bones_GEN

by Lila Dubois

  When she didn’t take the next step, Tristan reached for her jacket. She’d only gotten it partially refastened before their mad dash. He paused, fingers on the fabric, waiting for her to stop him. She didn’t.

  He worked the buttons, parting the material and then sliding the jacket off her shoulders. She wore a simple camisole under it, and though it had as much fabric as many women’s tank tops, she felt naked. She rarely went without sleeves anymore.

  He cupped her left arm. “Am I hurting you?”

  “No.”

  Like a knight in a fairytale, Tristan dropped to one knee and bent his head, kissing her left hand. Her breath caught and tears pricked her eyes.

  “You don’t have to do that.”

  “You suffered, and that deserves to be acknowledged.”

  He rose, then gently ran his hand from her shoulder to her wrist. The scarred tissue had little to no feeling, but she was aware of the pressure of his hand as it passed over her elbow.

  “You paid a very high price for your job.”

  “It’s not just my job. I mean, it is my job, but it’s my way of helping people. I know it sounds corny, but that’s how I feel.”

  “It is not ‘corny’. To fight and sacrifice for others is a noble thing.”

  “I don’t exactly fight, but like I said, I do believe families deserve to know that their loved one is dead, and each life deserves the recognition of a proper burial.”

  “You are a beautiful soul, Melissa Heavey.”

  “Thank you, Tristan.”

  Their gazes met, held. Melissa’s heart fluttered, and her hand, still in his, tingled. Desire she understood—it was a biological imperative and there was no doubt that Tristan was attractive. His features were almost entirely symmetrical, which from an evolutionary standpoint indicated a nearly perfect development process. His expression changed from sad and concerned to something she wasn’t sure she could name.

  “Did you know there have been multiple studies that link symmetrical features with measurable attractiveness and therefore desirability as a mating partner?”

  The words were out of Melissa’s mouth before she could stop them. She didn’t do well with intense emotions, and Tristan was like an intenseness-generator. Without planning to, she’d resorted to her default say-whatever-was-in-her-head defense tactic.

  He raised one brow. “And do I have symmetrical features?”

  “Yes, you do.”

  “Meaning you find me attractive.”

  “I said that symmetrical features are linked to attractiveness. It’s because nonsymmetrical features are indicative of growth and development problems in the zygote and embryo.”

  “The zygote? But of course. I was a very symmetrical zygote.”

  “I seem to have lost control of this conversation.”

  “And were you trying to control it? Were you trying to distract me so I wouldn’t kiss you?”

  “That’s what you were going to do?”

  He laughed, then turned the burners on. “You cannot hide from me anymore, Dr. Heavey.”

  “I wasn’t trying to, Chef Fontaine.”

  “Lies, lies, lies. Now, what do you prefer, blackberry or boysenberry?”

  “Blackberry.”

  “Go to the refrigerator and get me some. It’s that door over there.”

  “Aye, aye, Chef.”

  * * * *

  They ate in the restaurant. He took her to the best table in the house, a two-top near the window. Rather than light up the place and have someone come to investigate, he took candles off the tables around them and lit them. Between that and the lights spilling in the windows from the garden, they were more than able to see.

  They each had a plate of delicious pain perdu-style croissant topped with blackberries and chocolate. He would never put it on the menu, but it was delicious.

  “She’s pretty.” Jacques was sitting on top of the table next to theirs. Tristan nodded once to acknowledge his brother’s comment.

  “She thinks you’re crazy.”

  Tristan sighed. He was aware of that. Melissa’s face when they entered the kitchen had been a study in pity. She’d run with him when he asked, but it was clear that it was not because she’d felt or seen what he had in the garden. She’d done it because he asked her to, or maybe because she thought she should indulge his madness.

  “You need to tell her about me. About what happened to us.”

  Tristan didn’t respond. He couldn’t without tipping off Melissa that he was once again talking to his brother’s ghost.

  “This was delicious.” She was scraping the chocolate off the plate with her spoon. “I’m not being facetious when I say this may be the best thing I’ve ever eaten.”

  “Then you need to let me feed you more often. This was good, but hardly worth such praise.”

  “I don’t think you could top this.”

  “I assure you I can.”

  “Don’t get my hopes up.” Melissa placed her spoon on the plate and leaned back. She ran her hands through her hair, then twisted it into a bun at the back of her head, holding it in place with her hand. With her hair pulled back, her face was classically lovely, with perfect pink lips and round cheeks. It was only her eyes that seemed not to fit the image of a creamy English rose—they were intelligent and piercing.

  Tristan took his last bite, then he too sat back.

  “Are you going to tell me about it?” Melissa asked.

  “About what?”

  “About your brother.”

  Tristan looked at Jacques, who grinned and said, “I told you so.”

  “I do not think it’s a good idea.” Tristan picked up one of the little glass candleholders, rolling it between his palms. The light flickered and the glass was warm against his skin.

  “Why not?”

  “Because you won’t believe me.”

  “That’s…true, but I’d like to hear what you have to say.” Her tone was measured, but there was a hint of concern, of pity, in her voice that he didn’t like.

