Unattainable

by Victoria Ashe

  “I played in Boise seven years ago.”

  “Yeah, that’s exactly where I’m heading with this. You smiled at me when we walked by. You wanted to talk. I looked in your eyes and I saw drugs. I saw the alcohol. The women. The lack of sleep. And I kept walking while people started lining up in front of that ridiculous card table. But you? You kept looking at me.”

  “I’m sorry, Anna. I’m not sure what for, but I am.”

  “You were on one of the side stages. I don’t remember the band.”

  “We changed a couple bandmates out over the years,” he whispered.

  She physically shook ever so slightly, but the tremble was there. “I didn’t like the man who smiled at me back then, John.”

  “But you remembered me. Poignantly, it seems. I affected you.”

  “I didn’t seem to make an impact on you at all.”

  “I wouldn’t say that, Anna. And you like me now, I think.”

  “It was better when I didn’t,” she said.

  “No,” he said, stern for the first time. “It was safer. Not better. Don’t confuse the two.”

  She laughed, and her eyes misted gently. “I’m an idiot. I don’t even know why I’m so upset right now.”

  “Maybe it’s because you’re suffering now, and you’re looking back at an opportunity we lost before you were … encumbered.”

  “Encumbered? Maybe. I wouldn’t change anything, though. I don’t even know if that makes sense. I’d walk through fire a thousand times to come back to a life with Regan in it. You have no idea how precious that little girl is.”

  “And I would do the same to come back to this point and my tenuous grip on sobriety. I wouldn’t be who I am now if I hadn’t gone through the hell I experienced.”

  “I think—”

  “Yes?”

  “I think there are people who exist on the periphery of each person’s life, you know? People who aren’t meant to ever be in the inner sanctum—at least not for very long. They come in and out, they touch us, they show us something—and then fate takes them away again.”

  “I don’t have to be on the periphery.”

  “Yes, yes you do.”

  “Tell me what the hell is going on, Anna.”

  “If I knew, I might. There’s something going on right now that I don’t have the answers to with Michael. And I’m tired. Regan wakes up off and on all night long. She talks in her sleep. She has night terrors. I’m pretty sure the veil is thin with her, and she’s seeing things—or maybe just that she knows things … I don’t know. I’m exhausted.”

  “Well, her mother is sensitive. So is she. I’ve run into some things in my life that I couldn’t explain, but it’s nothing to be scared of.”

  “I’m not scared. It’s a gift. If I didn’t have it, I would have never connected with—”

  Her hand flew up and covered her mouth.

  “Me?” His voice grew soft on the other end of the phone.

  She nodded silently.

  “What did you walk away thinking when you left that tent, Anna?”

  “About a million things at once,” she whispered. “There are over three hundred million people in this country alone. And about one in every million people you pass on the street, there’s someone. There’s a person you simply know the minute you meet them. Weaknesses, strengths. The whole enchilada. It just comes at you all at once, and then nothing surprises you about that person. You accept them because you recognize them.”

  Emotion coated his voice. “In about two weeks I’m coming back to your area. Just down the freeway from you. I want to meet with you in person.”

  “I don’t see how—”

  “I don’t see how we can’t.”

  SIX.

  October

  Mist hung in the air around the park. The reds and oranges of newly fallen maple leaves fluttered along the sidewalks out across the faded grass.

  At a distance, somewhere in that mist, children’s laughter echoed from a swing set on the opposite end of the park.

  The sun hadn’t yet set, but the street lamps that lined each walkway glowed already, and under one of those was a solitary metal bench with a fleur de lis worked on the back. On that bench sat John Leaven.

  His former logger’s beard was shaven down close, respectable. His lush chocolate-brown hair was cropped short at the back of his neck, left longer on top to wave down slightly across his forehead. The unnatural red in it was gone.

  He looked like an Oxford literary professor from another time, so serious, so still—seated there in his long wool coat with a matching scarf just a shade of gray darker.

  When he turned to see her standing there watching him, she saw the pupils darken his already dark eyes as they widened in interest. In desire, if she was honest with herself.

  In a few casual steps, she moved toward the bench and sat quietly beside him.

  “You made it,” he said. And that voice, that golden, accented voice crept into her heart. “I doubted you would.”

  “I thought twice about it,” she said at length.

  They were quiet—afraid their voices would carry into the mist, afraid in general. A tiny, thin gold loop pierced the corner of his lower lip. Normally she would have been repulsed. But she wasn’t.

  He tucked his hands into the pockets of his coat.

  “Why are you here, John?”

  He sat up a little straighter and turned to her. “You know we have a concert tonight in Nampa.”

  She nodded. “You know what I meant.”

  “You’re different,” he said.

  “I’m married. I have a child.”

  He ran a hand across his beard. “I know it. But I wanted to see you. Are you happy—happily married in the slightest, I mean? If you are, set me straight.”

  She laughed slightly. She could smell the scent of his shampoo, his laundry soap, his skin …

  “You can’t ask me that,” she said flatly.

  “That means that no, no you’re not.”

  “It means that’s private. Too private to talk about.”

