by C F Dunn
“Tell me.”
The reassuring timbre to his voice became irresistible, and I found it difficult to recall what frightened me only minutes before.
“Ghosts, monsters – all grey like mist. They were there but without substance and they wouldn’t leave me alone, as if connected to me somehow.”
“Staahl?”
“I think so, but I couldn’t see his face.”
“Tell me what he said to you that night, Emma.”
He didn’t refer to the dream, and an echo of fear accompanied the memory of Staahl’s voice in the porters’ lodge.
“He said I had been sent to him – that he had been waiting for me. He said something about monsters, about how I must wish that the stories about them are true. And he said that I was alone – that God wouldn’t save me. But He did,” I whispered, “He sent you. And over this last week I keep coming back to why? Why me? Why you?”
His eyes travelled over my face, my mouth, my hair and, with an almost imperceptible shake of his head, he said, “Sometimes things happen; we don’t know why and we might never know the reason but we have to trust that they happen for a purpose. ‘For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways.’” He closed his eyes and his voice fell to little more than a breath. “But it isn’t easy; Heaven knows – it isn’t easy.”
I remembered the conversation in my tutor room as we looked at the posters depicting salvation together; I sensed then an internal struggle – I sensed it now.
“Like with your wife and the crash?” I asked tentatively.
I counted the seconds it took for him to answer. He opened his eyes but I found the look he gave me indecipherable.
“Yes, among other things – like my wife.”
There were issues here he hadn’t dealt with and I wondered at what point he would trust me enough to let me into his past to help him because, at the moment, he kept himself locked up so tight that I couldn’t see a way through. But this was something I understood all too well because I had yet to tell him about Guy. If we contemplated a future together, we both had secrets to share and, without that level of honesty, there would be no firm basis of trust. I wanted him to tell me of his own volition; I wanted him to trust me. Hesitantly, I reached out a cumbersome arm to touch the frown on his face, wanting to soothe it away as I voiced a nagging doubt.
“Matthew, I know it sounds silly, but I don’t know what to make of you and I want you to trust me enough to tell me, and I’m frightened that… well, sometimes I think that I only have to blink and you’ll be gone.”
I waited for a reaction, but it wasn’t what I expected. He brought his head close to mine, his mouth curving up in a slow smile.
“And what makes you think I could ever leave you, or let you go?”
I could hardly hear myself over the pounding in my ears.
“I… I don’t know.”
He lifted his head from the pillow and bent over me, his hand on the back of my neck so that even if I wanted to, I couldn’t pull away.
“Emma, I don’t want to lose you and I’ll do everything in my power to keep you. There is no chance I’ll leave; I’m tied to you in ways I don’t understand.”
I breathed him in, barely able to take in anything he said. His irises reflected the changing light of the fire as he leaned down slowly and kissed me, his lips brushing mine as if to taste them, continuing along my jaw, and stopping fleetingly under my ear where my pulse struggled to break free. He drew a deep breath, stopped, then kissed my earlobe and rolled onto his back and closed his eyes, perfectly still. I watched the firelight move across the plane of his face, then reached out and touched his lips with the tips of my fingers. He didn’t move and, for a moment, I thought he wasn’t breathing until his smile gave him away, and then I let my fingers trace the upward crease they made. I ran them along his unyielding cheekbones, then into his hair, soft in contrast, and I wished that more of my hand were free to feel him because it seemed that, like his mouth, his skin had a strange electricity – like a positive charge – that might have been no more than my imagination. Fascinated, I mapped out the faint marks of lines between his eyes, his skin fine-textured and supple and, as I did so, I became aware of his eyes focused on my face as if waiting for something. But I said nothing, and let my fingers find his neck, imagining they were my lips instead, and followed them down his throat, pushing aside his shirt to reveal the length of his collar-bone. I stopped suddenly and his eyes flared briefly.
I didn’t mean to react; I hadn’t meant to let it show, but the silver scar slicing at an angle across his shoulder took me by surprise. Tentatively, I put out a finger to touch it but he drew the fabric between us, drawing my exploration to a close.
“I’m sorry…” I began.
“Don’t be.” His face relaxed. “It was a long time ago; it’s… irrelevant.” He kissed me again, lightly this time. “Now, what is it you wanted to know?”
Caught off guard and unprepared, I said the first thing that came to mind.
“I want to know what matters to you most.”
“You are quite remarkable,” he murmured. “Of all the things to ask me! All right, well… my family,” he stated; “and my work, and my soul.”
I rested my head against him, listening to the steady beat of his heart.
“Tell me about your family.”
“That could take some time…” I gave him a cautioning look. “Just don’t say I didn’t warn you,” he said, relenting, and began.
“You’ve met Ellie and Harry: she’s the oldest and Harry’s the youngest of the three children, with Joel in the middle. Then there’s their father – Daniel…”
“So Daniel’s your brother?”
“Mmm. He and Jeanette have been married for almost twenty-five years now.”
