Читать книгу The Girl Who Couldn'T See Rainbows - Rosette - Страница 8

Several days passed before I managed to recover the initial alchemy with the owner of Midnight Rose.

I avoided Kyle like a plague, to discourage even the slightest hope he might have. His greedy eyes always sought to capture mine, every time he met me. But I kept him at arm’s length, hoping that it would be enough to dissuade him from trying new, unpleasant approaches.

On the other hand, I began to appreciate Mrs Mc Millian’s company. She was a smart woman, not a busybody as I had mistakenly judged her at first. She was totally loyal toward Mr Mc Laine, and this quality brought us very close. I carried out my duties with a passionate diligence, glad to be able, at least in part, to take some weight off his shoulders. I missed our arguments, and my heart threatened to explode when they resumed.

They started again unexpectedly, as they had the first time.

“Damn!”

I abruptly lifted my head, as I leaned over some of the documents I was rearranging. His eyes were closed, and he had a vulnerable expression on his boyish face that stirred me.

“Are you all right?”

His gaze was very cold, and I almost regretted that he had reopened his eyes.

“It's my damn publisher,” he explained, waving a sheet. The letter had arrived with the morning mail and I hadn’t paid attention to it. It was my duty to sort through the mail, and I regretted not having given it to him sooner. Maybe he was angry with me for having missed an important letter. His next words revealed the mystery.

“I wish I had never received this letter,” he said disgustedly. “He demands that I send him the rest of the manuscript.”

My silence seemed to fuel his fury. “And I have no other chapters to send him.”

“I’ve seen you write for days” I dared to say, puzzled.

“I’ve been writing crap for days, and I threw it all in there,” he pointed to the fireplace.

I’d noticed that the fire had been lit the previous day, and it surprised me, considering the summer temperatures, but I didn’t ask for explanations.

“Try speaking to your publisher. Do you want me to phone him?” I suggested quickly. “I'm sure he'll understand...”

He broke me off, shaking his hand sharply, as if trying to shoo a fly away. “He’ll understand what? That I’m in the middle of a creative crisis? That I’m experiencing the classic writer’s block?” His mocking smile made my heart beat fast, as though he had stroked it.

He threw the letter on the desk. “The book isn’t moving forward. For the first time in my career I seem to have nothing to write, I feel as though I’ve exhausted my flair.”

“Then do something else,” I said impulsively.

He looked at me as if I were mad. “Sorry?”

“Take a break, just to understand what's going on,” I explained frantically.

“And what should I do? Go jogging? Take a car ride? Or play a tennis match?” The sarcasm in his voice was so sharp it tore me up. I could almost feel the sticky heat of the blood flowing from my wounds.

“There are not only physical hobbies,” I said, bending my head. “You could listen to some music, maybe. Or read something.”

Now, he would probably get rid of me in a flash, like the person who had suggested the worst nonsense in history. Instead, his eyes were alert, focused on me.

“Music. That’s not a bad idea. I don’t have anything else to do, do I?” He pointed to a record player on the top of the library. “Go get it, please.”

I climbed on the chair and pulled it down, admiring its details at the same time. “It's magnificent. It’s an original, isn’t it?”

He nodded as I placed it on the desk. “I've always loved antiques, although this is a bit more modern. In the red box you’ll find some vinyl records.”

I stopped in front of the bookcase, my arms hanging along my hips. There were two dark boxes of similar size on the same shelf on which the record player had been. I passed my tongue over my dry lips, my throat parched.

He called me impatiently. “Move it, Miss Bruno. I know I'm not going anywhere, but that doesn’t justify your slowness. What are you? A turtle? Or did Kyle give you lessons?”

I would never get used to his sarcasm, I thought angrily, as I made a hasty decision. The time had come: should I confess my peculiar anomaly, or take the easy way out, as I had always done in the past? Such as grabbing a random box and hoping it would be the right one? I couldn’t open them first to spy the contents; they were both closed with large pieces of tape. At the thought of the terrifying jokes I would have had to endure if I had told him the truth, I made my decision. I got up on the chair and pulled down a box. I put it on his desk without looking at him.

I heard him rummaging in it silently. Surprisingly, it was the right one. And I started breathing again.

“Here it is.” He handed me a record. It was Debussy.

“Why him?” I asked.

