Chapter 36

As usual, the Christmas concerts were brilliant, filled with timeless music, magnificent stages, and excited audiences filled with new people just hoping to hear good Christmas songs.

And hear them they did! The boys, of course, were amazing, their voices perfect and awe-inspiring. Having filmed a successful documentary, I felt authorized to upload video clips as well as pictures, and the new, larger fan base loved them both. I was getting a constant flow of feedback from the Il Volovers, and I was able to supply them with what they wanted to see from the boys.

I was having so much fun, darting around the stages with my camera and getting brilliant images to share with the fans, and as the weather throughout the country grew steadily colder, I always felt warm and comfortable when Ignazio was around.

We had fun together, playing around during rehearsals, sharing hot chocolate, flipping through my landscapes, watching old Il Volo DVDs from when Ignazio was young and chubby and adorable, and just spending time together in our hotel rooms throughout the different cities we stopped in. On the constant plane rides we took the opportunity to rest and take naps, as I laid my head on his shoulder and listened to his music library with him: dozing as Sinatra, Michael Buble, Josh Groban, and of course, Il Volo played in my ear and helped me to relax.

Sometimes, I would wake up and be unable to return to sleep because of my constant flow of thoughts, and I would just look up at him and gaze at his peaceful face, faraway smile, and his handsome features so close to me.

As the December days passed by, I dreaded the days when we had to return home for Christmas. I didn't want to go home to Florida and Harrison and have down time away from work. I wanted to keep going with Il Volo, traveling and taking pictures and promoting the boys. I wanted to stay with Ignazio, and the idea of being away from him for the weeks we were allotted for Christmas break didn't sound like a break to me; it sounded like a separation.

"Oh, Ignazio," I whispered one day on a quiet plane ride. He was asleep and unaware that I was gazing at him, somber at the idea of leaving him. "I don't want to be separated from you. Even for a little while."

Then I leaned closer to him and tucked my head into the crook of his neck, peering up at him as my mind wandered.

"And as long as I've got my suit and tie…Imma leave it all on the floor tonight! And you got fixed up to the nines, Let me show you a few things!"

Gianluca and Piero were singing Justin Timberlake songs to the empty seats of the theatre as Ignazio playfully beat-boxed into his microphone along with them. I was lying on my back on the piano lid, holding my camera on my stomach and flipping through the landscape photos I had taken when we were in New Jersey. I turned my head and smiled as I watched my AMA winners dancing around the empty stage in their jeans and T-shirts.

We were back in California, at the end of the Christmas tour, and Il Volo had only three more concerts left to do. It was a pretty short tour, anyway, only about a month long.

This particular concert, in Sacramento, wasn't until a few more hours, and the boys had plenty of time to play around before the concert. I watched them, smiling, and then held my camera sideways and yelled, "Boys!"

When they turned, still dancing around at the edge of the stage, I snapped a picture and they laughed. Piero took bows while Ignazio blew dramatic kisses, and Gianluca smiled at me and then started to sing something in Italian, which Piero quickly joined in on.

Ignazio smiled at them, but then left them to come to me.

"You're probably not supposed to be lying on the piano," he said, smiling playfully.

"You're probably supposed to be practicing."

"Touché. So when are you leaving?"

"Whenever Michele comes to get me."

Michele was arranging for the boys to record another PBS concert after the Christmas break, and I had some ideas for it. I had sketched out some photography shots, stage designs, and stage directions for the concert that Michele really liked. I was accompanying him to a meeting with a producer from the Detroit PBS station. Using my powers of persuasion and reminders of how much Il Volo has helped PBS stations with fundraising, I had arranged for him to fly down from Michigan to meet with us.

Michele and I would meet with him and discuss arranging the concert, and I would present my ideas.

"I wish you could stay here and watch us rehearse," he said, sitting down at the piano.

"Don't you mean goof off?" I asked, turning so I was lying down on my stomach and facing him.

