Page 18 of Truly, Madly, Deeply
And so that the man might have a little more time with his girlfriend.
Tommy checked the time on his phone. Still another fifteen minutes before Annalee’s test would be finished. If he married her the way he planned to, one day they might be back in an office like this and Tommy might be talking to some young gun about his girlfriend of fifty years.
His Annalee.
He had never planned to have a serious girlfriend through high school. Tommy had been too focused on sports, too busy with his peers and his family. Back in middle school, guys his age with girlfriends always seemed to be pretending. Acting older than they were.Back then the girls towered over the boys and no one could drive.
Made more sense to spend his free time dribbling a basketball.
But all that changed his first day at Northside High.
Tommy leaned back in the waiting room chair. He had taken theater class because it counted as a music elective. That and two of his buddies from the team had also signed up. The rowdy social kids sat in the front that day. Ms. Elmer told them they were going to do a production ofAnnie Get Your Gun,and she expected everyone to participate.
Singing was something Tommy had gotten from his mother. They sang church songs and country favorites around the family piano. But that was it. Tommy was just okay—not the sort of gifted it would take to make a career. Which was why most of his friends didn’t know he could sing at all.
Not until the first day in theater class.
That morning, his group flirted with a few girls, all of them joking about being the leads. Ms. Elmer taught them the first verse of one of the songs. Then she asked students interested in being a lead to sing the verse solo at the front of the room, one at a time.
Tommy had never been afraid of much, so he was the first to raise his hand. If he was going to be in musical theater, he might as well let the teacher know what he could do. He sang that day with the confidence of someone who had been performing all his life.
His buddies gave him a standing ovation, high-fiving him and hollering over the fact that Tommy could do more than shoot baskets. Ms. Elmer nodded her approval. “Very nice. We have some real talent this year.”
The girls in their friend group took turns singing for Ms. Elmer and then his guy friends sang for her. Only a few could even remember the words.
That’s when it happened.
Ms. Elmer called on a girl from the back of the room. When she came forward a sort of hush fell over the class. None of them had ever seen her before. Blond hair spilled over her shoulders and when she turned and faced the class, her green eyes took his breath.
Most beautiful girl Tommy had ever seen.
“Class, let’s welcome Annalee Miller from Ohio. She and her family just moved to Indianapolis.” Ms. Elmer’s smile told everyone she knew more about what was coming than they did. “Annalee?”
What happened then was something Tommy would remember as long as he lived. Annalee began to sing and the sound filled the room. They might as well have sold tickets for the performance she gave that morning. Hers was the voice of an angel and when she finished, the other girls knew they were competing for second place.
Tommy’s teammates hurried him along when class ended, but just once he looked back at Annalee. She was gathering her things from the last row of seats and for the slightest instant their eyes met.
From that moment on, Tommy had been in love with Annalee Miller.
It came as no surprise a week later when Annalee was cast as Annie Oakley and Tommy, as Frank Butler—less because he was so talented and more because no one else in the program could sing on pitch.
Week after week of rehearsals, Tommy and Annalee were in the same scenes, working together, blocking their movements, side by side, singing duets. And in all that time Tommy learned practically nothing about her. Only that her parents were missionaries who had relocated to Indiana, and that she had one younger brother named Austin.
Otherwise she was an enigma.
Annalee was friendly while they worked on the show, but after rehearsal she would hurry off. When Tommy saw her in the lunchroom each day, Annalee sat by herself, usually reading. And she looked quite content about the fact.
Like she quite enjoyed the alone time.
Finally the night of the show, Tommy took a chance. After the applause died down and the curtain fell, while he and Annalee were still in the dark of the stage, he took her hand. He would never know what had been more surprising about that moment. The fact that he’d been brave enough to make the move, or what happened next.
Annalee didn’t pull away.
“I don’t want the show to end,” Tommy had whispered. “Could you still be my Annie?”
And she had done the exact thing Tommy had hoped she would do. Annalee Miller had laughed. “Why, yes, Frank Butler.” She had kept her voice low. The rest of the class was a few feet away in the wings. “I’d love to be your Annie Oakley. And I’m still a better shooter.”
They had laughed, their faces close to each other. And they’d been together ever since. Every now and then she was still his Annie and he was still her Frank. Back then his friends hadn’t understood the attraction. “She’s so quiet,” they would tell him. “Sure she’s pretty. But she’s always reading a book.”