  “My brother’s death was a terrible thing, and what came after it worse. Let’s not say anything more about it.”

  “If that’s what you want.” She cocked her head to the side. “Will you tell me what happened in the garden?”

  “There’s something out there.”

  “What exactly do you think it was?”

  “I don’t know, but it was evil. It was dark.”

  “Yes, it was dark outside.”

  “That is not what I mean. I know you don’t believe, that you can’t see what we see, but that does not mean it doesn’t exist.”

  “Tristan, I’m not trying to be difficult or dismissive of your experiences. I believe that whatever’s happening is real to you. Clearly there’s something about this place that is causing these mass delusions and visions.”

  “Delusions and visions.” Tristan snorted, then took her plate and stacked it on top of his.

  “You need to tell her.” Jacques stood on the other side of the counter.

  “No. I don’t.”

  “You do. And do not be angry with her. She cannot see. She’s protected.”

  “You said that before. What does it mean? Who is protecting her?”

  Jacques shrugged.

  “Tristan? Are you talking to your brother’s…ghost?”

  “Yes.”

  “He’s here?”

  “He’s sitting on that table.”

  “And what does he look like? Opaque or transparent? Does he have identifying features or is more amorphic?”

  “He looks like my brother, but pale, and sometimes he is not solid. Right now he looks the same as you—real, warm.”

  “And is he warm?”

  “I cannot touch him.”

  “So it’s different with him than it was with Elizabeth this morning.”

  “Yes. She’s very different. Jacques, did you know she was dead?”

  “She’s not dead. Well, she’s not just dead.”
/>
  “What does that mean?”

  Jacques just shook his head.

  “What did he say?” Melissa asked, peering at the other table.

  Jacques waved at her, then blew her a kiss.

  “He said that Elizabeth isn’t just dead.”

  “And what does that mean?”

  “I don’t know.”

  They were silent, then Melissa said, “Will you tell me about him? When he was alive.”

  Tristan relaxed. “He was younger than me, but only a few years. He was, how do you say, intense. The things he did he wanted to do so well that he would not stop until he was the best at them. And yet he loved to escape. He would take off for Africa, Germany, Canada, whenever he wanted to get away.”

  “He sounds a lot like you, the intensity.”

  “I guess we were alike, but all I ever wanted to do was cook. I planned to own my own restaurant, to create my own foods that would be sold in the best shops. I was so focused that I didn’t see how Jacques was suffering.”

  “Suffering?”

  “He was sick, here.” Tristan touched his temple. “The doctors all thought different things—depressed, bipolar. In the end it didn’t matter. Jacques had everything he wanted. At least I thought so. He’d always enjoyed cycling, and in the year before his death he trained for hours every day, doing so well that he was asked to join a professional team.”

  “That’s quite an accomplishment.”

  “I thought so. When he called and said he was tired, that he hated his life, I laughed at him. He had something many people can only dream about. He’d always been dramatic. When something didn’t go his way, he acted as though the world was against him. It was the way he was. I didn’t think about it.”

  Tristan looked at Jacques, who was staring out the window.

  “I didn’t hear from him for two days. He didn’t answer the phone. Finally I went to his apartment. I was pissed. I figured he’d lost his phone or had been out partying all weekend. But I remember as I walked to his building that I started to feel sick. I didn’t know why, at the time.

  “He’d hanged himself. I knew when I opened the door that something was wrong. The smell…I cannot describe it.”

  “I know what you mean, and it is terrible.”

  “I didn’t recognize him. His face was purple, his tongue hanging out.” Tristan shook his head and looked away. He hated that memory.

  “That must have been awful.”

  “I should have listened. I should have known something was really wrong.”

  “If your brother was suffering from mental illness, there might have been nothing you could have done. He probably needed professional help.”

  “That’s what he said.”

  “What he said… Because you can still talk to him.”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you ask him why he chose suicide?”

  “I did. He will not answer. All he says is that it wasn’t my fault.”

  “It wasn’t. And there’s nothing you could have done.”

  “You should have made me listen, little brother. I would have helped you.”

  Jacques shook his head. “Sometimes life is too big.”

  “When did you start seeing his ghost?” Melissa asked.

  “A month after he died. I walked into the kitchen and he was there, sitting at my table. It was so normal that I prepared food for both of us, put the plates on the table and started to plan my day without saying anything. It was as if I’d forgotten he was dead. When I looked up from my paper, there was no one there—just a plate of food sitting in front of an empty chair.”

  “That must have been terrible.”

  “I thought I was going mad, but then it happened again. This time I realized what I was seeing wasn’t real. But it kept happening. I went to a doctor, and they gave me medication for anxiety. I still saw him. He spoke to me. He told me he was sorry, then asked me about the rugby scores.”

  “When did you decide he was real?”

  “I never decided that, I realized it. For six months I tried to pretend he wasn’t there. I saw more doctors, took more meds. I went to church, but there was no comfort there. My brother committed suicide, and his soul was damned.”

