It had been over two weeks since I had screwed up and slept with the groupie, and I still hadn't told anyone, especially not Bea. It was eating me up inside. I was desperate to tell someone about it, desperate to get on my knees and beg for her forgiveness, but I didn't have a way to reach her, and I didn't know who else to tell.
With a sigh, I walked out of my hotel room, shutting the door behind me. I didn't exactly know where I was going, I didn't know what the best things to do in Nashville were, I just knew I needed to get out of the room. I was going a little stir crazy, if I was being honest with myself. I just wanted to be home.
As I suspected and half-hoped, I ran into Paul as he was leaving his room. A thin smile spread across his mouth and he glanced at me from head to toe before speaking.
"Funny how we keep doing this. Where are you going?" he asked, pressing the button for the lobby.
I waited until the elevator doors dinged shut, giving myself a moment to collect my thoughts before answering. It hadn't been too difficult to learn his schedule. Any time he got into one of his weird moods, he'd give up on the groupies for awhile and just spend every off day religiously following his routine. Wake up and be out of the room by 7:05, grab a cup of coffee for breakfast at 7:15, spend the day in the city, be back for a very light dinner at the hotel at 8, do a light workout at 9, and be in bed by 10. Once he fell into the groove, he stayed there for a long time.
"I'm not sure yet," I settled on at last as an answer to his question. "You?"
"There's a hall of fame for country music on Music Row, I thought it would be interesting to check it out. I know no one in there would really be competition to us, but hey, I'm sure I could learn something of value," he said with a shrug.
There was a pause as we both sort of glanced at each other out of the corners of our eyes before he shrugged again, turning his gaze to his reflection in the mirrored wall of the elevator, adjusting his shirt and hair and jewelry and belt and just about everything before speaking again.
"If you'd like, you're welcome to come with me," he said, almost to himself, but still loud enough that I could hear.
"I'd like that," I said, unsure why I hadn't just asked him myself if I could tag along.
We didn't talk much as the cab took us to the museum, both of us staring at the window, as if we were strangers, not people who had been friends for years. I paid the fare this time, walking inside with Paul.
It wasn't too crowded but it wasn't completely empty either, and we bought our tickets before blending into the crowd. Paul wandered over to a wall of plaques of country artists who had been inducted over the years, and I just trailed after him like a lost puppy, unsure of where else to go. Of course I could easily have walked through the museum by myself, I was a grown adult, but I opted to stick by him. We stood there in silence for a moment before I couldn't take it any longer.
"I slept with a groupie the first day of the tour," I blurted out.
There was a pause as a strange expression spread across Paul's face, the look in his eyes shifting. I couldn't tell what he was thinking, but I knew he was unhappy. It was a subtle shift, as if he didn't want me to know how he was feeling, but he couldn't hide it entirely. He wasn't happy at all.
"Oh. Why're you telling me?" he asked after a pause.
"I...don't know," I mumbled, cheeks beginning to burn.
"What happened with Beatrice? You decide you just couldn't settle the score after all?" he teased with a grin, bouncing back quickly, too quickly. There was something wrong with him, but I couldn't place it.
"No, I just...I don't know," I said, gazing off into the distance. "I don't know. But I wish I hadn't. Do you think she'll be mad at me? Dammit I wish I hadn't. I don't want to have fucked up my chances with her. Should I tell her?"
I was begging him for reassurance, for advice, for just anything to make me feel just a little bit better. A frown tugged at his lips, starting off as his usual faint frown before getting deeper and deeper, lines on his face standing out a lot more than they usually did.
"You should tell her," he said, voice thick, before he cleared his throat with a cough. "Sorry, frog in my throat. Anyway, yeah, you should tell her when you get back. Did you make things official with her before you left?"
"No," I said, drumming my fingers nervously on the railing I was leaning on. "No, no. She even uh...told me to just do whatever I wanted on the tour, and see how I felt about her after. But I still feel like she'll be disappointed in me. You think she will be?"
He looked at me, dark eyes getting darker for a moment before he shrugged, gaze sliding off my face and slowly returning to the wall of plaques we had been reading. "I don't know. You know her better than I do, don't you?"
"Do I?" I asked, unsure what was wrong with him, but he laughed, the same usual expression settling over his face as he arched an eyebrow.
"Well I'd hope so. I'm not close with her, Gene. We met once in the art store, and since then I've just been a middleman between the two of you. I have no idea how she'll feel. But I think she'd like to know what happened."
"How should I--"
"Do you think we'll ever get into a place like this?" he asked abruptly, and I let the question I was trying to ask shrivel up and die.
"The Country Music Hall of Fame? No, I don't think so," I said with a grin, and he rolled his eyes.
"That's not what I meant. I just meant like...a museum in general. That would be interesting. It's hard to believe, isn't it? Just a few years ago we were playing for crowds of 30 people. Now we're playing for crowds of 30,000," he said.
"Yeah. Wild. But I'm not complaining. This is everything we've always dreamed of, you know? The fame and the fortune and everything that comes with it. We're on our way to the top, we're the band--"
"We never saw onstage," Paul finished for me, before a soft sigh escaped his lips. "I know. But..."
He paused, before shaking his head. "Ah, forget it. I'll save it for Dr. Hilsen," he muttered to himself.
"You can talk to me about things too," I blurted out. "You're my friend. You can...you can talk to me about things."
My reassurance fizzled out as he gave me a look, almost pityingly, as if he was amused by my stupid suggestion, as if I was just some idiot throwing words the way a caveman hurled rocks.
"I know. But you're not my therapist," he said, before folding his arms across his chest, starting to close himself off again. I could practically see him building brick walls between us. "And I can't talk to you about everything."
"Oh," I said lamely. I didn't know what else to say.
