The child, holding onto the
pew in front of him, sanded his feet over the limestone floor. The hand
that latched onto his right shoulder at the conclusion of the congregation's
prayer promptly forced him back into his seat.
The throats of his polished
black calf boots had been laced too tightly where they hugged his arch.
Brand new and knotted with a precise bow at their tops, each boot exactly
mirrored its mate -- miniature examples of an expert cobbler's patience
and talent. Their fleeced-stuffed toes would eventually become less compact
as the feet they were custom-made for inched into their lengths.
Right. Left. Right and left.
They were shiny, almost patent-looking; and they weren't hand-me-downs.
The left one actually had a smudge across the toe where he'd kicked at
an uncooperative stone lodged in the church's dirt pathway, but one had
to look really hard to see it. One had to *squint* to even figure out where
such a smudge might be. It definitely wasn't a scratch, although...
It looked like a scratch
when he raised his foot high enough. Compared to the right toe... It *was*
a scratch! Deducing it was best not to keep them both together, he continued
swinging them right, then left; right, right, then left, left. With the
pew's edge rounding precisely under his knees, he didn't shimmy forward
even when his legs swung independently of one another.
Another nudge at his left
side... And he ignored that one just like he'd ignored the others. The
vise-like clamp just above his right kneecap couldn't be denied, though.
And it hurt!
He sheepishly looked up and
into the stern face of the gripping woman. Satisfied that his legs had
been stilled, she raised her cruel fingers to her face. Her silent direction,
reinforced from outside by the howl of an approaching storm, was done with
military precision: EYES FORWARD!
Following orders, he noticed
the processional's smoke still wafting above the congregation, hazing the
view of the high ornate pulpit. The Priest, his robe of finest Irish linen,
his chasuble of royal purple Chinese silk, the large crucifix around his
neck in gold -- heavy and polished to a high sheen, conducted the service
in a monotone pitch.
"... Draconis ... dirum
caput ... ducemque cum rebellibus ... fulminat ... "
A multitude of candles flickered.
Their flames, tossed about by the cathedral's criss-crossing drafts, bobbed
like the many heads attempting to stay awake during the formal Mass. He
looked to distinguish the candle his family had lighted prior to the service,
but there were too many and the distance was too far. That, and every time
he thought he could make out theirs, another bolt of far-off lightning
ignited the stain-glass windows and illuminated all their glorious color,
distracting him.
The Virgin posed in her archway,
her immobile face carved with unrelenting serenity. Under one brown-eye's
scrutiny, she appeared bored
" ... Princeps gloriosissime
... memor nostri ... ubique semper ... precare pro nobis ..."
Very bored.
"In conspectus Angeleorum
psallam tibi, Deus meus:"
"Adorabo ad templum sanctum
tuum, et confitebor nomini tuo," he responded with the congregation,
taking care with his pronunciation.
He hid his self-congratulatory
smile by looking up at the chandelier hanging nearly directly overhead.
The heavy chain that moored it to the ceiling was dark, as black as the
boughs shoring the steepled roof. There were eight, nine, ten, and some
more (because he could only count to ten) tapers mounted evenly around
its wheel shape, some of which smoked. Most of them burned cleanly, though,
the mid-vertical height protecting them from the central draft. He kept
expecting melting wax to drip onto the shoulders of the faithful but, after
checking closely, all shoulders in the vicinity continued to remain drip-free.
He leaned forward and looked
over his knees, scrubbing his chin against the nubby weave of his breeches.
That left toe was definitely scratched but it wasn't his fault. That rock
should've obeyed his will.
Two fingers attacked from
behind and, pinching his neck, painfully plucked him up straight.
"Oremus ... nostis infunde...
passionem eius et crucem... "
While "stay still!" was hoarsely
cautioned into his left ear, he raised his shoulder in protest. The brown
eyes belonging to the issuant returned forward before rolling sideways
and down, giving an appropriate warning all their own. Still, they were
filled with amusement and just a hint of jealousy.
Simultaneously, the five
and eight year-old boys blinked at each other.
He enthusiastically clutched
his older brother's arm a little tighter and turned into it. His nose rutted
the sleeve's center cable, sniffing at the pleasant mélange of wool
and adolescent perspiration.
The aroma surrounding them
-- the layers of incense, stale perfume and rank body odors -- was thick.
A briny scent waved from the pew behind and he twisted to find it almost
visibly haloing a row of dark-complected foreigners, their sea-worn faces
raised attentively. Turning from them he caught sight -- just beyond the
woman with the unforgiving clamp for a hand -- of the man seated next to
her, his handsome features pious and his lustrous dark hair tied at his
nape with a fine red ribbon.
