Forever More
Part 3 - . . . And The Greatest Is Love
Chapter Thirty Eight
Rebecca sat at a slot machine feeding in quarters and nursing a margarita. She and three friends had driven up to the reservation that evening, about an hours drive north of where they lived, to spend a few hours gambling and generally getting out of the house. She had to admit, it felt good to get away from the house and the kids and her problems and loose herself, and most of her money, at the slots.
She was having a good time and laughing with her friends who were seated not far from her when she was aware of a man behind her.
"Maybe you just need somebody to bring you a little luck." Tom said as Rebecca swung around and looked up to see him hovering behind her.
She was genuinely happy to see him, "What are you doing here?"
"Well, you said you’d be here this weekend. I thought I just stop in and see if I could find you."
She was flattered too. Rebecca called out to her friends that Tom had joined them. Cathy and Bonnie had met him, Laurie had not, but before long the party of five was having quite a time.
Tom was enjoying himself immensely. Dressed in a pair of rather tight black jeans, shiny black boots, western-style powder blue shirt, sleeves rolled to the elbows and topped off by his long dark hair tied at the nape of his neck, he made quite a dashing escort to the four women, who not only charming but devilishly handsome..
They had followed Tom to the black jack tables where he was doing rather well. Tom was a pretty familiar sight around the casino. He lived about an hour north and did his best to contribute to the upkeep of the casino on a regular basis. In fact Scott and Rebecca had been there with him on several occasions.
But Scott wasn’t there now and Tom was being his most unpredictable yet charming self. About two in the morning the girls had unanimously called a time out as Tom was still going strong. They were all seated at a large round table in the lounge when he finally joined them. They were thinking about calling it a night but Tom wouldn’t hear of it.
Rebecca excused herself to go to the ladies’ room, the result of way too many drinks already that evening. When she came back down the hallway Tom was standing near the exit.
"You look like you could use some fresh air?" he suggested.
Rebecca had to admit, that sounded good.
They stepped outside and started to walk a bit. The cool night air felt good and the quiet of the night outside was a welcome respite from the music and hustle inside the casino. It also made her very much aware of the dizziness that she was experiencing. She had been thinking that maybe that last drink was a little too much when she became aware that Tom had stopped walking. They were now some ways from the main entrance of the casino.
Tom turned to face her. "Having a good time tonight?"
"You know it," she answered.
"Good, you deserve it." Tom’s voice was soft and low.
Rebecca smiled.
"Its good to see that smile back on your face. I was afraid you had lost it forever."
"It wasn’t lost, just misplaced."
"Tell me that I had something to do with you finding it again."
Rebecca became aware of his hand as it smoothed away the hair from the side of her face. Her first reaction was a slight fear that overtook her. No one had touched her in that way since Scott. A second later she closed her eyes at the feel of his hand gently brushing her neck. When she opened her eyes Tom was pulling her closer and she felt her whole body tremble. She didn’t resist as he bent down to bring his mouth to hers.
She felt so small in his arms and for the first time become aware of just how large his stature as he lifted her up into his embrace. She willingly slid one arm around his neck and with the other felt the strong muscles of his chest.
The sensation of his lips upon hers was wildly exciting. She opened her mouth slightly as his tongue found its way between her teeth to gently caress the warm wet recesses of her mouth. She thought she might faint as she became more aware of his body pressing hard against her.
After a few moments he let her go. She stepped back slightly. At first she didn’t know why. His very touch brought feelings alive in her that she could hardly contain. In just a few short moments Tom had made her feel alive and desirable again. She was not even aware that she had needed that but yet she knew that to continue would be to negate any feeling that she had left in her for her husband.
When after a moment Rebecca brought her eyes up to meet his again he knew how he had affected her. He had felt it in her touch and way that she had opened her mouth to take him in and responded to the taste of his tongue with her own, but as she stepped away from him Tom became aware of Rebecca’s apprehension. He watched her as she gained her composure. He felt the stab of sadness in the pit of his stomach as he realized that he would never have her. Finally he spoke. "I’m not going to apologize for that. I’m not sorry at all."
They stood motionless a few more moments in silence. Rebecca felt the cool sting of a tear as it slid down the side of her face. Tom reached down and brushed it away. Then putting his arm around her he turned back toward the casino entrance. "Come on. Let’s get you back inside where its safe. You never know what kind of despicable characters are lurking out here."
Nearly back to the door Rebecca stopped. Tom looked down at her.
"Thank you," she said softly.
Tom drew in a deep breath then let it out slowly and painfully.
