“True. Should I start, or do you want to?”
“You. Tell me some Helen Britney trivia.”
“Let’s see. Okay. I’ve tried to go vegan a few times, but I love cheese too much. My favorite move is Young Adult, I’m not a pet person, and I won’t watch spectator sports because it makes me too antsy. Oh, and I can’t cook for squat, but I have found some success with those meal kit services.”
Brian played with her hair. “Why does watching sports make you antsy?”
They travelled down a stretch of Interstate. A muted, mellow song played on the car stereo, complementing the cabin’s tasteful powder scent and enhancing the effects of hard-fought relaxation.
“I guess I feel self-conscious about sitting there on my butt, often eating something unhealthy like nachos, while watching others work out. Makes me feel guilty, like I should get off the couch and go play tennis.”
He laughed, understated and toasty. “Fair.”
“Your turn.”
“I run six miles every morning, cook a mean green curry, and read every night before bed. And I can get behind Young Adult. It’s rather brilliant, actually.”
“Whoa. I thought everyone but me hated that movie. No love for the female anti-hero, yet people fell all over themselves for Dexter and House.”
Brian plucked a fallen strand of her hair from her jeans, an endearing mammalian gesture of care. “I suppose I related to a theme of what I interpreted as writer’s block. Though I’m glad to say I don’t have that issue anymore. Thanks to you.”
“You’re sweet.”
“I’m being honest.”
“Stop it before I cry. Now give me a wacky anecdote about life on the road.”
His good-natured murmur held decades of memories and stories, a treasure trove of Brian-related things she looked forward to learning bit by bit. “I have some choice cuts. What do you want to know?”
“Tell me the story of the weirdest person you’ve ever met on tour.”
“I have it at my fingertips. You’re in luck. So a bunch of us are playing poker in a hotel room one night, and this man strolls in like he’s a crime boss. A real rough character, about seven feet tall with a black beard and size-fourteen motorcycle boots. He stank like an ashtray and had scars on his face. He sits down at the card table and starts talking himself up. Says he works in the black market as a mafia fixer, and that his main job is making guns disappear. Then he’s on about about how he lived in Israel and trained in Krav Maga and has killed dozens of men. Etcetera.”
“I call bullshit. An authentic mob goon wouldn’t blab about it to strangers at the first opportunity.”
“You’d think,” Brian whispered in a theatrical voice. “But his eyes, Helen. They were as dead as doll eyes.”
“So you let him win?”
“Hell no. I cleaned him out. He was rather daft, but terrifying at the same time. I made my bodyguard sleep in front of my door that night. In case What’s-His-Name tried to break into my hotel room and kill me with his Krav Maga.”
“If that was for real, wouldn’t he have killed everyone at the card table with his Krav Maga and taken all of your money?”
“She’s too smart. Yet another reason I love her.”
Chit-chat and banter went on for awhile like this, and the more they talked, enjoyed an easy and looping rapport in the car, the deeper she fell in love with Brian. She learned about his early life on a rural farm in the English Midlands, how destabilizing it was for him to move to London at thirteen. He talked about his cold, unloving grandmother and his struggles to fit in at the elite school he attended to refine his musical talents. The story of how he met the other Fyre guys, and how the ragtag bunch of outsiders found themselves through friendship and music.
Brian started out on the violin and showed great academic promise, but to the disappointment of his teachers and grandmother, he dropped out of Cambridge after a year to focus on Fyre. He admitted to some regrets, but emphasized that he would not go back and live his life any other way if given the choice. He’d been shy and clumsy with girls ever since puberty and never quite took to the hedonistic groupie scene throbbing at the sweaty core of rock and roll. Sure, he tried to get into the parties because everyone was doing it, but figured out quickly that shallow sex and excess weren’t his preference.
Helen told him her life story while he listened, attentive, reassuring her with nonverbal cues and touches.
The conversation reached a comfortable lull, at which point Brian broke into a delicious rendition of Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams.” Every word in his rich, deep voice was heartfelt and trippy, the stuff of transcendental dreams.
While he sang of crystal visions, loneliness, and thunder happening only during the rain, Helen knew that she was exactly where she needed to be. Her dreams had come true.
She looked up at Brian. Though he was above her, height-wise, he looked up at her as well.
In that moment, tiny yet massive, the cosmos showered blessings upon Helen, and she allowed herself to receive them with gratitude.
She’d found not only her forever person on her crazy magical journey, she’d found her purpose. Her passion. Her place. She’d conquered her demons—figuratively and literally.
With her man beside her, it was time to get back to Minneapolis and run a rockin’ business. Expand. Teach workshops. Be the best guide and mentor she could be.
For the first time in years, maybe ever, Helen looked forward to the future. Her world stretched before her, a meadow to skip through instead of a graveyard full of zombies ready to rip her flesh.
She didn’t have to run from one unstable domicile to the next in search of that elusive home. She was there.
As if reading her, Brian leaned in and claimed her in the softest, sweetest, most swoon-worthy kiss.
Lost in a cloud of love
