by Mina Carter
“You cleaned!” Thyme exclaimed, a goofy grin on her face. Mostly I’d just delegated after making the call to the cleaning service but that should still count for something. “I don’t believe it. How on earth did you manage to…” She trailed off, lips flattening, moving backward, hand over chest. “Where is he?” she whispered looking like she expected the boogie man to pop out from behind the sofa.
“Who?” I queried.
“Leon.” Her voice shook. “I can’t smell him anymore but I can feel his evil.”
I moved toward her making a placating gesture with my hands when she looked like she was going to bolt. “Whoa,” I spoke softly using my horse don’t throw my ass in the dirt tone. “He was here earlier but I got rid of him. He’s gone now.”
“There’s no getting rid of him. “ Wide frightened violet eyes locked on my face. “He’ll never be gone.”
“Who is he, Thyme?” Right then I knew that the evening wasn’t going to go the way I had envisioned. Like sometimes when I had a set list in mind before I took the stage, but once I got out there and saw the crowd, I just knew I had to change it. I had a guess about this Leon character but I needed to know the truth. And I think she needed to tell me.
“He’s Apollyon, the Destroyer. One of the Favored.” She lowered her voice even more. “He’s an incubus, a type of demon who feeds off of the dark emotions of others. He uses the In Between as his personal playroom when he’s supposed to be easing the passage of the departed as he guides them to the other side.”
My brows disappeared into my hair.
“His not so secret ambition is to take over the entire underworld. Dethrone his father Hades. And with the power of my immortality and the others’ he’s stolen…”
“Wait,” I interrupted. “This guy is the one who took your life?”
“Yes. But before that he drugged and kidnapped Shane and me. Locked us up like animals.” Her chin dropped, her form seemed to crumple and her arms went protectively around her body. “And he raped me,” she whispered. “Over and over.”
“Oh my God, Thyme!” Insides knotted, reeling from that horrific revelation, I reached for her. I needed to hold her in my arms as much for my solace as her own. She backed up, though, peering up at me with her light eyes shadowed by memories so dark I couldn’t even fathom them. My entire body tensed imagining what that sick sadistic bastard had probably done to her. So this Apollyon was nearly indestructible, huh? Well, maybe he was, and maybe he wasn’t. Right then I made it my personal mission to test that theory. Or die trying.
She looked down at the floor her long hair curtaining her face. Staring at her just then it registered that her grey image wasn’t even flickering anymore.
I closed the distance between us, praying she wouldn’t back away again, and wrapped my fingers around her slim upper arms pulling her into me, and feeling something settle inside of me the instant I had her. Though it didn’t feel at all like holding a normal woman, more like the shell of one, it felt right. And so incredibly good when her hands came up and rested on my forearms. I nearly sighed when she inched even closer.
I slid a hand up curling a finger under her chin and tilting her face up so I could see it. “Don’t you dare be ashamed of what he did to you,” I ordered gently.
“But I didn’t stop him. I didn’t even try. Not even when he murdered Shane right there in front of me.”
Holy shit.
“I’m afraid that’s what Shane remembers.” Her voice went deadly soft. “That it’s the reason that he never came back for me.” Her pretty eyes went glassy and it was all I could do to fight back my own reaction.
“What could you have done, Ty Boo? Really?” My hand shook as I stroked her cheek and tucked a wispy strand of her hair behind her ear. I stared deeply into her tragic eyes willing her to believe me, to let go of the burden of guilt she should never have taken up in the first place.
Rage I couldn’t suppress reached a crescendo. I was mad at Shane. Partly because he’d had her in a way I knew I wanted to but never could, but also because he’d hurt her so profoundly by abandoning her. If I ever found him I was going to kick his ass. But Leon? My blood boiled as I imagined wrapping my fingers around his throat. I was going to kill him.
Chapter 28
The face of all the world is changed, I think, Since first I heard the footsteps of thy soul.
- Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Thyme
“Billy!” I exclaimed as his face darkened abruptly. “Your eyes.” I gasped. “They’re glowing.” They blazed a pure bright blue like the Gulf of Mexico at midday well beyond the shoreline where the Mississippi muddied it with silt.
He blinked seeming to pull himself back from the brink of whatever thoughts had consumed him, set me gently aside and moved to the hall mirror where he could see the truth for himself.
“You’re an immortal,” I concluded in an astonished whisper.
When he turned back to face me his eyes had returned to normal, but he looked like he was in shock. My own expression was similar for sure though this was something I probably should have at least suspected considering the fact that he could summon the dead.
“I don’t believe it.” He shook his head as if denying the truth would change it.
“I wonder whose you are.” I mused out loud moving and taking his larger hand in mine. I flipped it over to have a look at the parental identifier he should have on his wrist. Only there wasn’t one. Instead, he had a scar similar to the one Morpheus bore. I didn’t understand it.
“This scar covers up where your identifier should be,” I explained lifting my eyes to search his. “It’s a mark, sort of like a tattoo. It shows who your father is. When you turn twenty-one it fills in and other immortals can see it.” I could tell by his look of continued confusion that he didn’t know what I was talking about, but I asked anyway. “Didn’t you have any idea?”
