Cast a Pale Shadow

chapter Nine





Trissa felt warm, and giddy, and fuzzily soft-focused, as if someone had wrapped her in clouds and carried her to heaven and she thought it must be the wine. About her, the dear angels fussed amiably, tending to her needs before she spoke them, seeing that her glass was filled a second and a third time, singing sweetly as they finished their work and drifted off, one by one, all with the same knowing smile, privy to the same secret intrigue.

It had to be the wine and not the kiss that bewitched her so, melting away her aches, and weaving its magic through her veins. If she took just one more sip, she would know for sure that was so. If she felt the smooth, cool crystal on her lips, she would know it was that memory and not the soft warmth of Nicholas that still tingled there.

Before she had tiptoed off, the angel called Augusta had extinguished all the lights except the candles she had gathered from the ends of the table to circle the space where Trissa and Nicholas now sat alone. From some other cloud, a piano sent its bright notes like falling stars sparkling around them. Her fingers trembled as they reached for the glass, setting its golden contents to shimmer and dance in the candle glow. Surely, it was this magical potion and not the kiss at all that cast this strange enchantment.

Her hand was stilled by a gentle touch and the glass was taken from her. "I think you've had enough for tonight," said the angel Nicholas.

"Oh," she sighed her disappointment. Now, without the test of the last sip, she would never know. Unless -- His crinkly smile dazzled her very nearly as much as the twinkle of the candle fire and wine. Perhaps another kiss...She closed her eyes and wished for one.

Nicholas abruptly cleared his throat and pushed his chair back. "It's time you were put to bed," he said gruffly as he took her hand and tugged her to her feet.

Her cloud dipped and whirled a bit, and he put an arm around her waist to steady her. She opened her eyes and let the spinning stop. His hair was a curly halo glinting with candlelight. "Oh, but I feel so... so... I can't explain it. It's like magic almost, isn't it?"

"No, not magic. Just the wine."

She sighed again. "Ah, well, that's what I thought. Too bad." She nestled her head against his shoulder and took a few tentative steps with him toward the backstairs. "I should say good night to all of them. They were so kind to me."

"They'll understand."

A lighthearted giggle bubbled out of her. It was as if the stairs they mounted led to some rarefied atmosphere that increased her giddiness. "Oh, right. Appearances. I forgot."

"Shh, shh, shh," he cautioned softly in her ear.

The second floor of heaven seemed to be all blue and silver with stars shining from its ceiling and the polished floors she tried not to scuffle along. But, really, the air up here seemed so high and fine that she had great difficulty walking at all. "I feel kind of wobbly," she said just as Nicholas' grip tightened around her waist and he lifted her off her feet, "Another threshold to cross?" she laughed.

"Yes," he said. "Unfortunately, it's locked, and my hands are a bit occupied at the moment."

"Do you have your keys?"

"In my pocket."

"This one?" she asked and tilted dizzily to reach in and find them.

"Careful. Edmonds will kill me if I drop you on your head."

"I won't like it much either," she giggled. "Turn." As he did so, she frowned at the numerous keys on the ring. "Do you collect them?"

"It's the long, skinny one."

"Looks like a dungeon key? Should I watch out for bats and booby traps?" It took her three tries to successfully aim the key at its target and insert it. "Abracadabra, please and thank you." She turned the knob and the door creaked open.

Nicholas flicked the light switch with his elbow. "Ah, very nice, Mr. Brewer! Neat as a pin. But you will have to discharge your French maid now that you have a wife to look after you. No more hanky-panky with the household help, I'm afraid," she teased him.

"I'm the only household help around here," he muttered grumpily and carried her to the sleeping alcove. His bed was curtained from the rest of the room and was a cozy little nest of crisp, white linens and a blue and green tartan throw. It practically reached up and swallowed her in its cuddling comfort.

"In that case," she yawned, "I may have to reconsider the hanky-panky part."

"Hmph," he grumbled. "Let me take off your shoes." He sat at the end of the bed with her feet in his lap, slipping the black suede pumps from them one by one, then gently rubbing them to warmth. She arched and flexed them contentedly under his tender ministrations. His touch stirred warm tingling all up and down her spine that pooled in the very core of her.

But Nicholas stopped abruptly, shook his head and ordered her, "Now, go to sleep."

Exhaustion and the wine overtook her, and she remembered nothing more except the snugly toastiness of the wool throw he tucked around her and the fleeting kiss, as misty and delicate as angel wings, that touched upon her lips. "Mmmmm," she murmured, nodding into the pillow, "Maybe it was the kiss all along."



*****



Nicholas waited, watching, until her breathing deepened rhythmically and he was sure she slept. He tugged the bed curtain closed just enough to shade her eyes but still allow him a clear view while he worked. He needed an activity to ease his ruffled composure and calm his agitated mind. The rigid neatness of his room gave a facade of orderliness to his inner turmoil. He had to do something to forget her innocent teasing, and the memory of holding her so close for so long. It was too soon and there'd been too much wine for both of them. And it was all his fault.

