by Stanislaw Kaslowski
The Rockstar Muse Part 3
Andrew squirmed uncomfortably on the small, vinyl seat at Gate 11 in Kansas City International Airport, known around town as KCI. Frustrated, he angrily slammed shut his leather bound copy of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, the heavy maroon covers resounding with a loud pop as they connected with the pages of the weighty tome. Andrew had started reading “King Lear” immediately upon sitting down, but two hours later he found himself staring blankly at the same sentence.
Andrew sighed heavily, a sound of frustration and anger, and looked impatiently at his watch. Seven o’clock. He breathed an audible sigh of relief. They would start boarding any second now. He had been sitting in this same damn seat for over two hours, trying to find a way to comfortably squeeze 210 pounds in between the hard metal arms of the uncomfortable airport seat. He had been unsuccessful in that endeavor, his attempt at passing time by reading ultimately proving no match for his nerves, frayed as they were by the prospect of going to Denver. Air travel had never been a strong suit of his, and the circumstances of this trip weren’t helping the gnawing, painful anxiety that held his gut in a vise-like grip.
His fingers drummed on the right arm of his chair and his eyes ran over the same cheap wood paneling, cheap blue carpet, and masses of people who occupied both his gate and Kansas City International Airport that he had looked at dozens of time. His thoughts turned, as they had so often, to the series of events that led up to his sitting in KCI waiting for a plane to Denver. It had been almost exactly a month since his night with Stephanie, and everything in between was something of a blur that Andrew was still trying somewhat to sort out.
The letter had struggled to wiggle its way through his mail slot a week after Stephanie had disappeared into the Doubtless touring bus. It was a plain white envelope, his name and address scrawled sloppily, but legibly, in large, loopy cursive letters across the center of the envelope. The envelope was thick, bulky, and when he held it up to the light Andrew wasn’t able to distinguish any writing. There was no return address, but he knew whom it was from. Stephanie had asked for his return address before they had parted, and she had one of his business cards. The dots were easily connected.
His hand trembling, Andrew, with one quick, almost reckless motion, had ripped open the envelope, the entire upper half tearing away. In a miraculous stroke of luck, the contents inside weren’t harmed by Andrew’s carelessness.
He laid the items out on his desk as he took them out of the envelope. There was a first class ticket for Delta Airlines, the small, sharp black type spelling out in letters that seemed huge to Andrew where he was bound and when. 3 weeks hence Flight 343 was to leave Gate 11, destination Denver. He noticed almost instantly that it was a one way ticket.
The concert ticket Stephanie had enclosed entitled him to Seat 5 in the front row of the newly built Coors Center. Andrew smiled wryly at that. The Coors Center? Evidently the atmosphere of alcohol in Denver wasn’t painfully evident enough without the construction of yet another building named after a beer company.
Well, when Stephanie Newg does something, she really does it, he reflected upon pulling out by its elliptical string a pass that entitled him to full backstage access at the Doubtless concert. It was a simple little laminated piece of paper, signed by all 4 members of the band in what appeared to be purple crayon. Stephanie’s signature was the most distinctive of the 4, flamboyantly sloppy, the backstroke on the “g” in Newg extending for many and more inches.
It was the last item, however, that had made the envelope bulge to the point that it was barely able to fit through his mail slot. When Andrew pulled it out of the envelope it was a thick, napkin-sized bundle of folded paper with his name printed neatly on the outer piece of paper. He unfolded the bundle quickly, or tried to, his fingers stumbling over themselves in their haste to reveal Stephanie’s words. After a few false starts, Andrew managed to get the bundle open. He was startled at first when he saw that she had written him dozens of pages, but when he saw her handwriting he couldn’t suppress a chuckle. Her words were impeccably neat and legible, but her letters were ridiculously tall and wide, her blockish strokes occupying much more space than any relatively normal bit of chirography.
His eyes drunk in her words, eagerly as a man who has wandered weeks in the desert would gulp down a glass of water offered to him.
