I had a plan. I would write a song, impress Clay with it, fly out to LA to watch him record it, and then we'd go out and get fitted for wedding rings. The only problem was I couldn't right songs to save my life. So I stole one. Clay would never know, I thought.

I called his cell phone after tonight's show, which I didn't make it to cause I couldn't get a ticket.

"Hello?"

"Hello, Clayton."

"Hold on a sec. I can't hear you."

He was shouting over a lot of background noise. I heard him shuffling to another room.

"Okay. Hello?"

"Yeah. Hi."

"Um... hi."

"It's Patti."

"Oh. It's you."

I heard a male voice in the background asking if it was the "crazy girl". Clayton covered the phone with his hand.

"John..."

Him again!

"She's not crazy, she's enthusiastic."

He was lying out his ass, but I loved him for it. I heard him take his hand off the receiver. "Isn't that right, sweetie?"

His voice was low and maple syrupy. It made me break into a cold sweat. I started stuttering like a fool. I quickly hung up the phone until I could compose myself. Then I called him back.

"Hello?"

"Hey."

I heard John in the background. "Crazy, I tell ya." Note to self: Destroy John.

"Sorry I hung up on you."

"That's ok. I didn't mind."

"Yeah. I uh... I was walking through the yard, see... and this dog... he bit me. So I had to hang up... cause he bit me. In the butt."

I'm a really bad liar.

"A dog bit you? That's not good. You should probably hang up the phone and go take care of that bite."

"No. I'm okay." I said.

He let out an exasperated sigh.

"Humor me, Clayton."

If he knows what's good for him, he will. I thought to myself.

"To what do I owe the pleasure of this call?" He said sweetly.

"Good boy."

"So the reason for the call?"

"I wrote a song for you to sing."

"Oh really?" He sounded slightly interested.

"Yeah. It doesn't have a melody though."

"Let's hear it."

"Lost in love and I don't know much. Cause I'm thinking aloud. Fell out of touch. But I'm back on my feet. Eager to be what you wanted."

"Dude, that's Air Supply!" John yelled.

"Why are you letting John listen?! This is private!"

I heard him whisper to John to go away so he could "deal with this". I scowled.

"I don't listen to Air Supply. The one guy's pants are pulled up too high on the cover of the greatest hits album. It's wrong."

"I know." I agreed. "It's gross. You can see all his baby making equipment."

"And that is wrong."

He was quiet for a minute. I heard noises that sounded like he was chewing his toenails.

"Did you steal those lyrics from Air Supply?" He finally asked.

"How could you accuse me of such things?!"

"Come on, sweetie."

The cold sweat came again. I blurted out the truth, including some embarrassing tidbits like that time I wet the bed when I was 14 and how I'm afraid of escalators and clowns.

He gave me a lecture about plagiarism. I followed it with a lecture about bedwetting. I just wanted to keep talking to him, but he thought I was implying that he was a bed wetter. He got snarky and hung the phone up.

"Ah, lovers first quarrel." I sighed in content and hung up the phone. I went to bed and dreamt the dreams and dreamers... wait, what? h