"It is so beautiful," Stephen said in awe. He sat down next to Julie on her blanket. His lips occupied space so close to her ear that his breath stirred her hair. She longed to move closer, to make his lips brush her ear. She closed her eyes and fought the empty sensation in the pit of her stomach.
"Almost as beautiful as you," Stephen said, his voice low and camouflaged by the noise of the distant fireworks.
She shot him a desperate look and hitched herself a few inches further away. "Not here, Stephen," she murmured.
"Where, then? When?"
"You know the answer to that."
"If I did, I would not be asking."
"It's impossible. The two of us, I mean."
"I don't agree."
As the next starburst lit the sky, she heard an insect humming in the vicinity of her neck, but she ignored it.
"There!" said Stephen, bringing his hand down solidly on her shoulder. "I am sorry, Juliana, but there was a mosquito."
She turned her head. His eyes gazed deep into hers, and he didn't remove his hand. He was staring at her as though he were memorizing every eyelash, every contour, every nuance of expression. Her breath seemed to leave her lungs.
"Ooh," said everyone else. "Ahh." Above them a glittering fountain shimmered in midair and hung suspended as silvery confetti drifted to earth.
"Dearest Juliana," Stephen said helplessly. Her eyes widened as she watched his lips move toward hers. Once there, they lingered briefly, sending shocks of electricity through her body. The world seemed to stop; she didn't even hear the fireworks, and her heart forgot to beat. Then a dazzling golden glow lit up the sky and Julie remembered where they were and who was there, and she leaned away from him a bit, watching his face gilded in the light from the sky.
"You know what would make this perfect?" Eric yelled. "If Stephen would go up on the wire during the last fireworks!"
"Will you, Stephen? Will you perform for us?" Nonna leaned forward in her lawn chair.
"Well, I—" Stephen glanced at Julie, looking extremely uncomfortable.
"Please, Stephen," Mickey begged. "I want to see you do it."
"I will," he said quietly, and he leaped up from where he sat and ran toward the king poles erected not forty feet away.
Stephen shucked his shoes and climbed the ladder in his bare feet. He wore a pair of shorts and a T-shirt; he wasn't dressed to perform. Nevertheless, he looked very much at home on the platform.
Behind him, another fountain firework flared against the background of stars, this one with a whistle. And then two starbursts, red and blue, soared high into the sky.
Stephen did not use a balancing pole. He stepped confidently onto the wire, gazing intently at the cable stretched before him. He balanced, first on one bare foot, next on the other. Julie reflected that soon he would be walking the wire across Tallulah Gorge, fully focused as he was now. Below him would be huge jagged rocks and trees and a river and–danger.
Julie bit down hard on her lip to keep from crying out, but even as her emotions battled for control, her intellect told her that she had nothing to fear.
Stephen on the wire was supple and sure. He moved effortlessly to midwire, then stopped and knelt, raising his arms in one graceful movement, a classic wire walker's salute. When he stood, his body was strong and erect, and he completed his crossing as the last fireworks sputtered and lit the sky in one final beautiful tribute to America's independence.
"Now that wasn't so bad, Julie, was it?" Paul said, speaking quietly to her as they gathered up their blankets.
She shook her head, unable to speak, and hurried from the meadow hard on the heels of the capering children so that she wouldn't have to say anything to Stephen, who walked behind her with Eva and Gabrielle and stared at the back of her neck all the way to the house.
* * *
Soon after the Fourth of July, the house was overrun with people. The producer of the television show Dare! announced in a press release that Stephen Andrassy was going to cross the Tallulah Gorge on a tightrope. Network people, newspaper people, wire service people, and press agent people descended on the farm. Someone sneaked into the meadow and taped Stephen on the wire. The resulting video was an instant hit on YouTube.
One morning, a reporter met Julie in the driveway when she was running and jogged along beside her. What was he like, Stephen Martinovic-Andrassy? Was he her cousin? Why wasn't she practicing with the others? And by the way, what did Stephen eat for breakfast?
