Symphony in Blue

by M. J. Duncan

  “Fingers crossed,” Luke said. “Because—”

  An energetic, booming voice interrupted whatever he was about to say next as the gala’s host—a television celebrity whose face she recognized but whose name she couldn’t remember—sauntered toward the center of the stage with a microphone in his hand. “How about another round of applause for the amazing musicians of the Los Angeles Philharmonic!”

  Gwen smiled and nodded at the crowd that dutifully began to put their hands together, and blew out a sigh of relief when her heels hit the main floor of the ballroom. It was always a little nerve-wracking for her to navigate stairs while wearing heels and a gown and carrying her beloved cello. She was especially grateful to be back on solid ground when the host spoke next, because even with a flat surface under her feet, she nearly tripped when the host’s voice boomed through the ballroom’s speakers.

  “Our first speaker tonight was once a patient at CHLA who went on to win a total of fourteen medals at the Paralympic games.” He paused as an awed titter rippled through the crowd. “Now retired from competition, she still holds several national records in her classification, and is the Senior Associate Head Coach of the Women’s and Men’s swim team at USC. Please join me in welcoming Dana Ryan to the stage!”

  The crowd erupted into applause.

  Luke grabbed Gwen’s arm and hissed in her ear, “Wait, wasn’t that the name of the woman…”

  Gwen froze and, heart lodged in her throat, nodded as she turned to look at the stage. Dana was striding toward the man with the microphone with a wide smile on her face as she waved appreciatively at the audience. Her black slacks were as tailored as the ones she had worn that night in Maui, and her black sleeveless blouse highlighted her tanned, muscled arms to perfection. Her hair was styled in the same tousled, artfully messy style she had worn the night of Regan’s wedding, and Gwen bit her lip as a memory of how it had felt to run her fingers through those short strands smacked into her.

  “Fuck,” Luke hissed as electric blue eyes finished scanning the crowd and landed on them.

  Onto her.

  “Yeah,” Gwen whispered. There was no mistaking the hurt that flashed across Dana’s face as their gazes locked, and Gwen could only offer silent apologies as they stared at each other for a few heartbeats longer before Dana took a deep breath and turned back toward the crowd, her back straightening ever so slightly as she composed herself.

  “Good evening,” Dana addressed the ballroom.

  Gwen licked her lips and closed her eyes as she let the sound of Dana’s voice curl around her. It was deeper, richer than the one that haunted her dreams. Smokier. Sweeter. In a city of over nineteen million people, she had honestly thought she would never hear it again. Had been convinced that she could leave what had happened in that hotel room in the past and move on. She had clearly been mistaken—but as her stomach sank and her chest filled with a fluttery breathlessness, she honestly wasn’t sure if she was upset about it or not.

  “It’s an honor to be here,” Dana continued.

  A gentle hand on her elbow forced Gwen’s eyes back open, and she blinked twice to try and get control of herself as Luke turned her away from the stage, whispering in her ear, “Let’s get out of here.”

  “And thank you all for being here, as well,” Dana said, her voice so warm that Gwen could easily picture the gentle smile that was no doubt curling her lips. “I could stand up here and talk about all the amazing medical accomplishments that happen daily at CHLA, but you know about those. But what is often overlooked when analyzing a hospital’s success rate—the surgeries performed, and everything else that keeps a hospital at the top of the ‘Best of…’ lists—is the hope that those same doctors and nurses and therapists give to their young, scared, vulnerable patients whose lives have been turned upside down by illness or injury and who just want to know that everything will be okay.”

  The open honesty in Dana’s tone brought Gwen to a stop mere feet from the door behind which the rest of her colleagues were gathered, and she bit her lip as she turned back to Luke. “Here.” She handed him her cello and bow. “Put these in my case for me?”

  Luke automatically reached out to take them. “You’re sure that’s a good idea?”

  “Hope,” Dana continued, her voice rising by a fraction, “is everything.”

