See these hands

They're the same hands you held so tight in yours

That floated on your skin behind closed doors

Now they don't get to touch you anymore

I miss you and I miss me

I miss what we used to be

I miss your smile

I miss your laugh

Lord I miss my better half

Well here we are

Where'd it go

That easy love we used to know

It's been gone so long it's a memory

I miss you and me

The whole idea of that small, intimate tour had seemed smart. At least in theory. And it was Watty's idea and Watty was pretty much never wrong about things like that. Deacon could tell that Rayna wasn't convinced, but she wasn't in a very good spot to say no. He felt bad for her. It had seemed like just overnight the country music industry had shifted on its axis again. It seemed to happen every five to seven years. New artists would come on the scene. New styles of music. Old country. New country. Classic country. Outlaw country. Bro-country. The ebb and flow of female and male singers, groups and duos. It was nothing he and Rayna hadn't experienced in the twenty-odd years they'd been doing this together.

This time, though, it had pulled her into the quicksand. She'd weathered the changes before, stayed at the top of her game. She was one of the few reliable, bankable female stars, filling arenas on her name alone. A lot of it was because not only was she good, but she had a relatability that engaged the fans. She was kind and supportive and polite. She'd been raised in Belle Meade and, although she had little in common with the country club set, she'd never lost her manners and kindness. She had been the Queen of Country Music for nearly a decade, not surprisingly. But this time things were different and she was, shockingly and suddenly, hanging on by a thread.

They had started on this path together and, except for a short period when they weren't, they'd been doing it all these years. Ever since Rayna was sixteen and still Rayna Wyatt and he was a nineteen year old contemplating heading back home to Mississippi. In fact, that night he'd showed up for open mic at the Bluebird was going to be his last hurrah. He'd been in Nashville for two years and was still living out of his truck, barely scraping by. He didn't want to go home. Home was hell and he had no desire to fight those demons close up again. But nothing was working for him and he'd decided the better part of valor was to let it go.

But everything changed that night. Irrevocably changed. That was the night a pretty redhead stepped up on the stage. He didn't remember anymore what she sang. Her songs were childish and unsophisticated, but her voice was pure and clear, and he fell in love with her that night, before he ever even met her. She inspired a song he wrote, right on a napkin, a song that had remained close to his heart ever since.

Back in those days, that song represented the life he hoped to have with her. And for a while it looked like he might, if only he could stay sober long enough. But he never could and it didn't happen and now it was a song he rarely sang, because all it did was bring up painful memories of loss and hurt. He'd written other songs she inspired, but those were about pain and anger and yearning, and he sang them on every third Thursday at the Bluebird. She would never hear them, because she never came. Until the night she did. And the world they'd recrafted for themselves, the world that balanced delicately on a fragile axis, shattered in the wake of that night, and nothing felt like it would ever be quite the same again.

Watty had suggested that they do the Bluebird together that night. The agreement was to do the one song, right at the end of Deacon's regular every third Thursday show. He thought it would be good for them to test out the quiet, intimate idea. They would play bigger venues than the Bluebird, of course, but it would be a good way to see what the response was. Deacon was the one to suggest 'No One Will Ever Love You' and Rayna had somewhat reluctantly agreed.

They hadn't done that song in probably fourteen years. Deacon honestly couldn't remember the last time they'd performed it and suspected he was probably drunk when they did. None of the deeply intimate songs they'd written together were on their set list these days. Rayna had told him they were off the table when she'd brought him back into her band. He'd often wondered whether Teddy Conrad, her husband, had had anything to do with that, but he had to admit it probably wouldn't be a good idea to do them anyway.

But they'd figured out how to coexist, over the years. It had been a delicate two-step in the beginning, with Rayna drawing out clearly defined boundaries and him being too afraid to try to cross them. Eventually they had settled into a place where they could be friends. He let her have that, because he could see it was important to her. They had a friendship and they had the music and that had survived the implosion of the love they had shared for over eleven years.

He called her before he left for the Bluebird. "Hey," she said, when she answered.

He smiled on his end. "Hey. You ready for tonight?"

He could picture her, standing at her kitchen island, one hand in her back pocket, a soft smile on her face. "Yeah, I think so," she said. "I'm gonna plan to get there a little late, if that's okay."

He nodded. "Sure. I'm gonna announce you as a surprise."

She laughed softly. "Well, it sure will be for most people. I have to say I don't remember the last time I was inside the Bluebird."

