Call Me Home

3

Thanksgiving, 1969

"Come on, Teedee bird. You've got to eat something."

She lifted her head from the sofa and cast a bleary eye over the mountain of food her mother was holding.

"Jesus, mom, could you not make it at least appear manageable?"

Barbara looked crestfallen and a pang of guilt hit her.

"I'm sorry, mama. Thank you. Just - leave it on the coffee table, I'll see how I feel."

Jess watched from the doorway as his daughter drifted back to sleep under the blanket.

"Bunny, you don't think she might be - you know..."

"No! No, she wouldn't keep something like that from me. No, you heard her, she has stomach flu, it's something she ate. She's over the worst of it now though. She'll be fine by the time Bobby gets here tomorrow."

♾

Stevie was screaming as the car pulled up on the drive.

"Will you two stop, for Pete's sake?" Barbara despaired as she bustled toward the door. "You're grown adults!"

"YIELD!"

"FUCK YOU!! NOOO!"

As Bobby walked in, he looked baffled at the sight in front of him. His girlfriend was laying on the floor with her brother's head in a leg lock. He had one arm pinned under himself and she had hold of the other, squeezing his knuckles as he writhed in pain.

"Um, hi, honey."

"Oh, hey!" She smiled brightly up at him, overcompensating for the guilt still wracking her. Chris made the most of her letting her guard down and manoeuvred quickly, pinning her facedown to the floor with her legs twisted up behind her.

"Feeling better then?" Breezed Jess, walking in behind Bobby.

"Nnngffffhh" came the sound from the face shoved into the rug.

"Right that's that, stop it! Both of you knock it right off, we have company!" Barbara had resorted to hitting Chris with a rolled up magazine until he released his sister.

She jumped up and bounced over to her boyfriend, throwing her arms around his neck and planting a chaste kiss on his lips.

"Hi you."

"Hey, I missed you. Your dad said on the drive from the airport you were sick, are you feeling ok?"

"Yeah, it's crazy, I haven't been able to keep a thing down since Friday, uh -" An imagine of Lindsey's body pounding into her on Friday flashed into her mind and she shook it out "-Friday night. And, and then in like the past few hours, I dunno, it's like I perked right up! Good as new."

"That's great! Listen I thought we could walk down to the lake, there's something I wanted to talk to you about."

"Sure!" Trying to hide the panic in her voice she grabbed for her running shoes. Did he know? How could he know? Get a grip Stevie, of course he doesn't fucking know. How could he know?

♾

She stared out at the water, stunned.

"Say something."

"Well, honestly I wasn't sure this was how this moment in my life was going to go, Robert."

"Well, Stephanie, sometimes life isn't just a fairy tale. We have to be practical."

She snapped her head round to look at him.

"Are you fucking serious right now? You can't even try to disguise the fact you're doing this to advance your career? You haven't even got the wherewithal to try and make it in the least bit romantic? You literally just asked me to marry you because they offered you a permanent job in New York and it looks better -" she rage-mimed inverted commas "-if you have a wife. Seriously? You want me to drop everything, my plans, my career, just to play house with you thousands of miles away from anyone I care about? What, do they cut you a bonus check for every baby I push out too? What the fuck, Bobby? I mean, do you even have a ring?"

"There wasn't time - "

"Nice. Real nice. Well, thanks for the offer but I'm actually ok."

You're being childish."

"I'm being childish? Me? Are you fucking high? You literally want a picture book life for yourself. Have you even thought about how I'd feel?"

"You can work if you want to! You can teach in New York just as well as you can teach in California!"

"Teach?!"

"Is that not what you want to do?"

"No. No, that's what I had settled to do after listening to assholes like you. I'm a musician, Bobby. I have a music career."

He barked with laughter.

"You're not a musician! You sing fucking covers of chart songs at school dances in your spare time!"

She slowly stood and turned to him.

"You do not know the first thing about what I am capable of," she spat. "You are going to look so fucking stupid in a few years. I am going to sell out Red Rocks and Madison Square Garden, and you are welcome to get the fuck out of my life and find yourself a trophy wife elsewhere. This is done."

♾

As she fought back tears she punched in the number on the telephone in her old bedroom.

"Hello?"

"Lindsey? I need you."