Song of Renewal (30 page)

“Troy?” she called. Or did she? She no longer knew in this state of nothingness.

There! She saw him! He stood beneath the Love Tree where the sun rays, tossed over the lily pond, were so bright, the water sparkled like diamonds.

The Love Tree stood out in three-dimensional clarity. Troy leaned indolently against it, foot crossed at the ankle, arms folded across chest. Yet – something in his eyes, sober and disquieting, drew her. She tried to get to him, but each time she thought she was getting near he faded into a haze.

Everything grew misty…she could barely see him as he pushed from the tree and began to move silently away…she tried to open her eyes to see better…tried to run…wouldn’t move. Frantic, struggling…
can’t…reach…him!
“Troy!” she screamed. At her urgency, Troy turned and moved a little closer…a slow smile of encouragement broke across his face.

And she saw Scrounger beside Troy. No longer sick but grinning, his tongue lolling.

“I’ve got to go now.” The words floated from Troy, unspoken.

“But – ” She lifted a hand in supplication.

He hesitated, then said, “I want to show you something.” A mist wrapped and floated around them. When it parted, she felt like she sat upon it, like a cloud pillow, her feet dangling like
a little girl’s. Troy sat beside her and held her hand now. She curled her fingers into its warmth.

He pointed below them, to the medical team who dispensed extreme measures to the same patient she’d seen before. She looked at Troy questioningly. He nodded toward the activity below. “Watch.” The female doctor this time pushed her way through the thick doctors’ throng to the patient’s side, pushing aside other groping hands in an authoritative way that scattered them like startled birds. Angel felt a fierce, mystical connection to the doctor. Spellbound, she watched the woman lean over and put her ear to the still chest. Then she straightened and pounded on the at-rest bosom…she began a deep massage… she spoke to the inert form. Angel leaned in, keen to hear but only telepathic waves filtered to hear…. I can do this…I will do this! By God, I will do this!”

Angel looked at Troy, puzzled. “What does she mean?” Her silent question vibrated between them. Troy again nodded toward the medical clan below, who shook their heads in wonder at the now-breathing patient. The female doctor exited the room silently. No one even seemed to notice her.

Angel’s mist-cloud seat followed her. The doctor slowly removed her mask and cap…blond hair cascaded free and blue eyes shimmered with incandescent purpose and courage.

Angel gasped. “It’s me, Troy.”

He laughed, a pealing, joyful sound. “It’s
you
. Go back, Angel.” The silent words were gentle but firm as he loosed his hand from hers. His eyes darkened with sadness, then just as quickly, it evaporated and his smile returned. “Soon, you’ll know why. Go back.”

From somewhere drifted rich, wonderful music.

His smile broadened as the haze deepened and mist moved in to swallow him.

“Remember!” he called, “I love you. And don’t forget your present!”

Blinding bright light bounced against her slitted eyes. Soft music…everything blurred as Angel squinted. Slowly, ever so slowly, the two hovering blobs morphed into Mama’s and Daddy’s smiling, tearful features.

“Wh – ” her lips moved but no sound erupted. The thing in her throat – it stopped the sound. She cast her sluggish gaze about. White everywhere. Weird machines and sounds. Numbness in parts of her body. Pain in others.

She cut her eyes sharply to the right. Bedside table…the black ceramic figurine zoomed in. Then she saw the note. Squinting, she made out the letters “Remember I love you. All my love, Troy.” Suddenly, she smiled as tears rushed to her eyes.

She knew.

chapter fifteen

“So you’ve decided to come back to us, huh, brat?” Charlcy gruffly addressed Angel, and Liza knew it was to hide deeper emotions. Angel was back.

Barely. But thank God, back.

She still had problems speaking. The doctors had removed the respirator two days ago. But her throat remained sore as it healed from the lengthy intrusion of the ghastly, life saving tube, and later, the tracheotomy. Her voice was terribly hoarse. Dr. Abrams had said it would take time.

Just as it would take time to see how thoroughly Angel’s back and legs would heal. Angel’s most clearly enunciated words were “I will walk again.” They were not mere declaration. They were a vow.

