Chapter 29
Early the next morning, Brook woke to the sound of Lance coming through the front door, his clothes lightly sprinkled with snow and his cheeks ruddy. He placed more firewood in the box before slipping out of his coat.
On the bedside table sat a tiny metal tree. Its branches caught the lantern light and twinkled appealingly. Brook stared, momentarily mesmerized. “What is this?”
Lance glanced over. “Well, good morning. I thought you might like something to look at while you recuperate.”
“Where did you get it?”
“I made it,” Lance said, turning away shyly.
“Made it?” Brook reached out and picked up the tree. The trunk was made of brass machine nuts, slightly offset from one another and getting smaller as they got higher, giving it a gnarly appearance. Twisted wire branches rose from the center, some spreading out wide and some closer to the trunk. Scattered along the branches were small watch parts, tiny gears and wheels adding interest to the wire. At the end of each branch was a tiny sprocket from which dangled fine filament gold chains. The base of the tree had twisted wire roots for support. The piece was meticulously assembled and a mere seven inches tall. Brook couldn’t see how all the parts were held together but she was thrilled with the outcome. “It’s a weeping willow.” She ran her hand under the strands of chain, letting them slide over her fingers in a soft cascade. “This is beautiful. How did you think to make something like this?”
“I didn’t think it up. Someone else did. It’s steampunk.”
“Steam what?”
“Steampunk.” Lance said. “It’s kind of a hard craft to explain but it’s extremely popular. You’ll have to look it up on the internet when you get back home. You’d be amazed what people are making. I actually make sculptures and jewelry to sell. I remembered this piece and brought it in for you. It’s yours. To keep, if you want it.”
“Want it? Oh my, yes I want it. I love it.” Tears trickled down her cheeks.
I have two things I can call my own now
. She made a quick check and found her purse was safe. Relieved, she sat up, and wiped away the tears before he could see them and mistake them for tears of sorrow.
Clearing her throat, she asked, “Could I have something to drink?”
He brought her a cup of cold water. She emptied it and handed it back to him. Setting the cup on the table he came back to her bedside.
“Let’s get you to the bathroom and then I’ll cook breakfast. Could you eat a little something?” He gave her a smile. She was still shaking off a night of bad dreams and found it difficult to respond. She nodded and raised her arms to him. As he lifted her, she groaned slightly and he looked at her with alarm.
“It’s just my feet again,” she told him. “They’re pretty sore this morning.”
He deposited her carefully in the bathroom. “I’ll get a pan of water ready and you can soak them while I’m cooking.”
Once the door closed, she collapsed onto the toilet, raised her feet from the floor, and caught her breath as pins and needles prickled her soles. After a moment, she put her feet back on the floor and stood to pull down her pants. When she was finished with the toilet and had washed her hands, and brushed her teeth and hair, she called for Lance.
He sat her at the table. “Take off your bandages and put your feet in the water.” He indicated the pan on the floor under the table. “It’s got Epsom Salts in it.
She stripped her feet bare and lowered her them into the warm water. She closed her eyes and sighed with pleasure at the sensation.
“Check that out,” he pointed toward the window. The shutters were wide open and gray daylight streamed in. Under the snowy branches of the big pines were three deer, graceful as dancers, muzzles searching the snow. “I tossed some feed out there earlier to draw them in.”
“Oh!” Brook felt emotion welling in her again. “They’re so pretty. Absolutely beautiful in the snow.”
“That they are,” Lance agreed.
“Are you going to kill them?” She didn’t know she was going to say it until the words were out.
“Kill them? No.” Lance looked surprised. “No, I have enough venison. I put out the feed to lure them in so we can watch them. I just wanted you to see them.”
“Oh, okay.” Brook gazed out the window. Suddenly, her expression changed to one of fright. “Look! That goat’s going after them!”
