Bittersweet Passion

by Peggy Webb

  There. That’s the answer. That’s what I should have told all those people through the years who wondered how Michael and I kept our love so fresh, that it appeared we’d just that moment fallen for each other.

  Magic. That’s the key.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  You couldn’t miss the Saturn 5 rocket. It rose up out of the skyline, majestic and phallic, dwarfing everything around it. The minute she saw it Skylar had to take the next exit and pull her car into the first parking lot she came to in order to lean her head against the steering wheel and compose herself. That was the effect Huntsville always had on her. So many memories. And every one of them visceral.

  Pussy Willow leaped onto her shoulder and peered into her face. When Skylar ignored her, the cat slunk to the back seat of the car and sat there in high dudgeon, a queen without an audience.

  A tapping on her window startled Skylar, and she looked up to see a gray-haired man wearing a blue shirt with Carl embroidered on the pocket in red.

  “Is anything wrong, ma’am?”

  Even though she felt rotten, the courteous form of address made Skylar smile. That was one of the things she loved about the South. Men Carl’s age and older had had mommas who made sure their children learned manners, whether they wanted to or not.

  “I’m fine.” She was lying, of course. The man she loved was in another city, another state. As long as they were apart she would never be fine. “Thanks for asking.”

  “Need any gas?”

  “No, I was just resting a minute. I’ve come a long way.”

  Carl gave her fender a little pat and said, “Take care of yourself now, you hear?”

  She was trying. Oh, she was trying.

  As she drove out of the parking lot and back onto 565 memories swamped Skylar once more, threatening to drown her. She anchored herself to the steering wheel, tilted her chin high and kept on driving. She had places to go, things to do. Until she came face-to-face with her history and said, “You don’t scare me anymore, you don’t control me,” she would never be free. She would always have to keep on running.

  She left 565 and headed north toward the Tennessee line, north toward a little community in the foothills where country folk could walk to church every Sunday and listen to a man they called Preacher Tate exhort them to go home and sin no more.

  Skylar didn’t stop until she’d come to a white frame church tucked into what had once been a cow pasture. The door was open.

  She walked in and sat down on the back pew and waited. Instead of hearing her father’s voice as she’d expected, she heard music. The old hymns. “Bringing in the Sheaves.” “Shall We Gather at the River.” “Love Lifted Me.”

  At first Skylar hummed softly to the melody, and then she opened her mouth and began to sing.

  His first night without his wife was agony. The second, hell. Daniel thought he would probably have gone crazy if Hannah hadn’t called the next day with news of Skylar.

  “Pete knows where she is, Daniel.”

  “Where?”

  “He wouldn’t say. He wants to talk to you first.”

  Driving was too slow, so Daniel flew. Hannah met him at the airport.

  “You look like hell, Daniel. Have you slept?”

  “Not much.”

  “Pete’s waiting for us.” They hurried to the car she’d rented while she was home. “When was the last time you shaved?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “Everything’s going to be all right, Daniel.”

  “You haven’t said anything to Mom?”

  “No. There’s no need. Skylar will be back before Em’s wedding, and Mom will never know.”

  They were silent the rest of the way to Pete’s house. He met them at the door then ushered them into a den filled with framed photographs, most of them featuring Skylar.

  “From the early days of the band,” Pete said as Daniel walked from photograph to photograph looking. And aching.

  There was Skylar in jeans and a T-shirt, her hair pulled back in a ponytail, standing in front of the microphone with the band behind her. She looked about eighteen. There she was in front of the Tower of London, Pete on the left and the other members of the band on the right. And there… Skylar alone, a faraway look in her eyes, gazing into the distance.

  When Daniel sat down he was so full he couldn’t speak. Hannah knew, and saved him.

  “Pete said there were a few things he had to find out from you before he’s willing to reveal her whereabouts.”

  Daniel nodded, and Pete began to talk. “I know the two of you had a whirlwind courtship. How much do you know about Skylar?”

