Twice Upon a Soul Page 5

  Not receiving an immediate return signal from Avery’s own computer, Taylor disappointedly decided he must be away from his terminal. Reassured by the fact that the e-mail would be saved to a video file for later viewing, Taylor sighed as she doggedly returned to her search for information on the vast Internet.

  “T-a-y-l-o-r…are you in here?” chirped a shrill voice from the doorway a few hours later. Taylor cringed, barely controlling the urge to duck behind the monitor, in the hopes that Mrs. Ames would abandon her search and move on to somewhere else. Ever since Mrs. Ames had discovered that Taylor's relationship with Chandler had finally come to an end, she’d been earnestly searching for a suitable replacement to “brighten up” Taylor’s life. She was absolutely positive that it was unhealthy for Taylor to be alone. Good heavens, the child was twenty-seven years old and needed to be settling down! A sweet older lady that was excellent at organizing Taylor’s business agenda, Mrs. Ames had the tendency to carry the organizing over into Taylor’s personal life as well. Occasionally Taylor had to gently remind Mrs. Ames that she was quite capable of taking care of her own social life…to which Mrs. Ames would just cluck her tongue and shake her head with pity.

  “I’m over here…Mrs. Ames,” Taylor sighed, giving up her position easily. She might as well; Mrs. Ames was like a bloodhound, never veering from the scent.

  Mrs. Ames stretched up on her tiptoes, peering like a prairie dog over the field of computer monitors. Spying Taylor at her confessed location, she quickly sidled her ample body down the aisle between the desks. “I’ve got a long distance call for you, Taylor…it’s a Mr. Hines from New York. I told him I’d have to find you but he insisted on holding.” Mrs. Ames was quite frustrated and took it very personally if a caller seemed to feel that their message wouldn’t get delivered. She prided herself on never losing a message or forgetting the return number that was to be called. Mrs. Ames was a priceless database in and of herself for the Regent Oaks Museum.

  Hearing who the caller was, Taylor immediately jumped up from the computer, patting Mrs. Ames excitedly on the arm. “That’s great! I e-mailed Avery about a recent acquisition…maybe he’s calling to tell me that he’s got some information on the canvas.” Rushing to the podium at the front of the room, Taylor glanced back at Mrs. Ames, “Can you transfer the call in here, Mrs. Ames, or do I need to come out to the front desk?”

  Raising her chin in a gesture of smug satisfaction, “I’ve already transferred the call in here…I figured this was where you were hiding. Just pick up on line three,” she replied with a slight smile.

  Grinning her thanks to Mrs. Ames as she picked up the receiver, Taylor pushed the button to line three, “Avery…it’s Taylor, did you get my e-mail?”

  “Taylor, my dearest Taylor, yes…I got your e-mail. But first, how are you doing? You’ve not called me in f-o-r-e-v-e-r,” Avery scolded over the phone. Taylor could just picture Avery’s slight figure standing beside the desk, dramatically shaking his finger at her as though she could actually see him.

  “I know…Avery. I should’ve contacted you sooner. But you know how it is when you get busy…it’s just too easy to fall out of touch,” Taylor apologized as she gently banged her head against the wall. If she wanted any information out of Avery, it was obvious she would have to first serve her penance. “But now, you could’ve called me too…and I don’t recall any messages saying that you had,” she added, successfully turning the table of guilt back to Avery’s side.

  “Well…you know how it is dear…busy, busy, busy,” he quickly retorted. Avery Hines was a lot of things but he was never at a loss for words. “Now about that portrait file you attached to the e-mail…where in the world did you find that?” Avery asked with intense interest.

  “A friend of mine picked it up at a local vendor’s fair, believe it or not. Can you tell me anything about it?” Taylor’s excitement slowly began to build at the tone of interest clearly coloring Avery’s voice.

  “I’m not sure, mind you…but I believe it might be an unknown work of the 18th century British artist, Sir Joshua Reynolds. Do you remember his work, Col. George K.H. Coussmaker, Grenadier Guards?” he breathlessly asked into the receiver. New discoveries were like a drug to Avery, increasing his heart rate to an alarming rate, leaving him breathless with excitement.

