The Trilogy of the Void: The Complete Boxed Set

by Peter Meredith

  He had talked to Father Wheal, a priest from a neighboring parish who'd been kind enough to sit in with Father Alba. Jim told Talitha what he'd been told, "He's going to live, but there's no chance for the eyes, and there will be lot's of scarring."

  "It's what I expected," she replied without emotion, but that facade crumbled quickly, and her face broke, close to tears. "What are we going to do?"

  He took a peek at her before answering, but it turned from a peek into a stare. He couldn't help it. In truth he didn't know if he could help it or not; he didn't try, he just stared.

  Her features seemed at once delicate but strong, the two near opposites meshing to form a noble beauty. But sometimes her features would swing over to the extremes, one moment she might be delicate and sweet; childlike and in need of protection. And the next, the opposite, regal to the point of queenly, haughty, superior and sometimes dangerous.

  She was beautiful, but in a way that was unlike any other woman he'd ever known. And he stared. He stared until she turned her large brown doe eyes up to him and then he looked away quickly, pretending to admire the dismal rain covered city.

  "What are we going to do? I was going to ask you the same question," he said. It was the truth at least.

  "For once, I'm all out of answers."

  "Why do I doubt that?" he replied and they matched smile for smile. "Tell me, what would the other Talitha do if she were here?"

  She slumped. "Kill someone, I guess."

  "No really...well apart from that I mean." There had been too much truth in her statement to try to gloss over it.

  The girl sighed again, hugely. "She'd go to his apartment, search it, terrorize his neighbors, torture his friends, and kill their dogs. She's very thorough you know." Putting her back to the window, she worked her left arm back and forth with little twinges of pain showing on her face.

  "Getting better?" he asked.

  "Yes, unfortunately yes." She looked down at her arm and glared at it for a second. "Have I been fed or watered lately? Did the other Talitha eat anything?"

  "Are you hungry? I can make you something," he swallowed hard, wishing he hadn't just said that. His cooking skills were notoriously poor, outside of reheating frozen goods.

  "I don't actually get hungry, but I still need to eat. However, I don't like the idea of eating food from an orphanage." She smiled her shy smile, one of his favorites. "It feels too much like stealing."

  "Are you picturing all our boys in grubby clothes, eating small bowls of porridge, three meals a day?" he asked.

  She laughed heartily. "Yes! I've never been to an orphanage; my only frame of reference is Dickens and Little Orphan Annie."

  "You're not the only one. Every time we buy oatmeal at the grocery store, we get dirty looks."

  This caused her to laugh again, the second time in just a few moments, it made him feel good inside to make her happy, even for a little bit.

  "You know what I'm in the mood for?" she asked with a big sigh. "Ever since I heard I was getting to come with you guys to the city, I've craved pizza."

  Jim's stomach rumbled loudly at the thought, but before he could be embarrassed, she reached out and patted his slightly bulging midsection.

  "Excuse me, sorry," he said faking embarrassment; he was secretly thrilled by the way she had casually touched him. It wasn't that it was sexual in any way, because it wasn't. It was just that she wasn't repulsed by him, which may seem like a simple thing, but to Jim it was huge. "I always crave pizza. There's a very good neighborhood place that delivers, do you want some?"

  Her eyes lit up. "Yes please!" They were a match made in heaven or so he thought.

  "Onions, mushrooms, green pepper, sausage, pepperoni, and black olives...oh and spinach if they have any," she said.

  So much for the perfect match, his would be strictly meat. "Do you want beer? You can't have pizza without beer."

  She suddenly looked back into the rain. "I'm sorry, but I'm not as hungry as I thought. But you can get some for yourself and Will."

  Leave it to him to screw up a good thing. "Talitha...I don't need any beer. I'm not an alcoholic or anything."

  This brought out a long weary breath from her. "It's not that...I'm just being stupid."

  "I honestly don't think that's possible," he said, feeling like he'd somehow walked off the edge of a lovely green lawn only to find himself knee deep in a swamp and now he feared to move in any direction.

