Free Music Notes (Heartbeat #3) by Renee Lee Fisher Page B

watched closely to see the slight rise and fall of her chest. Eventually, her heart stopped as I made that choice to let my twin sister go.
    Wiping away the tears that had begun to form from this painful memory, I hear the loud honk of a horn behind me. I guess I was zoning out and sitting in traffic for longer than I should have. Here I am out on the California freeway, and the last thing I want to encounter is road rage. Moving my rental forward in the traffic I know that I never want to return to such a feeling of helplessness. I began to maneuver the lanes faster since by now, Madison was at the hotel. I received her text,
    The four of us landed safely…me, Cecile and our babies. I cannot wait to be with you.
    That brought a smile to my lips and I quickly responded.
    Love, I am headed in your direction now and cannot wait to hold you in my arms.
    My smile disappeared instantly as I put my phone down realizing I was stuck midday in Los Angeles traffic. I wasn’t going anywhere fast. As all the cars were creeping along, I felt the afternoon sun streaming in the windshield. My thoughts turned to my mother and sister. I missed them so much, and would have loved to have them here with me on my tour. Silently I say, “Mom, you and Ashley would love the music I wrote and the songs all inspired by Madison. You both would have loved her too. She has brought out the very best in me. Not that I ever was really a bad son or brother but I’ve learned so much and have really grown up.” Now with the traffic beginning to move along a little better, I decided to put on the radio just to pass the time until I got to the hotel. I was so anxious to be with my wife.
    I selected one station and it wasn’t a song I wanted to listen to, and so my finger kept moving changing each station where I heard only a few notes but passed on each selection so far. Finally, there was a station that made me pause. I heard only the first few notes of the music and that was enough. It was like divine intervention, and I had to turn it up. It was Missing Ash , a tune that I put together with the band as a tribute to my sister after her tragic accident. So here I am sitting in a shit load of freeway traffic, surrounded by cars filled with stressed out people. I’m just enjoying the warmth of the sun, and listening to the words of my song. This moment is completely mine. Alone in my car in a sea of vehicles, I don’t care that I’m crawling along in traffic.
    Much later when I opened the door to the hotel room it was very quiet. I saw her luggage off to the side, but there was no television on and no response when I called out Madison’s name. As I approach the bed, I see her loveliness laying there. It looks like she ordered room service and had a mini picnic all on her own. She’s sleeping so peacefully. I want to wake her, but instead I remove my clothes and slide in the bed next to her. She moans and turns but doesn’t wake. I reach around to her belly and can’t believe the bump has expanded so much since I last saw her. Now it is really evident that she is pregnant. I trail my fingers in patterns on her stomach until I fall off to sleep along with her. As I relax in the dark, my mind takes me back again. “Rand, you sure that’s her?” Kent asked sounding doubtful.
    “I think it is. She looks just like she used to when she worked at the newspaper.” I was certain it was Madison Tierney. I just had to be cool and play this down.
    “Are you going to try to talk to her after the show?” Kent kept up.
    “What for?” I fired back.
    “Well she wrote about us months ago in the paper and she’s probably just here to see in person that we’re a damn good band.” Kent stated.
    I laughed back at him and brushed off my nervousness.
    “Yes we are that!” I exclaimed and raised my hand to high five him, and then hustled him onto the stage. I had to cut off any more of this conversation.
    My eyes kept going to her during the Philly show. I had