The Fourth Sunrise Part 12

"*We do not part until we exchange addresses.'

"She hesitated and I could see her thinking hard. *I will give you a P.O. Box where you can mail me letters. It's in Was.h.i.+ngton, D.C.'

"I raised my eyebrows, not knowing what to make of this, except that she might have a job there and commute from her home in Virginia. I said, *I don't care if it's on Mars. This time I will be able to communicate with you. And I will. Expect letters.'

"*You got it, Joel. Right now, I want to feel you one more time. I want to experience all that you are because it might be...' She stopped herself from speaking further.

"I knew what she was going to say, but knowing that this could be possibly the last time I was ever going to be in her presence. I knew I needed to make it count. I needed to love her in my own way, so that she would remember us, the way we were.

"Christine reclined on her back, and I held my body up by my arms, hovering strongly above her body. We had been in this position many times throughout the night, but this time it was different. It was less s.e.xual and more romantic. Don't get me wrong. My body reacted to her the way it was supposed to, but it reacted to her in love, not in hormones.

"Our eyes locked together, neither one of us was able to look away.

"*Joel,' Christine said. Her breath was sweet and her skin was glowing like the petals of flowers. Her eyes reflected my face back in them. *I have loved you and desired you for the last fourteen years, too. I just had other huge life things I have been dealing with, like running a family and being a wife to a man who has no clue who I really am at the end of the day, or at the beginning of the day, for that matter. I'm just his wife and the mother of his children. I'm like Donna Reed in my perfect little wife-y life where I do what I ought to do.'

"I smiled grimly. *It sounds like a prison sentence.'

"In regard to him, it is. In regard to my child, he is my own little piece of heaven. I see the world through my child's beautiful eyes and suddenly, every day, the world is breathtaking and new, exciting and full of possibilities. But no matter how much I love my child, it doesn't take away from the person I truly ama"someone who Benjamin doesn't even try to get to know. I don't think he ever knew the real me. I was a pretty girl. I was a smart girl. I was a good girl. I was wife material, fiercely loyal and devoted and the one hometown girl who he trusted to wait for him through a terrible war. I supported him with letters, photos, and stories of home. I was his lifeline to the U.S. of A., and his idealistic vision of the American dream. We even have a white picket fence in the front yard. His idea.'

"I grinned when she said that.

"She continued, *I was almost the girl next door, uncomplicated, the one who never asked for much but fidelity, respect, responsibility, and perseverance. He is all that, unwaveringly, but he does not fulfill my deepest emotional needs, my most private sensual needs as a woman, like you do.' She gulped. *He rushes in the bedroom, so eager to skip to his pleasure and doesn't even hold me, afterward. It's such a small thing, to hold a woman afterward, and yet, each time, you do it for me and you do not let go of me until I let go of you. I am in heaven with you, Joel. I knew that you would be like this, as a lover. Your name has been on my lips every night, in prayer, that you should hear me call your name in my heart and know that I ached for you, missed you, loved you.'

"I love you, Christine," I said, looking down into her eyes. Her unveiling of so much truth was my validation that I was truly the right one for her. No matter what happened from now on, I did not have to wonder any more if we fit each other in every way.

"My hips unconsciously placed themselves right above hers, just where we dovetailed perfectly, her narrow hipbones inside of my wider ones. Her belly was soft against mine, smooth. It was a small matter of s.h.i.+fting forward just a few inches to easily be one with her perfect warmth and slick tightness that parted for me, yielded for me and became one with me.

"I held that position just outside of her and said softly, *I truly wish I would have just stayed with you and never continued with baseball. Had I known I was going to lose you, I would have quit the team that night.'

"*I wouldn't have let you do that for me. You would have always wondered if you could have made the major leagues.'

"*That would be better than trying to live my life apart from the only woman I have ever loved.' I sighed. *This morning, I roll all of my pa.s.sion, all of my pain, and all of my longing into your body, with mine, so I can imprint my love upon you, to take it with you forward in your life, and keep you safe and loved, in all the times when you doubt if you were ever loved. Because you are. And will be.' As I said that statement, my body naturally leaned forward, and I had now entered into her slick flesh. She moaned softly, acknowledging that we were now one again. She put her arms around my neck and pulled me to her lips. I leaned in and kissed her gently on the lips. *I don't understand why I cannot have you each minute of each day. It's life cruel trick for us to be star-crossed. Had I just come in October instead of Januarya"'

"*Shhh,' she said, and it was a comfort sound of pus.h.i.+ng away the sadness and drawing me inside of her like an inhaled prayer.