He slowly shook his head.
“Well, you definitely are, and your father must be a Dark Progeny considering what you can do with the harmonica. Gifts come from Progeny. Privileges always follow the male line. It’s an archaic and misogynistic system. But what I don’t understand is why your identifier was obscured.”
“I’m not sure I can wrap my head around all of this.” He rolled shoulders that looked tense and had remained that way ever since I explained about Apollyon. “My parents, my adoptive ones, told me the scar was there when they brought me home from the agency, but that no one could tell them how I got it.”
“Did they ever comment on the differences between you and the other children when you were growing up? Like how quickly you healed or the fact that you never got sick?”
“Yeah, actually they did.” He cocked his head to the side eyes taking on a thoughtful gleam. “My sister seemed to catch everything. I teased her about it. We all just thought my immune system was much stronger.”
“And how old are you now?”
“Twenty-two.”
That surprised me. He looked older, especially when I looked into his eyes. I stared at him, at the handsome planes of his face. “When you turned twenty-one didn’t you notice that your energy and stamina increased and that your senses became much more heightened?”
“No. I didn’t notice much of anything. That was when Nan and William died. I…” His gaze flicked away for a moment before coming back to me. “I didn’t handle it well. Spent nearly a year hunkered down. No music. No company. I was alone and drunk most of the time. If it hadn’t been for Arla, I probably wouldn’t ever have come out of it.”
“Arla’s the one who called the other night. Right?”
“Yes. He’s my manager.” He shrugged his voice thicker when he continued. “And a really good friend.”
“It sounded that way.” I took in a deep breath before framing his name the way I’d wanted to from the beginning. “Billy, what’s happened between us? These feelings I have for you, they’re forbidden in the world I’m a part of… the world y
ou’re a part of… because of what I am. And I feel guilty, too, because of who I belonged to.”
“Shane didn’t deserve you.” He touched my face and I leaned into his work roughened palm.
“I know,” I agreed softly. “He deserved better. I’m nobody and nothing anymore.”
“Bullshit.” His hands moved. I could feel them and his grip tightening on my shoulders because of the changes in my form. He stared intently into my eyes. “You are so not nothing. Even as a spirit you’re special. Kind. Beautiful. Unforgettable. I thought I would never find someone I could feel for the way I felt about Nan, but now I know that I was wrong.”
“What do we do then?” I whispered reeling from his words, the beauty of them. The way they seemed to heal the fissures inside of me. “I tried to leave you already.” Tried to do the right thing. The best thing. The safest thing. “I wanted to avoid us ending up like this. With both of us feeling like we’re betraying our pasts.”
“Maybe I should say let’s stop. Turn back before we go any further. But I can’t. I don’t want to. I won’t.” He leaned back, a tortured soul just like me only he was still alive and breathing. “Why don’t we see what happens? Start over together. We can’t go back and recreate the past even if we wanted to.”
“Yes. I’d like that.” He made me feel hopeful. I wanted to dream again. I deserved to have a bit of happiness with him by my side, my eyes wide open looking forward for a change instead of constantly looking backward at what could have been.
Even if it could only be in secret. Even if it only lasted for a little while.
“Good. I’m glad that’s settled.” His tone was light but his expression was intense. He stared at my face as though memorizing every detail while tracing a lock of hair from my temple to the end where it lay across the slope of my breast.
I shivered.
His lips curved up slowly, and he got that look, the one I was fast becoming addicted to, the one that he got just before he did something slightly naughty, like leaving his clothes strewn all over the place on purpose just to see if I’d pick them up. “I rented a movie for us to watch.” He stood and gestured for me to follow him into the kitchen. “But I missed dinner and I’m hoping you’ll want to do my other surprise first.”
“Ok,” I agreed hesitantly, narrowing my eyes much the same way he had when he’d thought I’d wanted him to clean. “But what is it?” I stopped as I took in all the things he had laid out on the counter. The milk, the sugar, the eggs and the Cuisinart ice cream maker. How had he known to leave the eggs out to bring them to room temperature so they wouldn’t curdle when heated?
When I looked back at him he was watching my face carefully. “You think you could teach me how to make ice cream?” he asked.
I smiled, full on, no reservations, all the way into the idea. And him. “I would love to!”
Chapter 29
Hope is a waking dream. - Aristotle
Billy
That smile was worth every bit of effort I’d put into the evening including calling my sister about the ingredients and then some. “So what do we do first?” I asked.
“Pour the milk into the saucepan and bring it up to simmer.” She started to reach for the pan but stopped mid-motion and frowned.
“I’ve got it.” I turned the stove on low heat. “Is it hard for you to move things?”
“It takes energy.” She nodded. “I can only do so much before I have to go back underground and recharge. Kind of the same way you have to sleep when you get tired and need rest.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have left all the messes around for you to clean up.”
“It’s ok. I don’t mind. It makes me feel useful. Needed.”
“Do you miss it? The cooking, eating, things like that?”
