Raquel's Abel

by Leigh Barbour

  I ran back in the house. The clock said five thirty. Don’t panic, I told myself. You have plenty of time to make it to the hospital. I dumped my purse out on top of the little table in the foyer—credit cards, lipstick, tissues, but no keys. I was already out of breath, but I ran back upstairs and looked under the bed, in the pockets of all the clothes I’d worn lately.

  I ran out into the hallway and all the way to Grandmother’s wing. I was huffing and puffing when I knocked on Maria Elena’s door. “Coming…. in…,” I called, feeling guilty at waking her up so early. I poked my head in. “Sorry to wake you up, but I can’t find my keys.”

  She turned a sleepy head toward me. “Today the surgery is, right?”

  I was still trying to catch my breath. “Thanks for remembering, but I can’t find my keys anywhere.”

  She threw the covers back. “I hope no is that ghost…”

  That’s it. It was him. I took some heavy steps out into the hallway. “Mr. Abel Rollins.” I put my hands on my hips. He couldn’t do this to me. “Don’t you hide from…”

  “You rang?” He materialized in front of me in my father’s smoking jacket.

  My lips trembled in anger. “Where are my keys?”

  “Probably where you last left them.”

  “Hay, no, you talking to el ghost,” Maria Elena plastered herself up against the wall.

  I took a step toward him. His pupils had little shards of caramel in them and his lips were thick and… “You know very well that isn’t true. You took them.”

  “If I did, I did it for your own good.” His eyebrows made a seductive arch over the hollows of his eyes and his skin was tanned, like he spent just the right amount of time in the sun.

  I decided not to listen to any more. I headed back to my room. Maybe it wasn’t too late. I’d call Regina. I picked up the phone. “What’s going on? There’s no dial tone,” I hollered.

  Maria Elena had followed me to my room and was standing in the doorway shaking and holding her hands at her mouth. “You making the ghost too mad.” She looked around the room as if he’d jump out from under the bed and attack her.

  I was scared too, but I wasn’t going to be foiled. I reached into my purse again and grabbed my cell phone. I dialed Regina’s house. Damn! No one answered. I left a message, knowing it was to no avail. Then I called her cell phone. It was turned off. She was at her new boyfriend’s house. Later on, she’d brag to me, “Of course I had my cell phone off. I didn’t want to be interrupted.” Then she’d give me a knowing wink.

  “Owen,” I said out loud. “He’s probably already on his way to the hospital. He can just come and pick me up.” I dialed his cell. He didn’t answer, either. If he were already at the hospital, they would have made him turn his cell phone off.

  The last time I’d called a taxi, it had taken an hour just to get here.

  “I know!” I’d call the hospital and see if they could delay my surgery.

  Soon I had the nurse on the line and explained the situation. “I’m very sorry but the doctor has back-to-back surgeries all day. You’ll have to reschedule the surgery.”

  “No, you can’t mean that. I mean it’s only 6:30. I was supposed to be there at 6:00. The surgeon only has to…”

  From her response, I realized there was no hope. I wasn’t having the surgery today. I hung up. I had reserved this space of time—rescheduled deadlines, book signings, meetings with editors—all so I could have this time off. Now, it was blown. When would I be able to have the surgery?

  I felt demoralized, manipulated, and worst of all, not in control of my own destiny. That’s what the surgery meant to me. I was finally taking control of my life.

  Like I’d done a million times before, I made my way into the kitchen. Before I knew what I was doing, I had a quart of chocolate fudge ice cream out on the island and was sitting in a chair wolfing it down as if I were competing for the last bit of food on the planet. I hated myself this time, just like every other. Food, my nemesis, had won. Beaten by some sugar, fat, and cream.

  After I’d eaten the entire container of ice cream, I waddled back up to my room and there in the middle of the bed were the keys to my car.

  “Did you do this?” I yelled up to the ceiling. “Tell me, Mr. Abel Rollins, how could you do this to me?”

