by C. C. Piper
All I could do was keep my head down and hope that it would all blow over soon.
What made everything even worse was that I hadn’t received a message from Christoff in weeks. I was fairly certain he knew this was my phone number. He’d texted me early on with the type of short messages you send when you’re not sure who’s on the other end of the line.
Even though Christmas and the New Year had come and gone, my family hadn’t celebrated either one. With everything going on, throwing a party had felt horribly inappropriate.
So, when the second of January came along, I was more depressed than I think I ever had been. Everywhere I looked was darkness, instability, and uncertainty. Drew spent his time trying to help Mom while completing his studies. He’d been avoiding me, and I knew why.
On New Year’s Day, I’d told him about Christoff.
He’d been shocked and had become strangely distant, mainly I think because of how I’d ended our conversation.
“I’m still in love with him, Drew.”
I tried to imagine this from my brother’s perspective. If my sister had been taken forcibly by someone and kept for five weeks, I probably wouldn’t want to hear that she was in love with her abductor either. I couldn’t blame my twin for having reservations, but I also couldn’t help how I felt. And I did still love Christoff with all my heart, even though I knew I shouldn’t.
That evening, feeling alone, I’d initiated contact with Christoff again.
I miss you.
I waited for his reply, but it didn’t come. When an hour passed, then two, I believed I had my answer. If he’d had any doubts about who’d been texting back and forth with him, my message should’ve cleared that up. What did his refusal to answer mean? But then, just when I was ready to give up, my phone chimed.
I miss you, too.
The knowledge that I wasn’t alone in my feelings opened up something deep within me, and for the first time since leaving the island, I was able to play Madison again. Since we were still out for Christmas break, I took the opportunity to lose myself in my music, forgetting time and everything else. I existed only in the notes of my composition as I poured all the devastation I’d been feeling into my song.
I became so caught up in tweaking my new material and playing nonstop that I didn’t realize Drew was there in the room with me until he spoke.
“Haven’t heard that one before. It’s magnificent.”
“I composed it on the island,” I told him, keeping my eyes on the sheet music in front of me. As much as I hated receiving my parents’ disapproval, feeling it from my twin was far, far worse.
“Did you write it for…for him?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t understand how you can love someone who put you through all that.”
“I still love Daddy after all he’s done,” I told him simply. It was true. He hadn’t turned out to be the man I’d thought he was, the man our family needed him to be. He was flawed. Human. But then, weren’t we all?
“But this guy kidnapped you, Rach.”
“Yes. Now, let me tell you what else he did.” And I proceeded to fill him in on my time there. How Christoff became my friend. How he took care of me when I was sick. How he kept me from dying. How he told me he loved me.
Drew scrubbed a hand down his face, but it didn’t remove the lines marring his forehead. “I just don’t know.”
“Look, I don’t know either. I’m still sorting through everything that’s happened. But I miss him. He’s suffered because of decisions Daddy made. I know it doesn’t excuse him taking me, and it never will. But I love him. I kept thinking maybe that love would just…die or something, but it hasn’t. It won’t.”
“So, what are you planning to do?”
“About Christoff? I’m not sure. But one thing I know is that I don’t want to run Brisbane Industries, Drew. I don’t. You have an affinity for numbers and business, and I know when the time comes, you’ll be an excellent CEO if that’s what you want. But I’m over doing things that are expected of me just because of our last name. I want to play Madison and just live life for myself. Even if that means other people will think less of me for it.”
At last, my brother smiled. “You’ve always supported me. Walked in every Pride parade with me. You’ve always had my back, Rach, and I appreciate it. You know how much I love your playing. I know you’ll be great.” He looked down and scuffed his feet like we were five instead of grown adults. “And if you end up with this Christoff guy, I guess I can support that, too. But if he ever hurts you…”
I put my hand over his mouth, smiling just as much. It felt weird to move my face like that, reminding me of how long I’d gone without doing it. “I know. All bets are off.”
As January floated into February and February drifted into March, Christoff and I continued to text one another. We kept things light and unimportant. Small talk reigned most often. But at the end of each day, we signed off with, “I miss you,” and, “I miss you, too.”
April was a big month for those of us in the orchestra. The time marked the start of the concert season, with more performances scheduled in that one month than in the whole rest of the year. With the winter snows melting, Lake Michigan turning from an iron gray to an aqua blue, and flowers blooming in vivid colors, Chicago became a lighter, warmer, happier place.
The passing of time made Christoff’s revelation less and less upsetting, and I looked him up to see if I could find out anything more about him. What I learned shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did. He’d been described as a prodigy, a genius with computer programming in general and gaming software and hardware specifically. He was also considered to be a bit of a recluse and an introvert, which lined up with what I already knew.
The articles summed him up as quirky, geeky, brilliant, but a little aloof. The Christoff, or more accurately Chris, I’d known had been funny, caring, and devoted, as well. Yesterday, we decided to communicate exclusively through emojis, and he’d had me in stitches comparing his hamburger lunch to the poo emoji.