"I began making love to her, slowly, tenderly, not rus.h.i.+ng, not eager to skip ahead to a climax, but just to be connected to her for as long as I could. I knew that once we climaxed, she would want to leave, so I tried to control my ardor and hold back as long as I could.

"*I'm so sorry, Joel, that you missed me. But you have me right now.'

"*I know I do. I feel your pulse,' I said, with a smile.

"She smiled back, closed her eyes and her mouth opened in wonder as I moved inside of her with motions I had not yet used with her.

"I began to slowly move my hips in slow circles and figure eights and crosses and even the letters of her name, over and over. And then, with my body, I wrote my first name inside of her by moving. I wondered if she knew how I claimed her like that. My heart, my tears, my love were all in unison as I moved inside of her. She followed every cue to keep me safe and tight within her. I loved this woman more than anyone or anything in this world, more than baseball, more than life itself. I risked making love to her, knowing that there was a chance this would be the last time I would ever experience her in the flesh.

"My sweat and my tears covered my face as my motion began to grow stronger and we gravitated toward a steady rhythm of give and take that had her panting a bit and me grunting with the effort of it. When my tears dripped on her face and ran down, she tasted them and wept silently, but kept moving with me, the diamond tears melting from the corners of her eyes and dripping down her cheeks, making wet lines that streaked down into her long, sweet-smelling hair. I kissed them away, and then devoured each tear from her face and neck as they came faster and faster. My own tears fell on her throat and her neck, as we wept together softly, climbing the heights of pa.s.sion, compa.s.sion, and utter joy.

"That time, our joining wasn't for a s.e.xual sake, it was for pa.s.sion's sake, for love's sake, for eternity's sake. I waited to elevate our love to a pinnacle of pleasure. Hers. The only way I could do that under the present circ.u.mstances would be to tenderly and thoroughly make love to her in the slow and exacting way that I did, where each moment was committed to my memory: what she felt like, smelled like, tasted like, sounded like. Every nuance of her need was met by my acknowledgment and action to fulfill her. That is exactly what I did, inhaled each and every moment and molecule and sensation of Christine, moving myself inside of her like a surging wave across s.h.i.+fting hot sand.

*Finally, she bucked underneath of me and clutched her fingernails in my shoulders. I released my seed inside of her as I had done four other times throughout the night. I released myself into her with the most forbidden wish ever, one I dared not even speak aloud.

"She cried out my name at her peak and I whispered hers at mine, and then we swallowed those names into our deepest kisses that felt like the kind that you would give a lover when a meteor was about to strike Earth and wipe out humankind.

"Afterward, the sun streaming across us on the bed, I held her and held her as she wept heaving, gut-wrenching sobs that finally subsided into the soft breathing of her deep and sated relaxation into me. And then it was my turn to say, *Shhhhh.' Even as she came back to me and smiled, our arms and legs entwined, I held her close to me and murmured her name and soft endearments, all of the validation that she so desperately craved. There was absolutely no chance that I was going to go to sleep or waste one second of Christine and me, together. I did not even pull out of her, so deep was my own need to stay connected as long as possible.

She needed it so much, the comfort of arms around her and kisses on her hair and my big hand on her soft cheek. She had been deprived of affection for a lifetime. I wondered how she would fare without it, now that she had experienced the closeness that she had always wanted, always needed, and always dreamed of, with me.

Chapter Nineteen.

"She finally exclaimed at the lateness of the morning, worried that she might miss her plane that afternoon. Oh, how I secretly wished for that to come about, for another day with Christine would be like another day in heaven. But I stepped out in the morning air with my heart in my hand, it seemed, and escorted Christine out to a truck that was parked out front in the motel parking lot.

"*I'm so sorry to tear myself away, Joel.'

"*As I am, Christine,' I said. *We should stop tearing away from each other.'

"She nodded. *I need to get going. That's actually my dad's truck.'

"*I recognize it from the night we met. As I recall, your dad was ready to have me arrested or something similar.'

