CATHEDRAL, Patrick Sean Lee [most popular ebook readers .txt] 📗

a rush back toward more heartache and melodrama with the author. The Matthew. The guy who, literally, fell for me, and against every instinct, I’ve fallen for. I think the only realities awaiting my return someday here at Roosevelt Lodge would be ghosts of regret.

“Ready Miss?” Charlie says, starting the engine. I merely nod, and then look out through the side window at four people standing on the porch. I wave my fingers an inch or so inside the glass at them, and then glance up to the dormer on the second floor. I see him holding the curtain aside, staring down. There is no expression on his face. No traces of life in his eyes.

Oh Matthew Ash. The world…no, the worlds you create…possess no life. Not really. You live in them, though, and you have for so long that you can no longer distinguish reality from fantasy. Oh my God…and through some persistence I’ve never encountered before, you’ve managed to draw me in to the latest fairyland you created.

Nearly.

Well anyway, goodbye, my lovely Roosevelt Lodge.

Goodbye, Matthew Ash. Time to get on with my real life, filled as it is with sad, happy, morose…but real beings.

 

The drive down the mountain, down through the canyons with their sheer walls of granite and insanely rushing river mesmerizes me. There is nothing quite as wild and beautiful as this winding miracle of creation, where I am sure God must often come to rest and relieve himself of the crushing burdens of keeping the universe functioning.

Why doesn’t Matthew write something with God in it? I laugh at the notion. Go back and tell him, Isabella. Tell Charlie you’ve changed your mind, that you need to return for a bit.

And miss your flight.

And create a new and worse drama.

Ha! Yes, I laugh at the notion.

Charlie drives quietly for half an hour, but finally breaks the silence.

“He’s in love with ya', Isabella. Ya' know that, right?”

A thousand different responses rocket through my brain. It takes me a second to reply there are so many.

“He doesn’t even know me…and I certainly don’t know him. In love with me? You men are all so alike in how you think.” I cross, then un-cross my legs and peer out the window at the trees and the rushing water ten feet down the embankment. I bite on an already-short fingernail and…

“He wanted…that is, it was just a physi…on his part…” I can’t quite finish or even make sense of it. Something tells me I am mistaken there. That something is telling Charlie the same thing I think. He turns his head, and I can feel his eyes bearing down on me. I try to stare out all the harder, but then I close my eyes and wait for him to tell me I’m daft or something worse.

Cruel.

“That’s a load of crap, Izzy.”

My eyes shoot open, and I turn my head in shock.

“Charlie!”

“It's plain enough in him, but I see it in you, too.”

“How!?”

He snickers. “I wish I’d made a movie of ya’…from the day ya' arrived, all serious an’ wound up inside till hell wouldn’t have it. An’ then Matthew Ash arrives an’ you’re all the sudden lookin’ half-alive again…it’s in your eyes, girl. The way ya’ walk, even.

“An’ now you’re runnin’ away.”

Did he get it right? Yes. But I had no idea any of it was written on my face, or in the way I walked around Matthew. Oh God, stupid me! I feel the blood rush to my face.

I was that bad? It was all that apparent?

Charlie doesn’t say another word for an hour or more. We wind down the narrow highway toward the city, and then beyond a wide turn, there it is. The city spreading out across the beginning of the Great Plains. In another hour I’ll be on a jet to home.

I’m more determined than ever now to get the author Matthew Ash out of my mind.

 

 

Day One

 Isabella

 

“Hello?”

“Hi, Brad. It’s me. How are you?”

Brad is ecstatic. “I’m fine! What the heck! I’m glad to hear your voice. What happened? I called ten times and all of them went to message. You okay?”

I force a laugh, but it is not genuine. It’s my first mask. “Well of course, why do you ask? I left my phone in the car so that I could rest. That’s all. Now I have it and I saw that you’d called. Hi.”

Now Brad laughs, and he sounds relieved. He asks me, “Then you’ve gotten back? I’ll come right…”

“No. I’m still here. In Colorado. My flight doesn’t leave until…Friday afternoon. I just wanted to call and tell you I’m fine.” I bite down on my tongue and wait.

“Oh…good. I was getting a little worried. You know. What with all the wolves prowling around back there. You know.”

I take it that comment has a double meaning, but I answer in an instructive tone of voice. “Bears. Lots of bears. I saw one fall into the lake a few days ago as a matter of fact! He was watching me—too closely, I guess—and he slipped over a little cliff! Really! In he went, so I ran like crazy back here to the lodge. No wolves, though.”

“You’re serious.”

“Yes!” I raise the timbre of my voice a little when I answer. He will believe me if I want him to badly enough. That raises a twinge of guilt inside me. A lot of twinge of guilt. I’m a mile and a half away from him and he believes I’m a thousand miles away. Sadly, I am, I think. I want to tell him but something stops me. It’s fear. I can’t bear to feel his sadness; no, his destruction. God, if you’re there, give me courage. Help me. He doesn’t seem to be anywhere near, and I cower. Really, though, I just need to think about it. I just need a little more time. After four years, four more days won’t make much difference. Not really.

