by J. L. Rizzo
Fuck. Not him again.
“I see.”
“He’s never here.”
“Good,” I reply. I don’t give a shit about Xaden. So I end my side of the conversation there.
“I just wanted to be honest with you.” She’s contrite and apologetic.
“Thank you for that.” I kiss her hard, calming my jealous nerves and staking my claim on Summer for the crowd to see. “Will you play another one?”
Her bright smile is all I need to see. “Good. This crowd loves you. You’re surrounded by people who love you, love your voice, love your message.” She blinks at me rapidly, processing my words. “I hope you see that, Summer.”
“I see a lot of things, Crew. But that isn’t one of them. Not right now.”
“You have your own story, Summer. Your own world. Focus on that.”
The discordant chords of whatever wretched song was playing have finally stopped. Summer grabs another tumbler — she’s a drinker? — kisses me chastely, and heads back to the piano, to the roaring crowd who need to hear her songs like they need a fix.
And I’m one of them.
Summer played a total of six songs tonight. All with more heat and purpose than the one before. When I thought she couldn’t possibly top the song before, she did. She always did. She’s like a beacon, alluring people to fixate on her while they attempt to navigate their own lives. Little do they know that tonight, her life was flipped on itself. Summer ought to be a narcissistic mess, given what her mother dumped on her. Instead, she’s nursing an escape.
She’s only had those two drinks, so I know she doesn’t use alcohol to cope. Thank the lord for that. If she did, we’d have a problem. I’m not in the market to enable anyone else. Not after the damage it’s done to me.
After her set is over, her apprehension to go home is palpable as we walk slowly, deliberately. Which is entirely understandable. Still, it’s been a hell of a day, and she needs sleep.
“I asked your mother not to be around when you got back. I’m sure she’ll give you some space for a while.”
“She’s not there,” she replies quickly.
“What do you mean?” I ask, obviously missing something.
“She texted me.” Summer shows me the text.
Staying at Chance’s house tonight. We’ll talk tomorrow. I love you. Mom.
“Wow.”
“Wow.”
“That’s bold.”
“Yep.”
“She can text.”
“Apparently.”
I wait a few moments to let it sink in.
“His name is Chance.”
Summer takes a deep, necessary breath, never making eye contact. “I guess it is.”
We walk a little more when I decide that honesty has to win over the silence. “Your feelings are justified. You know that, right?”
The frown on her face speaks her doubt. “Just what is it you think I’m feeling?”
I shrug my shoulders. “Betrayal. Anger. Sadness.”
Slipping her fingers through mine, she grabs a tight hold. “If I were feeling those things, than I might agree with you.” Her monotone voice speaks her despondence. She places her head on my shoulder as we walk. “But I’m not feeling them. So I don’t.”
The fire from before has been snuffed out. The woman standing next to me isn’t a rock star. She’s a shell of a girl, hanging on by a thread. Her body feels small and bony as I tuck her under my arm, never letting her go.
“What are you feeling, Summer?” The squeeze of her hand is all she responds. No words. Maybe she’s too tangled up in them to verbalize them. “Talk to me.”
She stops walking and turns to face me. The cold night air doesn’t seem to bother her at all. Brushing her fingers down my face as I have done to her, she takes a deep inhale and sighs it out. “Fear.” Her smile is weak and unconvincing. “I feel a tremendous amount of fear.” She drops her hand in defeat. “It’s not justified. It’s selfish and immature. And I can’t stop it.”
“I don’t understand, Summer. What are you afraid of? What’s going on in your mind?”
Turning to walk the last half block to her door, she says, “When I went to Austin yesterday, I was talking to my father about my year, but all the while I kept thinking, ‘I’m starting to forget.’ It really scared me.”
“What are you starting to forget?”
A few silent moments pass between us, then she replies, “Him. My father. I’m starting to forget what he looks like, his face, his laughter, how he smells. It’s all fading away.” Her eyes well with tears before she turns to open the door to her home. “I’m afraid that if I forget him, then I’ll lose myself. I’ll lose the one thing that has kept me going all these years, kept me playing, kept me feeling secure.” She opens the door without looking at me, and I follow her right in.
“What are you talking about, Summer?” I grab her elbow and spin her around. “How can you lose yourself? I see you now, right here, in front of me. I see the girl who just played at a bar simply to mend her bruised heart and the hearts of the ones who listened to her. You have a message, Summer. You have a story. Stop trying to re-create the old story and build a new one.” Her furrowed brows scream her insecurities.
“Summer, you didn’t play Chopin or Bach or Beethoven tonight. You don’t play the music of dead composers any longer; music that has been interpreted time and time again for hundreds of years by hundreds of people. You write new songs. Original music. And you’re so fucking good at it.” I take her face in my hands.
With tears streaming down, Summer sobs, “I just never expected my mother to move on. I never expected my mother to forget my father. He was her whole world.” She licks some tears that have reached her lips. “If she can forget him, then…who will remember?” The quiver of her lips confesses her fears.
Then it hits me that Summer isn’t afraid of her mother moving on. She’s afraid of losing her security. Her parents raised her together, homeschooled her, sheltered her from the obstacles of the world. Her mother has been her only constant for years now. Before that, her father was her rock, her sounding board, her safety net. And Summer isn’t prepared to face this world without them.
