Rock Pride, Country Prejudice is LIVE! Enjoy chapter one!

Chapter One

September 19, 2021

Truth universal.

“Ugh. That’s a lousy title,” I mumbled, frustrated. Uncrossing my legs, I rolled forward onto my stomach. The soft grass cushioned my body but even if it hadn’t, I might not have noticed. I was in the zone. The lyrics to my latest song had transpired rather quickly, like the contents of my dream had transcribed itself onto paper, but the title somehow had me stumped. The title—the least challenging part of the entire process.

Leaning over the worn notebook and a splattering of sheet music, I tried again. Man of My Heart. No…Maybe. I tapped my pencil against my lips as I hummed the tune again. Glancing over at my guitar leaning up against Old Hickory, I debated reaching for it, then gave in. Positioning the mahogany instrument on my lap, I placed my fingers on the strings and started from the beginning.

A fair portion of my songs have come from dreams; it’s strange but factual. My older sister, Jade, grew tired of me turning the light on in the middle of the night to quickly write down what I dreamt, so now she sleeps with a mask on.

This one came last night, and with it came the image of a man. A strong silhouette, perfectly proportionate from his head to his toes, but it was the contents from within that startled me. Though the subject himself appeared transparent, all the characteristics I desired in a man emerged—not that I thought about it that often or in such detail, which is really why it came as a surprise, but I could actually see courage, honesty, and intelligence appear.

This time when I woke up, I felt this strange sense of loss—like the emptiness that occurs when something is just barely out of your reach.

Typical. My love life wasn’t exactly a fairy tale.

I quickly jotted everything down but could not get a grasp on who he was. Truthfully, I doubted such a man existed…at least not when I was awake.

Awake. That’s it!

I set my guitar down and leaned my back comfortably against the shagbark, though this particular section of the tree had rubbed bald from my daily visits. My favorite scent of maple wafted through the air as I closed my eyes and let the warmth of the descending sun wash over me. The enormous oval-shaped leaves provided just the right amount of cover for a moment of privacy—a rare find in a house of five girls.

“Elllllllle!” The shrill cry of my youngest sister, Lilly, pierced my solitude. I glanced at my watch. 6:41 p.m. Twenty-seven glorious minutes of solitude…a new record.

“Elle, are you piddlin’ around out here?” Lilly hollered again. When she flew around the tree, Kassidy dashed hot on her heels, both girls’ high-pitched voices teetered between terror and excitement, so much that it was difficult to discern which emotion was genuine.

I quickly retrieved my notebook and papers to prevent them from getting kicked in the fray. My pencil fell to the grass as I jumped to my feet, preparing to referee.

“I wanna tell her!” Kassidy’s dark curls bounced as she came to a sudden stop.

“No, I do!” Lilly exclaimed. Her hair was only a slight shade lighter, and although it didn’t have an inch of curl in it, she still whipped it around as if her head was covered in them. Stepping in front of her sister, she held her arms out away from her sides in a desperate attempt to keep Kassidy from taking the lead.

Disregarding the fact that these two had already entered their teenage years, one might have thought two toddlers were battling over a beloved toy. Only fourteen months separated them, yet their behavior, demeanor…even personalities…were eerily identical to twins. They were certainly two peas in the same pod. When the childish pushing and shoving began, I stepped in to prevent anyone from getting hurt, though it rarely came to that.

“Enough!” I stood between them. “Y’all better quit bein’ ugly and tell me what’s goin’ on.”

Kassidy bent over and pressed her hands on her knees. As the least athletic in the family, she grasped at a series of full inhales. “Oh, I can barely breathe. Mama said the Lucas’…”

“The Lucas’?” I grabbed Kassidy’s arm. “Are they okay? Did somethin’ happen to Charly?”

“Charly?” Lilly giggled while Kassidy took deeper breaths. “Nah, Charly’s fine. Professor Lucas told us a secret.”

I placed my hands on my hips. “Told who a secret?” One of my eyebrows lifted. “And do y’all honestly know the definition of a secret if you’re both just bustin’ to blab about it?”

