The Boy from the Band

Old Friends

I wonder what I'm doing for about the millionth time. What is the force that pulls me to Rick? It can't just be his looks, he's no longer the skinny young musician that I met with the heartbreaker looks. Or is it? Or the fact that despite being an asshole musician he is very sweet? I wonder how much philandering he does when I'm not around, or how much he's hidden not only from Elizabeth but from me.

I guess it doesn't matter, but I wish it were easy, the way it was when I first met him. In those days I didn't worry about Elizabeth. We kept our affair secret outside of Shangri La. In those days I didn't give any thought to the fact he was in a relationship, but after Elizabeth found out about me things changed.

"You love him too much, you always have," I accuse myself, "You've wasted your life waiting on him when there could have been other men. You could even be married by now." Tears start forming in my eyes and I try to brush them away.

I hear a knock at the door and open it. "You're crying," a voice says and I look up and see Rick standing in the doorway. "Come here," he tells me, "Tell Uncle Rick all about it." He sits next to me on the bed and puts his strong arms around me, his arms have always been my safe haven. I feel his warm breath ruffling my hair as he tells me that he wants me to leave California and come back to Woodstock, he can't stand having me so far away.

He begins to pull off my clothes, and soon we are lying skin to skin on my bed and he's taken my breast in his hand and puts his mouth on my nipple. I start to moan, softly, I'm embarrassed that someone will hear me but as he moves his free hand between my legs, I forget about all that. When he's finally moving inside me, I'm lost. I hold him tightly and try to move with him, and he smiles.

"I love to watch you squirm," he whispers and our lovemaking grows intense until we climax together. He holds me for a few minutes then sits up. "Come on, let's go for a drive."

"At night?" I ask, but don't pursue it. It's a nice spring night and getting out of my room sounds inviting. So, we get dressed and get into Rick's car.

We drive around and, as always, I have no idea where I am. I sort of learned my way around Woodstock, but Rick knows it like the back of his hand, so I just lay back and see where he takes me. We end up on the top of a flat hilltop that has a beautiful view of the night sky, complete with the Milky Way. There are so many stars they almost block out the sight of the sky.

He takes me in his arms and kisses me, then looks at me and I can't tell what he's thinking.

"I forget how beautiful you are. Your hair, your lips, those bedroom eyes, I can't believe how lucky I am that you've been in my life." He pulls back and I know something is coming, I can feel it.

"I have something to tell l you, I'm marrying Elizabeth in May. I wanted you to hear it from me and not from the radio or from someone else."

I hear a noise like someone is trying to choke back a sob, then realize it's coming from me. I'm trying not to cry, I won't cry, I tell myself, not until I'm alone.

He can't be marrying her. Why after all this time does he feel the need to marry her and I realize that I know. Eli's death has opened up a hole in him, a wound that's raw that won't heal for a long time, if ever.

"God knows she's waited for you long enough; if it were me, I don't think I would have waited that long." I wipe my eyes; the tears are coming despite my efforts.

"This doesn't affect us," he's trying to explain himself, but he's wrong. As long as he wasn't married, I could at least tell myself I wasn't sleeping with a married man, but marriage changes things. There are legal things, like what if she finds out that he's seeing me again and wants to divorce him? If they're married, she'd be entitled to a lot of his money and property, and alimony.