Adam is standing next to me, watching me put the key into the lock. When the door swings open, I turn and give him a soft smile of thanks. For tonight’s swooning and for the ride. He looks down at me, and I see something new on his face. It isn’t appreciation or tenderness or admiration. It’s want. Plain and simple and undeniable. My eyes lock on to his, and the moment he touches the back of my neck, I forget all about the black car and my tired forearms. I forget about everything except Adam’s lips on mine and the sudden music inside my head.
This kiss replaces the one in the parking lot at Pine Manor, knocking it out of First Place in an instant. With his lips on mine, and the StingRay still slung over his back, Adam pushes us both inside, closing and locking the door behind him. The hand now at the back of my head holds me against him as if he’s afraid I might pull away. The other is sitting on my hip, fingertips pressing into the bone, holding on for dear life. Holding on as if separating from me at this moment would end everything he’s ever known.
The intensity of this kiss, this not-such-a-nice-boy-kiss, sinks deep into me. This kiss means something. Adam is sandwiched between me and my bass. He’s surrounded by us and apparently wanting nothing but more. His tongue sends a jolt of happiness straight into me every time it brushes against mine.
Adam’s hands drop away from me when, a few moments later, we separate. He slides the straps of the StingRay’s gig bag down off his shoulders, propping it against the wall behind him without taking his eyes off of mine. He’s motionless now, standing in front of me, bright and electrified. Full of light.
“Thanks.” His voice is charged. And apparently connected straight to the lump now rising in my throat.
“For?”
He doesn’t answer. Instead, he rushes at me, wrapping his arms around my waist and sliding his hands up my back, underneath my shirt. His mouth connects to mine, and the endorphins jolt through my body, kicking and screaming and lighting a fire everywhere his skin touches mine. The wildness of it is like nothing I’ve ever felt before.
His hands move down to my backside and push me against him with their solid grip, his fingertips again holding me as if to keep me from pulling away. I melt my body into his, removing the space between us and wordlessly assuring him that pulling away is the last thing I want to do.
This is exactly where I want to be.
We don’t make it to the bedroom, or even to the couch, before our clothes are off. They litter the floor in a circle around our feet, as if they are soft, colorful statues frozen in dance. I imagine them revolving around us in time with the music in my head. We are the bonfire, and they are the pagans.
His hands touch my flesh, surveying it with skill and temperance, as if to absorb each detail. The lightness of his skin against mine is shockingly beautiful, and because of it, I don’t want to close my eyes. Not now, or ever again. He kisses my neck, tilting my head to the side and running his lips across my collarbone. His mouth moves over the front of my shoulders, and he sweeps his hands across my breasts, sending a heady stream of anticipation through me. Then his hands move downward, along the sides of my waist, squeezing and molding me. They grasp my hips and tug me closer just before they skim over my stomach, light as a feather, as his lips meet mine again. One hand wraps around my waist, holding on to me. Holding me still. The other drops lower, down between my legs.
Adam Sinclair is touching me, turning me into his light. He circles his fingers against my skin, teasing my flesh with his, feeding his want and mine. My knees buckle just enough to make the arm around my waist hold me a little tighter, as if to catch me before I fall. I won’t fall, though, because my heart is holding me up. Just like it always does. Adam doesn’t stop touching me until, a few minutes later, a remarkable, fiery release litters my brain with another flurry of pyromaniacal endorphins. This time, they ignite a string of deafening bass notes and “Soul to Squeeze” burns in my ears and over my skin. Louder than ever.
Together, we drop to the floor of my living room, and with the carpet against my back, I wrap my legs around his hips. Our bodies fuse together; his rhythmical hips push into me, deep and steady. It feels just like I knew it would. Perfect.
Adam’s face hovers above mine, studying me for signs hesitation or regret. But he won’t find any, because there’s not a single morsel of either. There’s only desire, the memory of Miriam Hansen’s words, and destiny.