That red ribbon was tied
into a bow identical to the one on his boots. It was a sturdy bow and didn't
give way to his best tug. He looked forward to the day he would be able
to tie such a fine lace; which reminded him, if he kicked at a rock with
his right toe, he could make his boots match again.
"Liam!"
At the name hushed into his
neck, the child giggled maniacally. It wasn't his fault! He couldn't help
it if he was so ticklish right there...
...
"Are you awake?" she asked
after his vain attempt to hunker into a blanket that wouldn't budge more
than a fraction of an inch nearer his chin.
The early morning assaulted
his senses and, in his first awareness, he inwardly cursed at the commotion
in an attempt to return to the blissful void that offered some respite
from his daily existence. The scents around him -- his own sweetly ripe
body among them -- gathered in the back of his throat and he winced. Numbness
needled the nerves along the bridge of his nose in instant cognizance that
he hadn't burrowed deeply enough to ward off his surrogate lair's crisp
temperature.
After he pretended not to
hear her she resettled, the weight of her head defined by a chin-point
depression upon the center of his chest. She sighed and clenched his torso
a little tighter in resignation.
Lifting his eyelids ever
so slightly, through the mesh of his dark lashes he judged his surroundings
and calculated the degree of light since his arrival. He hadn't been there
long and she'd probably crept in shortly thereafter, waiting for him to
fall asleep before she joined him.
The high round of his angular
cheeks slightly obstructed his study of her patience while he wondered
what could possibly go on in her mind that would cause her eyes to roll
so furiously in one direction, so humorously in the opposite. Spindly dark-brown
curls framed the heart-shaped face that was a study of moods -- brooding
then relaxed, concerned then amused.
He squinted away a gathered
pool; forced his heart to still.
And then he pounced.
Startled, she squealed. Peals
of her laughter resounded throughout the rafters as joy burbled from the
depths of her being. Thrashing wildly, she pretended to fight back, mock-beating
him about his shoulders. He mouthed his affectionate growls into her neck
until her resistance, as it had every morning since their ritual had begun,
concluded with her lips planting a sloppy kiss on the side of his head.
Her arms encircled his neck.
He spilled her onto his mat
and she carefreely rolled from his arms. Looping one of her brunette ringlets
from her cheek and onto his finger, he gazed down on her, captivated by
the upturned corners of her lips. He responded in kind when she reached
to play with his eyebrow, delighted. An enthusiastic shrug of her shoulders
accompanied an even wider smile.
The smile did little to comfort
him, however, once the penalty for the burst of activity seized him. He
dove aside in one swift movement.
Bile singed the back of his
throat and his chill body became bathed in the contradictory warmth of
his own foul perspiration. Shaking, he managed to smear off a strand of
blood-tinged saliva with the back of his hand before plummeting onto his
back, his arms spread wide in concession.
A moan clearing his chattering
teeth threatened to evoke another retching fit. When she motioned to wipe
his mouth with the edge of her apron he pushed her hand away, unable to
ignore the sallow tinge of his flesh in comparison to hers.
"You're getting worse," she
stated simply, tugging the blanket from under his hip in order to wrap
him with it. She removed her velvet-collared coat and wadded it into a
pillow to tuck under his neck.
A tiny hand swept across
his fevered brow, slender fingers untangled his unkempt hair. She pulled
his collar together in an effort to modestly cover a bruise along the length
of his throat.
"I'll pray harder. God will
help me make you better," she spoke, her conviction even more evident with
a deep horizontal crease above her eyebrows which significantly aged her
youthful features.
"I don't deserve -- " Little
fingertips playfully pinched his lips closed before continuing to explore
the curve of his face, the fringe of his hair; circling the maze of his
lobes to settle him softly. To calm him. To love --
And heal him.
She struggled with each of
his leaden arms and tucked them under the loomed throw. "Shhhhhhhhh," she
cooed. Like her voice, her brown eyes were flooded with compassion.
Fear set him ashiver. "There's
nothing you can do," he sobbed, focusing on her affection. "I've always
been doomed. The Messenger keeps calling my name."
She reared back and sat on
her heels. Incredulity sharpened her features. "*I* call your name, Liam.
I don't recall speaking such wickedness. Haven't I only spoken of pleasantries?
Of wonderous things and how we'll always be together?"
"Y-- Yes." Before boring
deeper into his skull, an unpleasant spasm pained the muscles behind his
eyes, momentarily blinding him.
"Your listening to this messenger
would turn me into a liar."
