Intaglio: Dragons All The Way Down (13 page)

‘Not with Cole
here…’

She blinked in
confusion.  For a moment it seemed that she was somewhere else entirely, and
then the feeling was gone.  This was Thomas – ‘my Thomas’ – and he was kissing
her – really kissing her – for the first time.  He stroked her face, his eyes
intent on hers, his gaze holding her in place. 

“Tell me what
you want of me, Ava,” he said. 

Again the
sensation rose inside her, that feeling that he’d said exactly this sometime
before.  She took a shaking breath, feeling everything – the rain, his body
against her, her mother waiting at home, furious – all poised on this moment. 
Like a single drop of water poised atop a blade’s edge, able to go one way or
the other, the moment shifted slightly.  The decision changed.

“I… I want you.”

: : : : : : : :
: :

They lay tangled
in sheets, the steady patter of the rain outside wrapping them in a staticky
buzz.  Ava’s face was against Cole’s chest, listening to the steady thump.  She
ran a nervous hand up his ribs, pausing atop his heart.  She should tell him.

“I uh... I
should probably let you know I had a bit of a disagreement with your dad
tonight,” she said timidly.

“You what?” 
Cole asked, his voice disbelieving.

“I kind of…” her
voice dropped, “told him off.”

Cole did nothing
at all, his whole body waiting silent, and then suddenly he was laughing
raucously.  Ava felt him shaking with mirth, the sound leaving her smiling.

“So, uh… that’s
okay with you then?” Ava asked, shifting to prop herself next to him on the
pillow.

“Marta keeps
telling me I have to start standing up for myself.  So I certainly can’t hold
it against you.”

Ava nodded,
tipping her face toward him, but he didn’t kiss her right away. He ran his
fingers over her face, tracing her features the way he’d done when sculpting
her, expression solemn.

“I love you,
Ava,” he said, the palm of his hand resting against the curve of her chin.

She nodded.

“Love you too,”
she answered, leaning her cheek into his hand.  “I’m really glad you’re
starting to talk to your dad.  Even if it means yelling.”

Cole nodded, a
pained look passing across his features like a cloud blocking the sun.

“We were talking
about the time before Hanna died,” Cole began, his voice growing quiet, “Dad
was giving the same old line about everything being great... just bullshit, all
of it!  This time though... this time I just called him on it.  Told him I
didn’t agree.  That he hadn’t been there enough to even know.” 

Cole’s arms
curled around Ava, his face next to her ear, leaning against her as he talked. 

“Dad just kind
of freaked out.  Refused to hear it.  I told him how Mom used to be.  About the
way she was when he was gone… about her staying in bed all day, crying all the
time, not being able to function.  And then,” his voice broke, “Marta brought
up the term ‘clinical depression’ and Dad just flipped.  He started yelling,
like totally lost it!  He stormed out of the office.  God, Ava, I was so
upset.  Marta wanted me to talk to her… about what had happened with Dad and I
tried, but I was so fucking angry.  I was yelling too.”

His words
disappeared and he turned his face against her hair.  Ava felt his sobs.  It
was like his chest was ticking as the sound tried to burst out.

“Shh...” she
whispered, hands running up and down his back, face next to his.  “It’s okay. 
You did good, Cole.  I’m proud of you.  Love you.”

After a minute,
his breathing returned to normal.  He rubbed his face with one hand, eyes red.

“You’re pretty
awesome, you know?” he said roughly.

Ava smiled,
laying down against him once more, sleep tugging at her senses.

“Together, we’re
pretty awesome,” she answered, lids dropping closed.

Cole’s dream
started as it always did: he sat next to her body, seconds before her death. 

“I love you,
Ava,” he gasped. “I have always loved you... I always will.”

She didn’t
answer, of course; that wasn’t part of the dream.  Cole waited for the moment, his
gaze on the slant of sunlight in her eyes, like a clear stream slowly dulling
with silt.  Ava lay still and cold, the shallow rise and fall of her chest
slowing with each breath, her hand icy despite the growing warmth of the
day.    As he watched (as he always did), her eyes dilated outward until they
were no longer blue but black, unseeing.

“No... please,
god, no...” he cried.  “Don’t leave me.”

Sobs heaved from
his chest, the ache spreading inside him until pain was all he was.  He had no
shell any longer, nothing to hold back the deluge that drowned him where he
knelt.  She was gone from him.  Lost forever.

“Hullo…?” 

The voice came
from the distant trees.  Cole’s face bobbed up at the sound.  He’d never dreamt
that before.  A lone figure appeared in the haze of blue shadows, like a diver
slowly rising from the depths.  It was a woman coming from further up the
beach, her steps slow and steady.

She cupped her
hand around her mouth and called out to him as she reached the tree line.

“D’you need some
help there?”

Cole sat up,
wiping his face with his hands, his heart hammering against the walls of his
chest.  There was something about the woman’s build, her fair hair – brown on
top, but sun-bleached caramel at the bottom of her braid – and her gait as she
walked, half-hidden in the shadows of the canopy that had his chest tightening
with anticipation.

“Can I bring you
some help?” the woman called. 

 ‘It can’t be…’

“Can she be
moved?” she asked, louder now.  “There are others up the beach.   I could get some’un
to help you.”

Cole laid Ava’s
hand back against her chest with trembling fingers.  He climbed shakily to his
feet, his voice breaking with grief and hope. 

“There’s no
point,” he managed to answer.  “She’s already gone.”

The woman
stepped forward, her appearance leaving no room for doubt. 

‘Hanna…’
  He’d never
dreamt this before.  She was new and it terrified him.

