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lovesrain44) wrote2010-11-06 02:32 pm
Breath of Heaven - Part 2 (A Dark Shadows Story)
Breath of Heaven, continued...
"I have already asked him," she replied, her temper not quite breaking. "And he has given me no answer. What are you going to do, Mr. High and Mighty, beat it out of him?"
"Nadine...." began Sheriff Patterson.
"I don't care if he's the supreme maharaja of Maharajaville," she said now, her voice icy, "I will not be given orders by the very man who could be implicated in Willie's condition."
"I only meant," said Patterson, soft, "that you might give Willie a chance to speak, as well." He looked at Barnabas and then Nadine and then Willie. Worrying his hat all the while. "It is true that Barnabas works Loomis pretty hard, keeps him on a tight rein, but Willie is an ex-con, if you knew the trouble he'd been in before—"
"I am only concerned with the here and now," she snapped.
"So," said Barnabas. Mild. Eyes registering her face. Her stance. The distance between their bodies. Willie could see it. Barnabas would attack her if he had to. Or would have, had Patterson not been in the room. The vampire was still ready for it, and Willie had never been so glad to have the sheriff there. "Ask Willie any-thing. Anything you like."
Willie swallowed. Nadine turned to him, those blue eyes intense and focused.
"Willie," she said.
"Yeah," he replied, his voice breathy.
"I want you to be honest with me. Nothing bad will happen to you, but I want you to tell me the truth. Okay?"
"O-okay."
She folded her long harpist's hands in front of her, as if she'd just been praying and had now dropped her hands and was finished. "Who whipped you?"
There it was. The question. Directed at Barnabas, straight as an arrow. Willie didn't dare look at Barnabas, not even for a second, though his hand clenched at the sheet for a moment as he stopped himself from touching the back of his legs. Then he looked at Barnabas anyway, at the even set of the vampire's brow, the impassive gleam in his eye. Coat still on, fingers curling around the top of the silver-headed cane, canted at an angle. Willie knew every inch of what he was looking at, though the electric light of the hospital room cast it with a glossy sheen. Saw, for a moment, what other people saw, the courtly gentleman, the kindly cousin. A soft mark for widows and orphans. Overseer of the truculent Willie Loomis.
What he didn't see was any clue as to how he should answer.
Then Barnabas nodded.
Nadine still had the flush of anger on her cheeks, like roses to bloom in the heat of summer. Willie brought up his hand to scratch at his temple. The sheet fell away, lightly touching the bruises there. Which Barnabas' fierce grip had left only last night, though they could be put off to the fight in the parking lot, or Deputy Larry's eager handling.
"It's kinda embarrassing," he began, starting slow. Not knowing what he was going to say, feeling his way through the expectant gazes of the three people he least wanted anything to do with. Now or ever.
"Barnabas, I mean, Mr. Collins, you see, he sets a store by...his roses. He's got all kinds, tea roses, and old fashioneds, and those new ones that grow and grow. Well, I was—do I have to tell this part, Barnabas?"
He looked to his employer as if for advice.
"I do not know, Willie," said Barnabas, as if he were being kind. "Since I do not know what it is you are about to tell us."
Willie mock-sighed. Or at least it began as a mockery of the real thing, and then it turned real. He did not know what time it was, but it seemed hours and hours since he'd woken up and even more hours than that since the sun had gone down. Which is when all the real trouble had begun. And his heart was still thumping. Not quite pulsing with the anxiety as it had been, but still pushing through his flesh with jumps and bolts of sharp adrenaline.
"I was, well, Barnabas had ordered a trellis, one of those metal ones that folds back, so you have a kinda curtain effect when the roses grow off it. You remember that trellis you ordered, Barnabas?"
Barnabas nodded, seeming to attend to Willie's every word with the utmost consideration, though no trellis had ever been ordered. "Well it came in finally, and I was putting it up today, you know, in the garden. Using the ladder, which I'd set in place with bricks. It wasn't gonna move, the way I set it up, but with that rain we had. . . ."
He looked at Barnabas now instead of at his hands. Barnabas was smiling. The vampire knew exactly where this was going. He knew the end of the story even before the end of it was reached.
"I was gonna wind the briers through the trellis, and I was reaching for my gloves, and, well, maybe it was the clippers, and then, well." Willie stopped. Looked up, right at Nadine, at her kind, sweet face, and saw that the shock that was opening her mouth. She knew it was a lie, all of it, and now would come the biggest part of the lie. "Well, the ladder moved in the mud and I slipped. And fell into the rose brier. The thorns tore through my clothes and I squashed it flat, I'm sorry Barnabas."
