This had been sitting around nameless and half-finished until all that Bluebird goodness. Hiatus blues have already set in - write, write, write, people. Also a really big thank you for all your reviews on previous stories, you always make me smile :)
Rayna pushed the kitchen door open with her foot, her arms full of grocery bags. The house was quiet for a split second before two sets of footsteps thundered down the stairs, Maddie and Daphne appearing and eagerly taking the shopping.
'Where is he? Is he with you?'
'He didn't change his mind, did he?'
She dropped her purse on the counter and held up her hands, torn between calming them down and wanting him to see how happy they were on his account.
'He hasn't changed his mind, no. He's just bringing some of his things in from his truck, give him a minute, okay?'
What Rayna didn't say was that she thought Deacon might need a little more than a minute, if the look on his face during the drive from his place to hers had been anything to go by. He hadn't said it, but he chewed his lip when he was nervous, and he'd all but bitten through it in the fifteen minutes it had taken them to get across town.
'Can we go help him?' Maddie asked, her face so earnest that Rayna splintered into yet another piece inside. She was in so many pieces these days she was surprised she didn't rattle like broken china when she walked.
'You know what, y'all can help by making him some tea, how about that? I'm sure he'd like a nice cup of -'
'Anythin' but that herbal stuff, Ray. Not the herbal stuff.'
There he was, Deacon, hovering in the doorway a little uncertainly in his overcoat and boots, but there was a smile on his lips and he opened his arms gratefully when the girls ran to him.
'You're here,' Maddie said in relief, and he nodded, kissing the top of her head.
'I sure am sweetie.' He looked up at Rayna, who was doing a little hovering of her own by the counter, not wanting to fuss over him but wanting him to feel welcomed, and ending up in a sort of foxtrot with the fruit bowl.
'Where's your stuff?' she asked. He hadn't let her help him unpack the truck, telling her he was good, which in Deacon-speak meant he needed a little breather.
'Right here.' He held up a solitary overnight bag and a guitar case. Rayna lifted an eyebrow, and he shrugged. 'I travel light.'
He let Maddie and Daphne lead him further into the kitchen, Maddie wrestling the bag from him and dropping it at the bottom of the stairs.
'We got you something,' she said, signalling to Daphne, who bounded off and returned with a gift-wrapped package. They handed it to him together, and he tore off the layer of pale blue paper to reveal a pair of slippers.
'We thought they'd make you feel at home, now that this is your home,' Daphne said, as though it was that simple, and Deacon pulled her in for a hug, looking at Maddie over her head.
It had been a strange few weeks since he'd told Rayna about his cancer, an odd and surprising mix of some of the most difficult and beautiful times of his life. Rayna had fallen completely apart at first, so acutely he could feel the pain radiate off her, but they'd spent that first couple of days at the cabin while she processed, and while he processed the new reality of her knowing. By the time they made the trip back to Nashville, she had switched into full on Rayna Jaymes mode to a degree beyond anything he'd ever seen - finding a way for him to get better was the only possibility, and she was hellbent on it.
He wouldn't have admitted to himself quite how desperately he'd needed her to know, and needed her determination to hold on to, but now that he had her by his side he wasn't at all sure how he'd been coping without her.
Maddie, being a potent combination of the two of them, had landed somewhere in the middle of their reactions. Her horror and cold fear had silenced her for a few days at first, when all she'd been able to do was cling to Rayna, cling to him, and cry, not wanting to talk about any of it. Once the initial shock had started to subside, she'd internalised her grief, turning to her guitar and her writing for comfort; Deacon recognised much of himself in her for that. She had Rayna's fight though, and it was after he'd agreed to move in with them that he'd started to see it come through.
No one had ever bought him slippers before. He wasn't even sure he'd actually owned a pair; slippers were something that symbolised home, and the only home Deacon had ever really built had been with Rayna for those all-too-short years when clothes, let alone slippers, hadn't really been high on their agenda.
'Thank you,' he told them, feeing his heart swell and reaching out to brush a thumb over his daughter's cheek, Daphne still hugging him tight.
'Welcome home Dad,' Maddie said.
Maybe it was that simple.
