Sentinel of Heaven (3 page)

So sheltered
she finished everything on the plate he'd brought, comforted by his approving
glance.  With belly full and pain meds in her system, she felt approximately
human again.

“Are you going
to stay here with me, Leo?  At least a little while?”

He nodded.

“Then here's
the plan for the day.  I've got to go out and get some things, for you and for
me.  I know a few items you're going to need already, but is there anything
you'd like me to make sure I get?”

His brow
wrinkled thoughtfully, then his nose.  He held out his hand and curled it
around something invisible, then rubbed that invisible thing across his chest
and throat and up into his hair, then scrubbed his hands in his hair.

“You want to
clean up, with soap and water?”

Serious nod. 
His hair was tousled now; Moira tried not to smile.

“Damn... my
bathroom's about the size of a coffin.  It's obviously not going to work for
you.  Does it have to be hot water?”

Head shake. 

“Then I can
get a solution for you.  Thank God I don't have any neighbors.  First, though –
I
need to shower and get dressed.”

He nodded.

“That means
you have to go out to the living room for a while.”

Leo gazed up
at her, the picture of innocence.

“Seriously.  I
mean it.  Some things humans do require privacy.”

He spread his
hands in acceptance, stood up and folded his wings with a polite snap, and
sidled out the tiny door.  She could hear him brush along the hallway and
settle himself in the living room, back in his nest of pillows and blankets.

“I have books
out there,” she called.  “You can read if you want.”  Moira got no answer, but
wasn't really expecting one.

Sliding out of
the bed she tested her legs before she trusted her full weight on them, then
stepped into her closet to pick out underwear, shirt, and jeans for the day. 
Her oldest towels were in here as well (some more holes than cloth, and
probably better suited for the rag-bag) and she took two of them with her into
the bathroom since none of the other linens were clean.

He kissed
me... and then he was better.  Really wish I could get an explanation on that.

She stripped
out of her gown and pulled aside the shower curtain, careful to step in around
the bath bench.  She'd bought it as soon as she’d gotten home from the
hospital, having realized it was better to sit down when she got woozy in the
tub instead of slip or fall.

The water took
a long time to heat up – the heater itself being older than she was – but once
it did it was heavenly.  She stepped into the stream and sighed, then leaned
against the avocado-colored tiles.

Okay, Moira. 
Now
you can think about it.

The
directness of that first kiss; the purposefulness of it.  Straightforward at
first, and then he began to move... the feel of his hand slipping over the
nightgown, the feel of his palm on the back of my neck.

Then when
he pulled back and looked at me, just so... felt like I couldn't get enough
air, like I was panting.  The little kisses, at the corners of my lips,
slowly...  Languid, not desperate.  Still towering over me, even on his knees.

She sank onto
the bench, leaning back against the far wall.  The steam was filling the shower
space and blurring the outlines of her surroundings.

There were
times in her life when the endless flow of words in her brain seemed to give
out and everything became sensation, both past and present.  There was the heat
in the water, the feel of the falling droplets, the bliss of the opiate
medication soothing away the worst of her hurts and the memory of a kiss more
passionate than she’d gotten in years – the memory of his mouth, the memory of
his scent, the warmth in his hands.

Moira shut her
eyes and let her own hands add to the sensation, until she went to a place
beyond pain for a while.

She pulled
herself together enough to finish her shower before the hot water ran out
completely, feeling tranquil but empty inside.  Her short hair dried off
quickly – one of the benefits of having it cut that way, as well as not
straining her arms and back to have to style it.

Without
thinking she stepped out into her bedroom as she toweled the rest of her body
down, casting the used linens in the direction of the hamper and reaching for
her underwear on the bed.

A noise from
the doorway snapped her to attention.

Leo was
standing just beyond the bedroom door, body mostly hidden by the wall, only his
face and his arm visible where it rested on the door jamb.  His face was
expressionless, save for his eyes which were wide and disbelieving.  For an
instant she saw herself in the mirror of his gaze:  Short.  Ash blonde. 
Pale-skinned.  Green eyes.  Arms and legs and waist not too thick, even though
she couldn't exercise very well – much of the time the medication took away her
appetite.  Breasts heavy and beginning to droop as she crept into middle-age,
her nipples still tight and aching after her alone-time in the shower.

And the scars:
the random zigzags across her abdomen, the quilt patch of Frankenstein-work
around her left leg at the calf, the straight ones decorated with stitch-marks
along the center of her back, the loose faint lines up her arm and feathering
the outer side her left breast.

“Surely you’ve
seen a naked woman before?”

He shook his
head, his eyes never leaving her.  He may have seen naked women, that gesture
seemed to suggest – but not like this.

He wasn't
looking at her as a male looks at a nude female...  Who knows, maybe he
couldn't even picture her as that.  Such an impossible creature as he was probably
didn't classify as the same species; thinking of her sexually might be
considered akin to contemplating bestiality.