  “You are lovely as you are,” his voice breezed through the room.

  I had to admit it was good to hear somebody liked me the way I was, but he couldn’t run my life like this. “You just stay out of my affairs. This is something I want, and I’m the one who makes the decision.” I felt ridiculous talking to thin air, and I really wanted to see him again, even if I were angry enough to strangle him.

  Laughter filled the air, and my desire to see him turned to frustration. How dare he mock me.

  Chapter Four

  I sat down on my mother’s settee and heard it groan under my weight. Frustration was boiling in my gut. Usually I accomplished my goals, but now I had an apparition manipulating my life.

  But worse, could I be going crazy? Could I have conjured him up because I was scared of the bypass? I’d read a lot about this procedure. Occasionally, someone did die from having their stomach stapled. There could be an infection or a mistake on the part of the surgeon. However, being morbidly obese, I was more likely to die of a heart ailment, stroke, or diabetes than complications from surgery.

  I reached in my purse for my cell phone. I was rescheduling that surgery and would go through with it, ghost or no ghost. I just hoped he was real. Accepting something from the supernatural was preferable to losing my mind.

  “What has gotten you in such a dither?”

  Abel Rollins. I looked up to see him in his uniform again. “You. It’s all your fault.” I tried not to be moved by how gorgeous he was.

  “You are even more beautiful when you’re angry. Your cheeks flush and your eyes sparkle like fireworks.” He was wearing that WWI steel helmet he’d had on in my dream.

  I glared at him as I took in his eerily authentic uniform that made him look like he’d walked right off a Western Front battlefield. “You don’t belong here. And...and...what do you have that uniform on for?” My pulse raced. How could something that wasn’t made of flesh turn me on so much?

  “I am proud to wear this uniform.” He clicked his heels together and raised his hand in salute. “Corporal Abel Rollins reporting for duty, sir,” he barked then shifted his eyes. “Pardon me, ma’am.”

  “Mr. Rollins, you were never invited into my home.”

  “My rank was corporal.”

  “Corporal or whatever. You were never invited here.”

  “Actually, that’s not true.” He clasped his hands in back and took a few steps in one direction, his heels clicking on the stone floor, then doubled back. “I was most certainly invited to this house, by your great-grandfather, in fact.”

  I wanted to know more, but after the stunt he’d pulled, I couldn’t afford the luxury of having him around. “Listen, Mr. Rollins, this is my house, and I really must ask you to leave.” He was the reason I wasn’t on the road to slenderdom.

  “You are a beautiful woman. You are strong and voluptuous.” He made a point of raking his eyes over my entire form.

  “Well, you are the only person who feels that way. No one takes me seriously as an author because they think I’m just this pathetic fat person.” If I could just get this weight problem behind me, then I could go on with the rest of my life.

  “Poppycock! What kind of idiots are they?” His chest strained against his uniform as if he were ready to take someone on

  “It’s not just that. I’m developing health problems because of my weight. My sugar is high and my heart is getting weaker, according to my doctor.”

  He shook his head. “In my day, a woman that was round and plump was admired.”

  “Well, not today.” It felt good to have someone say things that were so nice. “I need to have that surgery.”

  “No! I forbid it.
” He jutted his chin out.

  “Forbid? This is my house and you don’t get to forbid me to do anything.”

  “That surgery is not for you.”

  “You are not going to tell me what to do. You don’t belong here, anyway.”

  He puffed his chest out. “I gave my very life for this country, and I will live where I please.”

  “Gave your life?” I stared at him. Even his arrogance was sexy. “You look very much alive to me.”

  He batted his light-colored eyelashes. “I shall visit you when you are in better spirits.”

  “Spirits are what I don’t need,” I hollered at his vanishing form.

  That afternoon I sat by the pool with Grandmother and Maria Elena, wondering if I’d seen the last of Abel Rollins. He was a pain in the neck, but such a handsome one and he really seemed to like me for who I was. I relaxed back on the lounge chair and let the May sun bathe my face.

