Sweet memory the painted.., p.11
Sweet Memory (The Painted Daisies #1), page 11
Landry’s eyes met his gaze. Besides the disdain that was always there when she looked at him, there was sadness now because, for two seconds, Paisley had chosen him over her.
“I would never hurt any of you,” he said quietly, talking to the room, but really the words were meant for Landry.
“I wish I could believe you,” Landry replied. Then, she turned on her heel, grabbed her bag, and left the studio.
The others watched Paisley and Jonas for a minute before following her. Only Marco remained, his stance wide, arms crossed over his chest, with his brows still furrowed in concern.
“Do I need to stay?” he asked as if Jonas was going to lose his shit again at any minute, and it added another layer of sorrow and regret to the well of it already inside him. After all they’d been through, Jonas had never wanted his brother to see him lose his cool again.
Jonas shook his head. “No. I’m good. If I’m not, I’ll call you.”
Marco stared at him for a moment, as if assessing how much he believed Jonas’s words, and it knotted his chest even tighter. “I’ll head over to the station and see what we can get out of Larry.”
As soon as Marco left, Jonas let go of Paisley and stepped away.
“I think you should go with them,” he said, every word a tortured truth.
“No,” she said vehemently.
“I’m not saying that because I want you to. I’m saying it because you need your sister, and she needs you, and I don’t want to be the thing that comes between you.”
Needles pricked his heart. Repeated stabs. If he sent her away now, would Landry convince her of the truth? That he couldn’t be trusted? That the boiling anger seething in his veins would always make him a risk? Would his nightmare become the reality?
Doubt flooded Paisley’s face, and it pulled at the shredded pieces inside him. He didn’t know if her doubt was over her, or him, or both of them, but he despised it. She’d been stepping farther and farther out of her shell, becoming more and more decisive, and he didn’t want her to slip backward, thinking she didn’t know what was right.
He brought her hand to his lips, much like she’d done with his minutes before, and kissed it. “Go. I need to call my therapist and burn out some anger on a boxing bag. You need to fix this with Landry.”
Her eyes filled with tears she blinked back. Then, she spread her palm wide over his chest where she could feel the unsteady rhythm underneath and said, “See. Right there. That’s why I’ll never fear you, Jonas. You want what’s best for me, even at the cost of yourself.”
Then, she turned and left, and his heart shredded a bit more from her words and her departure.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Paisley
NOBODY’S PERFECT
Performed by Sheryl Crow & Emmylou Harris
ONE DAY BEFORE
When Landry wasn’t in the house, Paisley knew she’d gone jogging at the pond. So, she found her way to the shore and sat there waiting for her sister. The swans glided smoothly over the surface, serene and elegant, and she wished she felt the way they looked. She wished the terrible twisting and turning inside her would turn into a blissful calm.
Instead, her heart hadn’t stopped its furious pace since Jonas had landed the punch on the reporter’s chin. She had this uneasy feeling as if they were all standing atop a cliff, and it was crumbling below their feet. It wasn’t just what was happening with her and Jonas. The album was struggling. She and Landry were struggling. The band was suffering because of it all. Landry’s words at the studio weren’t all that far off from the truth. Her decisions weren’t usually wise.
You’re so stupid. Did they suck all your brains out through that mark?
Her finger pressed into her star, deeper, deeper, deeper.
“Paisley?” Landry was out of breath, and her body was sweaty as she came around the last bend. She made her way over, dropping down on the grass next to her.
“You’re wrong about him, Lan,” Paisley said quietly.
“Maybe. Or maybe you are,” Landry said, and it increased the doubts plaguing Paisley.
She didn’t think she was wrong. The way she felt about Jonas was how she felt when she knew a song had finally come together. Like all the stars had finally aligned in the right order. Like she’d found something missing that had always belonged to her.
“I don’t understand how you can be mad at him for defending me. If you’d heard what that man said…” Paisley shivered again. “You would have lost it too.”
“You know how I feel about violence. I’d never hit someone.”
Paisley didn’t have a response, and a tense quiet settled between them.
“I don’t have time for this.” Landry got up. “I’m trying to pull together this documentary with Ronan, finalizing the album lineup, and trying not to piss off a creepy stalker. Be with him, don’t be with him, whatever. It’s obviously your call, and it seems like you’ve already made up your mind, but I don’t have to agree to be around him. I guess it doesn’t really matter anyway. We’ll be out of Grand Orchard soon, and then we won’t have to see him again.”
Landry’s last words stung the most. The thought of leaving Jonas, of ending what they’d just barely started, was almost too much to bear. Landry seemed to read her mind as she added in a softer voice, “Did you think he’d just give up his life here? To what? Follow after you like a little puppy? Would you even want him to do that?”
Paisley didn’t want Jonas to walk away from the people he loved. His job with Brady. The degree he was working on. And yet, she couldn’t imagine being without him. She couldn’t imagine going days, weeks, or months without feeling his skin sliding against hers. Without feeling their pinkies joined together. Without knowing there was someone standing at her side who only cared about her. Not the band. Not the album or the songs. Just her.