"When were you going to tell me about this?" asked Barnabas, concern flooding his voice. "Are you alright, Willie? Why didn't you tell me?"
"'mokay, Barnabas," he said, his lungs whooshing full of air now that the hardest part was over. His heart was still jumping, though, unable to slow down as if well past the memory of what a calm, normal heartbeat felt like.
"I got scraped up, like, and I messed up the brier pretty bad. Was gonna try and tack it up, an' fix it like. So you wouldn't find out, cause I know how much you like them roses. Tried messing with it all afternoon. Which is why I didn't get the painting done. Which is why I was at the paint store so late."
"I was wondering about that," said Barnabas, nodding. As if he were completely and utterly disconnected from the vampire who ranted about white paint and idiots who couldn't buy a simple can of it if their lives depended upon it.
"I don't believe it." This from Nadine, her derision clear, rolling her eyes at Barnabas as if she'd dealt with his kind before and couldn't believe it was happening again.
"You have to believe it, Miss Morris," said Barnabas, more kindly to her than he'd been all evening. "Willie would prevaricate to some, but not to me."
"It's true, Nadine," said Patterson, chiming in. He'd stopped worrying his hat, seeing now, obviously, that the weight of the argument was in the town patron's favor. "Willie can dance around the truth with anyone, even with me. But I've yet to see him pull a fast one on Mr. Collins here."
Willie's hip was going numb from being immobile, and he shifted. Not that that helped any. The blood rushing through his legs now pulsed double time through his welts. Buying the wrong color of paint had a price that was too high to pay more than once. But the movement cast three pairs of eyes upon him, and none of them were pleasant. Nadine Morris was furious, the flags of color replaced by white anger. Patterson, no longer worried, looked smug, smiling, promising retribution if Willie Loomis caused any more trouble this evening. And Barnabas. Mouth making a little motion as if he were trying not to smile at his having averted the tragedy of suspicion. Eyes glinting, even so, with a kind of liquid heat, and another promise. More certain this, more certain than anything Patterson could come up with: that if Willie did not close the story, and soon, it would be his last.
"I couldn't lie to Mr. Collins. He always finds out anyway." He shrugged as if that were the price for working for such a big, important man.
Nadine's eyebrows flew up. "And when he finds out, does he whip you, Willie?
Willie wrinkled his forehead, thinking. "Does Barnabas do what?" He looked at Barnabas as if confused and looking for guidance. As if there was something that Barnabas should have told him before he, Willie, began his employment with the guiding light of the Collins family.
In the silence, Patterson twirled his hand. Willie read loud and clear Nadine Morris' disappointment, and he felt a little piece of his heart break off for her. She'd been trying to help. Wanted to help. And now she stood there, her harpist hands twisting into each other. That smiling kind mouth now a tight line to hold back the simmering anger that flashed now in her eyes.
"Satisfied, Nadine?" asked Patterson.
To which Barnabas chimed in, "Yes, Miss Morris. With the consideration to you that you are, as you say, only doing the job that the State of Maine has appointed you to, it is of the utmost importance that you are satisfied in this matter."
She didn't seem to have any trouble following this long string of words, not at all. She shook her head once, and eyed Willie as if he were a new breed of trouble. "I am writing up this incident, just the same. I was called out here by a paramedic, and it is my duty to make a note of it. It will be kept on record, and in one month's time, I will make a follow-up visit with Willie and you, Mr. Collins, to ensure that his supposed state of satisfaction remains that way. Do I make myself clear?"
Her voice held the power of her conviction, and with anyone else, her opponent would have been flattened. Conciliatory with defeat, and dancing with an eagerness to please. However, it was not her fault that her first major encounter was with Barnabas Collins. He tilted his head in a bow, and smiled. "I assure you that I look forward to that meeting with great eagerness."
Leaving no doubt in Willie's mind that were Miss Morris to remain untouched, being saved only by the publicness of her position, the records in Augusta would, during one months' time, be lost in the vacuum and dust of all such records. Misfiled by an idle and sloppy clerk, perhaps. Or be considered by someone to be not important enough to take up a quarter inch space in the L file drawer. Willie did not know which it would be in Barnabas' mind to justify or explain it. Only that it would happen. Eventually. He just hoped that in the meantime, Nadine would reconsider her career choice. Or get married. Social workers, the ones he'd known, were quickly ground into the dust by the demands of their position. Especially ones that cared too much. Wore their heart on their sleeve with such passion. Had harpist hands and a gentle touch.
