Rock Me Senseless (Rock Star Erotic Romance) (Rock Me #1) (2 page)

It also lasted a lot longer
than all the other “dating” that went on in those days. There were a few other couples that got together now and again, but they always split up within months, weeks, and in some cases, days. Christian and I, however, were different. We were together until well into grade 7. I was twelve, he was thirteen, and I was starting to dream of the lives we were going to live together. After all, we’d been together for so long, surely we were going to last all through high school, then get married and have kids.

Until one day, my world came crashing down around me.
Christian and I were hanging out in the park after school when he broke the news to me, sitting on a picnic table together, watching the wind blowing the trees.

“Violet, my parents and I are moving to England next month.”

“What? Why?”

I looked over. Christian’
s head was hanging down to his chest, his eyes closed.

“My dad got a job working for one of the banks over there. It pays so well my parents decided to take it. They only told me about it yesterday.”

I didn’t know what to say. It was like everything I’d dreamed of, everything I’d hoped for, had just come crashing down around me. This wasn’t the way things were supposed to go.

“Are you going to come back in the summer or anything?”

“I don’t think so. I don’t know. There’s talk of sending me to a private school over there, since they’ll have enough money to pay for it.”

“That sucks. When will I see you again?”

“I don’t know.”

We sat there silently for a while, and I began to cry softly.
Christian wrapped his arms around me, and I sobbed into his shoulder. I couldn’t believe this was happening. He was leaving me? My childhood love, my best friend, was going away.

“I’ll probably come back to go to college, at the worst” Christian told me.

“That’s an eternity away. That’s like... five years!”

“I know. It’s a long time, but we’ll see each other again. I promise.
”

“Do you really?”

“Of course I do.”

For the next month I tried to enjoy every moment I could with Christian, knowing he was leaving. I was heartbroken. Christian was my best friend, my first love.
How was I possibly going to go on without him? The night before he left he came over to my house and we sat on the chairs on the porch, watching cars go by. Finally, he spoke.

“Violet,
I want to tell you something.”

“Yes?”

“I’ll wait for you. I’ll come for you. I promise you that no matter what, no matter what happens, I’ll come back for you. I want you to remember that, ok?”

I nodded. “Ok.”
Tears flooded my eyes once more. We embraced, and I watched Christian walk back down the street towards his house for the last time. He was gone. Early the next day he was to fly across the ocean, to England, where his family was going to start a new life. It was easier, now though. After all, he had told me he would come back for me. He told me that he’d wait for me. I knew I would see him again one day. Little did I know how long it was going to be before “one day” finally came.

That summer I waited anxiously for news
that Christian had come back. I waited to hear that his family was going to land at the airport and visit their home town, but that news never came. Eventually, a week before the next school year was scheduled to begin, I gave up, and realized that I wasn’t going to get to see Christian for probably at least another year.

It became a ritual for me, every Christmas break and every summer holidays I would ask my parents if Christians family was coming back, and every time they would tell me they hadn’t heard anything. Eventually, I went on to high school, and Christian became nothing but a nice memory. A part of me still loved him of course, but as time went by I began to forget what he looked like, I began to forget what he sounded like and my everlasting hope that he would return every time we had some time off began to dwindle.

I never forgot with Jonathan told me that night before he left, but I still moved on with my life. I had a few boyfriends in high school, and while none of the relationships worked out, they still helped to make me the woman I am today. My longest relationship lasted a year and a half, from the beginning of grade 12 until halfway through our first semester of college. It was funny, even though at that point it had almost been 10 years, my relationship with Christian was still the longest I’d ever had.

Now, I’d given up on ever seen him again. After all, I was in my last semester of my journalism studies, and about to graduate. I was 23 years old, and the last time I’d seen Christian I was 12. 11 years had passed. All that said, I still thought about him a lot. Well, maybe not locked, but at least once a week something would remind me of the boy that had completely captivated my childhood heart. Despite everything, I still held out hope that one day he would keep his promise, and coming get me. Realistically, I’ve known for years that that wasn’t going to be an option.

Christian had obviously moved on, had obviously created a life for himself in England. There was no way he was going come back for me. I still wondered what became of him. Christian had always liked music, and I knew he dreamed of being in a band, but I wondered what he really ended up doing. I knew I could look him up on the Internet and find his social networking accounts, probably finding out what he became, but a part of me also like the mystery and I never did it.

Now, I had my answer.
Sitting in my inbox was an email from Christian Anderson, my first contact with him in nearly a dozen years. Honestly, I didn’t really believe it when I read it. I had to go searching online to make sure what he told me was really true, and to my surprise, it was.

I read the letter from start to finish once more:

“Dear Violet,

I hope this is the right email address for you, I caught it from one of your friends on a social networking site. I could have simply messaged you, but somehow emails seem more personal. It’s funny how that is, the last time we saw each other neither of us even had an email address.

To get to the point, I want to apologize for not having contacted you sooner. I have no excuse, life simply got in the way. Then, the other day I decided that I was tired of simply thinking about you. I remembered the promise that I meet you, that I would come back for you one day. That day is today. I’m still in England of course, but I’d like to invite you to come and visit me.

There are no strings attached to this visit, and if you come over here and decide that you hate me then that’s fine. But I’d really like the opportunity to see if there was something there, if what we had back in elementary school is still there. You were my best friend, and there is nothing more in the world that I would like them to see you again.

