Lost In Rewind (Audio Fools #3) Page 25

  My tears won’t end as they run down my cheeks, and I’m beyond the point of hysteria. All I have left of my violin is the bow, which I’ve held onto for dear life. I have one of Joella’s floral scarves wrapped around my shoulders, but I’m still numb and frozen to the bone. The reality that I will never be able to replace the violin that was once played by the lost generation of women I will never again see is absolutely crushing.

  I feel myself start to violently shake, and all I hear is my heart thumping out of control while my teeth uncontrollably knock against each other. The devastating sense of loss and regret cripple me as I sit on a cold rock, watching the black waves crushing down against the shore, over and over. I haven’t been this close to the sea in over a decade, afraid of its power, but it can’t do more damage than I’ve already done. Here I am, sitting by the same waters that once took my maman, and pray to somehow have her precious violin returned to me. It’s all I have left of them. Perhaps the black sea will listen to my plea as I promise to never ask for anything ever again, just as long as their violin lives somewhere unharmed.

  My emotions have completely depleted me to the point of exhaustion. My neck can no longer hold my head up as my brain begs my lids to close and put an end to this nightmare. I begin to drift off to the land of unconsciousness where I’m never alone and he always comes back for me.

  I’m cocooned under a down blanket and the distinct spicy scent of the man I won’t dare mention ever again surrounds me. I recognize this dream; my psyché visits him in his home frequently. I open my eyes, and of course, my dear violin and bow are lying right beside me. I’ll hate waking up from this paradise where I have everything, even the tiny piece of his heart he left with me six months ago. I close my eyes again in the chance of delaying the unavoidable consciousness that will take it all away shortly. I never want to wake up. This is where I want to belong.

  I feel myself rocking back and forth with the sound of the sea lolling my aching soul. I touch my chest and feel not just my locket, but also the key that is once again around my neck as I greedily place my other hand on the violin. Perhaps I’ll be able to pluck them both out of my dream and into my grim reality. I caress the strings gently, and instantly sense a slack string under my fingers. I’m about to wake up—that’s how my dreams usually end, with pragmatic fragments of reality penetrating my idyllic fantasy world.

  “Sarah.”

  I’ve never heard him say my name, my real name. I knew it would be too painful recalling how it sounded coming from his lips.

  “Sarah, are you up?”

  My name sounds perfect from his lips.

  I feel his soft hands moving my hair away from my face, grazing my cheek and forehead as if he’s done it millions of times before. God, I hope he never stops touching me. How do I stay here?

  “Why are you so beautiful? How could I have left you?”

  Those are the words I put in his mouth. Those are the words that every woman wants to hear. To be loved, cherished, missed. This is what I imagine he says to me when he comes back to find me.

  “I’ve watched you all day, and I know you still need to rest, but I want you to get up. We need to talk. I have so much I need to tell you.”

  I smile and allow his gentle touch and loving words to soothe me from the inside out. Perhaps I’ll be allowed to stay in this dream and never again wake up.

  “That’s What Friends Are For” by Dionne Warwick

  The doctor has checked on her twice since Will returned, clutching her lax body in his arms. He’s assured me that all her vitals are good despite her body working overtime, but it's nothing a little rest and nutrition can’t restore. She goes in and out of sleep like she hasn’t slept in weeks. Sometimes, it’s as if she knows I’m here and she talks to me, responds to my touch. Tired, cried out, and dirty from sleeping on the beach, this girl is still one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen, almost too beautiful.

  Thank God Will and Sara found her. If it wasn’t for them, I’d still be at her stupid hotel waiting like a fool, and she would never show up. My heart breaks thinking of this fragile young woman crying, alone on a cold beach in the middle of the night. The last place I would have imagined finding her was by the sea, knowing the story of her mother’s death. Women have a sixth sense to know where to look, and Emily and Sara did enough research on the Romani pilgrims at the Camargue to understand the symbolic importance of the sea and why their people come to witness the plaster statue of Sarah La Kali being submerged in the water and blessing all those around her. Women make the best detectives.