/
The girls insisted on taking his things up to the guest room that had been earmarked as his, a big, airy room with an en-suite and a wide window overlooking the garden below. It was across the hall from Rayna's room, something that wasn't at all lost on Deacon. There had been so much distance for so long, and now a couple of steps was all that would separate them while they lay asleep at night.
He stood just inside the doorway clutching his guitar for dear life as Maddie and Daphne opened closet doors to show him where he could hang his clothes and piled fresh towels on his bed. Rayna stood a couple of feet away from him and let the girls take charge, and he glanced at her. She didn't really know what to do with her hands, he noticed; she tried shoving them in the back pockets of her jeans but that clearly felt awkward, so she rested one loosely on her hip and shuffled from one foot to the other. She was nervous. The realisation made him feel a hell of a lot better.
'Thanks for this Ray,' he said, catching her eye and smiling, and she let out a breath, her arms dropping to her sides and settling there.
Scarlett had left town that morning, not without tears, headed for her support slot on the Rascal Flatts tour. She'd be gone for a couple of weeks, not exactly a century, but Deacon couldn't deny the feeling that every moment weighed a lot these days, that they were worth more than ever now that he wasn't sure he had many left. He knew it was the same for those close to him, and Scarlett had taken some persuasion to accept the offer of the tour. She'd struggled with the fallout from his diagnosis, and Deacon knew as well as anyone how music healed, how being on tour could be an escape from tough times.
He was sure that Scarlett wouldn't have considered going out on the road had he not told Rayna about the cancer when he had, and the two events had coincided in such a way that Rayna had a pretty strong case for asking him to move in with her and the girls. The asking part was really a formality - she hadn't given him an option exactly, and he hadn't put up much resistance anyway. Truth be told, there was nowhere he'd rather be than with them, and if that meant shifting pairs of his worn jeans and old flannels into her fancy house with more bathrooms than rooms in his own house, then so be it.
'Do you need anything?' she asked when the girls headed back downstairs, and Deacon shook his head and sat down on the bed.
'I think I'm good. Got enough clean towels to last me a lotta showers. Or bubble baths, if Daphne's recommendations are anything to go by.'
'The tub in that bathroom is pretty incredible,' Rayna said, 'she's right. It has jacuzzi jets, you know.' He let out a low whistle and she laughed. 'Are you gonna be okay in here Deacon? This room I mean?'
They'd agreed that he'd have one of the guest rooms for several reasons - the girls, and their adjusting to him living with them, simultaneous to adjusting to this new reality where he wasn't invincible, where they feared what may happen; Deacon's sense of independence, of being able to stand on his own two feet, though he was finally ready to accept their support. And then there was the big question of what he and Rayna were - they'd spent an emotional couple of days at the cabin when she'd gone up there looking for him after their duet at the Opry, and it had been natural for them that such shattering news had driven them to hold on tight to each other, that they'd needed to be as close as humanly possible in every sense while everything around them crumbled. They'd lay in front of a crackling fire, whispering, crying, having sex over and over. When they'd headed back to Nashville it had been with the agreement that they would focus on doing whatever it took to get Deacon better, that they wouldn't complicate things further for the time being - whatever would unfold would do so with no pressure. What happened at the cabin stayed at the cabin, as had been true so many times before.
'Kinda weird huh,' he said, 'me bein' here?'
'We'll all get used to it,' Rayna said, and just the sound of the surety in her voice reassured him. 'We're makin' your favourite for dinner, spaghetti - you couldn't possibly not feel at home after that.'
She used to make him her mama's spaghetti back when they lived together, in times when he needed comfort food, and there were many of those. She'd stir, he'd chop, and they'd eat until until they both felt better, something about it wholesome and familiar when he felt dirty and lost. Without fail afterwards he'd carry her to bed, the dishes forgotten, and thank her until she was sweaty and exhausted in his arms.
Since Rayna had found out about him being sick she'd been very careful not to make him feel like she was smothering him, and he was grateful for it. The big things, her coming to his doctor's appointments, researching his particular kind of illness, getting tested to see if she was a match - they mattered, a hell of a lot. But the little things were just as meaningful. She'd been calling him before both of them fell asleep at night, not to say much of anything, just to remind him that he wasn't alone. She'd stayed for Maddie's guitar lessons, something that was good for all of them, particularly in the days after they'd told the girls.
