On Broken Wings (12 page)

They wouldn't cry, Chris. They'd retch. The best of them would get fighting mad. Most would refuse to believe that such a thing could ever happen to anyone in our enlightened age.

"Do I get another book today?"

"Sure."
Something a little more cheerful this time.
"Let me think about it for awhile, okay?"

"Okay. Do you have anything planned for the day?"

He turned to face her. "No, why?"

She looked off, studiedly casual. "I thought it might be nice if we dropped in on the Father again."

"Oh. Well, sure, why not?"

***

Father Schliemann ushered them into the rectory's sitting room and bade them be comfortable with his usual combination of warmth and Old World courtesy. Louis chose one of the armchairs. Christine sat in the other. The priest sat before them on the battered old sofa. Curls of steam rising from the coffee service on the sideboard indicated that he had prepared for their arrival.

"How have things been going for you, Louis?"

Louis shrugged. "No real changes since we last spoke, Father. Mostly, life just goes on."

"Yes, it has a habit of doing that." The priest's gaze lingered on his face for a moment before moving to Christine. "And what about you, child? Has my friend here been taking good care of you?"

She nodded and turned to Louis. "Would it be okay if I talked to the Father alone for a little bit? I don't mean to be rude."

He had expected it, and was rising from his chair as her voice trailed off. "Don't let it bother you, Chris. I'll take a walk in the woods. Will an hour be enough, do you think?"

She nodded gravely.

"Well, then, you two have a nice chat. I'll be back at about eleven. Take good care of her for me, Father."

He closed the rectory door behind him with unusual emphasis, so they'd know he had left, and headed for the woods behind the building.

Wish I'd thought to bring a book. Damn.

***

Schliemann could see that Christine was emotionally disheveled. The girl had no idea what to do with her hands and couldn't sit still. "Is everything all right, child?"

"Yes, fine, Father. I mean, everything's great. I feel great, Louis has been super, really super, but..." Her shoulders tightened and she looked down at her knotted fingers.

"Christine, come sit by me."

She rose a little unsteadily and went to sit by him on the sofa. He reached to take her hands, and she gave them into his clasp.

"I'm a Catholic priest, child. We have a practice called confession. Has Louis told you about it?"

She shook her head.

"We know that people sometimes do things that they have to talk about, but that they don't want to become widely known. So the Church trains us in how to listen, and how to keep secrets. You can tell a priest anything, and you need never fear that anyone else will learn it from him. What you tell me will stay between us forever. No one else will ever hear about it, unless you choose to tell him. Not even Louis."

She said nothing.

"We're also trained to understand, and to forgive."

Still nothing.

"Is there something you need forgiveness for, child?"

"No!" Her color rose and her posture became defiant.

He squeezed her hands, and she relaxed. "Then is there something you need help forgiving someone else for?" He paused to let her think. "It's not uncommon, child. And Louis, as fine a man as he is, is still only a man, with all of a man's needs and desires."

Surprise spread across Christine's face, and she began to laugh.

Schliemann watched in amazement as the laugh took over her whole body. Tears began to run down her face. It was plain that she was not laughing from a sense of merriment, and it was not a pleasant sight. It went on quite a while.

She subsided in a last flurry of squeaks and sniffles. "How long have you known him, Father?"

"All his life, child. I baptized him."

"And you think he could bring himself to hurt me? You don't know him well enough!"

Schliemann made a mental note to work on curbing his readiness to jump to conclusions.

"Maybe this isn't such a great idea." She began to rise, but he squeezed her hands again and she stopped.

"That's a good trick."

He smiled. "Yes, it is, isn't it? I've been using it for fifty years. It's amazing how well it works."

"Louis does something like that with his voice."

"Really? I'll have to get him to demonstrate it. It's possible that I won't understand you, or be able to help you. I, too, am only a man. But forgive me, please, for suggesting what I just did, and let's try again."

She looked away for a moment.

"You said you were trained to understand and forgive. But were you trained to
believe?
"

Her eyes returned to his. He felt the pressure of a test in progress.

"I promise to believe whatever you tell me, child."

Her gaze was oddly full of knowledge. "We'll see."

***

"Now what do you think?"

Schliemann shook his head. "I don't know what to say. But you're not complaining, are you?"

"No! I just need to know why. He doesn't seem to want anything from me. Not that I've got that much to offer. But I've practically sat on his face at least twice, and he didn't even blink."

The priest gasped. "Christine!"

"Did I say something wrong? That's the way Louis sounds when I say 'shit' or 'fuck,' but I didn't say those words. Unless I forgot and did it by accident?"

Schliemann made a frenzied shushing motion.

"It's all right, child, really. Sometimes I forget about your, ah, background." He rose and paced the room. "So what really bothers you is that you can't figure out his motives."

She nodded, watching him with concentration.

"And you know he has to have some, because we all do. But he hasn't said anything." He paused. "What has he told you about his own situation?"

"Nothing, Father. Where does his money come from, anyway?"

Schliemann's eyebrows went up. "Does it really matter, child?"

She met his eyes without flinching. "It might, Father."

"Ah. Perhaps you're right. Well, he made a lot some years ago, doing what he's teaching you to do, and he's invested it very well, or so he's told me. At any rate, I don't think we need to worry about that. He certainly doesn't."

