Maddie has been too giddy on their drive here, and Rayna is starting to get suspicious.

She watches her daughter skip her way through the Bluebird Cafe parking lot while humming some melody she doesn't recognize. Maddie waits at the door until Rayna catches up with her, and they both get inside. Deacon is standing next to the stage, talking to Vince, and when he spots them, his face lights up. Maddie runs to him.

"Hey, sweetheart."

He hugs her while he and Rayna exchange polite smiles. Her anger has passed, but the mood between them has been weird all week. There still are things they need to talk about, and neither of them has made the first move to yet.

Vince senses the awkwardness and steps forward to hug Rayna. "Hey, beautiful." They all chat for a while then until Deacon leads them to a table with a reserved sign on it. All the while, Maddie keeps breaking into random fits of giggles, and Rayna is now sure her daughter knows something she doesn't.

The place quiets as Erika gets to the mic to introduce Deacon. His guitar around his neck, he steps on stage and settles on a stool. Rayna thinks how it's been a while since she last performed in this kind of intimate setting. Part of her misses it.

Deacon starts with a couple of his songs Rayna has heard before, one called This Town which he told her he'd written last year, right after coming back to Nashville. As he's about to introduce the third song, Rayna notices out of the corner of her eye that Maddie is staring at her. When Rayna tries to look at her, Maddie turns her gaze back to Deacon.

"This next song is a new one I wrote a few days ago," Deacon explains. "Someone very special helped me with it."

He locks eyes with Rayna before he launches into the intro. The song is about past mistakes and new beginnings, about falling again sometimes but learning from it, about not being afraid anymore.

Rayna realizes once the song is over that she might have stopped breathing for a minute. Deacon smiles at her, and only then he finally looks away.

Next to her, Maddie is clapping so hard, her hands are turning red.

It's getting late, and the place has largely cleared out when Deacon notices Vince is up to something. He coughs to get the table's attention before he remarks that Rayna and Deacon could use a moment alone to discuss... things, as he puts it. He suggests they should hang out here a little longer while he'll drive the kiddo home.

Maddie is so quick to get up and follow Vince's lead that Deacon wonders if the two had plotted this. Before either Rayna or Deacon has time to protest, Vince and Maddie are scooting out the door of the Bluebird.

It's not where and when Deacon had planned to have this conversation, but they're here now. He figures it's as good a moment as any, and Rayna seems to agree.

"Listen, I—" they start at the same time, and they smile.

"Go ahead," Deacon says.

"I wanted to apologize."

He raises an eyebrow. "You wanted to apologize?"

"I feel like maybe I... pressured you. About the Opry, about moving in. Truth is, I get excited about things, and sometimes I just assume everyone feels the same way. I'm sorry."

"You didn't pressure me, Ray. I know how to say no. And in the long term, I want those things. I do. It's not why I... disappeared."

"Why then?"

He sighs. "Sometimes, crap from my past resurface. And I feel the need to just... run away. It's what I've been doing my whole life, but I don't want to anymore. I'm working on it. I promise."

He's never seen Rayna as vulnerable as when she admits, "You disappearing like this... it scared the hell out of me."

He wants to kiss her at that moment, to show her that he's here, that he's not going anywhere, but he's not sure where they stand on the whole going public thing after all this.

He gets a flashback to them having breakfast in that cafe all those years ago. He had let her go that day, and he'll never make the same mistake again.

He doesn't say anything, he grabs a napkin and the pen on the table, and he writes down. She smiles when he slides the napkin in front of her. He knows she remembers.

I'm here, the napkin reads.

He's aware it will take more than words, but he's intent on proving it to her. Every single day.

When they get back home, they find Maddie and Vince outside, sitting on the edge of the night-lit pool. Their feet are in the water, and each of them is holding a spoon and a bowl of chocolate ice cream.

"Ice cream? At this hour?" Rayna asks, looking at her daughter pointedly.

"It was his idea," Maddie is quick to rat Vince out. She doesn't look too remorseful. Vince, as for him, looks entirely unperturbed.

"Life is short, baby, you gotta make the most of it," he says. He gets up to put his socks and boots back on. "I guess this is my cue, though. Kiddo, this was fun," he tells Maddie, and he holds his fist out for a bump. He then hands the bowl and spoon to an amused Rayna before he gives Deacon a clap on the shoulder. "Deac, I loved the new one tonight." He starts to hum the melody as he walks out.

Rayna can't help but chuckle. Maddie should be in bed at this hour, but what the hell, maybe Vince is right. "Do I get us two bowls?" she asks Deacon.

"Sounds tempting."

"On my way," she says, heading to the kitchen.

Deacon gets his boots and socks off, rolls up the bottom of his jeans before he goes to sit next to Maddie. "So... I'm happy to report the song was a big hit."

Maddie beams. "Yeah?"

"Oh, yeah."

"I knew it would work!" his daughter squeals.

Deacon bumps her shoulder. "Thanks for helping me with it."

Maddie looks proud, but mostly relieved. He'd noticed how she's been anxious all week. "Anytime, Dad."

Rayna comes back from the kitchen, one bowl in each hand, and she passes one to Deacon before she sits on the other side of Maddie.

Maddie's gaze goes from her mom to her dad and back. She takes a deep, contented breath. Her parents have reconciled, they're all eating chocolate ice cream in the middle of the night, she believes life can't get better than this.

There are three songs she wrote with Deacon that will end up on the new album. If it was up to her, she would add even more, but it's the compromise she's reached with the label. It had been enough of a pain already to make them agree to cut two and add those new three.

Deacon has been hanging out in the studio all afternoon while she's been recording, and she loves having him around. She already knew he and Adria were getting along, but everyone else, too, seems to have taken a liking to him. She's not surprised.

The band are on a smoke break now, and she and Deacon are cuddled up on the couch while listening to an early version of Postcard From Mexico.

Watty is sitting at the console, and as the last note rings out, he turns around on his chair. "This one needs to be a duet, there's no way it will work as a solo."

They'd written Postcard From Mexico one afternoon they'd spent in Deacon's bed. It'd been a scorching hot day, and the idea for the song had started as a joke, but it had soon turned into a full-fledged thing.

Rayna straightens up on the couch. "Well, you know what? Screw the label. We wrote this one as a duet, we'll record it as a duet." She turns to Deacon. "What do you think? You're in?" she asks.

He smiles. "First, I'd like to say I find it really sexy when you're fighting the system," he jokes. She slaps his arm. "And, yes, of course I'm in."

When the band comes back inside, Watty gives them some directions while Rayna and Deacon put earphones on and stand facing each other at the mic.

It's the first time they're going to record together, and when she thinks about it, it's the first time they're going to sing together in front of people who aren't their daughter.

As soon as they start, it becomes clear it's as easy for them to record together as it is to write together. The song is light and playful, and she can tell Deacon is having as much fun as she does. She keeps grinning the whole way through.

They both laugh when the song ends, and as she turns to Watty who's standing on the other side of the glass, she can see he's grinning too. Rayna knows that look. It's the same look he has when he excitedly tells her about some promising artist he's just discovered.

He presses the button on the console so they can hear him. "Well, what would y'all say if we kept fighting the system some more?" he asks.

Rayna's not sure what he has in mind, but she sure is eager to find out.

TBC