Over the Rainbow - Book One - 'The Gathering Place' (3 page)

Chris winked at the befuddled girl.

“
For luck,” he said.

This just confused her further.

Squaring the mortar-board rakishly across his head,
Chris leaned in and violently struck the cue ball, blasting it into
the colorful triangle and causing an explosion of balls that
scattered in all directions. He watched with hands on hips as two-
then three- then four balls fell into various pockets around the
table. Without so much as looking at Dan, he casually gestured to
the glass containing the cards. “May I-? It would just save us
time...”

Dan snarled, “Screw you! You cocky little Ba-!” And
then he stopped, the expletive cut short by the presence of someone
filling the archway behind his detestable cousin. With almost
sickening ease, Dan’s demeanor abruptly changed as he addressed the
new arrival with nauseating sweetness, “Aunt Abigail, what a
surprise!”

Framed in the archway like a glowing angel, Abigail
Matthews was truly a vision of loveliness, her beauty-queen
features undiminished by her age. As was befitting of the wife of a
wealthy shipping executive, Abigail wore her money well. A
perfectly tailored, champagne-colored and intricately beaded silk
dress with matching jacket and elbow-length gloves were merely the
foundation for the carefully chosen accessories- an elegant package
that when taken as a whole resulted in a delicious confection of
grace and beauty.

A diamond-encrusted tennis bracelet adorned one
delicate wrist, a wealth of glittering jewels artfully displayed on
long, delicate fingers opposite it. A triple strand of exquisitely
matched pearls hung loosely around her neck, and a final, almost
incongruous touch of color was pinned to the lapel of her jacket-
it was an orchid corsage, bright magenta in color, the wispy
tendrils of a baby fern framing its singular beauty. In short,
Abigail Matthews was the perfect picture of wealth and
privilege.

But despite her outward
appearance, Abigail’s demeanor was most definitely
not
that of someone with
the superficial affectation of those typically cloaked in the
trappings of luxury. Quite conversely, Abigail exuded an air of
quiet humility, a grounded earthiness that made her stand out among
her peers, a woman whom even with all of her decoration stripped of
her would still reflect a sense of warmth and charm that seemed to
radiate from her core.

She timidly poked her head into the Billiards room
and smiled thinly at the gathering as she caught the attention of
her son, who had slowly turned and now smiled warmly to greet her.
“Hey, Mom- what’s up?”

“
Honey, it's time to go... are you
almost done?”

Chris turned back to Dan and stuck out his tongue in
a thoroughly puerile yet totally effective gesture of contempt, and
called over his shoulder as he leaned back over the table, “Almost.
This'll just take a second...”

Dan mouthed a silent expletive to Chris in reply,
but Chris merely smiled in return. He had Dan right where he wanted
him.

Abigail nodded and turned to leave, and then
hesitated, sensing the distinctly palpable tension in the room,
wanting to interject a cautionary note of motherly concern to her
son and nephew. The boys had a long history of fighting, and she
didn’t want this event sullied by another ridiculous display of
pugilistic posturing. She opened her mouth to intervene and then
suddenly stopped- deciding that it would make no difference if she
had, for the animosity these two shared would never heed her
admonishments at abatement. She sighed and hoped for the best, and
then slowly turned and walked away, a final worried glance cast
over her shoulder before she disappeared into the crowd. And as
silently as she had appeared, she was just as quietly gone.

The music, which had somehow inexplicably paused at
the very moment of Abigail’s arrival, immediately took up again
where it had left off, the throbbing techno beat rattling off the
walls, and Chris and Dan now began to circle the table like
combatants in the ring.

Chris leaned back down to the table and continued
his run, quickly sinking four more balls before missing a
particularly difficult shot, the cue ball drifting lazily to the
center of the table.

Dan licked his lips in almost predatory fashion and
took his turn.

The throbbing beat of the music sharply increased in
volume and tempo, and the play at the table matched it in pace and
intensity. Almost a dance, each shot more incredible than the next,
the balls spun and whirled into pockets around the table. Chris and
Dan strutted and postured with each successive turn, brandishing
and flailing their cues in almost martial arts fashion as the game
wore on.

Rack after rack, point after point
the battle raged on, the sharp clack of the balls reverberating in
time to the music. And then suddenly the action abruptly stopped,
simultaneously with the ending of the pulsating beat, both sounds
echoing into silence. On the table, only
two
balls remained- the
seven
and the
eight.
Both were in near
impossible positions, and several members of the group began to
frantically exchange side bets like traders in the Dow Jones
pit.

Dan stood and looked quickly to the counter-line,
confirming what he already knew- the points are dead even, with
only one solitary counter remaining. Smiling with an almost evil
confidence, he slowly leaned in and took aim at the seven. With a
smooth, powerful stroke, the cue ball flew to the opposite end of
the table and crashed into the glossy maroon sphere, scattering the
both it and eight ball in opposite directions.

The seven caromed off one rail, and then another,
and then one more, and then slowly trickled toward the corner
pocket and certain victory. Dan rose and shrugged in feigned
indifference as he shot a gloating smirk back to Chris. But the
taunting gesture went unrewarded, since Chris was apparently
watching something else entirely. Smugly confident in the impending
defeat of his nemesis, Dan casually reached to the glass to claim
his winnings, only to have his hand stopped in midair by the voice
of Chris as it cut through the heavy silence, “Ah-ah-Ahhhh! Not so
fast…”

Dan’s gaze snapped to that of Chris, whose head was
nodding pointedly toward the table, a wry grin twisting the corner
of his mouth. And as he did, he saw a sight that stilled the blood
in his veins.