In response, he jumped up and kissed me, and then sat back down and began to play something I didn't recognize.

"Tamzin, why are you lying on the piano?" I heard Michele say from beside the backstage curtain, and I turned and smiled at him. Then I slid off of the piano and slung my camera around my neck as Ignazio stopped playing and stood up. "Shall we go?" Michele asked, and I nodded excitedly

"I can't wait to get this thing arranged! My first PBS concert with you guys! I'll make sure it's amazing!"

"I have no doubts that you will," Michele said, and Ignazio came up behind me holding my red coat.

"Here," he said gently, "It's chilly outside," and then held it up while I slid my arms into it and pulled it on. He didn't let go when I had it on, pulling the fabric around me as he kissed my cheek. "Have fun."

"Oh, I will! We'll be back before the concert even starts, Ignazio. And I expect you to be well-rehearsed and looking very handsome in your suit."

"Oh, of course!" he said, and I turned around and gave him a quick kiss, then waved goodbye to Piero and Gianluca, who were doubled over with laughter, but they managed to wave back anyway.

"Be safe!" Ignazio called as Michele and I walked backstage.

We went to some sort of conference building filled with meeting rooms for our appointment with the men from PBS. The producer had brought along some associates, and among them was a production designer who asked if we had ideas for how the program would look.

Michele nodded to me, and in my excitement I took control of the conversation, pulling out my sketches and vibrantly explaining my ideas while suppressing exuberant laughter. I whipped through my plans, nearly overwhelming him with sketches and camera angles and additions to the stage that would look amazing on camera. He seemed very impressed with me, though occasionally he would lean back and smile as if he'd got me pinned, and ask something along the lines of, "Don't you think that's a but much?"

"No. It's brilliant, and nothing is too much for my boys," I responded at one point, placing a hand on my hip and smiling cunningly at him as he quietly agreed. I seemed to have managed to rally everyone in favor of my plans, but I was so vivacious and energetic that after a long while of having the PBS workers hanging onto my every word, Michele put a hand on my shoulder.

"Good, Tamzin."

"But there's so much more to explain!"

"Tamzin. Good. Sit."

I sat, and after the producer agreed to the project, it was time to negotiate the specifics of it. Suspecting that I would become ruthless and eager to jump in on the bargaining, Michele decided to send me outside the meeting room. He took me into the hallway and told me to wait for him. Despite my fervent protesting, I eventually relented to his firm command, going to the lobby of the conference center and sitting on the edge of a chair to wait. I held my camera in my lap and bounced my knees energetically, and then after a while sat back and grew calmer, and finally got bored and sat sideways in the chair, my red high-tops dangling over its arm.

I kept checking my new phone, watching the time grow closer and closer to the start of Il Volo's concert, and I watched the increasing darkness outside the windows. I grew anxious as I began to think I may not be back at the theatre in time for the concert. Even though I had more than enough pictures of the Christmas concerts, I still wanted to get some more from these, the last few of their Christmas tour, and I had told Ignazio I'd be there.

"Michele," I murmured impatiently, watching the minute hand creep along the office's clock. I didn't want to interrupt their meeting, especially knowing the scolding Michele would give me if I did.

I got many strange looks from people as they passed through the room and saw my sideways position in the chair, and eventually I got up and stood before the entrance, looking out at the darkness. I could feel the cold radiating from the door, and I instinctively shoved my hands into the pockets of my coat. I didn't like cold weather. I hated having to brace myself before I went outside, and I hated how it made it hard to go out and take pictures. But the thrill of going and getting my photos outweighed the unpleasantness of the cold.

It was getting steadily chillier as the evening moved on, and I checked my pockets for money to take a cab and found none. I should have gotten money from Michele before I left the meeting room, but I guess neither of us expected it would take so long to make the arrangements for the concert. I waited and waited, and neither the PBS people nor Michele appeared in the doorway. I tapped my feet and paced and checked the time again and again, probably annoying anyone who stayed for more than a minute in the lobby.