“Sure I do. There are so many restrictions in this shape and in the world I inhabit. I miss the simple things most people take for granted. The warmth of the sun on my skin. Not being able to touch those I love or to be touched in return. I couldn’t even say goodbye to a dear friend before he crossed over the River. But most of all, I miss my mamere. I wish she hadn’t moved away. Watching her leave, not saying anything, it was one of the hardest things I ever had to do.”
She came up behind me and offered me a wooden spoon. I wanted to turn around and pull her into my arms again to comfort her but I played it cool. The way I could tell she was trying desperately to do. “You’ll need to stir constantly after I add the eggs.” Her voice had an emotional rasp to it that wasn’t usually there. Her chin was down while she deftly cracked open six eggs with one hand.
I didn’t fuss at her about doing it herself. I figured the cooking was therapeutic for her and that she knew the limits of her strength. That reminded me. “How old are you, Thyme? You look the same as your pictures on the internet. But it’s been ten years. Don’t you age?”
“You googled me?”
“Hell, yes.”
She narrowed her eyes at me.
“I was curious. Found out how popular your shop was.” How pretty she’d been. How happy she’d looked. And other things. “You were in the Glee Club in high school.”
She didn’t say anything as she used a knife to slice open a vanilla bean pod before scraping in the sweet scented seeds. “Can you feel the mixture thickening?” she asked not looking at me.
“Yeah.”
“Good.”
“I get the feeling you don’t want to talk about your singing with me.”
She pressed her lips into a flat line nodding tightly.
“Why not?” I pressed. “You won state your senior year. Earned a tryout with Capitol Records. But I couldn’t find any evidence that you ever followed through.”
“I didn’t,” she said softly, then sighed. “It wasn’t what I wanted to do. I like singing, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t love it the way I can tell you do. I can see it in your face when you play your guitar at night or when you’re with the guys.” She dipped a quick finger in the base and gave a satisfied nod. “It’s done. Turn off the heat and get a big heat proof bowl. Fill it with ice. We’ll have to cool the mixture down completely before we can run it through the machine.”
After I set the pan in the ice, I noticed she still looked pensive with that tiny crease between her eyes. “There’s more you’re not telling me about the singing.”
She was quiet a minute nibbling on her full lip. I imagined tasting those lips and had to shift a bit to hide my response from her. “Did Google tell you my mom abandoned me when I was little?”
“No. I’m sorry, Ty Boo. That must’ve been hard.”
“Definitely.” She nodded and looked at me for a long moment. “Mamere was the best grandmother. She loved me and showed me how she felt in a million different ways, but there was always that emptiness inside from having lost my maman’s love.”
I reached for her wanting to soothe her, upset that I’d made her sad, but then elated when I felt her form relax into me a moment later. She laid her head against my chest and I wrapped my arms around her waist. Being close to her, feeling her warmth, smelling her unique scent, it was so good, so incredible, but yet it still wasn’t right. It wasn’t enough. There was no heart beating inside her chest and I knew if I squeezed too hard there’d be no real body beneath the outline that I could claim for my own.
“My mom used to sing a lot,” she said softly. “She had a mesmerizing voice. It should be a good memory, but remembering just makes me sad.”
“I understand. That’s the way I feel about certain songs or places that remind me of Nan and William.”
She gave me a sad smile. Not the one I wanted her to have tonight. Not the mood I wanted for tonight, either.
Failing again, Blade.
I cleared my throat and touched a finger to the custard as she had done. “It’s cool. Should we put it in the machine? Let’s watch the movie so I have a distraction from thinking about how good that limited edition batch of Thyme Bellerose vanilla ice cream’
s going to taste.” I held out my hand, she took it, and the clamp around my chest loosened a bit, enough so I could breathe easier.
I pointed and clicked the remote to start the movie, but as we sat on the couch and I pulled her closer, my doubts resurfaced.
Where was this whole thing heading? Was I only getting involved with a ghost because it was safe, because I feared a relationship with a live woman that might bring as much heartache as my last one?
*****
Thyme
I got sleepy about half way through Dead Poet’s Society, a great movie, a thoughtful selection by Billy. He had joked that I should enjoy it on two levels, the poetry angle and the dead part. I had elbowed him good, satisfied to hear his oomph.
It seemed like only moments later when I heard the ding of the ice cream maker and raised my head from where I had laid it on Billy’s solid chest. Looking at the view southward, his long jean clad legs stretched out on the coffee table, I tensed internally. Not nervous tense. The turned on kind, all warm and tingly, neither of which I should really be able to feel, but I did. I wanted to touch him. I splayed my fingers a little wider and moved them up his thigh just to see if everything about him was as delicious as it looked.
It so was.
I could feel his tension. He was the same kind of coiled as I was. His muscles rigid, and…
“Ty.” His voice rumbled deep and low. “I think you need to move that hand.”
“Sorry.” I did as he requested imagining my cheeks burning. I tried to sit up to move away but he stopped me, sliding my body more fully across his. Cradled in his arms in that position, I could fully perceive against my behind what I’d only just gotten a brief eyeful of a moment earlier. He was thick and hard and knowing he was just as turned on as I was right now set off a corresponding reaction in me that made my imagined heart race and my ghost breaths shorten.