I’M SNUGGLED up against Adam’s side, my head resting in the cradle of his shoulder. My left hand is splayed out on his chest, the lightness of his skin shining out from between my fingers, making four perfect Vs of light. It’s like I’m shooting rays of sun out from the crook of skin between each of my fingers. Out from a place that has brought so much music into this world.
And taken so many lives out of it.
“That’s hotter than it should be.” Adam’s voice breaks the silence, and I tilt my head up to look at him. He’s staring at the same place I was, examining my hand on his chest.
“It’s beautiful,” I say in agreement. His gaze moves to my face.
“This is going to sound totally weird after what just happened, but…” He stops as if he’s not sure he should say whatever he was going to say. I have a feeling I already know what it is.
“If it makes it any less awkward, you’re my first white boy, too, you know.”
His face cracks into a huge smile, and his cheeks flush with embarrassment. I was right.
“How’d you know what I was going to say?”
“Just a good guess.”
He pulls me in a little closer and kisses my temple. “Well, I for one liked it. A whole damn lot. Black or white or pink or yellow or upside down and inside out, K’acy McGee—this is going to sound a hundred-and-one kinds of cheesy—but everything about you is right.”
There are a few seconds of silence before I find my response. “Copy that, and send it back.”
I’m too embarrassed myself to say anything more. He kisses my temple again and exhales the breath he’d been holding since the end of his last heart-on-your-sleeve sentence.
“Come on,” he says, sitting up. “Let’s go to bed.”
Adam helps me to my feet, and we walk to my bedroom hand-in-hand, leaving the colorful pagans alone to dance in silent celebration on my living room floor.
FOR THE NEXT FOUR WEEKS, Jarrod is no longer alone at the bar at The King’s Court on Wednesday nights. Adam sits there with him, each of them nursing a beer as they listen to me clean my soul. They don’t talk much, but I know they like each other because their body language tells me so. One of them will occasionally smile or wink at me as I play. And Jarrod’s face lights up when I end each week’s set with “Soul to Squeeze.” I think he likes knowing we still have secrets between us, even though “Soul to Squeeze” is the most trivial of the bunch. Jarrod’s told me things I would never share with anyone, things he had to do to survive before we met, things we’ve talked about in the dead of night. And then there are the things I’ve told him. Things I don’t think I’ll ever tell Adam. Because he doesn’t need to know. These secrets connect Jarrod and me, and that’s never going away. No matter where life takes us.
Tonight, the three of us leave The King’s Court together, but once we’re out the door, Jarrod heads to the left to hop on a bus, and Adam and I cross the street to where his car is parked. I sometimes wonder if Big Al on the 43D misses me, but I’m not about to argue with having my own personal chauffeur/swooner. Plus, the car rides offer me and Adam a great opportunity to connect somewhere outside of the emotionally unpredictable confines of Ms. Sinclair’s room. We never ride in silence. We share and joke and laugh and learn. A few more car rides and Adam will know more about me than anyone else in the world, except for my father and Jarrod.
Adam walks me to my apartment door, but he never stays on Wednesday nights. He knows I have to be at work by 8:00 the following morning, and he knows how exhausted I always am after so much mental housecleaning. He graciously leaves me at
the door with a kiss and the promise of tomorrow, the pale skin of his palm brushing against the darkness of my cheek, filling me with its light.
Looking out the window, I watch Adam’s car pull away from the curb just like always, thinking about how beautifully comfortable things have become for us. I don’t want it to ever end.
The black car is there, lurking against the curb a block or so from my building, its driver still invisible behind the dark glass. I’ve seen it a handful of times over the last few weeks, always watching in perfect stillness from just far enough away. Each time I see it, my fear grows stronger, and when I think about the possibility of it being the police, panic rushes in, replacing my worry with something far more visceral. Could they be watching me because of something more than my visits to Latham Street? Did I miss some small detail?
Did I make a mistake?
To protect myself from all of the possible answers, I take the small wooden box out of the back of my closet, wrap its contents in a thick layer of paper towels, and toss them down the hallway trash chute.