Kassidy laughed out loud and squeezed my cheeks between her hands. “Persuasion!” she shrieked. Then turned her head just enough to smirk toward Lilly.

“Persuasion is comin’ here!” Lilly spit out the words faster to beat her sister to the rest of the details.

“Persuasion what?” I shook my head, not understanding their cryptic message. Both girls’ mouths fell wide open, though no sound escaped. I peered between them, doubting I’d ever seen them so silent.

“You’re kiddin’ right, Elle?” Kassidy threw her hands into the air. “Persuasion!” She cried louder, as if the volume of her voice would somehow increase my understanding.

“The rock band!” Lilly reached for Kassidy and with clasped hands they screamed in unison. “They’re comin’ to Hickman!”

“What?”

Kassidy smiled broadly. “It’s true. Professor Lucas told Mom and Pop, and some other adults, under strict confidence.”

“Why would they come here?” I glanced out past the small row of trees that lined our property and down the hill toward the Mississippi River. From where I stood, I could turn in every direction and almost see each corner of the old part of town.

In 1912, the Mississippi River rose so high it broke one of the concrete levees protecting the town and, within hours, the buildings on the main roads were buried up to the rooftops by river water. Old Town Hickman became a memory, but even with the newer developments a mile away, the town was still tiny. A mere speck on the map. Actually, I doubted that Hickman had made it onto any map.

“Law, hickory nuts!” Lilly’s tendency to get sidetracked pulled her eyes from me and toward the ground. She stomped the heel of her boot into the grass then picked up the remnants of the nut she just cracked. Popping the edible part into her mouth, she shrugged. “Somethin’ about a promise Chaz Bingley made when he was Professor Lucas’ student back in Washington or somethin’ borin’ like that.”

I blinked twice and tucked wayward strands of my brown hair behind my ears. “But why here? Can’t Professor Lucas just see them in L.A.?”

Both girls giggled on cue then Kassidy snorted. “Who cares a lick? They’re a comin’!” Then, as if their little squabble on who would get to tell me the news first was long past, they raced excitedly back to the house.

My brows furrowed. Why in the world would the country’s hottest rock band come to our little scratch in the sand? Our town barely cracked a population of two thousand, and I was pretty sure that number included livestock.

I quickly gathered my papers and grabbed the neck of my guitar, determined to get to the bottom of this ridiculous rumor immediately. I marched back into the house to confront my parents, but the moment I stepped through the front door of our farmhouse, earsplitting screams erupted from the kitchen.

“Nooooo, Mama!” Lilly cried. I entered the room the moment Mom swiped Lilly’s cell phone and tucked it inside her pant pocket with record speed. Then, with equal nimbleness, she had Kassidy’s in her other hand and behind her back.

“Give me my phone, Ma!” Kassidy stomped her foot, once again demonstrating her maturity level quite below her sixteen years of age.

“Y’all will get ‘em back in a week. I’ll not have you blastin’ your social media with the news.”

Kassidy folded her arms tightly over her chest. “I won’t, I promise.”

“Nope.” Mom stepped over to Melody and held out her hand her direction as well. Melody rolled her eyes and groaned, “Y’all know I don’t conform to that insular cultural idiocy known as social media, Mom.” The thick black liner above and below Melody’s narrow eyes made her stare appear more threatening than normal.

“Regardless.” Mom shook her hand impatiently. “I promised the Lucas’ that we wouldn’t do anythin’ to compromise their secret.”

“Why do Elle and Jade get to keep theirs?” Lilly sniffled. I turned to find my older sister Jade leaning against the wall across from me. Her lips pulled into a half smile while her bright blue eyes lifted in curiosity.

“Because, legally I can’t, they’re over age. But I believe…”—she sent a look of warning— “they’re mature enough to know how to behave themselves.”

I held back a muffled laugh. Certainly, we were older, at twenty and eighteen years of age, but not always as level-headed as mom thinks.

“Nothin’ like bein’ tossed aside as all get out,” Lilly cried and grabbed Kassidy’s arm as the girls trudged heatedly out of the kitchen.

I stepped over to Jade and whispered, “Think it’s true?” She shrugged. Pulling myself up to sit on the edge of the nearest counter I questioned, “Why here, Mama?”

