Title: Breakfast with an Orang Utan
Author: Magdala
Rating: M for language and some sexual content
Summary: Stacy's return
Disclaimer: All characters are fully owned by the producers of House MD
Breakfast with an Orang Utan Part Two.
Someday I'll find you, Moonlight behind you, True to the dream I am dreaming. Noel Coward
When I woke up it was dark. Turning my head on the pillow, looking out through the French windows across the verandah through the palm trees Singapore twinkled with lights. I could hear Greg playing the piano and singing in the next room and I drifted back into slumber.
Now as I drove through Princeton away from the PPTH I couldn't remember the song Greg had played half a world away. Recalling the Princeton Record Exchange I turned the car and headed for South Tulane.
"Do you have anything by Noel Coward? I'm looking for a special song."
"Mad Dogs and Englishmen?"
"No this was ... It was romantic."
"Are you thinking of 'I'll see you again'?"
"Doesn't sound like it. I can remember two lines I think. 'I'll leave you never ... love you forever' something like that"
"That's 'Someday I'll find You' you got the lines right"
"You are amazing!"
"Not really there was a guy on the phone asking about it earlier."
Greg it had to be Greg. I had to stop myself from asking how 'the guy on the phone' sounded and what he said. This young stranger didn't need me crying all over him.
"Do you want that on CD or vinyl."
"CD. I've got a player in the car. That's if the guy on the phone..."
"It's okay he wanted the vinyl."
So it was Greg. I paid for the Noel Coward Album nodded my thanks and left the store without saying another word. I was shaking by the time I got behind the wheel so I headed for the nearest Starbucks. As I asked for the House Blend I realised synchronicity was everywhere and opted for takeout.
I wasn't ready to face Mark I didn't even care if he was worried that I should have been back hours ago. So I drove to one of the spots in Princeton that Greg and I had loved, put the CD in it's slot selected the right track and started to drink the coffee.
How selective our hearing is when we are in love. And how incomplete is our memory when times have changed. I had remembered a simple love song and fixed on two lines. But as Noel Coward sang 'Someday I'll Find You' I realised was not just a simple love song. It predicted everything that happened to us from the end of that enchanted time away from home right up until the moment I was sitting alone in the car listening to the song carefully for the first time.
When one is lonely the days are long;
You seem so near
But never appear.
Each night I sing you a lover's song;
Please try to hear,
My dear, my dear.
Someday I'll find you,
Moonlight behind you,
True to the dream I am dreaming.
As I draw near you
You'll smile a little smile;
For a little while
We shall stand
Hand in hand.
I'll leave you never,
Love you for ever,
All our past sorrow redeeming:
Try to make it true,
Say you love me too,
Someday I'll find you again.
Can't you remember the fun we had?
Time is so fleet,
Why shouldn't we meet?
When you're away from me days are sad;
Life's not complete,
My sweet, my sweet.
Yes each night I had sung Greg a lover's song as I yearned for him. It wasn't until I was sure he absolutely didn't want to hear me that I started seeing Mark. It was not until I was sure he wouldn't ever try to hear that I married Mark. But I knew that when Greg listened to the words on vinyl he would not see it that way. "All our past sorrow redeeming" would not be acceptable to him. And if he remembered the fun we had it would only add to the burden he carried on that ruined leg.
I shut off the sound folded my arms over the steering wheel and buried my face in the crook of my elbow.
I wanted to get back to the memories and back to a happier time.
Greg had stopped playing he came into the bedroom sat on the edge of the enormous bed and switched on the bedside lamp. The sheet had fallen away and I was quite naked. He reached out and touched me. "Darling, You might like to put some clothes on."
I blinked unable to believe the sight before me. "Greg!" He was wearing a white tuxedo.
"I know I've gone troppo"
"I love it" I moved towards him and he took me in his arms the aroma of the aftershave filled my nostrils he smelt as wonderful as he looked.
"You smell wonderful" I murmured returning his kiss.
He caressed the length of my body with his left hand. I loved his hands. The speed, strength and sensitivity of his fingers, which drew such passionate music from the piano, could set my senses alight in seconds. His hands were so truly beautiful sometimes I would simply gaze at them.
Greg quickly lifted his hand away giving me a small tap on the bottom.
"Come on, Stacy. Up. Our visitors will be here in minutes."
"Visitors!"
"A few ex-pats and a Singaporean couple. They were going to take us out on a junk round the Harbour but when you were felled by jetlag we moved the feast here."