And now she was making him spaghetti.
He snagged her hand before she could leave the room, overcome with love for her. The intensity of it rushed through him and she sensed it, and moved between his legs, squeezing his fingers in return.
'I'm glad you're here Deacon,' she whispered, and he kissed the inside of her palm.
'Me too, Ray. Me too.'
'Wanna come downstairs and help me chop?'
/
They ate together, the four of them, Maddie talking about school and the new song she'd written the night before, Daphne scooping more food onto Deacon's plate every time he got anywhere near clearing it, as though feeding him up was her answer to making him better.
'I've been thinking,' she announced, spearing a chunk of mushroom, 'if you need a new liver, maybe we can just ask people if they have one they can give to you. Lots of people come to see you at The Bluebird and places when you sing - they all have livers, right?'
'It doesn't work like that Daphne,' Maddie said, rolling her eyes. 'They have to have the right liver, it has to be a match.'
'So any of us might have one that's right?'
'It's more likely that your blood relatives would be a match. Scarlett isn't though.' She looked pointedly from Rayna to Deacon. 'I don't know if I am.'
They'd talked in that first couple of days up at the cabin about how to handle Maddie's inevitable wish to be tested; she'd asked almost immediately, and they'd explained that it wasn't possible, but she hadn't let it go, regardless.
'We've talked about that sweetheart, you're too young to be a donor. We'll hopefully find someone who is, but in the meantime Deacon is on the list for a transplant, and that could happen any day.'
Maddie grumbled something and pushed her plate away, asking to be excused.
'You can leave the table when you've finished your dinner,' Rayna said, kindly but firmly, and Maddie pulled her food back towards her and sulked down at it.
Daphne watched her sister with frank sympathy, but Deacon could see the cogs turning in her head - she was a practical kid, never afraid to face something head-on and tackle it, just like her mother.
Rayna, however, had fallen quiet, and was twisting pieces of spaghetti around her fork. She was a fixer, someone people turned to and relied on, as strong as an ox, by all accounts. And yet here was something she couldn't fix herself, and he knew it had shaken her to her core. She let the pasta unravel without lifting it to her mouth, starting elsewhere on her plate and twisting aimlessly, her eyes unfocused. He knew better than anyone else how vulnerable she was beneath that exterior when it came to him and her girls, and here she was, with all of their hearts on the line.
/
The girls headed to bed after dark, and Deacon marvelled as they bid him sweet dreams that he'd never spent the night at Rayna's house before - but why would he have? This was the place she'd lived with Teddy, not him. When they'd reunited briefly before he'd found out about Maddie, they'd stayed at his place rather than hers, something he hadn't understood at the time but did now. They'd been in a completely different place, secrets still hanging in the air between them, and it had been them, the same love, the same force that had always pulled them together, but the them of the past, as though they'd rewound fifteen years, an attempt to plaster over the wrongs rather than heal and move on from them. Back then he would have felt out of place in her house, and she hadn't wanted to blend the present and their past. Now, though, everything had changed.
He kissed the girls goodnight and settled back onto the couch opposite Rayna, feeling a little self conscious. They may have moved considerably forwards of late, but this wasn't his house, it wasn't the place he usually took off his shoes and put up his feet, and he was a little unsure what to do with himself or how to be, given the strange situation. Home, though, was wherever Rayna was, and he thought back to all the hotel rooms, the tour buses, the places that had felt like theirs simply because they'd been in them together.
'You want tea?' she asked, her voice the low, smoky kind she spoke in when she was tired. He was suddenly very aware that they were alone, and that she was waiting for his answer.
'I should go to bed,' he said, but she was up and heading for the kitchen anyway, and he got up to follow her. She pottered about opening and closing cupboards, and he watched her; he thought he probably knew where she kept things, but he made mental notes anyway - where the tea lived, which drawer the teaspoons were in.
'Been a long day, huh?' Rayna said when they sat back down, on the same couch this time. She let her head fall back to rest on the plump cushions, her body turned towards him, and cradled her mug. 'How you feeling about bein' here?'
'Gonna take a little bit of gettin' used to,' he admitted. 'That bed upstairs looks a whole lot comfier than mine though, that'll be one easy adjustment.'