Lance looked up in time to see Gilbert lower her head into ramming position and dart toward the deer. They scattered with ease, tails bobbing, and disappeared into the surrounding forest. Gilbert stopped short and dug in her heels. She then nuzzled around in the snow for the feed they had left behind. Lance laughed. “That silly goat. That, by the way, is Gilbert. She’ll do anything to get free food. Plus, she doesn’t want any other animal invading her territory. Look at that goat-eating-grin, would you?”
“Goats grin?” Brook asked, and then laughed gleefully. “I guess they can, because that goat is definitely cheesing.”
“Well, she does have a tendency to gloat at times,” Lance replied. “She’s probably feeling pretty proud of herself right now.”
Brook looked up at Lance, the smile still on her face. He smiled back at her and let his hand slide with soft tenderness over her shoulder before going to the stove to prepare their meal.
After they ate, Lance treated Brook’s feet and then she settled into one of the easy chairs and observed as he heated water for laundry. She looked over at him from time to time, watched him soaping clothes by hand. After finally getting all the soap rinsed out and wringing them with a hand wringer he pulled a cord from a pulley high on the wall and stretched it across the room where he fastened it to an embedded hook. He then pinned the freshly washed garments and towels to it to air dry. She was making a lot of extra work for him, she realized. But she’d never heard him complain about it, not once.
Brook moved back to her bed and napped off and on while Lance went about his chores. He didn’t wake her for lunch, but brought her a tray when she stirred from slumber early in the afternoon. Thanking him, she nibbled at the sandwich and tried to hide her sadness. Wondering about her family and imagining how frantic they must be only made the situation worse. She also feared she may have lost forever the ability to feel true joy. Even though she wanted to bounce back from this terrible tragedy, she seemed to lack the control necessary to do so. There were moments when she would completely forget, insane as that seemed to her. It was as if her mind just blanked out for a space of time all the horror she had endured. Then recall would slam back into her with a strength that nearly took her breath away. And there were other times when her mind forced her to relive the details, tormented her with nightmarish images. Her thoughts would hang up on a particular incident and replay it as if doing so could grant her some understanding. It never did. She could not comprehend why she had been hurt like she had. The pain in her body combined with that in her heart and she finally gave into it all. She just wanted to be numb.
“Lance,” she said. “Could I please have a pill?”
“Sure,” he answered. “As I told you, I only have one tranquilizer left but I do have some pain pills or aspirin?”
“Pain pill, please.”
“Okay, but, how about just half, how much pain are you in?”
“Some, but not severe. Half will do, to start. I can always take more if I need it.”
He gave her half a pain pill and some water to wash it down.
While she waited for the pill to take effect, she ran her fingers back and forth on the chains of her small tree, almost as if she were strumming a harp. She watched them sparkle in the lamp light as they swayed from her touch. Her eyes grew heavy. Before long, she was pulled into a deep sleep. She was unaware when Lance knelt beside her and stroked her hair for several long minutes.
Realizing what he was doing, he scolded himself and went to his workroom to sketch plans for a new project.
Early that evening, Brook opened her eyes and felt measurably better. She called to Lance and he was at her side in an instant.
“Bathroom?” he guessed, and she nodded. Once there, she used the toilet, and washed up. She opened the door and tried to walk back to the bed.
“Oh,” she moaned. “I think I might need some help.”
Lance came to her aid and she leaned heavily against him as he half-carried her across the stone floor. He settled her back into bed, but she didn’t lie down. Arranging the blankets over her knees, she sat up, pillows behind her.
“Do you feel up to reading?” he asked her. “As you can see, I have quite a few books. And some of them are even interesting.”
She followed his gesture with her eyes to the bookshelves lining the wall.
“Sure, yes,” she replied. “That would be nice.”
“A lot of them are how-to manuals, which would probably bore you to tears. But, I do have some sci-fi, some classics, and even a novel or two.”
“Anything is fine. You pick,” she said, watching him peruse the shelves. She let her eyes rest on his broad back, dark blue flannel shirt tucked into his waistband, the tight fit of his jeans over muscular legs and buttocks. His thick black hair had an untamable look about it. She couldn’t help but notice that this man was in excellent physical condition. Her mind drifted and she found herself mentally cataloging the contrasts between Lance’s appearance and Clark’s.
