Page 56 of August Lane
“Country?” Silas’s eyebrows shot higher. “What do you know about country? Ain’t no trap beats or Lil John shoutin’ in the microphone.”
Luke smiled. “Been listening to it all my life. Hank. Johnny. It’s what I was raised on.”
“Johnny’s good.” Silas leaned an arm against the truck. “I can’t hang with Hank, though. Something about his voice. You listen to Patsy?”
“Cline? Yeah, I…” Luke spotted August’s blue Focus kicking dirt up at high speed. She turned into the lot with too much gas and nearly spun out before she parked.
Silas watched it all, unconcerned. He tapped the roof of Luke’s truck. “Your date’s here.”
“She’s my tutor,” Luke said quickly. He was paying her. There were too many gross implications to calling it a date.
“Tutor?” Silas frowned. “Are we talking about the same girl?”
Luke tried to open the door, but Silas pushed it shut again. “Where do you think you’re going?”
Luke realized the music conversation was a test he hadn’t passed yet. Failing meant he’d never step foot on this man’s property. “I don’t want to greet her sitting down like this,” Luke said. “It’s disrespectful.”
Silas stared, silently assessing him, before a wide grin spread over his face. He stepped back, pulled Luke’s door open, and waved his permission to exit.
Even though it wasn’t a date, Luke had put more effort into his appearance than usual. He wore a blue button-down and the newest pair of jeans he owned, but he had resisted aftershave because something about altering his scent felt like shouting, “I’d like to fuck you!” Which was fine, if that was your goal, but it wasn’t his with August. After what happened with Richard, he wanted to prove he could be her friend without an ulterior motive.
The minute Luke got a good look at her, he saw the flaw in his logic. He could act like some pious monk all day long, but in reality, he was just a boring sinner. August wore a frilly red top with a lower neckline than usual. She’d curled her hair, and it spilled over her shoulders, framing the most magnificent pair of breasts he’d never see.
Good Lord, he thought he’d wanted something before. He thought he knew what it felt like.
“I’m late,” August announced, in a matter-of-fact tone that told him to get used to it.
Luke said, “You’re fine,” in a way he hoped didn’t reveal the rest. That he’d wait all day if she asked.
Silas looked back and forth between them. “Lucas here says you’re his tutor. Is he lying?”
August laughed. It was big and loose in a way he’d never heard before. Maybe it was being in this place with her uncle, so far from town. “We’rewriting lyrics,” she said. “He’s paying me to help him write a love song for his girlfriend.”
Silas’s expression darkened. “Is that right?”
“No.” Luke looked at August. “The song is for me.”
“A love song,” she said. “They’re what you like, right? They’re what everyone likes.”
Luke couldn’t argue with her. If he ran down a list of his favorite songs, they’d probably all be about soulmates and heartbreak. It was probably why he couldn’t look at her without that fluttering in his chest. “Yeah. I want to write a love song.”
She made eye contact with him, and they were briefly in sync, caught up in the same moment. But then her lips tilted into a smirk that made it all a big joke. “It’s okay to be predictable, Lucas. Embrace cliché. It’ll make this easier.” She looked at Silas. “How long can we use the studio?”
“Long as you want,” Silas said. “Just finished working on the demo with that jazz trio. It’s all yours.”
Silas’s face softened when he looked at her, his affection clear in his voice. Luke never had that kind of relationship with his family. His mother’s parents refused to meet him. His father’s family hated his mother for inheriting their family’s land, so they also pretended he didn’t exist. Sometimes his little brother’s love felt like a burden because they were all each other had.
He wanted to ask her what it felt like. To be loved for existing. To reach for someone and find them already reaching back. How did it feel when someone held on to you?
Luke retrieved his guitar, and they made their way inside. He had only seen nightclubs in movies, and Delta Blue was a mix of those images and things he didn’t expect. There was the typical long mirror over the bar and round tables clustered near an empty stage. But there was also an art installation covering an entire wall, a collage of vintage album sleeves, handwritten song lyrics, CD covers, and photographs.
Luke spotted a picture of Jojo Lane standing onstage. She smiled at the unseen photographer with one hand on a microphone, her face damp and gleaming as if she’d just finished performing. Luke stared, searching for August in her features.
Silas pointed to a photograph of a Black man in a bowler hat holding a harmonica. “You know who that is?”
“No,” Luke said. “Is he famous?”
“That’s DeFord Bailey. First Black man Nashville ever recorded. Got inducted into the Country Hall of Fame a few years ago.”
