Grave Refrain: A Love/Ghost Story

by Glover, Sarah M.

  Andrew froze. Everyone around him screamed. Simon and Christian rushed toward Neil, but the monster heaved his body to the edge of the cliff, teetering there, daring them to step forward. Claudia screamed as Neil wobbled. Simon and Christian retreated with their hands held up in surrender.

  Andrew ran to Emily. Her hair was the only thing that moved, fluttering around the edges of her face. Her hands lay twisted and lifeless in the dirt, blood under her nails, her wedding ring brilliant in the sunlight.

  Why wasn’t she moving? Why was she just lying there?

  Andrew dropped to his knees and reached out for her. She was just hurt, that was all. Forgetting his own pain, he gathered her to him and rocked her in his arms and hummed, his voice too high and too far gone to be his own. The blood seeping from his face dripped down her cheek like tears. She just wouldn’t move. Someone tell me why she won’t move. Please!

  “She will make such a pitiful ghost,” the creature said from within Neil, his body perched on the edge the cliffs. Her milky eyes were to the sky, the wind gusting through Neil’s hair and whipping his bloodied shirt. “I can feel her already.” Then her gaze lowered to the satchel at her feet.

  Nora.

  The satchel containing Nora’s ashes was at her feet. He had cast it aside when he knelt down to hold Emily. With a smile and roar of triumph, she kicked it off the side of the cliff.

  No. NO! NO! Rage bellowed its cry inside him. Andrew rose from the ground and charged. “NOOOOOO!”

  Andrew’s fist smashed into Neil’s face. Neil crumpled to his knees at the edge of the cliff with a groan, then he growled as The Lady in Red reared his body back up. He surged forward and crashed into Andrew.

  “Where are his ashes, you bastard?” the creature hissed. “Give them to me!”

  Neil swung and Andrew dodged the blow, sending the rocks at his feet plummeting down the cliff face. The Lady in Red snatched Andrew’s sweater in Neil’s hands and hauled Andrew to his feet, locking his arms behind him. The pain in Andrew’s arm should have been excruciating, yet he couldn’t feel it. He couldn’t feel anything anymore. The Lady in Red was forcing him to watch Emily. The worst imaginable sorrow and grief rose up within his soul, ready to devour him. He welcomed it. He craved death.

  Then the impossible happened. Emily’s finger’s twitched. Was it madness, had he already lost his mind? Then she moved again.

  “Emily!” he screamed.

  She sat up and somehow staggered to her knees. “Please—please stop.” Her voice was hoarse, a gash bled on her forehead; her hand rose absently to touch it, but her entire focus was on the creature.

  It yanked Andrew’s hand into its grip. “Give me his ashes, girl, or I break all these bones. Every single one! You love these hands, don’t you? Don’t you?” The monster clenched Neil’s hands around one of Andrew’s fingers and twisted it back to its breaking point. “Your lover made beautiful music, didn’t he?”

  “No! Not his hands.” Her face filled with anguish, and she reached out, pleading. “Neil, please. You can’t take his hands. You can’t take that from him…please.”

  The monster yanked his finger back with all its might. Andrew fought everything inside of him not to scream.

  Tears blinded Emily’s eyes and choked her voice. “Stop!” She pulled the tin of Nick’s ashes out from the inside of her jacket.

  Andrew felt Neil buckle behind him as though his muscles were breaking apart. The sight of Nick’s ashes seemed to have traumatized the monster. Neil’s hands shook violently as he fought for control of his body. With a howl of pain he collapsed against Andrew, drenched in sweat, his legs giving way in utter exhaustion.

  “Neil? Neil!” Andrew yelled, spinning around and clutching Neil’s limp and beaten body in his arms.

  “You can’t change fate,” The Lady in Red hissed from within Neil. “You can’t! Give him to me!” Neil dropped to the ground, struggling to breathe.

  Emily pleaded with the monster. “Just let go Mrs. Chamberlain, please. Love your son and let him be happy. Only you can give him that. Love him enough to let him go. He has to be with her. I’ve seen him, I’ve felt him. He loves her.” Her eyes found Andrew’s.