He blinked at her, made speechless
by her simple logic. The way her brows arched optimistically made him want
to believe her. He motioned to reach for her, to gather her into his chest
but "Kathy" was all he could manage to say before a violent tug of his
innards drew him fetal.
"KATHLEEN!" preceded the
creak/bang of the stable's door.
"KATHLEEN!" the young woman
yelled again.
Kathy bent over swiftly and
graced Liam's cheek with a kiss. "Rest well,
Deartháir,"
she whispered, the care in her voice nearly smothered by another shout
of her name.
She cleared a few pieces
of straw from beneath his chin, pulled the blanket above his shivering
frame and over his head. "I won't tell them you're here." Her muffled whisper
relayed her understanding of exactly how overwhelming sound was to him.
Their voices were muffled,
but understandable. Anna, the house servant, questioned the whereabouts
of Kathy's coat before continuing to scold, "... and the straw in your
hair! Kathleen! Your mother will give me a whigging with you looking like
this! You're freezing!"
"Da said the colt's on its
way."
"Colt? Kathleen! I've heard
him tell you no less than a dozen times that the colt will be here when
it's born and not a moment sooner than nature's intentions. You staring
at the mare will only make her nervous."
A few chickens clucked at
the stable entrance. The mare whinnied once and the hens to squawked in
rebuttal before returning outside.
"You've seen your brother?"
was started in the mare's direction, completed in the opposite.
"I've been keeping company
with Laoi."
Anna's silence reproached
Kathy's cryptic reply. "Well, if you do -- " the young woman's voice, directed
towards the stable's loft, grew louder, "the Missus is receiving the Sister
this afternoon and it's best if he waits until the visit is done before
he strays back into the house."
To the silence that accompanied
her suggestion, she lowered her voice. "You'll let Master Liam know?"
"If I see him," Kathy replied.
The stable door creaked closed,
but remained unlatched. Liam concentrated on the lone spot of warmth that
Kathy's lips had graced him with as he slipped back into the welcoming
embrace of unconsciousness...
July, 2000
Angel detected a slight shift
of direction and a fluctuation in cabin pressure before hearing the landing
gear hydraulics engage. He woke abruptly, disoriented. Even dreaming, he'd
been acutely aware of the flight's trajectory -- his instinctive sonar
had been following the slipstream of life echoing up from below.
From back on earth.
Where he belonged. Not up in the heavens.
The stewardess quickly retracted
her hand from the pillow she had attempted to readjust behind the passenger's
head.
"He's not good with flying,"
Cordelia explained to the woman's startled expression.
An uneasy smile was the only
response to Cordy's comment. The attendant glanced from the young woman
in the window seat to the slender man sitting beside her, then back to
the crabby passenger whose pillow had threatened to plop into the aisle.
"Don't make excuses for me,"
Angel sniped at Cordelia while whipping his shoulder inward.
"We're beginning our descent,"
the thirty-something female stated. After motioning that the center tray
table be stowed, she took one last sight-check of the trio of laps before
moving to the next row of seats.
"You know, Angel," Cordelia
began through gritted teeth, "you didn't have to bite my head off. If Wesley
hadn't stopped you, you probably would have broken the poor woman's arm."
With the Airline Magazine's
crossword puzzle complete, Wesley thumbed the head of his ball-point pen
with a click and returned it to his shirt pocket. He shifted his knees
to stuff the magazine into the pouch in front of him and turned his attention
to his associate.
"Now, Cordelia, I think you
may be exaggerating a bit. Angel --"
"Stop it!" Angel barked.
The former Watcher immediately
fell silent and listened to an androgynous voice drone on about each passenger's
responsibility during preparation for landing. Concerned, Wesley raised
the armrest beside Angel, took the bit of fiber-fluff from the vampire's
hands before it could be completely mangled and rearranged it on the cap
of his shoulder.
Angel stared at the reassuring
hand on his wrist. Looking up, he focused past a somber Cordelia who had
taken to staring out the tiny porthole she sat next to. Pitch black,>>
Angel thought to himself. Recollecting the sensation of the sticky substance
on the back of his tongue, he suddenly craved a cigarette.
The last time Angel had taken
a regional flight, he'd been able to smoke on board.
He slumped further into his
seat and tucked his legs from out of the busy aisle while another attendant
searched for unbuckled offenders. Taking the slight tug Wesley gave his
sleeve as an invitation to rest his head, Angel settled his temple against
the sorry excuse for a pillow that barely padded Wesley's bony shoulder.
He forced himself to relax.
It wasn't that Angel minded traveling; it was just a much better experience
when his mind wasn't on a separate trip.
-0-
evancomo@netscape.net