She walked
toward him, her eyes on Ava’s stilled form.  As she neared, she lifted her eyes
to Cole, the expression so exactly his sister it nearly took him to his knees. 
It was Hanna Thomas as she’d been in life, the light humour and joy in her
features so right that it left his throat aching with tears.

“You came back,”
he croaked, eyes brimming with tears of grief for Ava, and joy for his sister’s
return.  It made no sense, but she was here.  She was alive.

The woman’s face
rippled in confusion. She glanced over her shoulder as if expecting someone
else to be there.  When she turned back, she gave him a sympathetic smile.

“Others survived,”
she said, her brogue the only difference to his sister’s voice.  “They’re up
there on the beach now.” 

She offered her
open palm and Cole reached out unsteadily for his sister’s hand.  She closed
her fingers around his hand, squeezing three times. 
‘I love you…’ 
Cole
opened his mouth to speak, but only a sob came out.

“You’re not
alone,” she said gently, pulling him away from Ava, her fingers tight around
his.  “There are others who’ve made it to the shore.  Come…”

: : : : : : : :
: :

Ava floated above
the field, watching the three figures: two standing, one laying, unmoving, on
the ground.  The snake and the coins were visible below her, the curve of the
river echoing with Delft blue, Davy’s green in the swirl of the sea grass.  As
she watched, two of the figures turned and walked down the beach, leaving her –
in the air, on the grass – alone. 

‘Wait for me!’
she called. 
‘Wait!’

But her cry was
only the wind, her voice lost in the calling of sea birds in the sky.

: : : : : : : :
: :

Ava woke alone in
the charcoal hues of pre-dawn, the bed beside her empty and cold.  The room was
dimly lit with greenish light coming from the window that overlooked the
ocean.  Within the window frame there was a silhouette. 

“Cole…?”

His shadow
turned toward her, but didn’t leave his place.

“Sorry,” he
answered.  “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

Ava squinted,
unnerved by his voice.  His voice was slightly different.  Thicker somehow,
like he’d been coughing or crying.

“Cole,” she
called hesitantly.  “Is something wrong?”

He laughed (or
sobbed,) she couldn’t tell, not without seeing his face.  He turned back to the
window, putting his hand against the pane.  Staring out into the slow bloom of
dawn.

“I dreamt about
her,” he said brokenly. 
‘Crying then,’
her mind observed. 

“About?”

“About Hanna,”
he said, leaning in to the window.  Ava realized he was looking out to the
cliffs far beyond the beach, where Hanna had defied death by jumping, and Cole
had waited for her at the bottom.  “I… I haven’t dreamed about her once… not once…
since she died.”  He shuddered, his forehead pressing against the pane.  “But I
dreamed of her tonight.”

Ava slid under
the sheets, soft warmth giving way to crisp cold.  She took hesitant steps
across the room.  When she reached the window, Cole dropped a hand down from
the glass, reaching out for her with chilled fingers.  As with the night
before, a hint of memory, hidden in the dark waters of her mind, slid toward
the light, like a fish about to surface, fading before she could get a glimpse
of what it was.  This moment was too pressing, Cole’s pain too sharp.

“What did you
dream?”

This close, she
could see his expression.  A smile flickered at the edges of his lips.

“I dreamed of
the field after the storm.”  He gazed at her, then back to his vigil at the
window.  “I dreamed of the snake and the coins.”

Ava felt the
other sense tug once more, moving closer to the shallows of her conscious
mind.  Her eyebrows pulled together in concentration as she following his line
of sight to the seascape and the rocky peaks beyond.  There’d been something
she’d dreamed too, but every time she pulled it forward, it faded once more.

“My painting,”
she breathed.

Cole’s fingers
tightened around hers.

“The dream I had
after Hanna died.  The same one… but this time it didn’t end.”

Ava turned in
shock, her hand slipping out of his fingers, rising in surprise.

“It didn’t end?”
she gasped.  “But… but how?”

Cole's laughed
tiredly.

“I dunno,” he
said with a shrug.  “But usually it’s the same: me on the grass, and you.  But this
time, instead of ending, there was more…”

Cole continued
talking but Ava’s mind skittered feverishly with the news.  The thing under the
water of her mind was very close.  She could feel its scales, could run her
hand over the shape of it, and she knew its name: Hanna Thomas. 

She’d dreamed
her too.

“…and she took
my hand, Ava.  She squeezed my fingers the way she did when we were kids.”  He
took her hand and squeezing three times.  “Then she told me it was going to be
okay.”  Cole’s voice broke, and though he didn’t let go of her fingers, he
turned again to the window.  “And then she led me up the beach.  I just knew… I
knew it was all going to be all right.”

“And me?” Ava
asked.  “Was I there?”

The muscle in
his jaw began to jump at her question.  After a moment’s delay, he turned to
meet her eyes.

“The rest of the
dream was the same.”

“Oh…”

Ava watched the
breaking waves on the beach, the pale blue lines growing lighter as dawn
neared.  She could remember a part of her dream now, and it terrified her. 

‘He left ME
behind this time!’ 

Ava’s heart was
pounding even before she spoke.  She knew how Cole felt about these things, but
it had to be said.

“Cole, I… I want
you to let Dad read your teacup sometime.”

He made a
strangled noise, turning completely from the window, letting go of her hand.   

“Uh-uh, no way.”

“Why not?”

He paused for a
moment, crossing his arms and then uncrossing them again, as if realizing what
he’d done.  He was either on edge or annoyed.  Outside, the first rays of light
reached the horizon, bright crimson spreading out under purple clouds that
covering the sky.

“Look,” he said,
running his fingers along her arm, “I just have a hard time believing that
stuff.  Last time when he read your teacup, it was just kind of... messed up.”