She laughed softly, and he couldn't help himself - his eyes flickered down to her lips, fixating on the way they formed a perfect Cupid's bow. It would be so easy to lean over and kiss her, but he didn't. That wasn't why she'd invited him to live with them, and he wasn't about to mess it up on the first night. Complicated, that's what they were. When had they ever not been?
They sipped their drinks in silence, the way that only people infinitely familiar with each other could, until she put hers down on the coffee table and stretched.
'I'm gonna go up to bed,' she said, and reached over to kiss him on the cheek.
'Hey Ray,' he said, feeling the tingle on his skin, 'thank you, for this, for...'
'You don't need to thank me Deacon, you know that.'
He got up with her, suddenly exhausted, and they climbed the stairs together, pausing awkwardly in the hallway between their rooms.
'Goodnight Ray.'
She wrapped her arms around herself and headed for her door. 'Goodnight Deacon,' she replied as she pushed it open and disappeared.
He wasn't sure how long he stood there staring after her when the door closed, but he was relieved there were no creaky floorboards to give him away when he eventually retreated to spend his first night across the hall.
#
Breakfast was something of a raucous affair in the Jaymes-Conrad household, quite different to the solitary - with the occasional addition of Scarlett - toast and coffee routine Deacon was used to.
Maddie and Daphne were like whirlwinds, racing down the stairs showered and dressed, to his surprise.
'Mornin',' he greeted them, fiddling with the hi-tech coffee machine he was pretty sure could launch a rocket into space but didn't seem to dispense actual coffee.
'Hey,' Maddie returned. She was a little cautious, stopping short of throwing herself at him for a hug as she usually did when she saw him. They'd been treading carefully around each other since he'd told her about his diagnosis, but she'd been unquestionably all for him moving in, and he had a feeling she would come around little by little now that he had.
'Um, Deacon?' Daphne said, trotting over to him and hitting a red button on the machine. It started hissing immediately, thick black liquid spurting from it a few seconds later.
'Whoa,' he said, jumping back a step. 'Thanks, Daph. I er... I was gonna try that one next.' She gave him the knowing look of a ninety year old woman who'd seen it all and yanked open the refrigerator.
'Where's Mom? She's usually up by this time.'
'Haven't seen her yet this morning,' Deacon said, feeling oddly guilty at Maddie's curious expression. He knew she'd been wondering if him moving in meant that he and Rayna were back together, and she hadn't asked but it wouldn't be long before she did. They'd have to find a way to answer her, and he was relieved when she nodded in acceptance and pulled a carton of orange juice out of the refrigerator without further questioning.
'I got some pancakes cookin' for y'all,' he told them, changing the subject, and both girls leaned over to look at the bubbling creations on the stove.
'Wow...' Daphne said, wide-eyed. 'Mom has no idea how to make pancakes. You're a good person to have moved in.'
Maddie was similarly impressed, and wolfed what was an improbable amount of pancakes, which Deacon took to mean she was starting to feel better about things, and that maybe she didn't think his cooking sucked, which was always a bonus in this how-to-be-a-Dad landscape he was still getting to grips with every day.
'Hey y'all,' Rayna's groggy voice said as they were washing up their empty plates, and Deacon turned to see her padding down the stairs barefoot, her pyjamas still on and her her hair all over the place. She looked like she hadn't slept at all. He could relate to that; he smiled a good morning at her over the top of the extra-strong black coffee he was depending on to get him through the day.
'Hey yourself,' he said. 'You sleep okay?'
She wouldn't quite meet his eye, and he knew she'd spent the night tossing and turning just as much as he had. It had been too much of a distraction knowing she was a few steps away, the question swirling around his mind well into dawn - if he'd got up and walked through her door, would she have turned him away?
He pressed the mysterious red button again and handed her a fresh coffee, proud of himself for managing it the second time around. She took it from him gratefully and gulped half of it down without so much as pausing to blow on the steam.
'I don't know how you do that,' he said, and when she finally looked at him he felt something bubble up in his stomach.
She shot him a wink. 'I need the caffeine to get in there fast, no messin' around.' She held an arm out like she was hooked up to a drip and closed her eyes, and Deacon laughed. 'I don't remember the last time I slept through my alarm, I'm sorry y'all. Who needs breakfast? What are we doing?'