Run, Miss Morris. While you still can.
"He will be properly treated before heis released from this hospital," said Nadine, turning to Barnabas.
"Certainly," he replied.
Barnabas reached out to shake her hand, but she tilted her chin at him, and gathered up her things. The clipboard went back in her big purse, and she slung it over her shoulder. Reached out to pat Willie on his forearm, her fingertips like a butterfly's kiss.
"Take care, Willie Loomis," she said, her moment of knowing him seared like a bright gem in her eyes. "I won't forget you."
He tried smiling at her, but felt some-thing twitch at his lip. It was too hard to smile, much easier to nod. He'd find him-self screaming for mercy if he so much as moved a muscle, as well. He knew that. With her standing there, and help so close. That genuine concern in her eyes, brave enough to confront Barnabas about what was right. Only inches away, and he could never ask her or tell her the truth. Desperation rose, climbing like an unbagged-snake.
"You okay, Willie?" she asked, her hand staying in its course along his arm. A warmer clasp now, her heartbeat shadowing through his skin.
"Yeah," he said, his voice coming out husky. "'m just tired, is all. Wanna go home."
"As you will," said Barnabas, "as soon as the nurse has seen to you, per Miss Morris' instructions." He bowed to her, a tip of his head, and smiled.
Nadine clutched her arms around her purse, gave one last smile to Willie and strode past Barnabas and the sheriff without another word. In one month's time, Willie would never see her again, even in one month's time, but now he could not even say goodbye. Only watch the sea-grass sway of her hair over her shoulders as she pulled at the heavy door and slipped into the corridor. Willie could hear a faint call for a nurse, and let his gaze drift to Barnabas. Frozen, like a mouse trapped by a snake.
"Thank you, Sheriff," said Barnabas, "you were indeed a help with Miss Morris. Overly educated women can be such a trial."
Patterson nodded, twirling his hat, and opened his mouth to speak.
"And now, if you would be so kind, I should like to speak to Willie alone."
Willie tried to tell himself that his heart did not sink straight into his gut, but he could practically hear the thump of it landing. Boom. Like a death knell of a single, hard note. As soon as the door closed behind Patterson, Willie took a breath.
"Be quiet," said Barnabas. It came out a hiss as the vampire stepped up to the bed and with one hand reached out and grabbed Willie by the back of his head. Hairs entwined with those hard fingers, roughly pulled, and Willie was forced up, half sitting, feeling the strain on his welts as they broke anew. The sheet fell away, the Johnny only a bare cotton shield now, Barnabas' face only inches from his own.
"Had you said anything other than what you did, you would have been removed from this bed a dead man."
He felt the vampire's breath on his face, a cold, bitter shift of air.
"Yes, Barnabas," Willie whispered, lips dry.
Barnabas released him with a flick and a shove and Willie fell back on the bed, shifting himself up on his elbow and scooting himself to the far edge as much as he could. Not that he could ever move far enough to be out of Barnabas' reach, but if the vampire was in a grabbing-and-throwing mood, the extra distance would, maybe, slow him down or give him pause.
"Your story lacked conviction, but that is to be expected from a manservant," Barnabas was saying now, starting a slow pace back and forth across the hospital floor alongside Willie's bed.
Willie watched him, moving only his eyes to keep the vampire in his line of sight. His heart would not slow down. And the back of his legs were screaming at him now, being so rucked about, and landed on and pushed and moved, they'd had enough. Willie had had enough, looking at the door to see if it would open soon, and then back to Barnabas. Raw nerve endings or bleeding on hospital sheets were the least of his worries.
"P-please, Barnabas—"
"You will be quiet." Barnabas stopped, mid-pace, his fist right next to Willie's head. "You will be quiet and you will listen to me. You will calm your nerves this instant."
"Yes, Barnabas," he whispered, wild shots of some-thing that felt white and hot scattering through his heart.
"When the nurse comes, you will allow her to administer whatever lotions or liquids she cares to. You will resist all blood tests, of course. And then you will demand that I take you home. I will not have you over-night here, is that clear?"
Willie let his head fall to the pillow, pulling up the sheet in a half-tired gesture, stopping it when he realized what he was doing. Cutting off the vampire, closing his eyes, turning away, which was not permitted. He opened his eyes, but found that he could not summon any strength to lift up his head.