She had too little experience to know any better, but he should have known. He should have been more conscious of her injuries and the way wine might affect her after the medication she had received. Having learned too well and at too high a price how alcohol worked on him, loosening his already tenuous hold on reality, he usually avoided more than a few cordial sips. But he had let happiness lull him into thinking himself normal. He had let himself relax as if insanity didn't wait to pounce at the least sign of weakness. He had let Maurice keep the wine flowing, and he had been negligent or worse not to notice.

Lighting his desk lamp and extinguishing the overhead fixture, he set to work clearing a drawer and one side of his closet for Trissa's things. Maurice and Jack had fetched them from the foyer and deposited them in his room. They didn't take up much space.

The sweater and skirt she slept in was the best she had. All the rest seemed tired and faded, survivors of many washings, lowered hems, and minor mending. A few pairs of jeans, tees, some khaki shorts, and a couple of old, white, men's dress shirts with frayed cuffs and collars, along with her underwear and night things made up most of her wardrobe. Pitiful enough for a girl her age.

Maybe her mother had held some back as she had the coats and shoes, he thought for a moment. But no, he decided, she probably never had them. This was all of it, what shabby, little there was. He could not imagine that mother of hers spending her time and money outfitting her daughter only to have the result be additional temptation for her scurrilous husband.

Dutifully reminding himself that the purpose for this busy work was the imposing of structure on the chaos of his emotions, he forced down his rising temper and continued with his task. The clothes were soon arrayed on hangers by category or folded in neat stacks in the drawer. He left out a pair of pajamas for her and lay them with a clean towel and washcloth on the bench at the foot of the bed.

He placed her schoolbooks on his desk and her ancient, battered record player on the dresser top. The record player's electrical cord was frayed and dangled from the broken pegs where it used to coil for storage. Another compartment when opened revealed a set of corroded batteries. Nicholas removed them and tossed them in the waste can. Tomorrow, he decided, he would have to ask Roger to check out the player and replace the cord and batteries if it were worth salvaging. If anybody could save it, Roger could.

Popping open the lid, he found a small cache of old forty-fives inside, representing, he supposed, the accumulated investment of many a week's allowance. It was a rather eclectic collection, more than odd for a girl of her age in these Beatles-crazy days. He wouldn't expect her to know, much less to own, the likes of Elvis Presley, Johnny Mathis, Harry Belafonte, Rosemary Clooney, and Patsy Kline. He shuffled through them, smoothing out the yellowed paper sleeves, and arranging them in alphabetical order.

A rectangle of white obstructed the label of "Heartbreak Hotel." He reached in to push it out of the way and discovered it to be a photograph.

The snapshot was of a very young Trissa, skinny and pigtailed, an inner tube around her middle, two teeth missing in the front of her smile. Standing next to her was a good-looking man in swim trunks with a towel draped over his shoulder. Her father. Nicholas was certain of it. There was something in the way her face angled up at him as if her squint was caused by the glare of his presence and not the sun that struck them both in the face. He felt a bitter surge of resentment that her father's eyes adored only the camera. The man seemed oblivious of the child who stood so wistfully in his shadow.

Nicholas shoved the picture into his pocket, neatened the stack of records and propped them between an old shaving mug he used to hold combs, pencils, and nail files and the brass Indian head Janey had given him on his birthday.

He collected Trissa's suede pumps from her bedside, her scuffed loafers, navy leather flats, and pair of dilapidated sneakers from the grocery bag in which her mother had stuffed them all. In the circle of light from the desk lamp, he applied polish to the loafers and flats, then buffed them to a shine. With a shoe brush, he rubbed the flat spots out of the suede pumps until they almost looked new.

The shoes were soon in their place next to her sneakers and her slippers on the floor of his closet. There was a satisfying sense of permanency to see them all there in a row, and he removed his own shoes and placed them beside hers.



*****



Trissa choked back the wave of nausea that woke her and lurched upward, blinking in the dim but sudden light. She shuddered as the remnants of a dream slithered away from her, back under the rock from where it would arise to taunt her some other night. She was confused to feel the soft bed beneath her and not the hard floor of her closet cushioned with just her rumpled quilt. Not until she saw Nicholas at her bedside, his tired and injured face lined with worry, did she remember where she was. "Nicholas, I think I'm going to be sick."

Without a word he threw back her covers and helped her to her feet. They flew across the room, barely touching the floor. He held her hair back from her face as she retched miserably into the toilet. When she finished, he rinsed a cloth in cool water and gently mopped her face.

"I'm so embarrassed."

"No need to be. I shouldn't have let you drink so much. Are you all right? Should I take you back to the hospital?" His face revealed his apprehension.

That he seemed worried rather than disgusted puzzled her. A vague memory of the warning signs Dr. Edmonds had told them could signal complications from her concussion surfaced through the fog of the wine and her chagrin. "But this is just the wine, I'm sure. Don't look so worried. I'll live, I promise."

Nicholas frowned and felt her forehead with the back of his hand. "I don't want to hurt your feelings, Trissa, but from the looks of you, you've broken that promise hours ago."