  Daniel not only told him what he knew of her background, but also told him the gist of her note, which gave her motive for leaving.

  “That’s Skylar. She’s been running all her life. What do you plan to say to her when you see her?”

  “I don’t know. I probably should be thinking up arguments strong enough to compel her to come back to me, but I won’t do that to her. I won’t make her feel guilty or use words such as commitment. Marriage is not an institution, as some believe. It’s an affair of the heart.”

  “Damn right,” Pete said. Hannah didn’t venture an opinion, which meant she thought she was out of her depth on this particular subject.

  “I guess I’ll tell her I love her and want her, no matter what, then leave the rest up to her. Make no mistake about it. I want Skylar. But I want her to come to me of her own free will.”

  “Good.” Pete smiled.

  “Does that mean I’ve passed the test?”

  “Yes. You passed,” Pete said, and then he told Daniel where to find Skylar.

  “I have one more question. Did Skylar tell you herself or did someone else?”

  “Skylar.” Daniel didn’t know how he felt about that, about the fact that his wife would call Pete instead of him. His conflict must have shown on his face, because Pete added, “I think she knew I’d tell you. I think she wanted me to.”

  “Why?”

  “Because she loves you and she’s miserable without you.”

  For the first time since Skylar’d left, Daniel felt hopeful.

  The drummer of New Blues was a thirty-year-old named Eric Cleveland, and he hadn’t blinked an eye when Skylar had showed up on his doorstep with her suitcase and her cat.

  “Come on in. The guest bedroom’s a mess, but you can tidy it up if it bothers you.”

  “It won’t bother me.”

  “Didn’t think so.” Eric didn’t mention Daniel, nor did he ask questions. He wasn’t one to meddle in other people’s business. He viewed life as a great big party and people as the partygoers, a diverse group he found endlessly fascinating. He wrote songs, he could harmonize any part and he played practically every instrument. He had talent coming out his ears and a generosity to match.

  That’s why Skylar had chosen him as her safe harbor instead of the lead guitarist Randy Tompkins, who lived in Huntsville with his wife and one child in a house that had two extra bedrooms and a guest bath.

  She stowed her bag, fed her cat, then curled up on one end of the sofa with a diet soda and talked to Eric until three o’clock in the morning.

  When she went to bed she was drained of everything except the need for sleep.

  Chapter Forty

  From the diary of Anne Beaufort Westmoreland:

  October l0, 2001

  Jake and Emily came in this morning to tell Michael about their wedding plans. Though none of us said anything, I believe we were all thinking the same thing: Michael’s going to hear this and get so excited he’ll wake up and say, “Why didn’t somebody tell me this sooner?”

  Well, anyhow…I thought Hannah was going to be here too, but she had something to do at the last minute. She didn’t say what. I suspect it had something to do with her next assignment, and naturally I didn’t ask questions. Not that it would have done any good. Hannah keeps things to herself. Always has. Even as a child.


  I remember that time she fell out of a tree and broke her arm. It was three days before she ever told us, and I guess she wouldn’t have then if the pain hadn’t gotten so bad it scared her.

  Back to this morning…I stood on one side of the bed holding Michael’s hand and Em on the other doing the same thing.

  “Dad, I have something important to tell you.” That’s the way she started, as if she were having an ordinary conversation with her father. Of all my children, Emily seems the most comfortable conversing with Michael. The most natural.

  “Jake and I are not getting married in a church,” she said. “We’ve decided to have the wedding at Base Camp Number Two in the Himalayas.”

  For a moment I thought Michael was going to come awake. I really did. His eyes sort of quivered, and I said, “That’s it, darling. Go ahead. Wake up.” But when I looked over at Emily and Jake I could see that they weren’t excited about Michael: they were worried about me.

  “Did you see that?” I said. “You saw how he tried to open his eyes, didn’t you?”