So she dropped
her hands and let him stare, even turning slowly in place as he had done in her
kitchen.  The space between her thighs was still slick.  She was forcefully
reminded that no amount of floral-scented shampoo or body wash could adequately
cover the scent of lust.  Would it register with him?

When she
looked at him again his face was empathetic.  He gestured at what was
waist-level for him, in the empty space of the door, then flipped his hand
toward her.

“The scars,
you mean?”

Leo nodded.

“Everyone has
something they don't want to talk about.”  She stepped into her underwear.  “I
don't want to go into that right yet.  Suffice it to say you're not the only
one who's crashed.  Anyway, I asked you to stay in the living room.”

He dropped his
eyes at that; a surprising blush lit the tops of his cheeks.

“I guess it's
not a big deal... no real harm done.”  But she dressed in efficient time and
dug her comfortable tennis shoes out from under the bed and slipped them on.

“Please don't
go outside,” she instructed as she shrugged into her jacket and picked up her
cane.  “I don't have anyone else living very close yet but it wouldn't be good
to have you seen accidentally by someone.  I'll be back as soon as I can.”

Meek as a
child he silently agreed and closed the house door behind her.

I’m a fool. 
I always have been.  Kisses or no kisses; to think that someone like that...

She clamped
down on the thought and climbed into her tiny car.  Town was around thirty
miles away; not an unpleasant drive when the day was nice and her health was
good, but it could be a terrifying unending pilgrimage when in physical
distress or fighting the effects of the medication.

Today's
journey wasn't bad, as long as she kept her morose side in check. 
Concentrate
on the play of light through the pines.  Concentrate on the wind that sweeps
past the window and goes on, a mystery in both its origin and its destination. 
That's all anything is.  We only touch things and people for a while and then
they're gone again.

Enjoy the
now, as much as possible, before it's taken away from you.

She’d found
Georgia to be a strange place to be disabled, although she didn't know if other
places were any better.  People loudly envied her parking space but shied away
from her cane, as if life-long bone and muscle and nerve damage could be
contagious.  They'd scramble to get to the door and hold it open for her but
refused to look at her straight on, as if meeting her eyes was either
unbearably rude or scary or both.

Moira was
lucky she could get around with just the cane these days.  If she thought she
looked elderly and sick to most men while wielding the little wooden stick, the
huge aluminum walker had been worse.  You might as well ask your average guy to
get romantic with an Egyptian mummy.

Not the most
empowering way to survive one's twenties.

Even now men
and women seemed to do a quick fade away from the little crippled person
walking the aisles of the department store, with the dreaded cane hung from the
shopping cart's side where it could be handy but out of the way.  At least it
left her free to roam the men's clothing section without becoming too
self-conscious.

Shirts would
be impossible, of course.  In the big and tall racks she got the longest pair
of sweatpants she could find, with drawstrings at the waist and elastic at the
cuffs.  She picked out three pairs: black, grey, and red. 

Now over to
gardening and lawn care, where she chose a large pack of sponges and a thirty
foot green hose that already had a spray nozzle attachment.  The house had an
outdoor spigot she could rig up to accept it, if it still worked.

Then across
the building to the health and beauty area; after a few sniff-tests she was
able to find a bottle of body-wash that wasn't trying too hard to be masculine
but wouldn't make him smell like a flower-shop in May.

Not that a man
nearly seven feet tall needs any help to seem masculine, or that smelling like
a flower-shop would detract from it in the slightest.  Never mind the wings.

Her final goal
was the pharmacy, fortunately not too far away.  Her medicine bottle was
feeling awfully light again and it was time to bring in the new prescription
and get it filled.  She took it out of her wallet and unfolded it, smoothing it
out before handing it to the pharmacy technician – who gave her a long look and
shrugged, entering the details into the computer.  “It'll be twenty minutes,”
the other woman replied brusquely.

“I'll wait for
it,” Moira answered, pulling her cart over to a bench nearby.   She made
herself as comfortable as possible and crossed her arms under her chest, chin
dropping and eyes settling closed.  Letting her thoughts wander she found
herself thinking about Leo again.  What was he doing right now?  Was he
sleeping?  Was he reading?  She could picture him sitting cross-legged in the
blankets, a paperback book dwarfed in his hands.  What would he be reading?

Let's say
Robinson Crusoe, the original castaway.  Or Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley... 
Or maybe her book of John Donne's poetry, where religious ecstasy often crossed
into the salacious and vice versa.

“... Then
softly tread

In this love's
hallow'd temple, this soft bed.

In such white
robes heaven's angels used to be

Revealed to
men; thou, angel, bring'st with thee

A heaven-like
Mahomet's paradise...”

And would he
read on, helpless to stop his frank curiosity, letting that faint blush so
foreign on a warrior's countenance continue to light the tops of his cheeks?

Too soon the
surly technician was calling her name to have her come up and pay for her
prescription, although Moira's serene smile seemed to dismay her somewhat.