  Will and Louis drove Emily and Sara back to the church to inquire if anyone had lost a violin, which in fact, they had. They told them of a young woman who played the violin at the crypt for hours, that she was in tears looking for her priceless instrument. They left all their information and the coordinates of where the yacht is docked in hopes of the young woman returning. Emily and Louis came back to the ship to wait in case someone showed up, while Sara and Will continued on foot from the church following the flower-covered path down the coastline to the seashore.

  Everything makes sense; her father mentioned that Sarah La Kali was her mother’s favorite saint, and they have named their only daughter in honor of her. Sarah LeBlanc came here to celebrate her culture on the holiest day of the year for the gypsy community. It’s the one day where her people, dispersed around the globe, come together here at Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer to take their beloved Saint Sarah la Kali, adorned in flowers and engulfed by layers of bright-colored robes, down to the sea. It’s a time of celebration, forgiveness and rebirth, a place where thousands come to ask for miracles. I hope that this fragile, yet strong woman, who I finally get to hold again, gets whatever her soul came here to ask for.

  “Jeff.”

  I turn as Emily stands in the doorway of my room that has now been allocated for Sarah while she comes to her senses. The Bruel generosity is beyond words, and I’m thankful to be on the receiving end of it, whether I feel deserving or not. Having friends who drop everything and come to your rescue is a blessing only few get to experience. I’m blessed.

  “Dinner is still waiting for you; they’ve warmed it up twice already. You’ve been in here all day, and the doctor said she’s okay … she just needs to rest. I think you should get something to eat,” Emily offers in her motherly tone. “Sara is giving JJ a bath and then she’ll put them to bed, so stop worrying. Everything is going to work out—it has to.”

  Emily is right; I should let our obliviously unconscious guest sleep and go refuel myself before I too pass out. I follow Emily out, giving Sarah one last look before I close the door behind me. It’s hard to wrap my brain around her presence, in my bed no less, and our current predicament. I hope that when she does finally wake up, she won’t be mad at me, and that she’ll want to talk to me and let me explain. But ultimately, I pray it’s not too late for us to start over.

  I walk up the stairs toward the dining room on deck and hear my daughter’s laughter coming from inside the room where Sara is bathing her and her brother. I can’t help but smile. All the things I love are within arm’s reach, and the warmth circulating inside me is nothing short of incredible. I wish I could stop time this instant and enjoy how all the pieces of my life have begun to fall into place and make sense.

  “Eyes Without a Face” by Billy Idol

  The sound of a violin wakes me as if from the dead. I sit up in pain as my sore muscles come to life and my unfamiliar surroundings knock the wind out of me. Where. The. Hell. Am. I? I’m in a small, dimly lit room that feels like a jail cell without any windows, just a porthole. I’m abducted, is the first coherent thought that enters my mind.

  “Hi.”

  I jump up as I hear a little voice coming from the left of me. I turn and come face to face with a blue-eyed little girl with hair almost as dark as mine. She looks to be maybe seven or eight years old. She’s sitting on the bed beside me with her damp hair cascading down her shoulders,
and she appears to be in a kind of nightgown. I notice that she has my violin clutched tightly in her small arms, but that can’t be right, because my violin is gone—lost forever.

  “Do you speak English?” The little girl vigorously nods her head. “Where did you get that violin?” I ask, sounding overly accusatory for no good reason.

  “I found it on the pillow next to you. Is it yours?” she asks, while handing me back my past.

  I take the violin from her outstretched hands, and a half cry escapes my lips as I recognize my best friend. There is no doubt it’s indeed mine. How could it be here? How did it get here? How did I get here? Where am I?

  “What’s your name? I’m Juliet, and if you’d like, I could teach you how to play. I’m very good,” she proclaims with such confidence I can only smirk with admiration.

  “Hello, Juliet. I’m Sarah. I would love to hear you play, and if you have time, I would be honored to be your student.” I attempt to keep a straight face as I answer the sweet child wholeheartedly.

