by Katie Dowe
This time, those smoky blue-gray eyes met hers, and the relief she felt was strong enough to nearly bring her to her knees.
“Heidi.”
“Christian,” said Heidi, and walked to his side.
Suddenly, she wasn’t sure what to say or do.
“I’m glad you’re here,” said Christian, finally.
Heidi smiled.
“Wouldn’t be anywhere else,” she told him, and he smiled at her.
“Came back for you.”
Heidi’s hand covered his again.
“For me?”
“Heard you. Came back for you. You sang for me.”
She nodded, and didn’t try to stop the tears this time, again.
Leaning down, she pressed her lips to it carefully, tenderly. She didn’t want to hurt him.
But his lips were soft and warm, after the water he’d had. His lips parted, and his tongue slid over her lips.
She sighed against him as she felt his arms around her, and when she pulled away, she rested her forehead against his.
“You’re back. You’re really back,” she said, and she felt him sigh.
“I am. We’ll talk. Mom?”
“On her way,” said Heidi.
He looked at her.
“I don’t know how much of what I remember is real. How much of it is real?”
Heidi smiled.
“If you remember it, it’s all real. It’s real to you. It’s real to me.”
Christian nodded, and his eyes closed again.
Heidi had to fight a moment of blind panic as she watched his eyes close.
“I won’t leave,” said Christian, but the efforts had already tired him out.
Heidi didn’t move her hand from his, though, and she felt his fingers move again.
When Gina came in, she got up. But his hand tightened on hers.
“Your mom is here. Don’t overdo it, Christian. I’ll be right outside,” promised Heidi, and watched those eyes open again.
She saw that light in them when he saw her, and she saw those lips curve in a smile when he saw Gina.
“You bad, silly boy. You’re in big trouble,” said Gina, and her eyes shone with tears, too.
“I know,” said Christian, before he was enveloped in a warm and gentle hug.
Heidi slipped away, slowly, and made her way to the cafeteria to get herself something cool to drink.
She needed it.
Christian was awake.
She could hardly believe it.
What did it mean for her? He remembered some of what she’d told him. He remembered how she’d sung to him.
Heidi wasn’t sure what to make of that. She didn’t know what she was supposed to do, really.
Did he remember everything?
She wasn’t sure how long she’d been sitting there when she felt somebody else sitting next to her. She looked up and saw Gina.
The joy she’d felt when she’d felt his fingers moving was plain on Gina’s face.
Heidi smiled.
“He’s come back to us,” said Gina, and this time, neither of them needed to hold it together for anybody’s sake.
They clung to each other, and wept in sheer relief.
*****
“Another day, Dale. I just… Look, he just came out of the coma. I need another day. Please.”
Heidi stood in the hospital and begged for a few more hours to make one of the most important decisions in her life.
“Thank you!” she said, finally, ready to weep again, this time from both relief and frustration.
She felt like she’d been crying for the last hour. At least she had Mrs. Spinelli and Bobby there, too.
“There, you don’t have to be strong all the time, my girl. He’s awake now, isn’t he?”
Heidi sniffled a bit, and let herself lean on Mrs. Spinelli for just a moment.
Just for a moment, she told herself. She needed it.
“Bobby…”
“Taken care of, Heidi. Dogs are all fine. Juno is a little off, I took her to the vet. Nothing much, just feeling her age a bit. But she’s getting all her tests done, just in case. Everything’s good.”
Heidi nodded gratefully.
Bobby was a gift, and one she really needed at the moment.
“Heidi, Christian is asking for you.”
Heidi looked up and saw Gina. She left Gina and Mrs. Spinelli, who had become pretty good friends, to catch up with each other and went to see Christian.
He was awake. She could still hardly believe it.
He couldn’t stay up for long stretches, and he was definitely tired, but he was awake.
He would be fine. There was absolutely no lasting damage, and there were no bad signs.
Rick had come by, and Christian had already declared his intention to go right back to his job as soon as he was cleared.
The thought made Heidi’s fingertips go cold with nerves, but she knew that he would, just as she knew that he needed to.
It wasn’t just a job for him. It was who he was.
She popped her head in, the smile firmly in place.
“Hey!”
“Come here,” said Christian, and he looked very serious.
She walked in and sat next to him, taking in the almost somber look on his face.
She couldn’t look away from his eyes. She hadn’t realized just how much she loved his eyes until it seemed like she could never see them again.
“Mom tells me that you’ve got a few paying gigs.”
“Dale has really come through.”
“You should take it.”
Heidi kept her eyes on his.
“I don’t want to leave you.”
That was just the truth, and it was all she had.
“Heidi… It wasn’t mom who told me. I know you’re thinking that. But I know because you told me. You told me everything.”
Heidi was stunned, and it showed.
“You remember everything?” she asked.
He nodded.