“Dearest Andrew,
” Hello from Dallas! I told you I would move Earth, Heaven and Hell if I had to for us to see each other again, and I’ll be damned, I pretty much had to do that. I practically had to pry that concert ticket out of Joe’s (he’s our manager) cold, dead hands! Babe, evidently you’re holding one of the most expensive tickets in North America in those hands of yours. I had to tell Joe I’d retire if I didn’t get that ticket. I don’t know what I would have done if he had called my bluff. And believe me when I tell you that for me, sitting down and writing this letter legibly was one of the seven labors of Hercules. Oh, by the way, thanks for letting me have that legal pad. I got some really good stuff down on paper, stuff that’s as good as anything I’ve ever written. And all this time I’ve always thought that it was anger and sadness that were the best muses; turns out pleasure can inspire me as well. Quite a revelation; we’ll have to do some more research into that phenomenon. You’re a freelance journalist? I got a laugh out of that one: I thought you told me you had real work you had to do. Damn, this paragraph is getting pretty long. I should probably start another one, don’t you think?
“About your flight: Don’t worry about booking a hotel or anything in Denver, or renting a car or any such nonsense. I’ll be there, maybe not with bells on, or with a giant flashing neon sign saying ‘Stephanie Newg looking for Andrew, man not her fiancé!’ but I will be there.
“That brings me to another, slightly more serious matter. You asked me before I left what we were going to do about Ross. I’d rather not end up one of Ross’ ex-girlfriends; it makes me sick to be on that list, but I should have thought of that before we kissed. I made my decision the moment I did kiss you. I’m yours, if you’ll have me, and you’re mine if you’ll give yourself to me. I like Ross, I like him an awful lot, but Andrew, we have something truly spectacular, something truly breathtaking. We have the love that I’ve sung about for 15 years, the kind I thought I’ve had twice before. But after that night, I know those were just mere pretensions of love. This, this is the real thing Andrew. I’ve only known you for a week, I realize, but I feel… it’s so hard to explain how I feel, except to say that it hurt, it ached when I left you. It still hurts every moment I’m not seeing you, or talking to you. What would I be doing to myself, to you if I just abandoned that because of the difficult publicity?”
A single tear fell from Andrew’s eye onto the paper. He swiped at his eye with the back of his hand and continued reading.
“However, that does bring up another more difficult point. You’re too smart to be laboring under the impression that the publicity wouldn’t be exceptionally difficult, and not just on me honey. Suffice it to say your day job would become considerably more difficult. Of course, you’re also too smart to believe that’s the real reasoning behind what I’m about to tell you. So, I’ll just cut to the quick with it: The publicity, as I said, would be immense, and it would not be particularly positive. And, as I’m sure Joe would remind me if I told him about this, we, meaning the band, are touring, and the last thing we really need on a tour is for people to get the impression that I just jump from man to man, and that’s what it would look like if it became known that I had dumped Ross to be with you. The opinions of the masses will change in a heartbeat, never doubt that.
“What I’m telling you, in a nutshell, is that we have to keep us a secret for a while. I’m not sure how long ‘a while’ is, because I know that’s exactly what you’re asking yourself right now. I understand how this must look to you, I really do. But you must know this: This does NOT mean that I am ashamed to love you, or ashamed of you, or any other variation on that same theme, no matter what all this secrecy may seem to indicate. I’m asking you to trust me on this. I’m asking you to believe me when I tell you that there is no possible way I could ever be ashamed of loving you, no matter the appearance. Please, just trust me. I know you know this, but it still has to be said: You can’t tell anybody about this. Not a word. Again, I know you know that, and I know you wouldn’t tell anybody intentionally, but I don’t really know that much about you. I don’t know how much drinking you do, where you do it if you do drink, who your friends are, or anything like that. To put this as delicately as I can, given the circumstances: Don’t put yourself in any situation where you might accidentally spill the beans. That’s a favor I ask of you.
