The Perfect Love Song

The trees were barren, and Jimmy spied a single leaf, shivering as if it were a living thing left alone in the frigid October wind by a cruel god. He was in Lexington, Kentucky, on a bench in an empty park. God, what he’d give to be in Palmetto Pointe.

Jimmy shook his head. “You call that a crowd?” he asked. “So, when does this stop being worth it? I mean, how long do we wait to break out before these gigs kill us?”

Jack shrugged. “I don’t know, but I’m guessing we’ll know by the end of your Christmas tour. If that doesn’t start to change things, then we’ll have to rethink all of this.”

The iron bench felt like ice; Jimmy pulled his coat closer around his body, shoving his hands into his pockets. “Don’t let the band hear you say that. And man, way to put the pressure on me.” He smiled. “So if my perfect Christmas song isn’t so perfect, then we’re all done for good?” He shoved his elbow into his brother’s ribs.

“Thanks, but no thanks. Carrying your bags while fans swoon all over you when I could be with Kara during the holiday season? Hmm . . . Let me think about that one.”

“She’s great. But there’s just no way for her to make the wedding. She’s just too . . . frail . . . to travel that far. I told her not to worry about it, but of course she’s worried. I assured her that we knew she’d be there in spirit.”

Days and time moved forward until on a frigid November afternoon, Jack, Kara, and Charlotte said good-bye to Jimmy, waving as he climbed aboard the fanciest tour bus they’d ever seen—a house on wheels. Kara and Charlotte then spent their days preparing for the wedding, for the holidays, hoping against hope that the busyness would keep the loneliness at bay.

The sweet, sugary aroma of shortbread filled Kara’s small white house. It was the week after Thanksgiving, and Charlotte burst through the front door and called Kara’s name. She clapped her hands together, as the November cold had come early this year and Charlotte wasn’t prepared, not even a coat did she wear. “I love this house,” Charlotte called out. And she did. The whitewashed walls, the crooked floors, the single bedroom and bathroom, the galley kitchen with room enough for only the essentials, the whitewashed furniture that Kara had found in flea markets and antique marts, refusing family heirlooms when she was trying so hard to make her own way in the world.

Across the round, ancient pine kitchen tabletop Kara had spread photos of Christmas lights strung across various porches, trees, and lanterns. Charlotte walked over, leafed through the photos.

Kara smiled. “I wanted to do a collection of Lowcountry Christmas lights. I took those pictures last year. Most are from around here, but some are from that trip to Savannah on New Year’s Eve.”

Charlotte picked up a photo of a gas lantern with the lights winding their way up the iron pole. “I think I love this one the most. What are you doing with them?”

“Sorry. Jimmy was finally able to call, and I wanted to . . . catch up. He’s in Atlanta. The Fox. It’s so exciting for him I can hardly be sad, but somehow I am. I just miss him with this dull ache that won’t go away.”

“At least I’m crazy busy with work. Everyone wants the perfect Christmas decorations, like Christmas is a competitive sport and the neighbors’ envy is the prize.” She sighed. “And there’s only three weeks left. What’s three weeks?”

Jimmy stood backstage and looked out at the empty Fox Theater. He was awestruck by its lavish beauty. This theater built in the 1920s with a sky full of flickering stars and drifting clouds, a National Historic Landmark overflowing with artistic fantasy, was the place a singer rarely allowed himself to imagine performing, almost as if it were too much to dream, too much to ask.

He’d been in the theater only once, and that had been as a child and in the audience. His mama had brought her sons to see The Nutcracker. The brothers had whined and wriggled through half the performance, but finally the happiness on their mama’s face and the stars above and the music had lulled both him and Jack into silence.

Rusk and Hope Corbin were warming up on the stage, doing microphone checks and playfully arguing about whether she should or shouldn’t take her shoes off halfway through the performance (which she had the night before). Watching this in-love and married couple filled Jimmy with hope, but also with a deep sadness. These two were so adoring, and this intimacy made the tour a beautiful celebration of Christmas and love. And yet . . . and yet . . . it made him acutely aware of Charlotte’s absence.

This was only their second concert, so Jimmy didn’t yet have many friends in the band, and the loneliness felt like an emptiness, as if someone had come in and scooped out the middle part of his heart and told him he could have it back in a month. He was used to spending time with his own band—knowing every nuance, private joke, and hidden agenda—and here in this new environment he was just another guy. A guy singing one song.

A backup singer, he thought her name was Ellie, came up beside him. “Hey,” she said. “Isn’t this the most gorgeous theater ever?”

Jimmy looked at her. She was young. Her black hair was pulled into a headband, her face clean and waiting for the makeup artist. “It’s beautiful. Really beautiful. Like it’s not real. A movie or something,” Jimmy said.

Her hands flew through the air. “I said it was gorgeous, and then you almost made it into a poem.” She exhaled and shook her head. “I’ve always wanted to write a song, but after hearing your song last night, I know there is no way I could ever write something like that.”