"Is that clear?"
"Yes, Barnabas." It was all he could manage. Surely the vampire knew it?
Barnabas nodded. "I will send in the nurse, and wait outside in the corridor for you."
Willie could let his head stay on the pillow now as Barnabas left the room, the muscles in his neck almost relaxing. Almost, because he was not home yet. Not by a long shot.
Before the door could close behind the vampire, the nurse was in the room, carrying a tray of different kinds of treatment, which she planted on the swinging table and moved closer the bed. It was Ida Jo.
"I'll be quick, if you'll be cooperative."
Willie nodded. Yes, he'd cooperate. Barnabas had said so.
"On your stomach, then, please."
Willie did as he was told, feeling the hollowness of his stomach gurgle as his weight shifted on it. Folded his arms on top of the pillow and sank his head inside of them. The sting and swell of each welt as it was exposed to the bare air.
He could feel Nurse Ida Jo pulling down the sheet, peeling apart the Johnny, loosening the ties. A cold, not ungentle touch as she pressed what felt like the tips of her fingers against a welt.
"These keep pulling apart, but we'll get you patched in a jiffy, Willie," she said. "I've got just the stuff to fix you up."
Willie believed her. He had seen it in her eyes how seriously she took her job. Brown eyes, detached and calm and that crisp, pert nurse's hat whose sharp edges spoke of much ironing and starching.
She started with something that stung, leaving Willie's eyes watering madly while she did it. Not as bad as the salt water that Barnabas applied, not by a long shot. But hard, hard enough to clean, smelling like iodine, and feeling like it as well. Then something cool, that she applied with long strokes, almost sending him to sleep, except when she would catch a jagged edge of skin. These she clipped with quick snips, jerking Willie into wakefulness with each one.
"They'll heal better with a clean edge," she said. "I'll give you something to kill the pain, after."
More long strokes, not sending him into sleep anymore, but waking him right up, smelling like a juniper tree berry and feeling like whatever she was putting on him was soaking right into the skin.
She swiped something along his upper thigh. "Here you go, painkiller, straight up."
It was a shot, something to kill the pain, and he sighed. Knowing that hospital-administered painkillers went straight into the system, instead of taking half an hour to work like the over the counter stuff did.
Then she pricked him again, and he twisted his head to see what she was doing.
"I'm going to take a blood sample to make sure you aren't on the verge of getting blood poisoning or anything. The doctor can tell you—"
Willie reached back, and with one quick, unthinking move, grabbed the heft of the tube, half filled with his blood, pulled the needle out of his leg and hurled the entire mess against the far wall. It shattered with high notes, as if it were made of fine crystal, and splattered red across the metal grey of the door.
"Oh!" said Ida Jo, shocked out of her efficiency. "Of all the—Willie Loomis, I will take a blood sample and you will let me. Do you understand? Or I will get your boss, that nice Mr. Collins, and he'll make you!"
"Get him," said Willie, his throat almost closing up with his rage. He sat up in the bed, ignoring the pressure of his weight against the back of his legs, the pain was fast fading anyway. "And get my clothes while you're at it. I'm going home."
Ida Jo stood up, the edges of her pert hat still crisp, but her brown eyes muddied by her confusion. "I will get Mr. Collins, I will," she threatened. "And you're supposed to stay overnight. For observation."
"Do it," said Willie, pushing back the swinging table and standing up. Tubes and bloodied cloth and the scissors fell off and clattered to the floor, but he marched over them. Advancing on her. And she, backing up. All the way to the door.
"Do it," he said again. "Do it now. Go get him. Ask him. He'll tell you. No blood tests."
Willie couldn't be sure, absolutely sure, that Barnabas would back him up on this one. Not after the last blood test fiasco, when the vampire had seemingly switched sides in a fast dance to outwit the doctor, leaving Willie to stagger in his wake, confused. And hurt, even, that Barnabas would not entrust him with the entire plan.
"No blood tests," he ground out. "And bring my goddamn clothes. Now!"
With a little shriek she pulled open the door, shouting for Barnabas in a high voice. Barnabas would come and would either bully Willie into giving blood, even after giving him strict instructions to the contrary, or he would back Willie to the hilt and carry Willie out of the hospital. Stark naked if necessary.