  Gwen shook her head. She wasn’t sure of pretty much anything anymore, but the one thing she was sure of in that moment was that she wanted to stay. To listen. To learn more about the woman she had foolishly fallen into bed with and been unable to stop thinking about in the time since.

  “You want me to come back out once I’ve stashed this stuff?” Luke asked, lifting their instruments indicatively.

  “Healing is, of course, and understandably, the primary objective of any healthcare provider.” Dana took the mic from the stand and walked toward the edge of the stage. “But it’s the steps taken after the disease or the illness or the injury that help to create each patient’s new reality.”

  Captivated by Dana’s words and presence, Gwen shook her head slightly as electric blue eyes turned on her, once again freezing her where she stood. “Go. Eat. I’ll be fine,” she murmured.

  “My new reality began when I was sixteen years old.”

  Gwen folded her arms over her stomach and, when Dana looked away again, backed her way toward the wall so that she would be a little more inconspicuous as she listened, as spellbound as the rest of the audience to the story Dana was weaving.

  “It was a typical summer Sunday night, and I was riding home from a swim meet at USC with some teammates when our car was broadsided by another car that had run a red light while we were crossing an intersection. I don’t remember the impact—which is probably a good thing—but I will never forget waking up at CHLA afterwards.

  “I hurt. Everywhere. I had a broken arm, a handful of broken ribs, too many lacerations on my face from the window that had shattered to even count, and a shattered left leg that, combined, were too painful for even the strongest meds to manage. And in the days that followed, when my arm, ribs, and face began to heal, my leg kept getting worse.” She tilted her head slightly, her left shoulder lifting in a small shrug. “The bone was infected, and after trying to fight the infection with antibiotics and failing, the choice was clear—my leg, or my life.”

  Gwen held her breath as Dana paused to let the weight of her words sink in.

  “It was actually a harder choice to make than you might think,” she admitted with a little laugh and a wry grin. “But on July 10th, 2002, my life as an able-bodied athlete was officially ended when my left leg was amputated three inches below my knee. Now, you might remember that I started this whole story talking about hope, and what a powerful force it is. When I woke up without part of my leg, I didn’t have any of it. I was convinced that my life was over.” She smiled and shook her head. “I was pissed at the world for the injustice of what had happened to me, but my doctors and parents didn’t let me wallow in my anger and self-pity for much more than a day before my butt was hauled out of bed and wheeled down to physical therapy.”

  A few people in the crowd made small noises of surprise, and Dana laughed.

  “That’s actually pretty typical following an amputation, but just being put into a situation where I had to perform at some level was the best thing that could have happened to me. I was—and always will be—an athlete. The physicality of therapy was exactly what I needed. I was fitted with arm crutches and the chair was taken away, and slowly but surely I learned to navigate my new reality.

  “Hope can be found in different places for different people, and I found mine in the one place I had always felt the most at home—in the water. As soon as my stitches were out, my therapists put me in a resistance pool, turned up the water flow, and told me to swim.” She shook her head at the memory, her smile pure sunshine as she chuckled softly to herself. “The current pushed me right back into the far side of the pool. Which, for a kid who had swam
in the Olympic Trials in 2000, was utterly embarrassing. And that first failure, while mortifying at the time, was the spark that lit the hope inside me once more because I was determined to beat that damn pool. It took me a couple days to figure out how this new body of mine worked, but once I got it figured out, I knew that I would be okay.

  “Hope is a funny thing. It’s often flighty and fleeting, but when it finds you, the impossible becomes possible. When I first woke up an amputee, I was convinced my life was over. Two years later, I had the honor of representing my country at the 2004 Athens Paralympic Games. I had always dreamt of swimming in the Olympics and, you know what, for as sweet as it would have been to achieve that dream, the alternate dream that I actually got to experience was so much better. Life isn’t easy, it doesn’t follow plans, it twists and turns and seems to really enjoy screwing with us at times, but in the end, I honestly believe that we end up where we are meant to be. A little hope goes a long way, and the spark I found on the therapy floor at Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles took me to Athens, Beijing, London, and eventually to my dream job with USC Aquatics.