Landry didn’t say another word. She just walked away, taking any chance of peace with her and leaving Paisley in even more knots than when she’d sat down.
There was only one place Paisley would find relief now. So, instead of going inside, she went out front and had Dylan take her back to the studio. There, she sat at the keyboard and played until her fingers ached as much as her soul.
The chords and lyrics echoed with conflicting emotions. Anticipation. Expectation. Being Lost. Being Found. First Love. Lost Love. Broken relationships. Anxiety, and fear, and hope. It all poured out of her. And when she was done, she had the last two songs that she’d known were missing from the album, the last act and the big finale.
When she finally became aware of her surroundings again, hours had passed. The studio was dark except for a lamp above her keyboard. A movement in the shadows made her heart race until her eyes adjusted, and Jonas stepped forward. He sat down next to her, twining their pinkies.
They didn’t say anything. Not about the reporter, or Landry, or the emotions that raged through them like fire through dry brush. Instead, their mouths met, speaking the words of the song, the rhythms dragging along their veins. Lips and teeth and tongues beat out the patterns and chords until all that was left was the fact that this…this was where they both belonged.
As always, it was Jonas who pulled away, slowing them down, and where she normally would protest, she didn’t. Because maybe it was better this way. Maybe they could stay away from their finale by holding on to the bridge longer. Maybe by remaining tucked inside these chords where anticipation and hope still belonged, they could keep the reality of their future at bay.
“You need to play these for them,” Jonas said. His voice was full of pride and awe.
She rested her head on his shoulder and spoke the truth that had been hiding in the recesses of her brain since she’d started making music with him at her side.
“I’m afraid if I let everyone hear them, they won’t belong to me anymore―to us.”
“They might have started out as ours, sweetheart, but the world…the world deserves to hear them. The world needs to hear them. They’ll make people feel seen and understood. It’s a gift you can’t keep to yourself.”
His words pounded through her, similar in so many ways to what Landry had been saying. But sharing her music was so much easier than announcing to the world she had stage fright and anxiety so strong it paralyzed her at times. She didn’t respond. She just sat, looking at the recordings on her phone with their titles all messed up because she couldn’t spell and the words shifted on the page, and for the first time in nineteen years, she didn’t care.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Jonas
SWEET CREATURE
Performed by Harry Styles
With a heart full of sadness mixed with awe and pride, Jonas walked Paisley to her vehicle with Dylan following them. He tried again to convince her to play the songs for the band, and she didn’t respond, but he wouldn’t push because it had to be her choice. She had to see she could make the right decisions―both with the band’s music and with him. Even if he wasn’t sure he was a good choice.
Neither his talk with his therapist that afternoon nor the boxing bag he’d beat to smithereens had shed one ounce of the self-reproach burning through him. He was still angry that he’d let the stupid reporter egg him into actions he’d spent two years trying to break.
He bypassed Marco and Cassidy’s house, not feeling like he deserved the solace and forgiveness he’d find there. Not wanting to face Marco after his brother had seen him at his worst once again.
Instead, he went to the apartment and placed a video call to Maliyah.
Her chestnut hair was wrapped up in a bun, and her hazel eyes sparkled in a face that was wrinkled and getting more so every day. “Mijo! I wasn’t expecting to hear from you today.”
She’d visited them for his graduation almost two months ago and had looked fine, but today she looked overly tired. Worry flew through him.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
She laughed. “Same old Jo-Jo. My heart is fine. I’m taking my meds. Nothing is wrong with me. Stop worrying so much. It will make your hair fall out.”
Jonas ran a hand through his thick hair with a wry grin, knowing he’d never stop worrying about her. Just like she would never stop worrying about him.
“Now, tell me what has you calling me midweek,” she demanded.
He didn’t know what to say or where to begin. He wasn’t really sure why he’d called her instead of going into Marco’s place. Maybe he just needed to hear the voice of the person who’d believed in him first, who’d thought he could be something better―something more than his past.
Instead of answering with all of that, he shrugged, and she laughed.
“You’ve practically become Marco. Neither of you talks.”
Marco might not talk much, but he laughed a lot these days. He actually laughed all the damn time with Cassidy and Chevelle and even Jonas. It was like falling in love with Cassidy had taken the guilt of Marco’s past and lifted it. As if he and Cassidy carried the load together now instead of him carrying it alone.
When Jonas was with Paisley, he thought he might feel that same way, like together they could weather any storm. Did it mean he loved her? He wasn’t sure because he had so little experience with that emotion.
“The Painted Daisies are in town,” Jonas finally croaked out.
“Ahh.” Maliyah’s eyes lit with knowledge. “The girl you’ve been pining over. Has she broken your heart?”
“You’re the one with the broken heart, Tía,” Jonas groused.
She chuckled. “Don’t try to change the subject, young man. What happened?”
