Out of the Blues by Mercy Celeste Page B

didn’t, I drove the five miles to town.
    “You have a good voice. Ever thought about putting that talent to use?”
    I had a flashback to Cody sitting stoned on the Oriental rug telling me that I was going to be a big star one day. “No,” was all I said about that.
    “You’d be good,” he said and then nothing else while I drove. The lights from town were closer than I remembered and we drove past a gas station that wasn’t there the last time I was out this way.
    “I’m just going to drive around and see what has changed. If you need to stop anywhere, just holler.”
    I could see his face now and that smile of his that lit up his face came back and I nearly ran off the road because I was looking at him and not watching what I was doing.
    “I’ll do that, Mason. Keep your eyes on the road.”
    “Sorry, I was…”
    “Don’t sweat it, man, we’re good. But if you see anything you like…pull over, and I’ll see about making you holler, how’s that sound.”
    Fuck me.
    He laughed. And maybe I might have said that out loud. Just…fuck…me.

Chapter Eight
     
    Kilby gets the grand tour.
    The town was about the same size as the one near my place outside Nashville. Way outside Nashville. Mason drove around pointing out the places of interest: The high school, the football stadium, the late night food places, and the places that didn’t care if you were underage.
    “Are you hungry? I could stop and get something. A milkshake or something?” he’d asked when the silence in the car became deafening. “There’s not much here. And we’re a couple of hours from any city with anything in it worth going to.”
    “It’s fine. I like small towns. Never been much for clubs or hanging out,” I admitted when he circled the main streets one more time. He seemed restless. It was after eleven and my body was already screaming for bed but I didn’t want to go back to the hotel because the bed I’d be sleeping in would smell like Mason and sex. Not something I was proud of.
    “Yeah, me either,” he said but he seemed distant. He turned down a street we’d not been on before and left town in the direction we hadn’t come.
    Dark engulfed the car. I could see his face illuminated from the dashboard. He looked sad. I didn’t say anything. I was enjoying the night air on my face and the smell of the woods as we drove deeper into the dark.
    About six miles out of town he turned off the main highway onto a dirt road that was overgrown with weeds. The mailbox on the corner hung on the post, the lid missing. “Someone bashed the box. Fuckers.” There was real anger in his voice.
    The road was about a mile long. I could see the moon through the trees. When he finally stopped, the headlights shone on a derelict of an old two-story farmhouse. I heard him grind his teeth. “She didn’t do a thing to keep it up.”
    I waited for him to turn the car off but he didn’t. We sat there idling for about five minutes before I reached over and turned the key. “Want to tell me where we are?”
    He leaned over the steering wheel to look out at the silver washed house. “Our house. Harper and I sort of grew up here. If you can call the four years of high school growing up…anyway, it was never great, but now…” He sounded like a little boy who’d lost something precious to him.
    “It’s not that bad,” I told him, but I couldn’t see much more than the front porch. One window was broken and the shrubs had overgrown the porch. That’s about all I could tell from the dark.
    “She promised to keep the place the same as it was.” His voice held a touch of petulance. “I wouldn’t have given her my half if I’d known she’d…” he stopped and sighed. “Doesn’t matter, does it? I could have bought her out and kept the place up myself. I’m just as much to blame.”
    I was confused. “Your mother?” I had to ask because this sure as hell didn’t look like some place Arden Monroe would live much less