My pencil scratched across the surface of the paper as I tried to re-capture the lyrics that had come to me while I’d slept.

When I’d woken up five minutes ago, I’d struggled to figure out where I was. Eventually, the stark white sheets, the smell of the stale air-conditioned air, and the bland, nondescript decor brought it all back. And that’s when it hit me all over again—my marriage was over and I had another fucking hangover to contend with.

And that warm body across the bed, tangled up in those wrinkled white sheets? I didn’t have a clue who he was and, to be honest, I didn’t care. It didn’t matter since I wouldn’t see him again anyhow.

Logically, I recognized my behavior was dangerous and it could get me into real trouble, but I couldn’t seem to stop. Why should I? If word got out how I spent my nights, no one would be surprised since it’s what everyone already believed. So what if I’d been the only one faithful to my marriage? So what if Crawford Madigan, the man I thought had been the love of my goddamn life, had been having an affair with his co-star the entire time we’d been married? So what that his new fiancé had cheated on her husband, too, and now those two fucking hypocrites were on the cover of every shitty celebrity magazine that existed proclaiming their undying love?

None of it mattered because the world knew what they knew and that was that. Since I’d signed an iron-clad pre-nup that prevented me from discussing the reality around the dissolution of my marriage, I’d decided to live up to everyone’s expectations. I’d been surprised to discover I was actually good at it too. That was, assuming sex with random strangers and drinking my way across America could ever be considered good. But since it was the only thing I seemed to excel at lately, I kept on doing it.

At first it had filled the void Ford left in me, but now I was just numb.

Standing on stage, in front of thousands of fans, I was able to pull myself together and give them a show worthy of the money they’d spent to be there. But the second my encore finished, I was back to nursing my broken heart the best way I knew how: through alcohol and sex. Every night a different city, a different bed.

It wasn’t hard to find a man willing to fuck the woman who, up until a few short months ago, had been America’s country sweetheart. But when I sauntered up to a drunk, horny man and said, “I’m leaving in 10 minutes and I want you with me,” not many cared about who I’d been, or how far I’d fallen. Time and time again they were more than willing to indulge me.

And that included the man in my bed right now. At least he’d been worth the effort, which wasn’t always the case. Actually, it wasn’t usually the case. You’d think night after night of mediocre sex would have put me off this path, but even when the sex was disappointing, at least I felt something.

I sighed and ran a hand through my tangled hair. The chorus had been so clear in my head in those hazy moments just before I woke, but the longer I sat here, the further away the words floated.

With a groan of frustration, I dropped the pencil onto the bedside table, stood, and stretched. As my spine popped and settled, the bed springs whined and the stranger stirred.

“Good morning,” came his gravelly rasp.

I turned to face the man who’d been inside of me only a few hours earlier and tried to feel guilty. Guilty for what I’d done and for what I was about to do.

I watched as his eyes came to life and a satisfied smirk crossed his lips. Lips that were full and featured a cupid’s bow that shouldn’t work on a man yet somehow worked perfectly on this one. He was handsome and rugged and different from the type of guy I usually hooked up with. Briefly, I remembered asking what he’d been doing in that dark and dingy bar because he hadn’t looked like he belonged; hadn’t looked like he was running from himself or trying to escape his memories like the rest of us had.

As I took him in, I tried to tell myself he was different from the others. Tried, and failed. Because with all the other men before him, I’d only felt a small spark of life. But when I’d been with him, it had been a thunderous explosion. The first time I’d come, I’d told myself maybe he was the one who’d be able to bring me back to life. But that had been last night, and I’d been drunk. Now, in the harsh light of day, I knew I’d been fooling myself. He wasn’t any more special than any of the others. He wasn’t the person who’d make me stop doing this.

No one could do that but me—and I wasn’t ready for that just yet.

“I’m hopping in the shower. I expect you to be gone by the time I get out.”

“You not a morning person or something?” he asked, not quite getting that our time together was finished. He scratched his beard and when he realized I wasn’t kidding, his flirty smirk faded and his eyes dimmed. “You’re fucking serious, aren’t you?”

“As a heart attack,” I confirmed, tossing him his shirt.