  Emily came around the bed and rested her cheek against mine. “Let’s go outside for a minute, Mom.”

  I felt like an old woman when she led me out. I really did. And that makes me so mad I don’t know what to do. Here’s the way it is: As long as I had Michael I felt young and vibrant. Truly alive. But since he’s been gone, since he’s been sleeping, I’ve shriveled. I feel as if all my life’s juices are being drained out of me. I feel as if I’m just a shell with skin stretched over it. Nothing underneath. Just half a heart that goes on beating.

  Anyhow…out in the hallway my daughter told me that yes, she’d hoped the excitement of returning to the Himalayas would cause Michael to come out of his coma. But all along she’d thought the chances were slim. “The real reason we’ve decided to be married there is that this whole family needs it. All of us need to go back and make peace with the mountain that took Dad away from us. But more than that I think we need to see what it was that kept drawing him back. You and I, most of all.”

  I was so proud of her I cried, and when she got anxious and said, “I’m going to call a nurse,” I said, “No, no. I’m not upset. I’m happy.”

  Em laughed. God bless her heart, sometimes I think Emily understands me better than any of my children. I think she’s more like me, too. Here we are, two women in love with men who will always be drawn to the high altitudes. Of course we need to stand face-to-face with the mountain. We need to hear the siren song that calls our men away.

  Well, I don’t know why she didn’t tell me all that in Atlanta when she and Jake first shared their startling news. I guess she thought I’d figure it out for myself. Sometimes I think my children give me credit for having more sense than I actually do.

  That’s what I told Clarice when she came by to pick me up for lunch. “Anne, don’t you know we’re heroes to our children?” she told me, and I said, “I’ve never really thought about it, Clarice, you’re the brain in this friendship,” and she just cracked up. Lord, you could hear her laughing all over the restaurant. For about two minutes it was just like old times. I completely forgot that Michael was gone.

  There now, I’ve said it. I’ve put it down in black and white and made it a fact. And it scares me to death.

  It’s getting harder and harder to look at this man sleeping in the bed and think of him as my husband. It’s getting harder and harder to see this comatose form and remember how it was with Michael and me. The giddy feeling I got every time he walked into a room. The way he could drive me wild with nothing more than a touch on my cheek. Or a look. Lord, that man could just look at me and I’d feel as if I were melting all the way down to my toes.

  That’s another thing. I haven’t bothered to paint my toenails since he’s been gone. It brings back too many memories. And anyhow, why bother? Who’s going to know? Who’s going to care?

  When I told Clarice, she didn’t say a word, just picked up her purse and grabbed me by the arm and hauled me down the mall to the nearest walk-in salon. “Give my friend a pedicure and paint her toenails purple,” she said.

  That’s why I’m sitting here now with my bare feet propped on Michael’s bed and his hand resting on my left foot. I put it there, of course. A little while ago. And for just a moment it felt like old times. Michael was going to wake up and give me that wonderful smile, then reach for me and haul me up beside him and suck my toes.

  Well, since I’m on such a soul-baring mission I’ll have to admit what happened next. I came alive. Totally.

  And now I know…I’m not wasting away inside. I’m merely dormant. Waiting for Michael to come back so I can come back to life.

  Chapter Forty-One

  I feel you, Anne. I always loved your feet—the shape of them, the astringent smell of fresh nail polish, the slenderness, the high arch.

  I’m willing my muscles to move, willing them to let me bring your foot to my mouth and suck one of your delicate toes, to run my tongue between them and hear you make those delicious sounds as if I’m the world’s sexiest man. That’s how you made me feel. Did I ever tell you that? I hope so. In exactly those words.

  Wait…I remember now. I always told you, you made me feel sixteen. That’s it. You made me feel like a teenager full of energy and hormones.

  I’m trying different ways to wake up. I can feel myself taking on energy. Almost as if I’m plugged in to some cosmic outlet. So far I haven’t been able to control that energy, to direct it.

