ROMANCE: His Reluctant Heart (Historical Western Victorian Romance) (Historical Mail Order Bride Romance Fantasy Short Stories) (110 page)
Authors: Jane Prescott
“We’ve never needed to. We have always been at peace. Now, just because of a misunderstanding that your brother caused, we are all gonna die.” He barked angrily.
Nico was innocent!” I answered feeling a bit taken aback.
“I didn’t mean Nico!” Garret consoled me. “It’s Henry. We did a little investigation of our own. We found out that the trap that Henry set up was faulty. That’s why an ordinary bear was able to just break it. That’s why your brother died.”
He held me in his arms. “None of our kind was anywhere near that place.”
“Henry?” I asked.
“Yes. It was Henry.” He answered.
“What do we do now?” I looked to his people.
“We’ll do the only thing we can do. We will run away.” His father an old man with a cane answered me. He turned to his people and muttered a few words before everyone went into the house in a flurry.
*****
They packed their three trucks up with supplies that could last months; tents, pots and even a crib for the baby.
Garret and I took his motor bike. We agreed to rendezvous somewhere deep inside the woods. His father said that this path was only known by them so they would be safe. They slowly moved out, one by one, taking different routes. We locked the doors and kept the lights lit to let my brothers think the Fields were still inside.
“Garret, look!” I pointed to south where two headlights had slowly emerged. I think they saw us right away since they revved up the vehicle which was now careening towards us.
“Hold on tight.” He yelled over the sound of the motor bike swerving around away from the truck.
They fired. Its sound of the gunshot echoed through the forest. My heart raced, as I grabbed tighter to his body.
It was so dark, but Garret had been able to manage to drive his way around the thicket. Our luck soon ran out as we hit something sharp that sent our wheels in a flat run. We decided to walk on foot, which was a decision we soon regretted.
“Freaks!” They called out. My brothers must have not known it was me.
We ran faster as we hear d the truck come to a stop. Maybe the same thing that busted our bike busted the truck. Next thing I knew, the sound of heavy footsteps started to gain on us.
Garret was getting really nervous. He was getting indecisive as to which paths to take. I started to worry that it was true; their people weren’t made for these things. They were docile and highly social were creatures. They didn’t know how to fight. This worried me and I didn’t want to lose him. I was determined to do all I could to not lose him.
Our luck then took a turn for the worst. We had reached a dead end as we accidentally ran into the foot of a cliff. There was no way we could just claw ourselves up it. So we decided to just stop.
The stampede of footsteps got closer, as I saw my figures racing toward us. “It’s me!” I yelled to them.
“What the hell Jenna!” Guiles exclaimed!
I turned to the other man in the distance and realized it was my father. “Father! Please stop this; they had nothing to do with what had happened to Nico!”
“Jenna, you’re confused! They’ve tricked you.” My Father called back. “Please leave that man and we can be a family again. Come back to us!”
“No.” I said with a heavy voice. Garret decided not to say anything so as not to aggravate the situation.
“Please put down your guns,” I beckoned to the both of them. “Where are Henry and Vince?”
“Trailing behind.” Guiles replied. “Please stop this Jenna. Just come with us.”
I finally snapped. “I said no!” I ran to Garret and embraced him to prove to my family what I had felt for him was real. I wasn’t deceived; I wasn’t brain-washed. They had to know this. They were my family.
Suddenly, heavy footsteps came rushing towards us.
“What the fuck are you all doing!” Henry. It was Henry. We had no time to react, and Henry quickly raised his gun and fired haphazardly in our direction.
“No!” Father screamed and Guiles tackled him to the ground. Vince was confused. He ran to were the figures he saw were and found me, bloodied in Garrets embrace.
“Jenna!” Vince screamed.
“I didn’t know!” Henry froze. “I swear father! I didn’t know it was her!” But my father had stopped listening to him as he and Guiles ran towards us.
Garret was sobbing. He explained what had really happened to Nico. That it was just an ordinary bear that broke a trap that was set-up wrong by Henry.
“Is this true?” Vince turned to Henry.
“I… I… I didn’t think it mattered.” Henry said as he fell to his knees. “It was a werebear father! We know it was.”