Julie barely said a word. After that incident she began to vary the times when she ran so that her habits wouldn't be predictable.
Stephen, however, seemed to glory in the attention. He granted interviews, talking at length about his work with the Moscow Circus, Cirque du Soleil, and his stint with the Big Apple Circus. He demonstrated his art on the high wire for photographers. He opened a Facebook page for the Amazing Andrassys and started Tweeting to their burgeoning list of followers. He emailed biographical sheets and publicity photos. Whenever possible, he included other members of the Amazing Andrassys in the pictures.
"You're getting famous," Julie couldn't help observing one night after Stephen had bade goodbye to a reporter from Entertainment Tonight. She was rocking on the front porch and enjoying a cool breeze. Stephen sat down beside her.
"That is good for all of us," he said solemnly.
"You thrive on the attention."
Stephen laughed. "I suppose I do, Juliana. One works to get to the top of a profession, and it is gratifying to be recognized as the best. Tell me, does it annoy you, my being famous?"
Julie considered the question thoughtfully. "It's like living in a goldfish bowl," she answered truthfully. "But, Stephen, you should know that I am proud of you."
"You don't approve of what I do, but you are proud of me." He broke into a smile. "I like that very much
Julie had the breathless feeling that he might kiss her, but at that moment they heard the approach of a car.
It discharged Mimi Fitchett, a publicity assistant from Dare! Mimi, who had visited briefly once before, was young, pretty, and wore a very short skirt.
"Stephen Andrassy?" Mimi called, squinting at him through the dim illumination of the yellow porch light.
"Hello, Mimi," Stephen said, standing up.
"I wasn't due here until tomorrow, but I finished my business in Chicago and decided to fly in tonight. Is there a decent motel around here?"
Stephen went inside to phone a motel in Cornelia to reserve a room. Mimi, shooting curious glances in Julie's direction, stalked up and down the porch and flicked green flecks of polish off her nails.
"I guess you're the Andrassy who doesn't perform," Mimi said after a while.
Julie stopped rocking and stared at her. An inexplicable heaviness settled around her heart, and she felt a twinge of longing for the old days when she had been proud that people recognized her as Juliana Andrassy, the youngest member of the Amazing Andrassys.
But those days were gone forever.
"Yes," Julie said quietly. "I'm the Andrassy who doesn't perform."
And excusing herself, she slipped quickly into the house before Stephen could return.
Chapter 9
Excitement in the household increased as the date of Stephen's Tallulah Gorge crossing drew near. Stephen, Paul, Albert, and Michael spent many days at the Gorge installing the rigging, a process that took weeks and invaded every aspect of their daily lives.
The cousins' practice on the high wire in the meadow was curtailed. Julie, out for her run at all hours of the day and night, grew accustomed to stumbling over piles of rope and stacks of steel cable on the front porch of the farmhouse. Stephen walked around looking preoccupied and wearing a heavy leather belt with loops and pockets for tools, the kind of belt a telephone lineman would wear. The belt and its tools were, Julie knew, the tools of Stephen's trade as much as the wire and his balancing pole.
"We're stringing the cable between the two spots where Karl Wall
enda walked the Gorge in 1970," Stephen told them all enthusiastically after one of his first long days at the site.
"They're building a big covered observation deck. It's for local dignitaries. And family, of course," Michael added.
"Do you know they're expecting thousands of people to watch Stephen walk across the Tallulah Gorge?" Paul said in amazement. "Isn't that something?"
Julie steeled herself for more of the same talk, but now she was determined not to make her family feel awkward around her. Stephen was right. She shouldn't cause them to feel uneasy about a walk that, in family annals, would go down as a great achievement. As best she could, she hid her worry from everyone.
"The producer of Dare! has rented a big house in the mountains not far from the Gorge," Stephen announced at dinner one evening. "I, of course, will live in the house for a few days before the crossing, so I can supervise last-minute adjustments to the rigging. The rest of you can spend the night before the crossing there. We're free to use the house for the rest of the week if we want."
