Page 3 of Lady Sings the Blues

Poor, poor Hadley. The sentiment repeated a good five times by the woman on the other end of the line in our short, one-minute conversation. That is, once she took me off hold. Hadley is loved. Hadley is hometown, and I’m outsider. Not just any outsider—traitor, bitch, whore, or any combination of the former. Traitor-bitch. Bitch-whore. Sometimes depending on how country they try to sound, someone will occasionally jumble the three togethertraitorbitchwhorein a rather unintelligible manner, which is supposed to offend or intimidate me. But honestly, it makes them sound drunk so stifling the giggle becomes hard. Like it makes me a saint not to giggle, hard.

As I make my way up Market Street, because every—and I do mean every—town in Kentucky has a Market, Commerce, or Main Street, my foot hits the break of its own will to stop in front of the scene of the crime. The place where I first met Logan Hollister. Or as he’s also known, the reason I’m atraitorbitchwhore.

God, he was beautiful. And that day, he had eyes only for me. He and his cousin Beau were hanging out. Those two were always hanging out back then. Crew cuts, clean shaven, expensive clothing. These guys were the epitome of the all-American boy-next-door jocks.

Beau was a grade ahead and already had his early admission to the University of Kentucky, or what everyone down here shortens to UK, for when he graduated. And he was beautiful, too. Good genes, the Hollister family. But as I said before, once Logan and I locked eyes that was it.

My dad had moved home after he and my mom divorced. It was undecided where I would live because my mom packed up and moved away from where we lived outside Kalamazoo to Denver. So either way I’d be leaving my school and friends behind. Little did I know the impact of being born up north, in Michigan, would have on my acceptance in the community. Enveloped between the love and warmth from my father and the Hollister boys, I never felt the impact. Up north, we don’t think it makes a difference where a person hales from. But in a small southern town, it makes a huge difference. Especially once I no longer had the Hollisters to protect me.

We met the summer before our junior year. And obviously that one day sealed my fate. I knew, just knew where I’d be living.

And his opening line was a doozie: “You’ve got kind lips,” he said. Big, bright smile full ofperfectly straight, white teeth.

Flattered and completely taken aback that such a specimen of masculine beauty would even speak to me much less send off a compliment, I smiled back. “I do?”

Totally fell into that one.

“Yeah, the kind I’d like to see wrapped around my—” But he didn’t finish. Waggling his eyebrows at me suggestively instead. The line shouldn’t have worked. Come to think of it, I should have been mortified. It was the eyebrow waggle that did it.

And thus began the reign of Logan Hollister and Elise Manning.

Life would be so different now if I’d just used my head that day. Walked away. Moved with my mother to Denver.

It still hurts. To think of what he might have been now. Whatwemight have been now. No use crying over spilt milk or dead boyfriends. Past should stay in the past.

Get in. Bury my father. Get out. Seems like the perfect game plan.

Time to get this over with and get gone.

I continue on to the funeral home, successfully ignoring the memories assaulting me from all directions now.

Mr. Delavigne, the funeral director, meets me at the door. He graduated with my dad—and as it were, Hadley’s dad. So of course, he’s none too thrilled to see me. Not that my dad’s death was my fault in any way. He fell off a ladder cleaning out the gutters on his and Hadley’s home. But I’d stayed away all these years, since the fallout with Logan, so that made me a terrible daughter.

“Just need you to sign some papers and write the check,” he says with as much curt punctuation in his tone as a business man can without being outright hostile.

“Sure,” I tell him. And follow him in to sign those papers and write the check.

***

There’s not enough bourbon in this state to make me forget today. Half the town still hates me for Logan. The other half, for my leaving my dad, even though they didn’t want me to stay in the first place. Why would I expect the universe to take it easy on me? Driving here after leaving the funeral home, I’m stuck sitting outside my dad’s house. I have to sit on the curb because Hadley wouldn’t let me in when I knocked.

He’s my dad. I loved him even if I had to stay away. And it’s not like he couldn’t come visit me. I’d have welcomed him into my home at any time. We talked semi-regularly on the phone, but it just so happens that he went out and found himself a replacement for both me and mom in one fell swoop. Old enough to sleep with and young enough to be his daughter, Hadley didn’t want to visit, so they didn’t visit. Booty over DNA. She never liked to not be the center of my father’s attention. Of course, this tidbit gets ignored by everyone but me. One of the perks of being homegrown.

Word of the day: Abysmal.

I fail to believe another word exists in the English language to as fully express the sentiment of this trip, and it’s only just begun. I hang my head in my hands, propped up by my elbows on my knees. My pose screams defeated, screams it as loud as if I used jazz hands and spirit fingers to draw attention to myself.

“Elise?”

I look up. And smile, returning the crooked smile of the gorgeous man with the peanut butter bun walking my way. Now I get to admire all the tattoos which had somehow escaped my attention in the darkened bar earlier. Because let’s face it, there’s something super sexy about a man with tattoos.

“Hey. Mark, right?”

His crooked smile grows even bigger.

“How’s it going?”

“Ah, you know… If I was doin’ any better, I’d have to be twins. How ‘bout you?”

“If you’re twins, then I’m a miscarriage.”

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