Chapter Fifty-two

THE ANDERCHRONICLES

By Me, Ellee

[WARNING: The following story has been rated FNF*]
*Fiction NOT Fact

[SECOND WARNING (For people who disregarded the first warning): Look, I'm not messing around when I say the following characters are in no way representational of actual people who live and breathe and walk the streets of New York City. As for the events, well . . . they're possible, they could have happened. I'm not saying they did, but they coulda.]

"Spring Rain"

The late afternoon downpour of spring rain was coursing down the kitchen window, where I stood gazing out. It was distorting the image of everything outside the glass. I tightened my focus a bit to watch the little rivulets as they raced down the pane. I could see my reflection, too. It appeared as if the rain were tears racing down my cheeks. But that was only an illusion. Deep inside me . . . well, that’s where the real tears were, and they, too, were distorting the image of my world. Andy’s distance had only increased with each passing day since his return eight days before. And that song streaming in my mind . . . ohhhh, it never stopped, even though I had heard it only once on the radio.

[Author’s Note: Play Half A World Away now. You can sing along and even cry—don’t hold it back]

You’re half a world away, the song played, standing next to me.
It seems that every day
I’m losing you almost . . . invisibly.
Though you are near,
I can’t reach that far . . . across to where you are.
And so you stay . . . just half a world away.

And I would cross the universe for you
What good would it do . . . if you weren’t even there?
Til you return, until you’re way is clear,
I will be here . . . not half a world away.

You’re half a world away.
And no one is to blame.
If love outlives its day,
And turns into an ember from a flame,
I’ll love you as before.
Til worlds will be no more,
Til I can find a way . . . to where you stay.
Just half a world away.

And I would cross the universe for you
But what good would it do . . . if you weren’t even there?
Til you return, until you’re way is clear,
I will be here . . . not half a world away.

You're half a world away.

[Author’s Note: Please dry your tears now, and continue with the story, but keep a tissue near by]

Even though Andy and I had shared the breakfast table every morning since his return, I knew I was losing him a little more each day, invisibly, just like the song said, and I didn’t know why. We had been so close when he was so far away. But now, I really couldn’t reach across to where he was—he was still half a world away as he read his newspapers and sipped his cup of Diet Coke.

All our late-night rendezvous via cell phone were slipping away, too, further and further into the distance. I could hardly hear them anymore in my mind. Andy hadn’t mentioned them even once since being back. Actually, he hadn’t mentioned anything at all—we simply didn’t talk, except when necessary.

After finishing each newspaper, he would carefully fold it up and set it aside, but just before picking up the next one, he would glance over at me, and for a few seconds the most distressed look would settle across his countenance. His eyes would cloud up just a teeny, tiny bit, and then he would quickly divert them to the next newspaper.

“Andy . . .” I would say, trying to engage him, but he would always stop me saying,

“Ellee, please, I don’t have time. These newspapers don’t read themselves.”

Then I would hear,

And I would cross the universe for you
But what good would it do, if you weren’t even there?
Til you return, until you’re way is clear,
I will be here . . . not half a world away.

[Author’s Note: If you think it appropriate, play the song here, again and cry some more.]

This was the scene each morning for seven days, but then on the eighth day when I came into the breakfast room, he wasn’t even there—at all. There was no Andy. However, as I seated myself at the table after filling my bowl with oatmeal, I found a large, golden daffodil placed carefully across the center of my white china plate. Next to the bloom was a deep yellow-colored card which read,

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance. . .

Willy, I said to myself. He loved daffodils as much as I do. But apparently we weren’t the only ones, so does Andy. Then I noticed more writing,

I know where this is—Wordsworth isn’t the only one.

I had no idea what all this meant. Andy hadn’t even signed it. Yet I knew it was from him—I recognized his scent, Ralph Lauren’s Silver After Shave. It permeated the card. I sighed . . . and breathed in the fragrance.

I then spent the rest of the morning and early afternoon outside with Molly, until black clouds rolled in and began spilling their contents all over us. We ran home, however by time we arrived, we were soaked and chilled. I turned on the fire for Molly so she could curl up and dry out, and then I took a hot shower.

Later, after drying my hair, I made a cup of hot soup to sip as I watched the rain. It was coming down in torrents. When the cup was empty, I put it in the sink and then walked to the window, where I stood to observe the swift-flowing movement of water. It was then I became aware that the rain rushing down the window was layered over my reflected image. How sad I looked with those
rain-tears streaming down the cheeks of my glass counterpart.

My heart diamonds—that’s what I had been calling them ever since Andy had referred to them as such, were glowing like fire as their reflection played on the rain-streaked glass. My attention at that moment was completely absorbed by this phenomena, so I didn’t really notice when it happened, but all of a sudden it became apparent to me there was another image in the glass. At first it startled me. It was hard to make it out through the rain distortion. When I forced my eyes into a tighter focus, it looked so much like . . . like . . . but no, I told myself, it couldn’t be real. I knew my mind was just playing tricks on me—once again, like they had done a thousand times since coming here.

But then suddenly the rain stopped, and the image came clearly into focus —IT WAS ANDY’S! It wasn’t an illusion—the image was real, and it was next to mine in the glass! His eyes were so penetrating, even though they were only a mirrored reflection.

The portrait of the two of us together, framed in the window, was exquisitely breathtaking! He saw it, and I saw it—all the elements of a fine painting—a Renoir, a da Vinci and yes, even a Kratsmyer. We were awed by the shear beauty of it, which took us both by surprise, and we registered an auditory gasp simultaneously.

There they were—two people, side by side, the incredible blue of their eyes glinting off the wet glass, generating a dazzling aurora around the entire picture, the platinum hair of the one, short and cropped nearly to the pale scalp, in perfect contrast with the rich dark brown of the other, their expressions intimating deep emotions being played out at that very moment.

“Ellee,” Andy broke in, “we have to talk . . .”

A sick feeling hit the pit of my stomach the moment those words left his lips. This is where he says it’s time for me to leave, I told myself. For seven long days I had the dreaded sense something bad this way was coming. Now here it was. At least that's what I had been thinking, but I couldn’t have been more wrong. The next words out of his mouth were,

“ . . . about us.”

Us? He wants to talk about us? Us . . . US . . . US ? THERE’S AN US ? I swung around coming face to face with this awesome man, and there it was—all of it—everything: the snow-capped mountains of Kilimanjaro; the two Arctic terns; the high ski jump; the blue Morning Glory pools, two of them, hot as ever, the steam rising as usual, and finally at the bottom of it all—the Grand Tetons, with the valley spreading out below the high peaks! I coughed and sputtered and then coughed again. I blinked my eyes. Yes it was all there— and all of it together made . . . him, and he had just said, US. I coughed again. I had waited so long for there to be an US, and now . . . now it was as close, at that moment, as he was.

But after a few seconds, I came to my senses and realized that maybe he was about to announce that there was NO US at all, and that it was high time for me to clear out and leave him be. I coughed again, but this time for a different reason. Maybe some clarification was in order about this . . . US . . . he wanted to talk about. That’s when I said,

“Us? Andy, w-what . . . what do you mean . . . exactly?”


Bye for now,
Love,
Ellee