The Way of Sorrows
Page 50
“I know.”
“We still need you. Now more than ever. Please come back to us.”
“Sorry. When an angel’s light dies, it’s gone forever.”
“You’re here with me, now.”
“No, I’m not here. You, me, LP’s bar . . . it’s nothing but a collection of imagined images flowing through the neural network of your brain.”
“You never learned how to properly chat up a girl, did you?”
“I guess not.”
“But you’ll always be here where I can find you, yeah?”
“Sure, this joint was always my favorite bar in this town. But I’m afraid it will always be the same imagination. It can never change. Rules and regs, you know?”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
Harper finished his glass, stood, and fumbled through his pockets. He pulled out some francs to pay for the drinks and dropped them on the bar. He picked up his mackintosh, put it on, and stuffed his hands in the pockets.
“I have to go, now, Madame Taylor. Good-bye.”
“Harper, find a way to come back to us, please.”
“I can’t come back, Madame Taylor, not the way I was. That’s just the way it is with my kind.”
He walked out the door of LP’s Bar.
• • •
That’s where the imagination always ended. And Katherine would either fall asleep, or find herself staring at the midday sky, or reading a book with Max, or doing any of the things she did these days as the mother of a little boy. This time, she was in Lausanne Cathedral, listening to Ella’s music as it sounded through the nave and rose to the cloud of light hovering in the high vault. A new imagination was born in the neural network of Katherine’s brain. The cloud of light stirred to the cello’s voice as if drawing breath. Then tiny sparks broke from the cloud and became tongues of fire. They descended like sacred things onto all souls gathered in Lausanne Cathedral.
I can’t come back, not the way I was. That’s just the way it is with my kind.
Katherine Taylor smiled.
THANKS
To David Rosenthal and Blue Rider Press for their guidance and support. To Georgina Capel for believing in the dream from the beginning; to my cats and dog for keeping me laughing; to Afnan, whose brilliance through the darker days got me to the end.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jon Steele was born in the American Northwest. He has worked as a keyboard player in a rock band, postman, liquor store clerk, waiter, radio disc jockey, and TV news cameraman. His autobiography, War Junkie, published in 2003, is regarded as a cult classic of war reporting. The Watchers was his first novel, published in 2012 as part one of The Angelus Trilogy. Angel City was published in 2013. Steele currently lives in Switzerland.
ALSO BY JON STEELE
FICTION
Angel City
The Watchers
NONFICTION
War Junkie
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