  He put his hands on her shoulders and gently turned her around. She looked up at him with her most delicate of looks, as if she were as insubstantial as a snowflake that would melt if he were to turn angry.

  "I'm sorry. Whatever I did to spoil your mood, I'm sorry." He gave her his friendliest smile even though it was gap toothed and turned his ugly face into a mess of long laugh-lines; it was all he had to work with.

  His stomach didn't help the situation. Having heard the word pizza so many times, it was getting impatient and rumbled a loud demand for it.

  It brought her around. "Sounds like it's two against one, I guess we're having pizza." He was about to ask if she was sure, but she beat him to it, "Yes, I'm sure. Now go call before I change my mind."

  "I'll be right back," he was gone in a jiffy, squeezing his broad shoulders sideways down the narrow stairs of the steeple, heading for the second floor of the management building. There were closer phones in the offices, but just the sight of the office doors nearly killed his hunger and he proceeded to the common room instead.

  Walking in, he was quite surprised at the scene. A man Jim had seen, but had never been introduced to, was sewing up the big flap of skin hanging from the top of Will's forehead. This had gone ignored all afternoon.

  Jim guessed the man to be a doctor by the precise weaving pattern his hands created as he sutured up the large cut. The needle was curved and tiny, and the thread was not the usual thick black string, but an almost invisible filament.

  He leaned in close and saw that Will had already been stitched up in two other areas and the handiwork was impressive. "I'm going to use the phone, if that's ok?" he asked the doctor.

  "Sure thing Jim, just don't knock the table," the doctor said, and Jim gave him a closer look at the sound of his own name, but still he was sure they hadn't met.

  "I'm getting some pizza, do you two want any?" The doctor didn't look up from his work, but grunted out a no.

  "I would. Pepperoni if you don't mind and if Talitha is getting any, get her a whole pie, or she'll eat most of yours. When she gets going, she can be pig," Will said from beneath the dexterous fingers of the doctor.

  Jim ordered three pizzas, one for each of them and they arrived shortly after the doctor had finished taping Will's fingers together. A buddy splint, he called it.

  They ate in the steeple, something Jim had never done before, but the rest of the church haunted him with memories. At first they were quiet as they ate, concentrating on the food, but the conversation picked up, at least for Jim and Talitha. Will was sullen and barely said anything.

  When Jim finished eating, leaving nothing for the squirrels, he checked the time, which set off a small chain reaction. First Will then Talitha checked their watches as well, 6:11 pm.

  "More milk?" Jim offered Talitha after she chugged the last of hers. He couldn't help smiling at the faint milk moustache she wore afterwards, it was endearing. She didn't seem to think so and wiped it away on the back of the sleeve of her borrowed habit.

  "No thank you," she said a touch coolly, as if he had only offered her the milk so she could sport a new moustache. "Any idea when he'll call?" she asked adjusting for the hundredth time, the overly large black dress that she wore.

  "No, in fact he might not call at all. He's still a little mad at you," Will said around a bite of pizza. He was eating very slowly on account of his swollen lips and missing molar on the lower left side of his mouth. With the blood cleaned away from his face, the newly sutured lacerations didn't look so bad, however the bruising and swe
lling was terrible. Especially obvious was the freshly set broken nose and the two black eyes.

  For the moment, Jim was the better looking of the two men. He checked his watch again, 6:12, and felt an undercurrent of the awareness of time, which had started innocently enough when he had been waiting on his pizza. For him, time always seemed to flow in slow motion when a pizza was supposedly on the way, however the feeling remained even when the food arrived. It wasn't nearly as obvious, but when he wasn't actively talking or thinking, he felt anxious about the time.

  Right now, they were waiting on a call from Eric Milner, hoping to get the address and key to Luke's apartment. There were a couple of other things they needed the cop's help with as well, the bodies of Sister Mary Agatha and Father John had to be explained and buried. There was also the issue of the body on the mattress in the charnel pit of a room beneath the church and the thing in the box, which no one but the other Talitha had even seen yet.

