Page 114 of If Not for My Baby
“Don’t mind me,” I say. “Just rethinking all my life decisions.”
He’s a bald man with the kind of wrinkles around his mouth and eyes that tell me he’s older than he sounds. “Can’t be too rotten. You’re here, aren’t ya?”
And he’s right. We speed past a wide plateau of high grass and wildflowers, which roll on endlessly until interrupted by sweeping green peaks. And not gray-green, or rife with patches of cardboard brown, but a rich, verdant emerald. Tom has the eyes of his homeland.
As we exit the highway and asphalt and guardrails morph into cobbled stone, reverence takes hold of me. The road narrows and narrows until it’s merely a footpath, and branches scrape the car on either side. We pass a medieval-looking church and a graveyard fit for gothic hauntings, replete with ivy-covered brickwork and old tombstones draped in moss. A bearded man tends to his sheep. A woman bicycles around us nimbly.
Just when I think I’ve got a grip on my feelings for Tom, County Kerry peels back another layer of his psyche. This creeping woodland, these patches of mirrored bog—the rosy foxglove and prickly yellow gorse—Tom’s been striving to capture the perfect imperfection of this vast and ancient land in nearly all of his work. Somehow, just breathing in the atmosphere, I already know him in a way I didn’t before. I sink deeper into my love for him, as if stepping right into one of those bogs.
The taxi comes to a halt and my hands begin to shake. That doesn’t stop me from combing through my bag and swiping on a fresh layer of deodorant, spritzing some perfume, and rinsing my mouth with the dregs of my travel-sized mouthwash. The sweet cabbie’s feet crunch on gravel right outside my open door and I’m mindful not to splash him when I spit primly onto the ground.
It’s a struggle to exit the car and take my bag from him because I’m seeing spots. A belated realization—I haven’t eaten in fourteen hours.
“Best of luck with all those life decisions,” the cabbie says before driving off.
As if on cue, heavy clouds slide over the fading sun and drench the slopes of bramble in shadow. He’s gone before I can plead that he take me with him.
Tom’s home is a refurbished eighteenth-century castle he bought for his parents after the success of “If Not for My Baby.” My heart twists as I remember the night he told me how he surprised them. We were twined in his sheets somewhere between St. Louis and Kansas City, his face illuminated in a pale bath of flat-screen light:“I’d even had the kitchen redone for my mam—two ovens, new range, hardwood. They’d said the house I’d grown up in was full of memories, and they were too old to make half as many good ones in a new spot. Broke my heart near to pieces.” His parents stayed in their two-bedroom town house, and Tom took the new home for himself.
And this remote estate is no thatched-roof cottage. A low stone barrier and high-reaching hedges encircle what must be quite a stretch of property, meeting in the middle with twowrought-iron gates. A call box sprouts from the ground, twined in leaves. Putting a lot of faith in these lucky black jeans, I press the red button before I can think twice.
While it buzzes I wonder why I didn’t call him first. This is some seriously stalker behavior. But I already know the truth: I couldn’t bear it if Tom told me not to come. And I’m betting all I have that he’s less likely to send me home if he has to look me in the eye. A stalker and a manipulator—what a catch I am.
“Hello?”
Even his garbled intercom voice is deep and rolling. My mouth is bone-dry when I attempt a weak swallow. “Hi. This is crazy, but it’s Clemen—”
The gates creak open before I’ve finished speaking.
I roll my suitcase over the gravel with enough difficulty that at some point I cave and just carry the thing. Tom’s home reveals itself piece by piece as the path unfurls. Unkempt clusters of hedges and beech trees give way to a calm, poised manor painted the colors of peaches and cream. It rises from the ground as naturally as if it were part of the landscape.
A simple stonework chimney pumps soft wisps of smoke into the cloudy evening sky. The tiled roof and wide bay windows are as timeless as the rural expanse of gorgeous green that slopes in all directions. Gangly heather, creeping vines, bees spinning around soft violet bells and gently swaying petals of pale yellow and white. It’s storybook. It’s breathtaking. And it couldn’t be more him.
A fine veil of rain is beginning to mist over my skin and I reach the stone porch right as Tom’s opening the door.
He breathes out in a rush when he looks at me.
And I know no man could ever be as beautiful. Even when his glorious hair is tied back as it is now, those simple Trinity sweats low on his hips, he hails from a land of gods and monsters. Every inch of him otherworldly and haunting and owning my entire soul. I can’t believe how many days I wasted not being right here by his side.
“Hi.” My anxiety has skittered off into the forest, dragging my self-doubt along with it. He could tell me to hit the road, and this entire journey would still have been worth it just to see him again. I’m still soaking him in when I realize the kind of intimacy I want with Tom Halloran simply cannot exist behind the walls I’ve erected around my heart.
“What’re you doing here?” He doesn’t say it unkindly.
“The band bought me a ticket.”
He’s not the Tom I knew on tour. He’s guarded. Hurt. “That was kind of ’em.”
The autumn air is beginning to settle in, and the windchill seeps through my sweater. Soft rain pitters against the roof above us. Everything is moving in slow motion.
“I am so sorry.” My fingers scratch at the tag on my luggage handle. “For Los Angeles.” When I speak again, my voice has a wobble to it. “You were right all along. I was scared. And I want to— I’d like to—”
A peal of feminine laughter rings out from inside his home. My focus reorients from the gravitational pull of him, and I can make out soft music and the scent of garlic wafting out from the house.
“Oh, God.” I’m like an animal that’s been kicked, limping away. “I should have called. You’re busy. Of course you are—”
His mouth twists unhappily. “Clem—”
“This is really embarrassing.” I drag my suitcase over the porch steps and it lands wrong, twisting my wrist into an unnatural angle.
