For the Love of Music (Sixty Minute Romance) (9 page)

“I think listening to your
music is about the best thing I would want to do today. Why don’t’ we finish
the CD and then go out?” Anne loved the music.

Ed was getting a little
agitated and red faced.

“There’s a song on there I
should have left off. I’ll get you another copy without it on and drop it in to
you.” Ed pushed the eject button and snapped the CD in half without any further
discussion.

“Ed!” Anne was exasperated
with him.

“I was enjoying that. And
you can write songs with words as well? Does that mean that you can sing?” Anne
was very impressed with this new information about Ed. But she was not happy to
see the CD broken into two pieces.

“I always used to write my
own stuff. Meeting you has got me back into it. It’s a bit personal but that is
the effect you have on me.”

“Well thank you, I guess.
But I’ll have the full copy of that CD please, without any edits, thank you
very much. I will know if you have missed a song off. How many songs are there
on the CD? “

“There was only one song.
All the rest is instrumental.” Ed was beaten.

“I look forward to hearing
it.” Anne was experiencing Ed’s mood swings first hand. She decided to try and
tolerate them today.

“Where do you want to go for
the day Anne?”

“Where did you have in
mind? I don’t mind what we do, but no food. I’m still stuffed from our meal
yesterday.

“I have theatre tickets
for an amateur dramatic society performance in Datchet this evening. My sister
is in it.” Said a well prepared Ed.

“That sounds like fun, do
we need to dress up?”

“I never dress up, other
than last night and you look great already. So we have about three hours to
visit the Queen at Windsor. If she is out we’ll go on the river and ride up and
down the Thames for a while.”

“Sounds good to me.” Anne
picked up her bag and they went out to Ed’s car. The day was great fun for both
of them. They went on a river steam boat cruise, that took them up the Thames
to a lock and back again.

“I really like spending
time with you Anne. I was near despair before you turned up on stage with your
band. You have made me enjoy my music as I used to and you haven’t rejected me
as a person.”

“Ed. I’m not as good as
you say I am. I rejected you completely at first. If I could have thought of a
way to avoid you I would have. But you are so pushy and we spent such good
times together playing music, that I ended up liking you.”

“Oh Wow, you still like me!
That’s good.” Ed gave her a small hug and Anne nearly fell over with surprise.
She hugged him back and nearly knocked him over in return.

“You know that I more than
like you, don’t you Anne?” Ed stated the obvious.

“Yes I realised that, I
can work some things out you know. You have made it pretty obvious as well.”
Anne smiled.

They followed the river
boat cruise, with a small snack at a Windsor coffee shop before driving the
short distance to the theatre in Datchet. The car park was just starting to
fill up as there was only about forty minutes to go to the performance.  They
wandered into the lobby to see Ed’s mum talking to some other people. She was
delighted to see Anne again and insisted on swapping tickets around so that she
could sit next to Anne. Anne looked at Ed as if to say
‘Help’
but he
just smiled and shrugged
‘What could I do’.

It turned out that Mrs.
Makin was just as forthright as Ed, in her conversation. She spent much of the
preshow time warning Anne about Ed and not to rush into things. She also
mentioned some of his old girlfriends who were totally unsuitable in her
opinion.

“But I like you. You are a
much better prospect than all the others.”

“Well that’s good to know,
I think.” Anne hardly had anything else she could say.

The play started. It was a
one act farce that went round and round in ever more complex circles. Ed’s
sister, Fiona, played the innocent and totally smitten love interest of the
lead male character. For her part this involved a lot of kissing of all the
other characters. The play was quite rude, but also very funny, and for the
last ten minutes it was complete mayhem. The small audience rose to their feet
at the end and applauded for a long time.

“That was brilliant. I
can’t believe how good your sister is. And all that kissing. She must be
exhausted.”

“She warned me about the
kissing thing. It was a good show wasn’t it?” Ed was pleased with Anne’s
reaction.

“Shall we wait to see her?
She will only be about ten minutes.” Ed wanted to congratulate his sister and
let her know how well he thought she had done, in her part in the play.

“Yes let’s do that.” Anne
was getting drawn into Ed’s family and it seemed like the most natural thing to
do. Why should she resist? She knew there must be lots of solid reasons to be
careful, but she couldn’t think of any right now. As an only child, she loved
being in this family setting, something she had missed since her parents had
died.

Fiona eventually appeared
and hugged her mum and Ed.

“This is Anne, you met her
a couple of weeks ago, at Mandeville.”

“Hi Anne, of course I
remember. Did you enjoy the show?” They hugged briefly.

“I loved it; you must be
worn out with all that kissing.” Anne and Fiona laughed.

“What are we doing?” Fiona
asked Ed.

“I’ve got to take Anne
home and then I’ll be home after that.” Ed explained.

“OK, I’ll take mum home.
See you later. Nice to meet you again Anne.”

“You too, Fiona.  I’m sure
we’ll meet again soon.” Anne replied.

They made their way to
Ed’s car and got in.

“Your family is lovely,
Ed.” Anne said.

“They are the best.
Thanks.” Ed was chuffed.

“Yes they are. Now we have
a problem, or at least, you have a problem.” Anne turned to face Ed. Ed looked
back at Anne slightly concerned, not knowing what was coming next.

“I want to hear your song
and I want to hear it tonight. I haven’t been able to get your music out of my
head all day. So, either we collect another CD from your house, or you sing it
to me live.”

