Rhythm in Blue (12 page)

Dear Rick,

First, I want to thank you for everything you’ve done for me. It has been a privilege to work with you and be taught by you. There is no way I can ever repay you.

Second, I know I let my feelings for you get out of control and I know you think it’s just a schoolgirl crush, and that’s probably how it started, but it turned into so much more than that, for me anyway.

At first, I’ll admit, I was in awe of you. The way you treated me, like I was important to you and how what I said really mattered, well, I thought you were amazing. Here I thought you were  opening up to me and showing me the real you
–
not the persona you give to the public and your fans, but you were just pulling me in the whole time, while I thought we were connecting on such a deep level.

You completely fooled me, and I should have known better. The day you lied to my parents was the first sign, but I ignored it. When you were drunk, and wanted me to sleep with you? That was the next sign. Stupid me.

You might as well have fucked me so you could have that notch on your belt. That would have been less hurtful. But to you, I was just another little groupie throwing herself at you. The way you just left me there? Like I didn’t even matter? Like everything that led up to that moment was just bullshit, and my feelings meant nothing. That hurt the most.

I meant what I said that day, how I wished I could be your girlfriend. You said if I were older, I would be. Why would you play with my head like that? I really thought you felt the same way when I kissed you. When you kissed me back, I thought that meant you loved me too, but that was just you finally showing who you really are.

I trusted you and you took advantage. Is that the way the big boys play? Make them feel like they count, and then use them as your plaything? You’re not growing up, you’re just finding a new game to keep yourself from getting bored.

Anyway, thanks,

Shelby

Rick folded the letter and put it back in the envelope. He rose from his chair, walked to the railing of the veranda, leaned over the edge, and threw up.

Chapter Thirteen

Spring 1980

As the stage lights went down, the thunder emanating from the arena grew to a wall-shaking level. The sold out crowd screamed and stomped for more. Rick liked this part of the show – the fake farewell, the fans begging them to come back on stage for just a few more songs. Encore! Encore! They had just enough time for a drink and a quick smoke before going back on stage to appease the roaring crowd.

It was their twenty-eighth sold out show on the tour, and their album,
Lord of the Sunrise
had climbed to number eight on the charts. The single,
Don’t Ask Me to Stay
, made it to number three. They always saved it for the last song of the night, and by the end of the show, the fans chanted the title, begging Smoke n’ Mirrors to answer their call.

As they stepped back onto the stage, the thunder grew louder. Keith sat back at the drums, Devon took his spot between the piano and synthesizer, while Randy and Rick strapped their guitars on again. They waited for the crowd to quiet down, and then Keith hit the drums, signaling the start of the song. Devon began to croon
Heartbreak on the Bayou
in his salty, southern style, while Randy and Rick sang harmony on the chorus. The crowd, temporarily appeased, loudly sang along, Devon’s voice barely audible above them.

The final song was Rick’s to begin and to sing. As he plucked the first four notes of the song on his bass, the crowd cheered wildly, but respectfully hushed to hear him cry out the first verse that would begin
Don’t Ask Me to Stay
. The song always made Rick sad, and though born from Randy’s remorse at leaving Morgan, it made Rick think of Shelby. He poured his emotions into every word, and the fans loved it.

When it was over, they walked off stage bowing and waving in thanks. The crowd quieted, instinctively knowing that Smoke n’ Mirrors had no more to give. Tonight, they would not linger after the show – they were finally going home. The bus trip would take four hours, and it would nearly be light out when they arrived, but they could at last sleep in their own beds.

Less than a year had passed since they had watched Erin take Kostas’s hand and ask the priest to marry them. They came back to the States and went right to work on
Lord of the Sunrise
, and before it even hit the stores, they embarked on the tour that would push it up the charts. Rick started to feel burnt out long before the end, and the strain of the long days and late nights was showing on everyone. But what lie ahead would be no picnic either. They would have a short break and would have to begin working on their next album. Their contract with the studio demanded it. They already had about six songs for the album and the beginnings of several more, having had too many for
Lord of the Sunrise
. They considered releasing it as a double album, but it would only count as one against their contract, so they saved the remaining songs for the follow-up.