"Well, it ain't changed at all." He paused. He thought she probably hadn't been inside the Bluebird since the two of them had performed there, back when they still could sing all their love songs to each other. "So, since it's kind of an unofficial kickoff to this small tour, I thought we'd do one of the old songs that would fit that kinda place."

"Okay. What were you thinking?"

He cleared his throat. "'No One Will Ever Love You'."

Again, he could picture her bowing her head, tapping her toe on the floor, taking a really deep breath. "You sure? I'm not sure, Deacon."

"It's just a song…Ray," he said, knowing it was anything but.

"It's not just a song, Deacon. You know that."

"It's a song we ain't played in almost fifteen years. People will talk about it after. It's the perfect song to lead off with."

It took her so long to respond that he wondered if she'd disconnected. "I guess," she said finally.

He felt like he needed to take some of the pressure off. "If it don't work, we won't do it again," he said.

"Okay," she said quietly.

He worked his lip a moment. "Well, look, I gotta head out. I'll see you there."

"Yep. I'll be there." And they hung up.

He wondered how this would go and whether it would freak her out. Then he shrugged and, picking up his messenger bag and guitar, headed out the door.

If someone was to have asked him what he'd been doing ever since he got out of rehab the fifth time, he would have said 'waiting'. He'd waited for Rayna before, when she'd break up with him for falling off the wagon, when she tried staying away from him hoping it would help, when they fought so angrily that they both walked away. But through all of it, he'd always waited her out, because at the core of it, he loved her. Always had and, he suspected, always would. He loved her now.

He had always believed she loved him too, because she always came back. She'd be there when he got out of rehab or she'd come back home after staying away for a couple days. The longest she'd stayed away was a month and then she'd showed back up at the front door, crying and telling him she couldn't live without him.

When he came back to Nashville from the fifth stay in rehab, the one that lasted six months and finally worked, not only was she gone, but she'd gotten married and had a baby. He'd been stunned when Coleman told him, the day he picked him up. That first year had been the hardest, as he struggled every single day to keep from drinking, just to drown the picture in his head of Rayna with her little family.

The pain he felt was overwhelming at times. Coleman spent more time with him than he did with his own wife, struggling to keep his friend from going off the deep end, probably for the last time. But one day he woke up and it had been a year and he hadn't had a drink. He finally began to feel like maybe he could do this. Maybe he could get through every day without a drink, without Rayna.

And then she called and asked him to come back to her band.

He'd been waiting, for twelve years.

He could tell, in the middle of the song, when things changed. He could tell that she'd gotten lost in it, that she was no longer just singing words, that it was no longer 'just a song'. He knew it because he felt it too. That moment when everything and everyone around them disappeared and they were just pouring their hearts out to each other on stage, the way they'd done for eleven years, back before she'd said they couldn't sing these songs anymore.

The applause broke the spell and he could sense her confusion. He reached for her hand and he could feel her cling to his. When the applause died down, she pulled her hand away gently and looked at him, her eyes filled with an incredible sadness and a pain he could feel in his own heart. She got up from the chair and turned to him briefly, as though she was going to say something, but instead she just gave him a sad smile and, lifting her hand in a goodbye gesture, turned away without saying a word and went out through the back. He sat staring after her, swallowing over a lump in his throat, before he was called back to the present by a fan.

The Bluebird was mostly empty when he finally packed up his guitar, just the employees cleaning up. He waved at Erika as he walked out the back, his heart heavy. He had such mixed emotions. He knew the words of the song meant something to her, he knew she still felt the same, in spite of her long marriage to Teddy, but he also felt that old guilt that he had caused her pain.

As he approached his truck, he could see her sitting in the passenger side, her head down, and his heart leapt into his throat. He suddenly couldn't breathe. She looked up as he approached and, in the light of the moon, he could still see the pain in her eyes and sadness on her face. He hesitated for a second, then walked around and first put his guitar in the back, then climbed into the driver's side. He sat, staring out the windshield, and waited for her to speak.

She didn't talk at first, but then he heard her take a breath. "I thought we had it all figured out," she said, her voice barely above a whisper. He wanted to say something, but he waited, knowing she needed to talk it out. "I set those boundaries and we honored them for so long," she went on. "It wasn't easy for me. I feel like I need to tell you that. Although I feel like, right now, you already know that." She breathed in and out. "But I have a marriage" – he noticed she didn't say a husband – "and children. And I have to protect them." She looked down at her hands in her lap. "I can't afford to open that door, Deacon. I just can't."

He swallowed hard. "I know."

She twisted her hands in her lap. "I thought we could do this. I thought we were doing this. I don't know why I thought…I don't know what I thought."

