Alright girls, I *had* to get in one more update before I run away for the weekend.
Let's see if Kev can get Whitney figured out.
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Gun Shy, Chapter 6
Santa Monica, CA
April 1992
Sitting in his silver car in Whitney's driveway, Kevin stared at the piece of paper, barely breathing as raindrops fell onto it from his hood. He brushed them away with a wet arm, smearing the ink a little, but it didn't change the words on the page. He'd already read it three times. Many of the words were illegible from the rain, but there was one line, obviously in Whitney's handwriting, that had nearly made his heart stop.
You said anyone could fall for me / You meant anyone but you / Where does that leave me if I already fell?
The last line was scratched through with blue ink, and there were some letters and numbers scrawled in pencil at the bottom of the page. He stared at them until he wasn't even seeing them any more, his exhausted mind trying to make sense of any of this. She'd obviously written this about him, and he desperately wished he had found the paper before it got wet. He wondered where she was, and thought about driving out to her recording studio. Maybe she hadn't slept, either. He knew he had to find her so they could talk.
Kevin backed out of the driveway, his brakes squealing slightly when he tapped them, and got back on Route 1. It was raining so hard now that he could barely see, and his wipers weren't helping much at all. Even the ocean off to his right looked more turbulent than usual. His nerves shot, he nearly rear-ended a red Ford, squealing to a stop at the last second as his brain finally made sense of something he'd seen on the paper.
AFR 65 to CDG. He'd traveled enough that he knew a flight code when he saw one, and now that he thought about it, he remembered her saying something before about some shows in Paris.
He pulled off loudly into a patch of gravel on the ocean side of the road, taking his gray cell phone out of the glove compartment and putting its antenna up. He hoped it still had some battery; he hadn't used it in a long time. After several numerical prompts, he finally got a real person on the phone.
"Hi... what's the status of Air France 65?" He paused as he got his answer, then hung up quickly, shifting his car into drive and squealing out, praying that there wasn't much traffic. He needed to get to LAX as fast as possible if he was going to catch her.
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A nice young woman smiled at Whitney, glancing at her passport, then tearing her boarding pass and handing half of it back to her. "Have a good flight, Miss Houston."
She returned the woman's polite smile before heading down the jetway, her duffel bag thrown over her shoulder. Finding her seat in first class, Whitney stowed her bag in the overhead compartment before sitting down. She reached into her jacket pocket, thinking she'd look over her song and maybe rework a couple of lines before takeoff. She pulled out a pen but couldn't find the paper, and was interrupted by having to stand up so an older man could take the window seat beside her.
As other passengers passed through her cabin, the stewardess came on the intercom to make a few announcements, including one that the in-flight movie was going to be 'Dark Horse'.
"You've
got to be kidding me," Whitney muttered to herself. The last thing she felt like doing was watching a movie about a horse. She wondered if there was ever going to be a time when everything in her life didn't remind her of Kevin.
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Kevin swerved into the airport, pulling his car up to the curb, killing the engine and hopping out after turning his hazard lights on. It had stopped raining. He broke into a run, passing the luggage handlers.
"Sir?
Sir! You can't just leave your car there!" a man yelled.
"Sorry!" Kevin shouted in response, already halfway inside the doors.
He ran past the ticket lines quickly, but got stopped in a security queue. He tapped his hand on his leg impatiently as he finally got through the metal detector then started running again, out of breath, pushing past everyone in his way. He hopped onto the moving walkways when possible, brushing quickly past anyone standing.
Finally arriving in the correct terminal, Kevin dashed up to the young woman at the podium.
"Hi, I need to..." he stopped to pant for air before continuing, "...see someone on that plane." He pointed to the large white aircraft still sitting on the tarmac.
"I'm sorry, sir, I can't let you do that."
"Please! I'm sure you hear this all the time, but this is really, really important." Kevin's blue eyes were pleading. A couple of waiting passengers were eyeing him curiously.
"I can't, it's a security issue. They have already closed the boarding door and pulled back the jetway. You missed it by about a minute. I'm sorry." She was polite but firm with him.
His face fell, and he blinked several times. "I see. Thanks anyway." Kevin spoke softly, stepping defeatedly away from her and sinking down into a chair. He watched as Whitney's plane pulled back and began slowly rolling away. He sat there in silence, staring blankly out the window for several minutes before slowly standing up and walking a few yards to the row of pay phones. Popping a quarter in, he dialed his friend Mark for advice.
"Kevin! I haven't heard from you in weeks, man. How are things?"
Kevin didn't go into detail about his night with Whitney, but he was sure Mark heard it in his tone. He related how he'd run off the next morning before she could turn him away, how they hadn't talked for a long time after that, the things he said in the interview, and finally, the paper he'd found at her house. Mark listened quietly, taking it all in, before giving his take on the situation.
"What makes you think she was going to tell you she didn't want a relationship?"
"Well, what else would it have been? A serious conversation right after... well, you know."
"Maybe the exact opposite of that?" Mark's words were so simple. Kevin paused.
"I never even thought about that, to be honest." He closed his eyes, picturing Whitney that morning, in her robe with no makeup. She'd looked beautiful and natural, and hadn't had the expression of someone who was about to turn him down. In fact, she'd seemed happy. Then he thought of the last line on the note, zoning out of the conversation for a few seconds.
"Kevin? You need to go talk to her."
"Well, that's kind of the problem. She's on a flight to Paris, Mark, I don't know what to do." He scratched his leg.
"Listen, I've known you for years, and I've never seen you as worked up over a lady as when you came to me asking if you could borrow my place for the night. Do you know when she's coming back? You need to talk to her soon or you're going to regret it."
Kevin thanked Mark, hanging up the silver phone, and heading swiftly back out to the front of the airport. He figured he could head home and make some calls to at least get the phone number to her hotel and leave a message for her at the front desk. Maybe he could even talk to her before she went on stage, if she'd listen to him and not hang up immediately, that is.
When he got outside, the curb was clear, his sedan nowhere in sight. He wasn't altogether surprised, but still wasn't happy about it. He calmly took the towing company's information from the baggage handlers and sat down on a wooden bench, burying his face in his hands. He really didn't need one more problem to deal with.
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At 37,000 feet, Whitney turned off the screen on the seat in front of her as soon as the movie came on. The older man next to her was already dozing off. She dug in her jacket pocket, still looking for the paper, and once again came up empty-handed.
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Kevin rose up slowly from the bench, letting all of his breath out and looking up at the overcast sky in the direction that Whitney's plane had gone. He walked back through the airport, then approached the same woman he had spoken to before.
"Sir," she started, obviously remembering him, "The plane is already gone."
"I know. When's your next flight to Paris?" He hoped his eyes didn't look as desperate as he felt.
Her fingers typed quickly on a keyboard, her eyes focused on the screen. "The next one leaves at 11:45, but that one is full too." More typing. "The 2:20 is sold out. The first one I can get you on is the 7:05 am tomorrow. Would you like to buy a seat on that one?"
"Yeah." Kevin bit the inside of his cheeks as he pulled his wallet out, hoping he wasn't doing all of this for nothing.