Page 79 of A Song for Another Woman

“There’s the house,” he says. “It’s not finished. But there’s a roof, walls, and electricity in enough places. No one will be there.”

The house. My house. The words hit somewhere I’ve been trying not to touch.

I nod before I can let myself think too long. “Okay.”

He reaches like he might put a hand at my back, then stops with his fingers half-curled in the air. That small restraint does more to my chest than the reach would have. He remembers he doesn’t get to move me through a room anymore. He waits until I step first.

We leave through the side door, away from the main windows. Cold night air settles over my face, sharp enough to make my eyes water. Cade walks beside me but not too close, his guitar case in one hand, his other hanging empty between us.

The drive over is quiet. Not cold and not comfortable, just quiet, with the dark road unspooling ahead of his truck and my hands folded over my purse in my lap. When he turns onto the gravel lane, my breath catches before I can stop it.

The house rises out of the dark in pieces. Porch posts. Fresh railings. Windows without curtains. A roofline I drew at nineteen with a dull pencil on the back of a shift schedule. The old dogwood stands at the side of the yard, bare-limbed and stubborn, its branches reaching over the roof.

Cade parks, but he doesn’t get out right away. His hands stay on the steering wheel, his knuckles rough. There’s a half-healed cut across one thumb and a strip of medical tape around the base of his palm.

“I can take you back,” he says.

I look over at him. He’s still Cade. The slope of his nose, the tired mouth, and the dark hair falling over his forehead because he never remembers to push it back until he’s already annoyed by it. The man I left in Nashville and the man who’s been building porch rails under a Tennessee sun live in the same body.

“No. This is good," I say, not really sure if it is or not.

His eyes close for half a second. Then he gets out, comes around, and opens my door. He stands back so far I almost laugh, except nothing in me feels laughable. I climb down carefully, one hand braced against the seat, my sweater falling loose around me.

Cade notices the care. He hasn't figured it out. I know because if he had, he would have already come apart.

I step past him toward the porch. The boards are new enough to smell like cut lumber. A temporary bulb glows near the front door, throwing pale light over sawdust, stacked trim, and the kind of clutter that means people have been here all day making something real. The porch wraps around the side exactly the way I drew it. Wide enough for two rocking chairs and a little table. Wide enough for coffee at dawn. Wide enough for a woman to sit with bare feet tucked under her and listen to rain.

I stop at the threshold, and Cade stops behind me.

“I kept your measurements,” he says, then shakes his head once. “That sounds ridiculous. I mean, I kept the drawings. All of them. The one with the porch. The one with the reading nook. The kitchen layout you changed three times because yousaid someday you’d want enough counter space to make biscuits without elbowing somebody in the ribs.”

My fingers touch the unfinished door frame.

The house is colder inside, but dry. The walls are up, some painted, some still waiting. Plastic sheeting covers part of the floor. There’s a ladder near the hall and a stack of tiles in the corner. The air smells like dust, pine, drywall mud, and the clean metal scent of new wiring. It should feel strange, but it doesn’t. That scares me more than if it did.

Cade sets his guitar case down near the entry and takes off his hat, turning it once in his hands. The porch light cuts across his face from behind, leaving the front of him in shadow.

“I had a speech,” he says.

My pulse stumbles.

He looks down at the hat. “A whole one. It was bad.”

Despite myself, my mouth trembles. “Was it?”

“Terrible.” His thumb rubs over the brim. “Cy told me if I used the phrase ‘from the ashes’ anywhere near you, he’d knock me unconscious and tell you I tripped.”

A breath leaves me. Not quite a laugh, but close enough to hurt.

Cade hears it. His face changes, hunger and grief moving through him so fast he has to look away. Then the room gets quiet again. He sets the hat on top of his guitar case, and when he lifts his eyes, there’s nothing rehearsed in them.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “And I know that’s not enough. I know it’s the cheapest thing I can say after making you pay for my choices.”

My hand tightens on the strap of my purse.

“I neglected you,” he says. “Not by accident. Not because touring is hard, the industry is loud, or because Duke pushed and Melody wanted and cameras were everywhere. I neglectedyou because being needed by strangers made me feel younger, more important.

“I chose the feeling of being relevant over you,” he says. “Over dinners you made and didn’t eat. Over texts I saw and answered later until later became never. Over sitting beside you at awards shows. Over making sure you had a pass with your name on it instead of being handled like an accessory. Over shutting down a story I knew was hurting you because I liked what that story was doing for my career.”