  “Hope is a powerfully amazing force to be reckoned with, and the staff at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles provides it in spades. I can say for a fact that I would not be standing here in front of you all today without them.” She placed her right hand over her heart and bowed to the crowd. “So on behalf of the kids who have yet to find their spark of hope, I want to say thank you for your support here tonight. It might seem like a small thing to you, but to the kids you’re helping, it’s everything.”

  Gwen swallowed thickly and blinked back the tears she could feel building in response to Dana’s heartfelt conclusion. She applauded along with the crowd that, rightfully, got to their feet as Dana made her way from the stage. She shook her head as she watched Dana disappear into the crowd, feeling like even more of an ass for what she had done, and jumped in surprise when a body sidled up next to her.

  “That was pretty wow, right?” Luke asked as he watched Dana wind her way through the crowd.

  “Yeah.”

  “She’s incredible.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I can’t believe you slept with her.”

  Gwen huffed a surprised laugh and shook her head. “Me neither.”

  “You know what I can’t believe more?”

  “Hmm?” Gwen hummed, tracking Dana’s progress across the room.

  “That you’re over here staring longingly after her and not running to catch up to her.”

  Gwen sighed. Honestly, there was a not insignificant part of her that was thinking the same damn thing “I’m not free to chase after her like that,” she reminded him.

  “But you want to.”

  Here, now, with only Luke as her witness, Gwen allowed herself to admit the truth. “Yeah. I do. But I can’t.” She sighed, and turned her back to Dana’s retreating form. “Is there any food left in there, or did you guys eat it all?”

  Luke, bless his heart, did not push. “Let’s go find out.”

  FOURTEEN

  Knowing that she was in no position to pursue Dana did nothing to stop Gwen’s eyes from sweeping over the crowd as she and the rest of her colleagues made their way back to the stage following their short break. Nor did it do anything to stifle the stab of disappointment that ricocheted through her when she failed to spot her. She wasn’t particularly looking forward to a confrontation with her—and, really, with the way she’d left that hotel room and the way Dana had looked at her tonight there was no other way their reunion could possibly go—however, she could not ignore how nice it had been to see her again. To hear her speak. To learn more about the woman she had met on a tropical island so far removed from her life in Los Angeles that it may as well have been another lifetime altogether.

  She shook her head as she took her seat and turned her eyes to her conductor. For as unpredictable as her emotions had been over the last few weeks, there was solace to be found in the predictability of these next forty-five minutes. For the next three-quarters of an hour, the only thing she had to think about were the notes laid out on the pages spread before her. Music, as it had been for much of her life, was going to be her savior tonight, shielding her from the darkness of her thoughts and the guilt twisting her stomach and the loneliness that echoed dully in her chest. Putting bow to strings, she took a deep breath as Rhode’s hands lifted in the air. She nodded when his eyes landed on her, and prepared to play. She might not know how to deal with the mess her life had become, but she knew how to do this.

  Music might not always be easy, but its expectations were always clearly explained in crisp black notes spread across a page. There was no ambiguity to the notes, no room left for her to have to think about anything other than making sure her fingers were in the right position and that her bow moved at the appropriate speed across the designated strings. And tonight, more than ever, she appreciated that clarity. Tonight, when she felt like she was being pulled in two directions—where she wanted to go and where she knew she needed to be—knowing exactly what she had to do was a relief.

  Because when it came to Dana Ryan, her head and her heart were at complete odds with one another.

  She closed her eyes and blew out a soft breath as the final note of Danzón No. 2 vibrated into silence, a feeling of hollowness taking the place of the serenity that had filled her while she had played. The sound of applause forced her to open her eyes to face their audience, and she nodded politely to the crowd as she, along with her colleagues, stood to take their final bow. At Rhode’s signal, they began to file down the stairs on either side of the stage, and Gwen kept her eyes glued to the marble in front of her feet as she hurried toward the side chamber where their things were stored. The event’s organizers had invited them all to stay and enjoy the rest of the evening as a thank you for volunteering their time for the performance, but she wanted nothing more than to escape as quickly as possible.

