Chapter 20: All This Time
“God blessed the broken
road that led me straight to you.” – Rascal Flatts
Jamarcus stood as
Danielle entered the room. She was
wearing a pink cashmere sweater with dressy black pants and ankle boots. Again, he was overcome by her beauty. Danielle hobbled into the living room where
her family was seated on the couch and said, “All set?” Jamarcus turned to Danielle’s father and
said, “Sir, there is one thing? Would
you mind if I blindfolded your daughter?”
Danielle’s eyes sparkled and danced as she looked from Jamarcus to her
dad and then back to Jamarcus. Her dad
said, “Why certainly but only if you have her home by midnight.” Jamarcus thought to himself that there wasn’t
anyway this Cinderella could ever turn into a pumpkin but he agreed to the
curfew and whipped out a blue bandana.
Danielle’s dad interrupted, “Just so you know Jamarcus, this one is a
little on the klutzy side so maybe you should put the blindfold on once you
maneuver the sidewalk out to the driveway and into the car.” “Dad!” Danielle exclaimed embarrassedly. “Well he does have a point dear,” chimed in
her mom.
The car ride was windy
but went quickly with easy conversation.
Jamarcus had finally untied his tongue and was able to joke and laugh
with her. Since she was blindfolded and couldn’t
see where they were going, Jamarcus decided to play a game with her to pass the
time. He would turn the dial to a radio
station and if Danielle liked what was playing she would give him a thumbs up
and if she didn’t she would give a thumbs down.
Jamarcus was determined to know all of her likes and dislikes and he
figured since she was a singer and a dancer that this little game would help
him get to know her better. Danielle at
first was nervous about the game. Old
habits die hard and she wanted to know what kind of music Jamarcus listened to
before she told him what she liked. But
Jamarcus restated the rules of the game and Danielle had to choose.
The first station was
talk news radio… definitely a thumbs down for her. Jamarcus laughed and said, “Really? My whole plan was to listen to Glenn Beck all
night!” Danielle couldn’t tell if he was
kidding because she couldn’t see his facial expressions. “Oh, well I don’t mind Glenn Beck, it’s just
that…” Danielle thought back to Luke,
the political science major she had just broken up with at college. He had gone on and on about the affairs of
the world and how our nation was going to hell in a handbasket. She had actually gone on dates where all he
wanted to do was watch Fox News. He had
the audacity to shush her conversation so that he could turn up the tv to see
what O’Reilley had to say about Obamacare.
Needless to say, nobody ever shushed Danielle and got away with it. Later that night, after a boring uneventful
evening in front of the tv, she had quoted O’Reilley’s catchphrase by saying, “Luke,
the spin stops here!” Jamarcus brought her back to reality, “Relax,
I was just kidding…let’s start the game for real now.”
The next station played
classical music. He was surprised to see
her give a thumbs down. “Really?” he
asked in genuine surprise, “but you are a dancer. Didn’t you study ballet?”
“Yes, that’s why I
don’t like classical music. It reminds
me of Madame Trulee and how she would always smack my butt to make sure I was
in perfect form in a pliee.”
Danielle thought of
Peter, the only other dancer she had ever dated. She told Jamarcus that Peter had been a
mistake from the get-go. They had been
practicing a leap during rehearsal for the big show and all Peter had to do was
catch her but instead he had gotten distracted by his own reflection in the
dance studio mirror and had noticed one hair out of place. So instead of catching the leaping ballerina,
Danielle had landed with a thud on the ground, spraining her ankle and having
to give up the lead in Swan Lake. Peter
was shown the door after he had brought a dozen roses and chocolates to her
house while she lay on the recliner convalescing. As Danielle remembered back, she said, “But
the chocolate truffles were delicious!”
Jamarcus had a visual
image of Danielle leaping gracefully into the arms of a Narcissistic buffoon in
tights and couldn’t suppress his laugh.
Danielle reached over and punched his arm. “Okay, okay…”, he laughed and changed the the
radio station again…this time to Classic Rock. Again… a thumbs down.
“Nope, it reminds me of
a con-artist Ryan, I dated that was obsessed with two things.
“Oh yeah, what’s
that?”
