Faerie Tale (16 page)

August days are dog days, when Sirius, the Dog Star, rises. In baseball, with the long season two-thirds completed, the heat and humidity begin to take their toll. Averages dip and pitchers’ arms begin to wear out; chronic injuries become acute and teams start to look to the minors or to trades with other teams for that player to fill the gap; front-runners begin their slides and teams talking World Series at the end of July by September first are saying, “Wait till next year.” A team holding the division lead throughout August is a good team.

Gabbie dreaded August, for behind August came September, and with September would come the decision: return to California or stay in Pittsville. Already August was a week gone, and time felt as if it flew by. She and Jack had talked, but there was something preventing either of them from making the commitment that would keep her in New York. Gabbie felt suddenly frightened as she turned straw with a pitchfork. She halted her work in the barn and leaned upon the handle of the fork, thinking. Jack had gone to New York City with Aggie, to meet with the members of some committee or another. He’d been gone for a week and it had given Gabbie a chance to reflect. She was in love with Jack, or at least she felt more for him than she ever had for any other boy she had known. And that caused her concern. Was she in love? Sometimes she felt like a little kid and everything scared her. She had made her way through life with an ability to hide her fears from others, to look calm and collected, even tough. Through private school she had been the object of scorn by most of the other girls, both for her good looks and for her money, but her protective façade never broke. Gabbie could be bleeding inside, but she’d never
let on. But just because she didn’t show it didn’t mean she wasn’t hurting.

In high school she’d had only one serious boyfriend, Danny. Gabbie had thought herself in love with him. He had seemed different from most other boys. She had thought the relationship would endure beyond his leaving for college. After he’d enrolled at Stanford, she had three letters from him. The third one had told her he had met another girl.

Gabbie’s face flushed in memory. She had flown into a rage, jumped into her car, and driven north, stopping only once for gas. She had her Porsche clocked at over 120 miles an hour at several points along Interstate 5, and had made the trip to Palo Alto in under five hours. She had stormed around Stanford until almost one in the morning, when Danny came back to his dorm from seeing his new girl. The confrontation had been humiliating. Danny’s new relationship was nothing but sex. Gabbie and Danny had never had intercourse. Their love play had always ended with Gabbie having to hold him at bay. In their last few weeks together they had passed the heavy-petting stage, each bringing the other to climax, but Gabbie still refused to permit the final act. Somehow she couldn’t let Danny inside of her, as if to do so would be an admission that it was love. And this girl had slept with him on the first date. He was totally infatuated with her, sexually obsessed, and regarded Gabbie as an unwelcome intrusion from his past, best disposed of quickly and without tenderness. He had called her a prude and a cock-teaser, then described in graphic detail the sexual antics of his new girl, as if her willingness to engage in them somehow proved her love for him. Gabbie had fled in shame and pain.

She’d expected to catch hell from her dad and Gloria, but they had been wonderful, offering support and no criticism over her flying off the handle. She had never communicated with Danny again. Now she understood that her reaction had been wounded pride and possessiveness. The jealousy that had attacked unexpectedly at the
Fourth of July picnic had been something completely different, a terror at the thought of losing Jack.

Gabbie resumed turning the hay and smiled at the thought of Jack. There was such a difference between Jack and Danny. Danny had been a nice boy, most of the time, but he’d been a boy. Jack was a gentle and loving man. He never spoke about Ginger, the girl down in Atlanta, except to answer a direct question from Gabbie. He had told Gabbie he was a little beat up from that relationship, and she attributed his reluctance to speak of the future to that. Whenever Gabbie would become concerned about tomorrow, all Jack would say was, “It will work out.”

Gabbie thought, Damn right it will work out, Jack Cole. Feeling a sudden surge of strong feelings for him, she found her eyes brimming with moisture. Damn it, she did love him. And she knew that soon she was going to drag him off someplace and make love. He’d never pressed and never accused, seemingly satisfied to take his lead from her. Twice now she’d regretted his not being a little more commanding. Ever since that first walk in the woods, since that night at Aggie’s, she would have let Jack make love to her. But the fact of his restraint only served to make her more sure of his being just the right man to be her first—and maybe only—lover. Gabbie took a deep breath, suddenly aware she was nervous. Jack was due back in an hour or two and Gabbie considered that this might be the night.