  Which was something Luke picked up on without her having to say anything, because he slipped past her with a quiet, “Breathe. Pack your shit. We’ll be in the car in less than ten minutes.”

  Gwen nodded tightly and followed him through the crowd, forcing a small smile at the many people who offered their appreciation for the group’s performance. The quiet of the small antechamber was a welcome relief, and she forced herself to take a slow, deep, steadying breath as she knelt in front of her cello case and flipped it open with her left hand. Years of experience allowed her to stow her instrument on autopilot, laying the cello itself into the open case before slipping her bow into its designated spot. After giving the body of the cello a quick wipe-down with an old T-shirt she kept in the case to remove any rosin residue that fell from her bow while she was playing and securing the straps around the scroll and the neck of the instrument, she carefully closed the lid and secured the latches on either side of the case. A soft sigh escaped her as she stood up straight, hefting the case onto her back, and she turned to Luke.

  “Ready?” Luke asked from just inside the door.

  “Yeah. I just…” Gwen shook her head as she stopped herself from even beginning to try and explain exactly what was going on inside her head. “Yeah. Let’s get out of here.”

  “Your wish, my command,” he replied with a gallant bow as he pulled the door open and motioned her to go ahead of him.

  She kept her head down and her eyes on the floor in front of her as she made a beeline for the foyer, sidestepping the occasional person making their way back to their seat from the open bar. It was a rather uneventful escape, quick, methodical, devoid of any issues, until a smoky smooth voice asked from somewhere to her left when she was not five yards from the open double doors, “You’re leaving?”

  Gwen stopped and turned to find Dana standing a few feet away, a glass of water in her right hand. Her expression was carefully neutral, but the tightening at the corners of her eyes gave away her discomfort. Gwen stumbled forward half a step as a body slammed into her
, and her heartbeat tripped over itself as Dana’s hands reached out to steady her.

  “Oompf,” Luke grunted. “Why’d you…” His voice trailed off and he whistled softly. “Oh.”

  “Yeah,” Gwen breathed. She glanced over her shoulder at him and added softly, “Could you maybe give me a minute?”

  “Yeah. Totally. I’ll just go grab a drink with Vic and Tucker who are at the bar.” Luke jabbed his thumb at their colleagues. “Let me know when you’re ready to leave.”

  “Thanks,” Gwen said, her attention drifting back to the woman whose hands were still lightly cradling her elbows. “I…” She began, but her voice died as she watched Dana’s tongue slide slowly over her lips.

  “Can we talk for a minute?” Dana asked hesitantly, her hands finally dropping away from Gwen’s arms. She shook her head as she jammed her hands into the pockets in the back of her pants and tilted her head as she waited for Gwen’s reply.

  The unmistakable absence of the innate confidence Dana had shown in Maui was both shocking and heartbreaking, and Gwen’s throat tightened as she took a step closer to her and nodded. From the moment she had run from Dana’s room she had known that she was in the wrong, but seeing how strongly her actions had affected Dana left a sour taste in her mouth. “Of course,” she murmured.

  “Okay.” Dana bit her lip and glanced around the ballroom, looking even more uncomfortable than before. “Would you mind if we, ah, maybe went outside where it’s quieter?”

  “Sure.”

  “Okay.” Dana nodded once as she pulled her hands from her pockets, her eyes sweeping slowly over Gwen’s face one last time before she turned on her heel and headed out of the ballroom.

  Gwen followed a few feet behind her, hating herself for the way she scanned the area to see if any of her colleagues saw her leaving with Dana. Mallory was anything but the jealous type, but the guilt of knowing she had cheated on her girlfriend with the woman she was now obediently following in a search for privacy had her on edge. For as much as she had wanted to see Dana again after the brief intermission between performances, she also desperately wanted to keep her two lives—the one she lived daily here in Los Angeles and the one she had gotten lost in for twenty-four hours in Maui—completely separate. She was forced to admit that it was an impossible wish, however, when she saw Tucker’s eyes following her despite Luke’s clear attempts to distract him from her exit.