Touch the Stars (16 page)

"I
want
to, Juliana." He held out his hand. How could she not take it?

And so they left the house, hand in hand. In spite of everything, it was, she reflected, going to be difficult to say goodbye to Stephen at the end of the summer—very difficult indeed.

* * *

After the three-legged race and the beanbag toss and the sack race, after the big dinner with fried chicken and Nonna's special potato-and-cucumber salad, they gathered at dusk in the meadow. From there they'd have an excellent view of the fireworks display at Andrassy Acres. The subdivision's holiday celebration was a publicity move by Paul, who was eager to draw attention to the neighborhood's parks and lakes and clubhouse.

As it grew darker, Julie passed out sparklers to everyone. Tonia chased fireflies. Nonna complained that she had to sit in a webbed lawn chair while everyone else lounged on widely scattered blankets brought from the house.

Michael set up torches for illumination, though they didn't need it once the fireworks started. The first one, a Roman candle, made a loud
pop.
Then followed a spate of red-white-and-blue fountains to splash the sky with light.

"It is so beautiful," Stephen said in awe. He sat down next to Julie on her blanket. His lips occupied space so close to her ear that his breath stirred her hair. She longed to move closer, to make his lips brush her ear. She closed her eyes and fought the empty sensation in the pit of her stomach.

"Almost as beautiful as you," Stephen said, his voice low and camouflaged by the noise of the distant fireworks.

She shot him a desperate look and hitched herself a few inches further away. "Not here, Stephen," she murmured.

"Where, then? When?"

"You know the answer to that."

"If I did, I would not be asking."

"It's impossible. The two of us, I mean."

"I don't agree."

As the next starburst lit the sky, she heard an insect humming in the vicinity of her neck, but she ignored it.

"There!" said Stephen, bringing his hand down solidly on her shoulder. "I am sorry, Juliana, but there was a mosquito."

She turned her head. His eyes gazed deep into hers, and he didn't remove his hand. He was staring at her as though he were memorizing every eyelash, every contour, every nuance of expression. Her breath seemed to leave her lungs.

"Ooh," said everyone else. "Ahh." Above them a glittering fountain shimmered in midair and hung suspended as silvery confetti drifted to earth.

"Dearest Juliana," Stephen said helplessly. Her eyes widened as she watched his lips move toward hers. Once there, they lingered briefly, sending shocks of electricity through her body. The world seemed to stop; she didn't even hear the fireworks, and her heart forgot to beat. Then a dazzling golden glow lit up the sky and Julie remembered where they were and who was there, and she leaned away from him a bit, watching his face gilded in the light from the sky.

"You know what would make this perfect?" Eric yelled. "If Stephen would go up on the wire during the last fireworks!"

"Will you, Stephen? Will you perform for us?" Nonna leaned forward in her lawn chair.

"Well, I—" Stephen glanced at Julie, looking extremely uncomfortable.

"Please, Stephen," Mickey begged. "I want to see you do it."

"I will," he said quietly, and he leaped up from where he sat and ran toward the king poles erected not forty feet away.

Stephen shucked his shoes and climbed the ladder in his bare feet. He wore a pair of shorts and a T-shirt; he wasn't dressed to perform. Nevertheless, he looked very much at home on the platform.

Behind him, another fountain firework flared against the background of stars, this one with a whistle. And then two starbursts, red and blue, soared high into the sky.

Stephen did not use a balancing pole. He stepped confidently onto the wire, gazing intently at the cable stretched before him. He balanced, first on one bare foot, next on the other. Julie reflected that soon he would be walking the wire across Tallulah Gorge, fully focused as he was now. Below him would be huge jagged rocks and trees and a river and–danger.

Julie bit down hard on her lip to keep from crying out, but even as her emotions battled for control, her intellect told her that she had nothing to fear.

Stephen on the wire was supple and sure. He moved effortlessly to midwire, then stopped and knelt, raising his arms in one graceful movement, a classic wire walker's salute. When he stood, his body was strong and erect, and he completed his crossing as the last fireworks sputtered and lit the sky in one final beautiful tribute to America's independence.

"Now that wasn't so bad, Julie, was it?" Paul said, speaking quietly to her as they gathered up their blankets.

She shook her head, unable to speak, and hurried from the meadow hard on the heels of the capering children so that she wouldn't have to say anything to Stephen, who walked behind her with Eva and Gabrielle and stared at the back of her neck all the way to the house.

* * *

Soon after the Fourth of July, the house was overrun with people. The producer of the television show
Dare!
announced in a press release that Stephen Andrassy was going to cross the Tallulah Gorge on a tightrope. Network people, newspaper people, wire service people, and press agent people descended on the farm. Someone sneaked into the meadow and taped Stephen on the wire. The resulting video was an instant hit on YouTube.

One morning, a reporter met Julie in the driveway when she was running and jogged along beside her. What was he like, Stephen Martinovic-Andrassy? Was he her cousin? Why wasn't she practicing with the others? And by the way, what did Stephen eat for breakfast?

Julie barely said a word. After that incident she began to vary the times when she ran so that her habits wouldn't be predictable.

Stephen, however, seemed to glory in the attention. He granted interviews, talking at length about his work with the Moscow Circus, Cirque du Soleil, and his stint with the Big Apple Circus. He demonstrated his art on the high wire for photographers. He opened a Facebook page for the Amazing Andrassys and started Tweeting to their burgeoning list of followers. He emailed biographical sheets and publicity photos. Whenever possible, he included other members of the Amazing Andrassys in the pictures.

