Moments In Time

by Mariah Stewart

  They called room service and enjoyed the luxury of breakfast in bed, no small children bouncing on the mattress, no tiny faces begging for a bite of this or a sip of that. She dressed casually and by nine-thirty was ready to begin her errands.

  “And what will you be doing while I’m out spending the bulk of the proceeds from your last album?” she asked.

  “I will finish reading the paper and take a shower. Maybe pop down to the local bookstore and look over the selection. I’m in the mood for a good, challenging mystery. Come back in time to have tea with me downstairs,” he suggested, “and you can tell me what wonderful surprise you found for my mom.”

  She leaned down to kiss him and in doing so spilled coffee onto the tray that she’d knocked with her elbow. Frowning, she sopped up the dark liquid with several napkins, grumbling, “I’d say I’m getting off to a good start today.”

  He pulled her down to him and kissed her.

  “I’d say you got off to a very good start today,” he reminded her.

  She laughed and headed out the door.

  Once out onto the street, she stopped, debating whether to take a cab or to walk. It was a pleasant enough morning, she decided, and paused to get her bearings, considered her errands, and crossed the street. She strolled along for several blocks, enjoying her solitary excursion, though her normally brisk pace was impeded by the crowds that were rapidly filling the sidewalks. Following first one side street, then another, she stopped several times to peer into the shop windows at items that caught her eye.

  The city bustled, as it always seemed to do in summer. The first morning rush of cars and buses hurrying folks to work had eased, their places on the streets now taken by the red double-decker buses jammed with tourists. She stopped to give directions to a group of Japanese tourists seeking Buckingham Palace, reminding them the guard changed at eleven-thirty and encouraging them not to miss the gardens as she pointed out the way. As they moved on by, the storefront that had been obscured by the throng came into view. The small antique shop was just opening for the day, and a quick glance at the window revealed a diminutive writing desk tucked into the display.

  She leaned closer for a better look. It was perfect, she thought, for that short wall in the front hallway of the home they shared with J.D.’s mother during summers and vacations. They had expanded the old house several times over the past few years as their family had grown, the last time enlarging the entry as they added a library and a sunroom to the left of the main stairway. She went inside the antique shop and carefully looked over the desk. It was just the thing. She asked the dealer to hold it for her while she ran back to the hotel to fetch her husband in hopes that he would like it as much as she did.

  She had entered the suite and gone directly to the bedroom, then seeing the bathroom door partially open and hearing the water from the shower, she called his name just as the sound of water ceased.

  She would never, she knew, forget the way it had all appeared to her as she opened the bathroom door. The scene replayed itself in slow motion every time she closed her eyes: J.D.’s look of surprise and confusion, Glory’s smug little smile as she turned to face Maggie.

  The pain and shock had knocked the breath from her lungs, numbed her mind.

  “Oh, Jamey, no…” she had heard herself whisper, then had turned and stumbled blindly from the room, out into the hallway, where she had leaned against the wall awaiting the elevator, a fist pressed tightly into the excruciating pain exploding in her abdomen. Her mind had been frozen, and she later recalled having prayed that she would not scream or throw up in the elevator as she descended to the lobby and sought a cab.

  It had never occurred to her that J.D. would be unfaithful to her. Maggie had honestly believed she knew him to the depths of his soul. Yet, hidden deep in her heart had always been the fear that Glory, who never seemed willing to abandon a desire to rekindle that old flame, would someday succeed at taking him from her, as she’d so often taunted she would.

  Glory Fielding was every wife’s nightmare. Even now, in her midthirties, she was still a most spectacular-looking woman with long golden hair and the face of a beautiful, innocent child. Three days ago, on Friday morning in a London hotel suite, Maggie’s nightmare had become reality.

  She had fled to the sanctity of Rick Daily’s country home some twenty miles north, grateful to find that Rick had gone to the city with his daughter for a few days. The housekeeper, well acquainted with the entire Border crew—Rick, J.D., and Maggie having been friends for years—permitted her to stay without asking any questions and had, upon Maggie’s instructions, denied her presence when J.D. had called. The message that had been relayed to Maggie was that he needed desperately to speak to her, that she must give him a chance to explain.

  He’d been caught with another woman under the most incriminating circumstances, she had indignantly scoffed. What on earth could there be to explain?

  Swallowing the lump that had risen in her throat in response to the memory, Maggie raised her chin resolutely, blinking away the burning in her eyes. All she wanted right now was to conclude this ordeal with her dignity intact. She commanded herself to somehow manage to keep her hostility toward him cloaked for the next two hours, then she could slam the door in his face. By this time tomorrow she would be on her way back to the States with her children. Just two more hours and I will never have to be in the same room with him again. Just two more hours…

  “Well, we’re all set. Camera one,” Hilary gestured behind her, “will be rolling first… Watch for the lights, there’s the cue… Smile, you two,” she commanded her guests as the lights glared and Hilary’s recorded theme song signaled the start of the show.

