A Little Bit Country Read online

  Dedication

  For Danny, who on our very first date asked why I had so much Dolly Parton on my iPod.

  And for Dolly.

  I will always love you both.

  Epigraph

  THREE CHORDS AND THE TRUTH.

  —Harlan Howard, on country music

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Chapter 1: Emmett

  Chapter 2: Luke

  Chapter 3: Luke

  Chapter 4: Emmett

  Chapter 5: Luke

  Chapter 6: Emmett

  Chapter 7: Luke

  Chapter 8: Emmett

  Chapter 9: Luke

  Chapter 10: Emmett

  Chapter 11: Luke

  Chapter 12: Emmett

  Chapter 13: Luke

  Chapter 14: Luke

  Chapter 15: Emmett

  Chapter 16: Luke

  Chapter 17: Emmett

  Chapter 18: Luke

  Chapter 19: Emmett

  Chapter 20: Emmett

  Chapter 21: Luke

  Chapter 22: Emmett

  Chapter 23: Luke

  Chapter 24: Emmett

  Chapter 25: Luke

  Chapter 26: Emmett

  Chapter 27: Emmett

  Chapter 28: Luke

  Chapter 29: Emmett

  Chapter 30: Luke

  Chapter 31: Emmett

  Chapter 32: Luke

  Chapter 33: Emmett

  Chapter 34: Luke

  Chapter 35: Emmett

  Chapter 36: Luke

  Chapter 37: Luke

  Chapter 38: Emmett

  Chapter 39: Luke

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Books by Brian D. Kennedy

  Back Ad

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  1

  Emmett

  Here’s the thing about writing a good country song: It’s really fricking hard. For starters, you can’t swear. Not if you want radio play. But I don’t give a “ship” about that. For me, the bigger challenge is coming up with something original to say. Anyone can put words to music, but how do you make those words sound new? I mean, the world’s only big enough for so many songs about long dirt roads, cheating spouses, and drinking enough six-packs of cheap beer to crash your pontoon.

  To be a good songwriter, you constantly have to be aware of your surroundings. You never know when inspiration is going to strike. Which is why—as my mom stands at the top of our driveway, sniffling into a balled-up tissue—my brain is already cycling through potential song titles:

  “The Tears in Mama’s Eyes.”

  “Mama Sobbed Like a Little Baby the Day Her Little Baby Left Home.”

  “Don’t Cry, Mama, I’m Only Seventeen and Not Legally Allowed to Leave for Good.”

  Okay, so I need to keep workshopping those. The good news is I have the next nine hours to do so. I can’t wait to be on the road, where I’ll have the sun on my skin, the wind in my hair, and my favorite country singer—Miss Wanda Jean Stubbs—blaring on my stereo.

  “You can at least pretend to be sad, Emmett,” Mom says.

  “It’s only for three months,” I tell her, trying not to smile as I pack my guitar case and my laptop, which has the latest copy of my demo, into the back seat.

  “It’s the longest you’ve been away. Don’t forget, you called asking if you could come home early from music camp—and that was only two weeks.”

  I didn’t want to leave music camp because I was homesick. I wanted to leave because it was full of snobs. Classical music prodigies who were total dicks about my taste in music. Look, I didn’t deny that Bach and Beethoven were musical geniuses. Would it have killed them to pay the same respect to Johnny Cash and Dolly Parton?

  “This is different,” I explain, making my way back up the driveway. “It’s the opportunity of a lifetime.”

  “It’s a job,” Mom reminds me, ever the realist.

  “No, it’s a gig. My first real one. I get to perform Wanda Jean’s greatest hits. In public. And someone’s giving me a paycheck for it.”

  “I just don’t want you to get your hopes up too much.”

  “Mom. I’m replacing someone who had to drop out at the last minute because he signed a recording contract. So, yeah, this is a little different than performing at the school talent show. This could be an important step toward something bigger.”

  Mom sighs, brushing my hair out of my face. “It’s so last-minute. I’m still trying to wrap my head around it.”

