Abby Road

by Ophelia London

  “Rapturous,” I said.

  Hal laughed.

  “Out of everything I’ve ever done since I started this whole thing,” I further explained, steadying my breaths, “I’ve never been more proud of any piece of work. This was worth it.”

  Hal cracked open a can of Red Bull and took a long drink.

  I pressed the CD to my chest, feeling my heart beating against it. “‘Indian Summer’ truly is a labor of love.”

  Hal took another swill. “Love is right,” he agreed, tossing the empty can into the trash. After a belch, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “It’s a love song, duchess, and it’s about you.” He propped one hand leisurely on the counter and grinned at me, a strange grin, a polarizing grin. “I wrote it for you.”

  “You . . . did?” I squeaked, trying to smile. My stomach made a weird little flutter—could have been love, could have been nerves, could have been dread. I honestly didn’t know. I did know that I wasn’t ready for things to change. I “loved” Hal, but . . .

  He was looking hard at me . . . gazing, kind of.

  “I’m sure you figured it out from the lyrics,” he said, grinning modestly. “I’m not very good at hiding feelings in songs.” He straightened up and took a few slow steps toward me.

  I stood with my back pressed against a kitchen chair.

  “The other guys know and, well, I thought it was pretty obvious by the way you sang it tonight.” His eyes locked on mine, zeroing in, causing my fingers and toes to turn cold. “You know, you’re flawless when it comes to interpreting lyrics. I’m constantly amazed by the directions you go in and the lyrics you changed.” He chuckled softly. “It’s like we’re totally riding the same wave.” He was standing right in front of me now. The top center of his orange hair was gelled into a tall faux hawk. I wished I could’ve laughed at how funny he looked, but I was afraid to move.

  “You’re always dead-on,” he added, “and you killed this one tonight. I know you were feeling it; I know you’re feeling it now.” His finger flicked at the CD case I was holding. “How could you not know? So obvious. The song’s about you, duchess.” He took a beat. “And Todd.”

  “Oh.” I blinked, staring at him in confusion. “But I . . . thought—”

  Hal’s soft chuckle cut me off. “What? That I was into you?” he finished.

  I nodded once as my lower lip jutted out. Hot tears of embarrassment burned behind my eyes. I felt ashamed all over again.

  “That’s ancient history, duchess.” Hal reached out, laying a hand on my shoulder. “It was over a long time ago.”

  “I’m sorry,” I whimpered, my voice choking with a sob. “I didn’t mean to hurt . . .”

  “I know.” Hal chuckled again. “After a while, I knew the best thing I could do for you was to play the hell out of my guitar.”

  “You’re my best friend, Hal.” I sobbed in joy, throwing myself into his arms.

  “Hey, now.” He pulled back and tapped my chin with his fist. “Get a grip, duchess; I said the song’s about Todd, not me.” He leaned against the table at my side. “Now, tell me how much you love it.”

  “Hal.” I sniffled, staring down at the CD in my hands. “It’s so amazing.” I pressed the disc to my heart, wishing it could’ve inserted into a slit in my chest like a jukebox, so it would always be with me. “I don’t know what to say.”

  “You don’t have to say anything.” He grinned. “I’m the official head writer around here, okay?”

  More tears spilled out of my eyes as I nodded over and over.

  “Now give us a hug,” he demanded, “and we’ll call it even.”

  Satellite radio was set on classical music while I drove northwest to Malibu that night. At the late hour it seemed only fitting that all the pieces were Baroque. Bach’s “Concerto for Two Violins” was playing—vibrant, cheerful, but also calming, almost spiritual. My Mercedes glided up the PCH, practically on autopilot, until I pulled through the wrought-iron gate.

  I was still humming Bach’s complicated melody when I unlocked my front door. I stepped inside, bolted the door behind me, and dropped my purse and keys on the floor in the empty entryway. The sound echoed.

  Still need to get an end table, I thought as I switched on the living room lights. I’d never really noticed before, but the room was very bright, very open, and very empty. The clean, white walls were bare. The solitary ivory sofa off to one side was the only stick of furniture.

