Chapter8

"TOM!!! WHERE'S MY GREEN SHIRT?" Sadie stomped around the room throwing things desperately searching for the green shirt.

Tommy on the other had sat relaxing in his large overstuffed chair with his headphones on. You know the type that is sound blocking, so you get the true sound of the music.
Jude's voice rang in his head singing sweetly to him, as his reality and his dreams merged into one and he fell asleep.

He was interrupted after a few minutes of resting when Sadie walked by and yanked the earphones off his head.
"What the hell was that for?" he spat at her.
"I need your help. When your sitting around, listening to Jude, that is not helping…that is pissing me the fuck off and I'm tired of it Tom." She slammed the door to the cabinet she was looking in and stomped back into the bedroom. Tom stood there speechless. Picking up his coat, he walked out the door, never saying anything at all to Sadie.

There was a knock at her door and she picked up her head from where it was resting on the sofa. She hadn't done anything for few days as she moped around about Tom leaving. He had given her some time to deal with it, and didn't push when it came to talking about the subject. Opening the door she saw his face, and walked right back to her sofa and lay down. Tom eyed the pile of blankets and the cartons of to go food and melted Ben and Jerry's with spoons still in them. He smiled softly, looking at her form lying on the sofa. He walked over and sat down next to her body and ran his hand through her hair.
"You ok?" he asked her. She just shook her head no as the tears rolled freely down her face like they had done numerously these past few days. He just laid down in front of her and held her close the best he could. She griped on tightly to his shirt as she cried her sobbing getting harder and harder.
"Shhh, it's ok baby, I love you, please Jude," he whispered into her hair. He slowly rubbed her back and calmed her down. When her whimpering subsided she sat up Indian style and looked at him.
"You're leaving soon?" she asked wiping her red nose.
"Tonight" he said.
"Will you call?"
"Of course, every chance I get."
"What if it's expensive?" she questioned him.
"I'd give away everything I own just to hear your voice." This made her smile, and appeased her questions and she laid back down by him.
"Do you love me?" he asked her as he studied her face. She nodded her head and hiccupped.
"I'll get you some water," he said smiling sweetly at her and standing up. He walked into the kitchen and reached for a glass. Filling it with water he noticed a note pad and pen on the kitchen counter. Inspecting it closely he found scribbled lyrics written down.

You're a song
Written by the hands of God
Don't get me wrong 'cause
This might sound to you a bit odd
But you own the place
Where all my thoughts go hiding
Right under your clothes
Is where I'll find them

Underneath your clothes
There's an endless story
There's the man I chose
There's my territory
And all the things, I deserve
For being such a good girl honey.

He stared at the lyrics and read them over and over again. Jude finally got up and walked into the kitchen wondering what was taking him so long.
"I thought you fell into the trash can or something" she said walking up behind him and wrapping her arms around his waist. She was still hiccupping.
"Jude, this is amazing" he said motioning to the lyrics in his hand. She saw what he was holding up and she buried her face into his broad back. "You weren't supposed to see those," she said, her voice muffled. He put the lyrics back down on the counter and turned around. He held her hands in his as she looked down at the floor, embarrassed that he had read her true feelings and emotions.
"Please when I'm gone, record this for me…" He said to her. She looked up at him, her eyes wide.
"Nobody produces me but you, I'm not recording anything when you're gone," she said.
"Let Kwest do it, please. Consider it a welcome home gift for me."
"I'll think about it," she said taking the glass of water. She put her lips on the wrong side of the glass and bent upside down, taking a drink. Tom busted out laughing, "What are you doing silly?" he asked her.
"Getting rid of my hiccups," she said putting the glass back down on the counter and looking off into space. After a second of no hiccups she looked at him. "See?"
He smiled and pulled her into a hug, "You were right," he told her, "Stay home tonight, your goodbye present will be here around 7" he told her.
"A goodbye present? Maybe you should leave more often!" she said teasing him as they walked together to her front door. He pulled her closer to him and kissed her firmly, running his tongue inside her mouth, and his hand cupped her face. He broke away and looked at her closed eyes and her parted mouth. "You're amazing Jude, I love you." He told her. She slowly opened her eyes and looked at Tom.
He kissed the side of her head and opened the door. He was just about to close it when her voice stopped him.
"Thank you," she said.
"For what?"
"For making me feel better about this, I'm going to miss you so much though," she said wrapping her arms around him one last time in the door way.
"I'll miss you to baby girl, I'll be home soon though ok?" She nodded her head but wouldn't look up at him.
"Jude," he said, making her look up at him. The tears in her eyes shown brightly as they rolled down her cheeks. "I love you"
"I know" she said sniffling, "I love you too"

Tom put his hands into his pockets and walked back down the street to where he lived and went upstairs. Sadie was still throwing things around and screaming every once in a while. He walked right back over to his chair and replaced his headphones. He pressed play and again listened to Jude, he thought about Sadie for a second though…she had never even noticed he was gone…

"Sadie! If you don't hurry up we are going to miss the flight! THEN we won't be going anywhere!" Tom said annoyed as Sadie thumbed through the magazines at one of the news stands in the airport.
"Don't yell at me," she said firmly as she kept on looking.
"Fine I'm going to go get on the plane without you!" Tommy said walking off from her. Eventually he heard her sling backs clacking on the ground and she caught up with him.
"I didn't think you would actually leave me…" she said pouting as she tried to hold his hand. He pulled it away from her and widened the space between them.
"Funny you think that" he said under his breath
They arrived at the gate and boarded the plane with no problems. Tom just wished this flight would go by very, very quickly.

