Page 71 of Play the Last Track
The man has no idea how he makes me feel or what he’s done to my brain chemistry in just a few short months. In college, I felt strong and independent, but I was also still growing. With Grant, I felt like I had settled. Settled with him, with my career choice, with my decision to give up playing music whenever I wanted.
With Flynn …
With Flynn, I feel free. Free to make a choice, a mistake, a rash decision. He takes every change of mind in stride, adapts to the mood, and runs with whatever plans are changed in the moment. He’s charming and funny, and likes his routine, but he still broke it for me. He continues to break it for me.
Now he’s somehow stumbled upon my secret music channel and has fallen in love with my covers? Well, I suppose if I wasn’t falling in love with him before, I am now.
My heart pounds every time someone new comes through the bar’s doors. The day after an away game is the worst. I only have a rough idea of when he’ll be back. They get off the plane, collect their bags, and then head home from the airport. Since he normallycarpools with Scott, he gets dropped off here, and then he’ll stay and distract me until the end of my shift.
I tap my fingernails, back to being painted the bright, fire engine red he liked so much, on the bartop.
Why the fuck am I nervous?
I try to shake myself out of it and move around the bar. Doug stands at the end, his pint almost empty.
“Do you want another, Doug?”
He nods, his eyes on the highlights from yesterday’s game. Ivy and I watched from home, curled up on the couch with hot coffee and popcorn.
“Your man isn’t half bad,” Doug comments as I take the empty glass from in front of him.
I smile, dropping in on the back of the bar and grabbing a fresh glass from the fridge. I twist the pint under the steady stream of beer. “Not my man, but thank you. I guess.”
“They make a good team, he and Harvey. You and Ivy are lucky girls.”
“Are we?” I’m regretting this conversation already.
“Course you are.” He takes the pint and hands me a twenty-dollar bill.
I roll my eyes as I take it. “How’s that? Because they’re million-dollar football players?”
“No, because they’re friends too. Just like you and Ives.” Doug sips his beer, and I place his change in front of him. “You’ll see when you start having kids of your own. When you have friends in the same place as you in life, you feel lucky to get to do all those milestones together.”
“Did you have friends like that?”
“Oh, yeah. We all lived on the same street. Half of us got married in the same year, and then twelve months later, we started popping out kids. Now, most of us have grandkids all the same age. One of my grandsons was in Ivy’s kindergarten class two years ago. Connor. Such a sweet lad.”
I just nod, my eyes flickering back to the door, waiting for Flynn to appear. Doug goes back to his table, so I go back for the dirty glass that I put aside and take it over to the dishwasher. Bending down, I place it inside and turn the thing on. It’s only half full, but what else can I do to waste time?
I glance back at Doug, now back among his friends. I wonder if he’s right—if it’s easier going through all the milestones with friends by your side. I’m sure it is.
But Ivy wants kids. Scott wants Ivy to have his kids. I have no idea what Flynn wants, but, judging by the way he talks about his relationship with his dad, he wants kids, too.
They were never on my radar. Grant never talked about what he might want in the future, and I think after some time, I stopped thinking about it, too. I settled into the life I’d chosen and was content, on the surface, to just live through it.
When I stop now and think about what I want, I’m not so sure anymore.
I thought I wanted to be a teacher, but I don’t.
I thought the bar was a temporary stop, but it isn’t.
I thought I wanted to be with Grant, regardless of whether I ever got the ring or the kids. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
My stomach turns over as I try to imagine what my life would be like with kids. I try to imagine my wedding, see myself in a white dress, walking down an aisle. I try to think about anything beyond the next six months.
Completely and utterly blank.
I think over the last four years. I stopped thinking about what I wanted. Maybe that’s why I’m struggling to define whatever Flynn and I have. It’s certainly not fake.
