"I can't believe I'm back here." Lottie sighs as she sits on the edge of the stage, her bare feet swinging. "I thought that after Calvin's wedding I'd never come back here again but here I am."

Riley looks over at her from the guitar rack. "You okay?"

"No." She sighs as she lays back against the stage, her hands covering her face.

Even being back in Jacksonville is tough for Lottie. She has some pretty bad memories here.

"Is your Mama comin'?" She looks at the upside down version of him.

"Yeah, she said she'll be here." He smiles at the grin she has on her face. "Got her a backstage pass and everything."

"I've been missin her."

"Me too." She turns to her knees and sits back on haunches. "Kinda sad to see the tour end."

"Really?"

"Kinda. Also kinda relieved, maybe I won't be as stressed when I get back to my house."

"I've been meanin' to ask you if you wanted to move back in together?" She looks down at her hands and shrugs. "It was just a suggestion, Lot."

"I- I know but we both know how well it went last time."

"You mean hookin' up? We- We hooked up twice in the last week."

"I know but-"

He shakes his head and walks away. Lottie sighs and stands, running her hands through her hair.

When the fuck did life get so weird?

+++

Lottie paces around the alley between the building she's supposed to perform in in the next ten minutes and the bus that's supposed to take her home after the show. Her heart is racing, her head is pounding and her breathing is shaky. It finally dawns on her that she's having a panic attack.

She hasn't had one in a hot second.

Sure, she's been worked up before, recently yes but she hasn't been up to this level of anxiety since probably high school.

She's made the decision of opening her last set with a bunch of songs she had written a while ago and some she passed on to other musicians. That isn't really fueling her panic attack, it's really Riley and Morgan but mostly being back in Jacksonville.

Lottie takes a deep drag from her cigarette, her third, and forces herself to stop pacing.

"Lottie! C'mon!" Ryan shouts.

She takes one last drag and holds her breath as she flicks the cigarette away. As she's closing the venue's back door behind her, she exhales slowly.

"You okay?" Ryan asks, looking over a clipboard.

"I'm good." She responds, looking down at her pack of cigarettes. "Where's Riley?"

"I'm not sure."

"How long?"

"You're on in like five minutes." He snaps his gum. "You sure you wanna play 'em songs? Have you practiced them enough?"

"It'll be fine, Ryan." She squeezes his shoulder before she heads to the stage to see if Riley's there.

Lottie's tired blue eyes land on Riley. His back is turned to her so she wraps her arms around him. He jumps but then relaxes when he realizes who's around him.

"Where's your Mama?"

"She's 'round here somewhere." He says then smiles down at her. "Hey, I'm sorry for gettin' pissed off earlier. I don't know what that was but I feel awful."

"It's totally fine." She says, her hands on his chest.

"I gotta tell you somethin' and I don't want you to get mad. Are you gonna get mad?"

"Depends on what it is, Riley Green. I swear if you broke my guitar-"

"No, it's not that."

"Then what is it?"

"I invited your family here too."

She rolls her lips into her mouth. "Why? You just wasted your breath. Me and you both know they ain't showin' up."

"Lot-"

"I gotta- I gotta go on." She wraps her arms around him again, taking in a deep breath of that smell that brings her so much calmness.

"Last show! Knock 'em boots off, baby!"

She starts to walk toward the stage but she stops. Lottie turns on her bare heel to make her way back to Riley. She grabs him by the front of the shirt and kisses him, shocking him and everyone who sees them.

She grins as she pulls away and rushes out under the bright lights with a fresh burst of energy.

Lottie kicks her set off with one she wrote at the start of her music career. "This song is my oldest song. I haven't got the chance to play it live yet but what better time than now. This is called 7 & 7."

"Back when you, when you were my darlin, I didn't mind to lose a little sleep. I didn't mind to do a little walkin. Reputation never meant that much to me..."

Riley is thrown deep into nostalgia. He was with her when she wrote this song. She wanted to bounce ideas off him but ended up writing it by herself in fifteen minutes. She's happy to admit that this is one of her favorites.

"This next one is one me and Riley wrote when we first came to Nashville. It was kinda- kinda for shits and giggles type idea 'til we actually started puttin' it together. You can listen to it on his new record and I hope he ain't playin' it tonight." She looks off in the wings at him. He shoots her an ornery look back and she laughs. "This one's Same Old Song."

Lottie's eyes scan the crowd. Her stomach drops when she sees three familiar faces.

Her fuckin family.

She makes eye contact with Chuck, her father and he looks dead inside. It's obvious he isn't doing too well. She hasn't seen him since she left after graduation. He's got an oxygen bag slung over his shoulder and a cane in his hand. He hobbles his way to a side staircase, Cathy's hand tight around his upper arm.

She brushes them off as she kicks it into another song.

"It didn't really take a hundred years to get to twenty-one. It didn't take a whole case of beer to have a little fun and a fire don't need gasoline and a Black Cat to get lit, nah, but to us it did...