“Stop talking Henry.” My father said in an angry whisper.
“We need to take her to the hospital!” Garrett shouted to them who were all too stunned to do anything. I was in shock and felt very cold, as blood ran from my shoulder.
Garrett lifted me up and swiftly ran towards our truck. Guiles snapped out of his confused state as he ran alongside Garret towards the truck. He proper himself into the driver’s seat and Garret carried me to the back. Father came along with us while Vince helped putting pressure on my wounds. We left Henry there in the woods. He didn’t move. He was just sitting there on his knees crying and muttering to himself.
They raced me to the nearest hospital. When I got there, the doctors did all they could. They were able to patch up all my wounds and take the shrapnel out of my body, but I had lost so much blood that they worried I wouldn’t make it through the night.
Fear gripped my family as they waited beside me trying to search for the slightest signs of life. But I was lying there, lifeless. Garret had stayed there too, mostly not talking to my family, but he stayed there anyway.
Henry had arrived. Vince had brought him. But it was obvious he was not well. If it were anyone else, for sure they wouldn’t be well too. When he found out he had shot me, his mind collapsed into a deep state of confusion, but when Garret told them about what really happened to Nico, Henry snapped. Father decided to admit him in a mental health care facility, two towns over. As for myself, I was still in that bed, deciding whether to finally just wake up or go on sleeping.
It was a week into my coma when my father had decided to go home with my brothers. Garret stayed though. It was the first time he got to be alone with me there lying, maybe even dying, on that bed. He propped himself beside me holding my hand as he started praying. He prayed with so many tears that flooded onto my hands. He wailed in a strained voice asking God to just bring me back to him.
I guess God was listening and responded to his pleas. I finally felt the strength to open my eyes and move my fingers.
He didn’t notice it at first, but when I spoke, he jumped back.
“Water?” I pleaded in a rough and strained voice
“Jenna!” He screamed, alerting all the orderlies and nurses at the station to the miracle that was happening.
“I love you.” He whispered as he kissed my forehead.
The nurses rushed back and forth to get me water and to check my vital signs. Every now and then I heard one of them mention that this was a miracle. I guess it was.
“Hey, big girls don’t die easy.” I told him.
“Big beautiful women really don’t. Thank goodness!” He laughed as we stared lovingly into each other’s eyes.
*****
The doctors finally let me out of the hospital after a few more days of monitoring. I didn’t feel perfect, but I felt fine. When I got to the house, Henry was already gone. Father made sure to ship him off to the facility before I came home. I wasn’t really sure how to feel about that. On one end, I wanted to say I forgave him and that he should get better soon. But then there is other part of me that is afraid of him – of his rage.
Father had let Garret come with us as they brought me home. He had always been there my side through this whole ordeal, and I think my father saw that and finally realized what we had between us was something really precious. It was true love.
My father and brothers all went to Garret’s to apologize to the Fields. They explained the situation and that Henry had been sent away to get professional help. They fortified their pact of peace and started reconciling. We were lucky. The fields were werebears of the mild mannered kind. Garret had told me that werebears in Alaska were fiercer than those in California.
“Do you know what’s the matter with you, my sexy bear man?” I asked him as we lay in my old bed together with the duvet and sheets beneath us.
He turned to look at me with those kind eyes. He reached for my hand and pulled it to his face. I felt the friction of his stumble as he let my hand graze his cheek. He looked back to me and smiled.
“What is ? What is a matter with me, my red headed siren?” He asked me.
“Nothing. Absolutely nothing” I stopped to pull his face closer to mine. I kissed him deep. I let his tongue invade my mouth sending my senses into fits of bliss and ecstasy. “Nothing is a matter with you.” I answered. He giggled and he kissed my cheek.
“I love you.” He said.
“I love you too. More than you could ever know.”
“Well then tell me. Let me know exactly how much you love me.”
“Oh Garret, it would take forever.”
“Well, then, Jenna, won’t you please spend forever with me?”
“Yes. I will.”