“I do. I remember you singing to me. I remember… A lot. Not everything, perhaps, but a lot. It was like being trapped inside a bubble, or under ice. I could hear you, somehow. I could feel you, too, sometimes. Your hand in mine, your lips on my forehead. But I couldn’t do anything. It was as if the body I had taken for granted for so long, which had done everything I asked, had finally betrayed me.”
Heidi shook her head.
“It didn’t. It just needed some time. You pushed too hard, Christian. That was all. Your body needed time. You responded amazingly well. The doctors said that you’re a prime physical specimen!”
She made him smile, as she’d wanted him to.
“It’s nice to be able to smile. I could hear you, and I needed to smile at you, laugh with you, touch you. So many times. But I couldn’t. I was trying, so hard, but I couldn’t.”
Heidi held his hand, and waited.
“Heidi, you should go for the gigs. I’ll be waiting for you. It will be a few weeks before I’m cleared for anything. I won’t be fit for work for a lot longer. It’s not like I won’t be right where you left me. Or maybe at mom’s place, because I don’t see her letting me out of her sight for a while.”
Heidi grinned.
“I share your mother’s sentiment there. You have a wonderful family, Christian. You should cherish them.”
They were silent for a long moment, each thinking of the weeks that had gone by.
“I don’t know if I can bear to let you out of my sight, either,” confessed Heidi, finally.
Christian’s hand squeezed hers, and she still couldn’t believe the little thrill when she felt it.
She’d wondered if she would ever feel it again.
“I don’t, either. But… Heidi, I need to say this. You know I will wait for you, because my heart is yours. I gave it to you when that was all I could do. I wanted to give you everything – comfort, words, actions. But I could give you none of it. I gave you my heart, and I hoped you could fee
l it, somehow.”
Heidi’s heart filled, until she thought it might burst.
“Christian,” she whispered, and kissed him, softly, with all the tenderness she could muster.
“I love you. I love you so much. I thought I might lose you, and I never told you that I’d begun to fall in love with you that night you came to listen to me sing. I kept sliding slowly into love, and I didn’t tell you. I saw you here, hooked up to all of these machines that I’m grateful for but hate viciously, and all I wanted was to be able to look into your eyes again and tell you that you made everything better for me. You mean so much to me.”
She felt his arms around her, holding her, and it felt like being home.
“It’s all right, Heidi. I’m fine now. I’m okay now. I’ll be fine. I’ll be waiting for you. This is your chance, my love. You should take it. I’d never forgive myself if you didn’t take it. I’ll be well taken care of. You know that. You can tell me everything that happens, and I will imagine all of the audiences you will win over, completely, because that’s what you do.”
Heidi couldn’t help the tears. She seemed to be crying far more than she ever had before.
But they weren’t just happy tears.
“I don’t want to leave you,” she said, again.
“I promise not to go into a coma again until you come back,” he teased her, and it did what it was supposed to.
She sat up and glared at him.
“If you even…”
He chuckled.
“I was kidding. You should go. I’ll want videos of every night.”
Heidi could see that the conversation had taxed him. He was looking a bit pale, thought Heidi.
“I have another day to decide. We’ll see. For the moment, I’m not going anywhere, so get some sleep,” she told him, and sat there, beside him, as he drifted off to sleep.
Heidi didn’t leave.
She sat there and watched him, and saw the small movements his body made. They reassured her that he was still with her.
Finally, when his mother came in, she saw Heidi asleep beside Christian, her dark head resting beside his hand, her hand still in his.
Gina felt a pang, for just a moment.
She wasn’t first in her son’s heart any more. She could rejoice it and still feel that bittersweet pain of knowing that her son had finally found what she’d always wanted him to.
She backed out of the room, and left her son in the very capable and loving hands of the woman she had come to love very much, indeed.
Christian could definitely have done worse, thought Gina. He couldn’t have done much better.
Heidi and Christian were going to make some fine looking babies. She was going to have beautiful grandchildren.
Gina walked until she found an empty stairwell.
Finally, Gina let herself break down, and feel all of the fears she had kept at bay so fiercely for far too long.
The sobs wracked her frame, until it felt like she might break apart from them.
A hand squeezed her shoulder, making her jump.
She turned around and saw Mrs. Spinelli standing there.
“It’s all right. Your boy is in very good hands. My Heidi, she’s strong. She’s as strong as we are. We have to be, don’t we? She will need it. She will love him more than she knows she can. Your Christian and my Heidi will be happy together.”
Gina nodded, and took the strength that Mrs. Spinelli offered so generously.
“Our children. They will always be ours, Maria.”
Mrs. Spinelli smiled.
“They will, even when they have their own. Do you think they know how deeply they have fallen for each other?”
Gina smiled, finally.
“Oh, Christian is slow to make up his mind when it comes to his own life, but once he makes it up, he moves quite fast. I think Heidi is in for a bit of a surprise.”
Mrs. Spinelli laughed heartily.
“There, you’ve had your cry, and well you deserve it. Now come on up and have a meal. You haven’t tasted food in weeks. Not hospital cafeteria food. I brought food.”
