Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. Vol. 133, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 811 & 812, March/April 2009

I wondered how many people in the audience understood what “break away” meant. Break away from Pete and me. Bastard.

Kelly didn’t reach for the stand-up mike, so John leaned it toward her. “C’mon, honey, just say a few words.” And as he said this, on a huge TV screen suspended from the right corner of the stage, was a sunny photograph of Kelly holding their two-year-old daughter Jen. The kid was almost as much of a beauty as the mother.

Pete tugged at my arm. “Let’s get outta here, man. I can’t take this.”

I whispered so nobody else around us could hear. “I’m tempted to go backstage and lay him out. Just break him up a little.”

“Yeah. And then I’d come visit you every weekend in jail — if they’d let me out of the halfway house.”

He turned, starting toward the door, but I grabbed him. “Just a few more minutes, Pete. We got nothing else to do, anyway.”

“I’d rather be back at the house.”

Invisible speakers boomed “Happy Birthday” so loud there was no point in trying to talk. Everybody was singing along and then this five-tiered cake was wheeled onstage. John went back into generic humility for the next few minutes as he cut the cake and served Kelly the first slice. This was when the other rock stars appeared, four of them, encased in their arrogance and privileged clowning.

Then dancing and liquor and dope of all kinds broke out. The party was officially on.

Pete managed to leave my side before I could stop him. There was a crowd at the door and he somehow eeled through it. I had to bump between two big important bellies to catch him just as he reached the front door and the androids. I could feel the belly owners glaring at me.

I grabbed him by the shoulder and spun him around. One of the androids had been facing inside. He lurched toward me.

“No problem here,” I said.

Pete saw that he was eager to waste me so he said, “Everything’s cool. No need for any trouble.”

Disappointed, the android stopped, glared at me, and then went back to his post.

I half dragged Pete into an empty corner of the lobby. “Where the hell were you going?”

“Where do you think? Watching her up there—”

“It got to me too, Pete.”

“Not in the way it got to me. You hate him and that’s different from me being in love with her. You just want to hurt him.”

“I want to kill him.”

“That’s what I mean. That’s different. You don’t know what I’m going through.” I’d seen him cry before, too many times, trying to kick coke. But these tears were different, not harsh but gentle, sad as only Pete could be sad.

“Aw, man, I’m sorry.”

“So could we just leave?”

“Sure. We’ll get a pizza.”

He smiled as he brushed a tear from his cheek. “All that fancy food inside and we’re going to get a pizza?”

“Yeah. Better class of people, anyway.”

He saw her before I did. There was a stairway leading to the balcony. She descended it concealed by a group of much larger people. He said “God,” and that was when I saw her, too.

And that was the moment when all the corny moments in all the corny movies proved to be not so corny at all. Her recognizing him; him recognizing her. It was really happening that way. Each stunned by the sight of the other. And all else falling away.

If she said goodbye to the important people around her, I wasn’t aware of it. She simply left them and floated across the lobby to us. To Pete, I mean. I doubt she was even aware that I was there.

He was the old Pete suddenly. The bad drug years fell from his face, his eyes. And it was all ahead of him, the great golden glowing future. And when she reached out and took his hand, I saw that she wanted to be part of that future. That she knew now how bad a mistake she’d made taking up with John. That despite her marriage, somehow she and Pete would be together again.

She tugged him away from the corner. She still hadn’t said hello to me or even let on that she knew I was there. I didn’t care. I was caught up in their movie dream, happy for both of them. And happiest of all that the retribution I’d wanted to visit on John was now far more crushing than a few punches could make it. He was losing his wife. They were gone.

For the next twenty minutes I drank wine and listened to conversations between people who were — or claimed to be — in the music industry. The anger was coming back. I wanted to hear my name instead of John’s. I wanted those chart sales to be mine. I wanted the tour they were discussing to focus on me. John should be working at Guitar City. Not me.

But at least Pete was getting something out of this night. All the way back to grade school he’d been the one she’d loved. And now maybe it was finally going to happen for them.

“Are you Mr. Rafferty?” She was an officious-looking blonde in the red blazer that Regency Hall employees wore.

“Yes, I am.”

“John would like to see you in his dressing room.”

“John Temple?”

“Why, yes.” She gave me an odd look, as if maybe I was stoned and not hearing properly. Was there any other John who mattered here tonight?

“What’s he want to see me about?”