"*He's still very protective. I need to head over to my parents' house before I leave and return the truck and say goodbye to them, get my long ride to the airport. I bet they are pretty worried. They might have already put a missing person's report out on me.'

"*I hope not. I would have to admit that I was again guilty for keeping you out all night. And this time, your father might actually punch me in the nose. I wouldn't blame him, actually. This time we were not so innocent!'"

"She smiled at that. *I wish I was 18 again. I would have done some things differently,' she said. *I would have waited for you. I would have said no toahim. I would have left town and become a baseball groupie and followed your team bus and screamed out your name at the games. And I would have met you at the players' gate after every game, and gotten you to sneak out past curfew to be with me.'

"I laughed. *You were a nice girl and nice girls did not do such things in those days.'

"*After last night, am I still a nice girl?'

"*Yes, Christine, you're the very nicest girl in the entire world. To me.'

"Christine kissed me out in the open. There was no one outside, but it was still a bold statement because people in the town did know her. She had grown up there and was kissing a strange man in a motel parking lot, a man who was not her husband, the also locally known war hero. I looked down onto Christine's brown eyes and was once again lost in her beauty. *Don't forget this,' I said. *Please don't.'

"*Forget it? Are you kidding, Joel? This was the single greatest night of my life, and you had your work cut out for you because my previous greatest night was the night we slow danced in the library.'

"*That was mine, too,' I said. *Every minute I have spent with you has been one of the greatest times of my life.'

"I took out a piece of paper that I had swiped from the room. It was some kind of advertis.e.m.e.nt that was blank on the back.

"I pressed the paper against her father's light blue truck and wrote down my address: Joel Murphy 4256 Flower St.

Fullerton, Ca. 92833 "*Is this your home?' Christine asked "*Yes, I live alone in a pleasant neighborhood.' I stared at Christine and I knew she was leaving. A panic came over my face. The realization that this could be ita"the enda"was my reality. So, I simply said. *I love you, Christine.'

"*Joel?' Christine started to say.

"*Yes?'

"*I can't leave my husband.'

"*I know,' I said. *You have a son who loves you both.'

"*Yes. And there is something else you might need to know.'

"*What?'

"*I'm six weeks pregnant.'

"*Wow.' I nodded my head and stared into Christine's eyes, feeling kicked in the belly that she had not told me this until now. I knew I was dead man walking from here on out. I held in a groan. In a matter of moments, I wouldn't see her again for a very long time, if ever. Somehow, in the back of my mind, I guess I had been thinking this: only four more years until her son graduates high school and goes off to college and the child-rearing, the big reason for her staying married, would then be history. Now, she had just dropped this bomb on me that she was having a second child. With him. Captain Jack. It ached inside, a fierce pain that felt close to betrayal, not just to her, but to him, too. Maybe a part of me had been seriously hopeful, thinking there was a better chance at Christine leaving her husband once her son was grown. But now, she was going to have another child with him. And the waiting, if I waited, would begin.. All. Over. Again.

"My hurt must have been visible on my face.

"*Don't look at me like that!' Christine said. *Please don't! It will break my heart.'

"I was numb. I wanted to tell her that she just broke my heart again, but my lips did not say that. I just looked at her, stunned.

"*It's a baby. A sweet little baby,' she protested, as if the baby was innocent in all this, which was true.

"I finally found my voice again. *I'm not trying to look at you in any way. It was just a sudden shock. I'm just becoming aware of the reality I'm living in. The love of my life lives on the other side of the country and is married to another man that she doesn't plan on leaving and also, she is six weeks pregnant with his child.'

"*Joel, I had no idea I was going to see you tonight. You need to know that my husband doesn't even know yet. I told you I was pregnant before I even told my husband. He has no idea that we have a baby coming.'

"I pressed my lips together, thinking of what I would say. I wanted it to be without anger, but my heart was breaking so hard that my chest actually ached. I said, *It seems like the closer I get to youacirc.u.mstances arise that make it harder and harder for us to even have any hope of building a life together.'

"Christine stared intently into my eyes. *It does make it harder because I am pregnant. As you said, the circ.u.mstances. Your face is telling me not to go. I need for your face to tell me it's okay for me to leave.'

