Wishful Thinking

by Lynette Sofras

  After he’d finished on the phone, he’d seen her with Adam again coming out of the boys’ bedroom. Why Adam had been in there was still something of a mystery. It occurred to him that Adam might be trying to move in on Jess and that thought almost incensed him. Was that what Adam meant by his threat? It was only the fact that Kate had been there as well that enabled him to control himself and say nothing.

  If Adam’s interest in Jess was genuine, then he could hardly blame him. As far as Adam knew, Jess was a free agent and after Amber’s treatment of him, he supposed Adam was too. He wasn’t yet aware how strong Christian’s feelings for Jess were, otherwise Christian knew he wouldn’t attempt to muscle in. Adam wouldn’t use Jess as a pawn in a revenge game. He needed to let Adam – and not just him – know how serious he was about Jess. Then he would back off and hopefully Amber would do the same.

  Christian had watched Jess constantly throughout dinner and his heart seemed to expand with love and longing – a deeply sensual combination he had never felt so intensely before and which was so acute he felt it almost as a pain in his chest. As long as he could keep her near him, he could cope with it, but whenever she left, the vacuum that remained was almost intolerable.

  He’d enjoyed the session with Adam – it had been like old times and he felt real enthusiasm for the new song ideas and a rekindling of interest in Wishful that he hadn’t felt in years. He thought back to the days when they would sit creating music together all day long – sometimes with Justin, sometimes with other band members joining them. The ideas bounced between them and the adrenalin flowed. Hours would pass like minutes and someone would look out of the window and point out that it was dark, when it felt like only lunchtime. And then the music seemed to dry up and though no one articulated it, everyone felt the interest drain away.

  It was like the words of that old song ‘American Pie’ - the day the music died – only it didn’t happen in a day. Their music died a slower death. They carried on producing it for a while but they realised - or at least, he and Adam did - that it wasn’t the music that had dried up but their belief in it. Wishful had taken them too far away from their own ideals. But tonight he’d felt that old buzz again; experienced the thrill of feeling that they could be back on track, back to their roots and both doing what they liked best.

  He knew he’d reached a crossroads in life and he couldn’t decide which way to turn as far as his career went. He’d tried the movies and wasn’t sure the constant travel, the hassle and the brittle egos all around him were quite the environment he wanted. He’d enjoyed the experience of the small roles he’d been given – supporting roles only, but decent ones and quite significant. He had no real aspirations to pursue an acting career and try for bigger billing. If he hadn’t quite realised that before, then he had tonight. He had lived enough of his life in the public spotlight and was ready for a quieter and more creative life – as long as it involved Jess, because only Jess could fill that aching vacuum inside him.

  He envied what Adam had, or perhaps it was what Greg and Kate had, because even without Adam they would have pursued this kind of lifestyle. Adam just made it possible for them to do it in comfort. It seemed to him to be idyllic and he saw that Jess thought so too. That she didn’t yearn for the showy trappings and glitz of public life. She was looking for something deeper and more meaningful. Could he have needed further confirmation that they were right for each other?

  So he followed her upstairs as soon as he could and knocked on her door to talk to her. But when she answered, all bundled up in towels and fragrant from her shower, some rather more primitive instinct took over and all he could think of was making love to her. He wanted her with an intensity that no amount of will power could deny and which was further fuelled by her own urgency. Not a single word was necessary between them as their bodies united in a love that was more genuine and profound than anything he’d known before or dared believe existed.

  Sated and unutterably contented, they lay in each other’s arms and he watched her struggling not to drift off to sleep as he simply gazed at her, drinking in her loveliness. He was the one who was supposed to fall asleep but he couldn’t waste a precious moment of her intoxicating presence.

  “Come on, sleepy-head, we need to get your hair dry. You shouldn’t go to bed with wet hair,” he told her and she sat at his feet as he rubbed it thoroughly and then took her hairbrush and let it slip through her still-damp curls. He had never brushed a girl’s hair before and found it immensely sensuous, enjoying the activity as much as Jess did as the brush slid through her limp, silken curls.

  Later they made exquisite love again and slept in each other’s arms. When he awoke he saw her hair was dry and those honey-coloured tresses fanned out across the pillow, glinting like spun gold. Again he marvelled at her in sleep; wondering where her dreams had taken her as her long lashes swept her cheeks making her look mysterious, secretive and even more alluring. A slight smile curved around her lips, which he badly wanted to kiss and when she finally opened her eyes, the smile broadened.

  “I was jealous of your dream,” he whispered, reaching down to bestow light kisses on her eyes. “You looked like you were enjoying it too much and I felt left out.”

  “You were there with me,” she murmured.

  “That’s where I want to be, always,” he said, his kisses moving down to the tip of her nose. “I love you, Jess. Please believe that. I love you and only you and I want nothing else in the world more than to spend the rest of my life with you.” He meant every word.

  She drew her head away from him slightly so that she could look into his eyes. “It sounds like there’s a ‘but’ coming,” she said tentatively.