  Her mouth opens, revealing two missing teeth as her eyes light up with joy. Her smile is infectious, and for a split second, looks familiar. She tries to contain her excitement but fails and claps her hands in pleasure at my response.

  “Yes, oh my God, Sarah, you have the perfect name. I have a best friend named Sara, and now I’ll have two Sarahs.” She’s deliriously pleased.

  I can’t help but mimic her happiness before I’m reminded that I don’t have any idea where I am, but perhaps, Juliet knows where we are and who’s in charge.

  “Where are we?” I question in a conspiring whisper.

  “We’re on a boat, silly. It’s called ‘La Vie en Rose.’ This is Eric and Rose’s boat—they are my cousins. I think I’m going to marry Eric when he grows up,” the little girl declares, employing a remarkable French accent while naming an Édith Piaf song. Maybe I’ve been captured by some strange cousin-marrying cult.

  “How old is your cousin, Eric?” It’s all too bizarre; I may simply be in a mental institution.

  “Eric is five and Rose is ten,” she affirms with a smirk.

  I’ve been abducted on a luxury yacht owned by children, it seems. Perhaps Peter Pan will come to visit me soon, too.

  “Where are your parents?” I ask, needing something to add up and make sense in my head. But the way the light in her eyes just dimmed, I regret asking her anything.

  “My mommy left to a place called heaven. It’s nice there; I don’t think she’s coming back. My brother doesn’t believe the red robin that comes to visit me every morning in my window is her coming back to see if I’m okay.” The sad little child, who reminds me of myself, continues to break my heart. “Mommy said that Daddy will find a guardian angel named Sarah to help us after she leaves for heaven. Are you an angel?” the sweet girl asks me.

  I look at her, at a total loss for words. I see his features materialize on her face one by one, as if a puzzle revealing and displaying a whole picture right before my eyes. I can feel his gaze on me—peering into my essence. I know whose child she is; there’s no denying it. I have an overwhelming urge to give this little person a hug and promise her that all will be well one day. I don’t know how I know, but I just do.

  “Can you play for me?” I circle back to a safe topic. “You know this violin is very old. It is over one hundred years old and it’s been around the world like a well-traveled gypsy.” She smiles at my description of my inanimate best friend, and the light that was extinguished earlier returns, illuminating her steel-blue eyes.

  She nods her head while I restring the loose cord on my beloved violin. I quickly tune and hand the instrument back to Juliet as I watch her expertly place it on her left shoulder. She then takes the bow, positioning her delicate fingers elegantly, ready to begin her solo concert.

  She stops to think and then adds, “My brother usually accompanies me on the piano, but he’s sleeping and we don’t have a piano here, so just pretend you can hear a piano.” She waits for my reaction.

  I nod; I can’t wait to hear my violin come to life at her command. “What song will you play for me, maestro?” I inquire before she starts.

  “It was my mommy’s favorite song. Jacob and I were preparing it for her birthday, but she had to go to heaven before she heard it. Daddy says she can hear it from heaven and that she’s yelling bravo.” She swallows hard before continuing to kill me with her words. “It’s called ‘Where Do I Begin’ or Daddy sometimes just calls it ‘Love Story.’”

  The child begins to play a melody that I myself have played hundreds of times. My maman, too, used to love and play this song when she would teach me to play the violin, when I was a child not much older than Juliet. I lie down and close my eyes as the lovely, smooth sound brings back thousands of long-forgotten memories. I can hear my maman’s voice sing the lyrics in my head as I drift back home. This is a dream—a beautiful, sad, vivid dream.

  “What are you doing here?”

  I open my eyes and sit up at once to a woman standing over my bed, directing her question at Juliet.

  Juliet smiles, gets off the bed, and goes to stand next to the woman, who to my delight is an adult and may have a reasonable explanation for all this. Juliet hugs the woman, who upon closer inspection could be her mother; they do look a bit alike. Maybe I just imagined she was his daughter.