  Right now I’m trying to direct all of it to my right hand. The one holding your left foot.

  See…see how my cognitive abilities are coming back? I can tell this is your left foot because when you put my hand there you hooked my thumb under your arch.

  Right now, lifting your foot is the most important thing in my life. The only thing. Not Em’s wedding, though I would never tell her that. Not the thought of flying to the other side of the world to face once more the mountain that took me from you.

  No, my world has become very small, my challenges reduced to the basics. Blink. Speak. Move.

  Wait. There’s something I’m missing. Something important….

  Telepathy. That’s it. My mind is the one thing I have left that’s fully functional. It’s my one connection to you now. If I transmit my thoughts to you, will you receive them? We did it once. Now I wish we’d practiced more.

  Here goes. I’m picturing myself out of this place and back home in Belle Rose. You’re lying on the bed. I’m standing there undressing, and suddenly I can’t wait that long. I bring your left foot to my mouth and suck your toes, one by one. Some I take deep, some shallow. An imitation of our lovemaking.

  I feel your foot tense, then jerk. I hear those small sounds you’re beginning to make. Soft. Urgent. Wait…don’t stifle them with your hand. I want to hear.

  Now I’m running my tongue into that sensitive space between your toes. Big toe first.

  Ahhh. That’s it. That’s the sound I want to hear. The aftermath of a small explosion.

  Go with it, Anne. Don’t hold back. That’s it. That’s it, my precious love. Feel my love pouring into you. Feel my desire, my need.

  I need you, Anne. Bear with me. Bear with me a while longer.

  I’m coming back to you. I’m coming home.

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Pete had driven all the way from Vicksburg, and was standing backstage with Skylar. Beyond the closed curtains she could hear the sounds of people coming into the auditorium.

  “It’s going to be a big crowd,” she said, “Especially for such short notice.”

  “Who would pass up a chance to hear Skylar Tate in concert?” He squeezed her cold hands. “Are you nervous?”

  “Yes.”

  She was thankful he didn’t ask why. He didn’t even act surprised. That was one reason she’d called to tell him about her plans. Pete was solid through and through. He hadn’t tried to talk her out of putting together a benefit concert in only two days. He hadn’t
asked why she’d chosen a little country church in north Alabama as the recipient of all the proceeds. He hadn’t questioned her wisdom in starting a foundation for wayward girls and naming it after her father.

  Pete understood. Besides he had turned out to be the kind of man who could move mountains.

  “I can’t thank you enough for all your help, Pete.”

  “No thanks necessary. Just be happy, Skylar.”

  It was a strange way of saying good luck, but Skylar was too busy to think about it until the curtain went up and the stage lights came on. As she took her place in center stage the audience started clapping.

  They hadn’t come to hear speeches about a new charity named after a man they didn’t even know. Some of them probably didn’t even have a social conscience. They’d come to hear Skylar Tate sing.

  Behind her Eric gave the cue, the band started to play, and Skylar started to sing. An old song. One of the hymns she’d sung when she was six years old and sitting on the front pew of the church dreading the moment her father ascended to the pulpit. He always insisted it be on a raised platform so folks had to look way up to him.

  Skylar had hundreds of memories pasted into a mental scrapbook she’d carried around with her for years. Tonight she was shutting it up and putting it away. Tonight she was singing the old songs in a new way. Free and easy and from the heart.

  As her eyes adjusted to the lights she began to pick out faces in the audience. There was Pete in the third row. Randy Tompkins’s wife was sitting two rows back. She’d brought Nancy, their oldest child, sixteen and already showing her dad’s talent.

  Skylar’s gaze swung to the right. There was the man from the service station. Carl. And behind him was…her husband.

  Skylar almost faltered. She almost forgot the lyrics. The only thing that saved her was her professionalism.

  Daniel was in Atlanta. That had to be someone who looked like him. Her mind was playing tricks.