Gabbie finished freshening the straw in the stalls and put the fork away. The horses were out in the pasture and this time of year stayed out at night, but the hay still got moldy. The boys had taken another riding lesson before their regular afternoon ball game. Gabbie was surprised to discover how much she enjoyed teaching them. When she had arrived from Arizona, the twins had been six, cute but underfoot a lot. Now they were turning into regular little guys, complete with personalities. They even managed to complete the small chores given them around the barn with a minimum of grumbling. Despite their teasing her about Jack, they seemed to hold their older
half sister and her boyfriend in genuine affection and showed gratitude after each lesson. And she loved them, despite a maddening tendency on their part to barge into the bathroom without knocking. Several leisurely baths had been terminated with Gabbie throwing bath sponges at one brother or the other.

Gabbie wiped perspiration from her brow. She didn’t know if she’d ever get used to the humidity after years in the dry heat of Arizona and Los Angeles. The unexpected summer showers were alien to her, and the one that morning had been a beauty. Even in the early evening, with the sun dipping behind the hills to the west, it was like a steam bath in the barn. She pulled at her shirt, letting the air in. She rarely wore a bra, and the air felt cool on her breasts. She unbuttoned her shirt and flapped it, allowing the evaporating moisture to cool her. She regarded herself as the cooling caused chill bumps to form on her breasts. Not as big as Sheila Riley’s, maybe, but not so bad, she thought, absently touching herself. As her fingers passed over her nipples they came erect, and she thought of Jack. “Christ,” she muttered aloud, “I’ve got sex on the brain.”

A noise caused Gabbie to freeze. It had been a laugh. She spun around, rapidly covering herself. She sought the source of the sound and glanced up at the hayloft, hidden in the almost evening gloom. “Is someone up there?” From within the shadows a laugh erupted, boyish in timbre. “Sean? Patrick?” Again the laugh. “Are you monsters spying on me?” Her tone was angry and she felt herself blush.

The laugh continued, and suddenly Gabbie was afraid. It wasn’t Sean or Patrick. There was something unnerving, almost mad, in the sound. Gabbie was turning toward the barn door when a whispering, musical voice said, “Hold, and abide awhile, Gabrielle.”

Gabbie whirled and beheld a boy, no more than fourteen or fifteen from his appearance, hunkering down at the edge of the hayloft. He was partly hidden by shadows. “How … ? Who are you?”

The boy jumped, and Gabbie felt her heart skip. She
regarded the drop, over twelve feet, but he landed like a gymnast coming off the high bar, both feet planted firmly on the ground. He wore an odd-looking pair of trousers, of coarse linen, it appeared, tied with a thong. They reminded her of the hospital pants worn by some of the kids at school. He was barefooted and bare-chested, and he stood slightly taller than she. His body was muscled, but smoothly, less like a man’s than an athletic boy’s, and his hair was a tangle of brown curls, of a color different from anything she had seen, looking like nothing as much as the color of tree bark. His face was young, but odd—high cheekbones, a high brow, almost cruel lips, and wide, deep eyes. The blue of those eyes struck her, and she was certain she had seen them before. Softly, feeling confused, she said, “Who … are you?”

“A wanderer, a seeker, fair one.” He stared at her, his eyes passing over her body as if caressing her. His expression was appraising, openly desirous. “Do not leave yet, for your society is most pleasing.” He spoke in a funny way, with an accent impossible to place but somehow familiar. He reached out, and Gabbie’s heart skipped again, and she felt terror building within her. She was on the verge of crying out, or running, but was somehow unable to accomplish either. The youth touched her hair, then her cheek. As his fingertips brushed her face, Gabbie’s body tensed, for a thrill ran down her neck, between her breasts, to her groin. Her nipples hardened again and her body flushed with heat as she trembled. The odor of flowers and spices assailed her nostrils and her head swam.

