Deacon
He can't sleep, but it's nothing new. Too many thoughts and nowhere to go with them. He glances with longing over at the Gibson in the corner, but Rayna is sleeping soundly next to him, and it would be a shame to wake her. The room is dark except for the moonlight filtering through the window above them, casting soft shadows. The sun won't be up for hours. His mind wanders.
"Let's stay at your place tonight," she said this afternoon when Teddy picked up the girls for their week with him.
He wasn't gonna argue with that. He can be content anywhere Rayna sleeps next to him, but it is different here, in his house, the house they'd first lived in together all those years ago. It's more than just familiar, being here. It feels like home.
Even though it's been a month of them living together, he doesn't want to hurt her feelings by telling her that staying in that big house on her fancy gated piece of property still feels a little off to him. He can't shake the slight feeling of wondering where he fits there. Those are the rooms where she made a life with Teddy and the girls. Sure, Teddy hasn't lived there in years, but it doesn't matter. He was in that house first. He can't help but think about it, every night when they go to bed in the room where she slept with Teddy. And Luke, which riles him up even more.
He doesn't tell her, but she knows anyway. She's the one who'd suggested last week that they go furniture shopping.
"Does this help?" Rayna said, amused, as they watched delivery drivers take apart the old ornate guilded headboard and assemble the new rustic cedar bed, clearly thinking he was acting like a big ole' baby about it.
"A little." He said begrudgingly.
But he smiled, and so did she.
Teddy may have left his mark on that house, but Rayna had left her mark on this one a long time ago. I had her first, he thinks, watching Rayna sleep with her hair fanned out around her on the pillow and her hand under her cheek. Even in sleep, she is the most beautiful thing he's ever seen. And she's his. She's always been his, even when she wasn't. He wonders what she's dreaming.
Her eyelashes flutter open, as if sensing his gaze.
"Hey," she murmurs, reaching out a hand to touch his face. "It's late. You okay?"
"Yeah, just laying here watchin you sleep," he says softly. "Prettiest thing I've ever seen."
Rayna gives him a dreamy little smile.
"I been thinkin," he says. "About the stuff with Tandy and going on with the testing."
Her blue eyes are suddenly wide awake as she leans up on her elbow, looking down at him anxiously. "What are you thinking?"
"Let's do it."
"Really?" Her heart skips a beat.
"Yeah," he says with a sigh. "Really."
She leans over and kisses him, then scootches over a little and lays her head on his shoulder, snuggles up beside him, her hand on his chest over his heart.
"It's gonna be okay, Deacon," she says quietly, closing her eyes again, reassured by the feeling of his heart beat strong under her hand. "I know it is."
He doesn't say anything, but he hopes it silently as he kisses her forehead and closes his eyes.
And finally, he sleeps.
##################################
2 weeks later-
Maddie is surprised when she comes out of school after choir practice and finds Deacon waiting for her in the front circle instead of Teddy.
It's been better between them, the last few weeks, but she's still cautious. Quieter than usual. Always watching him like she wants to ask something, or say something, but she doesn't.
I think she's afraid to be close to you, Rayna has said to him. That something will happen, and she'll lose you. Daphne, in comparison, is exactly the opposite. She is afraid to let him out of her sight, pitched the biggest fit he'd ever seen that morning when Rayna said Teddy was picking her up from school. It was so unlike her, that they were both a little thrown off.
"I thought I was going back to..um…Dad's today," Maddie says as she pulls open the back door and carefully sets her guitar case on the seat. One of his is there too, she notices.
"I told him I'd drop you off later," Deacon says. "Thought maybe we could spend the afternoon together. That okay? Just us."
They need it. As great as it is being with Rayna and both of the girls, he misses his quiet afternoons with Maddie. They haven't had a guitar lesson in weeks.
"Um….sure…." Maddie says awkwardly. "I guess." She climbs in the front seat, and immediately as they drive away pulls out her phone and her earbuds.
"Leave those off, okay?"
She looks like she wants to protest, but she doesn't. She switches the radio on low instead.
"Where do you wanna go? Maybe down by the park for awhile? Might be a nice afternoon to sit outside and play."