“This may seem a little cold and insensitive, but speaking on a more practical level, we have some time before we have to make a decision on how to go public with this. Ross and his band of merry men are romping across Europe as we speak, and before he left Ross told me they were going to be gone for at least half a year, and probably more. We were going to get married when he got back. Plans change, don’t they?
Evidently he and the band have decided that visiting Europe will be inspirational and help them write quality music again. It’s a stupid idea, and an expensive one, but Ross was having none of it.
“As for us, we’re going to be touring around the West for another couple of months, and then Joe has given us two weeks off before we start touring in the East. We can work out the details later, but I’d love for you to come out to California for those two weeks and stay with me.
“But I’m getting ahead of myself, and I’m also getting more than a little verbose. Could you believe it’s taken me three hours to write this thing? And that’s with knowing exactly what I wanted to say, it’s that hard for me to write something legibly.
“Anyway, I really need to go. The show starts in an hour, and I’ve got to warm up my voice. One last thing: Joe’s scheduled us an off day in Denver the day after your flight arrives, so we’ll have that whole day together and the entire day after that before the concert. I think you’ll enjoy what I’ve got planned for us. And even if you don’t, you won’t have much say in the matter.
“Remember: I’ll see you in Denver, even if you don’t see me.
Love,
Stephanie”
As he shoved his book into the small green bag that was his lone carry-on, Andrew smiled as the memory of the letter came back to him. It was a truly remarkable piece of work, that letter. Andrew had often thought Stephanie Newg seemed rather scatter-brained, her words did nothing but confirm that. He found her scatter-brained intelligence touchingly charming, refreshingly spontaneous in a world where smarts were expected to be demonstrated in a very orderly, organized fashion.
He was brought back to the present by the pronounced Southern drawl of the disinterested woman at the Delta check-in desk over the airport intercom.
“Delta Airlines is pleased to announce the imminent boarding of Flight 343, bound for Denver and Las Vegas. We will be accepting those with pre-boarding situations at this time. Any families flying with children under the age of 5, or any children under the age of twelve, please step forward and board.”
Andrew watched a small gaggle of families walk through the doors into the connecting passageway leading to the airplane. A small, pudgy young child, Andrew guessed around nine or ten years old, with a thick mop of greasy black hair was wailing uncontrollably as his mother, a small, pudgy woman with tangled black locks of her own, tried to console him. Andrew supposed he should feel sorry for the child, but all he felt was an intense desire to kill the kid for holding up the process. Children. Andrew had no use for them; he held no sentimental affection for the little brutes. Children annoyed Andrew, always had, even when he was one himself. Maybe that was why his mother always told him he had no childhood.
After a bribe of large quantities of chocolate was given over to the child, he completely forgot his past worries and consented eagerly to being led down the concourse to the plane. His mother seemed relieved to have the child out of her hair. Andrew looked on disgustedly. Probably sending the kid off to his father whom won’t be any happier to see him, he thought.
“We will now be accepting passengers traveling in first class. If you have a first class ticket, please step forward and board.”
Andrew joined a small line of official looking men with official looking business suits, pulling their official looking wheeled carry-on bags that contained their laptops, the essence of their officialdom. Andrew made a stark contrast in his faded black jeans and thick sweater of dark green wool. He was sweating now, but Andrew had made sure to check the weather forecast for Denver. It was bitterly cold, and would be for another couple of weeks.
Hefting his bag, Andrew took a deep breath and stepped onto the concourse.
* * *
Stephanie’s knuckles whitened as her grip tightened on the black leather steering wheel of the Volkswagen Jetta. Her eyes shifted to the glowing neon blue lights of the clock sunk into the dashboard. 9:00, Denver time. Stephanie cursed under her breath and pressed her foot a little harder onto the accelerator. The little orange needle of the speedometer inched perilously passed “80.” The engine of the German car growled in dissent at being forced to handle the increased speed with the car’s heater blowing at full tilt, but obeyed the intractable edict of Stephanie’s right foot. Stephanie ignored the car’s protestations and continued to speed down the highway leading to the Denver airport. She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw the green sign on the side of the road announcing the exit for the airport in a little under half a mile. It would be close, Stephanie thought, but she was going to make it to the terminal before the 9:30 arrival of Andrew’s plane.
