Souls of Fire

by Vanessa Black

  Holding her close, he rocked her gently, mourning the loss of a life he hadn’t come to know and the rupture of a link he hadn’t come to understand, and now never would; and knowing deep down that he could have prevented this tragedy if he had only been braver and had acted more decidedly.

  As he bent down and placed a gentle kiss on her cold lifeless lips, tears of regret rolling silently down his cheeks to glisten upon her beautiful white skin, he felt it.

  A spark!

  It was so weak and had flickered so unsteadily that, for a moment, Aaron thought he might have imagined it. Then he felt it again.

  It was still very weak, but he could tell it was getting a little stronger. Touching his fingers to her wrist, he could at last feel a pulse. Aaron let out a long shaky breath of relief.

  Although he had been able to feel the tiny spark through their connection, he had had to make sure by feeling for her pulse. He still didn’t trust this other strange and utterly alien sense!

  Knowing it would take only minutes for someone to come to her room, having of course heard the thunderous crash of the door being smashed to pieces, Aaron had to figure out what to tell people when they came to investigate the source of the noise.

  Even as he came up with a hopefully convincing story, the first students arrived in the doorway, looking at the ‘scene of the crime’ with shocked and reproachful looks on their faces, as if smashing down female students’ doors was one of his favorite pastimes and something he did with relish.

  “Professor Chambers?” one of the two girls standing in the entryway asked uncertainly. “What happened? Did you run down the door? How … why …?”

  “Is she dead?” the other one interrupted in an incredulous voice.

  “No, she’ll be fine,” Aaron countered in a confident voice.

  “One of the nurses got an anonymous call a few minutes back; the caller said this girl had swallowed a whole bottle of sleeping pills in an attempt to kill herself,” he lied wildly.

  “I happened to come upon the nurse just as she was trying to figure out what to do, and told her I’d get to the girl right away and take care of her. I had to break through the locked door in order to get to her in time. But her pulse is steady, and I’m taking her to the hospital straight away,” Aaron added, hoping his story didn’t sound too much like the flimsy excuse it was.

  Lifting her gently off the bed, he carried her past the gawking girls into the hall. Turning back toward them, he added:

  “If you would be so kind as to let the janitor know, he’ll probably want to replace the door as soon as possible.”

  “As for the pills she swallowed, I’m taking the empty container with to show the doctors what she took. So, there should be no need to go through her personal belongings,” he added as an afterthought, trying to keep anybody from snooping around her room, while supplying the girls with a reasonable explanation for the conspicuous absence of any evidence that would back up his story.

  The girls nodded their understanding and kept on staring at his back as he headed slowly down the hall toward the stairs.

  Having realized on the spot that he couldn’t take her to the hospital, he walked from the building, carefully disappearing into the dark shadows, so that nobody watching would be able to tell in which direction he headed.

  Under normal circumstances, the hospital would have been the first and only place he would have taken her to, seeing as she had nearly escaped death, was still very weak and seemingly dehydrated, and most importantly, had not yet regained consciousness.

  For all he knew, she could be in a coma. Although he had no idea what to do to help her, he was absolutely certain of one thing:

  No hospital could help her!

  It was true that the doctors could restore her weak and dehydrated body.

  They would ask a lot of questions, of course, none of which he would be able to answer to their satisfaction; because he couldn’t tell them about an anonymous call no one could confirm, or that she had taken pills they would be unable to trace in her system.

  Nor could he tell them she had stopped eating or taking fluids, because that would mean his involvement in some way. They would assume he had known about her state of health ― otherwise, how would he have known she needed help? And they would want to know why he had let her get so far without intervening.

  They might even get suspicious enough to contact the police, who would investigate, wanting to know all about his involvement, how he had found her, how he had even known she was in trouble. He had no reasonable explanation, nothing that could be backed up by witnesses. He would have no answer to give them.

  And they wouldn’t accept the truth. Under normal circumstances, he wouldn’t accept it either!

  If his certainty of ending up under suspicion had been the only thing standing in the way of her receiving help, he would have brought her there in a heartbeat.

  She would be on the drip, and her body would recover eventually.

  However, there was something holding him back. It was the same inner voice which had urged him to run to her. The same voice telling him what she needed. Not the hospital, not trained doctors, not medication.

  Him.

  She needed him.

  If he was being honest with himself, he would have to admit that he had sensed it. He had massaged her heart and given her his breath, keeping it up while the minutes silently passed him by. He had felt nothing with either of his senses.

  His sense of touch had detected no pulse; his other sense ― for which he had no earthly name and which he knew nothing about other than that it existed ― had felt no bond.

  It wasn’t until after he had already stopped trying to revive her and was holding her close to his body that she had suddenly and inexplicably found her way back to life.

  Even without this strange inner voice, he knew there was no sane explanation for what had happened; that by all rights, she should be dead! It was that voice, however, that insisted it was because of him. She had eventually returned because of him. Because he had been near her.