"Whatever you want," she says quietly.
She doesn't say much as he drives, but he's not giving up. He asks her about everything he can think of, school, her friends, her after-school activities, what she wants to do for her birthday coming up in a month.
By the time they get to where they're going, she's got a little bit more of a smile on her face.
"I've never been here," Maddie says curiously, as they park by the stone bridge and hop out of the truck. Deacon grabs the two guitar cases out of the back, and hands her a folded up blanket, and they walk down the slope to a nice flat spot by the river.
It's the unusually warmest day they've seen in months, probably close to 60 degrees. The sun is bright, the snow is long-gone, and green patches of grass are popping up all over. It probably won't last, spring is a long ways off yet, but for now it's a refreshing break from the gray winter days.
"Yeah it's nice, huh?" he says, squinting his eyes against the sun as he glances around, thinking about how many times him and Rayna had sat on that old wooden picnic table. They'd fought, cried, talked, laughed…. sometimes just sat next to each other without saying a word at all. Sometimes he'd get a call. Just "meet me" was all she had to say. Sometimes there wasn't a call at all, he just felt it. And when he got here, she was always waiting.
Maddie's eyes are knowing as she helps him spread out the blanket. "Did you come here with Mom?"
"Yeah," he says with a smile. "I did. It's kinda special to us, so I thought it might be nice to share it with you."
She absorbs this for a minute as she opens up her guitar case.
They run through a couple chord progressions she needs practice on, he teaches her a couple of new things, and then she pulls the battered notebook out of her case he knows she's been writing songs in for months. "I wrote something new," she says hesitantly. "Can I play it for you?"
"I'd love that," Deacon says as he puts his own guitar aside, and Maddie starts to play.
Don't know just where I'm going
And tomorrow, it's a little overwhelming
And the air is cold
And I'm not the same anymore
I've been running in that direction
For too long now
I've lost my own reflection
And I can't look down
If you're not there to catch me when I fall.
If this is the moment I stand here on my own
If this is my rite of passage that somehow leads me home
I might be afraid
But it's my turn to be brave
If this is the last chance before we say goodbye
At least it's the first day of the rest of my life
I can't be afraid
Cause it's my turn to be brave
Rayna's right, he realizes not for the first time as he listens to their daughter play with an ease than never ceases to amaze him. Maddie got the best part of both of them. Rayna's voice, his guitar hands, but that writing…..he's never heard a kid her age write lyrics like that. She's something, alright.
Some day she's gonna be better than both of us, he thinks.
He wonders if he'll be around to see it, and it is a sobering thought.
The song trails off, and Maddie's voice gets quiet.
"That was beautiful," he says.
"Thanks," she says, her voice unable to hide a little sadness. "Guess I have a lot to write about lately."
He gets real quiet for a minute, searching for the right words. Rayna always seems to know the right things to say. He's still working on that part. He's always been a lot better at saying what he feels when there's a guitar in his hands.
"I know all this stuff going on is real scary," he says, his voice catching a little. "With all this talk about me being sick and everything but…. I'm still me, you know? Getting to be your dad is the most amazing thing that's ever happened to me. Don't forget that, okay? No matter what happens. I mean I know you got another dad and all… You're lucky. Most kids would never get to be that lucky."
Maddie's dark eyes filled with tears. "But he's not you," she blurted out. "And it's not the same. What if they can't…fix you? What are we supposed to do without you?"
The pain of this is breaking his heart more than anything else. They haven't had nearly enough time.
Deacon hesitates, knowing him and Rayna have agreed not to tell the girls anything about Tandy becoming his donor until they know it's 100% going to happen. The last few weeks have been a barrage of testing on both their parts, everything from scans to psychological stuff. So far, it's looking more promising than they expected.
"I'm gonna tell you something," he says slowly. "But you can't tell your mom I told you, okay? She didn't want us to get your hopes up in case things don't work out. And you can't tell Daphne. But I think it might make you feel a little better."
Maddie quickly swipes the tears from her eyes.
"Aunt Tandy wants to be the person to give me part of her liver."