He put his hand out and over hers and she turned her head to look at him. He thought he saw the hint of tears in her eyes. He was sure he saw all her pent-up feelings, right there on the surface, and he could see that she was fighting that. "I'm sorry," was all he could think to say.

She gave him a ghost of a smile. "I don't know what to do with this now. I feel like there's a crack now and I don't know how to fix it. Or if I even want to."

His heart started to beat faster and he could hardly breathe. She broke the gaze and he took a deep, shaky breath, pulled away his hand, and turned back to look out the windshield.

"I wish we hadn't done that song," she said, finally, her voice low and filled with heartbroken regret.

He didn't look at her. "Now what are we gonna do?" After a moment, she got out of the truck, without a word, and headed for her car.

He sat for a very long time, not knowing how to put all of that back into the bottle.

When he woke up the next day, he felt like he needed to fix whatever it was that was going on. He tried calling her, but she'd rushed him off the phone, like she didn't want to talk to him. He felt confused, apprehensive, concerned. He hoped he'd get a better bead on where things stood when they met with Bucky the next day to talk about the tour. In fact, he thought he'd go ahead and put together a prospective set list, which they could talk about when they met, and he could see where things stood.

He tried focusing on his notebook, but his brain felt like sludge. He leaned back and closed his eyes. He knew what he'd seen in her face, in her eyes, the night before. He knew what she was feeling. It was one of the things that had never really changed for them, even after he got sober and even after she changed the rules of their game. He knew her better than anyone else, the same as she knew him. It had been that way almost from the moment they'd met. It had been the thing that had held them together during the bad years and the bad times and the hurt and pain they'd caused each other. He could read her moods, understand the subtext of everything she said and every look on her face. He knew when she was fine and when she was not.

And he knew, because they were part of each other, that she still loved him. He knew she had hidden it and used all those rules and boundaries to protect her heart, but he saw it. Sometimes he'd catch her looking at him and she'd move her eyes away when he looked back. He could hear it in the shorthand of their conversations, the underlying meaning of things she would say. But it had never been laid so bare as it had at the Bluebird, in the middle of that song. He knew she was questioning everything.

The girls were older. It wouldn't be as hard to make a break with Teddy now. Being out on the road on this small venue tour, just the two of them. He knew, and he knew she did as well, that it could blow everything wide open. If they sang these songs and were this close for all those days and weeks and months….

He sat up, rubbing his face. She was scared. He knew that too. He hoped she believed it was worth it.

She looked nervous. Her eyes would dance around, lighting on him for a second then bouncing off somewhere else. Bucky was running through the tour details and he wondered if she were really paying attention. He knew he was not. The nerves in the tips of his fingers felt like they were twitching. He wanted to touch her, hold her hand, tell her it would be all right. They would be all right.

Bucky left and the tension he was feeling ratcheted up a level. If they hadn't been sitting right across the table from each other, if their knees weren't almost so close they could be touching, he would have thought there was a glass wall between them. Or maybe a field of grass. Or an ocean. They needed to talk about what had happened at the Bluebird, needed to talk about what was said afterwards, but maybe it had just been so long that it was hard to find the rhythm again. But he knew that wasn't it. It was really because it was so overwhelming and so thick that it was hard to find a steady place to stand.

He had worked out a proposed set list, the way he always did. He would run down what he had planned and then she would react to it, make suggestions, reorder songs. He desperately wanted it to be normal. At least this part. "Alright, so, uh, this should be pretty easy. I thought we would start by, you know, going deep and starting with some of those early ones, stripped down, like, uh, 'Don't Leave Without Me', 'That Could Be Us'." He stopped and looked at her to see where her head was at.

She looked at him. "What if we were to just throw it on its ear and do something completely different. Focus on the big songs, like 'Already Gone' or 'Last Stand'." She stopped, almost like she was challenging him. But that made no sense. It wasn't that kind of tour. He knew what she was doing.

He frowned. "Uh, I mean, yeah, we could do anything on any given song, but don't forget it's just me and you up there. We don't got no band, not any backup singers so I just think we'd do better just doing the things like we did the other night, the 'No One Will Ever Love You' type thing." His voice trailed off as he realized she was avoiding his eyes.

She just sort of nodded and made a noise. "Mm hmm." He could tell she was shutting it down. Shutting him down. It was overwhelming her.

He pushed. "It's just a much smaller venue, Ray, you know. That quiet, intimate thing is what's gonna work…."

She gave him a look. "You mean, like at the Bluebird?"