"You're getting famous," Julie couldn't help observing one night after Stephen had bade goodbye to a reporter from
Entertainment Tonight.
She was rocking on the front porch and enjoying a cool breeze. Stephen sat down beside her.

"That is good for all of us," he said solemnly.

"You thrive on the attention."

Stephen laughed. "I suppose I do, Juliana. One works to get to the top of a profession, and it is gratifying to be recognized as the best. Tell me, does it annoy you, my being famous?"

Julie considered the question thoughtfully. "It's like living in a goldfish bowl," she answered truthfully. "But, Stephen, you should know that I
am
proud of you."

"You don't approve of what I do, but you are proud of me." He broke into a smile. "I like that very much

Julie had the breathless feeling that he might kiss her, but at that moment they heard the approach of a car.

It discharged Mimi Fitchett, a publicity assistant from
Dare!
Mimi, who had visited briefly once before, was young, pretty, and wore a very short skirt.

"Stephen Andrassy?" Mimi called, squinting at him through the dim illumination of the yellow porch light.

"Hello, Mimi," Stephen said, standing up.

"I wasn't due here until tomorrow, but I finished my business in Chicago and decided to fly in tonight. Is there a decent motel around here?"

Stephen went inside to phone a motel in Cornelia to reserve a room. Mimi, shooting curious glances in Julie's direction, stalked up and down the porch and flicked green flecks of polish off her nails.

"I guess you're the Andrassy who doesn't perform," Mimi said after a while.

Julie stopped rocking and stared at her. An inexplicable heaviness settled around her heart, and she felt a twinge of longing for the old days when she had been proud that people recognized her as Juliana Andrassy, the youngest member of the Amazing Andrassys.

But those days were gone forever.

"Yes," Julie said quietly. "I'm the Andrassy who doesn't perform."

And excusing herself, she slipped quickly into the house before Stephen could return.

Chapter 9

Excitement in the household increased as the date of Stephen's Tallulah Gorge crossing drew near. Stephen, Paul, Albert, and Michael spent many days at the Gorge installing the rigging, a process that took weeks and invaded every aspect of their daily lives.

The cousins' practice on the high wire in the meadow was curtailed. Julie, out for her run at all hours of the day and night, grew accustomed to stumbling over piles of rope and stacks of steel cable on the front porch of the farmhouse. Stephen walked around looking preoccupied and wearing a heavy leather belt with loops and pockets for tools, the kind of belt a telephone lineman would wear. The belt and its tools were, Julie knew, the tools of Stephen's trade as much as the wire and his balancing pole.

"We're stringing the cable between the two spots where Karl Wallenda walked the Gorge in 1970," Stephen told them all enthusiastically after one of his first long days at the site.

"They're building a big covered observation deck. It's for local dignitaries. And family, of course," Michael added.

"Do you know they're expecting thousands of people to watch Stephen walk across the Tallulah Gorge?" Paul said in amazement. "Isn't that something?"

Julie steeled herself for more of the same talk, but now she was determined not to make her family feel awkward around her. Stephen was right. She shouldn't cause them to feel uneasy about a walk that, in family annals, would go down as a great achievement. As best she could, she hid her worry from everyone.

"The producer of
Dare!
has rented a big house in the mountains not far from the Gorge," Stephen announced at dinner one evening. "I, of course, will live in the house for a few days before the crossing, so I can supervise last-minute adjustments to the rigging. The rest of you can spend the night before the crossing there. We're free to use the house for the rest of the week if we want."

"A vacation!" Gabrielle exclaimed. "We need a vacation."

The others were enthusiastic about staying at the mountain house, but Julie greeted Stephen's announcement in silence. She didn't plan to go to Tallulah Gorge at all. She'd remain at the farmhouse, far away from Stephen and his performance.

"Won't you change your mind?" Stephen asked later that night when they met accidentally on the stairs. "I'd like you to be there, Juliana."

Julie shook her head. Stephen stared at her for a moment, his face torn with frustration, before Julie brushed past him toward her room. She looked out the window and saw him heading for the meadow alone, his path illumined only by the cold glare of the moon.

The countdown began—a week to go, then six days, then five. A story about Stephen's planned crossing appeared in
People
.
Dancing with the Stars
asked Stephen to be on their show. A European film crew arrived to make a documentary.

"Are you going to be on
Dancing with the Stars
?" asked Gabrielle. It was her favorite TV show.

"I'm a wire walker, not a dancer," Stephen replied, although Julie agreed with Gabrielle later in their room that they'd both like to see Stephen perform the tango on TV.

"With me!" said Gabrielle hopefully.

"Doubtful," Eva replied. "With Sofia Vergara, maybe."

Julie had the rare wisdom to stay out of this exchange.

Then there were only four days to go. The next day Stephen would leave for the house in the mountains.

Stephen was in his room when Julie mounted the stairs late that night while the rest of the household slept. She'd been out jogging in the moonlight, running as though something was chasing her. She hadn't, she reflected as she reached the top of the stairs, managed to outrun it.

"Juliana?" When he heard her, Stephen looked up from his laptop. He'd heard the light click of her door latch when she'd left and watched her from his window as she set off running down the moonlit driveway.