  "He'll call," Jim said with confidence. "He'll make us sweat it out first, but he'll do it." Milner would do it for Sister Mary, not for Jim. She'd been a mother to Milner, something Jim had been endlessly jealous of as a kid.

  Will frowned at the statement and then touched his face gently as if the small movement had been painful. "I don't think I can sit around waiting, I'm going to call him again."

  This he did, leaving Jim and Talitha staring at each other, waiting for the sound of his footsteps to recede. While he was in their presence it felt like they were being chaperoned and they both struggled to keep from smiling or laughing.

  Finally, the sound of a door far off at the end of the chapel could be heard and Jim said, "He's a little too nervous. Do you think he's had another vision?"

  She turned slightly in the direction of the window and Jim was able to see her profile perfectly. "I don't know. Sometimes he hangs onto an old vision, worrying over it until it happens and then...what are you staring at?" she asked touching her face self-consciously.

  He'd been staring at her small nose. He generally found the human nose, like the penis, funny looking and oddly designed by God, but her nose was perfect, small and slim, exactly proportioned to accent her high cheekbones and to set off her large brown eyes.

  She had a beautiful nose. His resembled a medium sized potato.

  "Oh...nothing," he turned away putting his hand over his face, hiding the potato. He hadn't realized he'd been staring or more accurately, he knew he was staring, but hadn't realized that he wasn't being discreet about it.

  He couldn't help stare at her, she was an addiction. A happy one that he lost himself in voluntarily, or so he figured, self-reflection wasn't his strong suit. He just knew that his emotions were askew. The sadness and grief that he should've been feeling were wispy and weak, ghost like—they were there within his heart, but they lacked urgency. Anger too should've been burning him up inside and when he thought on it, he could feel the fire of it grow, but it would puff out of existence when he looked on Talitha.

  These emotions, the ones he thought of as correct for the situation; sadness, anger, hatred, grief, were eclipsed or blotted out altogether by his one fiction.

  He loved her.

  It was stupid. Very stupid and normally he would've laughed it off and done his best to keep away from her, not wanting to bother her with his oafish presence. He knew that he wasn't in her league in any way. Not just in looks, but intelligence and personality, accomplishments and potential. He was a huge nothing and knew he would remain so, while she had everything and would only become more.

  However, this wasn't a normal situation and Jim knew it was the nagging feeling of running out of time that had him embellishing his fiction instead of ignoring it. He knew consciously that what he felt for her was likely only puppy love or a crush; it wasn't real. Yet, the affect she had on him was very real.

  At the sight of her, his chest would swell from within and every time she touched him with her long thin fingers, he'd feel them warm and soft, even after she removed her hand, as if his skin was trying to keep the memory of her touch for itself.

  His eyes were always on her, wandering over her flesh, drinking it in, feeling the exquisite smoothness of her, but not in sexual way, no, his eyes were on her like an artist's. An artist who has seen a beauty so dazzling that it was beyond his ability to capture. An artist afraid to make even the first stroke of his brush, knowing even that little thing would never compare.

  And what would an artist do in such a situation but stare longingly in vain, wishing his talent was equal to her magnificence.

  That was Jim Anderson.

  He would feed his crush with her loveliness, but like the artist, would never make the first stroke, knowing with doomed certainty that it would go awry and end his fantasy.

  Still if he were to draw her, it would be her neck that he'd begin with. Presently she had her head tilted to the side and he took in her long slender neck as it rose to greet her jaw, the line of which was strong and could only be described as aristocratic.

  Her eyes flicked to him, purposely to catch him staring and he turned quick to look out of the window.

  "It's ok. You are allowed to look at me," she grinned as she said it.

  His cheeks suddenly felt hot and red. "Sorry...I didn't mean to stare. It's just you have a nice smile is all."