SOON AFTER I walk through the glass doors of Pine Manor the next morning, I learn from the shift change report that Ms. Sinclair got out of her bed four times last night. And all four times, when someone went in to help her, she was angry and very confused, yelling and telling everyone to stay away from her. She’s been doing it a lot lately, and as a result, at the bottom of the page is a note from the Director of Nursing about possibly changing Ms. Sinclair’s medication to keep her calmer and more compliant at night. It’s often a sad necessity for Alzheimer’s patients; it reduces a lot of dangers. I don’t like the thought of Ms. Sinclair being in a medicated haze, but I understand.
I’m sure Dr. Kopsey will soon be talking with Adam about it. It won’t be an easy conversation; it never is. The day nurse will tell Adam about Ms. Sinclair’s night when he comes in today, if she hasn’t called him about it already.
All I can do is make sure Ms. Sinclair is safe and comfortable, just like always. Outside of Sondra, no one here knows about Adam and me. But he knows I’m here for him, if he needs me to be.
A few minutes after Adam arrives at 10:30, I see the day nurse head back the hallway to Ms. Sinclair’s room. I watch her go in, and then I watch Adam follow her back out. Together, they go into the family conference room. I wish I could be there to hold his hand.
I’m staring at the conference room door like a hawk when they come back out twenty minutes later. As he walks back to his grandmother’s room, Adam wipes his face with the sleeve of his shirt. It breaks my heart.
After lunch, I wheel Ms. Sinclair back to her room. I haven’t been able to talk to Adam all day, and the mass of emotion in my throat is getting harder and harder to swallow. When we round the corner into Ms. Sinclair’s room, Adam is standing at her window, looking out over the parking lot. There’s an empty Subway bag and a bottle of Sprite on the side table.
“Hey.”
He turns at the sound of my voice, dropping his shoulders and offering us a small smile.
“Hey, ladies. How was lunch?” He walks across the room until he’s standing right in front of his grandmother.
“Uninspiring,” says Ms. Sinclair, looking up at him with admiration. “It’s a good thing there was chocolate pudding for dessert. It may have been the only redeeming thing about that meal.”
Sudden surprise hits Adam’s face, as if a distant, lovely memory has flooded in. “Do you remember how you used to pack chocolate pudding in my lunch every day, Gram?”
I see what he’s doing. He’s hoping to dig up a scrap of her memory, something to connect them together again. Over the past few weeks, he’s learned to take whatever he can get. Small bits at a time. Tiny pieces of the Evelyn Sinclair who raised him.
“Yes, dear. I do. It’s really too bad you never ate it.”
Adam looks confused. “But I always ate it. That was my favorite part of lunch.”
“Don’t be foolish, Bradley. I know you didn’t eat it because I dumped it into the garbage every day. Such a waste.” It’s the first time she’s confused him for the mysterious Bradley in many days. It must be destroying him inside to hear the name again. Adam lifts his gaze away from her face and up to mine. All I can do is shrug and offer a nod of understanding.
“Gram, I’m Adam. Remember?”
“I don’t care who you are, young man, we don’t waste food.”
He sighs and offers a resigned, “Yes, ma’am.”
Ms. Sinclair doesn’t say another word as we help her out of her wheelchair and into the recliner next to her bed. As she twists the cellophane off of a Starlight mint, Adam switches on the television, tuning it to a cooking show. She watches it contently as her grandson gives me a small kiss on the cheek just before I walk out the door.
OVER DINNER, Adam and I talk about his meeting with the day nurse. Just like I knew she would, she suggested he make an appointment with the doctor to discuss his gram’s medication. He’s already scheduled one for the middle of next week.
We’re at the same Mexican place where he kissed me for the very first time, and just like that night, Adam isn’t sitting across the table from me. He’s sitting right next to me, as close as he can get. With his hand on my thigh. Louise McGee’s imaginary discard pile has long since been burned to ashes. The only card I cared to hold on to was Adam’s. Still, every time he puts his elbows on the table, I can’t help but think of her and feel the last bits of bitterness slip away.
