Angels Fall First

35

Tuomas was worried. It wasn’t often that he wasn’t worried, true, but he was more worried than usual right now. He was worried about the person they all worried about most these days; Anette. She hadn’t been responding to his e-mails, and upon asking the other guys, he found that she hadn’t replied to them either. They had over a month off now that the short tour had been cancelled, and usually during any time at home, they didn’t see each other, but they still communicated semi-regularly through e-mail and SMS. Now, a week into the break, and Tuomas and the others still hadn’t heard from Anette? Tuomas felt it was completely justified that he be worried, considering how fragile she’d been when last he saw her. Considering what they psychiatrist had told them and considering what she’d done to wind up in the hospital the last time. Knowing how unstable her home life was, Tuomas was definitely afraid that she would try it again, that she still wanted to kill the pain despite what the psychiatrist said. It was on all their minds, he had no doubt of that. That they all felt helpless, he had no doubt of that either. What could they do when she wouldn’t respond to them?

Finally, nearing his wit’s end, Tuomas picked up the phone, resolved to call her. He hadn’t yet called her because he didn’t want to seem too clingy or too worried. He had just assumed that her reply e-mail would come, if not today, then tomorrow. If not tomorrow, then the day after. He finally accepted that a response wasn’t coming by e-mail, but surely Anette would pick up the phone when she saw it was him calling. He punched in her number, and waited, the phone ringing and ringing, until it finally cut to her answering machine, some recording in Swedish that he didn’t fully understand but knew was saying to leave  a message after the tone. He sighed and hung up. Maybe she was avoiding him, all of them, really, because she had decided that she really did want to quit the band and was trying to figure out how to tell them? Tuomas’ heart sank at this thought, though it was considerably better than the only alternative his mind allowed him: that she had attempted suicide again. Maybe he should fly back out to Sweden? That way she definitely couldn’t avoid him and he could find out what was really going on. He knew the way to her house from the airport now, and he could definitely afford it. He dismissed the thought almost as soon as it occurred to him. That would be overstepping his boundaries. He was her friend and her coworker, but that didn’t give him the right to fly in from another country and show up unannounced on her doorstep because she wasn’t responding to his e-mails. She was probably just busy and he was looking into the situation too deeply. He decided to let this work itself out, as surely it would once the next tour leg was looming closer on the horizon.

He needn’t have worried so much, as it turned out. Sitting in his e-mail inbox the next morning was a reply from Anette. He was hesitant to open it, though. This must be her telling me that she’s done with this band, that she can’t handle it. Could I handle it if she quit? He thought, forcing himself to click it open. He breathed a big sigh of relief when he saw how short the response was and how there was absolutely no mention of quitting the band. She wrote that she was sorry she hadn’t responded sooner, but she had been spending every minute possible with Seth. She assured him that she was fine and hoped he was too. Tuomas couldn’t help but laugh at himself. Yes, he’d definitely overreacted. It should have occurred to him that she would spend as much time as possible with her son while she could. That little boy was her heart and soul, and Tuomas could only imagine how painful it had to be for her to even imagine losing him. Of course she would spend every waking moment with him, what had he been thinking?

Later in the afternoon, assured now and relieved that Anette was alright, Tuomas called some friends over for a barbecue. He needed to distract himself from all the drama surrounding his band right now, all the thoughts about their future circling in his head. He hoped that even if only for a few hours, he could forget all of that. Even though it wasn’t in her last e-mail to him, Tuomas was convinced Anette was going to leave the band. He couldn’t fathom how she could bring herself to continue in it after all that had happened to her in the past months. He kept trying to force himself to stop thinking about it, but he couldn’t. It nagged at the back of his mind and saddened him. He didn’t want to see her go, he didn’t want to go through the search for yet another singer. He didn’t want to deal with all of that again. If she quit, Nightwish was over. It was getting to be more than he could handle.