"I stared and did my best to show her everything was okay. It took a few seconds to steady my emotions, but I finally looked at her in a loving, calm way.

"*Thank you, Joel. I needed that.'

"*Thank you, Christine. It was a perfect night. And a perfect sunrise.' Then I kissed her lips tenderly and held her body tight. I loosened up to let her go. But she re-gripped my hands and begun to motion her hips.

"*What am I thinking? It wouldn't be perfect unless we slow danced.' So that is what we did. We slow danced for five minutes, holding one another and not a single person came outside. It was our own private dance floor in the middle of the motel parking lot. I smiled and held her in my arms without any regard for what people driving by might see. To h.e.l.l with them.

"I softly sang a song from the last record that we had slow-danced to, the Frank Sinatra hit, *Strangers in the Night.' When I came to the end of the song, we stopped dancing and just held each other. She felt so small and soft in my arms. The breath of the Colorado morning lifted her hair and the moisture in her eyes made my throat tight. I said, *There's no other place in this world I want to be than right here, right now, with you.'

"Christine inhaled long and deep, as if suddenly coming up for air from the bottom of a lake and was deprived of oxygen. Slowly, she relaxed her body and let go of me, walked to her dad's truck and opened the truck door. She hopped in, looking small and fragile behind the wheel of her dad's big old truck. She closed the door and rolled down the squeaky window with the window hand crank. I leaned my head in and kissed her on her forehead. That kiss was my seal of eternal love, my grat.i.tude for the time we'd had together, my prayer for her health and happiness, and my unspoken grief, as she softly slipped away from me, yet again.

"*Goodbye, Christine.'

"*Goodbye, Joel.'"

Present Day a" Delta, Colorado - Deltarado Days Stage, 3:00 a.m.

"That was very romantic," Sharee said, looking up at me as I finished speaking.

"I wasn't trying to be. That was the thing with Christine. Every romantic thing I have ever done in my life was either for her or it was because of her." I sighed and laughed.

"So, that was in 1982?" Sharee asked.

"Sure was. You were probably not even born yet."

"It's about the time I was born."

"By then, I had felt like I'd had lived a lifetime in heartache being apart from her. And your life hadn't even begun yet. That is absolutely amazing to me."

Sharee paused in deep thought. "How long did it take to see her again?"

"Fourteen more years."

"You two had that kind of night and you didn't see each other for another fourteen years?"

"It sounds unbelievable, but we had a buffer this time. We were able to write. Being able to write what I felt was something I desperately needed. And I did it often."

"What I want to know is what about anybody else? You must have fallen for someone else along the way during that fourteen-year span?" Sharee asked.

"Nope. Not even close. I couldn't open up my heart to anyone else."

"You didn't have any serious girlfriends?"

"Serious girlfriends? As far as I was concerned, no. But I tried. Comparing anyone to Christine was life's cruel joke a" the joke was, life showed me excellence in Christine, and then expected me to settle for anyone but her. I just couldn't do that."

"You never wanted your own family?" Sharee asked.

I didn't antic.i.p.ate Sharee's question to sting so harshly, but it did. "If I would have, I would have felt like a fraud."

"You would have had a life."

"I did have a life. I did amazing things with lots of amazing people. I just didn't havea""

"The best part," Sharee said, finis.h.i.+ng my sentence the way she wanted to. I was going to say Christine, but Sharee had the soapbox to finish. "Love is the best part. It is my belief that there is no other greater thing this life has to offer us."

"You see, deep, deep down, I believe that, too. I believe true love is the greatest thing we have to give another. I couldn't give someone secondary love. That is what it would have been."

"I'm amazed."

"Why?" I asked.

"That someone who has as much depth as you had only gives himself fully to one person and that person never was given a chance to benefit from that." Sharee was getting herself choked up. I looked around and noticed the cleaning crew working around us. It must be close to two in the morning. We were still sitting on the stage. Our food was long gone, but our conversation wasn't. She was about the easiest person I had ever talked to besides Christine.

I thought Sharee and I were about to head back to my truck, but she wasn't done talking. "So, how did it happen?"

"The third meeting? The third meeting almost didn't happen. I did everything I could to prevent it. I guess in the end, I just made it happen all the more. The third meeting was more of an act of desperation than a natural encounter."