I sighed forlornly when I saw that it was time for the boys to begin the concert, imagining the moment when they first step onto the stage and the wild reaction of the people. Then I imagined Ignazio not having me to wish him good luck before he went onstage, and going out and looking for me and finding me gone.

As I stared at the clock on my phone, I got a text from Barbara.

"Concert just started. Where are you?"

"Still at the meeting. Michele says I'm done, but I've been waiting for him forever! I don't have money for a cab either…I want to be there!"

"I'm just hanging around, and we still have another rental here…I'll come and pick you up if you want."

"Yes please!"

"On my way!"

Yes! Thank God for Barbara!

I felt cheerful and excited now, knowing soon I'd be at the concert. It was only a matter of time. I'd definitely be there before it was half-over.

I sat down and waited, feeling very inactive as I tried to sit still and wait for my ride. I held the camera in my lap, playing with the strap and imagining the boys singing, mouthing the Christmas carols as they echoed in my mind.

After a while, even though my disdain for the cold was ever-present, I decided to wait outside. It was dark, but I didn't care. It sounded better to me than waiting in the emptying conference building. I stood outside, shivering and looking eagerly around for Barbara in the rental car.

Soon I saw it pull up, a small, lightweight white car whose passenger seat was filled with concert equipment: a speaker on the floor, cables and spare microphones, guitar strings and a spare case, and other things.

Barbara hadn't seen me standing under the entrance and climbed out as I took off, sprinting through the cold to get to the car.

"Barbara!" I called, and she turned and smiled at me.

"Get in! Let's get to that concert, shall we?"

"Yes! Barbara, do you mind if I drive? I hate sitting around idly when there are things to be done!"

She laughed and tossed me the keys.

"Oh, I know it!"

I got into the driver's seat, carefully setting down my precious camera on top of the speaker in the passenger seat as Barbara got into the middle of the backseat.

"So, tell me about the meeting. Did you convince them to lavish us with attention!?"

"Of course! I was stunningly brilliant! Those men will never forget the name of Tamzin Lucille Montgomery, who dazzled them so thoroughly on this day in late December!"

We both laughed, mine excited and eager as I turned onto the highway and started rapidly gaining speed. It was about twenty minutes to the theatre from where we were, but the traffic was pretty light, which delighted me.

As I drove through the dark highway with the black trees rushing by beside the road, I recounted to Barbara the details of the meeting, and she listened intently as I happily explained my interaction with the PBS people.

As I told her about Michele shooing me out and then my wait in the lobby, I turned onto a long stretch of highway that was almost completely empty, aside from a few cars here and there that whizzed along beside me.

"Well, good," Barbara said as I finished telling her about the meeting. "Sounds like it went really well, and that you did very well, Tamzin."

Then we were quiet, because I was thinking and Barbara could tell that I was preoccupied. I watched the road, calculating how long it would take to get to the theatre if the traffic stayed so light. There was only the sound of the rumble of the car and the wind rushing by as I drove, my speed just a little above 60. My headlights illuminated the road in front of me, and I could distantly feel the cold through the car windshield. Black trees surrounded us and raced past, and watched the road and the clock as I drove. A light inside the car cast a bright reflection of me in the window, and I glanced at myself, seeing the alert blue eyes reflecting my fast mental pace, the wind-swept blonde hair, the red coat pulled tightly around me. After we moved onto another, busier branch of the highway, the road started to curve somewhat sharply, and as I followed it my vision was blocked by the distant outline of trees that grew close to the road.

There was a cluster of headlights around the bend, and after a moment cars were whizzing past on my left, filling the lane with their lights and faint noise lost in the rush of the cold wind. As the rest of the lights rapidly approached me, I noticed that one of them had a location that seemed…off. I leaned forward and then tightened my hands on the steering wheel and felt my breath catch in my chest in terror as we sped toward the bright light.

