Tracy

006:

       

Tracy told them she was staying the night and took her bag up to her room to change--across the hall from Casey's room--and next to Miles's room. There was a phone on the nightstand and she dialed overseas with practiced ease. It was four in the morning there, but she didn't care. Julian wouldn't have cared if he'd needed her.

"What?" His slightly British accent flooded her ears with comforting familiarity. "Are you at Mom's?"

No one else would have called him at four a.m. Talking to Jules was like having an ongoing conversation that had long pauses.

"I'm at Mom's, yeah. Did you see the news?"

"No, but I talked to Michael. Damn, Trace, why do you let Case get to you like that? He can be such a prick." His voice wasn't exactly slurred, but she knew him well enough to know she'd woken him up, and he was not quite lucid.

"He wanted me to gig with him at Tapas. He got me out of the studio early." She fingered her bandage, and omitted the part about the cocaine. "He had the nanny come and get Danny so I can't see him." She tried to shield her choked up tones from him, but Julian knew her better than anyone.

"That's bullshit, Trace and you know it. I'll call him. He'll have him back to you right now."

"He's gigging tonight, Jules. I don't want to wake the baby up. Let him sleep in his own bed. I'll go get him for breakfast." But now the tears overflowed and she was glad he couldn't see her. Just hearing his voice and knowing he would have helped her made it all more bearable.

"You're not marrying him, you can't. He'll keep pulling this shit, even after he has you."

"I know Jules, I know. I don't know why I keep trying. I'm so afraid he won't let me see Danny." She now fingered the pale blue striped bedspread Coral had given her last Christmas. It wasn't soft, it was one of those K-Mart specials. But it had been bought with love and delivered under the tree with even more love. And honestly, that was really--- really--- really! All that mattered.

"He has to let you see Danny, it's in the agreement. If he doesn't honor the agreement he will go to jail, I promise you." Now in her mind's eye, she could see Jules sitting up, his boxer shorts loose around his hips, his white chest bare, his bony shoulders heaving in annoyance. He would raise a hand--- a drummer's thick palms---and run them through his lank light brown hair in agitation. She loved that he was agitated for her sake. He didn't tell her to buck up. He pretended like Casey didn't have a huge hold on each of them, and they could actually be defiant.

"He won't go to jail for not letting me see Danny, Jules. Who is really going to stop him? The system is overrun with deadbeat-dads and druggie moms. No, he still holds all the cards."

"If I call the authorities they'll have to do something."

"Is Bridge there?" She changed the subject, he'd been with Bridget the night before, maybe she was still there.

"Yeah. She's zonkered." His voice held affection and admiration. Julian loved Bridget even though they were actually divorced and on separate paths. And even though they were divorced, they still slept together. Tracy knew how much Bridget meant to him.

"Okay, don't wake her. I can call her later."

"Michael said you kicked ass today in the studio." He went along with the neutral subjects, knowing the pain Casey inflicted.

Tracy was startled, recalling being snippy at Greg and Jimmy. Then she relaxed, "I got a lot done. We finished Radical, and Images. We worked hard on the new piano solo part in Never Gonna Live."