  2

  “TONIGHT, FRIENDS, WE’RE PRIVILEGED TO HAVE AS our guests one of the mainstays of the pop music scene, J.D. Borders, and his wife, Maggie. We’re pleased you both could join us this evening. J.D., you’ve given us better than twenty-five years of popular music. So many of your contemporaries have come and gone and come back again. Yet you, for the most part, managed to remain something of a permanent presence in the business all this time. Why do you suppose that’s so?”

  “Well, I’m not sure that I’ve done anything that’s quite that notable,” he began with characteristic modesty, trying to control his quivering voice, forcing himself to speak slowly and to concentrate—no easy task with his life falling apart. “There are any number of very excellent musicians who started out back in the sixties who have been very successful, much more successful than I. Maybe at times I remained more visible than others because I never stopped recording. Maybe I’ve felt somewhat more pressure to keep working all these years simply due to the fact that I have so many children to support.” He turned to look at Maggie and recognized her “we-are-not-amused” expression. His mild attempt at light humor having failed, he cleared his throat and continued.

  “And many of the others from that time never went away at all. Some of the best performers from the early sixties through the seventies moved around a great deal within different bands. You could start out with just about any of the well-known groups from that period and trace different members into other bands that would lead you to still others. A lot of us did that, you know, went from one band to another.”

  “How would you describe the changes in your music over the years?” She shuffled a small stack of note cards.

  “I don’t know that it’s changed remarkably. There’s been some evolution, of course, as I’ve matured—keep in mind that I was barely seventeen years old when I started, so the songs I wrote back then would reflect a seventeen-year-old’s perspective. In general, though, I don’t think my style has changed dramatically. The same influences are there.”

  “Those influences being …”

  “A real hodge-podge, actually. Blues, jazz, rock—particularly American rock and roll—and I’d studied piano for many years, from the time I was five or six years old, so I had a classical background.”


  “How did an aspiring classical pianist end up in a rock-and-roll band?” Hilary asked with mild curiosity.

  “Rick Daily,” he answered simply, as if the name was explanation enough.

  “You hooked up with him at a fairly young age, as I recall. How did all that come about?”

  “My cousin, Robby, had told me about this great band he’d seen at a pub in a town down the road. One night he talked me into going with him—I was only sixteen and Robby had to sneak me in. Rick was already something of a local celebrity by then. Watching him perform was like nothing I’d ever seen or heard—there simply wasn’t anyone like him and still isn’t, by the way. I was starting to fancy myself a pretty decent musician about the same time I heard Rick was looking to start up his own group. I gathered all my courage to ask him if he would listen to me play. We hit it off, and that was how I picked up with Rick and formed our first band: Daily Times.”

  “It sounds like Rick was quite an inspiration to you back then,” noted Hilary.

  “He still is.” J.D. nodded. “He’s still the best.”

  “What caused your eventual split with him?”

  “Nothing dramatic, I assure you. And the split was strictly professional,” he explained. “Over the years, we simply developed differently—musically—as our individual styles matured somewhat. We’d tried working around that for a few years, but neither of us have the ability to compromise gracefully. So, when the split came, it was very natural, very much inevitable. And when Monkshood’s last tour concluded, we simply went our separate ways, though we’ve remained the best of friends.”

  “And that last tour was back in, let’s see, 1976?”

  “Close.” He nodded. “It was in ’75. And of course, that was the year I met Maggie.”

  He shifted slightly to face his wife, but if she noticed, she gave no sign. She had been silent since the show had begun, had declined to participate, as if she were no more than a fixture in the room. Though she shared the same sofa, in her mind, she was clearly thousands of miles away. No doubt rehearsing, he thought grimly, what she’d say to her lawyer when she got back home.

  He ached knowing how deeply she was hurt, could not bear the thought that he had caused her such pain. If only he could get through to her long enough to make her listen to the truth, she would understand, he was sure of it, but she had removed herself from the scene so totally that she seemed not a part of it.

  A few lines from a song he’d written years ago hummed in his ears like a pesky mosquito he was unable to swat. He tried to concentrate on what Hilary was saying, but the words and tune went around and around in his head, an insistent, melodic ferris wheel that would not stop.

  Every tomorrow holds a little bit of yesterday.

  Night’s still with us come the morning, though the darkness fades away.

  The years, long past, still hold us fast

  And beckon us to stay.

  The key to tomorrow lies lost in yesterday.

  How long had it been since he’d written those words? Fifteen years? Sixteen? He could not recall.

  The key to tomorrow lies lost in yesterday.

  The key to tomorrow…

  The smallest of smiles played on his lips, then spread slowly as it occurred to him that his only hope of weaving her back into his life would be to somehow use what remained of the show to remind her of all they’d been through together, all they’d meant to each other over the years. He would have to take control of the conversation, parade their memories before her, and convince her beyond doubt that she could not live without him.

  To Hilary, he said congenially, as if relating a tale to his best friend, “Nineteen seventy-five was a year of both endings and beginnings. It was, as you mentioned, Hilary, my last tour as part of a band, though I didn’t realize it at the time. The way things happened, with Maggie coming into my life so unexpectedly, always made me feel somehow that it was all meant to be.”

  “Kismet,” suggested Hilary.