  Taylor searched her memory, vaguely remembering the realistic portrait of the British officer; immediately recalling similarities of style with her own unnamed masterpiece. “Avery…do you have anything on file that might tell us who my mystery man might be?” Taylor crossed her fingers hopefully as she awaited Avery’s answer.

  “Taylor, you’re not listening to me dear…Open those little southern ears of yours, I said it could be an unknown work…unknown meaning, we have no information on the portrait in question,” Avery rattled into the phone. Taylor’s southern ears had to strain to keep up with Avery’s New York accent and as their friendship had deepened over the years, her southern drawl and his quick city dialect was a long-standing joke between them.

  “Well fine, Mr. City Mouse, maybe y-a-w-l could tell me how I’m going to find out who the man in this portrait is?” She purposely drew her words out even slower, coating them so thickly with southern honey, even she almost gagged.

  “That I couldn’t tell you…love,” Avery giggled with delight. “Besides, isn’t it more important to figure out who the artist is, rather then the subject?”

  “Not necessarily,” Taylor sighed. “The next time I’m in New York, I’ll stop by and tell you a story sometime…it’s too complicated to cover over the phone.” “Besides that, Avery, you’d probably never believe me,” she added shrewdly to herself. “I appreciate your calling me so quickly…Avery. I’ll download what files I do have on Sir Joshua Reynolds’s works. Who knows? Maybe I’ll find something.”

  “Call me if you do, love…in fact, call me if you don’t! I’m going to be very upset with you, if you continue ignoring me the way you have these past several months,” Avery spouted with flair. “Take care of yourself, my dear and hurry up here to civilization to visit your friend the city mouse!”

  “Y-a-w-l be sure and take care now, y’hear?” Taylor drawled deliciously into his ear, quickly adding, “Thanks for calling, Avery…you’re the best.”

  Replacing the receiver onto the cradle, Taylor stood smiling at the thought of her flamboyant friend in New York. Shaking her head as she unconsciously tapped her fingers on the phone, Taylor was grateful that he hadn’t pressed her for more information about the portrait in question.

  A thought suddenly occurring to her, Taylor again picked up the receiver, quickly punching in Mattie’s number. Mattie’s answering machine picked up on the third ring; the soothing sounds of chimes and harps in the background of Mattie’s singsong voice. A nauseating chant breathlessly requested the caller to visualize a peaceful scene as the signature of the caller’s aura was recorded on her machine. Slowly shaking her head in amazement, Taylor patiently waited for the last chime to sound, then left Mattie a message saying she’d be stopping by this afternoon after she stopped in to visit her mother.

  After she hung up the phone again, Taylor returned to the computer, searching for files containing all information pertaining to the artist, Sir Joshua Reynolds. She knew he was an 18th century British artist, who was the first President of the Royal Academy. He’d written fifteen discourses on painting and like herself, had also invented a specific surface treatment for the canvas. She’d always admired his portraits, so lifelike and realistic that it wouldn’t be at all surprising for the subjects to simply step out of the canvas into reality. Taylor had never made the connection between his known works and the canvas in question residing in her workroom. It had taken Avery’s objective eye to compare the styles for a possible match. Of course, Avery wasn’t so emotionally involved either, she noted wryly to herself.

  She’d been searching for information for over a week now, obsessed to identify the persistent subject who had no
w taken to haunting her dreams. Taylor hadn’t seen the mysterious visitor any more during her waking hours, but as soon as she fell asleep and drifted into a dream state…there he was, constantly imploring her to find her way to him. Never frightening, always gently urging, his handsome face seemed to be taking on a faint shadow of melancholy, becoming more pronounced each time he appeared.

  Taylor shook her head, momentarily dispelling the reverie, pondering whether or not to resort to sleeping pills in an attempt to sleep too deeply for the unnerving dreams. Rubbing her hand across her weary face, she noted the time on the monitor of the computer and decided to leave the museum early. Besides, she still had to go by and relate the day’s events to Mama before she headed over to Mattie’s house with her idea.

