Right Here Waiting

Music is a powerful memory keeper. My husband Tony, who is six years older than me, likes an oldies station, and when we are in the car together with the radio on, we inevitably end up talking about his college years or old beaus and my high school football games. Queen was big in my high school years;  Another One Bites the Dust and We Are the Champions always pull me back to the stadium and cool autumn evenings. 

I was a single mother in my senior year of college when the twin towers fell. That particular day was doubly hard on me because it happened at the tail end of a failed relationship. We stayed good friends, and on that day in 2001 we sat together in the college theater watching the whole thing unfold in real time with his arm around me and my head on his shoulder because good friends comfort each other. I cried so much that day, not only from the devastation appearing on every screen, but for my lost love.

There was no music on the air that day, and when my favorite country station returned to music in the following days, One More Day by Diamond Rio featured heavily on their playlist. Every time I heard it, I not only went back to the people who lost so much on 9.11, but the love that I had lost just two weeks before. Even writing about it today brings a lump to my throat and I find myself pausing to wipe my eyes, take slow deep breaths blowing the air out in a whoosh in attempts to release the pain in my heart from so long ago.  AND I’M NOT EVEN LISTENING TO THE MUSIC RIGHT NOW!

I wrote the story in my journal as it happened. I had hoped that somehow putting pen to paper might force our relationship in a better direction. I turned one entry into a short story regarding our “break up” discussion. I titled it Love Lost on the Rock. I asked him if he would mind if someday I put our story into a full-length novel. Surprisingly, but not surprisingly if you know Josh, he gave me his consent.

I did finally write that story about three years after it happened. I was back in school two years later to get a teaching certificate when I was given the assignment to write a multi-genre paper. Given the amount of music Josh and I shared in that one year, I thought it would be the perfect bridge from one genre to the next, but as I wrote, the tears fell freely and abundantly. A myriad of emotions filled me with each word or phrase I put to laptop screen, from frustration and sadness to happiness and comfort. I don’t know if you can call pain an emotion, but I felt it from beginning to end of that assignment. I got an A, but I knew a full-length novel would be put on hold for some time.

Six years after the multi-genre story I met Tony. I love him in a different way than I did Josh, and even though a part of my heart still belongs to Josh, I didn’t have any problem telling Tony. Even though he’s never met Josh, he says he would like to meet him someday.

I was alone driving on the freeway when the familiar piano solo leading into Richard Marx’s song, Right Here Waiting for You came on. I didn’t realize it was an oldie, but I was catapulted back to that Day in August 2001 when I finally knew our relationship was irrevocably over. It was suddenly like it happened yesterday. My heart skipped a beat, and I really wondered if I should just turn it off. My right hand seemed frozen on the wheel. I was sure I was going to cry, but as the song went on, my eyes stayed dry. Instead, I felt searing pain starting at the roof of my mouth, meandering through my sinuses, and down my throat filling my chest and settling in the pit of my stomach. It was then that I realized that this was one story I did not want to tell again. This was the result of that one time in my life that I had truly madly deeply fallen in love (apologies to Savage Garden).

The date? September 11, 2023.

The irony was not lost on me.

On that day, I knew it was time to publish the story in its original form and move on to other stories.  I tried to do it yesterday, but I’m still struggling with WordPress’s new editor. It did not turn out the way I intended, so I trashed it. I’ll try again later today If I get my work for the Garden of Hope done. If not, I’ll post it tomorrow. 

After 22 years, I wonder what would happen if Josh and I suddenly found ourselves single again. Would I still be right here waiting for him?

I don’t know.