  He propped himself up on one elbow so that could meet her gaze and show her he had nothing more to hide. There is something I have to tell you – about Amber. Adam is right – I haven’t been entirely truthful with you but I’m so afraid that when you hear it, I’ll lose you. And although I don’t know how I’ll bear that, I’ll have to respect your decision and let you go, if that’s your choice.”

  20

  A white mist still clung to the ground but the weak January sunlight was doing its best to burn it off when the three men and little three boys left the house on their otter hunt. Jess had decided to remain behind to help Kate prepare the lunch, for which she had insisted they all stay. It was mainly because of Ben’s pleading that she had relented.

  “I’ll stay behind and help as well,” Christian had said to her but she had declined his offer.

  “No, you go out. Ben will feel let down if one of us isn’t there to share it with him,” she had said. It was probably untrue as Ben seemed perfectly happy with his new best friend and by now completely at ease with Adam and Greg. The truth was she needed space to think and some mindless chores to occupy her hands. Besides, it was unthinkable to leave all the work to Kate, despite the latter’s insistence that she could manage perfectly well on her own.

  As Jess started on the vegetables, one of Kate’s neighbours called in briefly to see her and Jess felt thankful to be spared the need to make small talk and busied herself with her chores and her thoughts. And what a mess of conflicting thoughts she had to sort through.

  It had been a magical night and their lovemaking had been nothing short of wonderful. He had made her feel adored as never before and his combination of tenderness and passion was beyond anything she could ever have dreamed of – even better, as impossible as it seemed, than before he had gone away. When he told her he loved her, she truly believed him at last and her heart felt full to spilling over with happiness in its most concentrated form.

  Then once again Amber came between them. The moment he mentioned her name, she felt her heart sinking and that new found joy ebbing away as if someone had pulled the plug in the core of her being and allowed all that peace and contentment to drain away. The hollowness left behind was huge and troubling. It also hurt – or threatened to hurt.

  He spoke slowly and
deliberately, not wanting to spare himself the pain of remembrance perhaps, or wanting to ensure she heard every word of his horrible confession and understood its import.

  “When Amber first joined Wishful, I think most of the boys fancied their chances with her a little bit. We were all so young and seeing who could score first was one of those immature games we played. And she was such a flirt that it was hard to say if she was genuinely interested in any of us. She was what they used to call a bit of a tease. She gave off all the wrong vibes and didn’t seem to know how to tone down her behaviour – a bit like a manic depressive. No-one took her very seriously, until one day she took an overdose and I happened to be the one who found her. It wasn’t a serious suicide bid – none of her attempts ever were – but it scared me. It also gave me a new insight into her.

  “I spent the weekend with her and we talked day and night and – well, that’s how we became lovers. I don’t think either of us intended it but it happened and the press got wind of it and before we knew it we were bigger than Romeo and Juliet. We let it carry us away – let ourselves believe the media hype – let them plan our dream wedding for us, without actually giving it any proper thought ourselves.”

  Jess listened, thinking this was pretty much what she had surmised from her research and it hardly, therefore, came as a shock. They were young and thoughtless and wrapped up in the moment. It wasn’t an attractive side to Christian, but it was hardly a crime.

  “We were living a lie and we knew it, because it was good for the band. We weren’t even faithful to each other, though we managed to keep our affairs a secret. But then Amber discovered she was pregnant and suddenly everything changed and we had to re-appraise our situation. The problem was, I couldn’t even be sure it was mine, though of course she insisted it was.

  “She wanted to get married there and then. She suddenly became very conventional. Because of what happened to her, she wanted her baby brought up properly by two parents. Being so carried away with what she wanted, she was just incapable of seeing it through my eyes. The uncertainty just ate away at me. I went through hell. This is going to sound terrible to you, but I told her that if she terminated the pregnancy, I would marry her and we could have a baby that I could be sure was mine.”

  Jess bit her lip as she listened. For once she could sympathise with Amber’s plight. It was a horrible decision for a woman who evidently wanted a baby very badly. The need for the baby might seem more important than the need to know its biological father. Yet she could understand Christian’s side of it too and did not consider him unreasonable. But another nagging doubt also bothered her. She wondered if Christian’s aversion to another man’s child might extend to Ben.

  “She cried about it a lot,” he went on. “It was a cruel and horrible thing I was asking, but she eventually agreed with me. She checked herself into a clinic and everything seemed to go as planned. I couldn’t be with her, but got there as soon as I could afterwards. Then she told me that, at the last minute, she decided not to go through with it and discharged herself.

  “Of course, we argued,” Christian closed his eyes at the shameful memories. “We argued like characters from the worst kind of soap opera imaginable for hour upon hour, all that day and into the night. I know I shouldn’t make excuses, but I hadn’t slept for the previous three nights because of it all and I wasn’t at my most rational.

