So much for the rental car place making sure the car was set to go. Sure, no problem, I can stop for gas out in the middle of the woods. Why not?
“You can but the amount of woods in this area sometimes gives it fits. Just follow my directions and you’ll be fine. In this weather, you don’t want to be taking the scenic route the GPS will try to take you on.”
“Scenic, is it? Is that what they’re calling this?”
Kellan heaved out a sigh. “Look, man, I’m sorry about all this. Try to find the gas station. If you can’t, call me back in an hour and I’ll come find you. If I try to leave now, Wolf will hear it and Maggie will pitch a fit.”
It was my turn to sigh. “Along with the son, you have a girlfriend too?” It was only logical, but I didn’t get too personal with the people I worked with if I could help it.
I was focused on the music. Only the music. I didn’t give two figs about who was waiting—or not waiting—at the dinner table.
“Wife. Didn’t we discuss all this already?”
We probably had, but I tended to tune out when it came to family and all that. It was a potential job hazard in my line of work. Not that I had any looming entanglements on the horizon, but I also made sure not to cultivate them. My happiness was found in the studio, not in building family units.
I’d spent enough time trying to put an ocean between me and mine.
My old man didn’t get my love of music versus a good stable job like he had in the fields. My mum wasn’t much better. She’d stayed home with her children and thought that a family was the cornerstone of life. My younger brother Thomas went his own way, as did my younger sister Maureen. Yet my mum behaved as if we were living in a Norman Rockwell painting. Even if her marriage didn’t seem particularly happy and her kids weren’t close, the idea of home and hearth was all she cared about.
Not me. I wasn’t doing anything for the sake of tradition or appearances. And I was lucky enough not to have to please anyone but myself.
“Don’t remember, sorry.” I shrugged it off. “I won’t be your best friend, but I’ll help you get that hit single you’re looking for.”
“Fine by me. I’ve already got a best friend and no particular fondness for the warm and fuzzies myself.” Kellan paused. “So, give me that call if you can’t find your way back to the Cove, or else text me in the morning and I’ll meet you before we come back here to use my studio. Hope you can find accommodations. See Sage at The Hummingbird’s Nest if all else fails.”
I grunted and disconnected the call. Thanks for nothing.
Goddamn rockstars. Always thought the world revolved around them.
The sad part was they were usually right. Especially the successful ones like Kellan McGuire. As the frontman for the rock band Wilder Mind, he made the girls scream and his songs climbed the charts. Until one of the members had quit and Kellan had gotten the itch to play on his own on the side.
I played music now and then, sitting in with bands for my own entertainment or if a song needed something the artist couldn’t provide. But I was a part-time rocker at best. I treated music as art, but I also kept an eye on the business end. Whether or not my pop believed my work to be “artsy fartsy”, his words not mine.
I kept driving until I found the gas station Kellan had mentioned. I didn’t entirely trust his directions, and they were hard to follow in this inclement weather in any case. It was practically impossible to see anything. But somehow the huge sign for Heaphy’s still partially worked, a couple of the letters gleaming in neon in the darkness.
After making a U-turn, I went back the way I’d come from. I drove and drove and drove until I was about to turn to the GPS out of desperation. I didn’t see any 4-way stop. Maybe Kellan had been drinking. Maybe I’d become snow blind.
Struck incapable by lake effect, whatever the flying fuck that was.
Then a stop sign appeared out of the darkness like a battered red angel. The sign was moving in the wind. I would’ve said that didn’t seem possible, but my rental car was too.
Definitely getting a truck next time. Or a battering ram.
I made the left turn. Barely. The car fishtailed and the ditch on the side of the road came frighteningly close before somehow the tires bore down and gripped the road.
Heart in my throat, I soldiered on at the brisk speed of…eleven miles an hour.
This place was a hellhole. I was not ever returning. I didn’t care if Kellan bribed me with a million dollars and a lifetime of producing credits. I’d just stick to sunny California, thanks. When I needed a taste of cold, I’d go home to Ireland or visit my sister in Cheltenham.
It felt as if I was driving forever, although that might’ve been due to my reduced speed. I didn’t trust this car. Certainly didn’t trust the road. Weren’t they supposed to be out sanding or salting or something?
They probably would’ve been had it not been approaching eleven now. No one was driving out here but me.
A colossal idiot.
When the small green sign for Crescent Cove swam into view, coming out of the snowy dark like an oasis in the desert, I nearly wept.
Sweet bleeding Christ, I was here. I’d found it.