Joe had been considerate enough to schedule the band Sunday and Monday off in Denver in order to give them some rest and recuperation from a brutal two week stretch of the tour in Texas and Arizona during which Doubtless performed every night, traveling non-stop in the day to reach the next performance. Perform, travel, perform, travel, perform, ad nauseum. Texas and Arizona were scorching, as Texas and Arizona are apt to be, and while the tour bus was equipped with air conditioning, the air in the vehicle was swelteringly humid, making the hours of travel between shows a sticky experience for everyone on the bus, from the first week roadie to Stephanie herself. Everyone’s nerves were frayed. Tempers and egos, always problematical with a group of people as convinced of their own self-importance as musicians, had become inflamed by the humidity and constant travel and performance. The atmosphere of the bus, infected with the universal bad humour that was caused by the excessive humidity, had become toxic. If you need a basis for comparison, think the Balkans, pre-WWI.
Stephanie smiled as she pulled into the airport garage. All that, all the excessive heat, the constant travel, the bickering and the tension, it was all over now. They had another few weeks of touring ahead of them before they received a break, but it was a leisurely, pleasant stretch of the tour. A few stops in Colorado, a stop in Las Vegas, and all of California.
Stephanie checked herself in the rearview mirror. She sighed and stuck out her tongue at the rather ordinary face in the glass. Her long blonde hair was tied back into a tight ponytail, and her skin seemed stretched to the breaking point over the bones in her face. Stephanie thought her cheekbones, always high and visible and attractive, bulged far too conspicuously. She wore no makeup, and the dark circles beneath her eyes were painfully obvious. Her lips seemed thin, dry, chapped from the frigid Denver wind. Who knew it would be so cold this time of the year?
The white turtleneck she wore was thick and wooly, very loose on her body. The sweater created a form-hiding, gender disguising effect, and it was accentuated by the black sweatpants she wore. Andrew’s sweatpants, the pair she had borrowed from his closet after their night together. Looking at herself, Stephanie couldn’t even be sure she was a woman, and certainly not an attractive one. She was inconspicuousness personified.
This had all been Lanak’s idea of course. The thought of not telling him about Andrew had never really occurred to Stephanie. Neither had his reaction.
She had taken it as a matter of course that she told him everything, and that he told her everything. She had also taken it for granted that they would support each other, no matter the circumstances of the other’s plight. When she told him in Kansas City, Lanak was, for the first time since their breakup, legitimately angry at her.
“You did WHAT? Or should I say ‘who?’ Damnit Stephanie, what the hell were you thinking? You cheated on Ross for god’s sake! You’ve written songs about how you don’t trust that man at all, and you go and sleep with a total stranger.”
Stephanie had been too shocked to reply. She had expected some mild tsk-tsking, nothing of this sort. Seizing on her silence, Lanak had gone on. And on. And on. By the time he was done, Lanak had laid out every conceivable worst-case scenario. He had come within an eyelash of telling her she was going to hell for this, as he termed it, “escapade” of hers. He was, in short, pissed off beyond all belief. And in the end, he agreed to help Stephanie meet Andrew again.
And, Stephanie reflected in her car, one of his many tips was this outfit. She couldn’t deny the logic of it, but she absolutely hated the thought of meeting Andrew without looking her absolute sexiest. Lanak had rolled his eyes at that and handed her the sweater.
Well, she thought, at least my eyes are still pretty. She sighed and placed Lanak’s sunglasses over her eyes. Damn him and his intelligence.
Her eyes caught the time on the dashboard clock. 9:15.
“Shit!”