Now to buy the
other things; standing in the short line was not as much of a trial as it could
have been.  Among the impulse items on the shelf across from the register were
little bags of black elastic hair-ties and she picked one up on a whim.  Maybe
Leo might like to get his hair out of his face every now and again.  Maybe he'd
let her braid it.

She was
giggling at the thought as she put her purchases on the belt.  The painfully
young-looking cashier smiled back at her shyly.  “Are you washing your car
today?” he asked.  His name tag said “Jeffrey”.

“Noooo...
definitely not my car,” she answered, and burst into mystifying laughter again.

“I just ask
because sometimes I try to figure out from someone's items what their plans
are.  And it'll be a nice day for it – it's going to be warmer this afternoon.”

“Yeah...” Was
he flirting with her?  He couldn't see her cane from where she stood.  God, she
felt so ancient – he looked barely old enough to shave. “You're close, though. 
Not my car but something fun.  Something even
more
powerful.”

“Oh really? 
Like a motorcycle?”  Her total appeared on the LED sign; he took the cash from
her hand and gathered up her change, bending with enviable ease to put her bags
back into her cart.

“Mmmmmno,
kiddo –” she murmured, leaning in towards him.  She'd never know how winsome
she was when she was filled with good humor and vitality, her face bright and
her eyes sparkling.  “Something with wings!”

When she
turned onto the dirt road that lead down to her house, Moira was thrilled to
see that the tiny building far back behind the oaks and pines was still
standing, not on fire, not surrounded by police or ambulances or men in white
coats, not affected by any other of a dozen disasters she had imagined.  The
little forest was deserted as usual, and the empty fields beyond were
unoccupied for now.  She pulled around to the back yard, leaving the bag with
the hose and the sponges in the trunk and carried everything else with her up
onto the back porch, only now beginning to limp in earnest.

Moira found an
unexpected sight, upon the unlocking of the kitchen door.

First, the
kitchen had been straightened from the top down.  The remains of the first aid
kit had been removed and the table had been cleared.  Her housecoat was hung on
the hook outside her bedroom door.  The feathers were still there, now laid in
a small pile.

All the trash
and debris from the night before had been gathered up and added to the kitchen
trash, which was neatly bagged and stood by the door to await removal.  The
bandages in the sink were gone as well, and the sink itself was scrubbed out. 
The few dishes that had been in the bottom were drying on the rack.  The
counter had been wiped.

The dirty
towels and washcloths were in a tidy heap at the closet door, ready to go in
the laundry, and in the center of the kitchen floor was Leo.

He'd found her
wash bucket and her cleaning supplies in the cabinet under the sink and was
down on both hands and knees meticulously scrubbing the floor clear of the dirt
and cast-off blood from the night before.  He looked up over her shoulder at her
short startled bark of a laugh, his wings fluttering in surprise.

“I – I'm sorry
– I never imagined –” she stuttered.  He sank back on his haunches and studied
her placidly, eyebrows arching.  She pressed her palm against her mouth for a
long moment, waited until she collected herself, and tried again.

“I just...
what inspired you to start... housekeeping?”

Leo swept his
hands in meandering circles, indicating with the sudsy brush in his hands his
own state of disarray and the remaining mess, which was surprisingly small.

“Uh, indeed. 
Well, see if you can finish up soon – I'd like to try your bath before it
starts getting dark.”

She stepped
back out onto the porch, lips pressed tight, and pulled the items out of the
plastic bag, laying them neatly on the old patio table.  Pants, body wash, hair
ties.

An angel
is washing my kitchen floor.  On all fours.  Well, I'll be.  Another
unexpectedly nice view.  While we're waiting, then...

She popped the
trunk and carefully lifted out the last bag, heavier than the rest. 
This
is going to be fun – now I've got to crawl back on the other side of the porch
through the brambles and hook this up.  By November the snakes should be
hibernating and all the insects should be dead, right?

The sponges went
on the patio table with the rest of the purchases; the majority of the hose was
piled on the steps and soon she was carefully inching along on knuckles and
knees, trying not to move her back much, dragging the connector of the hose in
one hand.  There was a trial in trying to thread the adapter onto the dirt-crusted
spout of the spigot and then she had to throw her weight against the dial
before it would turn – but after a long moment the hose plumped up and she
could hear the water running.  Okay, then.

Moira backed
out through the tall weeds, brushed off her hands and the front of her jeans,
then tested the spray attachment which generated a satisfying drizzle.  By
adjusting the settings she could create a directed jet, a fine mist, and even a
light fall that felt more like her shower-head.

She was
playing with the mist, layering it out over her lawn and creating rainbows in
the afternoon sun (which
had
seemed to become warmer, as Jeffrey had
said) when she heard the kitchen door creak open.

For the first
time since last night Leo was standing outside, completely upright, and with no
fear of where his wings would wind up.  Moira saw the relief on his face and
felt the twinge in her again. 
It's not right to keep him stuffed in those
tiny rooms, but what else is there?

The wind
kicked up and stirred his hair; he smiled and turned to her, the last of her
frayed old towels in his proffered grip.

“Aren't you
cold at all?”