"God what am I going to wear?"
"I think you will find a little black number in the closet. We'll match"
And we did match. That was the way we were then.
I still have that dress it is floor length and bias cut in silk chiffon. It is the loveliest, most elegant, gown I have ever owned but I have not worn it in America. I might have worn it if Mark and I had gone to Paris but that didn't happen.
I looked at it just before we came to Princeton and realised it still carried the aroma of Greg and his aftershave but even when I buried my face in the fabric and wept I didn't think about Singapore. It was seeing Greg that had made those memories return.
Dance, dance, dance little lady, Leave tomorrow behind. Noel Coward
Our guests that evening in Singapore obviously valued Greg's intellect and enjoyed his wit. In Princeton jealousy of Greg's brilliance often created a barrier, colleagues were often afraid of his sarcasm and those who might have liked him held back seeing him only through the prism of his friendship with Wilson.
At the beginning of our relationship we were often invited to parties Greg was quite happy to play our host's untouched pianos simply to avoid boring smalltalk. Until one evening when someone put a twenty dollar note in the glass he'd just drained thinking he was the hired entertainer. After that he refused to play and the invitations diminished. But in Singapore Greg was not the only person who could play the piano after dinner Julian, the expat British micro-surgeon, went to the piano.
"I think I can manage a waltz Greg. You and Stacy should be dancing" he said.
'Tink' his Chinese wife whispered to me. "He plays almost as well as Greg. We are fortunate in our men. Those hands"
"Yes Oh yes." I said smiling back at her.
Greg came over and took my hand. "Let's go out on the verandah."
"No not outside. There'll be mosquitoes"
Suddenly everyone was laughing at me. "What have I said?"
"There are no mosquitoes in Singapore" Greg explained. "They were eradicated in the sixties."
"Then this really is paradise," I said.
Julian started to play Richard Rodgers famous Carousel Waltz and Greg swept me into his arms and danced me out onto the balcony.
"He's better than I am," said Greg listening to the piano. There was no trace of jealousy in his voice only appreciation.
"He thinks you are better than him" I said and Greg smiled.
In the time we had been together we had seldom danced and I was surprised that all I had to do was relax in Greg's arms and instinctively follow his lead. Our bodies were as one. There were a couple of flashes from a camera but I hardly noticed them. I didn't have to imagine what we looked like Greg in his white tuxedo and me in my glorious black dress. Our smiling guests were our mirror applauding us as the waltz came to an end.
While we were dancing they had decided they should leave so we could be alone together.
"It is after all your honeymoon," said Julian standing and stepping away from the piano. We kissed on both cheeks and they gave assurances if either of us needed anything we should just call.
After they had gone Greg and I stood hand in hand and looked at ourselves in the full length mirror in the dressing room.
"It's a shame to take all this off when we look so gorgeous" I said.
"Oh no it's not" declared Greg unzipping my dress.
We ran naked from the dressing room and literally dived onto the huge bed, which had been turned down. One of the chocolates bounced from pillow and landed between my breasts. Greg picked it up in his mouth and holding it between his teeth offered it to me with his kiss.
"You're still tired"
I nodded.
"Don't do anything. I'll do it alright"
"Oh. Yes"
Then his hands started to explore all the excitable areas of my body, his fingers flicking sensitive nerve endings with just the right speed and pressure. Yes Tink was right we were fortunate in our men. Those hands. Oh my God. Knowing I was close to orgasm. Greg slowed.
"What do you want?"
"I want you inside me."
He smiled then kissed my lips and then sucked on each of my nipples then his hands and fingers replaced his mouth on my breasts as he moved downward, preparing me. I was so ready so open to he that he was able to enter me with one deep sensational movement. I could feel the entire length of him within me moving gently at first almost withdrawing and then thrusting into me harder and harder.
"Keep going don't stop, don't stop..." he pinched and flicked my nipples in time to the rhythm of our movement my entire body was tensing and a flush of heat ran though me. I could see Greg above me looking down his face suddenly serious.
"I'm coming" I breathed and Greg exploded into me. We lay there entwined as aftershock after aftershock continued our pleasure.
My cell phone ringing brought me back to the present. Sitting alone in the car in Princeton. Reluctantly I put the phone to my ear.
"Hello." I said dully.
"Stacy, its Greg. I've got an opening for ten tomorrow morning. Make sure your husband isn't late."
"Greg. Greg" but it was too late he had severed the connection. He was gone.