“Because I've re-evaluated Debussy since I’ve known that your name was chosen as a tribute to him.”

The primitive simplicity of his answer left me breathless, my heart full of hopes that hurt like thorns. Because they were too good to be true.

I didn’t know how to dream. Perhaps because my mind had already understood at birth what my heart refused to do. Namely, that dreams never come true. Not mine, at least.

The music started, and invaded the room. First gently, then more vigorously, up into an exciting, seductive crescendo.

Mr Mc Laine closed his eyes and leaned back in the chair, absorbing the rhythm, making it his, snatching it in an authorized theft.

I looked at him, taking advantage of the fact that he couldn’t see me. At that moment he seemed tremendously young and fragile, as if a mere gust of wind could take him away. I also closed my eyes to that scandalous and ridiculous thought. He wasn’t mine. He never would have been. Wheelchair or not. The sooner I realized that, the sooner I would have gotten my common sense back, my comforting acquiescence, and my mental balance. I couldn’t jeopardize the cage I had deliberately locked myself into, risking to suffer terribly for a simple fantasy, an impossible dream, worthy of a teenager.

The music ended, passionate and inebriating.

We re-opened our eyes at the same time. His had resumed their usual coldness. Mine were shadowed and dreamy.

“I’ll never finish the book at this rate,” he decreed. “Get rid of the record player, Melisande. I want to write a little, or rather, rewrite everything.”

He gave me a brilliant smile. “The idea of the music was brilliant. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome... I didn’t do anything special” I stammered, avoiding his gaze, or else I’d have gotten lost in its depths.

“No, as a matter of fact you didn’t do anything special,” he admitted, making my spirits drop, because of the quick way he got rid of me. “You’re the one who’s special, Melisande. Not what you say or do.”

His gaze locked with mine, determined to capture it as usual. He raised his eyebrows ironically, in an expression that I knew so well now.

“Thank you, sir,” I replied.

He laughed, as if I had made a joke. It didn’t bother me. He thought I was funny. Better than nothing, maybe. I remembered the conversation we had a few days earlier, when he had asked me if I would have given my legs or my soul for love. At that time I replied that I had never loved, therefore I didn’t know how I would have behaved. Now I realized that maybe I could answer that insidious question.

He pulled the computer towards him and began to write, excluding me from his world. I went back to my occupations, but my heart was fibrillating. Falling in love with Sebastian Mc Laine was suicide. And I had no desire to become a kamikaze. Right? I had always been a person with common sense, practical, reasonable, incapable of dreaming. I was even incapable of day dreaming. Or at least I had been up to that point, I thought.

“Melisande?”

“Yes, sir?” I turned to him, surprised that he had spoken to me. Usually when he started writing, he lost touch with everything and everyone.

“I want some roses,” he said, pointing to the empty vase on the desk. Ask Millicent to fill it, please.”

“Right away, sir.” I grabbed the ceramic vase with both hands. I knew it would be heavy.

“Red roses” he specified. “Like your hair.”

I blushed, although there was nothing romantic about what he had said.

“All right, sir.”

I could hear his look piercing my back as I carefully opened the door and went out into the hallway. I went downstairs with the vase in my hands.

“Mrs Mc Millian? Ma’am?” there was no trace of the old housekeeper, and then a thought came to my mind, too small to grab it. The woman, at breakfast, had told me something about her day off... Was she referring to today? It was hard for me to remember it. Mrs Mc Millian was a source of confused information, and I rarely listened to it from start to finish. Also in the kitchen there was no trace of her. I sorrowfully placed the vase on the table, next to a basket of fresh fruit.

Great. I realized I had to pick the roses in the garden. A task beyond my ability. It was easier for me to grab a cloud, and dance a waltz with it.

With a persistent buzz in my ears, and the feeling of an imminent catastrophe, I went outdoors. The rose garden was in front of me, the roses in bloom like a fire of petals. Red, yellow, pink, white, even blue. Too bad I lived in a black and white world, where everything was shadowed. A world where light was unfathomable, indefinite, forbidden. I couldn’t even dream of distinguishing colours because I didn’t know what they were. Since birth.

I took an uncertain step toward the rose garden, my cheeks in flames. I had to make up an excuse to justify my return without any flowers. One thing was choosing between two boxes, another was to pick roses of the same colour. Red. How is red? How can you imagine something you've never seen, not even on a book?