  “Be careful, my dear, you’re going to end up looking like a common peasant girl. Isn’t she, Tatiana?”

  I doubt Maria Elena understood what Grandmother had just said, but she nodded her head and said, “Si, Señora.”

  It always seemed odd to me that Grandmother didn’t even seem forgetful or mixed up, yet she went on and on about such strange things. “Grandmother, they’ve always said that Anastasia escaped, but I’ve never heard that Tatiana got away from the soldiers.”

  “Poor mother and father.” She brought her hands to her chest. “Betrayed by those that were supposed to serve them.”

  “How did you escape, Grandmother?” I asked.

  She giggled and I saw her old eyes flit back and forth under wrinkled lids. “Well, there was a boy, the son of one of the men guarding us…”

  “Grandmother,” I said opening my mouth. “You were with a boy when…”

  She held her hand up. “I try not to think about that.” Her head bowed and she wiped at her eyes.

  “What is matter?” Maria Elena looked at Grandmother, clearly wondering why she was suddenly so melancholy.

  Grandmother turned to Maria Elena. “It’s better you don’t remember what they did to Mama and Papa and poor Maria, Olga, and Alexei.”

  How did Grandmother know all of the names of the Russian royal family? She must have read a book or seen a movie about them.

  I heard the French doors open and turned to see Regina parading down the steps to the pool area. “I thought I’d find y’all out here.” Her smile was radiant and her stride sure, unlike a few weeks ago when Carter left her.

  She came down and gave Grandmother a kiss on the cheek then came to the lounge chair next to me and made large gestures in taking off her cover-up. Underneath she wore a leopard-skin bathing suit that only covered her nipples and her triangle. “Like it?” She did a three-sixty degree turn. “Barry got it for me.”

  “It’s lovely dear,” Grandmother said. “You remind me of one of the gypsies that used to perform at court.”

  Regina scowled at Grandmother and sat down.

  “What’s new with you?” I asked Regina.

  “Did I tell you Barry’s a lawyer?”

  She probably did tell me that day, but I hadn’t listened. “What do you two have in common?”

  “Oh, tons of things. He’s newly-divorced, too.” She patted my hand. “Oh, and he wants to take me to the Caribbean when he’s finished with this case he’s working on.”

  I wondered how long this Barry would stay with my sister when he realized how shallow she is. The only hobby she had was replacing the man who had just left her. Even though she tried to hide it, these break-ups were hard on her. I knew she cried herself to sleep for nights on end. As each relationship ended disastrously, her eyes dimmed a little each time.

  “When do we get to meet him?” I asked.

  “Well, you know, he’s still going through his divorce and he’s trying to get joint custody of his two kids…” Her mouth momentarily turned down at the ends.

  “You? A stepmother?” It slipped out before I thought about how it sounded.

  “At least I know treating them both equally is a priority.”

  I knew where that came from. It was really meant for my father and not for me.

  “And you, I hope you’ve given up on that idea of getting that surgery.”

  “Absolutely not. I’m going through with it.”

  “Well, if you’re too nervous to have it, then you should listen to your inner spirit.”

  She’d probably heard that term at some new age seminar her ex-husband Carter dragged her to.

  “I’m not nervous,” I said a little too defensively.

  “It was the ghost,” Maria Elena interjected.

  “What?” Regina asked.

  “He a very smart ghost,” Maria Elena was standing up and wagging her index finger. “He taking things that belong to Señorita Raquel.” She giggled.

  “A very respectable man,” Grandmother said with her nose in the air.

  “Respectable and a ghost, that’s the kind of man I’d expect for you, Raquel.” Regina wrinkled up her cute little nose.

  “I’m calling in the morning for another appointment. I’m having that surgery.”

  “He won’t like it,” Grandmother said in a low deep voice.

  “Si, Señorita Raquel, he won’t like it,” Maria Elena chimed in.

