The melody in our hearts (27 page)

“Everything seems okay now. If you behave for a few more days, we might be able to release you soon enough.”

He reached out for her hand and intertwined his fingers with hers, the way they used to do when they were kids. She looked at him and smiled, feeling her heart melt. When he looked at her like that, she couldn’t help feeling overwhelmed by all the love she felt, all the love she had always thought was sisterly love.

“Feel like talking about it?” she asked, knowing he would understand what she was referring to.

“How much time have you got?” he teased, his smile a sad one.

“All the time in the world,” she said. “I’m actually off now and, as you know, I can’t leave the hospital without ending up on CNN!”

She winked and he smiled, nodding.

“Okay then.”

She sat on the bed and held his hand in both of hers, knowing she wouldn’t like what he was about to tell her, but it surely would do him good to let it all out.

“I won’t bother you with all the details, but to cut it short, when you ditched me for the hospital….” he smiled when she glared at him, then he winked and cleared his throat dramatically. “I mean, when you said you had to work, I thought I’d go out and check if Jen was at home; I didn’t want to be alone, and I needed some company after that exhausting European tour. But when I got there, without calling her first like I usually do, she was very surprised to see me and the reason…well….” He swallowed and inhaled deeply before going on. “The reason she was surprised was because her manager was there. In her bed.”

Valerie gasped and felt as bad as if it had happened to her: Ryan was her best friend, they were almost symbiotic at times, and she suddenly remembered the way she had felt when she had caught Jake cheating on her. The only difference was that she had dated Jake for only a little more than four months, while Jennifer had been Ryan’s girlfriend for almost a year, although they hardly ever saw each other. Still, this gave her no right to cheat on him, on the most wonderful man a woman could ever wish to be loved by.

She was so happy she had sent Jennifer away and had been awful to her the day before; Valerie only wished she had known what she had done, so she wouldn’t have let Jennifer get in and upset Ryan more than she already had.

“She said she could explain, but what was there to explain? We had a fight and I drove away,” Ryan went on, staring at his hands. “But I was so upset, and it was raining buckets, so I didn’t see the roadwork and crashed the car. The next thing I know, I’m back from the dead and you’re standing by my bed.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, and she truly was. She had never really liked Jennifer, but as long as Ryan was happy, it was okay with her.

“Don’t be. I should’ve seen it coming. It happened twice before, but she always said it was all a misunderstanding, and I believed her. I believed her because it seemed so unbelievable that a woman like her could like a guy like me....”

“A guy like you?” she scolded. “What do you mean, a guy like you? You’re a great musician, not to mention an attractive man, and you’re good and funny and loving. She should have known better than to cheat on such a wonderful person like you.”

He looked up and scrutinized her face, trying to understand whether she was serious or just teasing him.

“Besides, I never said anything before, but I honestly didn’t like her. I always thought she wasn’t good enough for you.”

He smiled and nodded, squeezing her hand.

“Yeah, I know. It showed.” He chuckled and she blushed. “I should’ve listened to you. It would’ve saved me so much trouble.”

“I guess it’s hard to trust people when you’re famous,” she said, looking at their intertwined fingers and wishing she were able to tell him the way she felt for him.

“You can never trust anyone. I’ve learned my lesson well by now. I thought she was different, but I guess I was just too blind to see.”

She was right, she was so damn right. It was impossible to trust anyone when you were famous: No matter how good you thought you knew a person, they would always be with you for a purpose, be it money, popularity, or some personal advantage.

He had never really meant to be famous; he had never really wanted to travel around the world and play in venues in front of thousands of people. He had simply wanted to make some good music, to write his own songs, like the one he had written years before for Valerie, and to play the piano. He had never thought, when that guy had approached him at Berklee, that his life would turn out to be a living hell.

He was rich – not that he was complaining about that – and had made more money than he would’ve made had he pursued a simple career as a piano teacher or a pianist, and he was famous, but he had never asked for that. He had only wanted to be a good musician, that was all.

And in the few days he had spent at the hospital, when he had almost died, he had come to realize that all he had achieved so far was nothing at all.

His manager had made some good marketing work, he had made Ryan known all over America and Europe, but what did he really have now? He could never have a say on what he liked or what he didn’t, on which songs he wanted to perform and which he didn’t. He had to drive around in cars with tinted windows to make sure that nobody would see him and stop the car. He could never go out with a girl without ending up on the front cover of some tabloids.

Ryan was making the life of every person he loved a disaster. Even now, lying in that hospital bed, he was giving Valerie a hard time, with all the reporters outside the hospital, forcing her to spend days and nights in there even when she wanted to go home to sleep in her bed.

It couldn’t go on like this. He couldn’t bear it anymore. He knew what he had to do now, and he had never been surer.

“I’m so tired of all this, Val.” He sighed and looked away, out the window at the blue sky. “It was cool for a while, but then it lost its real meaning. I wanted to be a musician because I love music, not because I want to make a hell of a lot of money from it. And it all became too much to bear. Managers, tours, spokesperson, reporters…I was always surrounded by a million people, but I always felt alone. I’ve never felt so alone in my life as in the last six years.” He sighed again, feeling kind of depressed. “I didn’t want all this; I only wanted to make some good music, to play the piano and be a good musician. I never wanted to be a celebrity. I’ve had a lot of time to think about it, and now I know what I have to do. I want to get in touch with Berklee College and see if they’d offer me a job as a teacher. It would be nice to help guys who love music, the way the teachers helped me. And it would have a meaning, it would be something useful and worthwhile, just like your job.” He looked up, scrutinizing her face, knowing she’d be glad of his decision. “And we’ll be together in the same city, and everything will be like it used to be when we were kids. It’ll be just you and me, Val. Forever. Nothing and no one will ever come between us anymore, I promise.”