  He smiled and shook his head. His teeth were beautiful and perfect. “I’ve spoken with you on the phone how many times now, Anna? Regan is there. He never is.”

  “You’re on the road most of the year,” she whispered. “You know how it goes. It’s hard.”

  Oh, her head spun. Surreal. The situation was so very surreal.

  “I’m not a very good person, Anna. But I’m trying to be better. I get that talking with a married woman probably isn’t the best way to go about redemption, but I know you’ll understand me. There’s something here.”

  “Redemption? I can’t fix you, if that’s what you’re hoping,” she said. “I don’t even want to try, if that makes any sense. I can’t help you become this better person. You have to work all that out for yourself because it’s not my place to do it at all. It scares the hell out of me just sitting here with you. This is just—terrifying. And insane.”

  He took his hands back out of his pockets, and she saw a small tattoo across the top of his wrist when his sleeve moved. He’d noted her gaze.

  “I had a twin sister. Once. She was killed in a skiing accident about three years ago. She loved dragonflies, so, there’s my tribute to her. She was the last and only truly good thing about my childhood. And she’s gone.”

  “It’s actually pretty. The dragonfly.”

  She could tell from his expression he’d expected her to give him condolences, but she didn’t. Most likely everyone he met immediately gave their condolences, asked questions, pried. About his sister. About Alex. He was visibly relieved.

  “I care very much that you’re hurting, John,” she whispered. “And if you want to talk, I will. I just had the feeling now wasn’t the right time.”

  His nod told her it wasn’t.

  “If I call you more from the tour, will you call me back, Anna? Will you start calling me back?” His brown eyes pled with her, melted her down to the soul.
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  “No. I can’t. Oh God, what am I even doing here?”

  Lead me not unto temptation …

  She started to rise, and he caught her hand, pulled her gently back down to the bench. His warm fingers wrapped around hers briefly, then he let her go. A burst of wind pushed a new flurry of leaves around them, swirling color at their boots. Almost delicately, he lifted a yellow leaf from her hair and sent it off into the breeze.

  For moments and more moments they simply sat looking at one another, seeing straight into places never seen in either them before by another living soul. Of that, they were each silently certain.

  “I need to tell you something,” he said low, matter-of-factly, “so you’ll know why I came. When I called that first time, it wasn’t because you’d sent that snarky email to PR. It was because I remembered you from the meet and greet and had no way on Earth to track you down. I remembered you, Anna, and not just vaguely. The moment you walked into that tent, I was shaken. If you want to know that you impacted my life, oh God, you did with a vengeance. Then you walked out and the opportunity was gone. I stood there on that stage looking out into the bleachers for you, and I spotted you there a couple times. It was hard to keep a bead on you because the crowds look like this mess of faces when you’re on stage, but I did. You had all that long hair up in that ponytail, and I focused on that. I thought about having security find you, but you’d have taken that the wrong way. And so I played my heart out for you, then I let you go.”

  He’d remembered her? Played to her? She felt the breath rush out of her lungs.

  He looked at the ground. “I had also told the PR staff to send me any comments from the Boise show. All of them. Normally I don’t have a clue what they do. I don’t know what they’re going to book for interviews. I don’t know about the complaints or compliments. I had to put my foot down.”

  “I didn’t know.” She paused while her pulse raced. “And you’re right. I’d have taken it wrong. I’m not the groupie type. You wouldn’t have been able to convince me that wasn’t what you were all about.”

  “It’s what I used to be about when I was much younger. There were times—”

  She put up her hands. “Yuck. Yuck. Don’t need to hear it.”

  “I drank. A lot. I lied. I didn’t cheat, but I thought about it almost every single time. I dated lousy, trashy women. I dated them too young for me. I misjudged the ones I thought saw me for me. I left them all when I was through or when I was starting a new tour. I have a son a lot older than your daughter—who I see once a year at best because his mother hates me. And for good reason. I left them when I couldn’t manage to stay conscious two days in a row. They let me leave because they didn’t believe I was faithful when I was on the road.”

  “You don’t need to tell me this.”

  “Yes, yes I do. I’m profoundly screwed up. Profoundly. You’re going to hear it everywhere if you start looking into my life, and you need to know the parts that are true. I’m fairly certain you’re just going to be able to sense in me the things you hear that aren’t. You do that somehow, don’t you?”

  “John, you have flocks of adoring, available women—I stress the word available— who would give their eyeteeth to be with you. You’re gorgeous. You’re wealthy, I’m guessing. How hard can it be?”

  “I’m a rich former junkie slash alcoholic. I’m not the greatest guy to be around a lot of the time. See this? Slight nose job when I was twenty-four to correct the results of a fist to the face. I haven’t spoken to my mother in ten years. Mostly because she’s an abusive, self-serving wretch. My alcoholic and equally abusive stepdad died eighteen years ago. I never met most of the stepdads after him. And somewhere out there is a video of me from a couple years back too wasted to even stand upright on the stage. That’s when I wound up in the E.R. with a tube down my throat and an I.V. needle stuck in my wrist. It’s going to take a rabid sinner or someone ridiculously brilliant and forgiving to take me on. A veritable saint.”