  I stood in the middle of the room and slowly spun around, examining the sheer nakedness. I knew there wouldn’t be much more to see in any of the other rooms, either. I smiled, remembering Christian’s stupid exercise equipment, his massive kicked-up stereo system that had taken up one full wall of our family room, and his entertainment center that had taken up another wall. We were—well, he was going to build a new state-of-the-art media room upstairs. But he never got to.

  All that stuff is gone, I thought, chewing my lip. There’s nothing left of his, not a hint that he ever lived here. I leaned against the corner of the couch, wondering where it all went. I still couldn’t remember much about those first months after he died, and that realization hurt a little. Molly had probably given everything to Goodwill. or perhaps she auctioned it off on eBay and earned a little extra cash for herself.

  Tilting my chin up, I cupped my hands around my mouth. “Hellooo,” I called aloud and then stopped to snort a laugh. “Echo . . . echooo . . . echoooooo.”

  I dropped my hands, grinning for a new reason. Since Hal’s demo was now done, I suddenly had the perfect idea for what the next balancing-my-life step would be.

  {chapter 31}

  “GOLDEN SLUMBERS”

  Some kind of New Age music was piping through the PA system when I swung open the front door and stepped inside.

  Not wanting to make a federal case about it, I had told only Molly, mainly because I needed her to look up an address for me of one that would still be open this late, which was what brought me there, all the way to Venice Beach at eleven o’clock at night.

  Few other customers were there as I strolled up and down the aisles, fingering the paintbrushes, canvases, charcoals, and other curious art materials. The store was a little daunting, honestly; a lot of time had passed since I’d employed this part of my brain.

  A twenty-something guy with an unkempt blond ponytail sat behind the front counter. I approached him, finally admitting to myself—despite my fervent desire for ambiguity—that I required assistance.

  After clearing my throat a few times to no avail, I asked him, “What do you suggest for beginners?”

  He was wearing a navy blue painter’s smock, smeared and speckled with a rainbow of colors. If he’d had a crazier ponytail or an ounce of facial hair, he might have looked more like the mad-genius artist he was trying so hard to portray. “Depends,” he replied without looking up.

  “On what?”

  He casually flipped a page of the art magazine he was reading. “On what you gonna do.”

  I didn’t reply, wondering if there was some secret password I needed to utter before I’d be graced with coherent information.

  “So, what is it?” the guy asked, evidently irritated at the interruption so near to closing time. He flipped another page. “Drawing?” he prompted after an aggravated sigh. “Painting? Pottery?” Finally he looked up at me in annoyance. “Decou . . . page . . .”

  His voice faded out as his jaw went slack, while his brown eyes grew wide like the centers of Van Gogh’s sunflowers.

  I coughed awkwardly. “Umm, painting, I guess,” I offered, chewing on the inside of my cheek. “I took some art seminars in college. I liked painting the most.”

  The guy just stared at me from across the counter.

  It wasn’t his fault, per se, but I so detested being gawked at like some indentured two-headed pygmy at a sideshow. It made that scared and submissive part of me long to run for the tall grass, to hide from the world behind another mask. But I wouldn’t do tha
t anymore.

  “Is there a book that will teach me?” I offered again.

  The clerk blinked once.

  I exhaled through puckered lips, a little frustrated. Then an idea came to me. It was a dirty trick, of course, but I had a feeling it would work. I leaned toward the counter, slowly. Another trick I learned from Molly. One spaghetti strap of my tank top slid down my shoulder, just so.

  “Oh,” I said, hopefully kind of sulkily. “Well, maybe . . .” I hesitated, allowing a strand of my hair to tumble over my shoulder and then across one side of my face. I slowly brushed it aside with a finger. “Do you happen to offer classes here?” I displayed the most enticing, sparkly, superstar smile I could muster.

  This finally woke him.

  “Uhh, yes, yes. We do offer classes.” He nodded and panted as he spoke. “But, oh,” his smile dropped, “not for beginning painting. Right now we have advanced ceramics on Mondays.” His backbone seemed to grow straighter. “I teach it.”

