Interludes
by Thomas Mc
Interlude 2
Catherine sat on the sofa in front of her fireplace wrestling with her feelings of hurt, anger and frustration. Eventually she dozed off from physical and emotional exhaustion.
~ o ~
The first thing she became aware of was that she was standing among a large group of people on some kind of rooftop garden overlooking Central Park. This was immediately followed by the realization that there was a wedding in progress directly in front of her.
The bride had long dark brown hair and, though she had her back to Catherine, there was something strangely familiar about her that kept nagging at the back of her mind. The groom had blond hair nearly as long as the brides. She caught a rear quarter view of the best man's face and that too looked oddly familiar.
As she was gazing at the backs of the wedding party in front of her, she felt a strong fuzzy hand grasp hers and looked down to see Vincent's furry, clawed hand holding hers. Just as she caught the glint of an intricately carved silver band on her wedding finger, Vincent's other hand came up to caress the back of her hand and she noticed a matching silver ring on his wedding finger. He then raised her hand to his lips and kissed the back of it.
Catherine found herself gazing into that incredibly handsome leonine face as he gazed back at her. In Vincent's eyes she saw love, joy and pride in equal proportions. But the most amazing thing was that she could actually feel those emotions coming from him over the bond they shared. It had become a two way link? She could feel herself sinking into those beautiful sapphire blue eyes as Vincent's emotions washed over her. The spell was broken when he again kissed her hand then looked back toward the wedding party.
Then she glanced at the people beyond Vincent and was surprised to see, standing just the other side of Vincent, Elliot Burch with his arm around a beautiful blond woman. Elliot glanced over at Catherine and smiled. Then the pretty blond smiled at her and Catherine recognized her as a model from some of her fashion magazines.
"I Charles Chandler-Wells ..."
Catherine's head nearly snapped back around at those words to see the bride and groom were now facing each other and she could clearly see their faces. The groom was a younger version of Vincent right down to the furry clawed hands and the leonine features. The bride was very pretty and Catherine now realized it was her mother's wedding dress that had seemed so familiar about her earlier. Catherine recognized the dress because one of her most treasured possessions after her mother died was a small book of her parent's wedding pictures that she had found when she was about twelve years old. She had kept it hidden away with her other secret treasures. The best man, she now saw clearly, was a younger version of Elliot Burch. These realizations had taken only a moment to register in her mind.
"... take thee Elizabeth Maxwell to be ..."
She heard a sniffling to the right and looked over to see Joe Maxwell holding the hand of a lovely blond woman that was as tall as him. She was dabbing her eyes with a handkerchief. In Joe's eyes, she saw the reflection of the same joy, love and pride she had just seen in Vincent.
Elliot Burch and Joe Maxwell both knew about Vincent?
Then the full impact of what she was seeing hit her. She was married to Vincent ... and they had a son ... who was about to marry Joe's daughter! And Elliot's son was the best man? She felt her knees get weak as she was overcome by all these revelations hitting her at once.
Then she felt the gentle pressure of a hand on her right shoulder
"You OK mom?" She looked over her shoulder to see her own green eyes looking out of another young version of Vincent. Two sons! Then she spotted Jacob standing just beyond her other son, looking so old and grinning so big that she could barely recognize him. He had his arm linked with a nice looking older woman that had to be at least four inches shorter than Catherine herself. Next she became aware of Jenny and Nancy standing nearby and Jenny was in the arms of a tall distinguished Gentleman that was currently gazing with love at the woman encircled by his arm.
Catherine again gazed up at Vincent, her heart overflowing with both love and amazement. They had done it! Somehow, they had managed to make their happy life work out far better than she could ever have dreamed of.
As Catherine gazed around at all of the familiar and occasionally unfamiliar faces, the scene around her slowly began to fade away.
Continued
'Beauty and the Beast' and its characters are owned by Witt-Thomas Productions and Republic Pictures. No infringement on copyrights is intended. This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given.