As the seven drifted slowly toward the hole, the
eight ball bounced softly off the near side rail and deflected it
away from the pocket, casually snatching away his certain victory
with almost mocking aplomb.

Dan’s face flushed to an angry shade of puce.
“OHHHH-FUCK! GOD DAMMIT! NOOOOOO…!” he wailed, snapping the cue in
half across his knee in frustration. “Awww, SHIT!” he moaned,
dropping the halves of the ruined stick to the ground in a pathetic
gesture of defeat.

The darkly glistening eight ball now sat poised
directly in front of the pocket, nearly teetering on the lip of the
hole. Chris strode calmly to the opposite end of the table, and
without pausing, much less even aiming, he gently tapped the cue
ball and sent it slowly on its way, deftly snagging both golden
cards as he passed the shell-shocked figure of his cousin.

“
You won't be needing this,” he
said glibly, waving the glittering card tauntingly beneath Dan’s
nose, and continued to exit the now deathly silent room. As Chris
crossed beneath the elaborate archway, he paused and called back
over his shoulder in almost absent-minded fashion, “Eight ball-
corner pocket.”

And the ball dropped in.

The dark, quiet confines of the club’s library were
nearly silent, the soft sounds of the musicians gently trickling in
through the open archway. The late afternoon sun angled low through
the tall, narrow windows, dust motes dancing on the sparkling
shafts that streamed through, brightly illuminating thousands of
elegantly bound volumes crowding the wall-to-wall bookshelves that
spanned the heights from floor to ceiling.

A beautiful antique globe,
jewel-encrusted and brass inlaid, sat perched on an intricately
filigreed stand, glowing almost magically in a brilliant pool of
light that streamed through the window. The faceted jewels on its
surface glittered as it slowly revolved beneath the hand of
Abigail, her gloves removed and bejeweled fingers and wrists
flashing with the colors of the rainbow. She glanced over her
shoulder to Walter, who was staring intently at the portrait
gallery, no doubt envisioning his own image upon the wall, and said
airily, “This huge, wonderful world. With all the places we've
gone, all the things that we've seen, how is it even remotely
possible that you have
never
,
ever
taken me to Hawaii?”

Walter sighed pointedly and turned
to Abigail, a look of thinly concealed disgust creasing his face as
he replied, “Abigail, sweetheart, we’ve been over this a million
times. Hawaii is just so ridiculously- 'touristy', so- more for
'common' people; Rock stars, Movie stars- uneducated
glitterati,
those
types. Personally, I can think of nothing
worse
to do than to just lie about
on the beach all day long doing absolutely nothing.” Walter
reluctantly pried himself away from his self-indulgent musings and
crossed to Abigail, limply gesturing to the world she now held
within her hands. “Besides, a beach is a beach; Hamilton, Honolulu,
what's the difference? I just prefer someplace where I can- keep up
with things. St. Kitts, St. Thomas, the Caymans-
those
are places where
you can at least associate with your
peers
, if you must insist on a
beach- rather than a horde of fish-belly tourists and their
dirty-faced children.”

Abigail stiffened and turned to
Walter with a look of affront. “Walter! How positively-”, Abigail
hesitated, searching for words, finding none, and then continued,
“You should absolutely relish the chance to do
nothing
for a change. Can you
honestly say when the last time was that you actually took some
time for yourself- just to relax?”

Walter countered with a droll
smirk and a slight puffing of his chest, “As a matter of fact, it
was only yesterday. I played two full rounds with father and
Michael- that's an
entire
day
of relaxing if
you-”

Abigail interrupted innocently, “What was your
score, dear?”

Walter smiled crookedly and chuckled softly, “Oh,
quite good, actually. Four under, for the day- took Dad and Mike
for a couple of-”

“
That's what I mean! That's not
relaxation, that's business!” Abigail sighed and then continued,
“You cleaned their clocks again, didn't you?”

“
Abby, that has nothing to do
with-”

“
It has
everything
to do with
it! You
never
take time for you-
you
always
have to be
winning, beating the pants off the competition even when you
aren't
in the office. It
follows you everywhere, all the time.” She turned to Walter with an
imploring look. “You need to learn to stop. Just for a minute. It
won't
kill
you...” Abigail paused, taking in a long, slow breath. “It's
sort of like- like holding your breath. You aren't going to hold it
forever- and the rush as you exhale and take in that first sweet
taste of air is just like that… letting go.” Walter stared at
Abigail in agitated contemplation, considered a rebuttal, and then
his shoulders sagged, his argument apparently defeated, and he
merely huffed and turned back to the portraits again in
silence.

As both Walter and Abigail drifted off into silent
contemplation, each considering their own fantasies, Chris strode
briskly toward them through the open archway, beaming like a Willy
Wonka winner and flashing Dan's card triumphantly over his head. He
addressed his father with a cocky grin, “Hey, Dad, check it out. I
stole Dan's lunch money again- Hi, Mom.”

Abigail simply sighed and shook her head, this time
underscoring the gesture with a skyward roll of her eyes. “Like
father, like son...”

Walter was clearly unimpressed, his mind
unmistakably focused on more pressing matters. He pointedly checked
his watch, obviously impatient to be elsewhere, and addressed Chris
with stiff formality, “I trust you packed your tux?”