It was that conversation, silly as it was, that had been the clincher for me. I’d been so unsure about how to deal with our crazy situation that I’d kept us both in this demilitarized zone where we communicated, but never attempted to make any real moves. We were sharing this quasi-friendship, platonic and distant.
But what I was about to do would change all that. Whether it would make things better or worse, though, was the million-dollar question.
20
Christoff
It’d been months and months since the events of the island. Sometimes I thought it must’ve all been a dream. Surely I hadn’t actually kidnapped the daughter of my business rival and spent over a month with her on some isolated hunk of rock off the California coast. The whole notion sounded batshit crazy.
Had it not been for the hole in my heart, I would have chalked it up to working too many hours and overindulging a bit too much at the bar with Kit. But the hole was there. And so were the daily texts Rachel and I had been shooting one another.
Though she’d never come right out and admitted it, I knew it was Rachel on the other end of those words. I lived for those words. Those little nuggets that allowed me to cling to her in some small way. They both comforted and tortured me. Comforted, because they meant she must not hate me outright. Tortured, because they were a tease. A reminder that I’d never be able to touch her again.
My memories of touching her were still as vivid as ever.
No woman had ever enticed me like her, and no woman had sliced me in half nearly as effectively. She held utter sway over me. I lived for those goddamn text messages as if they contained every ounce of oxygen I’d need for the day. They were that important to me.
Which was why this day sucked so hard. Hell, not only today, but all damn week.
She’d contacted me on Sunday, letting me know she’d be out of touch for a few days, but to watch my email. I’d watched my email all right. I’d watch
ed it like a hawk. But it hadn’t been until Wednesday that I’d received something I thought must be from her. It was a link to a ticket reservation to the Nichols Concert Hall up in Evanston for seven o’clock that Saturday night.
I was so anxious I’d arrived a full hour early. I’d even foregone my usual suit/superhero/high-tops ensemble for the full tuxedo treatment. The concert hall was in the Greek style with pillars lined up outside the entrance, and the inside was an intimate domed structure. My ticket was for the front row center, and when the first performers came onto the stage, I craned my neck until it cramped looking for Rachel, but she wasn’t there.
Had I mistaken the date? Had she set this up just to prank me? To punish me?
Jesus, if that’s what this was, I wasn’t sure I’d survive it.
They performed a series of classical numbers that I only barely managed to sit through. I tapped my foot and stared at the edges of the stage every time movement erupted from either side, hoping to glimpse those coppery red curls of hers. A quartet took the stage next, but again, Rachel was only conspicuous by her absence.
Had she planned to appear tonight, but something had come up? What if she’d been in an accident on the way? Or what if she’d fallen ill again? I pictured the wan paleness she’d exhibited back on the island when her fever had raged out of control. Would I ever know one way or another?
I retrieved my phone from my pocket and received several dour looks from the other patrons. I didn’t care, though. I had to check to make sure I hadn’t missed a text, a call, or an email from her. My anxieties probably made me look like some overdressed twelve-year-old forced to absorb culture he had no interest in, but I couldn’t keep still.
If Rachel wasn’t here, I didn’t know what I’d do.
And then, finally, thankfully, the announcer called out the next performance.
“Please welcome to the stage, Rachel Brisbane.”
I stood and clapped far louder than anyone around me, but I didn’t care because there she was. She seemed the teeniest bit slimmer than when I’d last seen her, which was concerning since she’d been so sick shortly before. She wore color on her eyes, something smoky, and a burnished shade on her lips that perfectly matched her hair. Her gown was the same hue, and though I stared right at her, she kept peering off into the distance as if she didn’t see me.
I nearly jumped up there and joined her, my chest ached so badly. Fuck the concert, I just wanted to hold her. Needed to, in fact. But then she sat, bending over the massive wooden instrument in her grasp, and I fell quiet just like everyone else.
She began with a song I’d heard her play on the island. At the time, she’d been nude and her cello had availed me of tantalizing views whenever she shifted her bow and adjusted the tuning pegs. But the song, while similar, wasn’t exactly the same. She’d made some alterations to it, some additions. A haunting harmony joined the main melody, making the song even more soulful than it had been.
Even if it also made it sadder.
She then played five additional songs I’d never heard, and I was as transfixed as if someone had glued me to the seat. Every note was so tragically beautiful that my eyes and nose burned to the point I had to wipe at them to make them stop. At the end, I wasn’t the only one giving Rachel a standing ovation. Every single person in that auditorium was on their feet, many of them with moisture in their eyes.
But I couldn’t take being away from her anymore, and I raced up the steps on the side.
“Rachel!”
As eager as I’d been to get to her, now that I was within a foot of her, I halted in my tracks. She seemed hesitant, tentative, and after everything I’d put her through, I couldn’t force her to accept me. I’d never force her to do anything ever again.
“You’re here,” she said, as if surprised.
“Of course,” I said. “You sent me tickets, remember?”
