Thanks to all of those who waited for this. Obviously, I would have had it up sooner but . . .
Anyways, I've gotten some very intriguing critiques from some very important people so this story is going to be revised (eventually) and
republished later with some scene changes and stuff. Keep a heads up. Also, I've got a new Witchblade story that I'll try and churn out real
quick.-- so pleas keep an eye out.
Thanks to everyone who's given me a critique! You guys rock.
Chapter 10: Epilog
thank you my angel
for blessing me
with these words and for giving me
what i was hungry for
taste of dirt
from the floor of heaven
thank you my angel
for cutting off my hands
forbidding me
to trace the lines of this miracle
across the great divide
for making love a foreign language
thank you my angel
for fluttering
out my window for telling me
all those lies about myself
it was your way of bandaging the bleeding
thank you my angel
for the clutter of my life
for dragging me
to the edge of the wilderness
to lie here by myself
just outside the land of promise
Phillis put down the guitar and bit her lips, nervously. She hoped beyond hope that he liked the song. It was all she could
think to give him, and she felt like she owed him so much.
Beyond her life and a new sense of hope and self worth, he'd given her the beautiful guitar. As she was tuning it he'd
dropped a few hints that this particular guitar might just be enchanted. The story was that the guitar had been given to Blues
Legend Derelle Doggwood Cots, who claimed the devil would sing melodies in his ear. Cots was killed by an equally insane
preacher, Mervin Buntloss, who was apposed not only to Cot's music, but also the color of his skin. The legend was that
Buntloss tried to burn the guitar, but it wouldn't burn, he tried to smash the guitar, but it wouldn't break, so in the end he
filled it with rocks and threw it in the river. It wouldn't sink. It floated down stream and, as far as Gabriel could tell, was
found 50 years later in a second hand music store by one of Cot's great nephews who claimed that the distinctive grain on
the wood gave the instrument away.
"This can't be a bedeviled guitar," Phillis had said as she tuned it. He hadn't told her it was hers yet, still the sheer
excitement of holding a guitar again made her almost giddy.
"I don't know, that's just the story."
"So how much you get it for?"
"I don't remember," Gabe shrugged. He was a good businessman and he did remember, $4,000, and it was a steal at that.
"It was years ago."
"And how much you gonna sell it for?"
"Nothing."
"What?" Phillis asked, she wasn't really paying attention to their conversation, she was too busy tuning the guitar.
"It's a gift."
That got her attention, she looked up, her deep brown eyes wide with disbelief, "What?"
"You need one, he broke yours."
"No," she said, quickly, but carefully, putting the guitar down. "I can't accept this."
"You afraid the devil will start whispering in your ear?" Gabe asked coyly.
She hesitated, "I guess I feel like I owe you to much already."
Gabriel's smile slipped. He didn't want her to feel like she owed him anything. "I didn't mean for it to come off like that."
"And it didn't," she insisted. "I mean, I feel like that, but it's not your fault."
They had been sitting across from each other in his small attic room, her with the open window to her back, letting in a fresh
breeze that filled the room with the sent of budding lilacs and forced Phillis to pull her hair back in an unbound braid. She
got on her knees and crawled to where Gabe was sitting, leaning against the drawers of his desk. It had been three days
since he was attacked but his eyes hadn't quite found their focus yet and his head hurt every time he moved it. It was
tempered agony to turn his head and watch her as she slipped next to him. But the soft, warm pressure of her arm against
his made it all worth it.
"So what's next?" Gabe asked, just a little nervously.
"I don't know," she answered softly.
"You're moving to New York?"
"I guess," Phil sighed.
"The interview went well?"
"Over the phone it's hard to know. But if the courthouse is as hard up for translators as Sara says . . ."
"They'd be crazy not to take you."
She turned to him and smiled, as if to say Thank you. Her smile melted as she turned away from him and they sat quietly
contemplating.
"Where you staying?" Gabe asked after a while.
"Chase said I could stay with her until I could get a place of my own."
Gabriel nodded, "Or you could stay with me?" he suggested half-hopefully.
"I don't think that'd be a good idea," Phillis replied meekly.
"Probably not," Gabe admitted.
"What about us?" Phillis finally asked, looking at her hands.
"I don't know."
"Should there even be an us?"
"I don't think so," he said, each word ripping into his heart.
"I didn't think so either," she said sadly.
"I, ah, I'm still hopeful."
Phillis to a deep breath, "I'm just sick of boys."
"I understand that."
"And I'm messed up."
"That might be a little harsh," Gabe said. For some reason, it hurt him acutely when she pointed out her faults, especially in
such a crude way.