Her goodbye present was right on time, and she wished more than anything he was there for her to thank. He had sent her star shaped diamond earrings and a note.
"You're my star, I love you.
I'll be back home again with you before you know it.
Stay safe and miss me bunches.
Your Tom"

She put them on, stopping to admire her self in the hall mirror. Quickly she dressed and called Kwest on his cell phone.
"Meet me at the studio in 30 ok?"
"You want to record without Tom?" he asked her not believing what she was saying.
"Yep, I'll see you there." She grabbed the pad with the scribbled lyrics off the kitchen counter and ran out the door.

Jude walked into G-major and Kwest was already there setting everything thing up.
"So," he said awkwardly, "You holding up ok? Tom said you were kinda upset about stuff."
"I was a mess, I'm ok now tho…lets record."

She sang the same song over and over again, until it was perfect and then she laid down the music for it. It was perfect when they were done. Raw, and passionate.
"That song, it's about Tom"
"Ya it's about Tom" she said as she started to grab her things.
"It was me, who found you in here the other night, with him."
"That was you!" she said amazed, "I wondered how his alarm got set, but I was too sleepy to ask…"
"Just watch out girl, I don't want to see you get hurt by him again." She walked over to Kwest and hugged him.
"You're a good friend," she said, "I'll see you later?"
"Ya I'm going to finish this up and I'll be out right behind you," he said.
She yawned as she walked to her car and got it, she was tired. It had been a long day, and a long night, all she wanted was her bed.

Tom slept on the flight most of the way, and griped only occasionally when Sadie woke him up to ask him stupid questions. Like if you could live off the salted nuts, because "they are SO good". And if flight attendants would give passengers' lessons on how to fly…his favorite was if he wanted to fuck her in the bathroom.
"What did you just say?" he asked.
"Come to the bathroom with me, it will be fun." She said bouncing up and down in her seat.
"I'm way too old for this shit," he said closing his eyes again and putting his head back down on the pillow. She didn't talk anymore after that.

The trip to the hotel was long; traffic was bad in Beijing, worse then in New York. What should have been a 20 minute ride soon became a 45 minute ride with all the traffic.
"This is so ridiculous," he said looking out the window.
"Oh get over it Tom, if I had known you were going to bitch the whole time I would have left you at home." Sadie said to him.
"Shut-it Sadie or I will leave"

The rest of the ride was in silence and they finally made it up to their room. Tom immediately took off his shoes and fell onto the bed. 28 hours…he had been on that damn plane for 28 hours and he was tired. But the kind of tired where you want to move around so bad, but you don't have the energy to do so. He drifted off to sleep but woke up an hour later when Sadie started to blow dry her hair. She was seriously on his last living nerve and he didn't know how much more he could take. He propped up the pillows on the bed and reached for the TV remote. He started to flip through the channels and his thoughts drifted to Jude. He should call her, she had to be worried, even though she knew how long the flight was.
Sadie finished up in the bathroom and walked over and laid down on the bed next to Tom.
"Let me see what's on, you're not even paying attention" she said as she took the remote out of his hand. She flipped and flipped as his attention went back and fourth between his thoughts and the TV.
"The weather today will-"
"And on this wall I'll be paint-"
"Team USA over Team Russia 98-"
"Singer song writer Jude Harris-"
"When wearing heels like this you really need to match them with a skirt that's an appropriate length." Sadie stopped on the next channel and Tom literally yanked her arm off grabbing the remote from her hand.
"They were talking about Jude did you hear that!" he said as he flipped it back to Fox News. The segment was over on her and Tommy sighed.
"Look see it's over, give it back," Sadie said reaching for the remote again.
"No," he said, "We are watching this till it comes back on." Sadie didn't argue with him but sighed and got up to finish her hair in the bathroom.
The news anchor made her way back around to Jude's story after 15 minuets. Jude's picture came up on one half of the screen and her mangled baby blue mustang on the other. It was raining there, and he could see it was wrapped around a tree. He sucked in his breath and turned it up.
"Singer/songwriter Jude Harrison was involved in a near-fatal crash yesterday, where she crashed her classic mustang into a tree. Weather is believed to be the cause of the accident, no alcohol or drugs were involved. Shepherd Smith is in Toronto, Shep?
"Hi, Linda, I'm at Toronto General, where Miss Harrison was taken last night after her wreck. She is in serious but stable condition, although doctors are not saying what her actual injuries are. They are saying that depending on the next few hours she may have to undergo surgery. The odd thing about this whole situation is who found her right after she wrecked. It was a fellow co-worker, Kevin West, or Kwest, as they call him, who found her. He's an up and coming sound engineer and producer who had just worked with her in the studio minutes before. That's all that we know for now Linda, we'll keep you updated if anything changes."
"Thank you Shep, we'll keep Miss Harrison in our prayers…and in other news…"

His world tilted, turned upside down, and backwards all at once, ina split second. Images of him and Jude flashed before his eyes as he tried to find his feet. When he stood he braced onto the entertainment center for support has he concentrated on controlling his breathing, and not breaking everything he could in this room.
"Sadie!" he called to her in the bathroom, his voice already cracking.
"What?" she yelled back. He walked to the bathroom door.
"Jude's hurt, I'm leaving, with or without you."