  Nick did love Nora, just as he loved Emily. Their fate was bound together, inseparable, just like those who had come before them. All of them with the same twisting and intertwining lines on their palms.

  “No! She’s gone. She doesn’t deserve him.”

  “Yes she does,” Emily whispered vehemently as she rose to her feet. “I know she does.” For that one moment she was both Nora and Emily and all the Thomases that had gone before her, all headstrong, determined, and bound for eternity to one man and one man alone. With one last fierce look she leaned back and threw the tin of Nick’s ashes over the cliff.

  Andrew stared at Emily in shock. The ghoul wailed, “Noooo!”

  “Nora!” Andrew, Nick, and the countless Chamberlains who had fought and died for these women watched as the tin fell from sight. Andrew’s chest constricted, and he felt thick and heavy, as though bound and trapped inside his own body, unable to move as poison flooded through his veins.

  Emily stared at him, confused. Andrew looked down at Neil lying on the ground, who now was convulsing and gasping for air, his eyes finally his own. Claudia had run to him, throwing her arms around him, and was hugging him to her chest.

  Every bone in Andrew’s body began to burn, and he had to fight to breathe. Out of nowhere a rage ignited his blood. The madness and unknown anger of all his years, all the fear of losing his mind, was made manifest and he could do nothing—nothing could fight it. He was in a body that was his, and yet not his. It felt so simple now, so right, the rage and bloodlust. He stepped toward Emily with only one intention—to kill.

  Emily staggered back toward the cliffs with the same horror in her eyes that every vision had shown him. But this time she steeled herself—her eyes flashed at something behind him.

  Andrew felt a pair of strong arms coil around his shoulders.

  “You can’t have him.” Neil’s fierce grip tightened. “You fucking lost your son, but you won’t take mine!” Neil spoke rapidly into Andrew’s ear. “She can’t fight much longer; she’s too damaged, too weak. You have to fight her—it’s the only way you can beat her. Try! You have to try!”

  Emily reached out and grabbed his hand. “Let go. Let us all go. It’s time to rest.”

  Sorrow so profound that Andrew could see its color drowned him. He felt himself scan the sea below; he felt his heart long for a son he had lost and a life he could never have. As the ocean blew across his face, a love he didn’t have a name for whispered to him.

  His body staggered into Emily’s arms. She held him tightly. His head fell to her shoulder as she hushed him tenderly.

  “It’s all right; everything is going to be all right,” she whispered as he felt his body surrender to the call.

  Suddenly he seized. No, boy, you can’t. I won’t let you, the creature hissed in his mind. Violence scorched every cell of his body. The force of it overtook his will and destroyed the last of his strength. He burned in hate. Rejoiced in it. Before he knew it, his hands were shaking.

  He could hear the creature inside him scream in victory; in a few seconds, it would all be over. Before anyone could react, his hands would be wrapped around Emily’s neck, her face would be drained a ghostly white as he choked the life from her body. He knew he would kill her. His eyes met hers. His hands lunged to her throat.

  “NO!” he heard himself roar. No! No! Emily’s breath came in spasms, her eyes pleading. “NO!” he screamed again and steeled his hands to his sides. He wouldn’t hurt her—he couldn’t hurt her. The demon screeched and tore at every muscle in his body. Kill!

  He could feel the shards of her ripping apart, like a frayed rag burning in flames. She fought with all her strength not to succumb, and in that split second, when she grappled with her own weakness, he saw it—lying there on an outcropping below was Emily’s
satchel. And the last part of the vision, the ending he could never see, was made clear—the piece that was missing. It was up to him and him alone now. Nick’s words rung like a bell in his head, “Seize life with your hands; it’s the only thing that will save you in the end.”

  They had broken the curse but it was not enough—the last of what remained of The Lady in Red had to be annihilated. He knew that because of the damage done to her from being within Vandin at his death, she could not take another blow and survive.

  With a final gut wrenching cry, he stumbled to the edge of the cliff.

  Emily’s screams pierced the sky.

  “ANDREW!”

  With his last ounce of strength he hurled his body over the side.

  “ANDREW!”

  He was falling, twisting, The Lady in Red screeching inside him, believing he had taken his life, her cries lashing through every corner of his mind. Such pain could not exist for her; it was too much for her to suffer. What was left of her soul could not endure another death.