It seems I’m falling hard for Adam Sinclair. Just like Miriam Hansen knew I would. I can’t help myself. He’s the one.
IT’S 1:30 in the morning when Adam’s cell phone rings. We’re both sound asleep, our naked bodies curled around each other like some kind of oft-clichéd yin and yang. Dark and light. Opposite and yet interdependent. Each of us has now dipped one toe into the other, leaving a small dot of ourselves on the other one’s soul.
Adam grabs the phone from the nightstand and clears his throat before offering a timid, “Hello?”
I only hear one-half of the conversation, but I know what’s happened. We’re out the door five minutes after he hangs up.
CHAPTER 17
In 2008, the floor at Terrebonne General consisted of alternating blue and white squares, highly polished and smelling of floor wax and disinfectant. For as long as I live, I’ll never forget that floor. I watched the wheels of my father’s wheelchair roll across it more times than I could count. I’ve never looked at that shade of blue quite the same way again.
But tonight, the floor in Penn Presbyterian is a mellow tan, and as Adam and I walk into the emergency center, his hand tenses in mine.
The nurse at the front desk asks Adam a slew of questions and then tells us his grandmother has suffered a concussion and, perhaps, a fractured hip. The doctor just sent her down to radiology for confirmation. Ms. Sinclair fell again while trying to navigate her way to the bathroom at Pine Manor. One of the night nurses found her and called an ambulance immediately.
Two hours pass before we learn Ms. Sinclair’s hip does not appear to be fractured. Her wrist, however, is sprained, and they’re going to keep her here for a few days because of the concussion. The doctor has also ordered an MRI of both her head and her hip, just to confirm the extent of the damage. They tell us they plan to do the MRIs later this morning.
As we sit in the family center, waiting for Ms. Sinclair to be put into a regular room, Adam is clearly shaken. His voice is unsure and unsteady. I wait with him until I have to head to the bus stop to go home and get ready for work. He wants to drive me, but I won’t accept his ride knowing how much he needs to be here. Saying goodbye is far from easy, especially because of how vulnerable I know he’s feeling. He looks exhausted, both physically and mentally. For a brief time I consider calling in sick, but I know my absence on this particular day might appear to be something more than a coincidence to my supervisors. I’m not ready to take the chance.
I DON’T HEAR a single peep from
Adam until four o’clock in the afternoon. I’ve been on pins and needles all day, walking around with my phone on vibrate in the pocket of my scrubs. Personal phone use is completely prohibited while on duty, but I can’t help myself.
The moment I feel my pocketed phone kick to life, I shuffle myself into a stall in the ladies’ room.
Gram’s finally in a room. She’s sleeping.
Any news from the MRIs?
Concussion is minor. She’s lucky.
Yes, she is. In many ways.
And not so lucky in many others.
Focus on the positives.
I’m trying, but it’s hard. She looks so frail.
It’s tough to see someone you love looking so vulnerable. Trust me, I understand.
I could use a friend tonight, if you don’t have plans.
No plans. Want me to come to the hospital after work?
No. I’ll come to your place when they kick me out of here.
Okay. Tell your gram I hope she gets back to Pine Manor real soon. Everyone’s been asking about her today.
Really?
Yep. Any time an ambulance comes, it’s a big deal, but night visits are particularly hard on everyone. She’s got a lot of people thinking about her right now.
She’ll appreciate that. I’ll tell her when she wakes up.
Sounds good. I’ll see you soon, Adam.
Not soon enough.
Those three words momentarily make me forget about the beautiful old woman asleep in a bed in Penn Presbyterian. They sing with promise. Because I feel exactly the same way.
Copy that, and send it back.
MS. SINCLAIR and her grandson spend the weekend at Penn Presbyterian. And K’acy McGee spends her day off there, too. We’re quite the trio, hanging out and watching television like we’re at home in the living room on a Sunday afternoon.
The Sound of Light Page 10