Teetering she stood while the youth walked around her. Gabbie was unable to follow him, as if her head refused to turn and her eyes were fixed forward. From behind her the youth leaned toward her until his face was next to her cheek, his chin resting upon her shoulder. Softly he said, “I would not have troubled you, Gabrielle, save that your longing sings to me. Your heat is felt and, being felt, warms my desires.” He giggled, a sound that caused a shiver to run up Gabbie’s spine. “Pleasing, your form is a delight to my senses. To you shall I return such
delight, for your needs are as apparent to me as a storm in the sky is to the raven.” She felt his hand press against the small of her back, then slide down over her right buttock. She shook, unable to move, trapped like a deer in the headlights of an oncoming car at night. Her mind shrieked and yet she could make no sound; and from deep within, a desire was building. The youth moved in front of her and she saw him clearly again. He wore nothing beneath the trousers, and she could see he was in a state of arousal. His eyes were electric, a blue like flashing lightning. His boyish features were masked by a shadow of ages, both childlike and ancient. He was beautiful and terrifying to gaze upon. He moved close to her, and all she could see were his eyes. Blue, like the shimmering surface of lapis lazuli, like perfect ice, his eyes drank her will. His voice caressed her, soft and sensual. “Shall such a flower wither for want of tending? Nay,” he whispered in her ear. His hot breath blew over her cheek and ear and she shuddered. “If the bloom is to be lost, then it shall not wither, it shall be plucked. Come, follow, child.” He gave her a small push and she found herself moving toward the barn door. The youth half skipped, half danced, reaching the door a moment before her. He paused to glance out and, satisfied that nothing was amiss, pushed wide the barn door. Gabbie found herself moving despite any wish of her own.

Her mind felt detached from her body, robbed of any volition. She moved in rhythms odd and jerky, as if whatever commanded her was unused to her body. Her body? her mind wondered. She fought to halt, and felt her body held at the door of the barn.

The youth spun to face her, a smile of searing heat burning her eyes like the crack of lightning. In a voice like music he said, “You know your desires. Do not pause. Come, come with me.” He made an airy gesture with his hand, a lazy half circle, and said, “Listen, listen, Gabrielle.”

From the distance came the sound of music, a sobbing melody so lovely it brought tears to Gabbie’s eyes. Grand themes overwhelmed her, though the sound was little
more than a quintet, a harp and three flutes, with another, unrecognized woodwind. Still, it swept over her like a wave, freeing emotions that came flowing up from some place deep within. Gabbie cried, for the song was too lovely to be mortal, both wonderful and sad. It was the loveliest song she had ever heard and the most melancholy.

Then the theme of the music turned sprightly, a jaunty tune of merry syncopations. Gabbie felt her body respond, felt her pulse quicken, as she moved in time to the music, half walking, half dancing behind the strange young man. He turned and capered around her, and from somewhere he produced pipes, four reed flutes fastened together. He played in counterpoint to the music, and Gabbie felt like laughing, yet it was an urge to a laughter caught between joy and insanity. A tiny part of her stood aloof, attempting to sort out the madness that had enveloped her, but that lonely part was the only logical being in an insane universe, for everything around Gabbie had become fey.

The barn looked blurry, as if seen through a smeared glass, and the light in the sky was electric, a searing blue vibrant with energies never seen, only felt. The trees rustled in the breeze and they spoke in an ancient language. Even the mud beneath her feet seemed lovely, a moist and warm carpet to dance across.

The boy moved through the pasture, Gabbie at his side. She was a puppet, a marionette whose strings he deftly manipulated. She found herself spinning, making running circles as when she had been a child, moving for the sheer and simple joy of movement. A gleeful sound echoed her own laugh and she saw the boy grinning at her.

Seemingly without effort, he vaulted the fence with but one hand upon the top of a post. Gabbie climbed, but even that normally awkward movement was in time with the song, all rhythm and harmony. He led her into the woods, into the cool green of the forest. And in the gentle evening the trees sang and Gabbie listened.

Never had the woods looked like this, alive, throbbing
with life and energies she could see. The gloom became soft sheltering darkness, transparent to her eyes, as a new dimension was revealed to her. She could see every branch and leaf, and every tree, each unique. She saw that there was another world, a hidden world, contained within, surrounded by, the world of her birth. She knew that this other world had always been there, but that she had never before been able to perceive it. Now, in the midst of this mad and joyous dance, she could see that other world. And in the darkness the boy glowed with his own faint blue light.