Page 86 of Beneath the Stain

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Of your shattered expectations

Of a man who’s not your friend?

If I break you will I miss you,

Should your pieces disappear?

After all I have been with you

For a shitty, painful year.

Can I break you into fragments

That I paste and glue again

Or will you gather your arrangements

Cause breaking’s too much pain?

Does it help to say “I’m sorry”?

That I didn’t mean to make you cry?

Does it help if I am truthful

And tell you truly why?

So if I break you, should I fix you,

Will that be a bitter end?

Or maybe just not break you

Just shake hands with my good friend.

Mackey finished, breathless, and looked at what he’d written. Trav had tried, here and there, to get a text in edgewise, but finally he’d just stopped in the middle and saidTell me when you’re done.

He read the texts again and again, hearing the music curling up from his stomach, and even though it wasn’t about lost love, and even though he didn’t hear any screaming in the middle like with his other songs from rehab….

He liked it.

That’s good, Trav texted.I like that a lot.

Well, should I call it “Apology to Blake”?

Either that or “Grant You Bastard.”

Mackey narrowed his eyes and thought. Well, yeah. Maybe the songcouldbe written from Grant to him—but he wasn’t writing songs about or for Grant anymore. That was part of his rehab, he’d decided.

How about “The I’m Sorry Song.”

The pause told him Trav was probably thinking about it.

Yeah, fine.

Your enthusiasm will end me. I can feel it. It’s destroying my psyche with daisies, rainbows, and bunny burps.

Yes, Mackey, it’s a WONDERFUL song. I’m mad at you for not being madder at Grant.

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