  “Sara, this is also Sarah. I’m teaching her how to play the violin. I think she’s our guardian angel, too.”

  We both smirk at Juliet’s introduction. When she mentioned knowing another Sara, I thought she was referring to a friend her own age, not an adult.

  “You should be in bed and not bothering anybody this late, your father will be mad if he finds you here.” Her other friend Sara reprimands her more like a mother than a friend.

  “She’s no bother. It was a treat to hear her play,” I offer in defense of my new little violin teacher.

  The woman lifts her gaze and smiles my way while hugging Juliet to her side. It’s impossible to be mad at this sweet little giggling person with two front teeth missing.

  “Hello, sorry for this. I’m Sara Klein by the way. No!—I mean Knight, my name is Sara Knight. I am the one who found your violin at the crypt when you dropped it yesterday. My girlfriend and I ran after you, but we couldn’t find you outside the church.”

  This must be the tall American girl I overheard speaking about him. I begin to power blink, because her last name sounds familiar, and she could be, she may be … oh God she is.

  “Juliet, please go back to bed quietly and let me talk to your new friend.”

  The little girl nods, waves goodbye my way, and then leaves me alone with Sara Klein or Knight or whatever her name is. I’ve made the connection—I know exactly who she is.

  “Eddie Klein’s little sister,” I say out loud before my brain can censor my mouth.

  “Yeah, Eddie is my brother. Liam and I found you on the beach last night. We tried waking you but you seemed disoriented. The way Jeffery described you, I knew it was you immediately. I saw your bright scarf a mile away. When we couldn’t wake you, we called Jeff, and he made sure we didn’t leave you on that cold beach alone. It honestly wasn’t safe for you to be sleeping there with the herds of people congregating, and in your condition, so we brought you here, where a doctor was waiting to examine you. This is my friend, Emily, and her husband, Louis’, yacht,” the attractive woman explains, shining light on how I got to my surroundings and alleviating the overwhelmed expression on my face.

  I recall him talking to someone named Emily on the phone, which at the time, I thought might have been Eddie’s little sister, but this is Eddie’s little sister—the woman he loves. I still don’t understand what they’re doing here in France in the first place. She could’ve just left the violin at the church. They didn’t need to go through all this trouble for me.

  “Was that Jeff’s daughter?” I question, but I already know the answer.

  “Yes, she looks just like hi
m, doesn’t she?” Her eyes brighten up.

  I nod and continue firing questions in an attempt to understand. “Why did you bring me here?” It still makes no sense.

  “Jeffery has been looking for you. We’re all here to help him find you,” she answers as if it should be obvious.

  “Why? He wasn’t looking for me before.” It’s the truth. He never called me back. He clearly wanted nothing to do with me. Once he unburdened himself to me with Joella’s words, our business together was over.

  “You’ll have to ask him that, but we’re here to support him,” she says sternly, in no rush to give me too much information.

  I know this is none of my business, but I’m going to ask her anyway, because I’m on a yacht that I didn’t ask to be on with people I’ve never met. “Are you the girl he loves? He told me about having a relationship with you before and maybe after he got married.” I look right into her eyes, and what I really ought to be asking is if she and Jeffery are now together.

  “What Jeffery and I share is complicated. We’ve known each other for a very long time. We will forever be a part of each other’s life because of the choices we’ve made, which neither of us regret. He told me about your grandmother—the fortuneteller, and the reading she gave him back in college. And he also hasn’t been able to stop talking about you. If you’re worried about us being together, don’t. We’re not meant to be together. We’ve never been good for each other. I knew a long time ago that he and I weren’t destined for a happily ever after the way we envisioned in our youth, but it wasn’t until he met you that he accepted that reality as well. You can’t force a love that isn’t intended. I’m now married to a man who has put all my past relationships into perspective, and perhaps, that’s what your interaction did for Jeffery. Believe me … he’s not the bad guy. He makes himself out to be, but he’s not. He made choices as best he could based on his circumstances.”