  I laughed, leaning away from him, fixing my shirt, crossing my arms in front of me. “I think I’d better stick to painting. How about a book?”

  “Oh yeah, we have books. Lots of book. Loads of books!” The guy actually leaped over the counter, ushering me to the aisle devoted to painting. “Here’s an amazing one.” He handed me a copy of Painting with Your Inner Id.

  “Something more basic, maybe,” I suggested as I scanned the shelves. “Looks like I’ll be teaching myself.”

  “Okay, okay” he said, nodding over and over. “Try this— it’s the best.” He handed me a tall, thin softback. “It’s a tutorial manual, step by step. You’ll be a Picasso in no time.”

  An hour later, I left the store with three bags full of art and painting supplies, after signing only four autographs. Not too shabby for midnight on a Thursday. I also had my helpful cashier’s phone number in the back pocket of my jeans.

  Maybe because I’d spent the previous two nights wide awake at Hal’s place, or maybe because of the adrenaline racing through my veins, I ended up spending the entire night filling up Christian’s once-empty and forsaken bedroom with brightly colored paint jars, easels, paper, canvases, and an array of brushes and art books. I covered its bare and lonely walls with inspirational prints from the Masters: The Starry Night by Van Gogh, Renoir’s La Grenouillère, Water Lilies by Monet, and my favorite: Degas’s Dancers at the Bar, all while blasting a mixed CD of golden crooners I’d locked in a bottom drawer months before.

  I am Abigail Kelly, Renaissance woman.

  A few hours later, I was sitting on the floor of my new home art studio, smoothing out that homemade bookmark with my long list, now wrinkled and with permanent fold marks. For weeks I’d carried it with me everywhere I went. Grinning, I made a check mark beside one more item. My home—along with my soul—was crawling back to life.

  Next, I painted. I painted every night for a week. I was not very good. I stank, perhaps. But at the beginning, it wasn’t about being good, it was about doing something, finding something, and unlocking something.

  Those late nights, after the duties of my day job were complete, I rushed home, eager to work my new craft, losing myself in the shapes of a bowl of fruit, with horribly disproportional apples. With only the sound of the ocean seeping through the open windows, those stolen moments were cathartic for me, and peaceful, allowing my heart to expand and my understanding to increase.

  There was something quite magical and wonderful that happened in a room when it was just you and a blank piece of painter’s canvas. You were forced to dig deep. You learned to find yourself and what you were really made of—warts and all.

  Things were becoming clearer. I knew what I wanted, but you can’t always get what you want, or so another classic British rock band once said.

  I stopped in the middle of a brush stroke and stared out the open windows into the dark night. I wondered, So then, what is to be Abigail Kelly’s next move? Celebrity conventional wisdom told me to hit the party circuit, get a tattoo, shave my head, fire my staff, develop a dysfunctional eating disorder and/or a trendy little addiction to painkillers, visit the Dalai Lama—or in my case, jet to India to sit with the maharishi—all while dating a string of high-profile celebs like Chris Hemsworth and Rob Pattinson.

  To be perfectly honest, at different hours of different days, one or more of those suggestions sounded pretty darned great.

  On night number six, after a few hours of painting, I fell asleep on the small sofa in the corner of my art studio. And I dreamed.

  It was different from my dreams in the past when he’d come to visit me. His hair had never been the correct shade in any of my dreams; that night it was even lighter. His face was aglow, his body also—which was new, too—like he was being lit on all sides by a heavenly crew of lighting techs.

  Floating before me, he extended one iridescent hand. I watched myself reach out and take it. I felt nothing between my fingers, like he really was a ghost.

  He grinned—the same grin from when we were kids and he teased me incessantly, or when we were in high school and he leaned on the horn until I made it to the parking lot, or when he stood in the wings, watching me onstage, beaming like the proudest brother on earth.

  “Go forward, Abby,” Christian said to me.

  I thought I felt him touch me that time. Maybe he squeezed my arm. Actually . . . it felt more like he knuckle-punched me on the bicep—his trademark big-brother punishment.

  “Or I’ll tell Dad.” He smirked, jokingly, radiantly. “Ya little brat.”