  As crazy as it may have sounded, and as difficult as it was for him to accept it, he knew ― and felt ― it to be true! If she was to have a chance at getting healthy again and regaining consciousness, it was he who would have to help her.

  The most the hospital would do was attempt to restore her health while sending him home ― thereby endangering her even more by separating them ― as he was no relative and couldn’t pretend to be her partner without creating new problems.

  Without a clue as to how, exactly, he could help her recover, but convinced it was the right thing to do, he clandestinely ― and for the second time in two weeks ― carried her limp body through the darkness in the direction of his room.

  Chapter 4 * Hurt

  Aaron was at a complete loss as to what to try next.

  He had brought her to his room, laid her on his bed, and had immediately busied himself with caring for her. He had spent the whole weekend feeding her broth and trickling water down her throat in an attempt to make her well again ― never once leaving her side, resting on the bed beside her at night.

  And, indeed, her body seemed less dehydrated already and was slowly beginning to get stronger.

  Yet she had not woken up.

  Her mind seemed to heal more slowly, if at all. He often wondered during those days, if she would ever regain consciousness, or if he had been too late, after all, to save more than just her body.

  Lying beside her on the bed, Sunday evening, after a whole day of taking care of her, of talking to her in an attempt to make her wake up, he wondered what he would do about the oncoming lessons he needed to teach the coming week. He didn’t want to leave her side.

  He dared not leave her side!

  He wasn’t sure how their bond worked, but he was afraid she’d stop breathing the minute he left the room.

  Or, maybe a tad less dramatic: if he stayed away longer than a couple of hours. Which ― in his boo
k ― was still dramatic enough!

  Thinking further ahead about her welfare ― for he would bet, her last shower had been quite a while ago, with her being too weak to care for herself ― he was wondering about the possibility of finding a discreet female care taker, when his gaze roamed over her pale face ― finally coming to rest on her motionless lips.

  Her lips…

  Unexpectedly, he was struck with a wild idea, his pulse speeding up uncontrollably as he pondered it.

  It was something he hadn’t considered before; something he suddenly knew was going to work. He had been so wrapped up, taking care of her and thinking about the coming week, he had completely failed to see the obvious.

  Now that the idea had taken hold in his mind, he couldn’t understand how he hadn’t thought of it before. Having held her body close to his while mourning her loss in her room, he had felt her come back to life the moment their lips had touched.

  Trying to ignore the skeptical little voice inside his head, which ridiculed the very idea, mumbling something incoherent along the lines of ‘Sleeping Beauty, my ass’, Aaron slowly reached out and pulled her body close to his, finally cradling her in his arms.

  She had been wearing a sleeveless top when he had found her, and he could feel the warm naked skin of her arms where it touched against his own bare skin, adding to the heat that had already taken hold of his body.

  Cradling her head in his left hand and leaning in to kiss her, he was once again overcome by desire. Straining to get a grip on this overflowing emotion, he finally managed to rein in the urge he felt and press his lips against hers ever so softly, hesitantly.

  No reaction.

  He kissed her again, still gently, but pressing against her lips with more pressure this time, lingering for a long while.

  Still no reaction.

  Plagued by the thought that he might not be able to bring her back after all, and with the mocking little voice in the back of his head keeping up a steady chorus of ‘told you so’, he crushed her body even tighter to his.

  He had been so positive it would work, that he was all the more frantic by her lack of reaction. In a raw and desperate, last attempt, no longer able to sustain his tight control, he pressed his lips to hers, holding her body against his so tightly, that she wouldn’t have been able to move a muscle, had she been awake.

  Kissing her desperately, brushing his mouth ever so despairingly against her lifeless lips, he waited … and waited … Gradually he relaxed his tight grip on her body, as all hope went up in smoke. He was so lost in his despair that he nearly missed the moment she responded.

  Nearly.

  For nothing could have made him miss the resounding and painful slap when her right hand suddenly shot out of nowhere, hitting him squarely and forcefully in the face.

  At first, I surfaced with agonizing sluggishness from my unconscious state. I had trouble opening my eyes, or more precisely, moving my eyelids at all. They felt as though filled with lead. I just couldn’t manage it!

  It wasn’t until I suddenly became more aware of myself, aware of being crushed to someone’s body, feeling my lips being smothered by ferocious kisses, that I was shocked into full alertness.

  Feeling the other person’s grip on me ease up just then, and finally regaining control of my body, I opened my eyes, pushed the person I now recognized as Aaron Chambers away and smacked him in the face with so much force, that my hand hurt terribly from the blow.

  Completely confused about what I was doing ― with him ― and with no memory of how I’d gotten to be in his company in the first place, I was anxious to get away from him. At the same time I felt outraged at waking up to find him groping and kissing me. Hurriedly I rolled away from him, fuming with anger.

  Intending to get away from him and up from the bed, my body still too weak to carry my weight, I lost my balance and fell to the floor, crying out in a choked voice as my hip hit the hard floor with a painful thud.

  “Ah,” I moaned, reflexively touching my hand to the area on which I had fallen.

  That’s going to bruise, I thought vaguely.

