Nocturne(91)

Shit. What could she possibly think of me, a married man, asking her to willingly carry on with me this summer as if we were the only two people in our lives? As I paced back and forth, there was a weak knock at my door.

“Gregory, it’s Savannah …”

I rushed to the door, swinging it open to find her standing with her arms loose at her sides, eyes cast down and looking swollen, as if she’d been crying. I wanted to take her into my arms in that instant, but I didn’t know if she wanted me touching her anymore. She was wearing a short black skirt and a grey tank top. Her hair was piled on top of her head in a wild nest of curls. Still, she took my breath away. She always had.

“Come in.” Instinctively, I looked down the hall before closing the door behind her.

“No one’s out there. I waited for them to clear out before I knocked.” Her voice was flat as she sat on the edge of the bed.

Pulling my eyebrows together, I walked toward her and sat down next to her.

“That’s how it’ll be, you know,” she said to the floor.

“That’s how what will be?”

“Looking over our shoulders for the rest of the summer. Making sure no one sees you with your mistress.” She stopped and looked at me as I gasped at her use of the word mistress. She started again, still not looking at me. “That’s what this is, you know. I’d be your mistress.”

I knew that’s what it looked like. It was an affair in the sense that I was married, but Savannah was so much more to me than my mistress. I couldn’t figure out how to say that to her, though, especially when she seemed to refuse to look at me.

I swallowed hard and tentatively placed my hand on her thigh. She didn’t move it. “Savannah …”

“What? That’s what you’re asking of me, isn’t it? To be your mistress?”

I clicked my tongue against my teeth and winced at the word. I wanted her to stop saying it. That’s not what she was … who she was.

“You mean more to me than that, Savannah. You know that,” I managed. Slowly.

“Then why …” She shook her head, looking at her manicured toes.

“Why what?” I asked, stroking my thumb back and forth across the top of her thigh.

She shrugged. “If I mean so much to you … I’m not saying leave your wife for me. But if I mean that much to you then why not wrap things up in your marriage and then come to me? Why an affair? Why now?”

I lifted my hand from her leg and ran it over my face. “My marriage … while it hasn’t been a long one, has felt like it. There’s … not a lot of love there, if any. I think it was convenient for both of us. Jesus, I don’t want to sound like a bastard here—”

“You don’t.” She grinned slightly. “Trust me, I get it. I think.”

I counted myself lucky that Savannah hadn’t run from the room yet. That she was still sitting there listening to me, and asking questions, gave me some hope that she wouldn’t disappear through that door forever.

I paused a moment before continuing, trying to consider how to talk about my wife with the woman I loved. “I was looking forward to this tour to have some space, some time to think. Honestly, some time to figure out how to make a clean break and not lose everything. Including my dignity. But something is going on with Karin right now. I don’t have all the details. It’s incredibly complicated, and I don’t feel right talking to anyone about it right now.”

“It’s okay. I don’t need to know.” Since she’d sat on the edge of my bed she hadn’t lifted her eyes once. They volleyed between her knotted fingers and her feet the entire time.

“Savannah,” I sighed, “why won’t you look at me?”

She hesitated before opening her mouth then tucked her lip behind her teeth and squeezed her eyes shut as several tears fell at once.

“Because if I look at you, I’ll say yes.” She lost it right then, taking a ragged breath as her head fell into her hands and she sobbed.

“Damn it,” I whispered as I brought her shoulders to my chest, and she let me hold her as she cried. Resting my chin on top of her head, I breathed in the sweet smell of lilies for what I was certain would be the last time.

She silently cried for a few moments while I tried to string together a few coherent words. I didn’t mean to make her cry. I’d never seen her cry like that before and knew I never wanted to again.

“Look,” I whispered before clearing my throat. “I didn’t mean to upset you, Savannah. If you want to forget about all of this, we can. We can continue the tour and play together, and be friends. I’d like to be friends with you if we can’t be more. I have to be friends with you if we can’t be anything more …” I trailed off, tears pricking my eyes, feeling the weight of what it would be like if Savannah Marshall vanished from my life, again.

She shook her head, as her forehead remained pressed against my chest. “I don’t want to forget about it. I can’t forget about it. I don’t … I don’t want to be friends with you, Gregory.”

“Oh …”

Savannah lifted her head then and looked at me through a beautiful mess of tears. I was captured in her gaze, waiting for her to speak, praying she wouldn’t leave. Not being able to blame her if she did. She slid her hands up the sides of my arms and across my shoulders, moving up my neck until they rested on each side of my face. Slowly gliding her thumbs across my cheeks as she steadied her breathing.