“Summer, whether you want to see it or not — you’re moving on. You don’t live in Austin any more. You haven’t played classical music in a long while. You changed the genres of music you want to interpret. You’re writing new songs. You play your heart out. And you’re singing them at places that aren’t concert halls. If that’s not moving on….”
She chuckles sarcastically at my point, but I’m entirely serious. “Just because you’re doing things that make you feel fulfilled doesn’t mean you’re leaving your father behind. He wants you to be happy, Summer. He wants you to live a good, fun, full life. He doesn’t want you dwelling on things you can’t change.”
I wrap Summer up tight in my arms, expecting her to crumble right before me. Instead, she wraps her arms tightly around me in return, practically squeezing the air out of my chest. We stand in this lifeline embrace for several minutes, filling the silence between us with love and respect and empathy.
“I don’t know much for sure right now,” Summer says into my chest, breaking the silence, “but I think that I’m madly in love with you, Crew Evans.” Her words stop my heart and suck the last bit of air from my lungs. It’s everything I want to hear, but there’s a twinge of skepticism given the circumstances. Summer sounds like she’s moving through the different coping stages of loss, and hearing such a profound proclamation during a precarious time lends itself to suspicion.
Still, she said them. I heard them. And my heart swells bigger than it has in years.
I break our embrace to give her space to look up to my eyes. Her eyes are a warm shade of brown, and they’re the kindest eyes I’ve ever seen. The delicate features of her face have been burned into my memory. Her long strawberry blond hair falls in soft waves down her back. She’s exquisite; she’s breathtaking. “I thi
nk I loved you when I was five years old, Summer.” I kiss her gently, feeling her soft tear-stained lips.
“Why do you love me, Crew?” she asks.
Reassure, Evans.
I wipe a tear away with my thumb. “You hit me the first time I saw you, Summer. Bouncing pigtails and all. I couldn’t take my eyes off of you. I pictured you that happy to see me, to be my friend.” I kiss her nose gently. “But it wasn’t until years later that I understood why I was so drawn to you.”
She furrows her brow, wanting to know more. “It was your passion that first drew me in. Your eagerness. Your willingness to set aside everything else for the one thing you loved. And secretly — I wanted that one thing to be me.” Her soft smile makes me continue. “I wanted to be the one to make you smile, the one you skipped to, the person who made everything better for you. You had your piano.”
She chuckles at my joke.
“That’s a beautiful sound.”
“What?”
“The way you giggle. You should do it more often.”
The shy look she gives me makes me love her even more.
“When I learned that I could be good at photography, I began to realize why you made the choices you made. Why you skipped to your lessons. Why you only went to public school for a short time. Why you worked so hard for this one thing. I didn’t want to do anything else but take photos that have never been seen before. Photos with depth and character. Photos that would mean something to someone one day. I couldn’t get enough. It’s all I did, day in and day out. Studying, working, traveling, learning. For years. That is, until —” I stop speaking to see if she’ll want to hear more.
“Until what?” she finally asks.
“Until I saw you again. At the cemetery. And it wasn’t what you accomplished or how you looked that immediately drew me in. It was what you saw in me.” She listens quietly, her face softening. “I was an absolute mess that night we met, but you looked at me, looked right through me, and you trusted me enough to sit and talk with me, to take your photo. You didn’t even know me, but you were brave enough to hear me, see me. No one’s ever really seen me before. They all pretend to sympathize with me, but they have absolutely no idea. It’s only been you. And you were tough enough to give me shit when I deserved it yet sympathetic enough to nurse an old wound that hadn’t quite healed.” I rub my finger down her cheek. “I needed you that night. I’ve needed you every night since.” I kiss her slowly, lingering the touch of our lips. Pressing my forehead to hers, I continue, “I’m so afraid that this is all a dream, that I’ll wake up and you’ll be gone. Or that you never happened in the first place.”
“No, Crew. Don’t say that,” her shattered voice rips me apart.
“I don’t love you only for who you are but also for who you make me become. So for you to say that you’ll one day lose yourself…well, then, I guess I’ll be lost as well.”
Summer kisses me with everything she’s got, pouring her love and soul once reserved for the piano into me. I feel her passion vibrating everywhere, my heart skipping every other beat to catch up with my thrumming emotions. She ignites every dormant emotion that I buried years ago, punishing myself by withholding any shred of happiness or love I might encounter. She’s the air I need to breathe, the light I need to see, the drink that quenches my thirst.
I show her my gratitude for her for hours deep into the night. Until she is naked and spent lying in my arms, where she belongs.
21.
Summer
It sounds like it’s raining; the sizzle of drops fill my ears as I wake from a sleepless dream.
I haven’t slept that hard in so long.
This must be my reward for years of relentless work.
My limbs are tired and heavy and sore from being up for hours with Crew. Part of the night was spent talking and being with him. But most of the night was spent in blinding passion. His stamina is impressive; he can go for hours and never tire. But his stamina pales in comparison to the tenderness and love he’s shown me.