The surprise on Maddie's face is evident. "What? Why? I mean I thought she didn't…."
"Like me?" he supplies. He can't hold back a grin.
Maddie grins too. "Well…." she hedges, but they are both laughing.
"I think we've worked that out. She just worries about your mama, you know? Your grandma died when they were real young, and Aunt Tandy got used to looking out for her."
"If it makes you feel any better," Maddie confided. "She doesn't like Luke too much anymore either. We saw some pictures of him on the front of a magazine in the store the other day and Aunt Tandy said she wanted to knock that smile off his face with the biggest stick she could find."
"Oh come on now," Deacon says with a laugh. "She didn't say that."
"No, I'm serious," she insists with a giggle. "Mom scolded her for saying that. But when Daphne and me were behind them I heard her say she wouldn't mind doing the same thing."
"You're mom's funny."
"Yeah, she is."
It is the best sound in the world, to hear Maddie laughing again.
"Let's pack up our stuff and head out, huh? How about some dinner before I gotta get you back? Maybe the Bluebird?"
"That sounds great," Maddie says as she puts her guitar back in its case. "Real great, Dad."
Just hearing that one word again is the best music his ears have ever heard.
##########################################
Maddie is as talkative as ever over their burgers and fries, but she gets quiets again on the way back to Teddy's, staring out the window, absorbed in her thoughts. It's a different kind of quiet, though. A thinking kind.
She'll be okay, Deacon realizes, even though it makes his heart hurt a little more. Whatever happens. She's tough. Like Ray and me.
Sometimes he still can't believe that their love was strong enough to make her.
At Teddy's he walks up to the door with her, and hands over her bag and guitar case. "You have a good week now."
"Thanks for taking me there," Maddie says, with her beautiful smile that reminds him so much of Rayna. Rayna says all the time that she looks like him, but all he sees is her. "It means a lot."
"To me too," he says.
Maddie throw her arms around his waist and hugs him fiercely. "I love you, Dad."
His eyes burn, and it's hard to talk around the lump in his throat. "Love you too. See you on Friday, okay? Give Daphne a hug for me."
"Yep, I will."
The door opens and Teddy comes out then, and Maddie slips in the house past them.
They stand there face to face for a second, him and Teddy. There's a mutual understanding now. It took years to get here, but it's there.
"Listen," Deacon clears his throat. "Dr. Abbott told Rayna and me that you got tested. I don't know why you did that, and…well, even though you weren't a match, I just wanted to say thanks." He holds out his hand.
Teddy shakes it firmly, without hesitation. "She loves you," he says simply. "That's enough reasoning for me."
Deacon doesn't ask whether Teddy means Maddie or Rayna. It doesn't really matter.
He nods his head, and turns to go.
That's enough reasoning for him too.
##################################
Mid-March
"So are you ready for this meeting?" Tandy asks as she smears jam on a piece of toast.
Rayna makes a face as she sticks her laptop into her bag and double checks she has everything she needs for the legal meeting with the attorneys. "Not really. It's ridiculous, suing me for half the cost of a wedding that didn't even happen. He's the one who wanted all that ridiculous stuff in the first place. I mean really, a ten thousand dollar ice sculpture with our faces on it?"
Tandy snickers. "I wonder what he did with that, anyway."
"Trust me," Rayna rolls her eyes. "I have no desire to find out. Knowing Luke, probably used it as target practice."
It was the first time she'd be coming face to face with him since the morning she'd called off the wedding three months ago. While she'd been trying like hell to stay out of the press with Deacon and the girls, Luke had been on his tour in Australia, getting his face on every magazine cover possible with every pretty girl he could literally get his hands on.
To say she is disgusted is an underestimate.
Tandy raises her eyebrows. "And what does Deacon think of all of this?"
"He's going with me," she says firmly. "I told him holding my hand would probably be the only thing keeping me from it connecting with that smug look on Luke's face when we settle. And you know we're going to have to settle."
"You know he's just doing it to get under your skin," Tandy says wisely as she refills her coffee cup. "It's not like he needs the money. And it's not like you can't afford it. Highway 65 is doing fine. Settle and send him on his way, and it'll finally be all over."
