Page 58 of August Lane
Luke played the verse. While his music was solid, his voice was halting and unsure because he knew that his interpretation may not be what she’d intended. But he relaxed at the chorus because it was his favorite part. “Sometimes it’s bitter / Sometimes it’s sweet / But I think / since you left / it’s forgotten how to beat / So don’t send your sorrys / thinking they can fix us / I won’t live like this—”
August waved to get his attention. “Stop. Stop singing.”
Luke stilled. “I messed it up, didn’t I?”
“No! No, that wasbeautiful. You sound like—” She blinked and rubbed her face. “You were perfect.”
Luke shifted in his chair, happily exploding inside. Nothing compared to this feeling. He’d be chasing it the rest of his life. “Thank you.”
“I’m the one who messed up. The story is wrong. It’s too angry.” She grabbed the notebook and went at it furiously with a pencil. “Don’t send your sorrys,” she mumbled. “Thinking they can fix us. I don’t…” She trailed off, searching his face. “Can’t. I can’t love like this.”
“In jagged pieces,” Luke finished.
“Yes!”
He played the music again and sang the revised chorus, changing the tempo to make it more vulnerable, the way she wanted. August sang along and Luke let his voice fade. He watched her while he played, too caught up in the melody to notice he was tumbling into something vast and endless.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
2023
August never struggled with writer’s block. Even when the words weren’t there, the ideas would be. She’d map out themes and imagery and wait to be inspired, which always happened eventually. But the minute she sat across from Luke, her mind went blank. She had nothing. Or nothing she could share with him, anyway.
She kept thinking about his divorce. How long were they really together? Did he still love her? Charlotte had found someone else, but what about Luke? Had he dated other women in secret? She had a million questions about his life, all centered on the realization that they’d both spent much of the last decade alone.
One of her favorite songs was “Help Me Make It Through the Night” by Kris Kristofferson. It had been covered by different people: Tammy Wynette, Johnny Cash, Elvis Presley, but she’d never cried until she’d heard Tina Turner’s version, with its sleep-thick delivery, like she’d recorded it while lying on one side of an empty bed. That song was a story of desperation, the kind that whispered in your ear at your lowest. It said take something. Anything. You won’t last much longer if you don’t.
Was that what Luke had been doing too? All those years. They could have been reaching for each other.
“I’m too distracted,” August told him, because she had to come up with an excuse. She was getting mad about things that only mattered ifhemattered, which he did not. He was her golden ticket. An on-ramp. No one pondered their ladder’s feelings about being stepped on. They just used it.
Luke nodded and said, “Terry.” Although it was true that her ex’sappearance had been objectively messy, August didn’t correct him. She gathered her things and lied about needing to go back to work.
That night, she unpacked a box of old notebooks she’d brought to her new apartment. The rest were still at Birdie’s house. Those were older and filled with naive optimism about her relationship with her mother. The journals August had packed were more recent, when she was old enough to translate the true meaning of Jojo’s words. “I’m too busy” meant this isn’t a priority. “Arcadia is out of the way” meant I hate that place, so stop calling it home. “I love you” meant this is all I’ll give you, and I don’t understand why it isn’t enough.
August never learned to translate Luke’s words accurately. The truth was skewed by what she wanted. He’d said “You’re amazing,” and she’d heard I see you. He’d said “I need your voice,” and she’d heard I’ll never leave you, which had proved laughably untrue.
Luke was playing guitar when she arrived at the house the following morning. She let herself in and followed the sound to the kitchen, but stopped to listen when he started singing.
There was a reason August had always hated the way Luke sounded on “Another Love Song.” The production was too hopeful. Too smooth. You just knew the man in that song would ride off into the sunset with the girl at the end. But Luke’s real voice was smoke and pain, lost love, and the realization that a broken heart will never beat the same.
“When I say I’m fine / it means I need you / If I say go / please stay / I need you / When you see me lying, close your eyes / Listen to the space between / ’cause Lord, I need you.”
When the song ended, he hugged his guitar to his chest and stared at the wall. She thought he’d smile at least, take some sort of pride in his performance, but he looked distant, like he’d gone to a place where things like pride didn’t matter.
“That was really good,” August told him, because it felt wrong not to. Her chest was heavy. The song refused to let her go.
Luke looked embarrassed. He lowered the guitar to his lap. “Sorry. Should have been listening for the door.”
August sat across from him. “I’ve never heard that one before.”
“It was on my debut. Most people quit listening after track three.”
“Wait.” August frowned. “Was it the last one? The weird honky-tonk thing with a keyboard in the background?”
“Yep.”
“It sounds different when you play it.” She thought about the rest of the album and its unrelenting optimism from start to finish. “I was so mad when I heard them layer all that noise over your guitar. It’s gorgeous by itself.” She shrugged. “That’s why I stopped trying to learn. I would never be as good as you.”
