Under the Same Sun (Stone Trilogy)

by Mariam Kobras

  “Goodness,” he grumbled, “you are insufferable. If you can’t stand being here, then go and smooch some more with the wife. Don’t dump your sour mood on us.”

  Jon didn’t reply.

  “You’ve already wasted fifteen minutes. You have another forty-five for the rehearsal, and then the press and the fan clubs will be here, Jon. You know we promised them a press conference.”

  As if he didn’t know, after a quarter century in the business. The first show of the tour, and they needed a good write-up. Everyone in the music world would be looking at the London concert, and everyone who was still thinking about buying a ticket for the later performances too.

  “Yeah.” He still didn’t feel like playing, let alone singing. She had said she wanted coffee and that she would join him shortly, but she wasn’t here yet. It made him restless. “Let me just go and make sure she’s all right.”

  Sal sighed. “For heaven’s sake, Jon, she doesn’t need a babysitter. Let me go and see what Naomi’s up to; but please, just do your job.” Without waiting for a reply he left.

  The guitars were well polished, not a single fingerprint from the tuning on their glossy surface, just the way he liked them. Lovingly Jon ran his hand over the koa twelve-string, its bold grain and coloring like the curly auburn hair of a lovely woman. It was an old friend, as old as his career. How well he remembered playing it in the sun-drenched open-air stadium in Geneva all those years ago when he had met Naomi, and the turmoil of his feelings when he realized she was the one and only, the one girl he wanted in his life.

  Beside it was the ebony acoustic, his lover, the one that had been custom-made for him ten years ago. He had seen the black wood in the workshop—the fine, wavy red stripes like the highlights in Naomi’s locks—and he had known he wanted it. The sound of the instrument, when it was delivered, had first surprised and then nearly hurt him. It was soft, melodious, with a sweet, mellow timbre; and it had an echoing, haunting quality that reminded him so much of her that he could only bear to play it when he was alone.

  Now, of course, everything was different. She was back in his life; and he could easily pick up the guitar during a concert, could even play their most intimate song, The Secret Garden, on it and no longer cry.

  Sean launched into the opening chords.

  Jon raised his head to look up at the high ceiling, listened to the intro and let it inundate him. He wanted to stretch out his arms and float on the melody, feel it carry him like a wave. It was his music, the extension of his soul into the real world, a shining cloud that surrounded him, the fabric of his existence.

  He picked up his twelve-string, swung it over his head, and settled it into place against his body. The guitar pick in his raised hand, he waited for his cue, then dove into the ocean of his creation.

  chapter 2

  Sal found her in the hospitality area, sitting quietly in a corner sipping coffee.

  He stood in the doorway for a moment before going over to her. She had changed, but not as much as he had feared. It was true, she was still frail, and there was a residue of fatigue around her eyes and mouth; but Sal hoped it was more from the overnight flight than from her injuries.

  “Hey,” he greeted her softly, “it’s good to see you back. He can be such an asshole when you’re not around.”

  A small smile appeared on her lips. She tried to hide it behind the cup, but he saw and grinned in reply.

  “So how was your flight?” Grabbing a cup for himself, he sat down beside her, his back to the wall.

  “It was okay.” Naomi shrugged. “I had this guy sitting across the aisle, and he kept pushing champagne at me, wanted to talk, talk, talk; and all I wanted was to really get some rest. That’s the downside of traveling commercially. No private space, for hours.”

  With a little sigh, she gazed toward the hallway leading to the stage. “But I wanted to be here as soon as possible. I promised.”

  Sal didn’t point out to her that with a private plane she could have traveled on her own itinerary, and without unpleasant company, so he only replied, “Someone wanted to impress you. I’m not suprised.”

  She pulled up her shoulders in that well-known gesture of denial. “It was more than that. He was just a bit too inquisitive. He insisted on telling me his name. Parker, he called himself. Just that.” For a moment she seemed lost in contemplation. “He was really rather cute, now that I think of it. Very charming, in an English way. Very European. A bit like a puppy, eager to impress. I turned my back on him and went to sleep. Ah well.” A wave of her hand, a cool dismissal. “It’s over now, and we’re all here.”

  Sal had the feeling there was a little more to it, as if a shadow of that flight was still lingering in her memory, and he was on the point of asking. But then, seeing her face soften as the music drifted toward them, he said, “Come on, you know where you’re supposed to be. He’s on the stage and being petulant because you’re not around, and I promised to take you there, drag you by your braid if I have to. You have such a way of unsettling the routine.”

  Naomi rose. “But I promised to come to London. Would you rather I leave again?”

  “No!” The thought alone was enough to make him break out in a sweat. “Don’t even think that! If you left now I know there’d be no concert tonight. He’d go after you like a mad dog and to hell with a sold-out house!”

  The red dress looked good on her. In fact, Sal thought, trailing after her toward the hall, she had regained some weight and was well on the way to being her old self, to being the beautiful, healthy woman she had been before the attack at the Oscars.

  “You look great.” He held the door for her. Naomi gazed at him over her shoulder.

