One month later…
Keegan
I’ve just pulled two bottles of Sprite out of the refrigerated case when someone behind me starts singing. It’s a song I know. It’s a song I love.
You’re all my hopes
You’re all my dreams
You are the only thing, the only thing
I’ll ever need.
The last time I heard that song, Blue was singing it to me, the deep, raw timbre of his voice soaking every syllable with emotion.
We’d been sitting by the river at sunset, and I remember focusing on his fingertips, watching them caress the strings.
It was almost magical, the way Blue could summon such exquisite sounds out of his guitar.
It’s what great artists do. They tear away the superficial layers we pile around our hearts. They pierce right to the core and, at least for a moment, we’re pure, vulnerable, as authentic as a child.
“I’m starting to get kind of jealous of that guitar,” I’d quipped when he finished singing. I needed a bit of sarcasm to keep me from totally falling apart. “It’s like you’re making love to it every time you play.”
Blue’s mouth had curved up into the wicked grin I loved. A grin I hadn’t seen much of lately.
“The guitar’s just a tool. It’s you I’m making love to. Every time I play. Every time I sing.”
I lean my forehead against the cold glass of the convenience store case for a second and close my eyes, clutching the Sprites in one hand and hanging on to the handle with the other.
I'm remembering how his words made me feel.
I’m also picturing Blue’s guitar, left behind at the ranch this morning. He said he was leaving it in my care, “in case I don’t come back.”
It hurt to hear him say that.104Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJniTuAFr6c
Once Blue arrives at Fort Sill for the start of his court-martial later today, there’s a chance he won’t come back to the ranch.
But I did not want to hear that.
“Everything okay over there?”
I turn to answer the teenage girl behind the counter. She’s tall and pale, with wispy blonde hair and hunched shoulders. She’s got earbuds in, and she speaks a lot more loudly than necessary. She must have the volume turned up pretty high.
She’s giving me a wary, irritated look that tells me she’d really rather be somewhere else.
I glance around the store. I’m the only customer at the moment. So it must have been her who was singing “The Only Thing,” one of the songs Blue wrote for me.
“Sorry.” I force out a chuckle to indicate I’m harmless and bring the bottles to the cash register. “Just these two items.”
Her fingers fly over the register, and she holds out her hand for payment. I pull a five-dollar bill out of my purse and drop it into her palm.
“That song you were singing,” I say, hoping I sound nonchalant, “it’s nice. Who sings it?”
She smiles, and I see the braces on her teeth.
“Yeah, it is, huh? It’s by that soldier who’s been in the news? Blue Daniels? He released all these songs, just put ‘em online for free. They’re so good.”
She closes the register and gives me my change.
“He’s going to be court-martialed down at Fort Sill, you know? But he was just trying to help this girl over in. . .I’ve forgotten, some other country. But it’s not his fault those other guys got killed. It’s not.”
She looks out the window for a second, squinting into the sun. “Have you seen him? Blue? He’s so hot. Oh my God, his eyes. And his music is just so…so…it gets me, right here.”
She presses her fingers into her chest, above her heart. Her face is open now, her voice dreamy.
“All my friends think so too. We’re all hoping he doesn’t get sent away to prison. He doesn’t belong there.”
My hand shakes as I tip the change into the jar on the counter.
The girl doesn’t notice. She doesn’t know that the hot music man she’s pining for is sitting in a car only yards away from her. She doesn’t know that he’s mine.
“Thanks.” I manage to say. “Take care.”
I smile wryly at Blue as I climb into the backseat of Holmlund’s BMW.
“I just met a fan of yours, Mr. Rockstar,” I say, punching him lightly on the arm as I hand him a Sprite.
One eyebrow goes up, and his mouth hovers somewhere between a smile and a smirk. “Oh yeah?”
I tell Blue about the girl and the song. I tease him about being an object of desire for dreamy teenagers. I don’t tell him what the convenience store clerk said about the trial.
But still, a shadow crosses his face.
He looks toward the store just as Holmlund finishes filling the gas tank and gets back into the driver’s seat.
“What was that?” Holmlund asks over his shoulder as he’s clicking his seatbelt into place. “Something about Blue’s music?”
So I fill him in, again not mentioning the girl’s comments about the trial, but emphasizing her enthusiasm for the songs Frasier Bryson posted about a month ago, after he came to the ranch to visit Blue.
Bryson thought putting the set of songs Blue wrote for me out there would build public support. He wanted Blue’s permission to upload the videos he’d made of him singing. He also wanted to start speaking out on his behalf.
“Believe it or not, I still have a bit of pull in the music business," Bryson said with a self-deprecating smile. "I know some of the people who are influencers, who could make a difference just by saying something good about Blue. I could reach out to them, tell them Blue’s story, get them to really listen.”
I had to admit, there was something mesmerizing about Bryson. The man has this presence about him that draws you in.
Still, when he first suggested releasing Blue’s songs, I was skeptical. The last thing Blue needed, I thought, was more publicity.
“But what good will it do to have Blue’s songs out there?” I’d asked that night at the ranch. “It’s not going to keep him from being court-martialed.”
Bryson turned his intense gaze on me.
“Music, good music, turns people,” he said. “They’ll forgive almost anything if you can reach them with your songs. The videos I made are raw, but that’s exactly what we want. They’re raw and real. Blue didn’t even know I was recording them. People are going to pick up on that, on the authenticity. They’re going to listen to the songs, share them. And it will change how people feel about Blue. I know it will.”
He’d shifted his eyes from me to Blue, and his face softened.
“Making music, creating music, is curative," he added. "It’s an act of compassion. For others. And for yourself. People respond to that. They always have. Blue knows that.”
At first, Blue did not want to do it.
“I didn’t write those songs to ‘turn’ people,” he’d said, vehemently. “I didn’t write them to get famous or to get out of anything. I wrote them for Keegan.”
Eventually, though, once Holmlund signed off on it, Blue agreed. And within a week, his videos had been viewed over a million times.
People have been downloading his songs like crazy. Celebrities have started mentioning his case, speaking out about him as a Good Samaritan caught up in a terrible tragedy.
The plan seems to be working.
Now, all I can do is hope and pray it will have an effect on the panel and the military judge, on anyone who may have a hand in determining Blue’s fate.
~~~
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