“Really? Boy you are a
tough cookie. It’s not even a good song. The first half is just instrumental.
Then the song part is only a couple of verses and a chorus. It’s nothing much.”
Ed was very unsure about it.

“I can’t sing it to you
live. I wouldn’t get through it.”

“That’s what I thought.”
Anne was determined.

Ed drove to his mum’s home,
which was an old cottage with its own drive. His sister and mum had not made it
back yet. He popped into his house and came out a minute later with a guitar in
its case and a handful of other things.

“Just remember when we get
back to your house, that you asked for this.”

“I know, I know.” Anne
smiled and snuggled up to Ed as he drove the ten miles to her house in West
London. She was enjoying herself. They hadn’t spoken a word for the whole
journey. Anne was mile by mile falling in love with Ed. She had never known
anyone who was so singularly devoted to her. She had been denying it to herself
but the last twenty four hours had shown her how Ed was. He was honest in his
devotion to her and yet had no expectation of receiving any love back from her.
He had no agenda that would force Anne to love him. And yet he still loved her
for who she was.

Ed loved feeling Anne
snuggling into him, although he nearly lost control of the car a couple of
times on the journey. He wasn’t going to give up Anne’s hugging him for anything. 
He did however become more and more worried about the song he had recorded. He
wasn’t worried about the quality or standard of songwriting. It was the lyrics
that really worried him. Anne would either love them or hate them.

“One last time, you are
sure you want to go through with this?” Ed was really panicking now.

“Of course I am sure. I
figure that somewhere in the song is something about me. Why wouldn’t I want to
hear it?” Anne was getting overexcited.

“Oh, you think you are
somehow part of this song. Well I’m sorry to disappoint you. You have
completely got the wrong end of the stick.”

For a moment Anne doubted
her resolve.

“Nope, let’s do it. If I
am not in the song somewhere, then you will have to write that song. In the
meantime, come on. I can’t wait any longer.” Anne was pulling Ed towards the
front door of her house.

“Hey, don’t pull me over
now.” Ed made out that he was in danger.

“No chance of that, don’t
be so delicate.” Anne laughed freely like she was a bit light headed.

She unlocked the door.

“Shall I make us a
coffee?” Ed asked.

“Not a chance! Get a move
on.”

“OK. Now my voice isn’t
great and I need to work on the arrangement.” Anne just glared at Ed as if to
say
‘Get on with it!’

“I’ll put in on. By the
way, there might be a little bit about you in it.”

Ed selected track three
and sat down opposite Anne. He stared directly at her with the same expression
he had used on the day of the first Kovergirls concert. He hardly blinked as
the guitar and bass music started up with a medium tempo. He looked at Anne as
the intro repeated with more instruments coming in. He tried to stand up.

“Don’t you dare move!”
said Anne. She loved the music. The anticipation of the song part was almost
unbearable. Eventually after two and a half minutes she heard Ed’s voice
singing out clearly and wonderfully on top of the music. It was a strong
powerful tenor voice with a slight break in it at the end of each line.

Anne looked across to Ed
and smiled. He looked back at her, with a mixture of total love and abject terror.

Verse One

Without hope I saw you across a crowded room

With nothing to lose I went out on a limb

With an empty heart and a lonely soul I sought some
help from you

With a broken body I came across the room

Verse Two

Without expectation from me, you met me in my need

With nothing to gain you went out on a limb

With an open heart and an easy smile you gave yourself
to me.

In your wholeness you came across the room

Chorus

I don’t like you, I love you.

I won’t hurt you, I’ll care for you

I don’t like you, I love you.

You can heal me body and soul.

The chorus repeated and
then the music faded out. Anne slowly got out of her chair and took hold of
Ed’s face with her hands. She kissed him briefly on the lips and then looked at
him. Then she kissed him again with a fervour that shocked him. He fell back in
the sofa and Anne fell on top of him kissing him passionately and holding him
tightly. Anne was completely taken over with love and desire for Ed that she
could barely control herself. After five minutes of what could have been
mistaken for a world championship wrestling match, she sat up on top of him and
just looked into his eyes.

“I’m guessing you liked
it.” Ed was smiling and red faced.

Anne’s response was to
kiss Ed once more until they both had to stop and take in some air. Anne was
smiling and looked stunning in her highly disheveled state. Ed was completely
taken off guard and just kept on looking into Anne’s eyes.

“I’m sorry Ed. I lost
control.”

“Yes you did, I noticed
that myself.” Ed was laughing now and Anne was trying to get back to being cool
and calm.

“That song, how did you
write it? It was lovely.” Anne did up some loose buttons.

“It was the easiest one I
have ever written. I’m glad you liked it.” Ed checked that his leg was still
attached properly.

“Like it? It was amazing!”
It was like the perfect song for us.” She couldn’t remember undoing her belt
but she did it back up anyway.

“That’s why I wrote it. It
was all about us.”

Anne and Ed talked for a
while and then Ed left to drive home.

“My mum has me on a curfew
of midnight. She gets worried if I don’t go home.”

“Your mum is great Ed. You
should look after her.”

“I do. I’ll call you in
the morning.”

“Speak soon.” Anne had
nearly recovered after losing control of her emotions. She saw Ed off and then
rang Sandy.

Sandy picked up the phone
after a few rings. Anne was ready.

“Guess What?”

Sandy screamed at the top
of her voice. Paulo could be heard coming in to the room to find out what the
problem was. Sandy explained that there was no problem. Paulo reminded Sandy
that he was still making it up to her for his lying to her.