Phillis laughed. "Come on, Gabriel. I lived with a guy who would bust my head every time the Giants lost, and I didn't
leave. That's messed up."
Gabe nodded, that was messed up. "What I want to know," he asked, fully aware that the last time he had hedged around
this subject they had not spoken for three years, "is why you kept going back."
"Well you get to a point where it's, you know, leave and die," she said almost flippantly. Gabe was amazed by the way she
could approach the tragedy of her life as if it were normal.
"I don't mean just with Jim, he was insane, I get that."
"You got more of it than you should have."
"What I mean is, guy after guy, the same type. Why didn't you . . ." he couldn't think of a nice way to say it, so he tried to
make his voice sound as kind as possible, "wise up?"
Phillis's flippancy dissolved, but she was not angry, "You asking why not you?"
"No," Gabriel insisted, "I'm asking why you kept going for guys who you knew would hurt you but, ah, . . ." he took a deep
breath, "why not me is kinda implicit in the question."
"I," her voice faltered slightly. "I didn't think you could protect me."
"Phil," Gabe said, dumbfounded. "If you were with me you wouldn't need to be protected."
"You don't get it," she insisted. "Jim didn't protect me from himself, he protected me from everybody else."
"You're right, I don't get it."
Phillis glanced at him, and then glanced away. "When Jim was with me I didn't need to worry about anyone else. He was a
local hero, nobody messed with him."
"So nobody messed with you?" Gabriel said sadly.
"Yeah."
"Nobody but Jim."
"Gee Gabriel, tell me what you really think."
"I just don't get it."
There was a long pause.
"Did I ever tell you what happened when my mother left?"
"You said your father was so ashamed he had to move."
"Her leaving isn't why he was ashamed," Phillis said softly. "They thought he killed her."
Gabriel was shocked, he was more than shocked. He had known Jaime for over ten years, in some ways he had been more a
father to the young man than his own. His heat stop, as did his breathing, eventually he was able to take a ragged breath and
say, "What?"
"She would always just leave," Phillis said, not bothering to mask the anger in her voice. She would never, well almost
never, talk about her mother. "Ever since I could remember she'd go out on a Thursday night and come back on a Monday
morning and not say where she'd been. She always reeked of alcohol and, other stuff. And my dad would lie about it, he
thought he was his fault that she was such a whore."
"Phillis,"
"Well she was!" the young girl said defensively. "Anyway, when she left, for real, he lied about that too, as long as he could.
But after a week people started noticing. And after two weeks the police got involved. Of course, his defense was that she
always just left but nobody knew she was that kind of person because he would always lie about it. The police did a crappy
job of looking, thank God for his defense attorney who gave a damn and found her."
"So he was found innocent?"
"It didn't get to trial, the charges were dropped, but the damage was done. He couldn't find work. And, ah, Luis and I had
already been shuffled through foster homes and halfway houses or whatever."
"I'm sorry," he said because he didn't have any idea what else he could say.
"All through my childhood, my dad couldn't protect me," Phil said. "That's the moral of the story. He couldn't protect
himself."
"So you're looking for someone who can? Someone strong, someone popular?"
"Yeah."
"Phil, you're still a little girl. You gotta grow up."
She took a deep breath, "I know, I know. And, ah, I'm sorry."
"Sorry?"
"You've waited, and waited, and earned me, and now that I'm free . . ."
"Wait, no," Gabriel interrupted. "I didn't earn you. You're not a prize or a reward. I don't want you to come to me
because you feel obligated or . . . or because I finally proved I was strong enough to protect you. If you're not choosing me
because of me I'd, well, I'd rather you chose someone else."
She looked at him, bewildered, for a moment. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "That's not what I meant." She looked at the
guitar in the middle of the floor. "I have something for you."
"I don't want anything," Gabe said, shaking his head and instantly regretting it.
"Tough, you'll have to deal." she said, crawling away from him and picking up the guitar. "Because this is for you, and
nobody else."
She cleared her through and sang, clearly, "Thank you my Angel . . ."
"No Sir," Sara Pezzini said into the Bowman's telephone. She was in the kitchen and Joy, Shauna, and Mrs. Bowman were
all standing around her, chopping up vegetables for the stew that would compose the night's dinner.
"I know sir, but surely Jake could do some of it. . . . No I don't think that's necessary. . . . Well, I certainly do understand. . .
. Yes sir . . .Thursday . . . yes sir . . . I will sir. . . . No, I'm not surprised. . . . Yes sir." Sara hung up the phone angrily. She
wanted, very badly, to say 'and you can go to hell, sir,' but she curbed that impulse. She had just been yelled at by her
commanding officer, she didn't want to add her best friend's mother to the list.