“Why here, what?” She huffed and tossed the girls’ cell phones into her purse, then walked over to the desktop computer in the kitchen nook and removed the cords. “There,” she sighed. “Now all the electronics in the house are disabled.”

I looked over to Jade, who shook her head. Our family had literally lost their minds overnight. “Mama!” I demanded her attention again.

“What?” She brushed a crumb off her favorite cat sweatshirt. The orange tabby posed like a Clydesdale with a tinge of real fur for the feline’s flashy tail.

“Why would Persuasion come here?”

She didn’t even glance my way as she spoke. “Chaz is a former music student of Professor Lucas.” She reached for a legal pad and pencil in the junk drawer and sat down at the table. “He promised if he ever made it big, he’d find the professor and thank him in person.”

I exchanged more subtle glances with Jade. “I doubt he ever envisioned himself comin’ to such a backwater speck of a town,” I mumbled.

Mom had the beginnings of a list started but stopped instantly and looked up at me with a severe furrow in her brow. “Now hold your horses, Little Missy, he sounds like a decent young man makin’ good on that promise.”

“But here?” I really struggled to picture the hottest trio of musicians here… in Hickman, Kentucky. Despite the love I personally had for my hometown, we rarely had tourists or visitors. The closest airport was a good hour away and even that was a small regional airstrip. We couldn’t even boast a real grocery store, merely a small local market, a hairdresser, a gas station, a small coast guard station, and a massive post office building which never made any sense to me. Actually, none of this conversation made sense to me at the moment.

Jade looked to mom. “So why the hush hush?”

She continued writing without looking up. “What kind of ruckus do y’all think would happen if word got out that these mega stars are here in town?”

Kassidy and Lilly screamed from the other room then dissolved into a fit of giggles.

“See? I reckon every girl with a pulse from age twelve to fifty will be doin’ that…right there.” Mom jabbed her pencil their direction.

Jade twisted her long blond hair into a braid and fidgeted with the strands at the end. “Just how does Professor Lucas plan to keep this quiet? He can’t have every mother in town stealin’ their daughter’s cell phone for an entire week.” She laughed. “It’s gonna get out somehow.”

“He knows it will eventually, but he hopes not until after their visit is over. He met with a group of adults this mornin’ at the town hall. We all see the sense in keepin’ this quiet, if not for the sanity of this place. Nobody wants a horde of cattywampus fans descendin’ on our sleepy town. We all kinda like the idea of havin’ them to ourselves.”

“Are they stayin’ with the Lucas’?”

“No, they’re fixin’ to rent out the house at Miller’s Ranch for the month. It’s gated and the most secure. They’re even bringin’ their own security team.”

“Why way out there, though?” I questioned, other than the fact that it was the largest estate house in the area. “Do they know there isn’t any cell service?” I had babysat the Miller’s three kids a few years ago, before they moved to Florida and decided to turn it into a rental. It’s a big, beautiful house, but I hated the creepy seclusion. The nearest neighbor was several miles away and there’s no cell service and no internet. They justified their lack of technological amenities as a rustic and old-fashioned experience that would appeal to somebody looking to unplug. I guess they found their somebody.

“Accordin’ to Professor Lucas,” Mom held up her list and examined it, “Chaz is lookin’ forward to the opportunity to disconnect. He said L.A. can be too overwhelmin’ at times and he was hankerin’ for a place they could unwind.”

Kassidy entered the room and started singing a song that I assumed to be theirs. Lilly strutted past her but stopped suddenly. “I can’t even imagine the thought of bein’ tired of L.A…” Her palm went to her forehead in dramatic distress. “I would move there in a heartbeat!”

Mom snapped her direction. “Maybe when you’re twenty-one!”

“Oh, come on, Mama, I’m fifteen. What if I wanna go to college o’er there?”

Though the draw to L.A. or anywhere in California didn’t make a lick of sense to me, it really didn’t matter, I wasn’t much of a fan of rock ‘n roll anyway. Country is where my heart lies, and Nashville was only three hours away.

Mom circled around as if she read my thoughts. “This could be it, girls.” She clapped her hands together. “This could be your big break!”