Rebecca continued, "For making me feel like a woman. I haven’t felt like that in a long time."
"Oh, Becky, you are definitely a woman." He strained as he decided to reveal one last glimpse into his soul. "It hurts me terribly to see what he’s doing to you. I care for you so much and I always will." He paused, "And if it was anybody but Scott..." Tom had to draw his eyes from her. "What can I say?" Rebecca heard a slight hoarseness in his voice.
"Don’t say anything," Rebecca responded.
With that they re-entered the casino and found their small party still seated at the table. Rebecca took her seat and Tom slid his large frame into a chair across from her and between Laurie and Bonnie. Rebecca looked up into his eyes as he took one last longing look at her. Then turning his head toward Laurie a large smile overtook his face. He threw his arms across the backs of their chairs and leaned back.
"Well, What do you say we go have breakfast? My treat."
A little over two weeks had passed since Scott had made the phone call to Tom. He was spending more and more time alone. The crowd that he had been running with since his arrival in L. A. three months earlier had dwindled. While he still saw some of them on occasion he didn’t feel the need to surround himself with anything that would help him forget why he was there. Lately he had been thinking about that more then ever. It didn’t seem as important anymore to drink to forget. He was now wanting to remember. It was the first week of May and he longed for the fresh air and the smell of the freshly plowed fields near their home. Becky had probably already worked up the flower bed that ran along the sidewalk by the garage. He could see her on her knees, hair pulled back, dirt under her fingernails.
Sarah and Treage would be out of school before long. Treage would be riding his bicycle up and down the long driveway when he wasn’t trying to shoot hoops out by the studio. Summer usually meant that Becky could coax him away from the video games to enjoy the fresh air.
Sarah had always loved to go horseback riding with her friends but she was getting older now. Maybe she didn’t even like that anymore. Maybe there were boys showing up in the afternoons.
Kyle would be moving home from the dorm for the summer. He would probably get a job and spend the rest of the time with his friends.
Ethan and Lisa were to be married late in the summer. Sarah had filled her father in on some of the arrangements. He had already wondered what would happen now since he had not even spoken to Ethan since that night so many months earlier. Maybe they wouldn’t even want him there. That thought hurt him deeply. He had told Becky that he would make sure that everything was paid for on their end.
He was often picturing his family going about their daily routines and often times would look at the clock and think to himself, Its seven a.m. Becky is probably trying to get Treage out of bed right now for school and I can just hear him whining. Or when a television show came on at night he knew that Becky would be lying in their, her, bed watching it as she had done on so many other occasions.
Why was it that every television show, every commercial, every song that he heard brought back vividly a comforting memory?
He missed them all so very much. He wanted desperately to somehow go back and fix every mistake that he had ever made. If only I hadn’t have done that or said that one thing maybe things would have been different.
He had long since realized that what his so-called friends were trying to do was to get him forget his wife. Get on with his life. Its over, move on. But he knew in his heart that it wasn’t over and he also knew that he didn’t want to move on. He loved Becky more than anything in the world but by now it was probably too late. In his credulous behavior over the past few months he had created a chasm between them that he feared wold never be filled.
If only he knew what she was truly feeling. If only he knew if she held any feelings of love in her heart for him at all. The thought that she might not tore at his soul. He knew he had only himself to blame.
Scott arrived back at his apartment about eleven that evening. He had spent a long weekend with Jon as Paula had taken their children and flown back east for her mother’s birthday. It had been just the two of them alone again doing what they loved most, talking, laughing, and kicking back a few. They stayed up all night and slept late every morning. They survived on cold pizza and what ever they could scavenge from Paula’s cupboards.
They also found themselves in the old familiar surroundings of Jon’s studio, guitars in hand, bouncing ideas and bit and pieces of songs off each other. Mixed in with the laughter and good times where some pretty good concepts, if they did say so themselves.
Scott’s hand was still giving him trouble. Jon did his best to ignore the signs of his friend’s weakness. Scott was coming to grips with his disability now and had come to some decisions. Jon was more than happy to hear that Scott had decided to find a doctor and if after a second opinion this new doctor thought that another surgery was warranted he would submit to it.
He wasn’t getting any better and was in fact in a lot of pain. He was facing the possibility that he would never be able to play like he once had but to totally give up and lose the use of his hand altogether was not only unintelligent but childish.
Scott knew now that everyone was only trying to help. Instead he had been so caught up in his own self-pity to see that. He had also begun to realize how difficult he had been and why the doctor had even considered counseling. He had wrongly taken the offer as an insult. Now he knew that his best interest was at the heart of matter.