"Who was that?" Joy asked with coyish curiosity.
Sara sighed, "My boss, reminding me that a weekend usually means three days or less."
"You don't have to stay here, dear," Mrs. Bowman said. "If you need to go back to the city . . ."
"No, no," Sara said. "I want to keep my eye on Gabriel, make sure he's ok."
"He does have a family," Shauna said. "Isn't that what we're for?"
"Shauna, I think I'll need more corn starch for the broth, would you mind going and picking some up," Mrs. Bowman
clipped before Sara could answer.
"Sure," Shauna said, only vaguely aware that this errand was a punishment.
"Take Joy with you," Mrs. Bowman added. "She can practice her driving."
"Alright!" Joy screeched, dropping her knife and running to the door. Shauna followed, a little less enthusiastically.
"Remember . . ."
"Corn starch, I know," Shauna said. "I'm not stupid."
The door banged shut as the two girls went off to the small town's supermarket, leaving Sara and Mrs. Bowman alone in the
kitchen. "Would you mind chopping up that celery?" Mrs. Bowman asked. "And I want to talk to you."
Sara wasn't sure what celery had to do with a frank discussion, but she took up the knife Joy had abandoned, started
chopping and asked "What about?"
"I just want you to know how much it means to me that you and Gabriel are so close."
"Oh," Sara said, unsure, exactly, what she was saying.
"He got lost, in this family." Mrs. Bowman said with surprising frankness. "Like Peter in the Brady Bunch."
"The TV show?"
"He always got lost in the family, there was nothing particularly special about him."
"There's a lot special about Gabriel."
"I know," Mrs. Bowman said, her voice was trembling, she was almost crying. "I know. Of all my children I'm the most
proud of him, well, him and Chastity. But she, she got a lot more from us than he did. Gabriel got lost in our family. Tony
was always such an athlete, he didn't know what to do with his children who weren't the same way. He gets along great
with Mike and Ralph and Joy, but he just sort of assumed. I would be able to manage the other kids. Chastity was good, she
was so easy to bring up. But then Gracie, I didn't know what to do, and I spent all my energy on her so that Gabriel had to
raise himself."
Sara got the sense that Mrs. Bowman was apologizing, Sara wasn't sure if she should, or could, grant absolution for
whatever sins of omission she might have committed. "For what it's worth," she said, "He's the best person I know." Mrs.
Bowman stopped her busy chopping and looked at Sara. Sara, on the other hand, continued her busy chopping and didn't
look at Mrs. Bowman. "He's honest, the only honest person I know. And he's kind, and generous and, ah," She took a deep
breath and looked up. "I don't think I could've gotten through this past year without him."
Mrs. Bowman was smiling, almost teary-eyed. "You have no idea how much that means to me."
"I think it's about time you told him what you told me."
She smiled and laughed softly, "You think he'd want to know? It seems sort of silly to me. Too little, too late."
"It's not too late until they're dead," Sara said with far too much bluntness. "Right now he's alive, and, here, I'd like to add.
And probably in dire need of some mothering."
Mrs. Bowman smiled. "I almost wish you two were more than you are," she said. "I would love to count you among my
daughters-in-law."
Mrs. Bowman stepped forward and embraced Sara in a hug, a warm, caring, mother's hug. Sara accepted the affection
gratefully. When she pulled away from the hug she saw Danny over Mrs. Bowman's shoulder. He was smiling at her. "I
told you you needed this."
Her only answer was a smile.
* * *
Ian Nottingham was as close as he had ever been to pure evil. As he crept, silently, through his masters office during the
darkest part of the night he could barely believe what he was doing. It felt surreal, like a dream. He had no fears of being
caught, not because of his superior skills, but because no one would ever suspect him of this heinous crime, in all likelihood,
no one would ever notice it. Betrayal was a sickening, sickening sin. The greatest sin, practiced by the worlds greatest
villains: Judas and Brutes, both in the lowest circle of hell, being consumed by Lucifer himself. And Ian was joining their
ranks.
But, for some reason, he could not conceive doing otherwise. As he opened the safe that held the legacy of James Pezzini,
Nottingham could hear the young man's words echoing in his ears. Don't you think maybe you should start giv'n people
back to her instead of taking them away? He was going to give Sara back the truth about her father, even if it killed them
all, he loved her, he owed her that much. He slipped the tape into the pocket of his long dark trench coat, turned, and
walked out of the room, a traitor in a world without a virtuous man to betray.
The (very) end