That first kiss didn't really get you higher than the moon. And takin' hits off cigarettes didn't really make you cool. That first check from that first job don't really make you rich, naw, but to us it did..."

She's got a few songs left. The lights go down as she stands at the microphone, taking a few deep breaths to steady her heart and voice.

"You found me at the right time. I loved you from that first night. Bet everything on what we had. Should've known better than that...

Riley crouches as he listens to a song he's never heard before.

Lottie wrote this with Michael after that whole debacle with Morgan. She didn't want Riley to know what was going on, give him more to worry about.

"I gave you my heart, you let it go to waste. You made me do the leaving and you made me take the blame. Does it make you feel good to make me feel bad. Yeah, you should've known better, should've known better than to break what you couldn't fix. Boy, what a shame, what you're gonna miss. Why'd you go and do what you can't take back. Yeah, you should've known better, should've known better than that..."

Her voice is so powerful and it brings tears to her eyes and Riley's eyes. He's never heard her sing like this before and he falls in love with her all over again.

When the song ends, Lottie takes a few seconds to gulp down a slightly warm drink she's been keeping on the drum platform. She cringes at the taste and temperature. She cracks her neck and shakes her limbs as she grins over at Riley, the cheering from the crowd is deafening.

"This last one is, uh, one of my favorites." She says then laughs. She turns to the drummer and he kicks it into her last song. Her bare feet stomp on the stage as the beat picks up.

If a song could describe her, this would be it.

"My left hand ain't interested in nothin' but a drink in it. Yeah, I'll have this dance, I like this song it's got some swing in it. You ain't Johnny and I ain't June but you can be my man in black tonight, baby, if you want to..."

The crowd screams the chorus with her and her face lights up. This feeling never gets old.

"Someday, I want the weddin', somethin' borrowed, somethin' blue; flowers and a veil and a sunset honeymoon. But tonight we ain't nothin' but a downtown bride and groom gettin' hitched on whiskey vows and exchangin' drunk I do's with neon diamonds and smoke rings. Neon diamonds and smoke rings..."

Lottie squeals as she leaps into Riley's arms, her heart beating out of her chest. Her ears are ringing as she wraps her arms around his neck, squeezing him into a tight, feeling good hug.

"You- that song- your voice- holy shit. I got goosebumps, Lot."

She laughs as she pulls back, cupping his cheeks. "Try to follow that, Riley Green."

He rolls his eyes and playfully pokes her in the belly. "Shut up."

"Y'know, we got about twenty minutes between sets." She says into his ear. She starts to pull him toward the back door for the bathroom.

"Lottie! Riley!"

"Mama!" Lottie says loudly, the sudden presence startling her. "H- Hey!"

"You sounded beautiful, baby." Karen grins at her daughter figure.

"Thank you." She laughs. "I- I gotta run to the bathroom real quick." She lies as she steps away from them to recompose herself.

Riley, on the other hand, is trying to hide a boner from his mother. He takes his ball cap off and holds it in front of him while he has a conversation with her.

Soon, Chuck, Calvin and Cathy are joining Riley and his mom backstage. Lottie isn't expecting it when she returns to the wings.

"Charlotte!" Cathy says, looking her daughter over. She hasn't seen them since the wedding and her mom has aged ten years from smoking in the last year.

"Hey y'all." She forces a fake smile. "What're y'all doin' here?"

"Well, we had nothin' else goin' on tonight. Figured we stop in to see what all the fuss was about." Cathy says, patting Chuck's hand. "Your daddy's dyin'."

"Cathy-" Karen starts, knowing that this is not the place to have this conversation.

"Thanks for tellin' me that now." Lottie spits. "Glad to see the asshole's finally gettin' what he deserves."

"Charlotte!" Cathy snaps and her daughter rolls her eyes. "You cannot-"

"Oh save it, Cathy. Just- Just go. I don't want y'all here."

"Lot-" Riley sighs, reaching out for her hand when she starts to walk away. "Babe-"

"I- I can't- they're just-" Tears swell in her eyes. "I can't."

"Take a deep breath, Lot." She just glares at the floor with her jaw clenched. Riley gently grasps her chin and makes her look at him. "Take a deep breath." She nods and stubbornly does as she's told. He looks over and sees his mom talking to her folks.

Riley had forewarned his mother about this and he was right about what happened. He had asked her to talk to them about going back to the Green house for coffee after the show to catch up.

It looks like they agreed.

The three make their way off the stage and disappear into the crowd. Karen comes up to the two. "I gotta get goin' after your show but I'll see y'all at the house, okay? 'Fore you leave?"

"Sounds good, Mama." Lottie nods, giving her a pained smile, wishing this woman was her mother instead of that other bitch.

"See you there, Mama." Riley leans over and kisses her cheek then sends her on her way.

"Riley! Let's go!" Ryan shouts, shoving him toward the center stage. "Last show!"

"Do good, Ri!"

+++