Willie found he was shaking now, standing in the empty space between bed and doorway. In front of the bathroom where the light that shone on him brightened up the mirror like a painting at the end of a dark hallway. His face was white, eyes glittering back at him as Barnabas' sometimes did, cutting through darkness or candlelight with equal sharpness. He could not see the backs of his thighs, but he did not want to. His mouth was frowning into a thin line, his shoulders square, the Johnny shifting off him, moving like silk instead of the cheap cotton that he was. In a second, or even less, he would be completely naked. Not a good idea. Even if everyone beneath the hospital roof professed a certain acquaintance with the human form in the altogether, Willie did not want to be caught by Barnabas that way. Felt too much like exposing the softest flesh for a vampire's rampage.
Catching the tail ends of the Johnny as it slithered off him, he pulled it up to hid neck and turned away, so that he could not see himself in the mirror anymore. Tied the first tie around his neck, and then the second, and then reached back to gather the Johnny closed, just as the door opened. It was Barnabas, and the nurse, with his clothes, and a doctor he'd never seen before. "I assure you," Barnabas was saying, "that should he show he slightest sign of fever, I will call for you at once."
The trio stopped inside the room, the doctor staying in the doorway, his expression saying that he resented being called from some obviously more important matter to tend to the trouble presented by the obstinate caretaker of the Old House up at Collinwood.
"As you wish, Mr. Collins," said the doctor. "Ida Jo, give that man his clothes and get back to work. And next time there's a problem? Don't go screaming down the hall-way, it isn't professional. And clean up this mess." He snapped the door shut behind him, seemingly not troubled by its weight.
Now chastened, cheeks flaring with color, Ida Jo handed Willie his pile of clothes. Roughly, eyes flashing her dislike of him.
"There," she said. "Happy now?"
Willie didn't say anything in return, not with Barnabas standing right there. Not with the pounding in his head, either. He felt tired enough to drop, but didn't know if Barnabas was finished with him yet.
She stormed out of the room, not waiting for Barnabas' courteous thank you, or even one final sneer in Willie's direction. "You may get dressed now," said Barnabas. "I will take you home."
There was a small pause, as Willie waited, then discovered with some abashment, that Barnabas was not leaving.
"Now, Willie."
He could only but obey. Barnabas was not in a mood to respond well to being asked to leave so that a lowly manservant could dress in privacy. Not ever and especially not now. Willie felt the back of his neck slick up with sweat, but there was no help for it. Barnabas would get an eyeful of his handiwork, if that's what he wanted, but Willie made himself not care. Not easy, though, as he moved to the bed and put the pile of clothes on top. Shed the Johnny with quick movements, letting it fall in a cloudy puddle at his feet. Pulling on his underwear and socks first, all while standing, knowing it would be hell to sit. Tugged his t-shirt over his head, still sweat stained from his earlier whipping, smelling like it hadn't been laundered in months. And then his pants. Having to bend over to pull them on made him grunt. Low in his lungs, an unwilling sound, one that should have been lost in the soft, low purr of his zipper being raised.
"That will teach you, will it not?" asked Barnabas. "And hopefully cure you of any future independent thought, if you would but remember it."
Willie picked up his cotton button-down shirt and pushed his arms through the sleeves. Considered for a moment leaving it at that, but knew that any deviation from Barnabas' dress code for servants would earn him another whipping. Especially at this time of night. He buttoned the cuffs and then fastened the front and tucked it all in, fastening his belt, and then lifting his head as if for inspection. Barnabas turned on his heel, and pulled the door open and Willie followed him, walking a step behind, as a servant should. Ignoring the pairs of eyes that trailed after them as they made their way down the corridor. Then down the stairs to the first floor, and even out to the parking lot.
Then Barnabas turned to face him, tall against the shadows cast by the streetlight. Towering over Willie with a grim expression, his cane held tightly in one hand.
"You will now walk to the paint store and collect your truck. You will return home. And then," here Barnabas paused, eyes glinting down at him as if making sure he had his servant's full attention. "Tomorrow," he paused to emphasize the word, "tomorrow you will repaint the trim on the third floor landing. With the correct paint."
"Tomorrow?" asked Willie, not believing his ears. That meant he could go home and go to bed. He wanted to ask why, but clamped his jaw shut against the impulse. Better not to question why, and follow a madman's orders, than have the vampire's tempest and full fury come down squarely on his head.
"Tomorrow. Yes, Barnabas."
The vampire strode off across the hospital parking lot, and Willie watched him go. Stood watching until the vampire's shadow was no more than a memory beneath the flickering electric lights.