She grimaced. "You have to understand, for ten years I was surrounded by guys who made money by beating the living, uh, daylights out of people and taking it from them."

"Ah, I see. He came by it honestly, never fear." He returned to the sofa, sat beside her, and took her hands between his own again.

"It's true that we each have reasons for the things we do. But it would be wrong to assume that someone's reasons have to be evil ones just because he hasn't discussed them with you. Isn't that so?"

She nodded. "I just want to know, that's all."

"I understand. In your position, I would, too. But you can't force him to tell you. For now, it lies between him and God. And you have more than enough experience with him to know that he will not harm you in any way." He thought for a moment. "Christine, did you ever ask him?"

She snorted. "Yes, Father, I did. Just last night."

"Well? What did he say?"

"He said he wanted me to become strong, confident, and happy."

"That sounds like Louis all over. But it's not enough for you, because there's nothing for him in any of that. Am I correct?"

"Yup."

Schliemann winced. "I'm sure he's asked you not to do that."

She grinned. "Yup."

He shook his head. "Perhaps it'll take a while. But I can assure you of this: you couldn't be in better hands. And he does have his reasons, and they are good ones."

She sighed. "I guess I knew that." The rectory door opened with a protracted squeal. Evidently Louis had returned. "Can I come see you again sometime, Father?"

"Any time, child. For any reason, or none. You will always be welcome in my home, and God's."

***

Christine was silent on the drive back. Louis tried to make small talk, but his heart wasn't in it either. When they returned to the house, Christine went to the mess from the previous day's shopping spree and began to sort through it.

"Which closet?" she asked.

"The one in your room, of course. Give me a second." He grabbed two plastic trash bags from the kitchen and dashed up the stairs. Five minutes later her closet was empty and the bags were full.

"I've been meaning to clean that closet out anyway. I just needed a reason."

She turned from her mountain of purchases and gave him that heart-stopping smile.

"I know, Louis." She bounded to him and embraced him, pulling him tight against her while he stood there holding the bags filled with his old clothes. Ridges of scar tissue scraped gently against his cheek. Her lips brushed the side of his face. She stood back from him, smiled again at his incomprehension, and returned to her pile of purchases.

"What was that about?"

"Oh, no reason."

====

Chapter
12

The nurse disconnected the intravenous unit and rolled it away. Louis didn't move.

Dear God, how much worse can it get?

He feared even to turn his head. The nausea had hit him as the drugs entered his bloodstream, and it was more powerful than he could have imagined. The breathing trick was not working. Panic was setting in.

He closed his eyes, hoping that the lack of visual stimulus might allow him to gain some purchase on his vertigo. The opposite occurred. The surges in his head and guts seemed to swell to enormous dimensions, as if he were being tossed back and forth by a pair of unseen giants.

His eyes snapped open again. It was unbearable. He could not lie there a moment longer. He raised himself on one elbow and tried to swing his legs off the gurney. They moved much more sharply than he intended, and he fell.

He crashed to the floor alongside the gurney. The impact shocked open his stomach valves. His body emptied itself in a rush. His nausea metamorphosed into pain, a combined sense of burning and corrosion that reached from his throat to his groin.

"Nurse! Thirty milligrams of compazine, stat!"

He recognized Miles Jefferson's voice. The young resident's face swam in his darkening vision. As his consciousness faded, he was irrationally comforted by the thought that at least he hadn't eaten breakfast.

***

Louis woke to pain. His left arm throbbed from shoulder to fingertips, and his left hip seemed to be a single giant bruise. Mercifully, the nausea was gone.

He had been laid on a bed in a tiny private room. Jefferson was there, asleep in a metal guest chair, head thrown back at an angle that looked downright fatal.

How does the man sleep in positions like that?

"Miles?"

The resident started, blinked, yawned, and focused on Louis. "How're you doing, sport?"

"Hard to say. I hurt like hell, but the nausea seems to be gone."

"It damn well should be. I hit you with enough compazine to quench a volcano."

Louis raised himself up on his elbows. Ignoring the throbbing from the left one took some effort. "Miles, is it always going to be like that?"

Jefferson grimaced and looked away. Louis could tell that the resident was mulling over how much to tell him.

"You've reacted badly so far. I'd have to say very badly. Normally, that's a pattern that doesn't change. This stuff is not kind to your innards."

"I hope it's even less kind to the cancer."

The resident ground his teeth and said nothing.

"Miles, you're scaring me."

Jefferson slouched forward, dropped his elbows onto his knees and covered his face with his hands. "It's not working, Louis. I'm sorry."

Louis waited until the resident could meet his eyes again. "What do you mean, it's not working?"

Jefferson stood up, staggering a little from exhaustion. "Are you okay to walk?"

"Sure."

"Then get up from there and come with me."

***

The X-rays on the light board were arranged left to right from oldest to newest. Their testimony could be interpreted only one way. The original malignancy on his lower spine had enlarged and sent out thick vertical tendrils. Dark masses had proliferated throughout Louis's abdomen. It appeared that every organ had been affected.

Louis stared at the story of his deterioration in silent shock.

Intellectually, he had known how slim his chances were. Emotionally, he had never conceded the certainty of his own death. Now, facing the evidence, he could no longer deny it.