A few months, later, right by the lake where he first saved me from the darkness that had tried to consume me, we vowed never ever to lose each other. We promised never to let each other’s hand go. He vowed to always love me in the most fantastic ways he could think of. He promised to always tell me I am beautiful because he knows for sure that I’d always be beautiful even when I’m ninety years old. He promised to always protect me. He vowed never to abandon me. He promised me the moon and the stars and sweet little kisses every single time I felt sad. He promised me a future with joy and contentment. He promised to make sure that I was always happy.
I vowed never to forget how I felt that first time I held his face – that sheer joy I felt and the understanding I had that this man was going to be my love forever. I promised him peace of mind that I will always be his and he will always be mine. I promised to cook him eggs and bacon every morning and make him coffee just after lunch. I promised to give him all of me, every single bit of who I was, who I am, and who I will be in the future.
I promised him my devotion – a never ending supply of affection. I promised to wrap him in a warm embrace when it gets too cold in this big scary world.
I promised him everything he could ever ask of me. I promised him my world.
When we said those vows, I turned to the people who had come and make this union possible: the Fields who never questioned my love for their son, and my family, who had changed for the better, even Henry. Every single person who made this dream comes true. I looked to them as tears slowly blotted my mascara. This time they were tears of utter joy.
I do.
THE END
I do this sort of thing all the time. I’m a poet. After I do my bit, people from the audience usually come up to me and tell me how much they dug my stuff. That my words are the truth and that what I said resonated with them. But that doesn’t make it any less work for me.
Hey, you try being faithful to your craft while going to school for something else. Nobody ever said you can’t study evolutionary biology and write poetry at the same time, but that also means they never told you that it’s incredibly hard to make the two worlds work together. I hear there’s work in evolutionary biology. Poetry won’t pay the bills.
So that’s how I came to be sitting at Word Up, this tiny community bookshop in Washington Heights, on a Tuesday night after school was over, doing a local show for the Heights locals. When you’ve got rent, your creative side goes off into Hobbyville, and it was nice that my hobby had a receptive audience and an online community supporting it. Poets supporting poets; kind of like a giant circle jerk if you ask me.
But I couldn’t say no to Henry when he asked me to perform. I had put my name on the freestage list last time I was there, to perform whatever I wanted after the mainstage performers did their piece, and I hadn’t been chosen. Now, Henry’s the sweetest man alive, his balding head and round nose atop a mustache that’s a shade or two darker than whatever remains of his gray hair, and he said he just couldn’t stand the thought of me missing my chance to go up there. Even if I wasn’t a scheduled performer or anything. He likes to give everyone a chance, so he asked me to come back the following week.
So here I am, sitting in this wash of colors and paper and mismatched chairs. The gentle chatter around me is from a group of misfits, among which two of my friends are sitting. I always like to have some support when I perform on stage, even if it’s something as low-key as this. I also like to imagine, though I’d never say this out loud, that my friends feel it’s kind of cool to know someone who’s a stage performer. I shoot them a wink and a smile while carefully avoiding the guy who just came in who I suspect is possibly homeless. Not that I would mind, under normal circumstances. My eye twitches without my control. It’s been a long week.
Ever since that busted clown Larry blocked me on Facebook over the weekend, I’ve been in a rut of self-loathing and pity. It’s kind of disgusting, really. But the bigger problem is that it’s gotten in the way of my properly preparing for this performance, and when I’m not prepared, I lose sleep. Literally. It’s like I’m lying in bed and my mind goes in circles and circles trying to keep up with the endless list of stuff I’ve got to get done over the week. Laundry, rent, that paper for Histology 302, that group project for my anthro class, and what on Earth am I going to wear for this performance? I’ve been waking up feeling like death warmed up since Sunday. Tonight, I’ve forgone my usual rule of dressing up for my best-fitting jeans and a T-shirt with a face on it. Still, I applied some eyeshadow and mascara and I feel like I’ve done my part for the eyes of my audience.
The first performer was a comic, as they so often are here, and he’s mildly amusing. I can feel the headache creeping like a thief through the night straight into my temples, and it lodges there. I can feel my eyes trying to give into gravity and tearing up at the corners. Damn it, come on. Everyone’s going to think I’m extremely rude if I start yawning, but I think I’m headed there anyway.
