Endless Possibility: a RUSH novella (City Lights 3.5) (18 page)

We scrambled to our feet, and gathered as much of our ruined picnic as we could, and Charlotte led me across a street, under the shelter of an awning.

“Oh my god, that scared the hell out of me,” Charlotte laughed nervously. “And we’re soaked. I wonder how hard it will be to find a taxi…?” She put her hand on my arm. “Hey. You okay? I’m sorry the rain ruined your picnic, honey. But I loved every minute. Even if we only had a few.”

I nodded. God, she was so generous. And so full of love. Maybe I could salvage something. A proposal in the Paris rain. But this rain wasn’t romantic. It was icy and cold, and Charlotte was already shivering.

We went back to the hotel and took a hot bath together, which soothed my frustration and disappointment, but not by much.

I sat down that night to work on my book. A book that still didn’t have an ending.

Charlotte’s mini-tour took us to Sao Paolo, Brazil, and from there, she took me to Peru for my birthday. There, on the Huayna Picchu, she played the dawn, painting it in vibrant color with her violin, describing it with the music that lived in her soul.

I should have brought the ring. I should have asked her right then, as I kissed her lips and held her in my trembling arms. But whatever pain and bitterness that might have been lingering in my heart since the accident, was gone, and left no room for regret.

We went back to the hotel in Sacred Valley, and I made love to her with my entire heart and soul guiding my movements. I gave her everything I had, and I felt her do the same. Every breath she exhaled, every moan and cry, every touch of her fingers over my skin and my scars, my name on her lips…she gave it all to me. We were immersed in each other. The pleasure that came at the end was just an added reward.

She slept after, as we’d awoken early to be on the top of Huayuna before dawn, and I mentally readied myself to propose to her when she awoke. It might not have been a grand gesture—but after the extraordinary gift she’d given me up on that mountain, I was ready. I couldn’t feel more complete than I did that morning, and Charlotte agreeing to be my wife would put me over the edge.

I dozed beside her, a silly grin lingering on my face...that soon morphed into a grimace of pain. I scrambled to the bathroom, took an Azapram, and slumped down against the bathroom wall to wait out the migraine that came over me like a tsunami, praying Charlotte wouldn’t wake.

But she did.

“What’s happening? Noah…”

“I’m okay,” I said, the croak in my voice making the lie obvious. “Had a migraine but it’s going away. Go back to sleep, baby. I’ll be in soon. It’s…almost over. Almost….”

“Oh, honey.” She knelt beside me and cradled my head to her chest. “Is it getting better? You took a pill?” She took the Azapram bottle out of my slack hand, and her chest beneath my cheek hitched with a gasp. “Noah…This bottle had seven pills last week.
Seven.
I know because I packed it before we left for Sao Paulo. You have only two left?”

“Charlotte…”

“Did you have
five
migraines in one week? Or maybe…Lucien told me these things were potent. Are you…addicted?” She sucked in a shaky breath. “Noah, what’s going on?”

Her fear and worry were awful to hear, which is precisely why I tried to keep this from her in the first place.

“I’m not addicted to the pills,” I said as the pain drummed a heavy, hard beat in the back of my skull. “Or maybe I am. Maybe they’re not working anymore…”

“How long have they been this bad? This frequent?” Charlotte’s hands buffered my face, forcing me to look at her if I could. “Noah,
why didn’t you tell me
?”

“I didn’t want to scare you.”

Or me.
Now that she knew, the fear that something was really wrong with me ballooned up; as if admitting it out loud gave it power.

“It’s nothing,” I said, trying to take it all back. “I’ve been stressed, tired. It’s not worth worrying about.”

But of course, Charlotte was having none of that.

“You don’t do that, Noah,” she said, her voice tremulous but firm too. “
We
don’t do that. We don’t
spare
each other anything.”

“I’m
fine
,” I said, turning my head away.

“No,” she said, her voice cracking. “You’re not. And I’ve been too busy flying around on my tour to really see that you aren’t. Oh my god, how could I not see…?”

Her guilt was like a whip, flaying me. Another reason I’d kept it hidden.

“Because there’s nothing to see, Charlotte. Please do not take this on yourself. The drugs aren’t working. A resistance or something. That’s all.”

“Okay, fine.” She sniffled. “Is that all it is? Good. Then lets get you home to a doctor and she can change your prescription. Give you better medicine. But you can’t just keep suffering—”

“I can’t go back,” I said, my frustration with this whole mess beating the migraine pain. “I did not crack my head open, or almost lose my leg, or bust my ass in physical therapy…I didn’t just stumble around Europe blind so I could wind up back in…” I bit off the words, shaking my head.

“Back where?” she breathed. “A hospital? Is that were you think you need to go?”

“God, I’m just scaring the hell out of you which is why I didn’t want to say anything
.
” I stood up on shaking legs and felt my way past her, back to the bedroom. I picked up a pillow from the bed to lay against. Instead I threw it back down. “I just...I thought I was done, that’s all. Done with being scared and in pain, with the smell of death hanging all over me.” I shook my head. “It’s fine.
I’m
fine. I’ll see a doctor. Get a better prescription, but I don’t want to talk about it anymore. I just need a little sleep.”