  “Which of those do you see me as?” she asked. “Because I’m really neither.”

  “Brilliant and forgiving. Some sort of combination. And absolutely beautiful. You’re like some part of me I lost so long ago that I’d forgotten I needed to find it. Until I did.”

  “No wonder you write the lyrics,” she breathed.

  He shrugged his broad shoulders.

  “Wait. You think I’m gorgeous?” he asked. “Not too chubby?”

  It was her turn to laugh. “No. You’re not chubby. At least I don’t think so.” In fact, she was attracted in the kind of powerful, consuming way that instantly filled her with guilt.

  “After the concert, which you should come to by the way, I’m going back to the hotel—alone. The Hampton Inn closest to the venue. Just come and talk before I have to go. I won’t pull anything untoward, I promise. We can have tea down in the restaurant. The band leaves in the morning through Oregon and up into Washington, then it’s back out international for a couple months.”

  “I can’t, John.” This time she did manage to stand up and stay firmly on her feet. Her eyes locked with his and she felt his energy soar through her. They connected. Miserably. Undeniably. Fatefully. “I have to go home now.”

  He rose, towering over her, so male the very presence of him made her ache. “I wish you wouldn’t. At least not for a while.”

  And she wished she wasn’t. But there was a threshold of goodness in her that she couldn’t cross, though the temptation wore heavily.

  “Here’s what I’m thinking, John. I wonder if you’ve deliberately chosen worthless women because they come with a built-in excuse for ending the relationship. You ride the high when it’s new, then use the pain when it’s over. You’re free to tour that way. And it’s great fodder for the music. Am I right? But maybe you know life’s worth more now that you’re older, so you’ve taken a step up. Now you’re looking for a decent woman—but the idea is still a little scary, so you hunted one down who’s … who’s unattainable.”

  He laughed, then stood there smiling at her. “Usually I’m the one up on the pedestal—unattainable.”

  “I wasn’t meaning to sound conceited.”

  “Neither was I,” he said. His laugh was open, genuine, reaching all the way into his eyes where it set them to light.

  “Or maybe,” she whispered, “you think I’m just another in a long line of those lousy, trashy women. What else would I be if I walked out on a husband and child without so much as a thought?”

  “I think you think too much.”

  “John. Someday you’re going to meet a woman who gets so deep into your system that you won’t be able to find an excuse to leave her. You’ll know her when you see her.”

  “Yes, I’m painfully aware of that.”

  She smiled softly at him. He really was something the likes of which she’d never see again, even if she lived to be an old, old woman. If she could bring herself to arbitrarily throw away her family to have him, would she ever have him? Really? She took a step away from him, farewell in her eyes, and began to turn away.

  “You’re only thirty-six years-old, John. You have most of your life ahead of you.”

  He looked into her soul again, ignoring every single word she said.

  “How long has it been since he touched you, Anna?”

  She closed her eyes, paused, then opened them again.

  “Twenty-nine months,” she whispered.

  Then she did turn, and walked away through the leaves, refusing to look back even once out of fear that if she did look at him again, she might not have the courage to go.

  •

  As she drove away, John sat back down in the mist and hung his head. He wiped unexpected emotion away from his eyes with the back of his hand. If he could have started back at the beginning of his life with a clean soul and a new body, giving up all the money and fame—would he? Would he give it up?

  He closed his eyes and soldered the image of her hotly, indelibly onto his brain. Thi
ck honey-colored hair falling in waves around her shoulders, and the greenest of emerald eyes that could put the sparkle of stained glass to shame. He’d memorized the sensual curl of black lashes and dark brown brows, the tiny dimples that appeared with each smile. She’d still be stunning at forty, beautiful at fifty. When her hair turned to white, he was sure he’d be able to look at her and see her in her prime, just as if the years had never faded her. She was timeless.

  Words like “obsession” and “temptation” swirled through his brain. There was a chance everything he’d always wanted was in front of him, found too late.

  He didn’t know why, he didn’t have a clue really, but in the deepest recesses of his once-black heart a calling for this woman had begun the moment he looked at her face.

  He simply knew. All the way in his soul. All the way through his blood and across every inch of skin. He was supposed to be with her.

  Or maybe he should stay away. Run far. Tour wide. Avoid her like he’d never avoided anything in his life.

  The answer didn’t come.

  He swore under his breath.

  The only knowledge that came was that love at first sight was real. He knew it now. There were at least two souls in the world so finely attuned to one another that they each recognized the presence of the other before a word had been spoken. That one of the two was his left him elated. And in complete despair.

  •

  When Anna got home, she found the text: I’ll be back here in this park at the stone bridge on Halloween at dusk. I will wait for you.

  SEVEN.

  Halloween

  He hadn’t called her and she hadn’t called him in the many days that followed. He’d ridden quietly, stop to stop, in the tour bus. Deep inside himself, he noticed the countryside as it rolled by in more detail than he ever had before in his life. Contemplation brought clarity some days, fear on others.