Chapter 2 The Power of Love #3
He and Rebecca shared a tent, and they grew closer every night, exploring each other’s bodies slowly, one hour, one night, one millimeter at a time.
The days and nights blended together as they stayed up late, listening to the likes of Canned Heat, Creedence, Mountain, the Who, Jefferson Airplane, and Joe Cocker.
They’d return to the purple bus in the mornings to rejoin their traveling circus and talk about how everything they’d been told growing up wasn’t the way it had to be.
Otis could only imagine how displeased his father would be with him, but for the first time it didn’t matter.
This ... this ... being here with these people and cracking the code to the universe was what mattered.
How can we keep living like sheep? Expanding your mind and stepping deeper into the present moment mattered.
The here and the now, man! Letting the music take you to undiscovered worlds mattered.
You hear that? Forget everything you’ve been told.
That’s religion, brother! No, that’s God!
Above all, being with this girl sitting next to him mattered.
Take it all away, and as long as she’s in this space, all is right.
The last night of performances crept into Monday morning.
At around 3:30 a.m. Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young took the stage.
Rebecca pulled Otis through the hundreds of thousands to work their way close to the front.
The young barefooted couple were stoned and happy and energized, having escaped the rain earlier and taken a long afternoon nap in the tent.
Though the ground was soggy, the rain had slowed.
Not that it mattered. Every part of them was soaked.
As the band sat on stools that formed a tight circle at the front of the stage, Rebecca gestured to a man in jeans and a brown corduroy blazer holding a big guitar on his lap. “That’s Stephen Stills there.”
Right then, Stephen addressed the crowd, not quite shy but certainly taken aback by the sea of people staring at him. “This is the second time we’ve ever performed in front of people, man.” His voice echoed out over the masses.
Bec, as he now thought of her, enthusiastically pointed out the rest of them: David Crosby, Graham Nash, and Neil Young. She absolutely glowed, and Otis fell in love with her for the thousandth time since they’d met. The only life worth living now would be one with her in it.
The band opened with a song called “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes.” Rebecca knew it well and danced with Otis to the tune, their muddy feet splashing through puddles. He had never heard prettier singing in his life and knew he’d become a lifetime lover of this band, of these men.
Not only were they perfect and perfect for this moment, but they would always and forever play the soundtrack to the biggest moment in Otis’s life.
He felt the ring he’d made that morning with a birch branch swelling in his pocket.
She was the only question in his life that came with an answer, and he’d decided the day before that he would propose.
There was no time to wait, no time to go to school and establish themselves before settling into marriage like most people.
Their love was different. The two of them were different.
He would not get back on that bus without going down on one knee.
The band played “Blackbird” next. Stephen Stills sang in a voice as bone-chilling as it was beautiful.
What brought Otis the most joy was the happiness beaming from Rebecca’s face.
Though she had her demons, they were a long way away.
She was as free as a human could be, taken away and healed by the music.
When they sang of Guinevere, Otis reached into his pocket. Rebecca was nearly off her feet in a glow of joy, swaying and singing along, while staring up at the stage.
“Hey, Bec,” he said, tugging at her hand.
She turned with a look of intoxicating beauty and aliveness. “What do you think?”
“I think ...” His heart kicked hard ... and he wasn’t sure ... and wondered whether he was being crazy ... and then he leaped right off the cliff, letting it all go. He lowered to one knee and sank into the soft mud.
Her eyebrows curled in curiosity, but only for a measure or two of the tune. Because his intent soon registered. Her smile took the rain away, took the pain away.
It was all he needed. He held out the ring he’d made, so insignificant but so much more at the same time. He asked, loudly enough to cut through the cacophony of sound, “Will you marry me?”
Their neighbors caught on and created a circle around them.
A more magical setting could not have existed.
Forget the rain. There they were under the beauty of the night, a small circle opened amid a sea of people, a band singing their hearts out, and a man so desperately in love that nothing else mattered.
And a woman.
A woman so extraordinary that he saw his destiny in her eyes.
“Yes, Otis! I’ll marry you!”
Otis lost his breath; tears filled his eyes. The damned happiest moment that would ever be.
Everyone around them clapped, and Otis’s Guinevere pulled him up from his knee and let him slip the ring on her finger.
“It’s the most gorgeous ring I’ve ever seen.” She kissed him ten times and then held him tightly, and they danced as lovers and best friends.
Later, in the tent, as the sun rose over the festival, they made love for the first time, and Otis said goodbye to his virginity and to his youth. He had no idea what was to come, but he felt a newfound optimism that he’d never known, and he became desperately thirsty to see what happened next.
When his own demons came, when he wondered what his parents would say, how this turn of events might affect his plans for college and life, he simply pushed them away and buried himself deeper into this woman who gave him the courage to break free.