I stepped on a broken rose. I leaned over to pick it up; it was dead, lethargic in its death, but it still smelled nice.

“What are you doing here?”

I brushed my hair off my forehead, and regretted not tying it up in my usual chignon. It was hung over my nape, and was already soaked with sweat.

“I have to pick some roses for Mr Mc Laine,” I said laconically.

Kyle smiled at me, the usual smile full of irritating allusions. “Do you need help?”

In those hollow words, empty and ambiguous, I found a solution to my problem, an unexpected shortcut, and I jumped at it.

“Actually you were supposed to do it, but you weren’t around. As usual,” I said bitterly.

His face was crossed by a quiver. “I'm not a gardener. I already work too much.”

This statement made me laugh. I put a hand to my mouth, as if to hide my hilarity.

He looked at me furiously. “It's the truth. Who do you think helps him to wash, dress and move?”

The thought of Sebastian Mc Laine naked almost caused me a short circuit. To wash him, dress him... I would have done it very willingly. The following thought, that I would never be the one to do it, made me answer harshly.

“But for most of the day you are free. Of course, at his disposal, however, he rarely disturbs you” I reinforced the message. “Come on, help me.”

He finally gave in, still annoyed. I handed him the shears, smiling. “Red roses,” I said.

“All right,” he grumbled, setting to work.

In the end, when the bunch was ready, I escorted him to the kitchen where we picked up the vase. It seemed more practical and easy to split the task between us. He would carry the ceramic pot, I the flowers.

Mr Mc Laine was still writing, fervently. He only stopped when he saw us come back together.

“Now I understand why it took you so long” he hissed at my address.

Kyle hurried away, clumsily placing the vase on the desk. For a moment I feared that it would fall down. He had already left when I started to arrange the roses in the vase.

“Was it such a difficult task that you had to ask for help?” He asked, his eyes glowing with uncontrollable anger.

I floundered, like a fish that had stupidly bitten the bait. “The vase was heavy,” I excused myself. “The next time I won’t bring it with me.”

“Very wise”. His voice was deceptively sweet. In truth, with his face shadowed by a two day stubble, he looked like a malicious demon that had come straight from the underworld to bully me.

“I didn’t find Mrs Mc Millian,” I insisted. A fish still clinging to the bait and hasn’t yet realized that it’s a hook.

“Oh, right, it's her day off,” he acknowledged. But then his anger, only temporarily alleviated, reappeared. “I won’t tolerate love stories among my employees.”

“The thought never crossed my mind!” I said impetuously, so earnestly that I got a smile of approval from him.

“I’m pleased to hear it.” His eyes were icy despite the smile. “Of course that doesn’t refer to me. I have nothing against having an affair with my employees.” He stressed the words, as to reinforce the fact that he was mocking me.

For the first time I felt like punching him, and I realized it wouldn’t be the only time. Unable to vent my rage on who I would have liked to, my hands tightened over the bouquet, the thorns forgotten. The pain surprised me, as if I were immune to thorns, since I was busy fighting off other ones.

“Ouch!” I snatched my hand away.

“Did you prick yourself?"

My look was more eloquent than any answer. He stretched his hand out to catch mine.

“Let me see.”

I gave it to him like a robot. The drop of blood stood out on my white skin. Dark, black to my abnormal eyes. Crimson red to his normal eyes.

I tried to pull my hand away, but his grip was strong. I watched him, bewildered. His gaze didn’t abandon my finger, fascinated, hypnotized. Then, as usual, it all ended. His expression changed to the point that I couldn’t read it. He seemed nauseated and hurriedly looked away. My hand was free, and I put my finger in my mouth to suck the blood.

His head turned in my direction again, as if driven by an unrelenting and unwanted force. He had an agonized and distressed expression. It lasted just a moment, though. It was incredible, and illogical.

“The book is going well. I recovered my streak,” he said, as if answering a question I had never made. “Do you mind bringing me a cup of tea?”

I clung to his words, as if they were a rope thrown to a person who was drowning. “I’ll go right away.”

“Will you be able to manage on your own, this time?” His irony was almost pleasant after the scary look he had given me earlier.