Jonas’s stomach contracted at the idea of telling her the truth. His fingers pounded out a rhythm on his knees, and then he let out a pained breath before saying, “I got angry and hit a reporter who was saying some ugly shit about her…”
Maliyah’s teasing smile disappeared. “Oh, Jo-Jo.”
She looked like she might cry, and it added another layer of guilt to the weight that was already upon him. When he didn’t say anything else, she asked softly, “Did this frighten her? Your anger?”
Jonas ran a hand over his face, thinking about Paisley’s panicked face that had turned to concern for him. “Yes and no. But her sister didn’t like me to begin with because of what happened with Artie. This just proved to her that I’m a loose cannon.”
Maliyah touched the screen as if she could touch him, and he had to clench his jaw tightly to hold back the tears. If there was anyone who would understand the wounds his past had left in him, it was Maliyah. She’d been a foster kid herself, abandoned and bounced around from home to home until she’d landed with her best friend’s family.
“Everyone makes mistakes, Mijo. It’s the only way we learn,” Maliyah said softly.
They were words she’d said to both Marco and him in the past. Words Marco now said to Chevelle whenever the little boy was too hard on himself. But they were words that weren’t easy to accept.
“I keep making the same ones,” he said, frustration ringing through his voice. “And every time, it costs me something―someone―I care about. Am I any better than her?”
Maliyah was serious in a way that was rare for her. “You are not your mother!”
Every day when he was little, he’d come home from school, hoping that was the day his mom would stop repeating her same mistakes. That she wouldn’t get angry and let loose her fists. That she’d give up the drugs and alcohol just because she loved him and wanted to be better for him. Every damn day, he had the same hope, until he’d ended up with a broken wrist and a concussion while she’d walked away, leaving him in a smoking car. Every day, his heart had been shattered, feeling like he was being rejected all over again.
“Don’t you see,” Maliyah said with love and sadness in her voice because she knew exactly where his head had gone. “By even caring about the mistakes and trying to make them right, it proves you’re different from her.”
Did it? He wasn’t sure if simply wanting to be better than his mom would ever make him so. It was a rabbit hole he’d traveled down many times and still didn’t have an answer for.
“Well,” Jonas said, swallowing and trying to remove the lump from his throat. “I should get some sleep. It’s going to be a long day at the studio tomorrow.”
Maliyah stared at him for a long moment before saying, “I love you, Mijo. Remember, making mistakes doesn’t mean you aren’t worthy of love and happiness.”
His throat closed, tears swelling again. He had to go before he broke down like a freaking child. “Love you too, Tía. Please take care of yourself.”
“I will. I don’t plan on going anywhere for a long time.”
They hung up, and he fell back on the bed in his one-room apartment, glancing at the slew of instruments all over the place that he’d never mastered. More mistakes. Another bad habit in a long list of them. But he had put some of his knowledge of the instruments to use behind the mixing console. Knowing more about them had allowed him to see the way they should blend together. Another favorite saying of Maliyah’s was that sometimes you couldn’t see the road you were really on because it was disguised by branches and thorns. That sometimes you had to wait until the forest broke to see the path winding down before you.
Maybe that was the problem with Paisley and him. They were in the forest, the brambles clinging to them, holding them back. Maybe they just had to make it to the clearing to find their way out.
♫ ♫ ♫
The next morning, Jonas purposefully delayed arriving at the studio until he knew the band would be in the live room warming up. He didn’t want to start something else with Landry, but there was also no way he could stay away. He had to be there if and when Paisley showed the band her new songs.
Instead of Jonas’s eyes finding Paisley’s through the glass, it was Landry’s glower that hit him. She didn’t want him there. His heart sank. While he understood her objection to his violence, he also would have thought she’d appreciate someone defending her sister.
Brady’s voice brought him back to the control room. “So…I guess more shit went down yesterday, huh?”
Jonas nodded.
“They’re all under a lot of pressure. I’m not sure anyone who isn’t an artist with a huge following can ever truly understand it. The need to outdo yourself. To make sure the fans get even more than they did the last time. And that’s not even throwing in this whole stalker issue. But I’ve been there too. The idea that there’s someone out there who is coming for the people you care about…” Brady’s voice choked on his emotions.
Jonas didn’t say anything while Brady collected himself. He’d forgotten that Brady had once had a stalker who’d tried to murder his old public relations manager―a friend of the family―someone Brady cared about. There’d even been a shootout at an award show before it had all been over.
He didn’t get a chance to respond as Paisley’s quiet voice brought his eyes back to the sound room. She was nervous, touching her birthmark. “I know we were going to work on the last song today, that we’ve pretty much finished the lineup for the album, but…” She shot a look at Jonas through the glass before taking a deep breath and continuing. “But…I’d like to play a couple of new ones to see if you might like to add them in…maybe?”
Damn, he hated that the confidence she’d been finding was suddenly wavering. The new songs weren’t just good. They were brilliant. They would weave the album into a story. She’d insisted Landry was the one that made it happen, but he knew the truth. It was all Paisley.
