When Angels Cry (28 page)

Chapter Twenty

Bastian and Kaylee walked to the art studio entrance.  As snow
blew around
them in thick flakes, he held open the front door and followed her inside.  She glanced at all the Christmas decorations that Rosie had carefully put up, from a tree in the corner to lights in the windows.

“How does your classroom look?” Kaylee asked.  “I haven’t been inside since the last time we were here.”

Bastian shrugged.  “You’ll just have to wait and see, won’t you?  It’s been a great place to hide your Christmas presents.”

“My presents?”  Kaylee smiled weakly and swayed slightly.

Fearing she might lose her balance, Bastian wrapped his arm around her.  “Yeah.  Good old St. Nick asked if you’d been good this year.  I said,
‘
Oh, yeah, baby, has she ever.
’
”  He frowned, wishing she didn’t look so damned pale.

“Well, if it ain’t the two lovebirds.”  Rosie st
epped from behind her desk.

“In the flesh,” Kaylee replied, embracing her.  “But you should be off today.  It’s Christmas Eve.”

Patting her back, Rosie replied, “I’m just about out the door, girl.  Bastian said he’d be bringing you here today, and I hadn’t had the chance to give you my gift.”

“You didn’t have to get us anything,” Kaylee protested softly.

“I wanted to.  Besides, you’ve had five new students sign up in the last two days.  Here are their names and phone numbers.  I expect you’ll be se
e
ing them Monday.”  She pulled out a sheet of paper from her desk. 

Bastian arched his eyebrow as he took the list.  As he read through the names, he shook his head.  “Wow, that tops each class at 30 students.  I’m not sure we can add more.”

“We’ll find room if we need to,” Katie argued, leaning against him.

Bastian shrugged.  “Hell, I’m not even sure what brought them in.”

“You did.  Rosie’s told me that students are singing your praises up and down.  Everyone wants to be in one of your classes.”  Kaylee faced him and offered a slight smile.

“Both your presents went together, so I wrapped ‘em together.”  Rosie opened one of her desk drawers and
handed Kaylee
a small red and gold bag. 

“You shouldn’t have, but thanks.” 
Bastian
watched Kaylee pluck the gold tissue paper from the bag and pull out two toothbrushes.  The pink one had a handle shaped like the torso of a female, and the blue one resembled a male’s lower half. 

“Rosie
!
”  Blushing, Kaylee
gaped
at her friend. 

“
Cleanliness
is next to
Godliness
.”  Rosie laughed, clapping her hands. 

“But just look at these.”  Kaylee pointed the blue toothbrush at her.

Placing one hand on her hip and waggling a finger, Rosie replied, “I did look at ‘em when I bought ‘em.  Besides, it don’t say nothin’ in the good book ‘bout what you use to be clean
—and
there ain’t nothing here you ain’t seen before, up close and personal.”

Bastian took the toothbrushes.  “That’s true,” Bastian said, examining the blue one.  “
T
hey’re even anatomically correct, unlike Barbie and Ken
—although
it does give new meaning to the term ‘oral sex.’”

“Give me those
!
”  The flush lining Kaylee’s cheeks deepened
, and s
he jerked the brushes from Bastian and put them back in the bag.

“Don’t be so grabby, woman.”  Bastian shook his finger at her.

“Careful, there.  She might be grabby in those ‘anatomically
correct places you mentioned.”  Rosie admonished, walking behind her desk. 

Bastian smiled.  “Oh
,
no
--d
on’t touch me privates.”

Kaylee’s eyes widened
,
and she focused on shoving the tissue back into the bag.

Rosie said, “You’d best handle his privates in private.  It ain’t that kind of studio you’re running here.”

Kaylee shook her head. 
“I’ll consider that.
 
Remind me never to get the two of you together again.”

Bastian winked at Rosie
as she
on her coat.  He took the bag and wrapped his arm around Kaylee.   “I’ll do that, my dear.”  Now why don’t we go take a tour of the studio?”

“Good idea.”  Kaylee let him lead her down the hallway
where
Bastian pulled a handkerchief from his jacket p
ocket and folded it into
a makeshift blindfold.

“What are you doing?”

He kissed her nose.  “Keeping you surprised.”  He then
tied the blindfold over her eyes
.  “Can you see?”

“Gee, there is a dark cloth over my eyes.  What do you think?”  Kaylee folded her arms across her chest.

“Good.  Now I can have my way with you,” Bastian replied as he opened the door and led her into the studio.    He flipped on the light switch.

“You’ve had your way with me numerous times and didn’t need a blindfold before.”  Kaylee clutched his hand, keeping him close.

“Guys look for opportunities.  Didn’t you know that?”  He wrapped his arm around her
, leading
her
into the room
toward his desk where a huge painting of the two of them hung on the wall
, a
matching photo was tucked into
one
corner of
its
frame.  It was the only picture he had of the two of them together.  On a shelf next to the portrait stood the vase Bastian had mended long ago.

“Close your eyes.”  Bastian removed the blindfold
, and he watched h
er face
. 
“Okay, you can open them now.”

Her eyelids fluttered, and s
he stared at the painting.  “Oh my
God,” she whispered, as her hand came to her mouth and touched her lips.  Her eyes glistened.