  His upper body slammed against the outcropping of rocks. His arms shot out and fought to grab hold of the wet rock where the satchel lay crumpled. With his damaged arm he lunged and grabbed it. Seized it just as Nick had told him. Seized life. Seized love. But the rock was too slick, and he could not hold on. With a final scream he wrenched himself as hard as he could, and his fingers fixed around the soft material and into the ashes within. The Lady in Red shrieked with the contact, her voice fire itself; she could not bear a second more, and the last of her nature, her last ties to this earth, perished. She disintegrated into a final death.

  His heart rejoiced at the victory. Then with a sharp pain, reality crashed back into focus. From far atop the cliff he saw Emily’s face. His grip slipped to only one hand. She screamed and turned to scramble down.

  “No!” he ordered her. “No!”

  “Andrew! Hold on!”

  He struggled to pull himself up the outcropping, blood seeping down his face as he clung to the jutting rock. The salt spray of the waves soaked his back. His mouth tasted of brine and blood.

  She stared down at him imploringly, tears running down her face. He tried to imprint her face in his mind. All the times he had seen that face: in shadows and in light, at dawn and at midnight, huddling at the top of the stairs, peeking at him across an old book, studying a poem. He couldn’t hold on anymore.

  Without warning, the rocks under him cleaved from the cliff. His body plummeted down the cliff face. Dear God, please don’t let her see me! Not like this. At that one thought his life flashed before his eyes. A child at a piano writing to his muse, his mother’s hands, his father’s violin, and all those notes and all those melodies that he would never write or sing. The Lost Boys, the endless miles, the joy and elation, the frenzied life. The crowds and the screaming. Finally, a club and a face with wide eyes. Emily. In everything. His blood, his bones. His whole life. His hands reaching out so hard to find her, reaching, reaching, reaching and only holding her for the space of a breath, the lifetime of a sigh. Please God, let me find her again.

  Then death smashed into his heart.

  Death wasn’t gentle. It seized his body in its many hands as he slid down the cliff. Its force made his body quake in excruciating pain as it grabbed and pulled him by his waist, his arms, his legs. It pinned his face and shoulders against the brutally cold rock and forced the breath from his lungs as he hung in its grasp. Death was also screaming. It was screaming a lot. And death had arms, arms that hauled him up to it and into a small cave on the cliff.

  He struggled to open his eyes, every bone in his body throbbing. He could hear the distant shouting of joy from far above his head. It was the voices of heaven calling to him.

  Since when did angels smell like pot?

  “Righteous!” howled a voice in his ear. “Blessed be!” wailed another. Death’s arms had bodies which were jumping up and down and screaming again as they all wobbled and smashed back into the rocks.

  His eyes fought to focus through his bruised and swollen cheeks. The image of Dwayne grinned back at him, with Egan, Dinesh, and Buck peering down at the sea below.

  “We headed over the side when things started looking gnarly, man. Thought we might be able to help,” panted Dwayne. “Blessed Mother, you’re a lot heavier than you look! We almost lost you there once that rock gave way. Good thing you didn’t fall from any higher or we’d all be flatbread right now!”

  “Oh, fucking righteous!” Andrew took a huge gulp of air and laid his aching head against the rocks, praying fervently in thanks as he waited for his heart to stop pile-driving out of his chest.

  He craned his neck to see the top of the cliff. Emily, his gorgeous, beautiful Emily, stood there, laughing and weeping.

  “I love you!” he screamed, battling the roar from the pounding surf.

  “Andrew!” she screamed back, too overcome to say anything more.

  He waved back madly despite the firebrand of pain shooting down his arm.

  “Thank you.” He turned back to the guys. “Thank you so bloody much.”

  Dwayne patted his back. “No problem. But I’ll tell you, it helps to work with crystal balls. They build up your catching arm.” He nodded to his feet where a metal candy tin sat.

  “Oh! Fucking, fucking righteous!” Andrew cried at the sight. He looked up the cliff where the satchel still sat on the ledge above.

  Nick and Nora, together. At last.