He caught it and slid out from beneath the sheets. Unabashedly, he turned to face me, his naked body on full display. Unable to stop it from happening, my eyes roved over every ridge and plane of his chiseled abs and then lower … down, down, down until they landed on a stiff, thick cock standing at attention.

I might have licked my lips.

“That’s not the look of someone who’s had her fill,” he remarked with a cocky twang I couldn’t place.

I raised my eyes and when they met his, they were flinty. Hard. Angry.

“I’m sorry,” I apologized, my voice steady, “but last night is all there is.” I shrugged. “I thought I made it clear last night that I’m a one-and-done type of girl. But even if I wasn’t that way, I have to get to work so it was nice meeting you. Take care.”

He tilted his head and eyed me critically. There was a time I would have shifted uncomfortably under his probing gaze, but no longer. Since I couldn’t bring myself to care what my closest friends and family thought of me, the judgement of a complete stranger meant very little.

And yet, I didn’t move from where I was standing. Part of my brain screamed at me to get in the shower so I could move on to the next town, the next handsome stranger. But another part urged me to stand still, to find out what he saw when he looked at me that way, like I was a puzzle he needed to solve. Did he see a woman as empty as she felt? Did he see the shell of my former self? Did he know I hated my life but was too chicken to actually end it?  

“You’re fucked up. You know that, right?”

Well, that answered that. He saw exactly the same thing I did when I looked in the mirror.

I licked my lips and nodded. “I do know that. Which is why you need to put your damn clothes on and leave …” I struggled to remember his name but came up blank.

He rolled his eyes and then scrubbed a hand over his beard. “You can’t even remember my name, can you?”

This was the part where I should blush, where I should feel embarrassed and ashamed. My grandmother would die of mortification if she knew I couldn’t remember his name. Scratch that. Me not knowing his name would be the least of her worries. The fact that he was probably the tenth guy this month just like him would kill her first.

“I don’t need to know your name,” I told him, my chin raised defiantly high, “because the second you walk out that door, I’m going to forget all about you. If you came here last night looking for something more, I’m sorry, but I’m not that girl.”

Before I’d finished speaking, the man’s head was through the neck of his shirt and he was stabbing his legs into a pair of well-worn jeans. Standing to his full height, he shook his head and made his way around the bed to stand in front of me. Then, with the same sort of confidence he exhibited in the way he’d fucked me the night before, he laid his large, calloused palm on my shoulder and bent his knees so our eyes met. “I don’t know your story, but I hope you find what you’re looking for.” When he stepped away his hand slid from my skin, leaving goosebumps in its wake.

Walking backward, one step after another, he kept going but never broke eye contact. When his back hit the door, he held my gaze for several long seconds, his eyes flicking between mine.

What was he looking for? The truth? An olive branch? The real me? I had no fucking clue and it gnawed at me. Suddenly I wanted to tell him … everything. I wanted to explain how my life was one big lie and I didn’t know who I was anymore. I wanted to tell him that the only time I felt something was when I came and that’s why I’d brought him here last night. I wanted to explain how everything had fallen apart and that I didn’t know how much longer I could go on this way because every day a piece of me died just a little bit more. I wanted to tell him not to go, to stay and I’d tell him my whole story.

Instead I said, “I’m not looking for anything.”

“Right,” came his skeptical response. All at once, he turned and opened the door. Once over the threshold, he glanced over his shoulder one last time. “My name is Ash,” he said.

And then he left me standing alone in another hotel room, on another gray morning.

“Ash,” I repeated on a whisper, the word hot, black cinders on my tongue.

Needing to chase away the taste of it, I poured two fingers of Jack into a glass and threw it back, the cheap liquor burning my throat. It didn’t matter. His name was what I’d become.

I brought the bottle to my lips and chugged as I climbed back under sheets that smelled like sex and perfume.

I grabbed the pad of paper I’d abandoned earlier and drank down another huge swallow of whiskey before I started scribbling again.  

I don’t know what time I eventually passed out, but when I came to, it was dark outside and I’d 20 missed calls and countless text messages.

Just another Saturday night, I thought, as I finished the bottle in one long swallow.