  ~*~

  Taylor signed in at the nurse’s desk as a matter of formality only. She’d been coming to the nursing home for so long, she was on a first name basis with everyone on staff. Her mother had resided at the home ever since her last heart episode had weakened her to the point of becoming bedridden. She had adamantly refused to allow Taylor to pay for a private nurse to live with her in her own home. Since Constance required dialysis three times a week for kidney failure, it was actually more convenient that she reside at the facility. It was just physically too painful for Constance to travel anywhere in a car or ambulance.

  Being at the home wasn’t nearly as bad as Taylor had feared. Before Constance sank into her current catatonic state, she’d made several close friends to keep her company throughout her long pain-filled days. Always concentrating on little ways to make her new found friends feel special, very few people had any idea just how painful Constance McKenna’s waking hours actually were.

  As Taylor started down the hallway to her mother’s room, her pace quickened at the sight of a doctor and two nurses exiting her mother’s door. At the sound of Taylor’s approaching footsteps, Dr. Banks looked up from his clipboard, meeting Taylor’s worried gaze with a disconcerting frown.

  “What’s going on?” Taylor immediately asked, not waiting for the doctor’s usual formalities. Glancing between the grim faces of the two attending nurses, Taylor plunged into the room, fearing her mother’s life had already ended. The weak and irregular beep of the heart monitor reassured Taylor that her mother’s body was still struggling along; but the labored rise and fall of her chest, as well as the painful liquid wheezing, told Taylor without a doubt that the struggle wouldn’t last much longer.

  Dr. Banks gently pulled at Taylor’s sleeve, “Ms. McKenna…if you’d step out here in the hallway…” Whispering, he curtly inclined his head toward the door.

  Casting a worried glance at her mother’s frail body, Taylor allowed Dr. Banks to lead her out of the room.

  “I’m afraid your mother has developed a severe case of pneumonia…you know we’ve been struggling for weeks to keep the fluid off of her lungs.” His face stoic as he peered at the clipboard, jotting notes as he continued speaking. “She’s gotten to the point where each breath is a struggle and I’m afraid we’ve got some decisions to make,” he finished with an apologetic cough, his pen paused in mid-air.

  Remembering the vision of her mother at Mattie’s house and her instructions for Taylor to allow her to go, Taylor dropped her gaze to the floor, her throat constricting against the words she knew she had to say. “Don’t put her on the ventilator…just keep her out of pain and let her go peacefully,” she whispered, hot teardrops splaying from her cheeks to the floor.

  “I’m sorry…Ms. McKenna…I know this isn’t easy,” Dr. Banks replied, marking Constance McKenna’s chart “DNR”…Do Not Resuscitate. As he turned to instruct the nurses on additional pain medication, Taylor returned to her mother’s room, pulling up her usual chair beside the bed as she took her mother’s hand.

  Ignoring the labored breathing and the erratic beep of the heart monitor, Taylor regaled Constance McKenna with the events of the day. Talking to her mother as though nothing in the world was amiss, Taylor filled in the details of everything Avery had told her about her latest find.

  As the hours passed and Constance’s breathing became more difficult, the nurses checked her vital signs at ever more frequent intervals. Taylor refused to move from the chair, even long enough to step out for a bite to eat. She instinctively knew that when she left the room this time, there would be no reason to return.

  It was sometime after midnight when Mattie came barreling through the door. Two nurses trailed closely behind her, threatening a call to security to have her removed. At Taylor’s raised hand for silence, both nurses smiled apologetically, quietly leaving the room. Each nurse glaring in aggravation at Mattie, their eyes narrowing as though she was an elusive prey.

  Mattie pulled up another chair to the side of Taylor, squeezing her friend’s shoulders with a quick reassuring hug. “When you didn’t come by this afternoon, I knew you’d be here,” she whispered, nodding toward the tiny body lying on the bed.

  Taylor smiled sadly, as she returned her friend’s hug, “It won’t be much longer now.” A teardrop escaping down one cheek, she gazed at her mother’s still face.

