Page 38 of A Song for Another Woman

I look at Cy. “Then I learn.”

His eyes narrow. “Learn what?”

I swallow. “Her,” I say. “From scratch. On her terms.”

Chapter Nine

EMMY

The WHLR studio still smells like dust, burnt coffee, and warm equipment. I used to love that smell. Tonight it sits in the back of my throat like a dare.

Pop Dobbs stands on the other side of the glass with one hand on the soundboard and the other wrapped around a chipped mug that says WORLD’S OKAYEST BOSS. The mug is old enough that I remember giving it to him for his fifty-eighth birthday. He’d laughed so hard he spilled coffee down his shirt, then made me read the weather three times because I kept losing it on air. That girl feels like someone I used to know from a distance.

“Mic’s hot in thirty,” Pop says through the talkback.

My headphones are too big. Or my head is too small. Or I’ve spent too long letting other people fit me into places I never belonged, and now even something familiar feels like it might reject me. I adjust them anyway.

On the desk in front of me, Pop has left a yellow legal pad, three sharpened pencils, and a stack of index cards with sponsor reads written in his blocky hand. Rayburn Hardware. Dogwood Diner. McIntyre Feed and Seed. Nothing with a stylist, a publicist, or a man in an arena telling me where to sit. Justlocal businesses trying to keep the lights on. Just me, if I can remember how to be me.

My phone buzzes face-down beside the legal pad.

June

I'm listening.

A second text follows.

June

And if you throw up from nerves, aim away from the equipment. Pop can’t afford nice things.

I almost smile. It feels strange on my face.

Pop watches me through the glass, his eyebrows lifted. “You ready, Emmy Lou?”

Nobody in Nashville called me Emmy Lou. It would have sounded wrong there. Too soft. Too home. Too much like the girl who stayed after her shift to re-shelve old records and eat vending machine crackers with the overnight engineer. Here, it slips through me and lands somewhere sore. I give him a thumbs-up because my mouth can’t be trusted.

The red ON AIR light blinks once. Then it glows steady. Pop points at me.

For one second, nothing happens. The old board hums beneath my fingertips. The second hand on the wall clock moves. My own breathing fills the headphones, too close and too human. Out beyond the little studio, Harmony Ridge is settling into the evening: dishwashers shutting off, porch lights clicking dark, the last trucks rolling down county roads with headlights cutting through mist. And somewhere, because the world is not merciful enough to look away, people are waiting to hear whether I fall apart.

I lean toward the microphone.

“Good evening, Harmony Ridge,” I say. My voice comes out lower than I expect. Not broken. Not strong either. Just there. “This is Emmy Sutton on WHLR Backroad Country, and if you just checked your radio to make sure it’s not 2009, I understand. I did the same thing when Pop handed me these headphones.”

Pop’s face changes first. A small grin, quick as a match. My chest loosens by one inch.

“I’m back for the evening show,” I say. “At least for tonight. Pop is calling it a trial run, which is a polite way of saying he’s not sure I remember which buttons not to touch. So if we accidentally broadcast the county emergency alert test over a Merle Haggard record, please direct your complaints to management.”

Pop lifts both hands like he's offended.

I take the first song because that's what you do when your hands are shaking. You give the room something older than you. Something sturdy.

The opening steel guitar fills my ears. I slide the fader up and sit back from the mic. My hands are trembling in my lap.

Through the glass, Pop mouths,Breathe.

I do.