The Song Remains the Same Read Free Page A

it doesn’t matter.” He waves a hand, and I notice a flash of a tattoo on his inner wrist, a surprise against his skinny frame in a dishwater-colored hospital gown, folded into a wheelchair. “But I asked to see you when you woke up. It feels impossible that it’s been a week since…everything.” His voice breaks, and he swallows, then sews himself back up. “My name is Anderson Carroll, and even though you don’t remember me, you saved my life.”
    “I’m sorry? I did?” I feel my forehead wrinkle, scanning my brain, but it feels like a muscle that’s been unused for too long, flaccid, impotent.
    “We were sitting next to each other on the plane,” he continues. “I’d…well, I’d probably had one too many vodka tonics—I sometimes tend to do that while flying—and I’d zoned out for a few minutes. You woke me up when things starting going wrong, snapped me into my seat belt, told me to put my head down, curl up to steel myself against what was coming.” His words catch on themselves, his nose visibly pinching. “Look, I don’t know how we’re here, why we were the ones who made it. But I do know that I owe my life to you—I would have been tossed ten miles from that plane if you hadn’t strapped me in, had the clear sense to keep me calm.”
    I stare at him for a beat and replay his words, my concentration lagging. I decide that I’d heard him right—that I’d saved him, that I’d been someone’s life vest, that in the horror of this situation, I’d come out of it a hero.
    “You’re welcome.” I suck on the gash on my upper lip, trying to put the pieces back together. “How’d I do that? Keep you calm.” A small rush swells inside of me, that yes, I was that woman, that go-to gal-about-town, that I was the one who kept people calm ! Of course I was. Of course I was. I already knew myself, even when I didn’t know anything else to know.
    “Just talking to me, holding my hand. You told me to focus on something other than what was happening, so we started coming up with our favorite songs, our favorite lyrics…it was chaos, but…” He stops. “I mean, obviously, it was chaos, people screaming, lights flashing, smoke pouring in, and well, I don’t know how you did it exactly, but you made me not lose my mind during it all.”
    “Who did I say?” I ask.
    “Sorry?”
    “My favorite band. Who did I say?”
    “Oh.” He angles his head to think. “I don’t know, we were just naming names, throwing stuff out to keep going. To be honest, I can’t even remember a lot of specifics.”
    “To be honest, I can’t, either,” I joke, unsure if I’m joking at all.
    “If it matters,” he says, “you’re famous.”
    He flips over a People magazine in his lap. There we are: him—when he was ripe and alive, healthy, perfect, the kind you do do a double take on the street—with his arm linked around the waist of some svelte model-looking type emerging from a nightclub; me, in a navy cardigan and pearl stud earrings, looking very much like I’ve never stepped foot in a nightclub in the first place, looking nothing like the girl-about-town. No, no, no. This can’t be me. I am the hero, the go-to gal.
    “Survivor Stories!” the headline screams in bold print.
    “Probably not the best shot.” He shrugs, as if he’s responsible for the way my mouth curls under like I’ve just bitten into a sour orange. “I kind of hate it—I think they pulled it from a website.”
    “I look like I’ve never had fun for a second in my life.”
    Anderson laughs, and I laugh, too, because, what the hell, I don’t really get the joke, but why not?
    “What?” he says. “No, I meant me. But regardless, I’m indebted. Truly. For the rest of my life, whatever you need, I’ve got your back.” Somewhere in the base of my neck, a headache begins to spin up through me. I wince, and he detects it.
    He starts to reach for the call button.
    “So how badly are you banged up?” I say, stopping him,