I feel like I’ve known him my whole life. Or at least I wish I did. His intuition astounds me. He’s so incredibly insightful. I have to keep reminding myself that he’s only a year older than me.
My heart swells with empathy thinking about the things he’s probably had to endure since his mother died. He said a few times that his father isn’t much of a nurturer, which means that Crew has been on his own for more years without his mom than with her. I’m sure those years were difficult for him, especially with his brother constantly acting like a loaded weapon. And with his father being so withdrawn from the family, Crew has probably had to make his own way for years.
Here I am feeling despondent about my mother having a boyfriend.
I’m fucking pathetic.
I need to give her a break despite the fact that there’s so much I don’t understand. Why did she not tell me about him? Why did she pretend to constantly be in a state of mourning for my father, never really smiling or having any fun? Why did she want me to think that she was so dependent on me, living with me, relying on me for so many responsibilities? Why didn’t she just come clean?
While I don’t understand the need to keep up appearances for so long, I need to be more sympathetic to the fact that she’s a grown woman who has her own life. I certainly don’t appreciate being lied to — which I intend to discuss with her at length — but I’m sure she has good reasons for all of it. At least I hope she does.
Crew’s right. She’s moving on. I’ve moved on, whether I meant to or not. It’s happening, and I need to accept it.
I’m starting to control this choking threat of fear. And I know why.
Crew.
He’s been through so much trauma in his life, yet he’s composed and in control. He’s got a great career, he’s brilliantly talented, he’s got his head on straight, and he’s the rock that people lean on.
He’s not just the rock. He’s the whole mountain.
And he’s here. With me.
I’m a lucky girl.
Opening my eyes, I realize that it’s not raining outside. Crew is in the shower. He’s singing a song by Frank Sinatra, and the acoustics of the bathroom make him sound sultry and inviting.
I want to see him wet and naked.
Wrapping myself up in my white robe, I walk softly over to the bathroom. The blast of hot steam surges at my face, filling my senses with the sweetest scent of jasmine and mint from my body wash. After I blink my eyes a few times, I gaze at Crew in the shower, sudsy and smiling at me with a twinkle of mischievous amusement in his eyes. He’s got the body of an athlete — strong, chiseled and sculpted in all the right places. If I didn’t know my type before, which I didn’t, I’d say he is my type.
“Are you going to just stand there and gawk at me like I’m some piece of art?” he chuckles.
Raking my eyes over his body sends a wave of lust down my spine. “That’s not a bad plan.”
He laughs, then turns the shower off and grabs his towel. Watching Crew towel dry himself off makes me wish I only had small towels at his disposal…hand towels…washcloths would be perfect. He slides the towel around his skin, which is pink and heated from his hot shower, all the while smirking at me.
“You’re staring.” He chuckles.
“I can’t help it. You’re gorgeous.”
“I don’t want you to help it. I just want to be the only person you stare at.”
When he wraps his towel around his waist, he strides over to me and envelops me up in his arms. He’s sticky and his long wet hair is dripping on me, but I’ve never felt so grateful to be damp in my entire life.
I kiss him hard. “I’m glad you’re here.”
He smiles at me. “Me, too.” Another kiss. “I’m going to make some breakfast. For some reason, I feel utterly drained of all my energy.”
“Oh, really?” I ask with feigned ignorance. “I wonder why that is.”
He shrugs his shoulders. “I don’t know. Could b
e the cold winter air. Could be the late night concert. Could be all the sex. There’s a list to choose from.”
His playful banter earns him a smack on his butt, which makes him laugh. “That’s a wonderful sound.” He frowns at my comment. “You should laugh more often.”
Another wide smile. “Anything for you.” I melt a little more when he looks at me like that.
He gives me a kiss then walks over to his bag to get his clothes. He’s a fine sight, Crew Evans. I often catch myself staring at him, admiring how he holds himself — confident, controlled, in command.
As he’s sifting through his things, something inside his bag catches my eye.
A yellow envelope with my name written on it.
What’s that?
He pushes it to the side, looking for a pair of jeans, never giving it a second glance.
But I can’t stop staring at it.
It looks like an interoffice envelope, with the red figure eight tie and peek-through holes. My curiosity is boiling over the top.
He doesn’t even notice it, pushing it around to search in his bag. It makes me think that whatever is in that envelope is either unimportant and he doesn’t feel the need to show it to me, or extremely important and he’s playing it cool not to alarm me.
Maybe he packed it to show me on this trip and decided against it. Maybe he never intended for me to have it.
Whatever the case, I want to know. I’m tired of secrets and lies and people trying to “protect” me from whatever they think I need protection from.
“I’m going to go make some breakfast,” he surprises me out of my trance. Cupping my face with his hands, he kisses me gently. “You ok?” he asks, with a frown behind his eyes.
I simply nod and smile, not giving him any sign that I’m reeling inside. But I don’t think I’m successful because he takes an extra long moment to study my face, the scrutiny searing his face.
“I’m going to take a shower. I’ll be up in a few minutes.” I kiss him trying to keep my racing heart under control.
Crew kisses my nose. “Don’t be too long.” He smiles and walks out of the room.