  31

  * * *

  BETWEEN THE SWEATING, the swearing, the laughing, and the crying taking place around him, Andrew didn’t know how he was finally hoisted and hauled up the cliffs and back onto solid ground and into the waiting arms of Simon and Christian. They pulled him to safety, careful of his arm.

  His mother, equally overjoyed and appalled at his injuries, fell onto him at once. “He needs to go to a hospital,” she ordered as she hugged and kissed him.

  “You know, I’ve always wanted to play lead guitar,” Christian remarked, panting through a huge smile, though its edges quivered slightly as he inventoried all of Andrew’s various cuts and bruises.

  “Not on your life. My fingers are still moving.”

  “Thank God for that,” cried Simon, taking a stronger hold as he moved him far from the cliff edge. “Otherwise we’d have to toss you back over the side.” His eyes were red and his breath came up short. “Fuck, man. You can’t do this shit anymore. I thought we lost you. Do you have any fucking idea?”

  “Yes. Yes, I do.”

  Before Andrew could say more, a swarm of women descended on him. Zoey’s large hands flapped about his injuries like a flock of anxious ducks, Margot, her ankle still lame from the fall in the basement, hobbled around him inspecting the damage, and his mother stood guard while Neil held onto her side for support.

  Yet he fought to lean around them, this sea of loving hands and ecstatic smiles. Where was she? Where was Emily?

  She stood a few feet away, staring at him. His coat hung open on her shoulders, and he could see her chest rise and fall erratically, though her hands lay still at her sides. She took one step, then another, and then there was nothing but her arms, her mouth, her hair, and the warmth of her body in his arms. The smell of her was full of life and tears. There with the wind gusting around them, hands, all those hands joined hers, and held him steady before lowering him gently to his knees. Emily kneeled in front of him, still clutching his hands in hers while she took in his injuries.

  Before he could say a word, a cacophony of groans heralded the arrival of Egan and Dwayne, the last of the stoners to make it up the cliff. In their hands they bore the remains of Nick and Nora. Without a word, they placed the tin and the satchel in front of Emily and stepped back. Her eyes widened, and she gasped in shock once she realized their significance.

  “It wouldn’t have mattered if they hadn’t saved them,” he said, squeezing her hands. “Nick would have found her.”

  “We really must get you and Neil to a
hospital,” his mother repeated. “You need a doctor. Heaven knows what’s broken.”

  “Probably easier to tell what isn’t,” retorted Simon. “But you know, I think I like it. The boy needed to get roughed up a bit. You were way too pretty before—now you look like a true rocker.”

  “Is she gone?” Emily asked as she peered into Andrew’s face.

  He nodded.

  “Does it hurt?”

  “Only when I breathe.”

  A half-grin, half-cringe graced her face, and she softly kissed him. “I…I was…I…”

  He kissed her in return, holding back a painful grimace at what had to have been a split lip.

  But the warmth of her lips worked like a drug, and before he knew what was happening, he couldn’t stop kissing her, although the tears that coursed down his face stung like hell.

  “Andrew! We really must go. You’re still bleeding,” his mother insisted.

  “No, wait,” he said after he removed his lips from those he loved. He wiped the tears and sweat from his face with his good arm. “We have to do this, and we have to do this now.”

  He touched the tin with Nick’s ashes and took it up in his hand. “No time like the present. What do you say, old man?”

  “But Andrew, you really should get to a doctor,” Neil admonished him as his hand cupped his shoulder. Neil looked over Andrew’s beaten face and over to Emily and back again. “I’m so sorry for what I did to you—to both of you. I never wanted…I’m so sorry…”

  “There’s nothing to forgive. Truly.”

  What Andrew had wanted to say was, Thank you for fighting against her to try to save me, but he was too overcome with emotion by the look on Neil’s face.

  “He was thinking of all the money he’d lose if you died,” Margot said finally, breaking the moment. “Only the royalties kept him fighting, right Neil?”

  He chuckled warmly and smiled up into the sky in relief. “Yes. I couldn’t allow another manager get a hold of you. They’d totally muck up your licensing.”

  A siren blared and emergency lights flashed from the direction of the highway. Traffic was backed up as far as the eye could see. They had completely forgotten the wreckage they had left in their wake.