  “You and Dad already said yes. If you change your mind now, you’ll only be crushing my biggest dream.”

  Behind us, the front door to our house swings open. Dad comes out carrying a plastic shopping bag. “It’s a long drive to Jackson Hollow,” he says. “I bought snacks for the road. And an extra package of socks and underwear. You can never be too sure.”

  This is exactly why I have to leave home.

  “I’m not running off to join the circus,” I say, taking the bag from him. “I’m staying with Aunt Karen. You have nothing to worry about.”

  “The circus might not be so bad compared to your aunt’s house,” Dad mumbles, getting an immediate head snap from Mom.

  “Derek . . .”

  “What? The woman lets strangers live with her. Strangers she finds online.”

  “She only rents out her spare room when money is tight.”

  “Money wouldn’t be so tight if she got a real job instead of selling her wind chimes.”

  “They’re not wind chimes. They’re artistic sculptures.”

  “Artistic sculptures people hang on their back porch. How’s that different from wind chimes?”

  “Well . . .” Mom pauses. “They’re more expensive.”

  Dad’s eyebrows skyrocket so far off his face, they practically orbit the earth. I love my parents, but I don’t know how they’re going to survive without me. I guess this summer will be good practice. Because as soon as I finish school next year, I’m leaving Oak Park for good. No offense to Illinois, but I was born in the wrong state. If I want to be a real country singer, I need to be surrounded by rolling hills and wide-open spaces. Not Starbucks drive-throughs and suburban shopping malls.

  Of course, it’s not only my geography that’s holding me back. There’s also the matter of my sexuality. There aren’t a lot of gay country singers for me to follow in the footsteps of. And there certainly aren’t many famous ones. But I don’t take that as a strike against me. I take it as a challenge.

  I like who I am.

  And I like who I like.

  Which is why I plan on becoming country music’s biggest openly gay superstar.

  It’s not going to be easy. But I’m willing to put in the work. I just wish I had gotten an earlier start. Taylor Swift was sixteen when she released her debut album. LeAnn Rimes won her first Grammy at fourteen.

  I’m seventeen and my dad still buys my underwear.

  But all that’s about to change. Because I get to spend my summer performing at Wanda World, the amusement park owned by Wanda Jean Stubbs.

  That is, assuming I can leave my driveway before my parents bicker themselves to death.

  “If you love her sculptures so much,” Dad says, still going on about Aunt Karen, “then why are the ones we bought still in the garage?”

  “I haven’t found the right place to hang them yet! They have a very specific . . . aesthetic.”

  “I’m leaving now,” I announce.

  Mom takes her tissues back out; Da
d pulls a wad of bills from his pocket. “Here. We’d feel better if you took this. Think of it as an emergency fund. In case you run out of gas. Or if something unexpected pops up. Like if you meet someone. . . .”

  “If I meet someone?”

  “Yeah. Like . . . a guy.”

  “Oh my God, Dad. What?”

  His face turns bright pink. “I don’t know what I’m saying. Just be smart. Use protection.”

  I take the money, carefully avoiding eye contact.

  “You two are a mess,” I say, giving each of them a hug. “I can’t wait to see what this is like next year, when I leave for good.”

  “There are plenty of great colleges in state,” Mom says.

  Country music superstars don’t have time for college. But that’s a conversation for another day. Walking back down the driveway, I try to take a mental snapshot of this moment. I need to capture everything I’m feeling so I can write about it later. Except . . . if I write a song about leaving home, shouldn’t it be a sad one? Or at least bittersweet? The only tears I feel like shedding right now are tears of joy.

  It’s finally time for me to spread my wings and fly! Which is a cliché, I know. But it’s also the lyrics to one of my favorite Wanda Jean songs. And when I climb into my car and turn the ignition, it’s the song that kicks off the playlist I created for this trip.

  Who am I to keep you?

  Who am I to cry?