I don’t know what’s become of you, but I’d like to hear what you’ve been up to. As for myself, will basically am living my dream. You know how I always wanted to be a part of the band? Well, in high school I started a group along with three of my best friends. We got quite lucky, the drummer’s father you a guy who knew a guy, and the next thing we knew we were signed to a label.

We’re pretty big in the UK, although practically nobody in the United States has heard of us. I’m sure you’re no exception, our label does no promotion over on your side of the ocean. Anyway, our band is called Deux Pamplemousses, which is French for two grapefruits. Feel free to look up her music videos if you’d like.

Of course, I’m noticing now that I’m rambling. I always used to ramble. But, now you know. I don’t know what you’re up to, I don’t know if you’ve got the time or even the inclination to come and visit me, but I just want you to know that I would like you to come and if that something that interests you as well then please reply to this email and we can organize something.

I’ll understand if you don’t want to see me. If that’s the case, then please either don’t reply to this email or tell me exactly what you think. Regardless of which option you choose, I’ll have deserved it. I wanted to go back home in the summer, come back and see you, but my parents wouldn’t let me the first few years, telling me I had to get used to life in this new country. Then, of course, life got in the way and everything changed. The years went by, and while I never forgot my promise I also never acted on it.

Well, this is me acting on it. I’d love for you to come and visit, and I’ll buy you a plane ticket for whenever. Just let me know.

Lots of love,

Your best friend Christian.”

It wasn’t the most romantic letter, the prose was far from flowing, but that had always been how Christian wrote. It was nice to see that some things never changed. I couldn’t help but note that his spelling had improved, however.

I mulled over his offering my head. Instinctively, I wanted to email him back, tell him how much I’d missed him as well and that I wanted to be on the next flight over. But did I really? Was it really a good idea? After all, he promised me that he would come back, and 11 years isn’t exactly staying on top of things. I had my own life now, and in just under a month I was going to graduate. I was starting to apply for jobs, starting my own career. Was that really something I was going to put on hold for a guy that I hadn’t seen in a dozen years? For a guy who might be completely different from the boy I knew when we were in school together? I wasn’t sure it was a good idea.

I decided to sleep on it, and went through the rest of the day. I tried working on the journalism assignment, but my mind kept drifting back to Christian’s letter. Something had changed since I read it. There was a feeling inside of me, not of emptiness anything like that, but more of desire. There was no way I could ignore it, my body was curious and it wanted to see Christian again.

It was dangerous, I knew that. If I saw him, maybe I would realized that I had actually over the years immortalized Christian is a much better person than he was. Maybe he would’ve changed completely, and I can. I could ruin all of my good memories of him by going to see him. But, I could also continue I love that had existed inside of me before.

The other thing I wondered about was his band.
It was true, I’d never heard of Deux Pamplemousses, but I was interested. I searched the band’s name online, and watched a few of their videos. Sure enough, Christian still looked pretty much the same as he did all those years ago. He wore more leather now, and his muscles bulged beneath his clothes now, but he still had that same beautiful face, the glittering blue eyes and gorgeous brown hair, although it was longer now, and the frosted tips were gone. I had to admit, it was kind of cool looking at him perform. He was good, there was no doubt about it.

Next, I searched the band, trying to see exactly what he meant about their popularity.
It was funny, I never imagined that places like England would have their own superstars that we over here in America had never heard of, but Deux Pamplemousses was one of them. Their debut album had gone number one in the UK in its first week, beating out one of the biggest stars on this side of the Atlantic. The more I read about the band, the more impressed I was. Christian had definitely understated things; he was well and truly a celebrity over there.

The band was named the fourth most popular British group by one of their biggest newspapers last year, there were fan sites with thousands – yes, thousands – of fans dedicated to the band, they had huge numbers of fans on every social networking website, and sure enough, I’d never heard of them.
I had to admit, I was impressed. Christian was living his dream, and as I watched him bounce around a stage in his videos, I also had to admit that he’d grown up to be just as good looking as he was in his youth.

I lay in bed that night, staring at the ceiling, unable to sleep,
thinking about Christian’s offer. I wanted to take it, but I wasn’t sure it was the right move.

What happened to you? What happened to your sense of adventure? Sure, he could just be a memory, but he could also be so much more than that. Isn’t it worth the risk to find out? Isn’t it worth finding out even if it’s just to get closure?

My little speech to myself worked. My mind was made up. I looked at my bedside clock, which read 2:37am. It didn’t matter. Rubbing the sleep out of my eyes, I got up and went over to my computer, booted it up, clicked on the email from Christian and pressed reply.

My fingers hovered over the keys for quite a while before I typed a reply. Then, when I was done, I read it over again, and again, and again, every time fixing up sentences. I wanted this email to be perfect. Eventually, I was happy with what I’d written.

“Hi Christian,

That sounds good. If I’m honest, I’ve waited to hear from you for years. I think about you probably every week or so, and I wonder how you’re doing. I’m glad to hear you’re doing well. I’d like to come and visit, I think it could be good for the both of us. I’m finishing my journalism degree, and will graduate early next month, but after that I’m free. In fact, it could be a great time to travel, before I really settle down and start my career,

It was nice to hear from you. Thanks for keeping your promise.

-
       
Violet”

I pressed send and closed my eyes.
A few minutes later I went back to my bed, and after a while spent tossing and turning, finally fell asleep. I woke up the next day and found a new email in my inbox. Christian was thrilled I’d taken him up on his offer, and wanted to see what dates I wanted to leave.