Dragonslayer

by Emilie Richards

  She shook her head when he started to interrupt. “So I chose option number two. I went back to high school and graduated near the top of my class. I won a scholarship to the state university and got my nursing degree. Then, when I’d had some experience, I came back here and pounded on doors until I had the money to fund Mother and Child. And I’m not leaving again. Not ever. Not as long as there’s a pregnant woman or a little child left in this hellhole. Not until they drag me out of here in a pine box!”

  “Which may happen sooner than later.”

  She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Something inside her eased. She had told Thomas her story, and he hadn’t flinched. She had needed his acceptance, and without so much as a smile, a tear, a touch, she knew—somehow she knew—that she had it.

  “A long time ago,” she said softly, “I realized there was a lot that could be taken away from me. But one thing that couldn’t was my determination to stay here and beat my head against the wall. Maybe that’s all I’m doing, and maybe it will never make a difference. But maybe if enough of us keep beating and banging and complaining and staying on here...”

  He understood better why she had married him. There was no decision as important to her as the one she had made at her baby’s death. Every other decision was weighed against that one. Even marriage to a man she hardly knew.

  “My story,” she said. She waited, hoping he would tell her his.

  “You are an extraordinary woman.”

  She saw no answers in his eyes. But what she saw was nearly as riveting. Something was blazing there. Something warmer than compassion, stronger than understanding. He knew what she had gone through, knew it deep inside him, because he had been scorched by the same fire.

  “The dragon got you, too, Thomas, didn’t he?”

  “One dragon at a time tonight,” he said.

  She thought it was a promise of sorts. Someday—if they were married that long—he would tell her what had brought him here, what drove him.

  He surprised her by reaching out to touch a lock of hair that had escaped to snake over her shoulder. “Extraordinary.”

  The word felt almost like a kiss. For a moment something shivered in the air between them. She felt herself lean toward him. She saw him lean toward her. But they didn’t meet.

  He turned away. She let out a deep breath.

  They spoke about the news and weather over dinner.

  7

  Even though he’d lived with Garnet for two weeks, Thomas was still aware of the different fragrances subtly perfuming the air in their apartment, even when she was gone. Bath oil and pastel soaps, scented candles, hand lotion and more. Like the woman, the result could not be ignored. Together the scents were bold yet elusive, flamboyant but somehow starkly elemental. The flowers in the Garden of Eden had undoubtedly combined the same divergent notes. The woman in the Garden of Eden had undoubtedly combined them, too.

  The apartment was silent now except for the noise of cars passing in the street below. When Garnet was home, the apartment was never silent. But Garnet was gone. Finn, Tex’s cop husband, had arrived just minutes before to whisk her off to Mother and Child.

  Finn was a gift. He had appeared the morning after Garnet moved into Thomas’s apartment, just—he claimed—to pass the time with her. For the past two weeks he had continued to appear faithfully each morning the clinic was open. Finn drank a cup of coffee while Garnet finished dressing; then he walked her to work. Casually, as if nothing could please him more. Casually, eyes darting right and left, hand hovering close enough to his gun that anyone watching would have thought he just might be expecting trouble.

  So far there had been none.

  In the stillness, Thomas located his worn-out briefcase. He had a little time before he was scheduled to be in his office, but the apartment seemed unwelcoming, as if all the life had been sucked from it with Garnet’s departure.

  Two weeks had passed. Two weeks of a marriage that was, by anyone’s standards, a fraud. Yet there were times when Thomas felt married to Garnet. They had already fallen into a routine. He arose in the morning before she did, and while he showered, she made breakfast. Invariably it was manna from heaven. She could take the simplest ingredients and cook food fit for the gods. Sometimes she made flour tortillas filled with beans spiced with garlic and herbs, ham, scrambled eggs, cheese. The list of fillings was as long as the woman’s imagination.

  Afterward he cleaned the kitchen while she showered and changed. She sang in the shower. Her voice was throaty and sensual, and she always chose love songs. Steam edged through the cracks in the doorway, scented steam that penetrated the pores of his skin—but never more than the songs did. When she emerged dressed in white, he didn’t stare, but secretly he searched out the small details that made her unique. The colorful costume jewelry. The ribbon or scarf in her hair. The bright sheen of her cheeks and lips...

  He caught himself staring at nothing. He didn’t want to reflect on the ways that Garnet had changed his life in the weeks of their marriage. Reflection was a pastime for those unscathed by the dragon.

  Downstairs he unlocked the front door of the church and left his study door wide open, even though doing so defeated the purpose of his small electric heater. He had no appointments to prepare for. He had made his office hours known to his congregation and to anyone else who might be interested. He was available to anyone who might need him during that time, easy to find, receptive and, more often than not, alone.

  Once he had needed a secretary to monitor his time and schedule his appointments. She had been trained to knock discreetly and to apologize to whatever parishioner was in the office before she ushered in Thomas’s next appointment. There had been no breaks, no time for meditation or prayer. He’d had a running argument with the church board. The board had hired another associate minister, and there had been funds available to hire an assistant to lighten his load, but Thomas had refused the help.