  My love for you is not a cage

  It’s a flame. Burning bright

  One I’ll never let die

  So spread your wings, my lil’ darlin’

  And fly, fly, fly

  Before I can fly, I have to obey a twenty-five miles per hour speed limit as I drive past all the well-manicured lawns and pink fairy-tale playhouses in our cul-de-sac. But once I’m out on the freeway, with the Chicago skyline in my rearview mirror and my future before me, I floor it.

  Next stop: country music stardom.

  Or, at the very least, Tennessee.

  2

  Luke

  I like having a brother and sister. Really, I do. But there’s nothing like the first day of summer vacation to make me miss being an only child. It doesn’t matter how well behaved they are during the school year. Once classes and homework are out of the picture, their inner demons are unleashed and we’re lucky if no one’s bleeding or tied to a banister by the end of the day.

  “Luke!” Gabe shouts, running into the kitchen with a bedsheet wrapped around him, like a drunk frat boy at a toga party. “I don’t got any clean underwear.”

  “Gabe, buddy. I did laundry last night.”

  “Well, my drawer’s empty.”

  “Check on top of the dryer, then.”

  Amelia enters, her long dark hair wet from the shower. “Do I even wanna know?” she asks, looking at Gabe and using the sarcastic tone she’s adopted ever since starting fifth grade.

  Gabe sticks out his tongue and leaves. Amelia grabs a box of cereal and plops down on a stool at the counter. She’s wearing her soccer jersey, even though practice won’t begin for another week.

  “Bean,” I say. “I’m fixing breakfast this morning.”

  She wrinkles her nose. “What is it?”

  “Eggs.”

  At least, I hope it is. I open the fridge to check if the carton I bought earlier this week is still there. It is. Along with a jumbo pack of shredded cheese, three kinds of lunch meat, and plenty of RC Cola. Keith must’ve gone shopping on his way home from work this morning.

  “I’d rather have cereal,” Amelia says, opening the box to pour a small mound of Lucky Charms on the counter in front of her.

  “Seriously, Bean?”

  “My name is Amelia.”

  “Sorry, Bean. But c’mon, you’ll always be a Bean to me.”

  She narrows her eyes. “That’s sexist.”

  I take out the frying pan and turn the burner on. “How’s that sexist?”

  “You only give me a nickname because I’m a girl.”

  “I call Gabriel ‘Gabe,’ don’t I?”

  “Gabe is an actual name. Bean’s a vegetable.”

  “Actually, a bean is a legume.”

  Shit. Now I’m being sexist and mansplaining.

  “Okay, sorry. From now on, I shall only refer to you as Amelia.”

  “Thank you.” She crushes a green marshmallow under her thumb. “Treating me like I’m not a little kid anymore is the least you can do. If I’m old enough to babysit Gabe all summer . . .”

  “You ain’t babysitting me,” Gabe says, returning to the kitchen in his actual clothes. Hopefully with clean underwear on underneath.

  Amelia snorts. “Yeah, I am. Not that anyone asked if it was okay with me.”

  “Luke,” Gabe whines. “Tell Bean I’m old enough to take care of myself.”

  “My name’s Amelia. Not Bean.”

  “Beanie the meanie!”

  “Quit being ugly,” I snap. “Y’all are gonna wake your daddy.”

  Keith, my stepdad, works the overnight shift at the automotive plant. It’d take an army of bulldozers to rouse him from his slumber down in the basement. But Bean and Gabe had still better hush.

  I go back to fixing breakfast while Gabe takes a seat at the table. It doesn’t matter how cranky or tired I am, there’s something about the sizzle a cold slab of butter makes when it hits a hot frying pan that puts a smile on my face. When I’m cooking, the only thing I’ve got to worry about is making sure food gets on the plate. Sometimes, if I want to challenge myself, I’ll pretend I’m a cook in a Michelin-starred restaurant or a contestant on Top Chef.

