Below the Music-Part 2
They were very secluded from any other lights, and the sky above them was covered with thousands of brightly glittering stars.
“What a view!” Isabel said.
“It is beautiful,” Cordan said. “Hey, can I talk to you?”
Something in the way he said it made her look at him quickly. “Of course.” She started twisting her fingers around in the other hand.
“Whatever happened to your friend John?” John was her former boyfriend. “Do you still talk to him?” Cordan asked.
“No!” Isabel laughed. “I haven’t talked to John in months, and he moved to St. Louis back in October.”
“Oh okay. Does he have a replacement now?”
Isabel fixed him with a steady gaze. “No. He was the replacement, but hardly adequate.”
“The replacement for who?”
Isabel answered slowly, face turned down but her eyes looking up at him. “If you truly want to know—you.”
The silence hung heavy in the air between them. Isabel broke eye contact and turned away from him.
“Isabel.” The sound of her name on his tongue was like silver falling. He had never used that tone before. She turned to face him, wondering.
They were only a few inches apart now. She could hear and feel his breathing. He was looking at her as someone would look at a newborn puppy or a fragile masterpiece that might shatter into pieces if you moved.
“Isabel…” he reached out and took her hand. His hand was warm and soft, and the mere touch was strangely distracting.
“I said some things to you last summer that I regret,” he said, studying her hand as if he were afraid to look into her face. “I believed them when I said them, but—” at this point he lifted his gaze to hers—“they are not true now.”
Her eyes flew open. She was lying in bed, covered with blankets and her thick purple bedspread. She bolted up to a sitting position, breathing hard. It had just been a dream! All of it! The party, her song, the secret passageway, her time alone with Cordan…
She sunk down against her pillow, dejected. It had seemed so real! And Cordan… Cordan had been talking to her as if maybe he felt something… but none of it was real.
Two tears ran down her face, but she brushed them aside and sat up again. She thought back to how they had first met.
Dominic had brought over a friend from school. That was six years ago, when she was 13. She had walked into the family room one afternoon and been startled to find a strange boy there with her brother. A strange, shockingly cute boy. She remembered the way she had shyly slunk back against the TV cupboard, self-consciously pushing hair behind her ear while she tried not to stare at him.
He came over often to hang out with Dominic and Edward, and sometimes he would speak to her—just a word or a sentence. And try as she might, she could never think of more than a word or two to say to him. It was torture. Every day she hoped he would come over, and when he did, she would try to be near him. She would steal glances at him when she thought no one was looking, but just to have a simple conversation with him seemed impossible.
He rarely seemed to notice her. On the few occasions when he did, when he would ask her how she was or hold the door for her or anything at all, she would think about it all day long afterward.
The years went by, and things did not change much until one afternoon, Isabel was lying on her back on the wide sunny window seat reading Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. She sat up and began reading it aloud in different voices for the different speakers.
Suddenly Cordan walked up to her, speaking Lysander’s lines in an appropriately exaggerated voice.
She looked up at him, smiling.
“You’re not a bad actress, Isabel!” he said.
“Thank you. You’re not a bad actor!”
“I love Shakespeare,” Cordan said, sitting down next to her and picking up her book which she had set down on the cushion. Isabel’s heart began to race. “Which of his works are here?” Cordan thumbed through the table of contents. “Quite a few. Which is your favorite?”
“Romeo and Juliet,” Isabel answered at once. She could not believe he was sitting next to her having a conversation with her. She wondered if he could hear her heart pounding.
“That’s a good one, but it’s too tragic for me,” Cordan said. “I prefer a happy ending.”
“Yes, but even though they died tragically, their love for each other stopped all the deaths and killings of their families,” Isabel said. “I think it’s sad but beautiful.”
Cordan nodded. “I think you might enjoy the book club I just joined. We sit around reading and talking about Shakespeare and lots of old classics. If you want to come and check it out, they would love to have you.”
“Really?” Isabel asked in a voice pitched too high. Why, oh why, couldn’t she just speak like a normal 18 year old around him?
“Sure,” Cordan said. “They meet at the corner café on Saturday mornings.”
“I will come!” Isabel said.
“I will look for you!” He smiled. “We start at 10:00.”
Isabel got up at 8 am Saturday morning. She had to shower and wash and fix her hair. She hurried to do her makeup and grab a bite to eat because she could not afford the expensive menu at that particular café, and she wasn’t herself if she didn’t have breakfast. She cut her meal short, brushed her teeth for thirty seconds, and ran for the car.
Slamming her car door shut, she looked at the dashboard and groaned. How had she forgotten to get gas? Her gas gage was on empty. She didn’t think she could even get to the café without filling up first. She sped out of the driveway, angrily berating herself for forgetting.
Not only did she have to get gas, but the traffic was unusually heavy for a Saturday morning. By the time she finally walked into the corner café and spotted Cordan and a group of others in an alcove at the back of the shop, every seat was taken and they were clearly well into their discussion. When she walked up, the leader stopped talking and looked at her.
“Hi,” she said, embarrassed. “I’m Isabel.”
“Are you here for the book club?” asked the speaker, a blond-haired thirty-something man with glasses.
“Yes.”
“Okay, let’s see…looks like all our seats are taken, but let’s see what we can do. Mary and Isaac, do you think you can make some room for her on your couch?”
