Appassionato (2 page)

Emma had more flashbacks throughout the rest of the day. Random bursts of vision and sound, none lasting long enough to pin down, but long enough to make her head start to pound instead of ache. She saw crowds and Duncan’s hands signing photos and pieces of paper. It was as if she was in his head, but just when she’d figure out that the point of view was Duncan’s, the hallucination would snap away and she’d be looking
at
him. She could hardly wait until school was done for the day so she could go home and crawl under the covers of her bed. She’d taken ibuprofen, but it didn’t do a thing to relieve the pain behind her eyes. At lunchtime, she hid in the library office, eating her sandwich alone while the visions flew past her closed eyes. She wondered if she was going crazy. She thought at first that maybe she just hadn’t slept well, but she’d never hallucinated before. By four o’clock, she was almost crying from the stress. She’d spent the afternoon dodging questions from Julie and Portia. She didn’t feel like trying to explain what was wrong when she didn’t understand herself what was happening.

After the last bell, she was finally able to escape, for once not lugging anything home with her to work on in the evening. She worried about driving, hoping none of the episodes would happen on the way home, but luckily the drive home was uneventful. She pulled into her short driveway, waved to her neighbor, and went into her small house, grateful to be home. She prepared a quick dinner, ate it standing up at the kitchen counter, then stripped and fell into bed, desperate for sleep. She dropped off right away, slipping into a heavy sleep despite the early hour.

The next thing she knew, it was dark and she was sitting up in bed, heart pounding. She flicked on the small bedside light and tried to calm herself, blindly looking around at her soothing cream walls and pale yellow curtains. The streetlight outside filtered through the soft fabric, twinkling in the darkness of her room. She didn’t feel rested at all.

When she closed her eyes, she remembered every dream as though it were real—Duncan growing up, having a hard time with his weight as a child until high school, teaching himself how to play guitar, losing the weight and realizing he could sing. She knew the exact moment he figured out he was bisexual and his very quiet experimentation during the one year he attended college until he dropped out to pursue his music career. She followed every step of his life from childhood to adulthood—his first record contract, the wild success of his first album, the two Grammys he won, and subsequent critical acclaim for his second album. She could sing every song on the new album, the one he was touring for now with his best friend and assistant, Jake Mackenzie. The memories weren’t sharp, not like her own. She knew the broad outlines of his life, but not the details that made them real. They felt like the memories learned in conversation with a friend.

She grasped the blanket closer to her chest, trying not to hyperventilate as she suddenly realized that she knew Jake, too. She knew the two men grew up together, and she knew that Jake was straight and had his heart broken by his high school girlfriend his second year of college. That was why he’d dropped out and finally taken the job Duncan had offered—manager, assistant, co-writer. She knew that he had an incredible laugh. He could play piano, and he’d helped create every single one of Duncan’s songs, though he refused to play onstage. She knew that they’d both grown up in New Jersey but that they lived in Brooklyn now, sharing a townhouse. Emma realized that she was crying because she felt like she knew the two men in her dreams as if they were her best friends, and that was so wrong. That was crazy and twisted, and she was obviously losing her mind, crying into her sheets in the middle of the night over two guys that she’d never even met. She sniffed and rubbed her nose, willing herself to stop it. She looked at her hands, vaguely surprised to find them so small and feminine after feeling guitar strings and piano keys under her fingertips for the past few hours. She couldn’t play an instrument if you paid her a million dollars.
What was happening to her?

Emma threw back the covers and groped for her robe, suddenly realizing that she was nude. In her rush to get to bed, she’d just pulled off her clothes and crawled under the covers. She blushed, mildly embarrassed. She never slept naked.
But Jake did
, she thought then blushed again. Duncan wore boxers to bed, a result of growing up with two sisters. Jake was an only child. And with that thought, Emma nearly started crying again, because really, she must be insane. There was no way she could know these things. Her brain was making this shit up. She padded to the bathroom and rinsed her face then made her way to the living room. She flicked on the TV and sank into her couch, not surprised to find a rerun of her favorite late show on, even though it was two in the morning. What did surprise her was how familiar the stage and audience looked as the camera panned across the stage. Her heart began knocking against her ribcage. That was the same stage she’d dreamed about! When the camera zoomed in on the host, he held up a CD, Duncan’s new one. Emma laughed shortly and dropped her face in her hands. When she looked up again, she wasn’t at all startled to see Duncan playing the guitar. She knew every note of that song by heart. The strange thing was that she knew exactly when he would change up the melody for this particular performance, holding certain notes longer and others shorter than the version on the CD. She sighed and settled onto the couch, willing herself to relax. If she couldn’t stop the dreams, she may as well enjoy the music.

* * * *

“Man, I hate it when our flight lands in the middle of the night,” Duncan complained, running his hands through his hair. He and Jake were in the car Jake had arranged to take them home to Brooklyn from the JFK airport after taping a late show in LA earlier that day. Jake slumped down on the seat across from Duncan, trying not to fall asleep. His friend looked exhausted, and Duncan worried about him.

“Yeah,” Jake grunted, not opening his eyes. “And this damn headache is driving me crazy.”

“My head still hurts, too,” Duncan said, rubbing his temples. “And even though I slept a little on the plane, I had the weirdest dreams.”

“You too? I dreamed about this woman, I think she was a high school librarian. I haven’t thought about high school in years, and here I am dreaming about a teacher. She seemed so lonely.” Jake laughed. “Reminds me of that old Adam Ant video.” He grinned at his friend, but Duncan couldn’t bring himself to smile back.

“Wait, what? I dreamed about a teacher, too. I even know her name, Emma Bell.” Duncan frowned as Jake looked at him in disbelief. “What?”

“That’s the name of the woman I dreamed about.” Jake scratched his head. “Did we ever meet someone named Emma?”

Duncan shrugged. “No, not that I can remember, but you know how many fans I’ve met the past eight years? There’s no way I could remember all of them.”

“Well, even if you could remember someone named Emma, why would we both dream about her at the same time?”

Duncan shook his head, feeling his headache intensify. “What did she look like?” Jake smirked, and Duncan rolled his eyes. “Yeah, I know what she looked like to me. I want to know what she looked like in your dream.”

“She had long, wavy brown hair. And the most gorgeous hazel eyes I’ve ever seen. And she was curvy.” Jake rubbed his face. “She was really pretty. I dreamed about when she was a kid. Saw how she went to college after—” Jake broke off, seeing Duncan nodding.

“Yeah, that’s what she looked like in my dream, too. And her brother died. That’s when she went to school.” Duncan yawned and blinked his eyes, trying to focus. “What the hell is going on? Dreaming about the same woman? That’s just weird.”

“Yeah.” Jake closed his eyes again and slumped down. “I’m going to nap until we get home. Then I’m going to crash for two days, and then we’re going to do the concert at the Garden, and we’re gonna laugh about this. Because it can’t possibly be real.” He smiled as he folded his hands over his abdomen. “We are obviously still asleep and I’m dreaming up this entire scenario because of the profound lack of sex in my life this past year.”

Duncan laughed and very carefully did not look at the way Jake’s tight jeans displayed his slim hips. He also refused to notice Jake’s taut stomach and graceful hands. He had a lot of practice ignoring his attraction to Jake, and he wasn’t going to screw up now. “Okay, I’m game. If you think you’re dreaming, then we’ll see if either of us remember this tomorrow,” Duncan said fondly, eyes lingering on Jake’s relaxed smile as the car took them closer to home.