Nocturne(83)

Savannah’s eyes dropped to the floor. She blinked twice. I couldn’t tell if she was trying to hold back tears or rage.

“I’m sorry you had to hear that,” I said.

She shook her head, a tiny, constrained movement. “Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why are you sorry? It’s reality. You’re married.”

The cab had come to a stop, and the driver laid on the horn. I leaned forward. Nothing but dozens of stopped cars in front of us. The sun beat down on the car, scorching heat coming through the glass of the windshield. At the sight of the wall of cars ahead of us, my shoulders tensed. I turned around. More cars were lining up behind us.

“What’s going on?” I asked the driver.

He shrugged, holding out his hands. “Construction. I told you that when you got in.”

“Are you in a hurry, Gregory?” Savannah had an ironic smile on her face. “I thought you wanted to talk.”

“I want you to stop behaving like a child.”

Her eyes flared wide, and she replied, carefully enunciating each word. “I am not behaving like a child. I do, however, need some time to think.”

“What is there to think about? We love each other.” As I said the words, I wiped my arm across my forehead.

She leaned close and hissed, “We love each other. And you are married. To someone else.”

“Do you expect that to change overnight?”

“I don’t know what I expect.” Her eyes were glazed over and she looked away from me.

I sighed and leaned back in my seat. The cab driver took out a phone and dialed, then began talking to someone. I leaned forward and said, “Can you turn on the air conditioning? It’s roasting in here.”

He shook his head and waved his hand as if to brush me off.

“Seriously,” I said, trying to keep a lid on my anger. How dare he wave me off in such a dismissive manner?

“Gregory,” Savannah said. “Relax.”

“It’s stifling in here!”

“Gregory!” she said in a sharp tone. “It’s not about the heat. It’s about us.”

I turned back to her and said, “I don’t know what to do, Savannah!”

She shook her head, violently, then said, “I don’t know what I was thinking. Do you intend for that to be me someday?”

“What?”

She pointed at my pocket, where I’d put my phone. “Some day, you’ll just be able to hang up. Like you did with her. And that will be that.” Her voice began to shake, and she rolled her eyes up at the roof of the cab. “I don’t know what I was thinking,” she muttered.

“Savannah ...”

Abruptly, she reached for the door of the cab and opened it. Immediately someone in a truck outside honked their horn. Before I could blink or catch a breath, she was out of the car and into the blistering heat.

I slid after her but she slammed the door shut, then turned and began to trot away, darting in front of another car and then to the curb. Her back was straight as she walked; her head flung back, pride intact. But where was she going?

The trunk of the cab was full of our luggage. And my cello. My seven hundred fifty thousand dollar cello, which I was not leaving alone in the cab.

What was it she said yesterday? That this was the part where she walked away?

“You’re paying her fare,” the driver demanded. Because now he could interrupt his damn phone call.

Savannah was almost out of sight, walking along the curb. Soon she was gone entirely, around the corner of a building. And then the phone rang. Again.

“What?” I snarled.

“Gregory? It’s Joseph. Are you all right?”

I coughed. Joseph McIntosh, our conductor.

“I’m fine, Joseph. What’s going on?”

“Where are you?”

“In a cab on the way from the airport.”

“Oh good! I needed to talk with you and Savannah.”

I closed my eyes. “I’m afraid she’s not with me ... she um ... went separately. To take care of some errands.”

“Damn,” he muttered. “Anyway, I’ll catch her later. Point is, reaction to last night’s show is out of this world. You two were fantastic, and the tour is nearly sold out for our paid shows. Absolutely amazing performance. It was inspired, and I’ve got no idea when you even had time to practice the changes with her.”

I didn’t have a clue how to respond to that, so I didn’t. They weren’t my changes, and we hadn’t practiced.

“Anyway,” he said, “we’re adding your duet to the show for the rest of the tour. You two will replace the first act after the intermission.”

“Joseph, I don’t know if that’s a good idea ...”

“No false modesty, Gregory. It doesn’t suit you. You’re doing the duet.”

I was speechless. I looked ahead through the traffic but still couldn’t see her.

She was gone.

“Fine, Joseph,” I said. “Whatever you say.”

What I wanted to say was f*ck off, Joseph. But that wouldn’t have gone over very well.

Instead, I hung up the phone and collapsed back into my seat.





Savannah