  “I mean, you look well. Rested,” he added hastily. “The break did you good. You even have a tan. Good!”

  Without replying she walked to the stage and put down her cup on the edge, right at Jon’s feet, and propped her elbows on the wood. It was a little too high for her, but she managed. Jon, in the middle of a verse, gave her a smile without missing a beat. He stepped forward and leaned down to her, still singing, to kiss her, and when it did not work went down on his knees, his guitar slung on his back.

  Sean, picking up the mood, changed to a gentler measure, changing the character of the song; and the lighting engineers, at their tables at the back of the house, pointed a mellow, pinkish beam at them. The image was so perfect, so made for a romantic moment somewhere in the show that Sal wondered if they should repeat it with a female fan, but he dismissed it right away, knowing full well Jon would never agree. He would never sell himself like that, not for anything. Sal sighed. It would have been a nice snapshot for a front page.

  A couple of pieces later Jon called an end to the sound check. They had, he announced, rehearsed more than they needed to already, and he was ready for some food and a rest before he had to face the press. Before Sal could get in a word, he had vanished, Naomi in tow.

  In the dressing room, quiet welcomed them. Naomi’s ears were still ringing from the volume of the music, her heart beating fast, bones throbbing with the rhythm. She sat on the corner of the table again to watch as Jon was transformed into the icon, the star who would make thousands of women swoon only a little while later.

  “This one?” Jon took a shirt from the rack, one among many. It was cream silk with colorful embroidery on the shoulders and down the sleeves. He held it up for her to see, a grin on his face. “I’m going to wear this one. What do you think?”

  Her breath caught. “Really, Jon?”

  “Yeah, I think. Does it remind you of something?” The supple material seemed to flow through his hands like a small waterfall.

  Of course it did.

  The concert had been only a couple of years ago, and she remembered all too well how she had
stood outside with the fans back then, hiding from him, wanting to see him but not wanting him to see her after their long years apart. Cold rain had dripped down her neck and soaked her coat, and Jon had walked by, eating an apple, unconcerned. She had told him, of course, once they had found each other again, how she had sat through the concert afterward, desperate and lonely, and how terrible his shirt had been.

  The makeup artist came in, towels over his arm. Muttering at seeing John still in his jeans, he turned and left again.

  “Well, yes or no? I have to change.” He began to strip, right there in the center of the room, tossing his clothes on the couch. “And don’t look at me like that. There’s no time for that now. Don’t make me regret that I have to go onstage in a little while.”

  Deep inside her heart she heard him sing as he had that night—sad, lonely, his voice breaking on the songs they had written together—and she recalled so well sitting in the third row, crying, mourning their past.

  “Not that one, Jon.” She couldn’t bear to see him in it again. “Please, pick something else.” And, with a wave at the rack, “Pick a new one. There are plenty. Give me that one. It’s my memory, and it still hurts, and I want it all for myself.”

  He laid it in her outstretched hand, bemused. “Okay, so which one do you want me to wear? You tell me.”

  Naomi slid from the table and went over to the collection of stage outfits, all still covered in protective plastic covers, pristine, waiting for their turn in the spotlight. For a moment she hesitated, then she took a dark red linen shirt down, and black trousers.

  “Here,” she said, “dress like a gentleman. Dress the way you should. You don’t need those crazy American outfits to stand out on the stage. Your music and your voice alone are good enough for that.”

  “I am American.” Jon’s eyebrows came up in amusement. “And you are married to me, so that makes you one too, more or less.”

  “Never!”

  The vehemence of her reply made him chuckle. “So tell me. What was that place where you were these past weeks? Your family’s?”

  She returned to her perch, the discarded shirt crumpled in her lap, and told him about the hotel where she had gone to rest, one of the many that belonged to her family, this one in Maryland, on the Eastern Shore, in a small town with the name of an archangel.

  “It’s right on the water,” her legs dangling, her fingers once again playing with the eyeliner. “With its own dock and a small swimming pool on the deck. It’s been ours for ages. Well, for twenty years.” She shrugged. “I don’t like the weather there. It’s okay now, but in a couple of weeks it will be as hot as hell, too hot to be outside.” There was a bowl of lemon candy on the table behind her and she picked one out. “I got up every morning at dawn to watch this couple go out to catch crabs. They would take a boat and row across the bay, their dog with them, and he would stand in the prow, all excited and yapping. I think it was a very young dog. He could hardly wait to get to the beach, and sometimes he jumped into the water just before they got there. It was fun to watch him shake himself and spray the water all over his people. They didn’t seem to mind though.” She smiled in reminiscence. “Then a little later the fishing boats would come in and I’d be there to watch the cooks buy what they wanted for the day, and then I’d go to the kitchen with them and have some coffee. And then…” She gazed into the distance, right past him. “And then there would be nothing for me to do. Mostly I sat on the deck and tried to write. They wouldn’t let me work the desk. And I hated it. I wanted to do something.”

  Jon, on the point of pulling on the shirt, let his hands sink to look at her and listen.

