Chapter Two – The Exchange
It's been three weeks since I saw Taylor York in that guitar shop. I sent the Gibson on its way alright, Skyped my brother on his birthday; he likes the guitar a lot, which is good, yet I didn't mention Taylor. There was something stopping me from doing so. Maybe I hadn't thought that Tom would believe me, or maybe a part of me – that pessimistic part – was thinking about how I'll never see Taylor again. Regardless of the 'hopefully' that I clung onto in the days afterwards, my head soaring in the clouds with a big grin, I don't have his number and he doesn't have mine, nor do I know where he lives. That would be a bit stalker-ish though. I almost don't want to know where he lives, as the whole situation is a little surreal.
So I'm getting on with my life. I have a job, finally, working for a publishing company. I'm just a secretary and the pay isn't wonderful, but it's work all the same. Now my parents can begin to withdraw their funding. Most people would be peeved about that, but I want my independence now. I'm twenty-two and I'm living in an entirely different country. In truth, I don't want to be known as that rich limpet girl who is the ray of sunshine blinding her wealthy parents into giving her money.
It's the weekend and I'm at Taco Bell with a colleague. Her name's Summer and she's about the only friend I have in America. She's all blonde ringlets and glowing skin, contrasting to my brown waves and pasty complexion. I don't tan. At all. I just burn. However I console myself with the fact that tanning gives you wrinkles when you're older. We're waiting in-line to order, and Summer is humming and hawing about what to get. She can't choose between a crunchy taco and a bean burrito. In all honesty, I don't actually know the difference between the two, which is quite ignorant of me. I'm not about to ask Summer though, that would be engaging into a fifteen minute conversation which will no doubt find its way back to her boyfriend. He's all she ever talks about. As we edge closer, however, I can make out the pictures above the counter. I can see a red taco, and as soon as the words 'volcano taco' swim into view, I have made up my mind. I want that one.
We're at the front of the queue now, waiting for a counter to free up. Heat is floating in from both directions, front and back, from the kitchen ahead of us and from the blazing sun outside. I should have moved to somewhere colder. I'd only moved to Nashville because we'd visited on holiday when I was younger and I'd fallen in love with the place. Now, it seems, my tolerance of heat has dwindled in those years. We have heat waves back in England, but this humidity is constant, pushing in from both sides all day everyday, like I'm wandering the streets in a tight box that happens to be painted black, just absorbing the heat.
"I'm gonna have the crunchy taco, it's Logan's favourite," Summer decides, managing to get another reference to her boyfriend in there. Maybe I'm being a little hard on her, but this heat just makes everything annoying. Every sentence is annoying, every sound, every voice of the people at the counters.
That's when I hear it, just brushing against my ears, like the smallest of clues. My head twitches up towards it, brow furrowed with concentration. And there he is, just metres away. You expect that when you see musicians and actors outside of the stage or screen, they'll be reading a script, or they'll have a guitar glued to their side. Seeing him in that guitar shop was easier to handle; he was surrounded by the instrument he plays, but in a fast food restaurant? It's like if I were to visualise the Queen right now, she can't be doing anything human, like eating. She has to be doing something regal. So seeing him like this, in a fast food restaurant, is just a little weird. Of all the places in Nashville.
Because there he is, Taylor York. Three weeks have gone by but it seems like I saw him yesterday. The only change is his clothes and the hint of stubble on his face.
I don't hear the girl behind the counter to our right shouting 'next'. Summer has to latch onto my arm and pull me over; I'm still going bog-eyed trying to look at Taylor. There was a part of me that had given up on keeping an eye out for him. I mean, how big is Nashville? And he washes up in one of the many fast food restaurants, the exact one that I happen to be in, at the same date and time as me. What are the odds? I only chose to come here because it's the closest fast food restaurant to my house. Does that mean that Taylor came here because it's near to his home too? I dismiss the thought; I'm getting my hopes up. And being weird.
Summer elbows me on the arm. "What do you want?" she asks, pointing at the menu above the counter. The girl behind the counter is tapping impatiently on the side of the cash register, her manicured nails clicking on the plastic.
"Erm..." I begin, breaking my gaze away from Taylor, who's just finished ordering, "can I get the volcano taco and... a cherry limeade sparkler please." I have no idea what a 'cherry limeade sparkler' tastes like, but I can vaguely recall Summer mentioning that she likes it.
I lean forward as casually as I can, peering round the customers until I can see Taylor, while Summer pays. If he were to see me now I'd be a red tomato all over again. But then I also want him to see me, to recognise me, that English girl he helped in a guitar shop. It'd be like something out of a rom-com. No matter how many times people say they're cheesy and they don't like them, everyone wishes their life would turn out like that – meet a guy, fall in love, fall out of love, fall back in love because he's really your soul mate. I admit that I would be ecstatic if my life played out like that. I'd give anything to not be a seventy-year-old spinster with twenty cats.
"What are you looking at?" Summer chirps behind me, squeezing past me to look down the counter in a much more conspicuous way. "Are you staring at that guy? That fat bald guy?" She's referring to the man on Taylor's right, who's currently hefting a huge paper bag into his arms.
"No!" I hurriedly dismiss. "The guy on the fat bloke's left, the one with the dark shirt."
Summer looks up at me suggestively, her blue eyes sparkling knowingly. "Do you like him?"
Blood soars into my cheeks. I haven't told anyone about meeting Taylor, and I've just gone and pointed him out to a bubbly, gossiping girl I've known for two weeks.
Summer gasps. "You do!" she exclaims, pointing at my flaming cheeks. "Do you know him? Who is he?"