Liza felt the vow in her bones. She prayed with everything in her that it would be so. But in the meantime, more pressing health issues faced them in the hour by hour, day by day seemingly endless crisis. Pain was her most vicious adversary. Next to that was the numbness below her waist and learning ways to cope and compensate. So far, so good because Angel rose to each in typical daredevil mode.

The doctor’s prognosis for her future was more grim. “Don’t get your hopes too high” became a familiar mantra. But Angel’s stubbornness, her patience and grit, astounded Liza. Angel’s stoical acceptance of her limitations bolstered Liza’s own spirit. Garrison, too, benefited from Angel’s pluck and optimism. He told Liza repeatedly how their gutsy daughter had kept him going.

“You gonna let her talk to you like that, Angel?” Penny piped in, winking at Charlcy. “Unless o’ course you deserve to be called ‘brat’.”

Angel nodded, a big old lopsided grin stretching across her face. Liza watched her interact with her aunt and still couldn’t believe Angel was actually there and, miracle of miracles, recognized everyone. Her speech, though slow and halting, was not too affected, nor was her memory, except for the moment of the tragic impact. Of that, Angel had no recall, which was normal according to Dr. Abrams.

It was a miracle. Of that, Liza would never be dissuaded.

Penny stepped up to the bed. “We’re not gonna have any of that head nodding,” she scolded good-naturedly. “Come on, let’s hear it. Mute is so not you.”

“Yes,” rasped Angel, and grinned like a doofus at the chorus of cheers.

Charlcy sat sprawled in one of the hospital’s ultrafirm leather chairs. “These chairs weren’t made for wimps, brat,” she grumbled to Angel, shifting herself in an unsuccessful bid for comfort.

Angel’s eyes lifted a bit. “Wanna…change…places?” she rasped unsteadily, grinning lopsidedly.

“Smart aleck,” Charlcy muttered blandly, winking at her niece.

“Ummm.” Liza stretched bonelessly and slid her feet into comfy Cole Haan slippers. Garrison had gone to the office for a while, whistling as he exited and with a distinct jauntiness to his step that she’d missed for longer than she cared to think about. Today’s sunshine spilled into and over the room, it‘s heat causing the air conditioner to hum incessantly. But Angel wanted the curtains thrown open and Liza was determined she’d have them open.

It seemed that was everyone’s sentiment, to celebrate to the hilt Angel’s return, from the cheering squad’s pizza party last night to Charlcy slipping her Snicker bars when nobody was looking. Liza saw but would have stood before a firing squad before denying her resurrected daughter anything her heart desired. Especially food. She’d learned her lesson in the most heartbreaking way.

A nurse came in and administered Angel’s pain medication and left.

Sitting with her back to the door, Liza didn’t at first detect the footsteps. It was the narrowing of Charlcy’s eyes, fastened furiously on the door, that raised her antennae. That look on her sister’s face usually forecast ill-omened events.

“Uncle Raymond!” Angel rasped, weak eyes struggling to focus.

Liza spun around in her chair, nearly gasping in shock.

Six feet three inches of raw, craggy masculinity towered uncertainly in the doorway. He nodded at his sister-in-law, clearly uncomfortable. “Liza,” he rumbled, then cleared his throat.

“Hi, Raymond.” Liza’s voice was whispery, surprised. Warm, she hoped, because she’d truly missed this man in her life.

Then his attention swung to Angel and his stony features softened a tiny whit. “Hey, little bit. Heard you’ve been away.” His deep voice, so familiar and so resoundingly family, drew
tears to Liza’s eyes. Then abruptly, her gaze swung to gauge her sister’s reception of this Texas-proportioned cowboy who had, according to Charlcy, done a splendid, bang-up job of doing her in.

His rodeo days were long past, but as Charlcy loved parroting, “You can take the man out of the rodeo but you can’t take the rodeo out of the man.” Corny cliché that it was, it fit Raymond like Saran Wrap. A back injury had taken him from the rodeo circuit but he had, at least before he’d lost contact with family, continued to work with training horses.

Beneath the white Stetson, hawk-focused eyes, as fierce as ever, gazed gently at his niece. The strong, firm bridge of his nose sported a small fracture-bump, a souvenir of his tough rodeo years. It took nothing from the dangerous, rugged good looks that had snagged Charlcy on that long ago visit to a Texas rodeo while on vacation.