  I woke up bathed in refreshing tears, happier than I’d ever been.

  The last weekend in November, Lindsey came into town again. At my request.

  When she’d visited me a few weeks before, while Steve and the boys were at Disney World, there wasn’t much for her to do; we still weren’t really speaking.

  This visit was different. We talked about everything. Her secondary undertaking was to help me pick out a new couch. It wasn’t the most popular color of the season, but I insisted on brown. “I want to feel like I’m in Dad’s cave,” I described. “You know, comforting, with big fluffy pillows.” I turned the page of the Pottery Barn catalog we were flipping through as the two of us laid belly down in the middle of my naked living room. Other decorating magazines and catalogs were strewn around us.

  “I want some cool chairs, too. One has to be red. And a coffee table.” I rolled onto my knees, animated, using my hands to explain. “And one of those groovy leather cocktail ottomans.”

  Lindsey lifted her chin and looked up at me. She had tears in her eyes.

  Max was in meetings the next afternoon, so the band had time off. Hal volunteered to tag along with my sister and me on our shopping spree. He was absolutely adamant about handpicking my new TV, which was fine by me. I couldn’t tell a back-projection thingamabob from a digital-resolution-whatever.

  “Now’s not the time to be frugal, duchess,” Hal said after he playfully jabbed an elbow into my ribs. We were standing before a never-ending wall of screens. “If you’re gonna do it, do it right.” He pointed at one screen. It was enormous. I was overwhelmed. “Seventy-inch plasma, ten-eighty-P, anti-glare, surround-sound compatible.”

  “I have no idea what language you just spoke, Hal.”

  “It’s a totally sweet system.” His eyes lowered as he pushed buttons on the long, black remote.

  I snatched it from him. “Which channel is Lifetime?”

  “You’re such a chick.” He gagged, grabbing the remote back from me and flipping through channels. “This is full HD.” He stopped on a channel showing a football game. “It’s like actually being there.” He sighed, eyes glazing over.

  “If I buy this thing, will you promise to come over and have a movie slumber party with me?” I asked, taking my own jab at his ribs. “We can watch Star Wars.”

  He turned to me. “Which one?”

  I thought for a moment. “The first one?”

  “The first one ma
de or Episode One?”

  “Hal.” I patted his shoulder. “We really need to get you a girl.”

  His eyes narrowed to slits. He was probably about to unleash a very fitting comeback, when his cell rang. He pulled it out, examining the Caller ID.

  “Yeah,” he said to me, holding out one finger. “Gotta take this, dear.” He backed up and took a few steps away. “Talk to me,” I heard him say as he rounded a corner.

  I turned back to the wall of screens, staring up, still quite overwhelmed.

  Hal returned only moments later. He was grinning.

  “What?”

  “Ohhh . . .” He was trying hard not to smile now. “Nothing.” He lifted his hand, waving two fingers to the sales clerk who stood off to the side. The startled young man approached. “The lady has made her decision,” Hal said and nodded at me.

  I rolled my eyes at the ceremony.

  “Uhh, Abby?” Lindsey came up behind us. “I think maybe we need to call security.”

  I followed her pointed finger to see out the front windows of the electronics store. My stomach dropped, as did my smile. I felt Hal step right behind me.

  A huge crowd of people gathered outside to watch me picking out a freaking TV.

  “Ridiculous,” I muttered. My gaze moved to my sister. “I’m so sorry.” I turned to Hal. “Should we call Shugger?”

  “Hell, no,” he answered, attempting to draw himself up to his full five feet nine inches of height. He puffed out his chest. “It’s high time us little people learn how to take care of ourselves, right?”

  I nodded uncertainly.

  He took ahold of my hand and reached forward and took Lindsey’s. “Allow me to show you ladies a little trick I learned from the drummer of Hybrid Theory.” The three of us were walking now. “We slip out the back.”

  Lindsey returned to Florida the next day. With her help, we’d bought enough furniture and things to fill the living room. But she left it up to me to do the actual arranging and decorating. A few weeks later, I found myself gazing around at the finished product.