“So he’s older than you?” I paused when I saw the humorous look on his face and did a rough calculation. “Oh, yes, he must be; maths is not one of my strongest subjects, you see.”
He chortled. “Evidently. Next, there’s…”
“How old is Harry?” I interrupted.
“Nineteen, and Joel is twenty-two…”
“Harry looks younger.”
“Does he? Well, then there’s…”
“And how old is Ellie?”
“Emma!”
“Sorry – I was just asking. I like to get my facts straight.”
“Ellie is twenty-three – nearly twenty-four…” He paused and raised an eyebrow. “No comment about that? No?” I shook my head mutely and he continued. “Ellie is a doctor, as you know, and Joel is in the Army. He feels the odd one out in the family – he hasn’t followed an academic route like everyone else, but he has talents he has yet to discover and refine, and when he does… anyway, he’s doing well. Harry’s trying to decide what to specialize in at the moment, so he is still at home; he helps me out at the lab in-between times, as does Ellie.”
“Isn’t she very young to be a doctor?”
It had taken me that long to work out the maths; I hoped he hadn’t seen me surreptitiously using my fingertips to count. If he had, he didn’t comment on it.
“Ellie’s completed her medical degree and is doing her residency now. She had certain advantages over her contemporaries that gave her a head-start, and she qualified young.”
I thought by what he said that he had probably helped her with her studies.
“You’re very proud of them, aren’t you?” I asked, and I could hear the introspective note in my voice even as I said it. He seemed astonished by my question.
“Yes, of course. Isn’t it the same in your family?”
My chest aching, I moved awkwardly to get more comfortable without compromising being close to him.
“I don’t know, I suppose they might be; they’ve never said.”
“I would be so proud of you, if I were them. Perhaps they’ve not been able to find the words to say it, or they have but you haven’t been able to hear them.”
> He had the uncomfortable knack of cutting through all the rubbish and getting to the heart of the matter; he meant no criticism – implied or otherwise – just a statement of fact as he saw it. It still touched a raw nerve, and I turned my head away and studied the fire while the second hand of my alarm clock ticked loudly in the silence.
“Emma…”
My throat tightened, as years of suppressed grievance ruptured my little happiness and I didn’t let him finish what he had been about to say.
“You saw how my parents are, Matthew; they mean well, but… but…”
He drew my face round with his hand so I had no choice but to look at him, and his eyes were full of understanding and tenderness.
“Yes, I saw,” he said softly.
“Oh.”
I felt sudden tears, then sniffled back a laugh, feeling very foolish.
“Would you like to meet mine?” he asked uncertainly.
“Who? Your family?”
He chuckled. “Who else?”
As he moved his arm to pull the rug around me, a glint of gold from the ring on his little finger caught my attention. Since it was next to the plain gold wedding band that served as a constant reminder of where his heart had lain not so very long ago, I had never looked at it properly before.
“What about your parents, Matthew? Won’t they mind?”
“My parents?”
A fold of the blanket fell over his hand, screening the ring from sight.
“I just thought that it might be a bit awkward if I turned up like a waif and stray or something. I was under the impression you all live together.”
I pulled his hand back into the light where I could see it more clearly, feeling a slight resistance in the muscles beneath my fingers. I didn’t let go, and he relaxed.
“We do live together in a way, but we each have our own home: Dan and Jeannie in theirs – a converted stable block, Pat and Henry opposite in the barn…”
“Are they your parents? Do they know about me?”
“Let me finish or I’ll forget what I was saying… and I have my own home. It gives us all our own space and avoids most of the internecine complications living in such close proximity usually entails. Then there’s Maggie.” He stopped to gather his thoughts. “Maggie is Henry’s daughter by his first wife – Dan’s half-sister; she lives in town. Alone. Anyway, would you like to meet them?”
Indecision must have been clear in my hesitant reply.
“It’s a big step – meeting someone’s family.”
“I met part of yours today,” he reminded me.
“That was on different terms, though,” I pointed out. I turned his hand over so that I could see the head of the ring. In the shape of a shield, it wasn’t a college ring but in the dim light as the fire burned low, I couldn’t make out what it might be; it seemed very worn. “Do you really want me to?”
“That was the idea of me asking you. Will you stay for Christmas?”
I played with his hand as I thought about his proposal and he kept quiet, perhaps hoping I would say yes. His hands – long and fine-boned – were perfect for a surgeon, but quite broad across the palm, and strong-looking. I twisted the ring around and squinted at it, using the firelight to cast shadows across the engraving, making the lines stand out in greater definition. It looked like three little blobs – perhaps stars – two either side of a line in the shape of an upside-down “V”, one inside it. Surmounting that, a lion reared on two hind legs: a coat of arms, the gold worn so thin that the band had been patched and repaired over the years. I looked up at him. He intercepted my question, holding his hand out so that he could see the ring with me.
“My father gave it to me when I reached my majority. I haven’t treated it with much respect, have I?”
I inspected it critically.
“It looks older than that – much older. It looks like an armorial ring.”
He stretched his long body, putting his arms behind his head and ruffling his hair so he missed my inquisitional gaze.