'All done Mom, don't worry,' Daphne said, patting her shoulder. 'Deacon cooked for us already.'
'He did?'
'Yup. He's pretty good.'
'We saved you some,' Maddie told her, pulling on oven gloves and lifting a plate of pancakes out of the oven where they were keeping warm.
She always had loved Deacon's pancakes - he could recall a catalog of occasions their sugary goodness had helped him to work his charm on her. She perched on the edge of a stool, clearly not quite convinced there weren't things to be done, but Maddie and Daphne were pulling on their shoes and shrugging on their backpacks, and she was peering at her plate as though she might drool on it.
'These smell so good Deacon...'
'Well you tuck right on in, I've got this school run thing sorted,' he said, sliding the maple syrup towards her. Rayna never ate a pancake without drowning it in maple syrup, however reluctant she was to admit it - he knew every weakness she had.
'You're taking the girls to school?'
'Sure am. I'll be back in a little while.'
He picked up his keys from the counter and the girls scurried over to kiss her, one on each cheek. Deacon resisted the urge to go for her lips and instead waved a hand and strode towards the door, leaving Rayna with a fork in one hand, syrup in the other.
When he returned half an hour later, she was asleep with her head on the counter, an empty plate next to her, not so much as a crumb left on it.
#
It was chilly in Rayna's kitchen at night. Deacon hadn't thought to put on any socks, and a T-shirts and boxers weren't really the warmest attire. He'd have made himself coffee but he figured that would do away with even any small chance he had of sleep, and he didn't want the whistling of the kettle to wake anyone.
She had a cleaner who came over every couple of days to give the place a once over. It was spotless, always, but he'd found himself searching through cupboards and drawers for a dishcloth and some detergent, the kind that smelled of apples, and had set to wiping surfaces.
Rayna's kitchen. He wondered when, if, he would ever see it as his too. He didn't know what the future held, for him, for them, whether he would overcome this and move back into his own house, whether they'd figure out their shit and he'd stay here permanently. Whether he'd overcome it at all.
He tossed the cloth onto the counter and let his head rest in his hands for a moment.
'Deacon? What are you doing?'
He spun around: there stood Rayna, in an old Bluebird T-shirt that was hanging off one shoulder, and a tiny pair of... he wasn't sure if they were panties or shorts, but whatever they were, there wasn't much of them, and he wasn't about to get himself shot for looking. He was suddenly fascinated by a little smudge he found next to a chopping board, and he scrubbed earnestly at it, the cloth squeaking beneath his fingers.
'I'm cleanin' the kitchen.'
'At three o'clock in the morning?'
'I couldn't sleep,' he said, sure he was about to wear the surface away completely. He could hear the weariness in his own voice - he knew she'd see right through him.
Rayna was quiet for a moment, and he kept his eyes obediently trained on his cloth but he felt her move towards him. When he looked up she was leaning against the fridge opposite, arms folded, head to the side, watching.
'Wanna write a song?'
/
He'd been in Rayna's music room before plenty of times, but he'd never written in it. Teddy hadn't been a fan of her writing with Deacon at all, anywhere, but under his roof was the last place he'd have allowed. Teddy no longer lived here though, and Deacon was finally free to really take in all the memories that filled the room - their old records on the walls, the pictures of them on stages all over the country. On the mantelpiece was a little glass jar filled with guitar picks that he'd given to her on her twenty-second birthday, little tags on the back of each one noting the cities they'd been in when he'd used them, each one reminding her in his scrawly handwriting that he loved her. He knew it had been there for years, and he also knew Teddy would never have understood its relevance, if he'd ever even been in this room to notice it.
They'd brought supplies with them: a pitcher of sweet tea, pita chips, some evil-looking cake he knew Rayna would only let herself eat in the dark when she couldn't look at how gooey it was. When she sliced them both a big chunk, the smell of chocolate and Rayna's sweet skin filled Deacon's nostrils; she handed it to him with a grin, and his insomnia suddenly seemed like a dear friend.
