The Pages We Forget (11 page)

If you're just a dream,

please don't wake me.

Right here is where I want to be,

loving you eternally.

But like an old memory,

your face haunts me

and takes me back to that day

when you turned and walked away.

So please tell me,

is it you I see?

The one who said his love was true?

Is it really you?

CHORUS

So please tell me,

is it you I see?

The one who said his love was true?

Is it really you?

“I
t's been too long since I've seen your smile,” June sang as she descended the winding stairway to open her
Pages
concert. The executives at her label insisted on the Showtime Network exclusive concert, which was broadcast live from Detroit's Fox Theatre. The concert was a part of the rush marketing of her new CD. Initially, June refused, but Alex and Bernard managed to talk her into it. Same as they talked her into interviews and cover layouts with
Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly, Cosmopolitan, Ebony
and
Essence
magazines. “Way too long,” June's voice purred. “Since I looked into your eyes.”

June stopped halfway down the stairs and teased the audience. “Is it you I see?” she asked and stared into one of the cameras as it zoomed in for a close-up. “Is it you?”

“It's me, June!” a young man near the stage yelled. “I'm right here, baby!”

“Did you find the fountain of youth or what?” she asked, shaking her head. “You were older than sixteen the last time I saw you.”

“Age ain't nothing but a number!” the man yelled.

She winked, joking with him. “Will somebody tell this cute young fellow in the front that he's what we older girls call jailbait?”

She turned to the audience and shouted, “I love you, Detroit!”

Applause erupted throughout the venue.

June smiled and blew kisses at the crowd. The locals had taken
her into their hearts as though she were one of their own homegrown divas. Detroit was Alex's home and the birthplace of the Motown sound that he recreated so well for some of June's biggest hits. She came here with Alex right after Bernard, also a Detroit native, negotiated her recording contract with Antmar Entertainment. She was one of the first artists on the year-old label based in the Motor City. She blossomed and became a star. Now, everything was about to change.

Leatrice tried to talk her out of it before the concert, but June was determined to go on as planned. Leatrice felt somewhat responsible because she was the one who pressured June into seeing Dr. Wylie again. She even made the Tuesday morning appointment. Leatrice figured that if Dr. Wylie had not been so truthful and direct, June would not have made this decision. And it was her insistence that prompted June to get a second and then third opinion. Both yielded the same diagnosis: the cancer was spreading rapidly and treating it would be more difficult.

While Leatrice was helping June get dressed, she made a last-ditch effort to persuade June to rethink her decision. She zipped the burnt velvet Donna Karan gown, the first of three gowns June would wear during the concert. She adjusted the bodice and then walked around to face June.

“If I have to beg, I'm begging. Please give yourself a little more time to think about this.”

“More time?” June scoffed. “Leatrice, this is all I've thought about during the past three months,” June said, taking a seat at the vanity. “Besides, time is something I don't have a lot of.”

“Stop saying that.”

June stared in the mirror. “Will you look at me? My hair is ugly. This gown is too big, except for around the stomach, and that's because I'm bloated. I look a mess.”

“You've lost some weight, but you're still beautiful.”

“You're just saying that because it's your job to make me look like somebody.”

“And it's a job you make easy,” Leatrice responded. “Now stop complaining about nothing and listen to me. You're about to make one of the biggest decisions of your life. You shouldn't do that alone when you've got people who love you, myself included. If you were doing this because you were starting chemotherapy tomorrow, I would be behind you one-hundred percent. But that's not why you're doing it. You're still hoping for something that's not going to happen.”

“My mind's made up!”

“Fine. Then do it. All I want you to do is tell Alex before you go out on that stage and tell the world.”

“I can't.”

“You can but you won't.”

“Haven't I put him through enough already?”

“Well, how do you think he's going to feel when you're done tonight? Will he be all smiles? What do you think, Junie? Will he be happy for you?”

“No, he won't. But if I tried to talk to him now, he would automatically assume this was about Keith.”

“Not if you told him the truth.”

June stood and took a final look in the mirror. Although she complained about the way she looked, she was pleased with what she saw: a flawless, glowing complexion, perfect cheekbones, arched brows and big, brown, starving eyes. She was beautiful. Ravishing.

“If you told him the truth about the cancer, I promise you he'd understand.”

“But can he fix it for me like he fixes everything else in my life?”

“I don't know, but at least—”

“But nothing!” June cut her off. She walked toward the door, intent on getting to the stage. “Alex isn't God. He can't simply wave his hand over my head and make everything okay.”

“No, he isn't God. But he can still help you through this. He deserves to know, Junie. So does your mother. How can you do this to them? And to Trevor. What about Trevor?”

“This isn't about Trevor!”

“How come it's not about him? You're his mother and you're trying to die.” Leatrice covered her mouth because she didn't mean to say what she had. She cut loose with the statement, letting it flow like the tears flooding her face. “I'm sorry.” Her voice trailed, trying to find her volume again. “I didn't mean that.”

June was out the door. She had heard enough. And besides, there was an audience of 5,000 adoring fans and legions of television viewers anxiously waiting to see and hear her perform the collection of songs that
Rolling Stone
called, “A classic for sure. One of music's finest songbirds at her soaring best. Brilliantly conceived. Stylishly and heartbreakingly delivered.”

“Mesmerizing. You will never forget
The Pages We Forget,
” proclaimed a
USA Today
review.

“Astonishing from the first note to the last,”
Vibe
magazine's reviewer wrote. “A masterpiece.”

Still, despite the critical raves and the CD's chart-topping debut, June walked down the spiral staircase to the center of the stage holding firmly to her plan. As the cameras and lights hovered around her, she strolled to the front of the stage and inconspicuously searched the mass of faces for someone she knew wasn't in the audience.