Suddenly I was blinded by the bright headlights of a car coming headlong toward us, swerving slightly as it approached.

"TAMZIN!" Barbara screamed, and her voice was so desperate and piercing that it sent a jolt through me, and I jerked the wheel sharply to the side. The car was violently yanked off the side of the road, and I screamed and pulled the wheel the other way as the speeding car shot forward and past us. The scream rang in my ears as everything in front of us became a wild blur, and suddenly there was a flash of a black figure and a deafening bang as I was yanked forward with a force so violently tremendous that I knew I must be dead. But then pain exploded throughout me, and I let out an involuntary agonized scream as everything around me shattered and crumpled and exploded, and then something white was shoved into my face and suddenly there was no more force, only agonizing pain.

I kept screaming as I reached up and desperately shoved at the thing in my face, and I felt a tight hand on my shoulder as I fumbled for the car door, frantically trying to escape wherever I was. I felt it open easily and heard Barbara screaming my name as I tumbled out of the metallic trap and then was writhing on the ground in the freezing grass. I opened my eyes and the stars- maybe the real ones but I didn't know- flashed in front of my face.

My screaming faltered, but there was still the pain shooting through my body, and figures danced in front of me through the bitter cold and the new wet and sticky heat on me.

"TAMZIN!? TAMZIN!" Suddenly Barbara was in front of me, and through the blurriness I could see her terror as her blurred face appeared above me, and I felt her hands on my own face.

"Tamzin, can you hear me!? Answer me! TAMZIN!?"

I saw her coming closer, leaning over me, and then the pain intensified and I screamed through the intense confusion now gripping me.

"What is it!? Where does it hurt!?"

I didn't answer, wracked with the most pain I've ever felt in my life, and I could hear my ragged breath loud in the darkness.

"Oh, Tamzin, there's so much blood…"

I turned my head and saw metal crumpled beside me, and realized after a moment that it was the front of the car, smashed against a huge dark tree growing too close to the road. Branches wove their way around the windshield, and I saw glass on the ground stained with a dark red that made its way through the grass to where I lay.

Barbara was talking again, only frantically and not to me, and as I closed my eyes and started shivering I wondered if maybe she was telling the boys to get out of the car to come and help me.

"Ignazio!" I cried suddenly, weakly, and I tried and failed to reach up for his hand.

"Tamzin!?" Barbara said, and through the blurred shapes I saw her hanging up her phone and leaning over me.

"Barbara!" I cried, and as she moved closer I reached up suddenly and gripped her blouse in my hand. "Barbara, we were in a car crash!"

"Yes! Good girl! Tell me what hurts!"

"Everything! Barbara, listen to me!"

"Yes, Tamzin, I'm listening! What hurts!?"

I pulled on her blouse, realizing for the first time the blood glistening on my wrist.

"You can't tell Ignazio until after the concert!"

"Yes, yes, Tamzin, I need you to tell me-"

"Everything!" I gasped, and then closed my eyes and felt the urge to scream, but was too weak to. "My arm! My chest! And my head…" I identified, and moaned in agony as I felt her cool hand on my cheek, trying to comfort me as she pulled back the flaps of my coat.

"You can't tell Ignazio!" I insisted faintly, pulling weakly on her shirt and struggling to focus my vision, "He'll panic! You can't tell him until after the concert! Promise me!"

Her face was white.

"Tamzin…" she almost whispered, "There's so much blood…What if you don't get to see him again?"

I felt so weak, and I could feel consciousness slipping away from me. I wanted desperately to pass out so I didn't have to feel the excruciating pain, but not until she agreed.

"I will," I said hoarsely, struggling to stay awake against the torment throughout my body, "I don't intend to die."

"I'm so sorry. You can't control that."

"No," I whispered, "But I'll do the best I can…"

Then the blackness overtook me and pulled me from the freezing grass beside the road.