She grimaced at her ghost white reflection in the mirror, the bruises standing out dark and mean against her pale skin, and knew what he meant. "Really, I'm okay. I've been drunk before. I remember what it feels like. And it's exactly like this," she admitted sheepishly.

"You drink?"

Was it judgment or doubt she saw in his eyes? "No... I mean... once. When I was ten."

"Ten?"

"I just wanted to know what it felt like. My father -- You see, I had to find out what made him do it, why he liked it so much."

"And did you?"

"No, I told you, I got sick."

His lips were a grim, straight line, his fisted hands shoved in his pockets. For a moment, she wondered if he meant to melt her with his scowl, then he blinked, shook his head and turned away from her toward the sink where he rinsed and wrung the washcloth in water so hot it reddened his hands.

"Why are you angry at me? I was only ten. I didn't know any better."

"Not you, Trissa. I'm not angry at you. I'm very tired, that's all."

Their eyes met for a second in his reflection, but this time it was she who looked away. She needed time away from him. His intensity still frightened her a bit. She needed time to think. "Maybe, if I took a nice, hot bath... Could I?"

"Of course." He left and quickly returned with a bundle of towels and her pajamas. On top of the pile was the bag of toiletries he had bought her. "Uh, this door has a lock. If you'd feel safer..."

"I trust you, Nicholas. I do," she said, as much to convince herself as him.

He shrugged and nodded, then left, pulling the door closed behind him. She stared at the lock, her fingers reaching toward it as if they had a will of their own. There were so many nights she'd locked herself safe from harm in her closet. She dropped her hand to her side and turned toward the tub.



*****



Nicholas straightened the bed covers and turned down the sheets for her, then looked around the room dismayed to see that there was nothing left to fuss or fidget with. While she slept, he'd followed the polishing of her shoes by emptying a desk drawer for her to use, dust mopping the floor, restacking his magazine rack, and preparing his coffee pot to plug in the next morning.

The slow trickle of the water in the tub told him he had a lot of time yet. The combination of the mammoth, old tub and the fitful pressure of the ancient water pipes made bathing a protracted affair. He really was very tired. He'd been awake for all but a few hours of the past twenty-four, sleeping just long enough to dream in the chair at the hospital last night and the front seat of his car this afternoon. It would be the sofa for him tonight, but the thought of its sagging springs and lumpy horsehair stuffing made the bed all the more inviting. If he could lie down for just a moment, until he heard her draining the tub, he might be able to store the memory of its comfort in his bones to make the rest of the night go easier. He stretched across the foot of the bed and promptly fell fast asleep.



*****



Trissa found a comfort of her own, luxuriating in the deep, steamy water. All her plans for thinking through her new life floated away from her like so many soap bubbles. She watched vacantly as the Ivory Soap cruised in lazy circles over the surface and remembered her silly, wine-inspired illusions of heaven.

They might not be so silly after all. It hadn't been the wine that had put the first notion of Nicholas as her guardian angel in her head. He'd snatched her from death and brought her to this new life where she did not have to lock doors to feel safe. And where she had a whole new kind of family to welcome and look out for her.

If there were mysteries about him that she still could not unravel, that was the way of angels, wasn't it? Maybe after all the years of praying and wishing, someone finally got around to answering her. She didn't really believe that was true. She shouldn't. But oh, how she wished she could. It was such a little thing to ask, one small miracle.

Eventually, the water cooled and reluctantly she climbed from the tub to dress for bed. She discovered that the pajamas Nicholas had brought her were not her own. They were her brother Lonny's. She had snatched them from his drawer and slept with them under her pillow for a month after her brother died. Then she'd tucked them away among her own things and only saw them once in a while when she put away her laundry or went searching for a scarf.

They were flannel, printed with yellow, brown, and orange Indian symbols on a white background, piped in yellow at the cuffs and down the shirt front, garish and ugly, now that she studied them, but warm and serviceable and soft against her skin. There were tiny, white buttons that fastened on the wrong side, but that was the boys' way she remembered and wondered why it would be so. There was a drawstring that she could cinch snugly around her waist, and it only took a few folds up of the pants legs to keep herself from tripping over them.

Covered from neck to ankles to beyond her fingertips, she emerged from the bathroom. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the dim light after the brightness of the bathroom. She did not see Nicholas.

"Nicholas?" she whispered. But there was no answer. She thought he must have stepped out. When she reached the bed and saw him there, sprawled across the bottom, she did not have the heart to wake him. She found a blanket on the sofa and covered him with it. He did not stir. There was plenty of room for her at the top of the bed. She was short and, used to the cramped space of her closet, she usually slept curled on her side. Softly, so she would not disturb him, she crept beneath the covers.

She sat for a moment watching him sleep and remembered a childhood prayer her grandmother had taught her. "Angel at my shoulder, Angel at my side, Angels all around me, keep me safe tonight." Her lips moved with the breath of a whisper. "Good night, my Angel Nicholas."