“I'll try,” I replied, playing along with him.

This time I didn’t meet Kyle, and I was relieved. I moved through the kitchen with greater ease than I had in the garden. Since I ate all my meals there, in the company of Mrs Mc Millian, I had learned all her hiding places. I easily found the kettle in the cabinet beside the fridge, and the tea bags in a tin can in another one. I went upstairs with the tray in my hands.

Mc Laine didn’t look up when he heard me come in. Evidently his ears, like radar antennas, had already understood that I was alone.

“I brought both sugar and honey, not knowing which one you prefer. And milk.”

He sneeringly looked at the tray. “Wasn’t it too heavy for you?”

“I managed,” I said with all the dignity I could muster. Defending myself from his verbal jokes was becoming an exceptional habit; certainly preferable to the terrible expression he had a few minutes earlier.

“Sir...” It was time to tackle an important issue.

He gave me a smile full of frank kindness, like an amenable monarch towards a loyal vassal. “Yes, Melisande Bruno?”

“I’d like to know when I’ll have a day off,” I asked breathlessly, gathering all my courage.

He opened his arms and stretched out, voluptuously, before answering. “Day off? You've just arrived and you already want to get rid of me?”

I stood on one foot and then on the other while I watched him pour a drop of milk and a tablespoon of sugar in his tea, and then sipped it slowly. “Today is Sunday, sir. Mrs Mc Millian's day off. And the day after tomorrow will be exactly one week from my arrival. Maybe we should talk about it, sir.” It seemed like he didn’t want to give me any day off.

“Melisande Bruno, do you think that I don’t want to give you a day off?” He asked mockingly, as if he had read my mind.

I was already mumbling that no, I wouldn’t have dreamed of thinking such an absurd thing, when he added. “...because you would be perfectly right.”

“I don’t understand you, sir. Is this another of your jokes?” I asked in a thin voice, in the effort to control it.

“What if it’s not?” He replied, his eyes as unfathomable as the ocean.

I stared at him with my mouth open. “But Mrs Mc Millian...”

“Kyle doesn’t have a day off, either,” he reminded me with a sly smile. I had the distinct feeling that he was having fun.

“He doesn’t have fixed hours like mine,” I said dryly. I longed to explore the village and the neighbourhoods around the house, and I was annoyed that I had to fight for my rights.

He didn’t even blink. “Anyhow he’s always at my availability.”

“Then when should I go out?” I asked, raising my voice. “At night maybe? I'm free from dusk to dawn... Should I go out instead of sleeping? Unlike Kyle I live here, I don’t go home in the evening.”

“Don’t you dare go out at night. It's dangerous.”

His soft words set in my conscience, causing a shiver of fury. “Then we're at an impasse,” I said, my voice as cold as his. “I want to visit the area, but you don’t want to give me a day off. On the other hand, however, you ordered me not to go out at night, saying it was dangerous. What else can I do?”

“You're even more beautiful when you’re angry, Melisande Bruno,” he said. “Anger turns your cheeks a lovely pink colour.”

I basked in the joy of that compliment for a delightful moment, then I was overwhelmed by anger. “Well? Will I have a day off or not?”

He smiled wryly, and my fury disappeared, replaced by a different and absurd excitement.

“Okay, you can have Sunday off” he finally granted.

“Sunday?” He had given in so fast it stunned me. He was so quick in his decisions to make me doubt I’d be able to follow him. “But that’s also Mrs Mc Millian's day off... Are you sure...?”

“Millicent is off only in the morning. You can have the afternoon.”

I nodded, unconvinced. For the moment it had to be enough. “Agreed.”

He pointed to the tray. “Would you bring it to the kitchen, please?”

I had already reached the door when a thought struck me, with the impact of a meteorite. “Why Sunday?”

I turned to look at him. He had the expression of a rattle snake, and in a flash I understood everything.

“Because today is Sunday, and I'll have to wait seven more days.” Therefore mine was just a Pyrrhic victory. I was so furious that I was tempted to throw the tray at him.

“They’ll go by in a hurry,” he said amusedly. “Oh, don’t bang the door, on your way out.”

I was tempted to do so, but I was hindered by the tray. I would have had to put the tray on the floor, so I gave up. He probably would have enjoyed it even more.

That night, for the first time in my life, I dreamed.