He knew she was challenging him, so he decided not to take the bait. "Yeah. I mean that's what this is, you know," he said, raising his eyebrows.

She nodded. 'Yeah, that's what this is," she said, her voice quiet.

He could sense that this was overwhelming her, that what had happened between the two of them was weighing on her. "Freakin' out a little bit?" he asked.

"Think I might just need a little minute here," she said.

He couldn't sit here like this anymore. He knew he needed to give her some space, to figure it out. So he said, "I tell you what, there's something I gotta go do right now anyway, so you go ahead and take your minute and you take a little more, go through that." He closed his notebook with the set list drafted out and slid it over to her. "Just call me when you know what you wanna do." He picked up his phone and messenger bag and left the room, closing the door behind him.

He really didn't know why it kept happening, that he ended up in Juliette Barnes' bed. Oh, he got that the sex was fun and uncomplicated and it always seemed like the next step after making music. Or maybe making music was just a prelude to having sex. It had always been that way for him…with Rayna. And that was part of the reason why he wasn't sure why he kept doing this. Juliette was certainly no Rayna. She was someone he used to satisfy an itch, which wasn't fair to her. And it wasn't fair to Rayna.

This wasn't really what he wanted, but it was what he'd had for nearly fifteen years. One-and-done's, Coleman called them. They weren't all one night stands, but they never lasted long. Two or three times, max. It never did really feel satisfying, although he didn't think any of them ever knew that. Juliette was smarter than most and he suspected she wasn't looking for anything more than he was. Nobody felt like Rayna did, nobody made him feel like Rayna did.

With Rayna, it was like he was outside of himself. It was so much more than just the sex with her. It was how their bodies fit together, how they understood what the other needed, how they just knew. He'd never had that with anyone else, somehow knew he never would. Which is why he waited.

He was sitting in Juliette's kitchen when she called. He left abruptly and had barely closed the front door of Juliette's house when he called her back.

"I would still love to talk if you still, you know…if that's cool," she said. He could hear the catch in her voice, he knew she was near tears.

"Sure."

"In person?"

"Yeah, sure."

"I'll meet you" – she cleared her throat – "at Percy."

"On my way."

She was already there when he got there. He could see her sitting on the stone wall along the steps. The sun was shining down on her and he felt his breath catch in his throat. She looked so beautiful. He hurried up the steps and sat next to her, close but not quite touching. She looked at him, her eyes squinted against the sun, and gave him a trembling smile.

He knew right away she didn't want to do this tour. It was what she'd said, after they sang at the Bluebird, that there was a crack – in them – that she didn't know how to fix. The reality of this small, intimate tour meant that the walls and the boundaries and the separation that had made it work for all these years probably couldn't hold. And she wasn't sure she was ready for that.

It was easier for him. He could say it out loud – I miss you and me – but it was harder for her. Because she had, as she'd said, a marriage and her girls. It was a lot to tear apart, even for them and all their history. It was hard to even acknowledge that it was still there, that love they'd had for all those years. He thought about what she'd said – I wish we hadn't done that song – and he knew the truth of it.

They sat for a moment before she said, "I'm not avoiding you. I just don't know what to say."

He sighed. "It's my fault. I don't know why I'm forcing you to say it in the first place." He looked out over the grassy meadow.

She smiled a little. "Say what?" Her voice was almost teasing. "Why don't you say it?"

He thought about all the things he could say, but decided to say the thing that would let her off the hook. He looked at her and could see the confusion in her eyes. "The only thing you can say, Ray. That it's all over." It hurt like hell to say it.

He looked away and sighed. She breathed in. "I feel like that's what I need to be saying, you know." Her voice got that breathy quality that told him she wanted to cry. "I need to be letting you go, move on with your life, go do that damn tour if you want, you know, whatever, I just…."

"So why don't you, Ray?" he asked, turning to look at her. Somehow they'd moved closer to each other, her shoulder touching his.

Her voice started to tremble when she spoke. "Because you and music, there's no difference, you know? It's the same." He looked away and gave a sharp nod. Then he looked back. "And I feel like I'm holding these hearts in my hands and I'm trying real hard not to break 'em, but my heart's in pieces. " He swallowed and then looked down at his hands. "And I'm trying to do the right thing but none of it feels right to me."

He considered what she said and breathed in. "Okay," he said softly. He turned to look at her and his heart was breaking as he watched her struggle with that. She nodded and then her face crumbled. "I'm gonna go now." He pushed up from the wall and, without hesitating, he walked back the way he'd come, leaving her.

He was pretty sure her heart was breaking, same as his.