I open my mouth to reply, a little part of me wanting to shout her down and just forget everything; the guitar shop, Taylor, everything. Do I know him? Really? I know of him. But to say I know him is to imply that I've met him more than once before.
"His name is Taylor York," I answer eventually, the both of us still gaping down the counter at him. He has no idea what's going on, oblivious to the two girls staring at him. He's just standing there, reading the menu board while he waits for his food.
"Do you know him then?" Summer presses, her voluminous hair blocking my view a little.
"It's complicated," I say, not really knowing how else to put it. 'Yes' would be a lie, and in truth so would 'no'. My answer is in limbo.
"Ooh," Summer gasps, liking my reply more than I thought she would. "Is he like an ex-boyfriend or something?"
"No!" I exclaim again. "I've met him once."
"Oh I get it," Summer continues, "you met him and you liked him but nothing came of it. Am I right?"
I can feel my cheeks morphing into a deeper shade of red, as scarlet as the taco I just ordered. "Spot on," I answer reluctantly. I have a feeling that Summer is going to get into this.
"Go talk to him then," she pushes, moving out the way. Instinctively, I shuffle back, putting more distance between me and Taylor.
"What? No," I snap, my heart quickening, beginning its imitation of a pneumatic drill.
"Go on, talk to him, I'll grab our food."
The tug-of-war is flaring up again, but instead of my stomach, which is already in knots, its my reasoning that's acting up. One side of me sees this as my only chance, the other side sees this as suicide. Suicide of my heart, that is. Would Taylor ever really be interested in me?
"Go on, quick, he's leaving," Summer goes on. And sure enough he is. One of the employees is passing him his food. Just ten more seconds and he'll be out that door, and I'm not about to chase him across the car park.
"Just do it, what's the worst that could happen?" Summer nudges me in the back, pushing me in Taylor's direction. With that my mind has been made up. My feet are already on their way, the rest of me will just have to catch up.
I hurry across, squeezing through the queue. My tongue feels like a lead weight in my mouth, but somehow I manage to get it moving. "Taylor!" I call, forcing the most genuine smile I can muster onto my face. It's either that or the look of a panicked rabbit caught in the headlights. He turns at the sound of his name, glancing behind him, his shoes squeaking on the floor. His eyes rove the mass of people until they connect with me. A smile cracks on his face and I feel my heart do a nervous flutter.
"Hi!" he says as I stop in front of him. "Callie... from the guitar shop, right?"
"Yeah, and Taylor York, of course."
He pretends to flick hair from his face in a vain manner and we both laugh.
"Did your brother like the guitar?" Taylor asks almost immediately. I was flattered that he had even remembered my name, let alone that I bought that guitar for my brother.
"Yeah, he loved it, he was really pleased with it." I can feel my face prickling with sweat. I don't even need the sun to get me hot and bothered.
"Oh good," Taylor replies, clutching his bag of food. His shirt is rolled up to the elbows. "So... how long has it been for you in Nashville now?"
"Five weeks," I answer.
"You liking it here?"
"Yeah it's good. A bit hot, but you know, I'll get over it. I've got a job now so... yeah, I'm getting there." I laugh nervously, thinking of Summer back at the counter. I bet our food has come by now, she's probably watching the scene unfold from the safety of a table.
I spoke too soon.
Summer comes practically skipping up to us, the bag of food swinging in her hands. A huge, friendly grin is plastered on her face, lighting up her honeyed skin. "Hi!" she greets Taylor, glancing at me to show that she knows me. "I'm Summer, Callie and I work together."
Taylor returns her greeting. I have to say that I'm a little relieved. Other people might be jealous or peeved that they couldn't be left alone, but I'm grateful for Summer's intervention. I was floundering internally and somehow she knew it.
She turns to me. "Sorry, Cal, but we need to go." She grimaces apologetically at me, but there's something in her eyes that says otherwise. Is this some kind of ploy? I don't answer for a second and Summer's eyes flare in prompt. Then I see Taylor's expression, the sheen of disappointment and fluster that he's trying to conceal, and I now think I'm catching onto Summer's plan.
"Oh yeah we need to go," I add, sounding a little monotonous but Taylor doesn't seem to notice.
"Oh, okay," Taylor says, his warm brown eyes flicking between Summer and I. Summer starts moving off and he looks to me. "Why don't we swap numbers or something? Just in case, I don't know, we ever want to meet up?"
Summer, out of Taylor's vision, gives me a knowing wink and I have to hide my smirk. Summer's little intervention plan was simple, yet I'd never have been able to think of that.
"Sure," I answer Taylor, suppressing an ecstatic grin that's trying to make a break for freedom.
It feels a little surreal typing 'Taylor York' into my phone, and giving him my number is even stranger. I can sense Summer loitering behind him and I have to try and stop myself from going into a girly fit and running out the door, the two of us gushing about the entire situation while Taylor is left behind eating our dust.
"Well, maybe I'll see you sometime soon," I say, putting my phone away in exchange for the calm, friendly exterior I should have adopted from the beginning.
"Yeah, maybe, that'd be great," Taylor replies, his infectious smile joining in as him, Summer and I head out of Taco Bell.
"Bye Taylor!" Summer calls enthusiastically, dragging me off in the opposite direction.
"Bye!" he calls back, waving a little shyly. The sun lights up the deep brown of his short hair, illuminating the tell-tale curls lying in wait.
Summer turns back to me as we wander down the road, cars rocketing past us. "No turning that phone off now."
"You think he'll call?" I ask, doubt still trying to find its way in.
Summer scoffs and gives me a look that says, "Think? I know he will."
I hope he does.