Loving Dallas(49)
We were planning a six-week tour between Dixie’s junior and senior year of high school. Mostly just the tristate area, but a big deal for Leaving Amarillo since it was our first time actually going on “tour.” Robyn was all set to go with us and she was so excited about being on the road. She had this whole list of places we were going to go in each city we were scheduled to play in, a road trip music mix, and enough snacks stockpiled to feed a football team.
Then she bailed. Said she had decided to take a few summer classes and she stopped answering my calls. Eventually I got frustrated and drove down to see her at school. Except she wasn’t there.
When I showed up at her house and confronted her, her eyes filled with tears and she broke down. Said she just couldn’t do it anymore. I needed to focus on the band and she had other obligations. I’d assumed she meant school obligations. She’d always been such an academic overachiever.
From that night on her porch until now I have imagined a thousand scenarios that caused Robyn to end it. I can’t even count the nights I lay awake wondering.
Was there another guy?
Did she finally decide I wasn’t worth waiting for? That I was just going to spend my life chasing a dream I’d never catch?
I’d refused to leave her porch that night until the sun peeked over the horizon.
“Just tell me what I did. I can fix it, baby. Please.”
I’d been f*cking pathetic.
“You can’t,” she’d said a dozen times. “No one can.”
The more I’d pressed, the more she’d closed herself off to me.
“Just come with me,” I’d begged. “We have a show in Fort Worth tomorrow night. Sunday we can go to that museum like you wanted.” I’d never given two f*cks about visiting art museums, but I’d suffered through a couple for her. She’d get so excited. While she was looking at paintings I couldn’t make heads or tails of, I’d be watching her. The way her eyes would light up and her mouth would drop open just slightly as she stared in awe at each work.
For a moment, I thought I’d had her. She got that look, the same one she got when she looked at her favorite paintings. Then her expression blanked, her eyes lost their light, and she shook her head.
“I can’t, Dallas. Life on the road is your thing. Not mine.” She wouldn’t even meet my eyes when she said it.
I’d wondered briefly that if maybe I had more money, if the band were more successful, if I could promise her fancy hotels and room service instead of leftover pizza and Cracker Jacks in a van, if that would’ve mattered. But I’d never known her to be materialistic and up until then she’d seemed fine with the lack of luxury accommodations.
But as we said goodbye for the final time, my insecurities took over and I decided that she’d simply gotten tired of my shit and finally lost faith. In the band. In me. In us.
There was always a possibility the band would never take off, never “make it,” so to speak.
I’d had a choice to make.
I could let her down or let her go.
Standing here now, staring at the woman she loves most in the world and half-listening while Dixie details the hell that was Robyn and Belinda’s life that summer, I know I chose wrong.
29 | Robyn
“YOU LATE?”
Dallas’s words echo in my head over and over.
Because I am late. And I am never late. My life runs according to a very set schedule and my body cooperates with this most of the time.
I try to reason it away. I’m stressed. I’ve been traveling a lot. My body is just out of whack.
After hours of hanging decorations and lights and chasing down everything from extension cords to building permits, my feet and lower back ache like I spent the morning beginning my career as a barefoot carrot farmer. To make matters worse, I feel like I’m coming down with something. Something I am hoping and praying has nothing to do with the fact that my monthly visitor from Hell had yet to arrive. The nausea has mostly subsided but a wave blindsides me and while Katie handles the rest of the setup I am in the bathroom, sitting on a closed toilet seat holding a wet paper towel to my neck.
After a few minutes the soggy texture of it against my skin threatens to bring the half a turkey sandwich I had for lunch back up, so I throw it away and lean on the cool marble wall, concentrating on taking deep breaths until I regain my equilibrium. That is, until the scent of the bleach-based cleaner they must use to sanitize the ladies’ room hits my nostrils and nearly doubles me over.
Tonight’s party is one of the most important of my career, the one Mr. Martin will use to decide if I can really pull this off as well as I’ve said I can. I might as well be wearing a T-shirt that says, “Don’t believe the hype.”
The two-story historic home is fully decorated by the time I feel steady enough to leave the restroom. Guests are pouring in and it looks like I pulled myself together just in time. The main room is alive with neon blue lights streaking the blackened ceiling and our LED-lit displays are strategically placed by each minibar. Maneuvering my way through the crowd in search of Katie, because I basically owe her my life for covering for me, I crane my neck in search of her blond head. The second I think I’ve caught a glimpse of her, a solid mass slams against me, sending me careening toward a waiter in a tux carrying a tray of the signature cocktails Midnight Bay created for Jase’s tour. Just before I crash into him and his tray full of glasses, a strong hand grips my upper arm and yanks me back to safety.