  “Yes. Exactly. At least, that’s how I always think of it, the day I met Maggie.” His boyish smile drew their hostess unwittingly into his scheme.

  “Sounds romantic.” Hilary met his smile with her own. He certainly has a disarming sort of charm, she mused.

  J.D. laughed. “The circumstances were hardly romantic, but it is an interesting story.”

  Hilary was not oblivious to the tension that was building in Maggie’s face. She had half turned in her husband’s direction, then glanced toward the door, as if fighting an urge to leave the room. This is a most peculiar scene, Hilary thought. It may be amusing to let them play it out. She decided to encourage him to pursue this nostalgic path.

  “Sounds like fun. Tell us about it.”

  Maggie met her husband’s eyes for the first time in three days, and in spite of the distance she’d chosen to put between them, silently pleaded, Please don't do this. He acknowledged how much it would hurt her—hurt them both—to look back but hoped that by the time the show had ended, she’d understand that it was only desperation that permitted him to knowingly inflict any further wounds to her heart. It could mean the difference between losing her and winning her back. He had no choice but to continue.

  “The band was on a bus, coming into Philadelphia…” he began, and in spite of her best efforts to block him out, it all came back to her as her husband recounted the events of that day a long fifteen years ago…

  It had been an unusually warm day for so early in March, the record high temperatures more like early summer, with clear blue skies and warm breezes and that feel of the sun that normally doesn’t arrive until mid-May. A real teaser of a day, sandwiched in between the blustery gray gloom of late winter, which seems to last forever in eastern Pennsylvania, and the first true touch of early spring.

  J.D. had been asleep on the back of the bus that had carried the band from Pittsburgh, where they’d played for two consecutive nights, into Philadelphia where they would appear for two more at the city’s largest arena. The U.S. leg of the tour was barely a month old, and already J.D. couldn’t wait till it was over. He hated touring after the exhilaration of the first few weeks on the road wore off. The monotony of the hours spent actually traveling made him crazy. There had to be a better way to live.

  As the bus’s road rhythm ceased, he sat up, somewhat disoriented, and looked around to find the other members of the band and the better part of their traveling entourage stoned. The heavy, sweet smell of marijuana thick in the air.

  “Where are we?” he called out to no one in particular.

  From the front of the bus came the reply “Philadelphia.”

  “Why are we just sitting here?”

  “Accident up ahead. Looks like a bad one, too. We ain’t goin’ no where for a while, so get comfortable, boys,” the driver called back to his passengers.

  The parklike area along the river was alive with people, as if every jogger and biker in the city had emerged to take advantage of what would most likely be the best day they’d have for at least another month. That would account for the heavy traffic. Four o’clock on a Sunday afternoon in March was probably not normally a happening time in this city.

  Rounding a slight bend in the river, along a path about twenty feet in from the road, came a jogger, long strides for such short legs, he’d thought at the time, watching the white shorts and red sweatshirt move closer. Cute little body that moved with an even, rhythmic pit. Cute little face, rigid with concentration as she ran. He found himself wondering what was on her mind that absorbed her so deeply, then smiled unconsciously at the sight of her. Definitely a cutie, not a knockout, but she definitely deserved a second look. He amused himself momentarily wondering if she’d be among the scores of girls who’d be waiting outside the doors of the arena come Tuesday night after the concert. His instincts told him not to waste his time looking for her face in that crowd.

  A discordant motion from the jogger caught his eye. She was almost parallel to the bus when she began
to stumble, both hands reaching out in front of her to break the coming fall. Her left foot twisted slightly under her as she appeared to go down in slow motion. He watched to see if she would get up. She made a wobbly attempt but could not stand.

  Pain reflected in her face as her small body crumbled back to the ground, and she banged a fist into the dirt in frustration. Over on the path closer to the river ran another group of joggers. A row of hedges obscured her from their view, and they did not notice her. He waited another minute to see if someone would stop and help her. No one did.

  OK what the hell, he thought, I could use a stretch right about now. He walked to the front of the bus, motioned to the driver to open the door, and hopped down.

  As he approached her, he noticed she was holding her left ankle in both hands. She looked up at him, tears sliding slowly onto her cheeks, and it struck him that her eyes were the oddest shade of green he’d ever seen, like deep bright emeralds, the color almost unnatural. They held him for a very long moment.

  “I saw you fall,” he said awkwardly, hoping to break their spell.

  “You and everyone else on the drive.” She swallowed hard, wiping her wet face with the back of her right hand.

  “What can I do?” He felt unexpectantly stupid.

  “Got any ice?” she asked with just a hint of sarcasm, stripping the white wool sock gingerly from her foot and tossing it toward the running shoe that lay on the ground.

  “Got the next best thing.” He headed for the bus. “Be right back.”

  He bounded onto the bus and grabbed a T-shirt that someone had tossed onto the front seat, then opened the beer cooler. Not too much ice remained, but the water was frigid. He soaked the shirt and headed back to her.

  “Maybe this will help,” he offered.

  She sat with her forehead resting on her raised right knee, her left leg stretched out before her in a straight line, bare toes pointing skyward. His first impression had been correct. She had nice legs, a nice little body.