"A vacation!" Gabrielle exclaimed. "We need a vacation."
The others were enthusiastic about staying at the mountain house, but Julie greeted Stephen's announcement in silence. She didn't plan to go to Tallulah Gorge at all. She'd remain at the farmhouse, far away from Stephen and his performance.
"Won't you change your mind?" Stephen asked later that night when they met accidentally on the stairs. "I'd like you to be there, Juliana."
Julie shook her head. Stephen stared at her for a moment, his face torn with frustration, before Julie brushed past him toward her room. She looked out the window and saw him heading for the meadow alone, his path illumined only by the cold glare of the moon.
The countdown began—a week to go, then six days, then five. A story about Stephen's planned crossing appeared in People. Dancing with the Stars asked Stephen to be on their show. A European film crew arrived to make a documentary.
"Are you going to be on Dancing with the Stars?" asked Gabrielle. It was her favorite TV show.
"I'm a wire walker, not a dancer," Stephen replied, although Julie agreed with Gabrielle later in their room that they'd both like to see Stephen perform the tango on TV.
"With me!" said Gabrielle hopefully.
"Doubtful," Eva replied. "With Sofia Vergara, maybe."
Julie had the rare wisdom to stay out of this exchange.
Then there were only four days to go. The next day Stephen would leave for the house in the mountains.
Stephen was in his room when Julie mounted the stairs late that night while the rest of the household slept. She'd been out jogging in the moonlight, running as though something was chasing her. She hadn't, she reflected as she reached the top of the stairs, managed to outrun it.
"Juliana?" When he heard her, Stephen looked up from his laptop. He'd heard the light click of her door latch when she'd left and watched her from his window as she set off running down the moonlit driveway.
Julie walked slowly to his door and stood gazing down at him. She tried not to look at the clothes spread out on the back of the couch–red shirt, pants, shoes.
Stephen drank in Julie's beauty like one too long deprived. It seemed that he never saw her away from the others these days. He'd missed her.
"Come in," he invited, patting the couch beside him. "We haven't talked in a long time."
She sat down beside him and pulled one of the couch's small pillows into her lap, holding it in front of her like a shield. She played with a loose piece of fringe, feeling oddly out of place. She'd never visited Stephen alone in his room before.
"Soon the crossing will be over," he said with satisfaction. "Then I will have more free time."
"I doubt it. You'll go back to training the others every day, won't you?"
"We have a lot to learn before September."
"You're not going to attempt a pyramid when you all go back on the wire, are you?" She hadn't wanted to ask, but she felt compelled to.
"We will do a five-person pyramid. But to do the wonderful nine-person Andrassy pyramid—it will be years before we can attempt it. We don't have enough people."
"But you will someday, is that it?"
"If Sam keeps up his work with us, and if Eric joins in, and if later Mickey and Tonia want to be a part of the act, then we will do the nine-person pyramid." His expression was calm.
"So Sam is hooked on the high wire," murmured Julie.
"He shows much talent, yes."
Julie sighed. "Really, Stephen, I must go to bed now. I'm very tired."
"I knew you would not approve of my plans," Stephen said slowly. "But I don't want to keep them from you."
"What difference does it make whether I know your plans or not?"
"It is important for you to know everything about me," he said in a low tone. "Everything."
Julie stiffened, not knowing how to take this.
"Just as important," he went on, "as it is for me to know everything about you. Don't you know why, Juliana? Haven't you guessed?"
She stared at him dumbly, afraid for both of them. Some words were best left unspoken.
"Juliana, I leave tomorrow to undertake a very dangerous mission. I'm confident that I will make a successful crossing of the Gorge, but I am never unaware of the dangers. It is best for you to know what is in my mind and in my heart."
"Not here—not now," she whispered.
"Ah, do you think my little room is not quite the romantic place?" His mouth quirked upward in a brief flash of humor.