Bastian smiled and pointed to the painting.  “No, that’s not a portrait of God.  He looks way better than I do.”

“You
did
this?”  Kaylee stepped toward the painting,
moving
slowly, as though
sleepwalking
.  She pulled out the picture. 

He stepped behind her. 
“For
you.  Merry Christmas, Love.”

Kaylee wrapped her arms around him.  “God, I love you.”

“There’s something else I want to show you
—something
I fixed.”   He gently released her and went to the shelf where the vase waited
.
  As he took it i
n his hand and walked toward her.

“What is it?” she asked weakly as he put it in her hand and curled her fingers around it.

“All fixed.”  His hand lingered there and when she looked up at him he wished once again, his love had the power to fix her.

* * *

It was after midnight when Kaylee woke from a restless slumber, more exhausted than ever from dancing with all her demons.  Tonight, one of them was winning, no matter how she looked at it.

Slowly
,
Kaylee sat up and peered at Bastian
, who slept without stirring,
his chest rising and falling with the ebb and flow of tranquility.  A
swatch
of moonlight
spilled across
his face, highlighting his skin.  His lips parted slightly as though he were conversing with his dreams, and Kaylee smiled, wondering if she were in them.

As Bastian slept, he appeared younger, as though time had not leaned so heavily on him.  The usual tell-tale crow’s feet that appeared when he laughed or frowned
had
disappeared
amid
smooth
er
skin, and the cold Celtic
cross
adorning his chest shimmered in the light, lending a warmth to his skin.  His arm still lay beside her, and she remembered holding his hand just before she’d drifted to sleep.

That same swatch
of moonlight shone on his long, graceful fingers.  Curious, Kaylee turned his palm so she could see his lifeline, and the path her finger traced in the groove of his palm was severed not once but twice, matching the life that Bastian had led up until this point. 

He had loved his mother and lost her
.  N
ow, Kaylee had come into his life only to die, once again reminding him that the spirit of love was eternal.  Physical love was not.  As Kaylee thought about her own mortality, a new
,
darker fear suddenly consumed her.  Bastian had been broken by love once–his mother’s death had almost killed him.  He’d been willing to throw it all away, to fire a bullet into his brain if it
meant silencing t
he ache.  Would he be strong enough when she died?

In careful silence, she slipped off the bed and over to the dresser, her fingers latching onto the top drawer handle and pulling
the handle
out before she'd thought about it, knowing what she would find buried under the boxer shorts and socks–Bastian’s gun.  She gently pushed and prodded until her fingers touched the unforgiving steel.  Despite the way she tried to tell herself it was just a gun, the way she tried to make herself believe it couldn’t hurt him unless he chose
as much
, she couldn’t stop shaking.  God help her, that was what she feared most
.  Would h
e cho
o
se
that
after she died
?
 

Trying to still her trembling fingers, she slowly lifted the gun from his drawer, mesmerized by the way the
metal
flashed in the moonlight as she held the gun by the butt with two fingers.  Holding this gun, k
nowing what it meant to Bastian and
what he’d often planned to use it for, made it that much harder not to slip to the window and throw it outside.  Still, she knew that if he truly wished to destroy himself, he didn’t need
a
gun.  He could pick a different method.  Either way, what difference
would
it make in the end?

Kaylee brought the gun over into the moonlight and  touched the barrel, its steel warmer than she would have thought, as though it possessed a
head and a
life of its own.  She felt
her
breath catch in her throat
.  W
ith her other hand
,
she covered her mouth, stifling the
rising
horror she felt.  As she weighed the gun in her palm, it shifted and tumbled from her grip to the floor.

Bastian abruptly sat up. 
“Kaylee?  What’s going on?”
 

Kaylee scrambled to the floor and lightly patted the carpet, searching for the gun, but the darkness hid it.

“Kaylee?
  Where are you?
” Bastian
asked
, dangling his legs over the side of the bed as he brushed his fingers through his hair and blinked. 

“Down here,” she finally said.  “I dropped my earring.” She reached under the bed and frantically tried to find the gun, but her hand found only the push carpet.

“Why are you worried about your earring now?
  Why don’t you come back to bed?
”  He stepped to her, knelt, and stroked her back. 

With one last sweep under the bed, Kaylee’s fingers brushed the barrel.  She latched onto it, dragging it back to her.  As her fingers closed around the handle, Bastian reached for her hand and stumbled across the truth of her search.

“What the hell?”  With both hands, he pried the .38 from her grip, strode to the dresser
,
and buried the gun under his clothes before slamming the drawer closed so hard the mirror attached to the dresser shuddered.  Clenching his teeth, he focused on the frantic pounding of his heart and
how
each breath seemed
to come
faster
,
as though he’d run a race.  He peered at his
own haunted
wavering
expression o
ver the dresser top,
he
could still see the teenager his father had said would never make it.  Closing his eyes, he whirled.

“Why did you have the gun out?”  His voice, barely above a whisper, sounded thick with fatigue and emotion.

“I…I don’t know.”  Kaylee hurried back to the bed,  buried herself in the covers, and wished she could go back to sleep.