*
By the time he pulled into the driveway of the Old House, his spine felt permanently fused to the bottom of his skull, rusted stiff like metal flagpole too long exposed to sea air. Going through the kitchen door, ignoring the fusty smell of damp and dirt rising up from the floor-boards, he slipped down the hallway in the dark, not bothering to light a candle to ease his way. His eyes were mostly closed anyway, screwed up against the exhaustion ripping through him with indecent ease, and his feet knew the way. Knew every board, every squeak of the stairs. Willie wanted to avoid Barnabas, if he was even around, and a lit candle would have been to the vampire the boldest, most imprudent signal. Let him forget that he had a servant, even if only for a little while.
He reached his room only by the starlight he brought with him, from the vaguely remembered drive home, the spear points of light that flickered behind his pounding headache. And the back of his legs, the painkiller had not worn off, but it would. Eventually. He wanted to be flat on his stomach, in bed and asleep, when that happened. Closing the door behind him, he sighed. Lit the courting candle and peeled off his clothes. Everything smelled medicinal, as if someone had soaked his clothes in some-thing to clean them. But they were still dirty, so he knew it was just his mind playing tricks on him. He let the clothes fall to the floor, and crawled naked between the sheets. It was summer enough to forgo the fire, or socks to warm his feet, and even if he was still shivering, did not feel as if he could ever stop, he would rather not have any-thing binding him, even in sleep. His wrists still tingled from the manacles' grip, and jaws singing slightly from the smack he'd earned earlier from Barnabas or the punch from the guy on the street. Willie rolled onto his stomach and rested his head on his arms. Was there any part of him that did not ache?
With a shudder, his body jerked itself to relax, the thumps of his heart slowing pace by pace, but snail slow, as if it expected that it would, at any second, start speeding up again. Had been happening all evening, Willie could not really blame it. And now, now in the quiet, the welts on his legs stirred a bit. Blood thrumming through them as if only whispering now. Later, in the morning, it would be a shout, but now it was so quiet he could pretend to ignore it. And concentrate instead on a pair of ocean blue eyes burning with the passion to defend and protect. Sea-grass hair bound by a clip only because it wanted to be. And a harpist's hands, moving the air as if to summon heaven's breath for Willie to inhale into his lungs.
You're loosing it, man.
Yeah. Loosing it. But, having lost it long since, what did it matter?
It didn't. Nadine Morris was history. Yesterday's news. She would not be able to do more than she had done, even if she were to come back in a month. Barnabas would spin the tale he wanted her to hear, she would be forced to drop any investigation, and though Willie knew he would probably be spared any whippings in the days to come, he had no doubt in his mind that on the very next day after her visit, if she came, any twitch out of place, any misspoken word, any . . . any anything would have Barnabas fast delivering the punishment that he'd been saving up for some thirty-odd days. And Willie did not relish the prospect. Barnabas denied any of his wishes or wants was a nasty promise that Willie knew would be kept.
He yawned, his body finally reaching a point where it wanted to shut everything down. His brain was reaching the same conclusion, his thoughts skipping around from Nadine's blue eyes, to the back of Barnabas' hand slicing through the air to meet his face. The cooling ointment beneath Ida Jo's touch, and the soft sweet smell of rose water as Nadine patted the mattress beside his head.
Go to sleep now, Willie, she said. I'll be looking out for you. I won't forget you.
But I'll forget you. I have to. Otherwise I'll go mad.
Though it wasn't a certainty that he hadn't done that already.
Below him in the Old House, he heard a door open and close. Footsteps, in even treads, along the hallway and into the front room. The faraway snap of a match being lit, the faint sizzle of a candle being lit.
You're not really hearing that, you know. You just think you are.
That had to be true, for how could someone half asleep hear the sounds of a candle flame? But it was enough that he heard it. The back of his neck eased out of tension, the muscle lifting from bone. The weight of his head like bricks in a sack, and the slight pulse of a vein on his hand beneath his cheek. He shifted the hand, moved it under the pillow, and took a breath.
Goodnight, Nadine, wherever you are. And thanks.
A gentle breath, and a sigh, somewhere, an echo in his head, not real, not possibly real, and the soft dusk of rosewater on warm skin. And then the blackness of sleep, sweet and still and quiet.
The End
Master Fic List
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But I'm so happy to see you had written a new Dark Shadows story! :D
Beautifully written!
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