  “It felt a bit like being back in Halmar, for a while. But then I realized it wasn’t, and that was when I knew I was ready to come back to you.” A smile brightened her face. “And about time too, it seems.” Her attention returned to him. “Look at you, daydreaming when you should be getting ready. Here, let me help you.”

  Patiently he stood still as she buttoned the shirt for him and straightened the shoulders, the urge to draw her into his arms strong. He even held out his hands so she could fasten the cuffs.

  “You look good, Jon Stone. You look good enough to make the ladies wilt. I’m jealous.” Naomi stepped back to look at him critically. “How I hate sharing you with all those others. You know you’re mine alone, don’t you?”

  “Yeah. Three weeks, and you have no idea how I missed you. You can’t begin to imagine how lonely I was and how grueling the nights were—me, alone in that bed, your scent still on the pillow.” He tried to embrace her, but she stepped back, shaking her head. “And now you won’t even let me kiss you. What’s the use in being married?”

  “You will get rumpled. No hugging and fondling before the show.”

  Before he could react, there was another knock on the door, and he sighed. It was time.

  She was there. That was all that mattered. Naomi once more sat on the corner of the dressing table, in the way of the makeup artist, forcing him to work around her, creeping ever closer as the eyeliner was applied, fascinated by the procedure; and Jon, a deep burning in his heart, recalled how she had done the same thing right before that interview, after they had won the Oscar. Moments, it had been only moments later that she had been shot. He felt the urge to jump out of the chair and be done with it; take her hand and walk out of his old life; forget the stage, the concerts, the publicity and hide somewhere, in a quiet corner of the world where no harm would come to her and he could be himself.

  “Just a minute more,” Ralph murmured, feeling his impatience.

  “So you miss Halmar?” Jon asked around the puffs of powder Ralph was producing around his face.

  There was no answer for a while, and he closed his eyes. The smell of the makeup was irritating.

  “No.” Her voice was steady, calm. “No I don’t. I want to be here, with you.”

  When he dared to look she was smiling directly at him, her eyes bright.

  There was a way of dealing with the press that they had developed over the years; and now, walking into the room reserved for them, Jon said, “Stay with Sean and Art. You don’t need to be out there with me. Not this time,” and quickly pressed her hand. There would be no more kisses before the show; he was ready for the limelight now.

  “Hello, darling.” Sean touched her shoulder lightly. “It’s good to see you. Are you well?”

  She had missed him, and everyone in the group. As much as she had needed the silence, she needed this more.

  Standing between Art and Sean she felt safe, at home in a way she didn’t feel anywhere else, and so she leaned into him briefly.

  “I’m well, Sean, and so glad to be back with you all.”

  He left his fingers on her shoulder.

  The last time she had been at a press conference with Jon it had been before the Grammys. Then she had gathered all her courage and joined him, faced the many questions, cameras, and curious eyes; but now, she knew, she would never be able to bring herself to do something like that again, ever. The lights scared her, the hum in the large room seemed deafening, the crowd—focused on Jon—as threatening as a clown with razor teeth.

  “Steady,” Art mumbled when he felt her draw back. “We’re all here. Don’t be spooked. No need to be afraid.”

  But she was. For the first time since the shooting, the well-hidden panic surfaced: black bile in her throat, a silver flitter behind her eyes, red knives in the veins of her arms.

  Naomi gasped. She could feel Sean’s steadying arm around her waist and Art moving to stand in front of her, shielding her.

  “Do you want to go?” Sean asked softly. “If you want to go I’ll take you back to the dressing room, or Art can take you to the hotel. What do you want, darling?”

  She clasped the frame
of the door. Sal was speaking, thanking the press for being there, giving some details of the tour program, praising the venue and the organizers, then he introduced Jon and invited questions.

  “I’m okay,” Naomi said. She didn’t want to leave, didn’t want to give in. There was the taste of metal on her tongue, and breathing seemed hard.

  “What I would like to know,” someone in the audience said, “is how you deal with what happened to your wife at the Academy Awards? You are launching a big concert tour today, and where is your wife?”

  Abruptly, silence fell. Naomi felt Art and Sean shift, felt them move closer to her as if to close ranks, and saw the security men around them change their stance into one of alertness. The woman, LaGasse, hired by Jon to be her guard, moved in front of her with the easy elegance of a cat, her hand on her back, under her suit jacket.

  “This is not a topic for tonight.” It was Sal’s voice, contained and cool.

  She couldn’t see Jon from where she was standing now, inside her tight ring of people, not even when she rose on her toes to peer around LaGasse.

  “It’s also none of your business. She is well, and that’s all I’m going to say about it.” Jon was furious; she could hear it in his tone.

  “It was your former lover, was it not, who shot her? A young woman named Sophie? A movie director’s daughter?” The interrogator was still the same. “It was she who shot your wife, is that not correct?”

  No one spoke. Then Jon replied, very softly, “Yes. That is correct.”

  “Your wife was severely hurt, correct? She lost part of her lung? And her bodyguard was killed. The girl Sophie died too, if I remember correctly. So what about your wife? Where is she now? Here you are, starting a tour, and where is your wife?”