Request: “The reader was with randy rhoads until his passing and Izzy finds out about her past and they talk about randy and share stories “
They say in life you’ll have three loves.
The first one is the fairytale love which was my first boyfriend in high school. We were the two kids that seemed like they should be together. Popular and good looking. Our parents were friends and we all just fit together in that neat little package. Plans of getting married after HIgh School was in our future. My mother was so sure of the ring that would grace my finger that on weekends we’d go into London to browse shops for a potential China that I’d want to get.
It was on one of those trips that I met my second love, The Hard love. It seems foolish to call Randy my hard love. There was nothing hard about loving him, It came easy. From the moment that I literally walked into him when I ducked out of the shop we were hooked. He was a skinny blonde American and I was a short brunette from outside of London but it was like sparks and fireworks despite the chilly rain.
For a week I thought about the stranger that had bumped into me outside of the shop. I begged my mother to let me go to London by myself that weekend and she did. When we saw each other on the street we both had these stupid smiles on our face because we knew that we were looking for each other.
We talked all day in a little tea shop. Randy kept ordering more and more stuff so they wouldn’t kick us out but when there were no customers left we realized we needed to go. He walked me to the train station and before I got on the train he pulled me into a kiss that had my mind spinning on the ride back home. After church the next day I broke up with my boyfriend. I knew if I could feel like that after one kiss that I couldn't stay with him.
Two weeks later I had packed a bag and was moving into a small house with him. It was easy playing house, even though my parents didn’t approve of the man that was so much older than me.
Randy was my soulmate. Everything we did was together. It must have driven everyone nuts how we became a packaged deal but now knowing how our story was cut short I appreciate how deeply he loved me.
When we got to the US I loved laying in the California sun but he pushed me to go for a degree. He always wanted better for me and believed in me when I wasn’t sure of myself. I grew up with Randy. We had plans of being in school at UCLA, him for music studying classic guitar and me for business.
Randy insisted I stay in school and not come on tour. He wanted to make sure I was getting settled in. He sent me pictures of all the places that we were going to see together. All the places he wanted to take me. I have all the letters that he sent to me in a shoebox in my closet, with the polaroids and film.
I was in our apartment sitting on a stool in the kitchen well I worked on an assignment, the radio playing in the background when I heard them say they were going to play a block of Ozzy songs and they said you had died. A plane crash. But you hated flying so how could that be true. I was confused and scared. My mind is not making sense of anything. When Sharon called me an hour later to confirm it I had screamed before dropping the phone.
I mourned Randy all through college. Not thinking of anything but getting my degree and making something of myself for him. I wanted to do something to make him proud of me. We had been together for two and a half years and it felt cruel he had been taken from me. I didn't know how I was even going to heal. Some days now I get sad over it now thinking of what had been.
But I met my last love five years later.
When I met Izzy it was a set up. A blind date. A date that I did not want to be on but got set up on by a few friends. I walked into the restaurant ready to explain to the person that I was supposed to meet that this had been a terrible mistake and I wasn’t ready to date anyone, Being lead over to the table I sat across from a man who had me talking like we were old friends in under 20 minutes. Breaking down walls that had been built and crafted to protect me.
We had our second date the next day at a small sushi place where I drank Sake for the first tme and laughed loudly at how he ate with his fingers. It didn't feel like a date as much as it felt like we were just catching up as friends.
Our third date was two days later where we went to see a show together. Izzy towered over my 5ft nothing frame and picked me up on his shoulders to see the band playing. As he walked me home to my flat that night he asked me if he could kiss me. I hadn't been kissed by a man in years so instead of responding I had cried.
Izzy had got me inside and on the couch, getting a warm cup of tea in my hands and listening to my love story with Randy. I told him everything that I could think of. And he listened to it all and when I was calm he said something that made me know I’d love him.
“You don’t have to stop loving Randy, ever. But you deserve to be loved again.”
And I did love Izzy now.
It was a different love. We both were older and had been through different situations of love before. So we were ready for each other, comfortable in ourselves and our careers. It wasn’t all consuming but more like two puzzle pieces fitting together. Solid and right.
Izzy taught me how to have fun again. He took me to shady bars where we would play pool or darts and drink beer that tasted flat for a dollar. He made me stay up past my self imposed bedtime to go to parties with celebrities that he’d whisper gossip about. He liked to wake up early and drag me with him outside, wrapping me in his arms as we sat on lawn chairs watching the sun rise together.
He loved me for who I was and always gave me room to be that person. It was the type of love that we would always have because it was a love that was truly with my best friend.
I had been lucky to love three amazing people and have three amazing stories. But as I adjusted the white veil I knew Izzy was the one that I’d grow old with. He was my last love.
