Part 3. Sorry it took so long. Enjoy. :) Happy Thanksgiving.

"Abraham, Bram, was more like a brother to me," Crane said while he tried to sit still.

"You don't have to tell me anything." She dipped her brush in a small blob of paint.

"He would've liked you, Miss Abbie. He would've been ecstatic about this."

She smirked. "Is that so?"

"It is."

"He must've been the fun one."

Crane chuckled. "More so than myself. He constantly told me to remove my head from ass and live."

"Was he right?"

"Indeed he was."

He watched her wet her brush, dry it, and select a different color.

"How did he die?"

"He was killed in a subway train accident last year."

Her brush froze on the canvas. "I'm so sorry, Ichabod."

"As am I."

She painted again. "How did it make you feel?"

"Grief is never gentle." Crane glanced in his lap.

"It's still hard on you."

He nodded, near tears. "There is no peace, Leftenant."

"There'll never be peace, Crane."

He nodded again and stayed silent. He was never this candid about how much Bram's death affected him, not even with his parents. He tried not to appear as tired or as thin in front of them. They were prone to worry, so he shaped his beard, made himself decent, got some sun, stuffed his stomach. Made himself all bravado. They saw through it but never pushed him. They talked about clouds to make him feel better.

"Were you there when he died?"

He shook his head. "I received a phone call about an hour after I got home. We had just come from our favorite pub—not quite sober, if I may add. I insisted he rest at my place. It was already late. Bram refused. He said he could manage." Crane paused. "I should've stopped him. If I had done more…"

The worst part of it all was telling Bram's parents. Their weeps stuck to him on every train he waited for. He'd hear them constantly. At one point, he even believed he saw Bram's ghost. He distracted himself with his phone to rid it all. It barely worked.

Abbie put her brush down. "I felt guilty for a while, too, after Corbin's death. I thought I should've done more, said more. Crazily enough, the old man visited me in a dream that night. He was eating apple pie. Smiling. 'You're not accountable, kid. Find some happy.' That's what he said. Then I woke up. I still battle with it, but I learned to stop blaming myself so much. No one asked for this: not Corbin, not me, not Jenny, definitely not Joe, Corbin's son. Some things are just out of my control. Death is one of them. It's not your fault, Crane."

He was appreciative of Abbie's encouragement. One day, he wouldn't feel guilt. He knew Abraham and his parents wouldn't want him to carry such a thing. He didn't know when or how he'd let it go. That didn't mean he wouldn't try to.

He wiped his eyes. "Thank you."

"It's no problem."

They got quiet, and he watched her choose another color for his portrait.

"I heard his death on the little radios we have," Abbie said. "His clipped sentence, shots, screams, his ragged breathing. I ran inside, and his body was sprawled out. I tried to keep him talking until the ambulance came, but you know…."

After about three hours, she was almost done with his portrait. She honeyed his face in navy blue and black and olive green. That's how all her portraits looked. Instead of capturing their skin complexion, she colored their faces with their emotions, with the bits of themselves they told her. The colors differed depending on what they said. Some things were happy, comfortable, lovely, calm, peaceful; others were angry, confused, destructive, sad. Mostly, it was all mixed together. That's what Abbie enjoyed most: their variedness.

Yet underneath all that bullshit and fuck overs, they left with a tiny tinge of hope, even though some of them came into her studio with it. If they didn't have any, she made sure they left with some. She went as far as to paint their faces in all bright colors, despite the horror stories they shared about their lives.

"I am sorry you had to witness such trauma."

"Yeah." She paused. "Their deaths will live with us. But it's comforting to know we saw them in a good place, right? Was Abraham happy before he died?"

"He was." He smiled slight. "Bram was drunk off hard apple cider and hummed his favorite karaoke song. He'd just opened his first restaurant in Sleepy Hollow and broke up with his girlfriend. She didn't love him like he thought she did. All she wanted from him was his money. We were celebrating."

She nodded as she finished up. "It's good to remember him like that, with bright eyes and big laughs. Corbin was happy. He had just reconnected with Joe. They started having problems when Jenny and I came into the picture. We didn't mean to cause a rift or to take any attention away from Joe. Corbin just had such a big heart, he couldn't stop helping people. Thankfully, they worked their relationship out just in time. But, yeah, Corbin was happy. He loved to protect people. He was protecting all of those held in the bank. He was protecting me that night, too."

That was the only reminder that didn't make Abbie feel so guilty. Corbin was doing what he loved; he was doing his job, even though it ended up costing him his life. It still hurt that he was gone, of course.

"That seems to be the only way to bring some type of healing, yeah?"

"Agreed." Abbie wiped her hands on a towel and stood up. "It has to dry, but here it is. Come."

He stared at her work wide-eyed and open-mouthed like he did with the canvases on her wall. It was all in wonder and amazement.

"You've captured everything. It's perfect, Abbie."

She painted him with wet and sharp blue eyes, with a little smile, and with color.

"What do these colors mean?"

"The black is for your guilt and sadness because of Bram. The blue and green are for peace, freedom, and healing. I want you to have that."

She saw him choke up again. Then he unexpectedly pulled her into a hug. This was crossing boundaries. She's never had physical contact with the people she painted, except her family. Somehow, she found she didn't mind it with him. He was grateful and wanted to show her as much. She squeezed her arms around his waist while his were on her shoulders. His head fell into her neck, with his tears and mumbled thank-yous. She got a feeling he wasn't able to completely fall apart in front of anyone, not even when he was alone. It seemed like he kept most of his grief tumbling inside.

She rubbed up and down his back. "It's okay. I've got you."