Gina smiled, and gratefully let herself be led back into the world where there was color and happiness, and she ate Mrs. Spinelli’s lasagna.
Finally, she tasted food again.
Finally, she felt alive again.
*****
“One month, Dale, and I’ll want the contract reviewed. I’m very grateful for everything, but you’re right about the contract. Even to me, it seems fairly restrictive.”
Dale grinned.
“Good girl. I can point out a few things right now, but it’s better to have a lawyer do it. Now, you’ll want to retain rights so that you can upload your performances to YouTube and so on.”
She nodded, busily going through it.
She was going to go on tour. Christian had pointed out a few fair points, the best of them being that he would get so cranky in two weeks that she’d wish she’d gone on tour.
He didn’t want her to resent him for missing out on one of the biggest opportunities of her life. She didn’t, either.
Besides, it felt as if she and Christian had come to an agreement, as far as their relationship was concerned. She had never been in favor of long-distance relationships, but a month wasn’t years. A month was definite.
Whatever came after that, they could handle, together.
They were together. There were no questions of that anymore.
Heidi still hadn’t gotten used to it. She and Christian were together.
They were in love.
They had said the words. Once they started saying the words, it felt like they could never stop.
She hoped they wouldn’t.
Heidi felt as if she could sing all of the world’s love songs and mean them all.
So Heidi found a lawyer – Rick knew one, of course – and signed on the dotted line.
She spent every minute she could with Christian.
Bobby, she discovered, was even more dependable than she’d hoped he’d be. Her dogs would be in good hands.
Still, she wasn’t ashamed to admit that she’d shed a few tears when she said goodbye to them, for two whole months.
She could come back with enough capital to consider their business more seriously, she comforted herself.
She’d let her schoolwork slide a bit, but she would catch up when she was back from her tour.
She was going on tour. It was scary.
Every time she felt it get a bit too big, Christian gave her strength.
“It’s only fair. I seem to have taken a bit too much of it,” he teased her.
Finally, it was time to leave.
Saying goodbye wasn’t easy. So she didn’t say goodbye.
“See you later,” she said, and kissed Christian, long and hard.
“But not in the hospital,” said Christian, and pulled her closer to deepen that kiss.
Heidi smiled.
Christian was going home – to the home where he’d grown up.
And she was off chasing a dream that finally felt like it might be within her grasp.
Everything was changing.
Chapter 10
Heidi smiled and bowed.
The standing ovation – no matter how many times she got it, and in the last couple of weeks she’d gotten it at least four times, there was no getting used to it.
“All right, everybody, now we’ve got for you the people you really came to see. Put your hands, and whatever else you can, together for The Spinettes!”
She even heard a couple of calls for an encore as she waved and walked off the stage, the guitar clutched in her hand like a lifeline.
She walked straight to her bag and pulled her phone out.
She smiled when she saw the message. Christian, of course. He always wished her luck at the exact moment she walked onstage. She didn’t know how he did it. But every time she walked on, she heard her phone beep his tone, and she knew that everything would be
fine. She would do great.
Once she was done, she replied.
Went great. I miss you.
She would send him the link to the video later.
Heidi knew she’d made the right decision by doing the tour. But she missed him, so much. Every night, they talked about everything.
He was better. He was beginning to complain about not being back at work, so he was definitely better. Heidi would never have thought that she’d feel such relief at somebody whining about not being able to go back to work!
Her dogs were fine, too. Bobby was doing an excellent job with them. Not being made principal dancer didn’t seem to weigh him down so much anymore. He even sounded happy now.
Would he realize soon that he had never really been happy as a dancer? She hoped he would.
She was saving money. If somebody gave her a recording deal, she’d be able to put aside enough to invest in their grand plan.
She’d make it work, she promised herself.
“Hey, Heidi! You blew them away tonight. At this rate, by the end of the tour, they’ll have to open for you instead of the other way around!”
Heidi laughed as she accepted compliments gracefully.
She was getting used to those, too.
Finally, thought Heidi – finally, she was a singer. She no longer felt like a fraud when she told anybody she was a musician. Until the tour, she’d felt like a worker in a dead-end job pretending to be a singer because reality was so bleak.
The relief that she could make it, that she finally had proof that she was good enough, was stupendous.
But there was another kind of relief – relief that they were halfway through the tour. She needed to go back home, to Christian.
The tour was another kind of test, too. It was a test that her feelings for Christian could handle the distance. And that his feelings for her could last despite the distance, despite her hectic schedule while he was obviously bored out of his head.
Two weeks until he could go back to work.
Until she went back to him.
Things would change then. Heidi knew that. But she was beginning to embrace change, too. Even if it also meant uncertainty about her future with Christian, she would embrace it, and trust that they would find their way.
Until then, she would perform almost every night, and she would make those important contacts.
She would do her best and leave the rest to chance, because for once, she felt that luck was favoring her. It didn’t happen too often. She was going to make the most of it while it did.