“But now I see, someone staring back at me,” she sang. “Who has your smile, and that sparkle in your eyes.”

Not far from the stage, sat a well-dressed black man with straight, black hair just like Keith's. Their complexions were about the same, but their faces were different. Keith's face was rounder, fuller. This guy's was long and narrow. And he didn't have those hard-to-look-into eyes like Keith. Keith's smile was timid, while the man's smile was one of befuddlement, especially when he realized June was looking at him. She smiled.

“Could it be, finally, the one I gave my heart to?” her voice wafted through the theater. “Is it really you?”

Ironically, on one of the rare days when she hadn't been forced to replay one of her memories of Keith, she thought she saw him. It was four years ago, during a concert in Orlando. She was halfway through a song when she looked into the audience and there he was. He was standing a few rows from the stage. She stood paralyzed, unable to sing or talk when their eyes met. Before she could gather her senses, the face in the crowd disappeared. June continued searching the crowd, but he was nowhere to be found. She never said anything about seeing Keith's face in the crowd to anyone, not even to Leatrice.

“I know you…You know I know you,” she sang. “I don't mean to stand here staring, but I know you from somewhere. I know it's you. Boy, you know I know you. Because in your eyes I see him there. I know you from somewhere.”

Alex and Trevor were sitting front and center. Dressed in matching pinstriped Armani suits, they were poised and ready for the television cameras to zoom in for the first of the obligatory close-ups. Trevor knew the routine as well as Alex: Sit up straight and look totally mesmerized, which didn't take any acting. June's four-octave powerhouse voice made sure of that.

Kathryn sat next to Trevor and Lucy Kaye sat next to Kathryn.
June, having conceived her plan beforehand, asked them to come up for the concert. They caught the train in Tallahassee Thursday and arrived in Detroit thirty-one hours later, on the morning of the concert.

Alex wasn't thrilled about Lucy Kaye visiting, but he stayed quiet. He didn't dislike her—he considered her a family member—but he knew June was on a quest to find Keith and Lucy Kaye was Keith's mother. Alex also felt Lucy Kaye had the ability to blow the lid off the secret that he, June, Kathryn, and Bernard had hidden from the rest of the world since the day Trevor was born. Alex never forgot the look on Lucy Kaye's face when she came to the hospital with Kathryn and first saw Trevor. It was a look of recognition, like she saw her son in him. She never said anything, but whenever Trevor was around, she couldn't keep her eyes off of him. When Trevor was six and they were vacationing in Hampton Springs, Alex overheard Lucy Kaye and Trevor talking on Kathryn's porch. Alex stood in the front doorway, slightly out of their view.

“You wanna know why you're one of my favorite people in the whole wide world, Trevor?” she asked as they swung back and forth on the porch swing. “Because you remind me so much of my son, Keith. You have hair like him. Eyes like him too.”

“I wanna see him,” Trevor said. “Is he home?”

“No,” she answered. “He doesn't live at home anymore.”

“Where does he live?”

From the doorway, Alex could see the tears forming in Lucy Kaye's eyes as she pondered how to answer Trevor's question.

“He lives in a place far, far from here,” she answered and ran her fingers through Trevor's hair. “Trevor, can I ask you for a favor?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“May I put my arms around you?”

“To remind you of your son?”

“Yes, to remind me of my son.”

Trevor smiled and threw his arms around her. She pulled him close and held on tight. Too many years had passed since she had hugged her son or looked into his sad eyes. Too many days of wondering why he kept running as she begged him to return.

Alex pushed the screen door open and walked out on the porch. He looked over at Lucy Kaye holding his son. His face was placid, but it was tearing him up inside to see Trevor in the arms of his real father's mother.

“Thank you, Trevor,” Lucy Kaye said and wiped the tears from her eyes. “Forgive me for getting all teary-eyed.”

“He understands,” Alex intervened.

Even now, as June captivated the audience, Lucy Kaye was more interested in playing eye games with Trevor, who courteously played along with her.

“So please tell me, is it you I see?” June's lyrics pleaded. “The one who said his love was true? Is it really you?” Her voice faded into silence.

The audience responded with a standing ovation.

“Thank you,” she said over the applause. “You are too kind.” She turned and smiled at Alex. He looked so happy, clapping and shouting louder than anyone in the theater, with the possible exception of Trevor. She hated herself for what she was about to do to him, but she was doing what she thought was best.

“I love you,” he signed to her.

“I love you back,” she replied.

The crowd settled as the orchestra began playing soft background music.

“I would like to first thank all of you here at Detroit's Fox Theatre
for coming and all of you watching on television, thanks for tuning in,” June told the audience. “I must say that I'm more surprised than anyone by your overwhelming response to my new CD,
The Pages We Forget.”

Cheers filled the theater.

“This album was a very personal project for me, and it really means a lot to me to know that you've embraced it as much as you have my other work. Thank you.” She walked to the other side of the stage. “It was a difficult project for my family and me. But not that difficult,” she sarcastically emphasized. “I know some of you read and believed the tabloid stories about all of the alleged, and I do mean alleged, fighting between my man and me while I was recording this album. Okay, I'll admit it. We had a few arguments, but trust me, it wasn't for the reasons the tabloids implied. I love my man and he loves me. Right, baby?”

“You know I love you!” Alex yelled, knowing this would be one of the television close-ups.

“I guess you heard that.” June looked into the camera and smiled as the audience cheered at his response. “My baby loves me, and I love me some him,” June teased and continued her scripted banter with the audience. “But seriously, this album was a way for me to look back at the young girl from Hampton Springs, the one my mother and everybody else back home called Junie. This is Junie's album. On my previous albums, what you heard was a collaboration of a whole lot of Alex and me. Let's hear it for my baby, Detroit!”