I crawled into bed to try to salvage something of the morning, trying not to think of yet another proposal ruined, or how Charlotte wasn’t the only one who was fucking scared.

The migraine was receding, but I could feel Charlotte’s presence, the warm energy of her, as she stood regarding me.

Finally, I felt her slide into bed beside me. Wordlessly, she sidled up close, wrapped me in her legs and arms, and pulled me to her so that my head was pillowed against her breast. She stroked my hair gently, massaging the last of the pain away. I tensed at first…then sighed and melted against her.

“I’m sorry, baby…So sorry.”

“Sssshh, no.” She kissed my temple. “How long?”

“I don’t know. Since Rome, I think. So that was…”

“Early July,” she said, swallowing hard. “Almost four months, Noah.”

“Yeah. I was stressed, baby. That’s all.”

I felt her shake her head. “We’re going home. Back to New York City. Tomorrow.”

“Damn. You’ve worked so hard to plan this trip for us…”

“Doesn’t matter. You’re the only thing that matters. We’re done traveling for a while. And you are going straight to a doctor.”

I squeezed my eyes shut in defeat.
I blew it. My chance to ask her, ruined. And now she’s scared.

“Sleep now, Noah. Get some sleep.” She kissed me again, held me close, and I felt enveloped by her, by her body and her love, and I nestled closer.

“We’re going home.”

Back in New York City. The townhouse. It sounded and smelled the same as when I’d left it, eons ago, but felt different now. Charlotte was back, and so the place felt like a home instead of the black prison I’d locked myself up in after the accident.

We had an appointment with my old neurologist at Lenox Hill the following morning. On the phone he’d sounded concerned. It leaked out from behind his professional words when it wasn’t supposed to, and then fear settled into my chest like a lead weight. Roaring, relentless migraines. Dizziness. Nausea. I didn’t have to be a Google M.D. for my mind to jump to the worst conclusion.

“Come to bed,” Charlotte called to me that first night. “Get some rest. You can pick that up again later.”

I was writing. Writing these words. Speaking them into the machine where they vanished from me, but were written down too, so that others can read them. So Charlotte can finally read them, and know what she means to me. I could speak until I was hoarse and I’d never run out of ways to tell her how much I loved her, but right then, on the brink of an unknown tomorrow, I struggled to find the
right
words, to lock them in place for all time.

“Charlotte,” I finally whispered into the machine. “Thank you. Thank you for loving me like you do.”

The next morning, we called a cab to take me to my neurologist’s office at Lenox Hill. While we were standing on the curb outside the townhouse, waiting for the taxi, the ground slid out from under me. My hand slipped off Charlotte’s arm, and I stumbled sideways, to land hard on my knees. And still, the ground beneath my hands tried to slip away.

A rushing sound filled my ears, and Charlotte’s voice came from a great distance, as did the sound of a car engine. Hands lifted me, softer hands held me, and then the pervasive blackness dropped down over my thoughts too, and I knew nothing…

An old terror grabbed hold of me with both hands and shook me awake. The smells—cleanser and latex—filled my nose. The beeping machines and monitors, the voices and footsteps in the hall outside, echoed in my ears.

It all came flooding back. The accident. My head and neck were weighted down, metal plated and heavy, and it was so fucking dark. I was anchored to the bed and grabbing at my eyes for the bandages that weren’t there, before begging, in a voice torn ragged with terror, for someone to turn the lights back on. Please. Why is it so dark? Why…?

I sucked in a breath and bolted upright. Not anchored down. No pain. In the dark, yes, but then memory, such as it is to me now, came back. A hand slipped into mine.

Charlotte. This wasn’t after the accident, this was new. New and yet frighteningly similar to my remaining senses.

A barrage of tests, worried family members, and more tests, marked that first day and Charlotte tried to get me through these hours in which we waited for the doctors to tell us what the hell was wrong with me. I was scared, but I hated that Charlotte was scared more.

I slept with her standing guard over me and awoke again, to hear her crying. I heard her sniffle, and smelled the salt of her tears.

“Hey,” I murmured, reaching for her hand. “What’s wrong? Why are you crying, baby?”

I wondered if the doctor had pulled Charlotte aside and told her, yes, we can explain the increased migraines and dizziness, and we’re so sorry…

“I’m crying because I’m mad at you, Noah! And mad at myself. For being so ignorant to how exhausted you really are. How hard it’s been for you…” She huffed a sigh. “I read your book tonight.”

“That bad, huh?” I teased but she wasn’t hearing it.

“I read about Europe and I just can’t believe what you did for me. What you did for
us
. To undertake something like that, blind and alone…And it was so dangerous, and lonely, and exhausting...God, Noah.”

She crumpled into sobs and I held my arms out to her. “Come here, baby.”

Charlotte crawled back into bed with me, face to face. I wiped her tears away but more fell.