The bell of the bookstore tinkles and I lean back to see who’s just come in. It’s just another middle-aged woman who seems to have made it her mission to look like a bag lady tonight, but I will my brain to be a little bit nicer. She’s a local; she clearly just wandered in on her way home from work or something. And who am I to knock an audience? I start turning back to the stage, but then my gaze snares on this guy.
From the corner of my eye, I can tell he’s kind of Hispanic looking, and for a second, I can feel him watching me watching him out of his own periphery. Hmm. Those types of guys usually like me, too. He’s got these long sideburns and a face that’s kind of large; unless I’m prepared to crane my neck and keep looking at him obviously, though, I’ve got to turn back to the stage. This woman is telling the story of the summer she got so dehydrated she passed out in front of the Museum of Natural History. It’s good, and I laugh, but my head’s getting that kind of floaty feeling and I know I’ve disconnected from whatever is around me. I’m regressing back to an earlier, caveman kind of stage where all I can think about are the three Fs: food, fucking, and floor. As in will fall down on it and snore if given half the chance.
And then Henry introduces somebody named Justin Raleigh, and Hispanic boy gets on the stage with a guitar. Well, damn. I heard something in his bio about American Idol. He sounds pretty legit. He takes a second or two to tune his guitar and I take a fuller, yet still quick look at his face. He’s pretty, this guy, with these long, thick lashes framing dark brown eyes, and a ponytail of thick, curly dark hair. I’m half expecting Spanish music to roll out of that guitar, but instead, when he starts to sing, it’s all updated country twang and soothing melodies.
I’m entranced. I want this guy to sing me to sleep. His voice sounds like someone rolled honey and milk all together and it’s washing over me like a warm bath. I take him in up on the stage, and convince myself it’s not rude to stare because that’s what he’s there for, right? I’m allowed to look if he’s gotten up as a performer; when you’re up there, you’re displaying your face and form as well as your talent. It’s why I take dressing up seriously.
He’s yummier than I expected, especially with the combination of that voice. He’s a bit on the short side, compactly built for a guy his height, and there’s a stone necklace hanging off a cord on his neck. He’s got a shirt of some muted tone on his body, and I can tell he’s gracefully built. He’s holding the guitar like an extension of his body, and I’m letting myself melt into his song, which is all about his ex girlfriend. Hm, ex you say?
He sits back down after he’s done, but I’m seeing him as an actual performer now. Not small stage, you know what I’m saying? Damn. Suddenly, I feel like a fraud in the face of a professional. Suddenly, I’m nervous about what is to come. I’ve got to show him I’m not joke myself, and it’d be nice if he noticed me back. Matters do not improve when I get on stage and I deliver my poem, line by line, way too fast, not even giving the audience time to react. Wow, what’s wrong with me? I’m never this off. I don’t dare look at the audience, let alone Guitar Boy on my way off the stage.
There’s a few more people after me, but I don’t notice anybody anymore. My part for the evening is done, and it’s been a total bust. The bookshop is about to close, so Henry gets everyone off the stage. My friends go off to mingle with the small crowd that managed to gather by the end of the night and I decide to approach Henry. By looking at him, I gather the impression that he’s the type of guy who always has a million girls around him after a show, just begging him to sign their bras or something. But no, he’s standing alone, talking to my friend Max, who apparently knows him somehow. I substitute sheer bull-headedness for courage and walk over to Justin as soon as he’s alone.
He looks at me, exhibiting all the normal cues of someone who’s prepping for conversation, and I open my mouth.
“Music. Your music.”
Good God, what the hell is coming out of my mouth? Is it even a sentence? Are there words coming out of my piehole or am I actually grunting at this guy?
Because seriously, he’s delicious as fuck. He’s got these cheekbones you could cut yourself on. To his credit, he doesn’t seem to react to the fact that I’ve just stood there and made orangutan sounds at him. Instead, he says, “Oh yeah? What did you think of my music?”
I try to think of something to say besides,
Hey, wanna see my apartment and me naked in it?
And come up with, “Well, what genre is it?”
“What genre do you think it is?” Damn, this guy doesn’t give up easy, does he?