  I wondered if I’d scared Abel Rollins away for good by the way I’d acted this afternoon. I really hoped not. Around him I felt special and appreciated, and even attractive.

  Regina frowned. “Sounds like you three have your little secrets from me, just like father used to.” She touched me with the back of her hand. “Don’t you remember that? How father used to tell you things that he wouldn’t tell me.”

  I didn’t respond. I felt guilty that Daddy had liked me more.

  Maria Elena stood up to push Grandmother up the hill to the house. “You know, Señora Regina, if Señorita Raquel have the surgery, maybe she prettier than you.”

  Regina got a look on her face as if she’d just been served a rat for dinner.

  As Maria Elena pushed the wheelchair up the hill, I heard Grandmother say, “Tatiana, you shouldn’t talk that way to my granddaughter, you know her father never gave her the love she deserved.”

  Regina sat for a few minutes playing with her newly manicured nails, trying to act like Maria Elena’s comment didn’t bother her. “Sorry to visit for such a short while, but you know, Barry wants to take me to dinner tonight.” She looked at me. “I like to eat before I go out so I don’t pig out in front of him.” She waved her long fingernails. “Toodle-oo.”

  I watched her walk up the hill. Here I was as big as a side-by-side refrigerator yet happier than my gorgeous sister. That’s because apart from the weight issue, I was very content with my life and I liked who I was.

  I turned and saw Abel sitting right where my sister had just been. I jumped and grasped my chest my heart as it pounded uncontrollably. “Don’t do that to me!”

  His eyebrows rose. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

  Feeling my heart beat so rapidly scared me.

  “I came to apologize for my terrible behavior earlier today.” He leaned over, digging his elbows into his thighs.

  I was relieved he’d come back. “I shouldn’t have reacted the way I did.” I liked sitting close to him. He had a little boy look about him that I found charming.

  “When I was a child, my mother went in for surgery.” He took his helmet off and ran his fingers around the edges. “She never came back.” He looked down.

  “Your mother?”

  “I was a just a boy and she went to the hospital and…”

  I remembered how I felt when they told me my mother had passed away. “How horrible. What happened to you then?”

  “My uncle, he wasn’t really the type to take care of a child, so he took me to an orphanage.” His eyes darted up to me then back down.

  “So, you thought I wouldn’t come back?”
>
  He didn’t respond, just kept fingering the rim of his helmet.

  “And your father?”

  “Oh, my father, he was taken by consumption a few years before my mother.”

  “I’m so very sorry.” It was sweet that he’d been worried about me. “I’m touched, I really am.”

  “I shouldn’t have put you through what I did.” He reached his hand over and placed it on top of mine.

  His skin was soft and warm and I felt excitement twitching inside me. He wasn’t a part of this world. He was an apparition. How could I feel this way about him?

  “Please accept my apology.” His eyes opened wide and he looked into mine.

  I thought I would melt. “I can forgive you, but why are you here?”

  He took a deep breath. “The two weeks I stayed in this house were the best days of my life.”

  “The best days of your life?”

  “While I was here, I was happy because I had been assured my mother would be fine. After that I was at the orphanage.” He looked out at the line of trees dividing our estate from the other next door. “My days here were blissful.”

  “When were you here?”

  “During the summer of 1909.”

  “The house was practically new then,” I said more to myself than Abel. “And Granddaddy was a little boy.”

  “Yes, we were fast friends, your grandfather and I.” His eyes became misty. “And after that came the orphanage.”

  I couldn’t have imagined what would have happened to me if my father had died also. “It must have been awful.”

  He tried to turn his frown into a smile but was unsuccessful. “I enlisted as soon as I could and went to Europe.”

  I scanned his uniform for a bullet hole. “Were you shot?”

  “No, I wasn’t that lucky. I got hit with the mustard, didn’t hurt at first, but…” His face shriveled like a prune as if he’d eaten something horribly bitter.

  I remembered reading once why the Geneva Convention outlawed mustard gas. “I’m sorry.”