2007

He meets her in a bar in Nashville not long after he turns 23. She’s a student at Vanderbilt, originally from Georgie and in a sorority. She’s blonde with blue eyes and barely reaches his shoulders in the heels she wears. They end up nearly pressed up against each other as the bar becomes more crowded and it forces them to talk to one another. He ends up giving her and a couple of her sorority sisters a ride home after they close the bar down. He ends up leaving with her number keyed into his phone.

They start seeing each other regularly after that. She’s easy to talk to, funny and bubbly and everything that seems to be his opposite. But she drags him out of his shell and they have fun together. Their relationship is easy, and something he hadn’t expected to find.

2008

The band explodes overnight it seems. One minute no one knows who the hell they are and then suddenly, everyone knows who they are. Grayson barely has time to breathe and he gets caught up in the fame whirlwind more than a little bit. She becomes a little resentful that he’s never home, reads all about the rumors of his supposed infidelity on random messages boards. He hasn’t done anything to perpetuate the rumors but knows there isn’t anything he can really do to prove it when she throws accusations at him. Things are especially bad when the band is overseas and they don’t see each other face to face for weeks at a time. They fight and argue over the phone, and sometimes Grayson goes to sleep wondering if they’ve actually broken up.

But when he is home and he’s there with her, things go back to being easy. She says she understands about the band and touring. She says she understands the record company wants to strike while the iron is hot and they have to go out on the road in order to sell records and make money. But Grayson wonders if she really does when she asks how long he expects the band to last. He can only stare at her like she’s suddenly grown two heads when she mentions him getting a “real job” because he doesn’t know what that means.

2009

Things go back to normal and easy when he’s at home for a stretch of time when the band is working on writing and recording a new album. He can go with her to parties, weddings and dinners. She’s happier and they’re both excited when they start looking for houses together. He even starts toying with the idea of buying her a ring. It’s a scary thought in a lot of ways, he’s never been serious about anyone ever. His other relationships had been glorified flings basically. But the two of them make sense together. Things are good. Easy.

2010 and 2011

He buys a ring but doesn’t pop the question yet, wanting to find the right time. The band releases an album in October of 2010 to lukewarm reception. They’re all tired before they even hit the road and things only get worse from there. He has problems with his voice and the four band members all butt heads more often than not. She visits when she can but Grayson can tell when she starts pulling away from their relationship. He finds himself snapping at her on the phone and one often hangs up on the other in a fit of anger.

The ring burns a hole in his pocket while he drinks more than usual in order to get through each show. The more he numbs himself, he quicker he can get through a show. The quicker he gets through a show is one less day they have to be on tour with each other. They need a good long break from everything. His phone calls to her become more infrequent as time passes. When they do talk, the calls are usually filled with long stretches of silence. The ring is mocking him from his pocket but he doesn’t want to mention it to her over the phone - not when things feel so uneven.

Things come to a head in Dallas. Grayson has a massive anxiety attack, his voice is shot to hell and he leaves the stage after a drunken ramble. From there, everything moves at a hectic pace. They decide to cancel the rest of the tour and the band members all scatter to parts unknown. Grayson goes home to Nashville to figure out where everything is going. He has hopes of fixing things with her for once and for all.

She comes to his place a day after he gets home. She tells him that there’s someone else. Someone with a “real job”, who is home all of the time and doesn’t live like a nomad for 10 or so months out of the year. He’s pissed off enough to put his fist through a wall. She cries and he wants to grab her and shake her hard. But he doesn’t. He tells her to get her shit and leave. Honestly, he’s too exhausted physically and mentally to put up much of a fight. Truth be told, it had been coming for a long time and deep down he knows it. The ring laughing at him from his pocket was just a band-aid done in hopes of patching a wound that was too big to close in the first place.

2014

He’s home in Nashville before his birthday for a few meetings and to see his family and friends before their European tour starts. He runs into her when they both end up in line at a local coffee shop. It takes him a moment to recognize her with the man standing next to her and the big ring on that hand. He doesn’t say anything to her until after he’s placed his order and it’s obvious that she recognizes him as they all stand next to each other.

He’s introduced to her husband and it’s only a little awkward when he realizes this is the guy she left him for. The three of them make small talk while they wait. He takes a few moments to think about how they really hadn’t fit together back then when he thought they had. What he viewed as easy back then really hadn’t been. He thought it would hurt to see her again. He thought that there would be some feeling of longing and loss but as he grabs his coffee, wishes them both well and leaves to head for his meeting he finds that there’s nothing there at all.

When he’s home later in the evening getting ready to go out for dinner and drinks with friends he finds the ring tucked down in the bottom of a drawer. He stares at it for a long time and tries to remember that part of his life but finds he really can’t even though it really wasn’t that long ago. He sets it aside as he finishes getting ready and at the last minute shoves it into his pocket before he leaves.

It’s only when he’s driving down the interstate with the windows open that a closed hand reaches out into the wind and opens, letting the little piece of diamond and platinum fall from his fingers. He doesn’t look back in the rearview mirror and rolls up the windows.

That was the easy part.