  “She said she never intended to go through with the termination, just kept hoping that at the eleventh hour I’d call her and tell her I’d changed my mind. I wish to God I had now! But when she told me it was all a sham…I just lost it.” There were tears in Christian’s eyes at the painful recollection and it took a while before he could finish.

  “I pushed her. She came at me, hitting me, calling me all sorts of names, and I pushed her away. Only I must have pushed her too hard and she lost her balance and fell. There was a short staircase - five or six steps leading down to the kitchen - and she lost her footing and just went flying backwards.”

  “Oh dear God!” Jess gasped, her hands clapped to her mouth.

  “She lost the baby as a direct result of the fall.” Christian got up and went into the bathroom and Jess could hear him splashing water on his face. His expression, when he returned, told Jess there was still more of this sad story to relate. “I was sick with self-loathing. I would have done anything to put things right – to change what happened. She said I’d ruined her life and she’d never be able to forgive me. But then she insisted that we should try again for another baby immediately. I couldn’t understand how she could bear to look at me, much less…you know. It was the last thing I wanted too, but I felt so monumentally guilty. I’d taken away from her the one thing that she wanted. If I could turn back time and change one thing only in my life – then that would be it. As it was, I tried to do the next best thing. But even that failed.

  “We started to make wedding plans, and a couple of months later, she found she was pregnant again. She had her heart set on a Christmas wedding – the baby was due in February. But after a few weeks she miscarried. The doctors told her it was some complication of the first miscarriage – some tissue left behind in the uterus or something that became infected - I think was how they explained it. Again, I wasn’t there at the time. But I did find out afterwards that further pregnancies would most likely end the same way.”

  Jess rose and pulled her robe around her before going to sit in one of the small armchairs. She was shivering, though the room was not cold. Christian continued to sit on the bed, his hands clasped together around his knees. He rested his chin on them and continued speaking – his eyes by now very far away.

  “Seeing what she went through was too much for me. I knew I couldn’t ever give her what she wanted and I knew I couldn’t go through it again. She was right to say I’d destroyed her life. Two dead babies and they were both my fault. I was a murderer.”

  Jess wanted to go and comfort him, but felt too numb to move. A part of her was also too appalled to do so. “So how did you separate and still manage to remain friends?” she asked instead.

  “It took me a good deal of counselling to actually find the courage to leave her. It seemed to compound the crime to me. But she’d always turned to Adam for support and I noticed they seemed to be getting closer. I just had to stand by and watch it happen. Adam had always been in love with her, but when she first joined us, he was involved with someone else. When that ended, he was a free agent. So I drifted away and Adam drifted closer.”

  “But she went on to lose more babies?”

  Christian nodded sadly. “Two more miscarriages. The doctors told her not to try for any more – wanted to sterilize her for her own safety and sanity, but she refused – though evidently she told Adam otherwise. She thinks that if she wants it badly enough, it will come to her eventually.”

  “So what happened between them?” Jess stood up and returned to the bed but only to perch on the end of it. She didn’t feel she could handle being too close to Christian at the moment as her pity for Amber and her lost babies was still too raw.

  He shrugged, looking very despondent. “Adam told me he begged her to terminate it the moment he heard the news this time. He said he couldn’t go through it all again – and who can blame him? He also believed it couldn’t be his because he’d had a vasectomy to try to prevent exactly that from happening again. When he told her, she came up with this crazy idea of saying it wasn’t his.

  “The thing is, Amber is also trying to turn back time. She looks for signs in everything and when Adam told her about the vasectomy, she suddenly had this idea that if we could go back to where we were before the first miscarriage, then somehow the outcome could be made different. She thinks I owe her that – and a part of me knows she’s right – which is why I’ve always found it so difficult to deny her anything. She even told Adam the baby is mine, but that’s a blatant lie. It’s definitely Adam’s - she told me that in L.A.”

  “What a mess,” Jess said. �
��Poor Amber.”

  Christian looked at her in surprise. “What about poor Adam? He’s the one I feel sorry for in this.”

  “Of course you would, having been through that yourself. But Amber must be so desperate. She’s just clutching at straws like a drowning person. If she doesn’t cling on to the belief that one of those straws can help her, what else does she have? The craving for a child can drive women to do incredible things.”

  He gazed at her in a kind of dazed wonder. “You know, Jess, your compassion amazes me. But then you are amazing – which is why I love you. But…”

  Jess gave an exaggerated sigh. “There you go again with those buts. The moment you say something nice, you have to go and spoil it with that wretched little word!”

  “I was only going to ask you if you hated me,” he told her with a sad small smile on his face.

  “No, Christian. I don’t hate you – that would be impossible. I don’t think you’re a monster, though I don’t think you’ve behaved well either. You’ve been cowardly and selfish and that’s not good for anyone.” She pursed her lips together and looked at him unhappily, tapping her foot on the side of the bed in nervous contemplation of her next words. “I thought better of you, but I can perfectly understand why you did what you did. You need to go now, though. I can hear people stirring. We’ll talk again when we get back to London.”