The young couple spoken to reluctantly squeezed over to one side of their loveseat and Isabel sat down, blushing slightly. She didn’t dare make eye contact with Cordan. Why couldn’t she have gotten there early?? The café was so close to her house! It was really embarrassing, and she wanted so badly to make a good impression.
The book discussion was not bad, but Isabel’s experience was tarnished by her own feelings of embarrassment. It was not even eleven o’clock when Cordan began to stand up.
“You going, Cordan?” asked the leader.
“Yes, I have somewhere to be by 11:30, so I have to step out early today,” he said, standing up and hoisting a tan backpack onto his shoulders.
Isabel’s heart sank. She did not know he was leaving early. Not only did she embarrass herself, but she would not get to talk to him at all.
“All right, thanks for your input,” said the first man, Dane. “Drive safe.”
“Thanks. Goodbye,” Cordan said, looking around at all ten of them. His gaze lingered for half a second longer on Isabel.
“Goodbye,” she said. He walked to the door and the bell on the door chimed as it shut behind him.
Isabel did not really hear anything else that was said in the meeting, and she left as soon as she could at the end.
A week later she was walking down the sidewalk across from the Amtrak station when she looked up to see Cordan standing by the train tracks, a large suitcase at his side. Isabel looked both ways and ran across the street.
“Cordan, is that you?” she exclaimed, jogging up to him.
“Oh hi, Isabel,” he said, looking up from his phone.
“Hi! Are you taking a trip?”
“Yes, I’m going to Arizona.”
“Arizona! What are you doing there?”
“I signed up with a band out there. It has all happened really fast. I just auditioned online earlier this week, and they let me know a few days ago. They want me there by Saturday.”
“You’re moving and you didn’t tell us?” Isabel said, unable to keep the hurt out of her voice.
“I’m sorry!” Cordan said. “I did tell Dominic, and I texted you too this morning. I wish I didn’t have to go so soon, but like I said, it all happened so fast.”
Isabel just stood there shaking her head, devastated. She had not seen any text. A whistle blew loudly, and a train rushed down the tracks toward them.
He put his arms around her and hugged her. “I’ll text you,” he promised.
He had never hugged her before, or even touched her. She clung to him, not willing to let him go. Gently he extricated himself from her embrace and boarded the standing train. He stopped at the window and waved to her as the train pulled out of the station.
Isabel stood there unmoving, looking after the train long after it had gone.
Gone. Just like that. Years of love and now he was totally gone in an instant. She turned away from the tracks and walked blindly through the town, trying not to cry and failing miserably. It was so sudden! Completely without warning. Why hadn’t he had the decency to tell them??
She pulled her phone from her pocket and blinked. There was a text message from him from an hour ago.
She opened it.
“Hi isabel, it’s cordan. i just wanted to let you know ill be moving to arizona for a new work gig I got with this one band. thanks for coming to book club the other day. you should keep going. it would be fun. See you soon.”
So he had texted her after all.
“Fun?” she said aloud. “It won’t be fun without you!”
“How soon is soon?” she texted back.
“Probably a few months,” the answer came right back.
At least he was responding. They had never really texted back and forth before.
Over the next few months, the two of them kept texting. Cordan sent Isabel pictures and clips from his concerts. She kept him updated on her life at home. She was almost happy, for even though he was gone, they were talking more than they ever had before. She got to know another side of him—his inner world—besides the energy, kindness, and enthusiasm she had always loved about him.
On Christmas afternoon, there was a knock at the back door. Isabel went to answer it. When she opened the door and saw Cordan’s handsome face and gorgeous smile, her heart leaped in her chest and she attacked him with a bear hug.
“Merry Christmas Isabel!” he wrapped his arms around her, laughing.
“I can’t believe you’re really here!” she exclaimed, spinning him in a circle. She was so excited she was literally beaming with happiness.
He chuckled. “I am here all right, and I have something for you.” He dug into the large paper sack he was holding and pulled out a thin rectangularly-shaped gift which he handed to Isabel.
Isabel was so surprised she could not move, except to hold and stare at the wrapped present.
“Do you want to open it?” Cordan asked.
Mutely she nodded, and awkwardly tore open the wrapping paper, revealing a book of piano music. Her eyes went wide. “This is my favorite band!” she exclaimed.
Cordan nodded. “I know. That’s why I bought it.”
Isabel hugged him. “Thank you so much, Cordan! I feel terrible, though. I didn’t get you a present!”
“That’s okay. You didn’t know I was coming home. But you’ll have to play some of those songs for me.”
Isabel’s face shone. “I’ll play you the whole book if you’ll listen!”
At this point, Dominic appeared and rushed at Cordan, yelling greetings and slapping him on the back.
It was the happiest Christmas Day Isabel could remember, but the very next day Cordan had to fly back to Arizona.
“When will you be back?” Isabel asked him after he said goodbye that night.
“I don’t really know,” he admitted. “It’s expensive to fly out, so it will probably be a long time.”
“I wish—” Isabel began but stopped herself.
“What do you wish?” Cordan asked, his eyes lighting up.
“Nevermind,” Isabel said, shaking her head. She had been going to say, “I wish I could go with you,” but then realized how that would sound.
Now, sitting in her bed reminiscing, Isabel wished she had just said it. Let him think what he would, how she wished she had let him know how she felt. Not that he would have taken her with him, but if only he had known what he meant to her before he signed a three-year contract with the Arizona band and bought the house out there. Now they saw him once a year, if that. But there was not a single day that she did not miss him.
Part 3 will be posted within a week.