Charlcy’s exuberant, immediate phone relay to Liza had been, “Gawd, he’s the most gorgeous hunk of man I’ve ever laid eyes on. I could eat him alive! Wait till you see ‘im.”

And indeed, he’d lived up to every descriptive adjective in Charlcy’s worldly-wise repertoire.

As an afterthought, Raymond snatched off his Stetson and ran quick fingers through his auburn-cast, over-the-collar hair. Liza saw threads of silver in his sideburns, which only added to his primitive beauty. He dropped the hat on a close-by chair, terse and awkward in his movements.

Charlcy’s white face hung slack, like she’d been slammed in the midriff by a hulking, maniacal quarterback and had just been peeled from the ground. Is
she breathing?
Liza wondered, watching her skin turn a chalky gray. Charlcy licked her dry lips. A quick, furtive gesture. Her glazed eyes remained fixed on Raymond Benton’s face.

“Why?” Charlcy’s lifeless lips quivered around the word.

Raymond looked steadily at her. “Why what, Charlcy?” he drawled.

Despite Charlcy’s mounting bravado, hurt pooled heavily in her eyes. “Why did you come? What can you possibly want after – after
pulverizing
me last year, then skipping out? Huh? You could become a billionaire by giving seminars on ‘Ten Easy, Quick Steps to Ruining Lives,’ Raymond. Well, playing the martyr is so not my style. Am I supposed to fall at your feet now and thank you for coming back? Is that your script?”

“Maybe this time, it’s not all about you, Charlc.” He nodded toward Angel’s bed. “Other things figured into my coming.”

Charlcy lifted her chin in pitiful insolence and crossed her arms, clearly trying to hide how affected she was. “W-who told you about Angel?” Her voice sounded like a weak clarinet.

“Lindi.” Raymond gracelessly shifted his lanky frame and shoved big hands into loose jeans pockets as Charlcy’s gaze swept his long length, over-bright eyes lingering on the muscular chest beneath his western shirt and the uncharacteristically thin waist cinched by a silver buckled belt with turquoise inlays. Her perusal, one which struck Liza as insolence-aimed, stopped at the leather cowboy boots only to return quickly to the ultraslim midriff.

Liza noted that Raymond’s former Super John Wayne frame had diminished considerably since she’d last seen him. She knew that Charlcy had taken note as well by the shimmer of concern that bled through her narrowed gaze.

“When did you and Lindi talk?” Charlcy’s eyes narrowed even more.

“Last week.”

“Sit down, Raymond. Please,” Liza insisted, gesturing to a chair near Charlcy.

Raymond nodded politely and folded himself into the leather chair, elbows too long to sit on the armrest. They ended
up resting on his hips, large calloused fingers clasped across his lap.

“Lindi didn’t say anything to me,” Charlcy said, relentlessly returning to the tabled subject.

Raymond’s gaze lowered to the floor. “Raymond?” Charlcy’s voice slid to a strident – then tentative – note. “Something’s wrong. What is it?”

Raymond’s head snapped up. “Nothing’s wrong.” His gaze wavered, fingers grew restless.

Charlcy’s eyes narrowed to slits. “Spit it out, Raymond. If there’s one thing I can smell, it’s trouble.” She snorted. “I’ve got this built-in radar, doncha know? Course you do. Didn’t ask for it, but the forces that be decided to bestow me with this gift of sniffing out
caca
.” She rolled her eyes balefully. “
What a crock.
So what is it this time? Why are you in town?”

Liza felt herself tensing and was about to attempt to defuse the situation when Raymond spoke.

“First and foremost, I’m here to see Angel.” His hurt gaze rested on Charlcy. “I didn’t know about Angel till Lindi told me – she had my phone number all along. Why didn’t you call me, Charlcy? You know how I feel about – ”

“Call you?” Charlcy peered testily at him, as though he’d grown buffalo horns. “Case you don’t recall, you sorta dropped off the planet in the past year. Where have you been, Raymond? I’m surprised Lindi will even talk to you. You broke her heart when you failed to call her on her birthday – or for that matter, Christmas.”