“ZZ Top and Me!”
Danielle exclaimed. She confessed to
Jamarcus that after she broke his heart he ended up getting caught in a ponzi
scheme and landed himself in jail. When
he was allowed his one phone call, he had called Danielle. All she had to say was “Ryan, you should know
that every girl’s crazy ‘bout a sharp dressed man…an orange jumpsuit isn’t what
ZZ had in mind.” The line on the other
end had gone dead and thankfully, she had never heard from im again. She was repulsed by the memory and asked Jamarcus
to change the station.
Next up was a country station. “Oh Billy”, she reminisced. “Poor, poor, lovesick Billy.” The afternoon before Danielle broke up with
him, he had quit the High School baseball team.
He was the pitcher. The coach had
always been mad at Danielle because the reason he gave for quitting the team
was to “spend more time” with this girlfriend.
Billy had walked away from a potential college scholarship.
“Wow, does every station
have to remind me of guys I have dated in my past?” she said a bit too irritated and Jamarcus feared
he had ruined the moment but the game went on.
The 80’s, 90’s and today was playing Back Street Boys which reminded her
of Adam, her first kiss. Then they
switched to the Top 40’s station which was playing Mirrors by Justin Timberlake
which reminded her of Tom. Tom was the
one who had taken her on a beautiful horseback ride up in the mountains. Out of all the guys she had dated, Tom was
the one who seemed to make the most sense.
He was a bit older than her and had just been accepted into Med
School. Life with Tom would be lived in
a mansion with her driving a sporty Mustang.
Unfortunately, Tom had jumped the gun and had told his parents that they
were engaged before he had even popped the question to Danielle. Danielle had been horrified at his
forwardness and embarrassed to be welcomed into a family she had only just met
hours before. Tom had begged her to
reconsider and had actually sang, “Cuz I don't wanna lose you now, I'm lookin'
right at the other half of me…”
Danielle had never been
serenaded by a guy and although she was impressed, she was sad to hear that Tom
was completely tone deaf…definitely a deal breaker. Jamarcus laughed once more as he changed the
station one last time.
This
time, he didn’t get a thumbs up or a thumbs down. Instead, he got silence. Danielle reached up under the blindfold to
wipe away a tear just as Jamarcus pulled into a parking spot at their final
destination. He had tuned into K-Love
Radio which was playing the song All This Time by Brit Nicole.
“You were there
You were always there
It was You and I
You've been walking with me all this time”
You were always there
It was You and I
You've been walking with me all this time”
“You
can take off the blindfold now” he told her.
As she took off the blindfold and noticed where they were parked, she
started to cry harder. Jamarcus had
brought her to the Falls. At first, he
thought maybe he had made a mistake bringing her there, but she reached out and
touched his arm and said, “Can we please finish this song?” They both sat in stillness in the truck. Jamarcus knew Danielle was having a moment
and he didn’t want to interrupt it. He
had never heard the song
before so he turned it up to hear the lyrics more clearly.
“Every heartache and failure
Every broken dream
You're the God who sees
The God who rescued me”
Every broken dream
You're the God who sees
The God who rescued me”
Danielle knew that even
though their date was just beginning that she would always associate this song
with Jamarcus. She squeezed her eyelids
shut trying not to think how this relationship would end. She glanced over at Jamarcus and was
surprised to see him getting a little teary eyed. She realized she had spent the entire half
hour drive talking about herself and hadn’t once asked about him. She suddenly longed to know everything there was
to know about this handsome, young man from Jamaica sitting beside her in the
truck parked in the parking lot. As she
listened to the closing chorus, she realized that through all her rocky
relationships and dating fiascos, there was indeed one constant in her
life…God. Jamarcus was thinking the same
thing but hoped as he looked over at the cute girl in the pink cashmere sweater
that there would now be two constants in his life. After being introduced to Danielle’s
boyfriend graveyard, he was a little bit scared about how the rest of the night
would go. Thankfully though, he needn’t
worry at all. Danielle looked over at
him and gave him two thumbs up!
Britt
Nicole. All This Time. Rec. 31 Jan. 2012. Sparrow Records, 2012.
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