He stroked her hand with his thumb and suddenly felt short of words. He knew what he wanted to say, he knew he should say it, but he wasn’t sure she would understand, he wasn’t sure she felt the same. Still...when he had looked at her, after saying that he would stay in Boston and try to get a job at Berklee, he thought he’d seen a sparkle in her eyes, something more than just happiness because her friend was going to be near.

“That’d be awesome!” she said with a big smile on her face. “I’m sure the dean at Berklee would love for you to work there. Besides, I’d love to have you around again.” She sighed, stroking his hand with her free one. “I’ve missed you in the past six years. I’ve missed what we used to have.”

“Me too,” he said, nodding. “I didn’t mean it to be like that. I didn’t mean to neglect you. You’ve always meant the world to me, Val. And you do now too.”

She smiled sheepishly, feeling embarrassed. She had never felt embarrassed around Ryan; they had always been like brother and sister, but everything was different now. She felt different because she loved him. And not just like she had loved him in the past, like a brother, like her best friend. She loved him with the big L, the kind of love she knew she wouldn’t be able to live without. Just the thought of him being around, always, every day, had lit up her day, had made her feel whole.

“Well, it seems we did choose carefully who we wanted to date, uh?” He chuckled nervously, knowing this might be the right time to finally tell her how he really felt. “It’s funny, we tried to live our lives separately and we both ended up getting cheated upon by our partners. Don’t you think fate might be behind all this?”

Valerie shrugged, looking away. “I’d rather say it was bad luck; maybe lack of good judgment, too. I mean, we should’ve known better than dating a playboy and a model: It was doomed from the very beginning. It’s such a cliché, after all.”

“Now, that’s what I call seeing the glass half full!” He teased and she wrinkled her nose, making a face. “You know,” he said, suddenly turning serious. “After what I’ve been through, I really think fate has had an important role in our lives, Val; I mean, if they hadn’t called you to fill in for your colleague, I would’ve never gone to see Jen and I would’ve never found out she was cheating on me, so I’d still be dating someone who didn’t care about me.” He shrugged and noticed she wore a different expression on her face now. “Plus, if I hadn’t crashed the car, you wouldn’t have gone back to the operating room; and if you hadn’t been on duty, I would probably be dead, because another doctor wouldn’t have cared as much as you did: I would’ve been just another patient, an unlucky guy who had a bad car accident and died because it was his time. So, yes,” he continued, looking her straight in the eye, feeling something burning inside his chest. “I do think fate has had a hand in all this and I think I might have understood what it wanted to tell me.”

Valerie tilted her head to one side and stared quizzically at him, not sure he really meant what she hoped deep down in her heart he did.

“You lost me.”

“Val....” he said, almost choking on the word. He cleared his throat and tried again. “Um....”

She looked at him, wondering what was so hard for him to say. He had always been such a chatterbox, and words had always come easy to him – the hard part was make him shut up.

But now, lying in that hospital bed with an IV attached to his arm and a screen next to him monitoring his heartbeat, he looked so fragile, so different from the boy she used to know.

“I...um....”

She chuckled, squeezing his hand.

“C’mon, it’s so unlike you to be short of words! Spit it out: What’s bugging you?”

He looked up and when their eyes met, both of them felt a shiver, like an electrical shock, going down their spines. None of them knew what the other had felt, but when the machine monitoring Ryan’s heartbeat started to beep faster, they both knew something was going on.

“I love you, Val,” he finally said, looking away. “All that’s happened in the past few days has finally opened my eyes and made me understand that what I was looking for had always been by my side my whole life.”

She flinched when she heard the words come out of Ryan’s mouth, and he let go of her hand, guessing she wanted to move away.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that....This is gonna spoil our friendship, right?” He sighed, shaking his head. “I’ve ruined everything. I’m such a jackass....”

He bowed his head, feeling stupid, and didn’t dare to look up at her to see the expression on her face: Feeling her flinch at his words had been enough to understand that she hadn’t expected him to say that and that she didn’t feel the same.

“No, you’re not,” she said, taking his hand again. “And you haven’t spoiled anything, you eejit. You’re my best friend, and you’ve been my North star ever since I met you. Nothing in this world could ever spoil our friendship or push me away from you.” He looked up and saw that she was smiling, although her eyes were damp. “The past few days have been quite tough for me too, and only God knows how I felt when I thought I was losing you.” She sighed and looked away. “My life wouldn’t mean anything without you, Ryan: It started the day I met you, and now I know that I would never in a million years be able to love anyone in this world the way I love you.”

She knew she was blushing, and for a moment she felt silly, but seeing that lovely smile brightening up his face erased everything.

“You mean....” he trailed off, unable to say the words.

“I mean I
love
you, and not the way I used to love you, not like my best friend, but more like a soul mate, more like...like I couldn’t possibly imagine a life without you in it.”

The most beautiful smile she had ever seen spread on his face, and she could feel tears pricking her eyes, but she tried to fight them back.

He pulled her close to him, still holding her hand, his eyes locked with hers. They stared at each other for a moment, then he lifted his hand and stroked her cheek softly, as if he was scared she would flinch again and stand up. But she didn’t flinch, nor did she stand up; instead, she closed her eyes at his touch, feeling as if nothing else mattered, nothing else but that moment with him.

He leaned forward and, while her eyes were still closed, he brushed her lips with his, softly, gently, like their first kiss years before.

Valerie winced, but only because he had caught her by surprise, and she kissed him back, knowing it was all she had been dreaming of, all she had been waiting for.