  Now he didn’t need help; he didn’t even need a secretary. And he had all the time for prayer that any man of God could want.

  More than this man of God had need of.

  His desk was empty, no stacks of phone messages to answer, no carefully coded correspondence needing his attention. His desk was as clear of self-important hustle and bustle as his life. There were a telephone, a blotter and one sheet of scratched-up notes for Sunday’s sermon that he had worked on the previous evening.

  He stared at the notes. Evenings, after he and Garnet returned from work, were fraught with subtlety and innuendo. Dinner was as creative, as sensuous a treat, as breakfast. While Garnet chopped and sautéed they talked about their days as two strangers talk, but sometimes there were moments of surprising intimacy. The shared smile, the clink of glasses, the husky laugh, the insightful comment.

  He had come to look forward to that time together as he hadn’t looked forward to anything in years. Sometimes during the day he found himself thinking of things he would tell Garnet; sometimes he found himself thinking of things she had told him. Sometimes—as now—he thought of the curves of her body, the forbidden length of leg under a satin nightshirt, a glimpse of her neck when she lifted her hair.

  At night, after dinner, when he knew she lay in the next room listening to music or reading, thoughts of her kept him awake.

  He had married Garnet to protect her and for no reason other than protection. Now he wondered how he was going to protect himself.

  By the time the front door slammed, there was a second sheet of paper, even more scratched up, to attest to his struggle to concentrate. But he still had no firm idea of what he was going to say on Sunday. He leaned back in his chair and waited for the visitor.

  Ema came to the doorway and smiled her tentative smile. “I’m bothering you, aren’t I?”

  He stood in welcome. Something like relief filled him at the sight of another human face. “Of course not.”

  “I could come back.”

  “Sit down, Ema.”

&
nbsp; “I can only stay a minute.”

  “Make it two, at least.”

  She smiled, exactly the same frightened doe smile, and sat. “I shouldn’t be here.”

  “No?”

  “I told Ron I was going out for groceries.’’

  “And he’d be angry if he found out you were here?”

  “He...keeps track of me.” She looked around the room, as if hoping there would be something there to comment on.

  “Are the girls in school?”

  “They’re supposed to be. They’re.. .they’re at a neighbor’s.”

  He sat a little straighter, alert now to barely perceptible signals that she was distraught. She was twisting the handle of her purse in her hands. He was so used to seeing her eyes red-rimmed and swollen that he hadn’t noticed immediately that this time the tears were fresh.

  “What’s going on?” he asked.

  “Did you know my real name is Emerald?” She laughed, and the sound wrapped around his heart. “Imagine that. Someone like me with a name like Emerald. But Mama didn’t have anything else of value. Garnet’s probably told you all about that.”

  “Not much.”

  She looked at him as if that was hard to believe.

  “Your sister and I...” His voice trailed off. He couldn’t find words to explain his marriage to Garnet.

  “I know. She told me why you married her. But I thought...”

  “Thought what?”

  “Well, Garnet’s pretty good at making the best of things.” She looked away. “Anyway, Mama named us all for jewels. She said it was the only way she’d ever have any. You know? She called us her little treasures.”

  “And you were treated like treasures?”

  She seemed to consider the question. “By Mama,” she said at last. “But we were poor, and this is a hard place to grow up. Garnet and Jade, well, they turned out different from me. Jade ran away and started a new life. Garnet just fought everything that stood between her and the kind of world she thought the Corners should be. And I...” Her voice trailed off again, and so did her gaze.

  “You got married to a man who beats you,” Thomas said.

  “Well, not all the time.”

  “Once is too often, Ema.”

  “Do I deserve better?” She forced her gaze to his. “I want to know, Reverend Stonehill. Do I?”

  He marveled at how simple some answers were to give. “Yes.”

  “Ron says women started all the trouble in the world.”

  “Ron is a sick and violent man.”

  “I can’t please him.”

  “No one could.”

  “I try. I cook foods he likes. I keep the apartment clean. I don’t complain when he comes home drunk.”

  “It comes down to two choices, Ema. You can stay with him, knowing that things will stay the same or get even worse. Or you can leave him and start a new life for yourself and the girls. But there is no third choice. You can’t stay and hope that he’ll change.”

  “He doesn’t mean to hit me.”

  “He does. And he means to hurt you. And someday he may mean to hurt your daughters.”

  “Oh, he’s never--”

  “Even if he never lifts a finger to Jody and Lisa, he’s still teaching them it’s all right for men to hit women. When your girls grow up, they may look for men like their father, and if they do, they’ll probably act just like their mother when those men hit them.”

  The handle of her purse snapped in two. Ema looked down at her lap. “I don’t want to teach them that.”

  “Do you want to stay with your husband?”

  “Is it all right... does the Bible say... ?”

  “Marriage is sacred, but only if both people treat it that way. Love, honor and cherish aren’t answers to a multiple choice question. Until death do us part doesn’t mean that one partner has the right to cause the death of another.”

  She flinched. “Sometimes—” She looked up. “I hate him.”

  “I’m sure you do.”

  “But that’s wrong.”

  “Sometimes it takes anger to get a job done. You’ll have plenty of time after you leave Ron to work on forgiveness.”

