the way he had. But when he didn’t move to stop me, I knew before Frances answered he was telling the truth.
“Hey, Daisy,” Frances said in a chirpy tone.
“Frances … guess what?” I said.
“What?” she asked sounding excited.
“I have a visitor today.”
“Oh yeah? Who’s that?” she asked, invested in the conversation like she was enjoying the mystery.
“Jamie,” I said, flatly.
“Jamie?” she replied, but the screech in her tone told me everything I’d needed to know. “Wait, Daisy. You know I love you, I never expected him to come back, I did what I did out of love …”
“Oh bejesus, Frances, I’ve heard it all now. You held back his letter … my private letter and watched me heartbroken for months?”
“I did,” she confessed. “But I thought your fling had run its course and he had been using his band’s album as a way out.”
“You read it? You fecking read it?” I yelled.
“No, he told me that’s why he was leaving. I still have the letter, its unopened. Just know I was protecting you.”
“Ha! Protecting me? Frances from where I’m sitting right now, the person I need protecting from is you… or rather, the next time we’re in the same room you may need protection from me.”
I ended the call and turned to look at Jamie again. “Sorry, I believed you before she answered, but …”
“It’s okay, I understand,” he told me reaching out and pulling me into a hug. “I’m really sorry, baby, believe me.”
“From the moment I left here everything else in life had to go on the back burner. My total focus was on: writing, composing, recording, re-recording, dubbing, multi tracking, infills … the creative side of a music album is all consuming. I had to forget about everything else and immerse myself in my song writing. It’s the only way to get results. When the tracks are done, the producers and record label give their input before the album can be signed off. Then, they plan a strategy for the pre-release promo, optimizing the release date against who else is releasing … it’s all those complexities that ensures the album doesn’t fail.”
I sat blinking, wondering how he could have thought how he left had been acceptable. True, he’d left that letter, would he really have not gone had I cried?
“But now that's done,” he smiled. “There’s only a few more minor obligations, then I can have my life back and be here with you.”
“You think?” I scoffed at his confidence. There was still the matter of him not being around for so long. “So, I should be grateful that you came back? That you can squeeze me into your busy schedule after months of nothing, right?” I sounded bitter and I wished I’d controlled my feelings better, but I couldn’t just turn off months of hurt in a heartbeat.
“No, you shouldn’t be grateful. I understand how you feel, given what we’ve found out about Frances. If you’d done the same thing to me, I’d have been pissed, too. But, baby, I went to work. I didn’t expect you to shut the bar tonight to talk to me, did I?”
“That’s hardly a fair comparison for what you did.” I huffed, my eyes ticking over his face, and even though I felt extremely hostile toward him, my heart ached for his touch. “Even if I accept what you’ve told me, I can’t get my head around how you thought it okay to get your PA to call me like that. That was insulting.”
“That wasn’t my call. Paddy knew how being away from you affected me. We had both thought we’d be gone for a couple of months, and when it became four, I was afraid I had blown it with you. One of the production team left when we were doing the last few cuts of the final track and Paddy scribbled a note to his wife, Bernie to get in touch with my PA, Donna. Maybe when you hear the album you’ll hear how much you were on my mind, since most of the lyrics I came up with were directly related to you and the time I spent here with you.”
I must have looked gobsmacked, and I stared at him open mouthed as his confession of thinking he’d blown it with me sank in.
“So DistRoyed have recorded songs you wrote about me?”
“Yep, five tracks have been heavily influenced by you, and they’re beauties. Writing lyrics helped me express how I felt and that I’d fallen in love