flattens into a straight line and he gives a quick nod. “Good. Better not be.”

“After I tell her everything—once she knows everything that I did and what happened—she might tell me to stay the f*ck away from her.”

Dallas doesn’t reassure me. Probably because he knows I’m right. “She might. But that’s her decision to make.”

“There are some sins even saints can’t forgive,” I mumble.

Dallas claps me on the shoulder and shakes my hand, pressing something into it. “Well let’s just hope she loves your sorry ass back. Good luck, man.”

Adjusting my bag on my shoulder, I nod to where Dallas’s guitar is propped by the dresser. “Same to you, my friend.”

She answers on the second ring.

I’m sitting in the station where I used the money my best friend slipped me for bus fare to get a ticket home. I have about five minutes until my bus arrives so I decide to call the absolute last person I want to talk to. Well, one of the last people. Definitely not the first.