Devon timed the end of the tour to coincide with the expected due date of his first child. He and his on-again off-again girlfriend, Julia, married not long after their return from Greece. He came home to the news that she was pregnant, and Devon was anxious to become a father. Rick was happy for him, and glad that at least one of them could settle down and find something permanent to hold onto. Rick, on the other hand, returned to his habit of finding a new girl after almost every show, preferring to continue with no emotional ties, but he was the only one. Keith had a girlfriend he’d been seeing for about six months, and even Randy shunned the promiscuous lifestyle he’d perfected. He corresponded with Morgan regularly and she planned to visit after the tour.

When they left the venue and Rick settled himself at the back of the bus, he closed his eyes, drifted to sleep, and dreamed, as he often did, of Paros. Always confusing and muddled, he searched the scenarios for hidden meanings he could never find. This time, he dreamed he took the ferry and upon reaching the island, could not find his way off the boat. As the passengers got off, and new ones got on, Rick frantically ran around looking for stairs that would take him to the exit. When he couldn’t find a way off, he decided he would jump, but as he looked over the railing to the water below, he found he was several hundred feet up. The drop would kill him. Erin stood on the dock, angry he wouldn’t get off the ship. He called to her, trying to explain, but she couldn’t hear him.

Next, he dreamt he was lying on the sidewalk by the chapel under the rocks. A sea of screaming fans replaced the water, all wanting him to play
Don’t Ask Me to Stay
. His bass was on his lap, but his hands and fingers were too fat to isolate the strings. Each time he tried, the guitar made a terrible screech, and the sea of fans began booing. Instead, he tried to sing the lyrics, but he could only sing in a whisper, and the sea booed louder. Beside him, Devon’s focus was putting on his flippers, and when Rick asked him to help start the song, Devon shook his head and said, “My feet won’t stop growing!”

It was just before dawn when the bus dropped them off, and Rick, still groggy and dazed from his dreams, fumbled for his car keys which found their way to the bottom of his bag. Finding them, he opened the car, threw his bag in the back, climbed in, and started the engine. He pulled his Mustang out of the parking garage and headed toward the freeway that would take him home. It was a half-hour drive, and he passed the time trying to piece together his dreams from the bus. He hoped he might remember glimpsing Shelby. She almost never appeared in his dreams. Sometimes, he had the feeling she had been there, but he couldn’t remember anything specific.

Rick took the exit leading to his home in the mountains outside Boulder, Colorado, and after a few miles, turned onto the isolated road snaking up the hill. The light snow covering the ground grew deeper as he climbed, and he made a mental note to get the studded tires mounted. He thought about his dream of sitting on the sidewalk, his fingers too fat and swollen to play – what did it mean? Why had Devon been so concerned about his big feet and the stupid flipper that wouldn’t fit? And, he wondered why he couldn’t find his way off the ferry. He knew exactly how to find the stairs leading to the gangplank, but in his dream, all the stairs led up. He was a stranded passenger, not allowed to disembark and join the revelry – he could only stare wistfully from the deck.

In his mind, the dream changed to a new one, one of him begging Erin not to tell their father he was dead. The dream startled him so badly, he woke just in time to see his car careening toward a steep cliff falling away from the road. Rick slammed on the breaks and jerked the wheel, but it was too late. He had the sensation of falling, and he could hear glass breaking and metal ripping. He wished he’d jumped off the boat when he had the chance.