She hurriedly grabbed her purse and strode quicklytowards the elevator at the end of the parking garage. She was wearing sneakers, another of Lanak’s idea, but this one didn’t bother her. She had never grown accustomed to wearing heels, and never was comfortable in dressy shoes.
The parking garage was full up with vehicles of all sorts, but it seemed bereft of life. The only noises were her breathing and the sound of her steps scraping on the cement floor. The air was chilly, but musky; thick and dark. Yet the heavy concrete pillars loomed large through the darkness, lone sentries standing a tiring and burdensome guard over the cement empire that they supported on their backs. Stephanie shivered, with fear or cold she did not know, and quickened the pace of her steps as her heart quickened the pace of its beat. It seemed like an eternity, but eventually she reached the elevator doors and pushed the small, white button on the side.
The elevator doors opened, and Stephanie stepped inside.
Andrew walked hurriedly down the concourse; away from the plane, towards the airport. He was anxious; to see Stephanie yes, but also to get as far away from the plane as was humanly possible. 2 hours in what Andrew considered a flying coffin was more than enough for him.
The walkway outside the waiting area was packed with throngs of people, excited, noisy people, jostling each other against the glass barrier so that they might get a quick glimpse of their loved ones. Yet despite the pushing and shoving, the atmosphere was jovial, pleasant, as if they all understood each other’s discourtesy and thus bore the discomfort with a ready smile and a willing back. Of the many different people, they all had hope, expectation, happiness in their eyes. And looking behind him, Andrew saw the same looks on his fellow passenger’s faces. He had never seen a group of people so happy.
The same optimism briefly surged through his body and left him light-headed, but Stephanie was nowhere to be found, and his heart dropped like an anchor in the ocean. He had come out with visions of her; he had imagined her standing there as soon as had de-planed, smiling that little smile, waiting with hands on hips and a little twinkle in her eyes.
He had known that was a stupid thought, of course. She said she would be there, and he didn’t doubt her word. But he knew that there was no way she was going to let herself be seen in public waiting for him, holding him, kissing him. He had known all that, but dreams do not fall victim to the siren song of logic and common sense. They endure like rock steady mountains until the very moment they are proven to be false, when they shatter like so much glass. The shards of Andrew’s dreams, once designed to give him pleasure, now contrived to bring him more internal pain than he had felt in the entirety of his life.
He had completed the long, lonely march from the plane to the walkway outside the waiting area. He was engulfed in a sea of smiling faces, laughter, an ocean of happy re-unions and loving welcome backs. He swung his head from right to left desperately, hoping to catch a glimpse of her somewhere in the airport. His view was obscured by the bobbing heads of those around him, and Stephanie was nowhere in sight.
Andrew worked his way through the throng, or rather shoved his way through it, and found an oasis of silence near a pair of elevator doors on the back wall of the airport. He leaned; or rather fell back, against a concrete pillar to the left of the elevator. It would be incorrect to say he shut his eyes. Rather, they clamped shut, as if finally wearying under the burden of an Atlas-esque weight. A heavy sigh passed his lips, Andrew felt though his legs would collapse from under him at any moment. Doubt and worry pounded at his heart with the fist of god, and his heart reciprocated by thumping heavily against the bones of his ribcage. Through the fog in his mind, Andrew was dimly aware of the elevator bell dinging to his right.
“You know, you really should brush your hair before going out. The grunge look is so out.”
Andrew’s eyes shot open as the voice in front of him pierced the fog of his mind like a shaft of sunlight. There was no makeup, and her hair, that wondrous, glorious hair, was pulled tightly back into a ponytail. And the sunglasses she wore blocked her eyes from view. Still, she was as beautiful as he ever remembered seeing her.
Stephanie Newg stood before him, that smile still gracing her face, her arms jauntily crossed across her chest. Andrew broke out into a smile to match Odysseus’ upon seeing Ithaca.
He ran his hand through his hair and shook his head vigorously.