  Gently patting her friend’s hand, Mattie silently sat with Taylor. At a time like this, no words could ever come close to making things easier. The best thing she could do for her friend was simply sit beside her, quietly keeping the lonely darkness at bay. Taylor would still hurt, her heart would still grieve, but she wouldn’t be alone…Mattie would stay as long as necessary.

  As the sky was beginning to pinken in the first wee hours of dawn, the uneven beep of the heart monitor finally stopped, becoming the continual tone announcing the stillness from within. The nurse quickly walked over to the machine, flipping off the switch. She gently patted Taylor on the back and quietly instructed, “Just let us know when you leave.” Smiling sadly, she left the room, closing the door softly behind her.

  Taylor gently placed her mother’s hand carefully back on the bed; she’d held it continually the last several hours, silently pleading for a gentle squeeze in return. She tenderly smoothed back her mother’s silver hair, kissing her on the cheek as she had every night as far back as she could remember since she was a little girl. “I love you…Mama…,” she finally whispered, wiping away the teardrops before they ran off her face onto her mother’s lifeless body.

  Quietly standing at Taylor’s side, Mattie put her arm around her friend, carefully steering her out of the room. “You’re staying at my place tonight,” she said, wiping the tears from her own eyes. Taylor silently nodded in agreement, pausing at the nurse’s desk and signing out for the last time.

  ~*~

  The graveside service was simple and brief, just as Constance McKenna had requested. The absence of flowers came as a surprise to several of the onlookers until they remembered that Constance had also wished for all expressions of sympathy to be given in the form of donations to an established charity or church. In life, Constance had always put others first…she continued the practice in death.

  After everyone else had left, Taylor knelt at the tiny grave, placing a small bouquet of roses gently against the marker. Knowing her mother’s love of the crimson blossoms, Taylor couldn’t bare the thought of her grave remaining completely unadorned. As she rose from the kneeling position, steadying herself against the headstone, Taylor looked across the grave straight into Chandler’s sympathetic eyes.

  Gingerly stepping around the tombstones, Chandler and Taylor silently walked to the awaiting car sent by the funeral home. As she started to open the door, Chandler quickly put his hand against the window. “Wait Taylor…let me drive you home,” he asked quietly, carefully taking her by the arm to lead her over to his car.

  Nodding silently to the driver of the family car, Taylor dismissed the dark limousine and turned to join Chandler in his champagne colored sedan. Collapsing wearily into the passenger seat, Taylor leaned her head back against the headrest, gratefully closing her burning eyes to the harsh reality of the day.

>   Chandler slid behind the wheel but refrained from starting the car. Staring down at the floorboard, he struggled with his feelings while he sorted through his words. “I’m so sorry about your mother,” he finally said quietly, noting the dark circles shadowing the skin beneath Taylor’s eyes.

  The closed eyelids fluttered as a teardrop escaped from beneath them. Her full lips trembling into a half-hearted smile. “It’s for the best…now she’s not hurting anymore.” Her voice raspy with her tears, she blindly gazed out the window. Searching vainly in her purse for a tissue, Chandler came to the rescue, gallantly offering his freshly starched handkerchief to wipe away her tears.

  “This make-up will stain it,” Taylor mumbled apologetically, dabbing at her red-rimmed eyes.

  “Doesn’t matter,” Chandler mumbled, his arms aching to cradle her, console her from her pain. “She’s denied you that right,” he sternly reminded himself, taking a deep breath in a vain attempt at reining in his emotions.

  “Would you mind dropping me off at Mattie’s house?” Taylor asked in a weary voice. “I’ve been staying there since Mama died…but it’s time I gathered up my things and got back home now.”

  “Sure…wherever you want to go is fine,” Chandler replied, quickly turning the key in the ignition. What could he say to her to make everything all right….not just for Taylor but for their relationship?

  Struggling to make idle conversation, Taylor sat up straighter in the seat, bleakly staring out the window. “So, how have you been?” she asked. Glancing shyly at Chandler’s strained face, she vaguely noted how the muscles of his jaw seemed to ripple whenever he nervously clenched his teeth.