~

The sound of Keith’s bass drum echoed in Rick’s head, Devon couldn’t seem to find the right note on the synthesizer. They weren’t playing in the same time, and Rick’s irritation grew. Devon attacked the instrument with both hands, but all that came out was
beep, beep, beep
. Meanwhile, Keith’s drum beat didn’t come close to matching Devon’s beeping. Rick growled in frustration, and Devon turned to Keith, saying, “I think he’s trying to talk.” This only made Rick angrier, and he pulled his arm back to take a swing at Devon, but the movement sent waves of pain through his body and brought an involuntary scream to his throat, though the sound didn’t match the effort.

“Did you see that? He moved his hand!” He could hear Devon, but he couldn’t see him anymore.

“Are you sure? I didn’t see it.” The voice belonged to Erin.

“Yeah, his hand just jerked a little bit.”

“Should we call the doctor?” Erin’s voice asked.

Rick tried to call to her, but his throat hurt when he tried, and a muffled moan was the best he could offer.

“Get the doctor! I think he’s waking up!” Rick couldn’t see anything anymore. The noises and voices surrounding him floated in the darkness, and he struggled to anchor them to something. He wanted to open his eyes, but couldn’t make them do anything. Then, he felt someone holding his hand, gently caressing it, and he heard Erin, “Please Ricky, wake up.” He could hear the tears in her voice, so he worked a little harder to open his eyes. He needed to show her he was okay, because he could tell she was worried. Gradually, pieces of light began to pierce his brain, and he squeezed his lids shut to block out the pain accompanying the light. He felt a hand on his face, brushing his hair aside. His eyes opened a crack, and he could see a silhouette against the light.

“Ricky?” Erin asked excitedly. He groaned in response and saw her form replaced by a much larger shape.

“Let’s have a look, shall we?” said an unfamiliar voice. His eye opened, seemingly on its own, and the brightest of lights shone into it, then, the other eye. “Mr. Rowland, can you hear me?” the strange voice asked. Rick heard himself moan in reply, his surroundings coming into focus. He tried to move his head to search for Erin, but a searing pain accompanied the movement, so he stopped.

“Okay, try not to move or to talk anymore. I’m Dr. Howard, and you’ve been involved in an accident, Mr. Rowland. You have some severe injuries, so you need to keep very still for now.” The voice came from a man in a white coat. “You have a tube in your throat to help you breathe, so you can’t talk. We will remove the tube in a few minutes, but talking will still be difficult.” Terrified, Rick didn’t remember an accident, but he could tell by the way Erin looked and the way he felt that things were bad.

The doctor turned and left the room, and Erin returned to her post, again stroking his face and smiling through her tears. On his other side stood Devon, a fatigued look of concern on his face.

“Ricky, we’ve been so worried about you,” Erin cried. “I thought I’d lost you!”

Devon must have seen the question in Rick’s eyes, so he explained, “You went off the road on your way home, after we got off the bus.” Rick tried to remember, but his mind was blank. “The police couldn’t find a cause for the accident – they think you probably fell asleep.”

The doctor returned with several other people dressed in white. “Okay Mr. Rowland, we are going to take out the tube, but you’re going to have to help. When I tell you to, you’ll need to cough, it will help us remove the tube and be less painful for you.” Rick tried to nod that he understood. He coughed when they told him to, and the tube came out. “Do you want to try and talk for me?” asked the doctor.

“Okay,” Rick said, in an almost inaudible voice.

One of the people in white left the room with the tubes and equipment, and another wrote on a chart taken from the end of his bed. “You are a very lucky man, Mr. Rowland,” Dr. Howard said as he checked the tubes attached to Rick’s body.

“How long?” Rick croaked.

“How long have you been here? You were brought in about a week ago. Your body has kindly been trying to recover without you, to save you from unnecessary suffering.”

Devon pushed a chair to the doctor, who pulled it closer to the bed and sat down. “Ricky, you broke your back in a car accident – three vertebrae. I don’t want you to panic, it sounds much worse than it is. The good news is there doesn’t appear to be any permanent damage to your spinal cord.”

Rick could hear the doctor, but he could only focus on the man’s large teeth as he spoke. The information he imparted was lost on Rick, too much for him to comprehend.