  "Really? How about now?" She made a face at him, pulling back the corners of her mouth, sticking out her tongue and crossing her eyes. It was wonderfully carefree and childlike, the sweetness of it made him love her even more.

  "I like that smile most of all." And he did too. Her silly smile had been for him alone and in his lonely and loveless world, it was unique.

  "If you liked that then you are beyond my help." She remained smiling at him, her normal pretty smile, white teeth against her tan. "It feels weird to smile...with everything going on."

  "I know. I feel the same way. It's strange, like I'm being wrong somehow," he responded.

  "For me, I know part of it is the fact that Father Alba forgave me. He really meant it, at least for now. But I still feel lighter inside," she nodded happily at the memory, while Jim felt his own smile slip. The priest's face with its gaping holes was a sight that would haunt him for a long time.

  "What do you mean for now? He's forgiven you, that can't change."

  Her smile remained, but became edgy with bitterness. "He was in a state of shock. Wait until he's walking into walls. Or wait until he's trapped in his apartment, afraid to go out without someone there to guide him. Or wait until his depression boarders on suicide; he'll be cursing my name for certain."

  "Oh," Jim's face dropped as he imagined a blind Father Alba sitting in a dark apartment, alone. He wouldn't let that happen. "I'll take care of him, Talitha. I'll make sure that he's not alone."

  "I know you will. You're a good man," she said patting his arm. The feel of her hand caused a little shiver of excitement that he squelched, but only with difficulty.

  "Uh, what about you? What do you plan on doing when this is all over with?" His question was lame, but her hand had felt hot on his skin and it was taking up a large part of his mind and not a little of his body as well.

  Her incredulous look dismayed him however. "Me? I guess go back my cabin." She said this nonchalantly, but untruthfully.

  Jim was screwing up his fantasy. The last thing he wanted to do was to make her sad. "Whatever you do don't become a poker player. You're a terrible liar, maybe the worst I've ever seen. If you ever went to Vegas, you'd lose everything and be broke in a week."

  Her smile came back, an honest one. "Sorry I lied. I was just enjoying our conversation and I didn't want to ruin it."

  Concern and fear for her safety exploded in his heart. "Do you know something? Did Will tell you something?"

  "No, but he is a bad liar as well. I can see it in his eyes and hear it in his voice...he thinks one of us will die." She said this quietly but a second later, incongruously, Talitha stuck a huge toothy smile on her fac
e. "That's why I'm going to be extra peppy! If I have only a little longer left, I want to be happy. Happiness is not allowed where I'm going, so I better get all I can, while I'm here. What about you? Will you join me in celebrating our impending doom?"

  She held out her hand, and he was slow to take it. The idea that his death could be hours away, occupied a potion of his mind, but Talitha still held sway over the majority of it and he reached out his great paw and swallowed her tiny one in his.

  Her touch was like magic and his fears and worries vanished. He held her hand for over a minute without looking at her. He wanted to remember this touch for always, but finally he looked up and said, "I will, for better or worse."

  Chapter 20

  Will Doesn't Like E.T.

  Luke's apartment turned out to be a complete bust.

  Eric Milner had called just before seven, giving Will the address to the place, which turned out to be only a few minutes away by car. Jim didn't own a car, something he was embarrassed to admit and they were forced to use Father Alba's, which still bore the stains of his blood.

  Talitha refused to get in until Jim cleaned up as much of the mess as he could and even then, her new peppy smile, bogus and strained, clashed with the misery in her eyes. It made for a quiet ride and even the rain, falling in little more than a light mist felt subdued. But thankfully the place was close and Jim was quick to hop out and open the door for Talitha, something that earned him a genuine smile.

  He smiled back at her and then at her brother, but Will only scowled at the ground making his way to the door. They found the key where Milner said it would be, under the mat and as Will fumbled with it, Jim caught a nasty smell coming from the apartment.

  "What is it with this guy and stinkiness?" He was putting on a show of cheeriness and Talitha after a little sigh, added to it.

  "I know. You would think he just got elected mayor of stinktown."