We continue chatting for a few more minutes, all about how he’s a little bit of country mixed with soul and R&B and then we part, as awkwardly as we met. There’s going to be no apartment and no nudity tonight, and maybe that’s for the best. My head is throbbing and it’s a long ride home to Brooklyn. But the thing is, the one that I don’t share with much of anyone who’s not close to me, is that I’m too chickenshit to go through with it anyway. My room’s pretty much a disaster and I haven’t parted with my childish side yet, so I would invite him back and then where would it go? It was time to quit while I was ahead and get on that train home.
I didn’t even say goodbye.
* * *
I went and sent him a friend request. Yup, I did it. What was wrong with me that nervousness was bubbling up in my stomach like a cat on wheels? People send random friend requests all the time. I held my breath, waiting for him to respond, trying to tell myself I didn’t care. Something that I knew not to be true because I jumped out of my seat squealing as he accepted it.
Contact, make contact
, I told myself. So I typed him a little message.
When did you learn to play guitar?
It felt like someone was squeezing me tight around the middle, and then I saw the little bubble at the corner of my screen that let me know he was typing back.
I was about six. I just picked it up. Then I took some jazz guitar in college.
I could just picture him at six. Squeeze those cheeks tight, little Music Boy. Instead of answering him, I scrolled through his pictures. Nice family, lots of trips all over the southern states, and… some tall, dark emo chick on his arm. Fuck. Was he with someone? It didn’t say it. So I ignore it and type back. Because guys don’t talk to you if they’re already with someone. If they’re with someone, they don’t give you the time of day.
That’s cool. I always associated jazz with sax, so I’m always surprised to hear about it with other instruments.
Please think I’m cool, I pray silently.
Well, what would a jazz band be with only a sax?
Well, what would it?
A solo performance.
I’m pretty pleased with myself; I even chuckle aloud. A few seconds goes by and he says nothing. This doesn’t surprise me, although music puns are not my specialty. I realize after several more minutes that the conversation is over, that likely, he either didn’t understand or appreciate my joke. And somehow, although there’s a slight sting at this realization, it doesn’t bother me as much as it ordinarily would. At all other times, I’m a sensitive as a fair-skinned person is to a mosquito, but there’s something about my recent breakup that’s made me a little numb. I’m somehow less inclined to ask questions of myself. Sometimes, it’s better just not to think at all.
I keep scrolling through his pictures, find the ones of him where his hair wasn’t so long and other times in his life where it was just like mine, short and busy, thick ropes of curls. I like the ones where his hair is short, too, because then you can see his face, all contorted in song. I like that he does what he loves. I like that I’m sure his songs will tell me exactly how he is in bed without my even having to imagine it.
A notification pops up and I see that Henry has invited me over to Otto’s Shrunken Head, where apparently, he’s hosting a show that will feature in its nameless little band ensemble of nobody I’m sure anyone has ever heard of before, the esteemed Justin Raleigh. Usually, this is the point where I’ll call up one of my few girlfriends—smart mouths attract mostly boys whose mothers were the same way when they were growing up—but somehow, I don’t feel ready to share this tiny tidbit of nothingness with anyone just yet. There’s something about all of it that I don’t want to say out loud to anyone.
When I click “Attending” on the event page, I wonder if Justin will notice. I don’t ask myself why I’m going, especially when he doesn’t seem to be responding to me in any way that could be deemed encouraging. I’m so used to going places with other people, using them for social crutches, that imagining going is havoc-wreaking all in of itself. I feel like I’m a brave sailor about to go and conquer a brand new land.
And possibly suffer the barb of the natives, as well.
I’m not a musician. I don’t even know what type of show it’s going to be. All I know is that prettyboy Justin Raleigh will be there, and that’s somehow enough for me.
* * *
Getting dressed for your first solo journey out in years is more stressful than anybody ever tells you it’s going to be. Do I show my boobs? Is a dress too soft-spoken? How do I look like a tough, no-nonsense woman and like a God damn adult? I’m stuck somewhere in between wanting to be the kind of girl someone approaches at a bar and to have no one talk to me at all. Sometimes, even to myself, I make no sense and all the sense all at the same time.