He was starting to get his life back together. Broken relationships were the hardest to mend. He and Jon had already recovered from their differences. He had much that he had to say to David and Rick and even Tom. He had talked to Rick recently and was starting to bridge the gap that had grown between him and the band once again.
But even as he sat with Jon late one night he knew that the one area of his life that he most desperately wanted to reconcile was his marriage. He had not the least idea as to how to go about that.
Jon and Scott had been sitting, feet up, feeling their way through notes, chords and bits of lyrics. This was a typical jam session. The kind that you can’t make happen. It was the type that was born out of a late night of good friendship and a few too many cans of beer. But it was the best kind.
Somewhere along the line Scott was trying to recall part of a piece that he had worked on a long time before. Something that had come to him while he was on a plane and, as he knew that he would probably loose it, he grabbed the only paper he had available at the time, a hotel receipt, and scribbled phonetically on the back the sequence of notes as they came into his head.
He knew he had that somewhere. He never threw anything out, music-wise. He even thought he knew where it was.
So there he was, at nearly midnight, back in his own apartment riffling through the contents of a brown cardboard file box that he had shipped from his studio in Michigan a few months earlier. He had hauled it down from the upper shelf in his closet and he now sat on the floor with the box between his legs.
He just knew he had seen that scrap of paper in there. He even remembered, vaguely what he had written it on, a receipt of some sort. I’ll know it when I see it.
The box contained all sorts of things. Loose papers mostly, nothing actually filed just piled up to the point of overflowing. As he sorted though he came across many interesting things. There was phone bill dated a few years back, a drawing of a horse that Sarah had done at school and gave to him in the studio one afternoon and a candy bar wrapper. The box also contained actual sheet music that he had painstakingly written by hand but also much more of the bits of paper and scraps that he was now looking for.
He was getting to the bottom of the box. I was sure it was in here, he was just thinking to himself when he pulled out another handful of loose papers to sort through. Suddenly as he glanced down to see how much was left in the box, his eyes fell upon a discolored, dog-eared piece of lined notebook paper. There were words covering the page, some in pencil, some in ink. The handwriting was not all that great, sloppy at best. He recognized it immediately.
He laid the pile of papers in his hands to the carpet. Slowly he reached in to carefully pick up the worn piece of paper. Bringing it closer a deep feeling of sadness worked its way through his body.
The handwriting was his. The words were his. With a growing lump in his throat he sat on the floor and read the words aloud.
It was a love song. One that told of a man’s great love for a woman. A man who had not gone looking for love but it had found it. Love had sought him out. He wasn’t even aware that he needed it, but once he had found it he knew.
The words also told of how this man had learned to come to need the love of this woman and depend upon it. How it seemed that they had been through so much together and they would always be there for one another. The man knew that as the years went by his love for her would only grow stronger and he counted on her and that love more each day. The title, penciled at the top of the page in block letters: Forever More
Setting the paper to the floor, Scott buried his head in his hands and wept. The only picture that he could focus on in his mind was that morning that he had sat on the edge of the bed and sang it for Becky for the first time. He remembered the way that she sat intently and listened to every word. He could smell the soft fragrance of her perfume. He could see the tears that fell past her cheek.
He loved her so much. He wanted to put all of the past behind them. He wanted to hold her in his arms again and show her how much he truly loved her. He wanted to ask for her forgiveness. He wanted to go home.
As he sat there deep in sorrow and pain he began to ask forgiveness from the only being who was able to truly give it. He began to pray. It was very hard at first to rekindle a relationship that he had knowingly neglected, but as he sat near the bed the words started coming as he asked God to forgive him for all the wrong that he had done to not only himself, but his family and his friends. His healing process had begun.
Finally when he had no more tears to shed, no more confessions to utter he felt a warm sense of hope pour over his soul. Pulling himself to his feet he went into the bathroom to splash cold water on his face. Somehow the man that stared back at him in the mirror had nothing more to hide. He wasn’t afraid to look past his eyes into his own soul.
Scott laid back onto his bed. The room was now dark. The painful throbbing in his temples made his whole body tremble. His eyes were red and stung, but as he lay there he felt the first peace that he had in months.
He reached for the phone and dialed the number from memory.
Rebecca had been lying in bed awake. She had not been able to sleep and just moments before had returned her Rosary to the night stand. The phone rang and she heard her husband’s strained hoarse words in her ears,
"Becky I wanna come home."
