“No, I’m fine with it. Ask me anything you want,” he shrugged with ambivalence.
She studied him for a moment, trying to figure out his hidden agenda. Lately, everything with him seemed to take on a game-like appearance. “I can ask you anything I want?” she asked with caution.
“Sure. Go ahead. My life is an open book, but you already knew that,” he said attempting to make a joke.
Annie returned to the chair. “Okay, for starters, why don’t you tell me when you plan on leaving the island?”
He sat back on the couch and rested an ankle onto his knee. Then he stretched his arms over the back of the couch. “Well that depends on when or if you're leaving.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“It means, I intend to stay as close as possible to my kids. If you move back to Boston, I will too. If you’re planning on living here permanently, then I’ll buy a house in town instead of renting.”
Annie began to cry and quickly wiped each tear as it cascaded down her flushed cheeks. “So, basically you plan on stalking me?”
“That’s not what I meant,” he sighed, hating the fact he had made her cry. “I only want to be near my kids. We can arrange something on paper with our lawyers if it makes you feel more comfortable. But unless I drop dead tomorrow, I’m in their lives to stay.”
Annie wiped her face with her hands.
“I walked away from you and everything I owned when you divorced me, Annie. I’m not walking away from my kids for a second time.”
“I never asked you for anything, except for this house,” she cried.
“I didn’t say you did. I told my lawyer to give you anything you wanted to keep you happy. I felt it was the least I could do for the pain I caused you. But, to my surprise, you didn’t ask for anything.”
He ran his hands nervously through his hair. “And you know what? You not wanting anything hurt more than if you had taken everything I had. It was the final stab to my heart, knowing that nothing I had or what we had accumulated together meant anything to you.”
He waved his arms around in the air. “Except for this house. I would have thought this place harbored too many memories for you and be too painful to live here. But I guess I was wrong about that too.”
“The memories made me feel safe,” she mumbled, her eyes in her lap. “Sammi was conceived here.”
He forced a smile onto his pained face. “Yes, I remember that night,” he replied. “We had a lot of nights like that in this place.”
Then his eyes glanced over toward the spot on the floor in front of the fireplace. “I remember the night you told me you were pregnant as if it was yesterday.” His eyes fell back to her. “Too many nights to count.”
She felt naked beneath his stare, open and very vulnerable. For a brief weakened moment, her thoughts were consumed with the memories and the love they had shared then. Her heart beat loudly in her throat and somehow the walls of the room seemed to be shrinking in around them.
An awkward pause fell between them and Annie dropped her eyes to the floor. “Can I ask you something else?”
“Of course.”
“What are the doctors saying about your arm?”
He forced a smile onto his strained face. “Do you want to hear the truth or what my agent keeps feeding the press?”
“The truth,” she requested, and shifted nervously in the chair, bracing for what he might say next.
A long weighty sigh expelled from his chest. Self-consciously, he reached to rub the tender area surrounding his old wound. “Basically, the mobility I have now is as good as I can expect. As for playing guitar again…,” his voice trailed off. “Lets just say, I’ll never be able to play at the level I once did, and I’m okay with that. I had a career that lasted over twenty-five years that was never less than phenomenal. I won’t waste my energy complaining that it’s over now.”
“It sounds to me like you’re not even going to try and play again.”
His back stiffened on the couch. “Annie, the feeling still comes and goes in my finger tips. It’s kind of hard to handle the neck of a guitar when I can’t feel the wood or the frets. Besides, I’ve never done anything halfway in my life. To do that now would be an insult to myself and to the fans.”
“Under the circumstances, I think they’d understand.”
“There are other things I can do to remain ‘in the business’. For instance, I can produce new talent. But, for now, I’m happy to be alive.”
Annie nodded at him and smiled. “I suppose you’re right about that. Life truly is a gift.”
They were quiet and Annie began to fidget.
“Something else on your mind, Annie?”
“Yes.”
He nodded for her to continue.
“Can I ask why you’re still wearing your wedding ring?”
He smiled broadly. “I’m surprised you noticed,” he said, twisting the gold and diamond band around his finger. “I wear it on my right hand now, but to me, it still holds the same significance. I want it to be a constant reminder of what I had and what I lost.”
His blue eyes lifted and burned into hers. “Probably sounds pretty stupid to you, right?”
“No, not at all.” Self-consciously, she reached and felt her empty ring finger and remembered the day she took off her wedding rings.
Michael crossed his legs and rubbed at his forehead. His fingers grazed the small scar from his drunken rage in New York. He smiled at the memory.
“What’s so funny?” she asked, instantly taking a defensive stance.
“I’m surprised you didn’t ask about the scar on my head,” he smirked.
“I figured it was none of my business,” she sniffed.
“I did this to myself the night before Bull signed me into rehab,” he stated, looking her directly in the eye. “It was after the award show. Bull found one of your new CD’s and gave it to me. I went back to my hotel room, listened to it, and went berserk, totally tore the room apart. Furniture in pieces, broken glass, you name it. I must have cut my head on the glass. When Bull found me, I was covered in blood but I don’t remember a thing. Not one of my proudest moments.”
Annie’s eyes fell. “The CD wasn’t all that bad, Michael,” she spoke softly.
Michael quickly reached out and touched her arm. “Annie, I didn't say it was bad. In fact, I thought it was great. But the lyrics destroyed me because I knew a lot of the hostility and pain you wrote about involved me. It was a real eye-opener to what I had done to you, but I've never been more proud of your talent.”
His lips curled into a brilliant smile. “And the cover art…”
“What about it?”
Michael rubbed at his chin. “It blew me away.”
Annie smiled and began to shift uneasily in her seat. “Well, I guess I’ll get supper started while the girls are still sleeping.”
As she stood to leave, Michael caught her hand and gently pulled her to a stop.
“Thanks, Annie.”
“For what?”
“For talking to me as a human being and not the man you hate for the sheer fact I’m breathing the same air as you.” To his surprise, she didn’t remove her hand from his.
“Michael, I may never get to the point where I can enjoy being in the same room as you. But, no matter how I may feel about you in the years to come, the fact still remains: you are the father of my children. And with that illustrious title comes a certain amount of respect.”
He nodded in agreement. Then his eyes dropped to their clasped hands and he watched as her tiny hand slid from his fingers. In the blink of an eye, the warmth of her touch was gone.