“My father always liked the past, Emma; he was always delving into family history, and I imagine he liked the thought of his son wearing something like this; it gave him a sense of belonging, perhaps.”
“Does it help you to feel as if you belong, Matthew?”
He brought his arms down slowly, his eyes suddenly veiled.
“What is it about me that makes you think that I don’t belong?”
I held his stare, aware he had tensed again.
“If truth be told, I don’t know what to think but, if I had to stake my life on it, I would say that there’s something… unfathomable about you. Whatever you tell me, I still don’t feel I really know who you are. Maybe ‘obscure’ is a better word.”
He gave a short laugh but it lacked humour. “‘Obscure’, that’s a good one! This from the woman who lives in the past and is too afraid to look at her future!”
“Matthew, that’s not fair!”
“Then tell me what you want, Emma, where you see your life going.”
I didn’t hesitate. “Oh, I know exactly what I want.”
“What’s that?”
“I want you.”
He looked stunned. It wasn’t the response I’d expected, although I hadn’t thought that far ahead – it had just sort of popped out of my mouth.
“But Emma, you don’t know me.”
I smiled encouragingly. “I thought we were fixing that.” He continued to stare at me, amazed. I puffed in frustration.
“I don’t understand, Matthew; you’ve just invited me for Christmas; what do you expect?” He leaned forwards so I could no longer see his face; I didn’t need to, the set of his shoulders said it all.
“Complications,” he said under his breath at last.
“For goodness’ sake! You’re not making sense again; don’t you want me to want you?”
Real torment lined his face, seeping through into his voice, and he could barely look at me.
“Yes – but Emma, I want you to know what it is you wish for; and you might not like what you find,” he muttered as an afterthought.
“You see what I mean? Obscure. We’re back to all those unanswered questions again, Matthew. All I can go on is what I know of you now – I can’t second-guess the unknown and, if you won’t tell me, what choice do I have? What can I do?”
He shook his head from side to side, trying to shake some sense into it.
“I’m asking too much of you…”
I had been on the crest of the roller-coaster, but now faced the steep descent on the other side and I wasn’t ready for it. I knelt next to him.
“You expect me to accept you at face value and I’m telling you that perhaps I am happy enough to do that because, quite frankly, if it’s all I can get of you, I’ll be content with that – for the moment, at least.”
His eyes flashed open, challenging. “And when you decide you want to know more?”
“Perhaps I won’t – perhaps you’re right, I’m just too scared to look any further in case what I find stops me from… from…” I glanced at him, his eyes intent on my face.
“Stops you from… what?” he prompted.
Bother, he might as well know. “From loving you.”
There, I’d said it – something I began to think I would never say. “You love me?”
Did I detect hope in his voice, or did I merely try to convince myself because it was what I wanted to hear?
“Do you really think I’d let you kiss me if I didn’t? What sort of girl do you think I am!”
“No, of course not, but…”
“Can’t you tell, Matthew? Is it so unlikely?”
Speaking slowly, carefully, he asked, “You love me even though you know I’m different?”
“Yes, ridiculous, isn’t it? It goes against everything I’ve ever believed or done, or set out to do in the States. Talk about complications – I wasn’t looking for thi…”
Without warning he reached out and ca
ught me by my waist, his mouth seeking mine with an urgency that spoke of loneliness and longing, so no element of doubt remained between us. I lifted my clumsy arms around his neck and pressed against him, all caution gone. Pain broke through my consciousness and I gasped out loud.
“Matthew – my – ribs.”
He immediately released me, his eyes wide with remorse.
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry – are you all right? Have I hurt you?”
I clamped my lips together, waiting for the pain to subside.
“I’m fine – give me a minute.”
I inhaled carefully, evenly. He raised his hands to support me, then dropped them to his side, fists bunched as if they alone were to blame, watching my face for every tell-tale sign of discomfort.
“Perhaps it’d be better if we weren’t alone together,” he said, almost to himself.
I managed to garner enough breath to force an objection.
“Don’t you dare say that, Matthew Lynes; it’s as much my fault as yours, and I won’t be broken forever.”
“Forever,” he repeated. “Forever is a very long time.” He put his arms around me again – this time hardly touching – and I leaned against him as I waited for the twinge to pass. He buried his face in my hair.
“I can’t bear to hurt you in any way; you give me hope, Emma. It might not seem like much, but I’ve lived so long without it, I can’t tell you what it feels like.”
“You don’t need to tell me,” I whispered back; “it’s mutual. You can make it up to me, if you want to.”
His voice came back muffled. “What? How?”
“Take me into the mountains soon; can we, please?”
He drew back to look at me. “Is that all you want from me?”
I nodded, smiling bashfully. “For now.”
He smiled faintly in return. “All right, it seems a safe enough scenario, all things considered. I have things to do tomorrow, so I won’t see you as much but…” he put his finger on my lips as I started to object, “we’ll go the day after, as long as you behave yourself and get plenty of rest over the next twenty-four hours. Yes?”