Different Stars

“How have you not been to an airshow?” Cadence asked, her expression clearly shocked.

Sid shrugged. “I haven’t really had time.”

“You’re missing out no longer! Although, I have to say that when they fly so ridiculously close together it does make me tense. I keep thinking they’re going to crash.” Cadence shuddered at the thought. Cadence thought it had to have been divine intervention when she found out the air show in Dallas coincided with her date with Sidney. Or not really a date, whatever it was. She loved air shows. Her stepfather had loved them and had taken her to every single one he could. That was before he’d gotten sick though. Air shows had been such a formative part of her youth, she could not believe Sidney hadn’t experienced one.

“My Pops used to bring me to at least three a year. He would drag my mom, my sister and I all over the place going to the best ones each summer. He was obsessed.” Cadence smiled as she thought back on those times.

“I told you before, for me it was just hockey. All summer, all winter, all seasons.” Sidney said simply.

“Oh my goodness.” Cadence said dramatically as she looked at something behind him, and Sidney laughed. “They have banana flavored ice cream. That is not possible. This is kismet.” She informed him as she quickly walked over to join the line.

“That means destiny, yeah?” Sidney asked as he followed her. He'd seen her in music videos and concert footage, where she would always look glamorous. Dressed in shorts or a skirt with makeup on and her hair styled. Today she wore jeans and a tank top. She looked incredibly sexy this way. He felt like he was seeing the real Cadence.

“Destiny, serendipity, kismet all the same things, yep.” She told him. She was so excited about the ice cream that she was having trouble standing still, but suddenly she stopped and stood completely still. “You can have ice cream, right?” She asked as she turned to face him.

He shouldn’t, but he also knew that he wouldn’t deny her this little pleasure. “Every once in a while, it’s ok.” He lied and he didn’t even feel remotely guilty. She was so cute and oddly sexy when she was like this. So open and free. He didn’t really know what that felt like, so seeing it in her called to him in a way that he couldn’t understand.

She could hardly contain herself as she waited to get the Banana ice cream she ordered.

“Mmm…”He heard her say as she took a lick. He watched her tongue trail up the ice cream then slip into her mouth and was mesmerized. He was getting aroused just watching her eating ice cream and she wasn’t even trying to arouse him. This wasn’t a good sign.

“Do you know that I’ve never written a song about a guy in my own personal life.” Cadence told Sidney as she licked her ice cream cone. He pulled his mind out of the gutter when he heard her serious declaration.

“Not buying it. You’ve written songs about break ups and falling in love. I’ve heard them.” Sidney scoffed at her, taking a lick of his own vanilla ice cream cone.

“Those were about other peoples lives. They talk to me about their heartaches and I write about it. Especially when it’s my people. People that I love and their hearts are broken. When my sister’s husband left her, she was devastated. I wrote “Braden’s Mine” about that whole situation.”

Sidney stopped walking to lean over the fence that looked onto the airstrip. “Was she mad?” He remembered that song. It was about breaking up, and one person coming out better for it and the other worse.

“I played it for her before we even recorded it. Actually she liked it. She told me it felt like she was telling him to suck it because her life was so much better off without him. Her son’s name is Braden. He’s one of the coolest kids I know.” Cadence smiled, then shrugged.

“I can’t believe that you’ve never written about love that you’ve had.” He was a little dumbstuck by the news. Someone as amazing as her, never been in love?

“I haven’t ever really had my heart broken. Not smashed into so many pieces that it hurt just to get out of bed broken anyway.”

Sidney didn’t comment immediately, just took a deep breath before saying, “Sometimes I think that something’s wrong with me because I can’t feel that connection with people.” His brow furrowed and Cadence wanted to reach up and gently rub the wrinkle that formed between his eyebrows. She resisted though.

“Maybe you just haven’t met the right person.”

“No.” He shook his head and Cadence could feel the agitation run through him. “It’s more than that. The guys on the team have all had at least one serious girlfriend that they either left or that left them. I haven’t. I don’t look at a woman and think, there she is. The one.” He looked away, somewhat embarrassed.

Cadence blinked, and was momentarily at a loss for words. She grabbed his hand, and after a second said, “That’s because that doesn’t happen. Life is not made of fairy tales. Relationships are work, hard work. Both people have to commit to putting in the effort to make it work or it will fail every single time. You have to want that person in your life more than anything else.”

“No love at first sight, Cadee?” Sidney sounded disappointed. She hadn’t realized he was such a romantic.

“I don’t believe in it.” Cadence threw the remains of her ice cream cone in the trash, then turned to face Sidney again, their hands still connected. “My dad met my mom when she was 17 years old. He was 19. He told her that he saw her and he just knew he would marry her. The one.” Cadence rolled her eyes. “Fast forward ten years and two babies later and he announced that he’d never really loved her and was moving onto the real love of his life. She was a woman he’d met working at his job as an auto mechanic.” Now it was Cadence’s turn to look away. For some reason she felt slightly teary. She never really talked about her father to anyone outside of her bandmates because they were her best friends and she never felt like she could trust that people didn't have some ulterior motive. Sidney was different though. She felt like she could tell him anything and could trust him with her secrets. She hadn’t spoken to her father in over a decade. He’d left when she was 6 and never looked back.

“I’m sorry, Cadee. I don’t know what to say.” He used their still joined hands to pull her toward him and into a hug. She fit perfectly, her head rested on his shoulder. He couldn’t stop himself from tilting his head to breathe in her scent. She wore a perfume that he found irresistible.

Cadence closed her eyes and wrapped her arms around him in return.

“I guess there’s not much to say. It actually turned out better. My step dad’s the best dad ever. He’s who I consider my real dad, but I call him Pops.”

Sidney felt awkward and again he didn’t know what to say, so he remained silent. After a second he felt Cadee’s hand reach up his back and gently poke him between his shoulder blades. “How do you even get muscles there?” He laughed and she pulled away from him, but left their hands joined. “What exercise do you do for that?”

“I wish I could say something manly and impressive like, kill mountain lions, but really it’s just the sport.”

“I would be sad if you killed mountain lions. They never really hurt anyone. We’re the ones trampling on their territory.” Cadence told him with a mock stern look.

“How do you feel about fishing?” Sidney asked her because he loved to fish and was suddenly worried that she’d have some activist opinion about that.

“Uhm, fishing’s ok. As long as you don’t like, just throw dynamite in the water to kill them, then grab them when they float up.” She said completely serious and Sidney found himself dissolving into uncontrollable laughter yet again.

“What? That’s mean. I saw it on TV once and I was appalled.” She said indignantly, causing him to laugh even harder.

“I don’t do that. I actually fish.” He told her when he could catch his breath.

“With poles and stuff? No explosives?” Cadee asked crinkling her nose.

“Poles and all. I eat the fish you know. It’s not like I just catch them for fun.”

“The one and only time I tried fishing was with my friend. Somehow I ended up with the hook in my thumb.”

“Were you putting the bait on?” He asked squeezing her hand gently.

“I was bending to pick up the hook and my friend kicked the stick and the hook rammed into my thumb. It didn’t really hurt that much.” Cadence told him. “The weird part was that my friend started to suck on my finger and told me that it would make it heal faster.”

He paused and tilted his head to the side a little, “How old were you?”

“12. That was the last time we went fishing. I kicked him in the nuts and ran as fast as I could.” Cadence told him then laughed. “The next day at school he tried to tell me it was Southern remedy.” And Sidney laughed.