  As I contemplated what to do next, how to get away unharmed, Aaron Chambers jumped off the bed and hurried to my side, a worried expression on his face.

  I automatically threw my arms out in front of me in a protective stance that had him stop in his tracks, his face a mask of disbelief and shock.

  “Wait!” he said, throwing up his arms in surrender and retreating a few measured steps.

  “No … It’s not what you think! I can explain,” he began in a seemingly calm voice that betrayed him by starting to shake.

  “I didn’t mean … I shouldn’t have assumed … that is … I …,” he spluttered, seemingly unable to explain any of it.

  “Please … I’m sorry,” he finally managed, regaining some of his composure. “I didn’t mean to frighten you … and I swear I won’t touch you … in that way … again … Obviously I’ll have to touch you … in order to help you get back on the bed … though.”

  His voice faltered on the last word as I started to shake my head emphatically.

  “You’re not getting me back on that bed,” I spat, the outrage I felt drowning out my fear and seeping into my voice.

  “How dare you!” I confronted him. “Who do you think you are? You think, because you didn’t get your way with me before, you can just waltz in here … and … and …”

  I trailed off, suddenly very aware of not being in my own room. The last thing I remembered was lying in my bed, depressed ― over him ― although I couldn’t recall why I’d felt that way at the time, since it didn’t make any sense to me in the least.

  Upon waking up and feeling him kissing me, I had automatically assumed that he must have come to my room in the middle of the night to take what I had been unwilling to give.

  Now I realized I was in his room again! Why did I keep ending up here? Was it fate or bad luck, I wondered. Or both?

  “What did you do to me, you sick bastard? Why am I in your room?” I shouted at him, the anger, and fear I felt making my voice shake uncontrollably.

  “Let me go this minute! If you don’t let me go … right now … I’ll scream …”

  Before Aaron Chambers had a chance to respond, the next hysterical torrent of words flowed from my mouth.

  “I swear … if you lay one finger on me again, I’m going to … I’ll …,” I started hissing at him.

  But what exactly I was going to do stuck in my throat as I realized there was absolutely no way on earth I could ever take him on. He was so much stronger than I was; and that was on a normal day. Today I felt weak as never before.

  Suddenly feeling it might be unwise to threaten and curse him, seeing, as I was ― entirely ― unable to deal with the consequences of ticking him off, I tried to check my anger, attempting to stay calm.

  If worst came to worst, if he attacked me again, I would fight until my last breath! But until he tried anything to hurt me, I might as well remain calm and save the last bit of strength I still had left, I mused.

  Taking a deep steadying breath, I looked up into his face, and felt my heart plummet. I had expected him to look either enraged or completely unmoved by what I had said; at the very least, I’d expected an exhibition of mockery at the idea of my standing up to him.

  But his expression held none of the reactions I had expected. I was completely unprepared for the emotions I could see not only mirrored in his eyes, but etched in every line of his face.

  They even affected his behavior … the way he backed away from me suddenly and turned his back in an obvious attempt not to let his feelings show, trying to regain control. But he had been too slow to conceal the hurt and betrayal showing in his eyes.

  There could be no other explanation for what I’d seen. Wishing to God there were because then I could go on despising him without second thought and without feeling guilty, I tried to come to grips with his reaction.

  He had been hurt by something
I’d said. Well, not exactly by the things I’d said, but by what my words had implied. I had implied that he’d done something to me, drugged me perhaps, and abducted me so that he could have his way with me.

  The word ‘rape’ hadn’t needed to be spoken aloud for it to hover between us uncomfortably. Who could blame me? I thought. The last time I had seen him, he had only reluctantly let me go. And tonight I woke up to find him groping wildly at me. And I was in his room! What was I supposed to think?

  Now, his behavior and the hurt he had involuntarily shown at my implication, suggested that I must have been mistaken about his intentions after all.

  I could understand his being hurt by my false accusation, although he should have been merely slightly hurt. What I couldn’t understand in the least, was the betrayal I had clearly seen in his eyes.

  Why should he feel betrayed by me, or more accurately, by what I thought of him? I didn’t owe him my good opinion. We weren’t friends, we certainly weren’t more. And the bond I felt at times was nothing of consequence to me; besides, he couldn’t feel it anyway.

  As far as I was concerned, I didn’t owe him a damn thing! So, why this act of feeling betrayed?

  But even as I thought it, I knew I didn’t really believe it to be an act. I sensed it was genuine, which made me feel all the more baffled … and guilty, even if I had no idea what I was supposed to feel guilty about.

  Even as I was pondering what to say, I heard his quiet voice interrupt the silence.

  “You’re free to leave whenever you feel like it … I … had no intention of keeping you here … against your will,” he said softly, his back still turned.

  I didn’t know what to respond. All I felt like doing was disappear from his radar. I was now convinced that he meant me no harm. Had he wanted to rape me, he could easily have done so by now.

  All of a sudden, I felt terrible, ashamed of having falsely accused him. On top of that, I felt utterly embarrassed by the weak state I was in and by my grimy appearance.