Clark had slick good looks, groomed hair with touches of gray just starting at the temples. Though shorter and slighter built than Lance, Clark was no slouch. He swam, played tennis and racket ball, and jogged every morning. But his looks were calculated and deliberate, carefully crafted, from his manicured fingernails and gold watch, to his custom-tailored suits and glossy leather loafers. While she would never call him vain, he was definitely meticulous about his appearance. His body was flirting with a middle-aged paunch, even with the workouts, and while undetectable in his suits, it was obvious in his swim trunks. In silent defense of her husband, she reminded herself with an almost guilty nudge that he wasn’t as young as he used to be. Neither was she, for that matter.
But, unlike Clark, Lance radiated a quiet, natural vitality. This was a man with self-confidence. His ability to shake a fist at life and come out on the top showed in the workmanship of his cabin and its accoutrements. She believed this man would know what to do in a crisis, that a person could rely completely on his strength.
Brook shook herself. What was she thinking? Clark would be able to handle an emergency just as well. She shouldn’t be thinking that this virtual stranger was better in any way than her own husband. It was disloyal. But even as she chastised herself, she conceded that Clark might not react in the best way during a crisis. Clark exuded power, power over finances and people and social situations. But she knew he was inclined to call for help when something unforeseen happened. When the water heater dumped its contents all over the basement, he called a plumber, never even got his feet wet; when a tree fell on the house during a storm he called the tree service and roofer, leaving the tree hanging partially in the living room until the repairs were made. Clark was a get-it-fixed-man while Lance seemed to be a fix-it-man. It appeared quite obvious that each of these men displayed different strengths, but she somehow perceived Lance’s internal fortitude was deeper than Clark’s. Again, she wondered why she was comparing Clark to this stranger. She threw off these thoughts as Lance walked toward her with a couple of books in his hands.
“Here are an Asimov and a Mark Twain,” he held out the books to her. “I’ve got some westerns, too, if you’d rather have one of those.” He had decided against horror novels and bypassed that particular shelf.
As he handed her the books and a tiny book light, she noticed the backs of his hands, so tanned, so strong. They looked rough but she knew from experience they could be gentle.
What had gotten into her?
It must be a combination of factors; the odd situation they were in, him caring for her, and the horrors she had survived that had left her drained and confused. No small part of it, she was sure, was simple gratitude. The man
had
saved her life.
“These are fine. Thank you,” she said, looking away from him.
“No problem,” he answered, and then went around the room lighting lanterns, closing shutters against the deepening chill. He stoked the huge stone fireplace and the room grew cozy. Lance glanced at Brook and found her turning one of the books over and over in her hands, a troubled look shadowing her face. “Is something wrong? I can get different books if you don’t like those.”
“What?” Brook looked up, eyes slightly glazed. “Oh, no, these are fine. It just reminded me of something.”
“Something you want to talk about?”
“I don’t know. It’s just…It’s just that Clark, my husband, sent me to pick up a book for him from a bookstore that day.” Brook stopped cold.
“That day?”
“The day all my troubles started,” Brook said in a small voice. “I just remembered when you handed me this book. I never even bought the book. Never even entered the bookstore. But, it all started with a book.” Her voice trailed off as she stared unseeing at the book in her hand.
“Brooklyn?”
She shook her head. “Just never mind.”
“You’re sure?”
Brook didn’t answer; she opened the book, turned to the first page, and pretended to read. Lance noticed, however, that she didn’t turn any pages for quite some time. He waited a few minutes and then brought her a jug of cold water and a cup, placed them on the bedside table, and turned to her.
“I think you can regulate your own water intake now,” he explained. “At first, I worried about you getting sick. Your stomach feels better now, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, much.” Brook kept her eyes on the book.
“Well, I’m going to go get cleaned up. Do you need anything else?”
She shook her head, felt tears behind her eyelids but couldn’t explain why.
Have I been so beaten down that I’m going to cry every time someone shows me a kindness now?
She ducked her head, hiding her weakness.