“Well, for those of us without a multi-million dollar recording contract and access to the best hairdressers in the business, not to mention without the beautiful gene, it’s sort of hard to have a great hair-day EVERY day. By the way, I absolutely love the incognito look. It definitely works for you. And it’s good to see my sweatpants are getting some use.”
After that, neither of them spoke; they both stood there, each staring at the huge smile the other was sporting. Stephanie broke the informal staring game first as she glimpsed the green duffel bag Andrew was carrying.
“Is that all you brought? Any other luggage we need to pick up?”
Andrew laughed at that and ran his hand through his hair. “Yes on the first question, no on the second. This bag can hold a weeks worth of stuff. Had it for 10 years, wouldn’t give it up for anything.”
Andrew ran his hand through his hair again. Stephanie nodded, and wordlessly they stepped into the elevator. They both held their breath as they waited for the doors to close. No one ran to join them, and the doors closed without incident.
As soon as they did, Stephanie cupped Andrew’s face and kissed him, slowly, but with the passionate abandonment of a woman long separated from her lover. When they finally pulled apart, the elevator doors had opened onto the parking garage where Stephanie had parked the car.
Andrew ran his hand through his hair and gestured at the crowded garage.
“Well, lead on fearless leader.”
Stephanie started walking to the car, and Andrew followed, carrying his bag, but she hadn’t laughed at the joke. Again no words passed between them, but this was a different sort of silence. It was thick, heavy, coated with tension thicker than a London fog. Stephanie stepped quickly, and it all Andrew’s shorter legs could do to keep up with her. Their footsteps scraped off the cement, though Andrew wasn’t sure which was colder: The atmosphere or the concrete.
They reached the car in record time, but Stephanie did not open the doors. Andrew stood blankly at the passenger side door.
“Uh, Stephanie? Are you going to open the doors?” He asked with a sweeping gesture at the car.
“Later. Andrew, you’re nervous. Why?” She asked him, a sharpness in her tone which told that no bullshit would be brooked.
“Nervous? What are you talking about?”
“You’ve run your hand through your hair at least 4 times since I’ve seen you. You’re not THAT concerned about you’re appearance. What’s up?”
Andrew stared blankly at her. Stephanie sighed and reached across the top of the car. She took Andrew’s hand in hers.
“Andrew, do you love me?”
“What?! What…what…wha…did you say?” Andrew started trembling.
“Dear, it’s really quite simple. Do. You. Love. Me?”
“Wel…well, really, that’s not a fair question. At all. I-I’ve only known you for two weeks!” His trembling slowed a bit.
“Yes, and I’ve known you for that same time, and you know I know I love you. How bout it?” She stared in at him unrelentingly, but not unkindly.
Andrew took a deep breath. “I…No, no Stephanie I don’t. I don’t love you. I love your beauty. I love your eyes, though I can’t see them right now. I love your hair. I love your mouth. I love the way you taste, the way you smell, the way your breasts feel beneath my hands. I love your voice, your talent, your intelligence. I love the way you write. I love the way that, right now, you’re probably convinced you look awful despite the fact that you’re still so unbelievably gorgeous. I love everything about you. But Stephanie, I can’t say that I’m in love with you.”
The air was silent. Both faces were blank for a brief period of time. Andrew held his breath, awaiting the explosion.
And then, shockingly, Stephanie smiled.
“You’ve been practicing that, haven’t you?” She asked with a laugh. A smile finally burst over Andrew’s face.
“Just a little.”
“How did you know I’d ask if you loved me?”
“Oh, I didn’t. One night I asked myself that very question, and that was what I told myself.”
Stephanie squeezed his hand gently. “I appreciate you telling me the truth. It would have been very easy for you to have lied and said yes. I would have known if you had lied. And if you had, I would have sent you right back home.”
Andrew scratched his chin. “Yeah, about me getting back home-“
Stephanie interrupted him with a chuckle. Then her eyes seemed to crystallize, and she looked at him fiercely.
“You’ll see. Patience is a virtue, remember?”