The concert went off without a hitch. Jimmy received his first standing ovation, and unscripted, the duo chatted onstage about the beauty of the song, of undeserved love. Jimmy watched the audience, especially the children, enthralled with the wonder of the Christmas lights, the orchestra, the sweetness of the songs, and the soft sound of jingle bells playing in the background.

At the end of the concert, tinsel fell from the ceiling and across the stage, over the heads of the singers and the orchestra. Jimmy didn’t know how they did it, but the duo and the orchestra feigned surprise when, of course, the tinsel falling was planned all along.

The curtain fell for the final time of the night, and Ellie stood next to Jimmy, pulling tinsel from her hair. “They love that,” she said.

She sighed. “I just think Christmas is so . . . forced. Everyone is working so hard to be happy. There are all these expectations for happiness and joy.” She shrugged her shoulders, picked at her nails. “I’m glad to be on the road. How could anyone or anything be so happy and sweet for an entire month? I don’t see how it can lead to anything but disappointment.”

“I know,” Jimmy said, swinging his guitar over his shoulder. “I’ve for the most part ignored Christmas. All this . . . cheer . . . is a little overwhelming.”

“Exactly. It’s like a magnifying glass—if you’re happy, you’re happier; if you’re sad, you’re sadder. And I think most are sad.” She released a long sigh, staring over at the duo. “You think they could possibly be that happy all the time?” She nodded her head toward the couple laughing, his hand on her lower back.

“No way,” Jimmy said, and then thought of Charlotte and the way he felt every minute he was with her. “Wait,” he said. “I take that back. Yes, maybe they can. I think that yes, it is possible.”

He smiled at her, feeling a little sorry that she didn’t even believe in the possibility. Ellie walked off, and then called over her shoulder, “Meet us out back in twenty. Okay?”

“Okay!” he hollered after her. He realized, of course, that even a year and a half ago he would have answered Ellie with a more cynical tone, less believing in love and its ability to change his life. The difference a year can make, he thought. He plucked a few notes of his song and stared out into the empty hall. Even without a single person in it, the auditorium held a certain magic, a secret it wouldn’t tell.

The bar must have been breaking fire-code laws. People were jammed up against the bar and the tables. Flashing colored lights hung from the ceiling and walls. Patrons banged up against the fake tree where plastic Christmas balls rattled like empty hearts. The wrapped boxes beneath the white snow-sprayed tree were empty and squashed from the careless steps of those who crammed into the tiny space to hear the woman singer who looked as despondent as the holiday decorations. Men and women battled for one another’s attention, hollering over the singer, flirting, buying drinks, and faking cheer.

This desperate grabbing for happiness never leads to anything but despair. Jimmy saw this and knew it also: the falseness that bears cynicism as its firstborn. He placed his beer on the bar and stood to leave.

He didn’t want to scream over the singer, knowing better than anyone in the room what it felt like to be ignored while singing and playing an instrument.

“Okay,” he said, knowing that he must travel and live with these same people for another month. It definitely wouldn’t hurt to get to know them.

He sat back onto the stool, lifting his beer in a cheer as his answer. The band and backup singers, the grips and crew, began to motion from across the room—they’d secured a table. Ellie and Jimmy worked their way through the crowd, and Jimmy slid onto the bench, finding himself against the wall without a way to escape.

Within an hour he was comfortable—this was what he was accustomed to, this kind of nomadic life, this language of bands and singers and travel. He slipped with ease into the conversation and into the night.

Mickey, a crew member, sat across from Jimmy. “So, man,” he said, lifting his drink to Jimmy, “you wrote that song for Christmas, and that’s what got you on this tour?”

“Really?” Mickey laughed. “I wouldn’t be telling anyone that little tidbit. They’re all calling it the Christmas song. The Perfect Christmas Song.”

The secret tempo of music and being on the road soothed Jimmy until he felt part of the group. The bar closed, and they walked out into the cold night, stomping their feet, clapping their hands, and walking toward the Fox, where the bus waited.

They crossed the street, quiet, each one thinking of home and what home meant, where it was, and how they wouldn’t be anywhere near it for three more weeks.

Charlotte turned the pillow over to find a cold spot and checked her cell phone one more time: She hadn’t missed a call or text. She glanced at the digital clock: 2:00 a.m. Jimmy usually called to say good night, but something must have kept him tonight. She tried not to think too long or too hard about what that “thing” might have been.

She closed her eyes, but sleep still did not come. She finally stood and stared out her bedroom window. The sadness that arrives when one can’t change a circumstance, when it just is what it is and there is nothing to be done about it, overcame Charlotte in the middle of the dark, moonless night.

The consolations she usually used to comfort herself—the reassurance that she’d see him in Ireland in a few weeks, that he loved her, that he missed her—weren’t working this night. This is how love is between two souls: One can feel when something is amiss with the other. She knew, but didn’t want to know, so she blamed the dark night, the loneliness, and the nonstop blinking lights across the street. She crawled back into bed and pulled the pillow over her head, sighing deeply into the sheets. “I miss you, Jimmy,” she said. “Please come home.”