"That's not the point," Rayna grumbles. "He's just doing it because he lost. And he doesn't like admitting it."
"He sure did lose," Deacon says as he comes into the kitchen, fresh from the shower and plants a lingering kiss on Rayna's lips. "And I'm glad he did."
Tandy looks away, but she can't help a smile. It just reassures her that she's doing the right thing. Watching them find their way back to each other the last few months has been like watching a fairy tale played out before her eyes. Deacon's illness is the only thing holding them back now from getting their happily ever after.
The surgery has been approved. Dr. Abbott's team wants to do it as soon as possible, but Deacon wants to wait until April and he's not backing down on that.
Rayna had thrown a fit when she heard that….until she found out why, and confided in her sister.
Maddie's fifteenth birthday is in March, Rayna said with tears in her eyes. He's still afraid he won't be around for the next one.
So they're waiting. All of them. Counting days down on the calendar. There's about 25 to go now. Maddie's birthday is next week.
"Come on, or we'll be late," Rayna says, letting Deacon steal one more quick kiss before she gathers her bag.
"I wouldn't mind that at all," he says with a grin.
Rayna laughs, and swats his arm away as he tries to pull her back in, hands on her hips, his blue eyes teasing.
She treasures every moment like this, when she can forget for a second that he's sick.
He's gone downhill in the last month. It happened fast, and took them all by surprise. Rayna keeps trying to deny it to herself, but it's obvious, and it hurts them all to watch it happen. He's tired all the time, not eating, losing weight at an alarming rate. He pretends he's fine for the sake of the girls, that those pills are working, and but she knows he isn't fine. She can see the yellow creeping into his eyes, and that is the worse feeling she's ever had. 25 days. And yet it feels years away.
"See ya at the office?" She says to Tandy as Deacon goes out the front door ahead of her. "I'll be in as soon as I get this handled and over with."
"Heading there right now," Tandy says, forcing cheerfulness. "See ya in a bit."
"Thanks," Rayna says, reaching out to hug her sister. "For everything. In case I don't say it enough. I don't know what we'd do without you right now."
Tandy has been a godsend in the last few months, and not just agreeing to the surgery. Helping with the girls, working at the office to help her keep Highway 65 running, all of it.
"That's what sisters are for," Tandy says, squeezing her tight, and willing away the tears that gather. "Better go. If Deacon beats you to that courthouse, there won't be much of Luke left."
Rayna laughs, and heads for the door, tossing back a wave.
Tandy lets the tears fall after her sister leaves, because she can see it too. The worry in Rayna's eyes that she tries to hide in front of everyone else. The way Deacon is fading a little more every day.
She wonders if April will be too late.
########################################
Rayna drives. She always drives now.
"This is ridiculous, you know," she says to Deacon as she impatiently watches for the red light to turn. "I don't know why he thinks this will do either one of us any good. He's just trying to give the press something else to talk about."
After a bit, she realizes she's the only one talking, and she looks over at Deacon.
He's sitting in the passenger seat, his face a pale shade of gray.
It is a startling change from the man who was kissing her in the kitchen 30 minutes ago.
"Deacon," she says, panicking, trying to keep her eyes on the road and shake him awake at the same time. "What's wrong?"
"I'm not sure," his voice is barely there, fading. "I think, Ray….."
His eyes drift close, and he slumps over in the seat, his head making an alarming thud as it lands against the passenger side window.
Rayna swears her heart literally stops as she yanks the truck to a halt on the side of the road and takes off her seatbelt. "Come on, Babe," she says as she leans over, frantically shaking him for a few minutes, slapping his face gently, but he is unresponsive.
Without another thought, she whips the truck back out onto the highway and puts the gas pedal to the floor. They are two miles from the hospital.
Just two miles.
And yet it feels like 20.
"Come on," she whispers, grabbing his hand as she pumps the gas pedal harder, and tears stream down her face. "Don't you leave me yet, dammit. I'm not done with you. Hold on, please hold on."
For the first time in a long time, his hand doesn't squeeze hers back.
thanks for reading! The song I borrowed was "Brave" by Idina Menzel