  I’m not saying I’m good enough to be either of those things. But maybe someday I could be. We’ve got a shelf of my nana’s old cookbooks in the kitchen that I’ve slowly been making my way through. A lot of the recipes are dated—apparently, cheese logs were big in the seventies—but some aren’t bad. Despite Amelia and Gabe having picky palates, I got them to eat asparagus after it was baked into a quiche.

  Even when I’m fixing simpler dishes, I do what I can to dress them up. If this were last summer, I’d run out to Mama’s garden and grab a tomato or some parsley to give my scrambled eggs a pop of color. This summer, however, the only things growing in there are weeds. Mama was too sick to plant anything.

  After serving Gabe and Amelia their breakfast, I set a third plate of eggs on a tray with a glass of orange juice and some toast. “Y’all are in charge of washing your own dishes,” I say, leaving them to eat. “And make sure you actually scrub.”

  The floorboards on the staircase groan as I head upstairs. Our house is a big old farmhouse. Emphasis on the old. It’s drafty as heck, and we have to line the upstairs hallway with Tupperware containers whenever there’s a heavy rain. But as Mama likes to remind us, we’re just blessed to have a roof over our heads. Besides, except for the cookbooks, this house is about the only thing we’ve got left that belonged to Nana.

  Heading down the hallway to Mama’s bedroom, I peek through the crack in her door. She’s sitting up in bed with her eyes closed. The TV’s on, but the volume’s turned down low. Mama just likes the company.

  “Knock, knock,” I say, nudging the door open with my foot.

  Mama smiles, opening her eyes. “Hey, honey.”

  “I made breakfast.” I set the tray down on her side table, knowing there’s a good chance it’ll still be sitting there, untouched, when I get home later tonight. “How you feeling, Mama?”

  She sits up a bit. “Like I’m ’bout ready to get out of this bed.”

  Mama wasn’t officially diagnosed with multiple sclerosis until after Gabe was born. For years before that, Mama would complain about feeling tired and having dizzy spells. She’d even experience the occasional numbness, but the doctors couldn’t figure out what was causing it. She s
pends most of her time in remission now, until this spring, when she caught the flu and had a bad relapse. Amelia and Gabe are a bit young to fully understand her condition, but while Mama’s been off her feet the past month, we all do our best to keep the house from falling apart.

  “I’m sure I could use a trip to the salon,” Mama says. “Heck, I’ve been avoiding looking in the mirror for days now.”

  “You look fine, Mama. Besides, Dr. Collier said you shouldn’t—”

  Mama swats her hand in the air. “I’ve been getting all my infusions. And I haven’t felt dizzy in weeks. Dr. Collier just likes being cautious. He’d keep me on bed rest forever if he could.”

  Unfortunately, because Mama only works part-time at the Craft Barn, they don’t give her any sick leave. Keith’s job at the auto plant pays decent enough, but his insurance doesn’t cover the full cost of Mama’s treatments. As a seventeen-year-old, I didn’t think I’d have to know anything about deductibles or out-of-pocket expenses. But we’re a family, so I made it my business to learn. Mama and Keith shouldn’t have to take on the burden alone.

  “Luke,” Mama says. “You’ve got that look on your face again.”

  “Huh?” I reply, snapping out of it.

  “Like you’ve got the weight of the world sitting on your shoulders.”

  “No, Mama. I’m fine.”

  She grabs my hand. “Don’t take this the wrong way, honey. But I wish you’d learn to have more fun.”

  Fun’s not going to put breakfast on the table. Not that I’m bitter. I like doing my part to help out. It’s more than my father or granddad ever did. Except for Keith, the men in my family don’t have great track records.

  I give Mama’s hand a gentle squeeze and sit on the edge of her bed. “You don’t gotta worry about me, okay?”

  “I do worry. You’re always so serious.”

  “Would you rather I be out drinking and gallivanting all the time?”

  She shrugs. “I wouldn’t mind if you cut loose now and again. Especially if it got you to stop using words like ‘gallivanting.’”

  Maybe Mama has a point.

  “You planning on seeing Vanessa this summer?” she asks. “Haven’t heard you mention her lately. . . .”