I exchanged a nervous glance with Jade. If either one of us had been born with perfect hair, flawless skin, and hourglass figures, she would have made the most stereotypical pageant mom on the planet. As it was, we were fairly typical Southern girls; yes, Jade stood a bit taller with a willowy figure and blond hair against my more athletic build and chestnut waves, but mom believed our musical talents were beyond typical and that we were “so very close, to becomin’ stars.” Well, her and Professor Lucas…and our regulars down at Bubba’s BBQ.

Though it was well known that Professor Lucas had an eye for talent, I struggled to believe Jade and I could even compare to his former students. He did, after all, instruct none other than Chaz Bingley, the lead singer and guitarist for Persuasion, currently the hottest rock band in America. Yet, between Professor Lucas’ and our mom’s insistence, Jade and I went four times a week to his studio to write, play, and record. He has said more than once our time was simply right around the corner.

“Mama, you do know they’re rock stars, right? They aren’t even crossovers.”

She glanced at me blankly, as if I had just grown a third eye. “And?”

“We play country.” As if she didn’t know.

“Y’all play music, Elle…country/rock…what does it matter? It’s all about connections anyway and we’re gonna make sure y’all take full advantage of any connection that comes your way.”

I inhaled slowly and watched as Jade’s lips turned into a placating smile before she shrugged her shoulders. “It’s highly unlikely we’ll ever cross their paths, anyway. If Chaz is lookin’ to relax and visit with Professor Lucas, they picked the right house for it. Nobody will even get through the gates or onto the property, and I doubt they’ll venture out and about town.” She leaned down and kissed Mama on the cheek. “And I reckon they aren’t here to perform.”

I jumped off the counter and walked back out into the living room with her. “I don’t know why Mama thinks their acquaintance would make a difference in our music.” I slumped into the La-Z-Boy. “I doubt they’ve ever listened to a country song.”

“Can I borrow your phone, Elle?” Lilly skipped over and flashed her sweetest smile, fluttering her eyelashes at me.

“No way,” I laughed. “You heard Mama, y’all need to keep this a secret. Do y’all really want every teenage girl in the state of Kentucky grazin’ on your green grass?”

She pushed her lips out into a big pout. “I reckon you’re right.” Suddenly her eyes lit up. “I do prefer to keep them all to myself.” She ran over to Kassidy. “Hey, let’s go see if we can catch them arrivin’. Maybe they’re takin’ the ferry. You have a Polaroid, don’t you?”

“No, Lilly.” Jade reached out. “Leave ‘em alone. They came for seclusion. Besides, you just got your learner’s permit last week, y’all can’t drive without one of us and that’s not gonna happen.”

Melody grumbled from the floor. I had forgotten she was even in the room. “I can think of a hundred other places in the world where seclusion would be more gratifyin’…”. Sitting up, she brushed her dyed, jet- black bangs aside, revealing her recent eyebrow piercing. Not her first…just the most recent. “A cave, a crypt, a cemetery…” She continued naming off each place she found more appealing than a secluded mansion as she stood and left the room.

“I don’t know why y’all are makin’ such a fuss over this.” I reached for my guitar and started toward our bedroom. “We’re so polar opposite from these guys that it’d be ridiculous to even assume they’d take any interest in our music at all.”

“Mark my words, Punkin’,” Mom hollered from the kitchen. I should’ve known she could hear us. She continued speaking as Jade joined me down the hall. “Persuasion’s visit will be life-changin’.”

When we reached the room, each of us fell onto our own twin bed, but she leaned on her side and rested her head on her fist. “Did you finish Wildflower?”

Laying on my back looking up at the ceiling, I sighed. “Mostly. I worked on it yesterday. I’m stuck on the third verse, but the chorus is done.”

“If you want, I can take a look,” she suggested. “It’s such a beautiful song. I can’t wait to give it a try on the fiddle.”

“Yeah, let’s work on it tonight and maybe it will be ready for Bubba’s on Friday night.”

“Sounds good,” she chuckled and held her opposite hand high in the air. Wiggling her fingers, she laughed. “I think our five fans are ready for somethin’ new anyway.”