“Where did you say this place was?”

“Kind of in the north-central part of the state. Near a little town called Allenspark. Why? Are you planning on coming up?” I end the sentence with a chuckle, but then I regret having asked the question. I can almost hear him thinking. After a pause, he answers.

“Yes, maybe.” I hear him take in a long breath. “Yes, I guess I could…if you want me to.”

I don’t hesitate in responding to that. “No, don’t. I mean you probably don’t have the money. I’ll only be here a few more days. No, don’t fly out here, it’s a waste of time.”

As I am finishing the sentence the doorbell rings. I die. The chime is distinctive and Brad has rung it a thousand times himself. Nobody on earth would have the same doorbell. I take in a deep breath. God, who could it be? Why now? Please!

“What was that?”

I am totally unprepared. I cover the phone with my palm, think. Maybe if I dash out the rear door and run to the cover of the orange trees at the back of the yard. Think! Quick! I can’t stall him much longer; it’s been several seconds. The doorbell chimes again. I do plan one, and race into the kitchen, cell phone palmed, open the rear door, don’t bother to close it, then reconsider. I push it shut and run. A dog begins to bark a couple of houses down. I’m dead. I have to talk to Brad or else hang up. I put the phone to my ear and remove my hand from the microphone.

“Hello? Brad?”

“Yes, I’m here. What’s going on? I heard your doorbell. Where are you?”

“Oh, that. It’s the TV here in the lounge.” That’s lame, but I go on. “It’s a movie Mrs. Davenport and I are watching. Hear the dogs?”

Brad doesn’t say anything. I half-cover the microphone again. Something tells me he isn’t buying my story. I’m scared because I’m lying and he knows it. Finally he speaks.

“Let me talk to her.”

I scramble for something, anything reasonable. Mr. Chang appears from around the corner and sees me standing under the trees. The dog starts up again, louder. My goose is cooked. I answer anyway, waving at Mr. sixty year-old nosey Chang to go away. He stops. I’m furiously waving my hand, panicking. That affects my voice. The damned dog is raising Cain. “She went out to get some milk…and cookies.” I bite my lip, turn in a little circle asking God for a miracle, and then I remember from Sunday school that He doesn’t answer prayers uttered by liars and cheaters.

“You’re home. What’s going on, Isabella?”

“No, no…really, I’m not,” I laugh unconvincingly. “I’m here…”

“Tell me what’s going on. Tell me the truth.”

I don’t know what to say other than the truth. I want to build another lie, but I remember what Daddy said about that thing called character. The truth, even though it has to be humiliating. But, not all of it. No. My character has its limits. He needn’t hear the whole story, his part in it was chiseled in stone months ago. Whatever I’m feeling about Matthew doesn’t affect this heartache. It could only make it worse.

“I stayed for the week…and…well, before I booked a reservation at the lodge I’d been thinking. You know, about us. About…”

“It’s over, isn’t it Isabella? You’re calling it quits. Just tell me. Spit it out.”

“I, uh…I’ve been tangled up inside…”

“Just say it. I can take the truth, but lies will kill me,” he says calmly. As though in my absence he’s been preparing. I’m wanting to cry, and I wave at Mr. Chang to go away. I look down at my bare feet in the grass. A dark orange spot, two, three—half a dozen lay in the grass around me. Fallen fruit.

“I’m so sorry. Yes. I’m so sorry.” I can’t even say his name. My eyes tear up and my lip begins to quiver. This hurts. He loves me, loves me more, he said, than anyone I’d ever been with possibly could. Totally. I begin to cry and I don’t want to speak because he’ll hear my anguish. I know he must be beginning to curl up inside, into a black, tiny cinder.

“I’m home,” I whimper.

“I’m coming over.”

“No! No, please don’t.”

“I have gifts for you. Special things. One that was very expensive. I want you to have them. I spent a lot of time…they’re special. I couldn’t bear to keep them. I don’t want to throw them away. I want to talk to you…at least one last time.”

I am falling to pieces and I have to sit down. My bottom crushes an over-ripened orange and I feel the wetness spread. The damned dog won’t shut up. I want to die.

“Not tonight.”

“When?”

“I don’t know. Tomorrow…or Tuesday. Tuesday would be better.”

“Tomorrow. What time?”

“I don’t care. I’m not going into the shop until late. Whenever.” I want to say I’m sorry again, but I hold my tongue. My chest is heaving sobs and I twist the phone up, away from my lips.

“Eight, then. I’ll see you at eight.” He pauses. “I love you, Isabella. God how I love you. Please don’t do this.”

I have nothing more that I can offer, and so I say the one thing that makes no sense to him,