They had a thing for the floor - writing songs on it, having sex on it, laying on it and talking about everything and nothing all night long. Without needing to confer, they hunkered down on the rug in front of the coffee table, backs against the couch, and Rayna pulled on some giant socks he was pretty sure had belonged to him a million years ago and crossed her otherwise bare legs, a knee resting against his hip. He'd been keeping his guitars in this room since he'd swung by his house to rescue them from impending dust, and his trusty favourite lay by his side waiting to help them create whatever they would tonight. He kept one hand on it as though it was his moral compass, and would jump up and bash him over the head if he tried to make any kind of move he knew he shouldn't.
'I could write a whole song about this cake,' Rayna said around a mouthful of chocolate, and he laughed, reaching up to capture the crumb on her bottom lip. She startled the tiniest bit, enough for him to know the gentlest of his touches had the same effect on her as it did him. He licked the crumb off his thumb and for a second she stared at his mouth so darkly he thought she might throw it all out the window and pounce on him, but she recovered herself and turned away, shaking her head.
'Good thing I didn't drop that down my shirt,' she quipped.
Touché.
She opened her notebook to a clean page. 'Anything on your mind you wanna write about Deacon?'
He tried to close his mouth, wondering whether covering her with the throw from the back of the couch might help his concentration. 'Um... right at this moment?'
'Mmhmm,' she said, 'right at this moment.'
'Nope. Nothin' on my mind at all Ray.' He rubbed a hand over his face in an effort to clear his head of the thoughts of her running through it. 'Know what I really don't wanna write about? Bein' Goddamn sick. I'll go for pretty much anythin' but that.'
Rayna nodded, and she looked a little relieved herself. 'How about long, hot nights cleanin' the kitchen?'
/
He was vaguely aware of the door opening quietly, of light feet creeping through it, but he didn't open his eyes. Sleep receded slowly and he became conscious that he was laying on something springy, a couch maybe. There was a blanket over him, and he was toasty-warm but for his toes, which were poking out from under it. A familiar scent surrounded him and he breathed it in, comforted as it filled his lungs. His chest rose and fell slowly, soft puffs of breath on his skin that weren't his, and he could feel his arms wrapped around someone, silky hair against his cheek.
Rayna. She was snuggled against him, her face tucked into the crook of his neck. As he hazily conjured up the night before, them writing on the floor, her falling asleep in the early hours with her head on his shoulder, lifting her up onto the couch, he felt her stretch against him and sigh, and her body wriggled in closer. He wasn't sure when he'd joined her on the couch, but he must have done, and she obviously hadn't objected.
There was something else that was creeping into his consciousness - hushed whispers, someone hissing a 'Shhh,' and he cracked open an eye. Maddie and Daphne were leaning over them, Daphne with her hand clamped over her mouth to stifle her giggles.
'Umpf,' he groaned, and Rayna stirred in his arms.
'Hmm?' she said, thick with sleep, and lifted her head to look at him. It took her a moment or two to register that she'd been asleep on Deacon, and she didn't appear at all troubled by the notion, like it was the most normal thing in the world to wake up with him. She dropped her head back onto his chest and mumbled something into his shirt, and it was too much for Daphne, who released her hand and let out a girlish peel of laughter.
Rayna's head shot up. Realisation dawned on her and she untangled herself from Deacon and sat up quickly, throwing the blanket back.
'Late night?' Maddie asked, looking like it was Christmas morning and she'd crept downstairs and found a pony under the tree.
'We were... writing a song,' Rayna said, sounding thoroughly guilty, however true it was. She visibly blushed, and Deacon chuckled to himself, sitting up and running a hand through his hair.
'All night?'
'We must've fallen asleep.'
Maddie sat on the edge of the coffee table, nodding as though she didn't believe a word, and Daphne copied, picking up their notebook that was full of fresh scribbles of ink.
'They were writing Maddie, look,' she said. 'Will you play it for us? Please?'
She picked up Deacon's guitar and heaved it towards him, and who was he to refuse her hopeful little face? However awkward it was to be rumbled by the girls, he had to admit it was a good feeling to have them all there when he woke up, to hear their laughter and sit around playing music with them in what was fast becoming his favourite room of the house.
He strummed the opening chords of the song he and Rayna had finished as the sun came up. She turned to him and he saw on her face that she was finding the whole thing as amusing as he was. She started singing, and as the song unfolded he relaxed into the melody, joining in with her.
Every cloud, so they said.