"Well, I—"
"Believe me, Juliana, I would much prefer that we sit on the banks of the creek in the moonlight, as we did one other time. Or that we were dining by candlelight, just you and me. But there has been no opportunity for such frivolous things, and somehow I think it doesn't matter. We are both very practical in some ways, and romantic trappings would not make much difference."
Julie didn't know what to say. Stephen's talk of moonlit creek banks and candlelight dinners was unexpected, and at the moment those situations didn't seem at all romantic. What seemed romantic right now was that the two of them were entirely alone, face-to-face, that they were able to speak what was in their minds and in their hearts without preliminaries, and that, somehow, despite Stephen's obsession with the wire and her own aversion to it, they understood each other on a deeply human level.
"Many times I have thought of your face glowing up at me in the moonlight, or of making love to you—no, let me finish!"
Julie stirred restlessly, hugging the couch pillow even closer. His words seemed inappropriate, but were they? They were surely no more unseemly than her body's swift response to the yearning expression in his eyes. She longed to touch his face, to kiss his lips. Not touching him seemed like exquisite torture; she remembered so well that night in her car when they had stopped short of unchecked passion. She felt her cheeks grow hot with the memory.
"I have dreamed of making love to you, Juliana. Many, many times. But knowing how you feel about what I do for a living, I have been afraid to care for you too deeply. Yet I think you have stronger feelings for me than you let on."
He paused, wishing she would speak. Her luminous dark eyes refused to leave his face, and her lips were moist and slightly parted. She looked fearful and yet somehow relieved, and so he plunged on, groping for the right words. English was not his native language, but it was the only language Julie understood. He must say this right.
"You need not tell me your emotions, Juliana, if you don't wish. But I must tell you mine. Please believe me when I tell you that I love you."
Her rapid intake of breath interrupted him, and he gently took the couch pillow from her and let it fall to the floor. Then he reached out and pushed the door quietly shut and clasped her hands in his.
"I must add that loving is not something I do often," he said.
"I don't know why you're telling me this," breathed Julie.
"Because if anything happens to me, I would wa
nt you to know that Stephen Andrassy truly loved you. That is why."
In her mind's eye, Julie pictured Stephen setting out on the wire over the great Tallulah Gorge, sliding one foot forward, then the other, his balancing pole shifting carefully from side to side. He was concentrating mightily on the wire, an expression of intensity on his face, and it was so far until he would reach the other side, so very far.
"I can't bear it," she blurted out. "I can't stand to think about it!"
"About my love?" Stephen said, holding her hands fast. "So now I have made my great declaration and you cannot stand to think about it. Dearest Juliana, do you have any idea how that makes me feel?" He was teasing her.
"No, no, the Gorge! You treat it so lightly, as though it's nothing, but how do you think I'll feel when I know you're out there, suspended in space? Stephen, how can you put me through this?"
"It is the way I live. I'm made to walk the wire. It is all in a day's work, as you Americans would say." He grinned at her, but then he became serious once more. He remembered how he had felt in the aftermath of the tornado. He couldn't have borne it if anything had happened to Julie, and thus he could identify with the fear she felt right now.
"Don't do it, Stephen! Please! Call it off. Please?"
"There is no way I can do that," he said quietly. When she didn't reply, he drew a deep breath and continued.
"Juliana, I would like to think that someday there might be a chance for us to have a life together. This is why I have told you how I feel about you. Do you—do you think it would ever be possible for you to love me?" He held his breath, watching her face. Many expressions flitted across it in rapid succession—longing, sorrow, hope, affection. But he didn't find acceptance there.
"I don't think I could have a future with a man who walks the wire," murmured Julie, looking down at the floor.
He tipped a finger beneath her chin and forced her eyes to meet his.
"But you care, don't you? Admit it, Juliana! You love me as I love you, do you not?" His eyes cut into her like chips of blue glass.
Slowly she slipped her hands from his fierce grasp, and slowly she slid them up his chest, over his solid pectoral muscles, to his shoulders and the nape of his neck. She closed her eyes, and when she opened them again, Stephen's expressive face was only inches from hers.
Touch the Stars Page 11
