I stuffed the final cord into a plastic container and hoisted the container up into my arms when I heard my name. The voice was soft and kind of timid.

I turned, and through the dark with only glimpses of red and white stage lights, I made out a girl.

“Jessica,” I said.

I watched her shy face grow a smile.

“You’re back in Missouri,” she said.

I lowered my eyes as I felt a smile creeping to my face. It felt good to be home.

“Yeah, we got back earlier this week,” I said.

“Well, I was in the area, and I saw that you were playing, and I just thought I would stop by,” she said.

Just then, Daniel came in through the back door and stopped in between us. He looked at me and then at Jessica and then back at me again.

“Uh, I think we’ve got everything loaded,” he said. “Is this the last one?”

His eyes were planted on the plastic container still in my arms.

“Uh, yeah,” I said.

He grabbed the container.

“We’re going to go ahead and take off,” he said, looking back at Jessica and then at me. “You’ve got your car, right?”

“What?” I asked.

“Your car — to get home,” he said.

Daniel flashed me a cheesy grin.

“Oh, yeah,” I said, nodding my head.

“Okay, I’ll see you tomorrow then,” he said.

Then, he bobbed his head at me, smiled at Jessica and then hurried again toward the back door.

My eyes followed him until he disappeared.

“You guys are really good,” Jessica said.

I met Jessica’s gaze again.

“Thanks,” I said, smiling and tossing my eyes to the floor.

There was silence between us for a moment.

“Look, I know this place is closing, but I saw a diner at the end of the street,” she said. “Maybe we could catch up.”

I looked up and caught her soft stare.

“Uh, sure,” I said, nodding my head.

For some reason, I felt strangely awkward around her all of a sudden. She didn’t seem to be with Jeff. I wasn’t used to her showing up without him.

“Okay, well, let’s go this way,” I said, eyeing the back door.

She smiled and then walked toward the exit. I followed after her but then reached out and pulled the door open for her.

“So, this is how you avoid all of your adoring fans,” she exclaimed.

A coy smile was planted on her face.

I laughed.

“Of course, didn’t you see the ten people that were in there?” I asked. “It would have taken us at least two, whole minutes to get to the front door.”

Jessica’s smile widened. She seemed confident again — a little closer to how I had remembered her from that New Year’s Eve night years ago.

“You are crazy,” she said. “Will, I don’t know what you could see from where you were standing, but from where I was standing, the place was packed, and they were all loving it.”

My eyes darted to the ground again, as we rounded the outside of the bar and made our way to the sidewalk in front of it.

“So, what brought you to this side of town tonight?” I asked her.

She seemed to hesitate before she spoke.

“Oh, you know, stuff,” she said. “So, how have you been? It’s been awhile.”

I slowly nodded my head.

“It has,” I agreed. “I’ve been doing well. I took a leave of absence from the station. They were surprisingly pretty cool about it. We’re doing this tour thing now.”

She softly laughed, and I turned to examine her face.

“What?” I asked.

“It’s nothing,” she said. “I just…you’re such a big deal, and there’s a part of me that feels starstruck, but then there’s that other part of me that doesn’t even realize I’m talking to someone who was just on national television not too long ago.”

I caught an almost bashful-looking stare beaming from her face, and I smiled.

“The TV thing really wasn’t that big of a deal,” I said. “Honestly, I just wanted to get out of the dressing room before Chris broke one of the fancy decorations in there and we had to use our money we needed to get back home to pay for it. Really, though, it doesn’t feel any different.”

She laughed to herself.

“It’s just kind of surreal, I guess,” she said.

I felt my smile grow a little bit wider.

“I guess,” I admitted.

We reached the diner minutes later, and I opened the door for her again. Then, we found a small table in the back of the room and slid into it. A waitress, maybe in her sixties, sauntered over soon after, flipped open a pad of paper and grabbed a pen from behind her ear.

“What can I get ya, honey?”

She didn’t even bother looking up. Jessica smiled at me and then glanced at her menu.

“I’ll just have a cup of coffee,” she said.

The waitress’s pen didn’t move.

“What about you, hon?” she asked, turning her face slightly in my direction.

“I’ll just take some water,” I said, turning over the menu in my hand. “And maybe some of your cheese fries.”

The woman scribbled something onto her pad.

“Thanks,” I said, attempting to hand her the menu.

She gestured toward the end of the table where a stack of menus already sat and then sauntered off without another word.

I smiled to myself and then slid the menu behind the ketchup bottle. And when I looked back up, Jessica’s eyes were on me.

“This is a no-nonsense diner, Will,” she said.

“I see,” I said, chuckling.

“So, Jeff said you got a job in South County,” I said.

She nodded her head.

“I did,” she said. “Turns out, they were looking for nurses.”

“How do you like it?” I asked.

She smiled.

“I love it,” she said. “It took a little while getting used to the shifts, but now, I can’t imagine working a nine-to-five.”

“That’s good,” I said.

The waitress returned then with the coffee and water. She set the two onto the table and disappeared again.

“So, what’s Jeff doing tonight?” I asked. “Isn’t he usually bumming around with you if he’s not with me?”

She started to smile, but then it kind of faded.

“I don’t know,” she said and then stopped.

“Listen, Jessica,” I said. “I know he likes to talk, and most of the time, he doesn’t know when to stop, but he’s really a good guy.”

I watched a smile finally find its way to her lips.

“I know,” she said.

“Cheese fries,” the waitress said, sliding a platter of fries across the table.

“Thanks,” I said to the woman, who quickly vanished again without a word.

“Cheese fry?” I asked Jessica, giving her my best enticing face, while holding out a soggy fry covered in the yellow stuff.

She laughed.

“I’m fine,” she said.

I popped the soggy fry into my mouth.

“Will,” she said.

Her voice had changed, and it instantly got my attention. I met her eyes just before they left mine for a spot on the table’s surface in between us.

“I wasn’t just in the area,” she confessed, returning her eyes to mine. “I heard you were playing here, and I decided to come see you.”

She paused, but I didn’t say anything. She had gotten serious all of a sudden, and I was trying to figure out why.

I watched her take a breath and then let it out.

“I’ve been holding onto something for quite a long time now, and I just can’t hold onto it anymore,” she said.

I swallowed the fry and sat back in the booth.

“Remember New Year’s Eve years ago?” she asked. “The night you said that you weren’t ready for a relationship yet?”

I wished I didn’t, but unfortunately, I did remember it.

I nodded my head.

“Well, I didn’t understand until later,” she said. “I put the pieces together, and Jeff, without telling me outright, helped me fill in the holes along the way.”

She paused for a second.

“And I guess I’m just wondering if you’re ready yet,” she said.

Her eyes remained in mine. I shifted my weight in the booth and struggled to take a staggered breath and then to say something. But I had no words.

After a moment in my eyes, Jessica found the spot on the table in front of us again.