  Tristan rubbed his face, then looked at Melissa. He didn’t see the pity or concern on her face that he’d dreaded. Instead what he saw was puzzlement and sadness.

  “He spoke to me in those first months, but I never replied to him. One day I gave up and answered him. I sat there and spoke with my brother, who looked as real to me as he had when he was alive. I’d missed him. I’d missed talking to him, and hearing him laugh. We watched rugby matches, he sat in the kitchen while I cooked. The only thing he couldn’t do was taste the food I made.”

  “There are people in my life I would give anything to have a chat with one last time.”

  “After that I believed—and I went in search of more ghosts.”

  “More ghosts?”

  “If my brother was still here, I knew there had to be others. We—Jacques and I—went into the Paris catacombs.”

  Melissa’s eyes widened. “If I believed in ghosts, I don’t think I would ever go someplace like that.”

  “It was not a good idea,” Tristan admitted.

  “I told you so.” Jacques sounded smug.

  “You saw other ghosts?” Melissa was peering at him with interest.

  “I saw nothing but ghosts. It was like walking in thick fog. The tunnels are packed with them. They weren’t real-looking, like Jacques was. They were gray and white, some with faces, other with heads but no features.”

  “What did you do?”

  “The first time? I ran. It was the most frightening thing I’d ever seen. After that, I saw them everywhere.”

  “That must have been hard.”

  “It was.”

  “Tell her what you did. Tell her why you can’t go back to Paris.”

  “She already thinks I’m mad.”

  “I don’t think you mad.”

  “Perhaps you will.” Tristan picked up the plates. “Let’s go to the kitchen, we need to wash these.”

  Melissa sat on the counter as he rinsed the chocolate from their plates. Tristan kept his back to her, not wanting to see her face as he told this part of the story.

  “My brother was with me all the time, but no one else could see him. I’d forget and talk to him, as I’ve been doing now. I lost my job because of it, and then I couldn’t sleep. For months I couldn’t sleep. I was tired of having people look at me as if I were insane when I spoke to him. Jacques was right there, why didn’t everyone else see him? I decided that everything would be okay if Jacques would just come back.”

  “Come back…from the dead?”

  “Oui.”

  “That’s…”

  “That’s impossible, yes. But I thought that maybe I could do something no one else ever had.”

  “Tristan, did you actually try and reanimate his body?”

  “Jacques was cremated. I couldn’t do that.” He dried his hands, then rubbed his head. “I went to the library. I read old books looking for what I needed. After a month I had come up with it—the recipe that would bring him back.”

  “You developed a…ceremony? A spell?”

  “Both. With pieces from every culture, bits of things that made sense to me.”

  “Oh.”

  “I went in the catacombs with my ingredients. For two days I sat there and tried to bring my brother back. Jacques begged me to stop, but I thought he was just scared. I wouldn’t, couldn’t stop.”

  “What happened?”

  “The police found me. Some kids had snuck in, hoping for adventure. Instead they found me, out of my mind and chanting and screaming. I was taken to a hospital. They drugged me until I barely knew my name. I lay there, thinking it was over, and Jacques walked up and sat on my bed.”

  “You poor thing.”

  “I didn’t tell them I could still see him. The hospital doctor
s decided I was mad with grief and let me go. Too many people in Paris knew what had happened. I couldn’t get a job in a good restaurant. I ended up working at a cafe for tourists, making sandwiches and cheap crepes.”

  “And through all this you could still see Jacques?”

  “Yes. I learned not to talk to him when other people were around.”

  “Tristan, this is really intense. I know you said you saw a psychologist, but maybe there’s someone else you could see.”

  “It is not in my mind. Jacques is real. I know how it sounds. I know I seem crazy, but I am not. I don’t expect you to believe me, but that does not make it any less true.”

  There was silence, then Melissa said, “Okay. I won’t mention it again.”

  “Thank you.”

  Tristan wiped down the counters and then put everything away. It was late and he had to be up early. The intimacy that had developed between them earlier was gone, washed away by his story. Whatever was between them was buried under her unspoken yet clear belief that he was suffering from a mental illness or defect that made him think his dead brother was hanging around as a ghost.

  “I’m sorry, mon frère. It will be all right in the end.”

  “I will walk you to your room,” Tristan said, ignoring his brother’s words.

  “You don’t have to. I know the way.”

  “Fine.” He knew he should escort her, but right now he wanted to be alone.

  “I’ll see you in the morning?” she asked.

  “I will be in my kitchen, as I always am.”

  “Okay. Hopefully Sorcha will have some answers from Seamus.”

  “Yes.”

  Tristan waited for her to exit out the doors that connected to the restaurant before he bent over and rested his head on the counter. He hated that she pitied him. Hated that she would never look at him the same way again.

  And most of all he hated the niggling suspicion that she was right, and there was something terribly wrong with him.

  Chapter 8

  “You’re leaving?”

  Tristan shoved his hands into his hair as he watched Sorcha giving instructions to the staffer at the front desk. She had a bag over her shoulder and a suitcase sat by Séan’s feet.