  “That’s not what the others told me. You’re not like any other pastor I’ve been to.”

  He doubted that, in the most important ways, he was like any pastor anywhere, but he wasn’t going to explain that. “This is not the Middle Ages, and I’m not alone in this,” he said. “I can promise you that there are pastors all over the world who would give you the same advice.”

  She nodded, as if absorbing that.

  “Do you have a place to go?” he asked.

  “Mama offered to let me come there. She lives in Florida, and she has friends who will help. I think it’s too far for Ron to follow me. Jade offered, too—”

  “Why aren’t the girls in school today?”

  She twisted what was left of her purse handle. She seemed to be debating. Finally she spoke. “I’ve got bus tickets.”

  “For when?-”

  “Ron goes to work at one. Our bus leaves at two.”

  “Does Garnet know?”

  “I thought maybe you could tell her?”

  “Why don’t you tell her yourself?”

  “Because she’d make a speech about how I’m finally doing the right thing. And I know she’d be right, but I don’t want to hear her say it.”

  “May I say it?”

  She looked up again. “Please.”

  “You are doing the right thing.”

  “Am I really?”

  He nodded.

  His words seemed to strengthen her. “Will you tell Garnet I love her? Tell her I just wanted to do this because I know it’s right, not because somebody pushed me.”

  “And will you call?”

  “When I’m all settled, I’ll call.”

  “Good.”

  “You won’t tell Ron where I am if he comes asking around?”

  “I don't know where you're going. I didn’t let you tell me exactly.”

  She smiled a little, and for a moment the worry lines in her forehead smoothed. He saw Garnet in the momentary sparkle of her eyes. Ema’s eyes were green, like her sister’s. And someday they might sparkle often.

  “You’ve helped me,” she said. “I needed a place to come where I could think. I needed a place where somebody cared about me, not because they had to, like family, but just because I was a human being. You made me remember that’s what I am. You and your God. Ron made me forget, but you helped me remember.”

  “Don’t forget again,” he said.

  “I’m going to try not to.” She stood. “I’ll get a few groceries, then I’m going back to Ron. For the last time. I’ll be okay,” she added, before he could ask. “He waits till he’s done with work to start his heavy drinking. He’ll really have something to be mad about when he comes home tonight, won’t he?”

  Thomas stood and walked her to the door. “He’ll always find something to be mad about.”

  She paused in the doorway, then shyly rose on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek. “Goodbye. Take care of my sister. And thank you again. You gave me something to hold on to. It’s the first good thing that’s happened to me in a long, long time.”

  She had been gone for minutes before he turned back to his desk. He was glad he had given Ema something to hold on to. He gazed upward, although he had never really believed in a bearded, complacent God on a cloud-borne throne.

  “Does that make me a hypocrite?” he asked out loud. “She’s holding on, and I let go.”

  There was only silence, a greater silence than he had ever heard. But perhaps years ago he had never taken the time to listen for answers, anyway.

  “I don’t know where she is, Ron. I just hope it’s somewhere thousands of miles away.” Garnet held the telephone receiver six inches from her ear. When the torrent of abuse receded she responded. “Try any of those things, Celabraze, and I’ll have you in jail so fast your head will be sp
inning for a week! I’m not my sister. I’d like nothing better than to see you turned into fish bait and fed to the sharks.”

  “Sharks?” Thomas asked, after she had hung up.

  Garnet tried to control the anger that had boiled over at Ron’s accusations. “Big ones. Ema’s left Ron. He went home early, probably got the itch to beat her up before midnight for a change, so he sacrificed drinks number ten through fifteen. Anyway, he found a note. Do you happen to know where she went?”

  “Somewhere she and the girls will be safe.” Thomas poured Garnet a glass of mineral water. The clinic had been open late that evening and, as always, Finn had escorted her right to the church’s front door. Ron’s phone call had come only minutes after her arrival.

  His face was inscrutable, and for once she couldn’t pass it off as vintage Thomas. “So you know? And you’re not going to tell me where?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t want to know. You don’t, either, in case Ron goes to the police and accuses her of kidnapping the children.”

  She told herself he was right. She told herself to be calm. “I don’t think he will. There are too many people who could testify about the way he beat Ema. And he has a whole file drawer to himself at the cop shop. The law would move very slowly to assist Ron Celabraze.”

  “Then a toast might be in order.” He lifted his glass.

  “Ema told you, but not me.”

  He drank alone.

  “Why?” she asked. “I wouldn’t have said ‘I told you so.’ She knows me better than that.”

  He heard the hurt under the anger. Garnet was struggling for control, but the wound was apparent. “She wanted to be sure that you and everybody else knew she was doing it on her own. It was her decision completely.”

  “Then why did she tell you?”

  “I think she needed an objective stamp of approval.”

  “God’s?”

  “Maybe so. I couldn’t give her that, but she got mine.”

  “She thinks you speak for God, Thomas. They all do. I watch their faces on Sunday morning. Those people drift in from the street to hear you preach, and they all think you speak for God.” She stood up and strode to the refrigerator to see what she could make for dinner.