That had been her, right? What if it hadn’t? What if my presence here had somehow blindsided her?
But then, the corners of her mouth quirked up, making her face light up as if from within. “So I did.”
Jesus, why did this feel so awkward? “You were fantastic up there. Beyond words, good.”
She glanced up at me through her lashes. “You really think so?”
“I know so.”
“It was for you,” she mumbled, so softly I couldn’t be sure I’d heard her correctly.
“What?”
“It was for you. Tonight. The music. I wrote those songs for you.”
I swallowed, half afraid to ask my next question. “Why?”
This time, she opened her eyes up wide, gazing at me straight on. “Because I love you, Chris.”
I moved before I was aware I’d done so, wrapping my arms around her, cello and all. “I love you, too, baby. And I’ve missed you. So goddamn much.” My voice hitched in the middle, but it didn’t matter. Tears shone as they rolled down her cheeks and past the most gorgeous smile she’d given me yet.
And I knew that despite everything, we were going to be alright.
Epilogue: Rachel - One Year Later
“Chris, this is messing with my equilibrium,” I told him, then felt him grab my arm.
“You’re okay, baby. Just relax. Keep your eyes closed, and then once you open them, don’t forget to blink.”
I did, pleasantly dumbfounded by how comfortable these contact lenses were. I’d never worn any before and thought they’d be a bear to deal with, but after using the eyedrops Chris gave me, they were no problem at all.
It made me feel better about being Chris’s guinea pig for his newest and most revolutionary invention to date, something he called VR Sight. Whereas his virtual reality glasses slipped over the wearer’s eyes to immerse them in an alternate environment, VR Sight were lenses that went directly on the eyes. Like all contact lenses, they did away with the separation between eyeball and corrective lens. The overall effect was more real than ever.
“Okay, Rachel, open those beautiful eyes of yours,” Chris told me, and I cautiously slid them open.
“Wow.” The view was amazing. I stood in the middle of a black room with a white tile floor that I knew was an illusion, but felt like it actually existed.
“Keep a hold of my arm. Okay, here’s Hawaii.” My surroundings altered to the flowing palm trees and tropical beaches of the Aloha state. “Now, here’s Alaska.”
I squealed as a glacier sheared off right in front of me, the boat I’d been placed on rocking so believably I almost got seasick.
“Chris, oh my God!” It was beyond words. With this new product, people could go anywhere and do anything from the comfort of their own living rooms. “This is like a Star Trek holodeck.”
“Well, that was my inspiration. That and you.” I could hear the smile in his voice even as he stood behind me.
“So sappy,” I heard from my left, recognizing Drew’s voice. He loved to make fun of us, which of course, only made us want to get more obnoxious about it.
“Sappy is the best,” Chris and I said in unison, then kissed sloppily, making my twin groan.
“Jeez. Get a room, will you?”
“Technically, this is a room,” Chris said jokingly, and I laughed. It’d taken some time and one memorable night of drunken debauchery with Alicia in attendance, but after my brother witnessed for himself how ridiculously dedicated to me Chris was, he gave us his blessing.
A month after that, Kit had introduced him to his elegant cousin, a man so stunning I knew he was gay the instant I caught sight of him. Drew was smitten just as quickly, and they’d been serious for about six months now.
Drew now spent the majority of his time training at Mom’s side. She’d enlisted his help now more than ever since my dad was no longer in the picture. Shortly after he’d stepped down, the IRS did an investigation and found that our father and Hannah had gone behind the company’s accountant and changed some key components on the tax return.
They’d both been charged with
tax evasion and were awaiting trial. Mom had already filed for divorce, which while not a joyful task, proved to be a necessary one.
“Close your eyes again, baby.” I followed Chris’s instructions, wondering where he’d be taking me next. I was fine until he released me.
“Chris?” I reached out for him, not wanting to fall.
“You’re stable. Just stand still. Now, open your eyes.”
I gasped. A flawless recreation of our island swam around me. The man I loved had gotten everything right down to the most miniscule detail. The rocky surface covered here and there with bits of green grass. The camouflaged residence where we’d lived together. The cliffs off to the side. The waves crashing. Even the seagulls calling overhead.
And in front of me, down on one knee, was Chris, holding a black velvet box.
“Rachel Diane Brisbane, will you make me the happiest man alive and be my wife?”
My eyes filled, the moisture dribbling down my face, and I slammed them shut, scared I’d lose his precious creation. “Will they slide out?” I asked, feeling panicked, and yet knowing I needed to answer him.
“Don’t worry,” he said, coming close enough that I could feel his breath on my forehead as he took my left hand in his. “They’re cry-proof.”
I opened my eyes so I could look into his. I stared up into those crystalline green depths and saw everything I felt for him reflected back at me. This had always been one of our greatest strengths, letting each other in without compunction. I saw him register my answer before I even gave it, as he grinned, his eyes filling, too.
“Rachel Brisbane Green does have a nice ring to it,” I told him, then he kissed me.
And I felt it in both virtual reality and for real.
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