[otc] 16.2 - "i should have..."
For a long while, he could only stare at the monument and wonder why he hadn’t come before now. All the years he’d stood in awe of the master, of his own soul, and he hadn’t made the journey to this place. He’d stood in the presence itself, and he hadn’t understood that violated feeling for what it was. Now he was here, with her again, and he wasn’t sure what he was supposed to feel.
Brighter laughter rang in his next to the carefree intimacy of another low chuckle. The memory of warm, luscious curves and of lean planes of skin burned under his fingers as he thought of two different loves, two different women.
He wondered about her soul…wondered if it recognized his.
When he finally gathered his courage to approach the tombstone of Wilhemina Beatrice Rahner, a bouquet of flowers in hand, so much of his fear melted away that it was hard to remember he’d been scared. He feared Bess Houdini on even her best day when he’d lived before, to be sure…but she knew his worst and still she’d mourned.
He didn’t feel disrespectful as he placed his bouquet of cheerful orange poppies in the vase before her headstone and sat, drawing up one knee to rest his arm on. It satisfied something in him to be here with the sun on his face…lounging in the grass where his sweet girl rested.
“I’m sorry it took me so long to get here.” He finally whispered, his own voice sounding strange in his ears. “It’s…been a long eighty two years. I was lost for a long time, but I’m back now. I’m found, and so are you. I’m just sorry you didn’t get your space, sweetheart. It’s still there.”
The sun warmed his skin. The grass was sweet and damp under his fingers. Somewhere on the air, a bird sang.
“I should have told you the truth about me.”
He wasn’t aware of speaking until the words left his mouth, a truth borne of some deeper knowledge hidden in the memories still not fully known to him. Maybe it was a resurgence of Houdini’s essence, maybe it was just him, but now that the words had started he couldn’t stop them…or the tears that came with them.
“There were other women and other loves, other touches that I found peace in when things fell apart. You know that, knew that after I was gone. But Daisy, Charmian, the girls from the films…I loved them, Charmian above all, but I gave them nothing that I gave you. I abandoned my calling, Rosabelle…I gave up my life’s work for you, and I never told you. The destiny I was born for, the legacy I left my people…it was a lie.”
His tears were a silent river, his guilt and his grief a solid knot in his throat as he reached out to touch the well-worn marble…whether the sun or the spirit made it warm, he didn’t know, but the heat under his fingers was a comfort.
Raising up slightly, he leaned in and pressed a kiss to the name engraved there. Bess. Rosabelle.
“I should have told you.” He breathed, resting his forehead against the marble. “I gave them everything I had, sweetheart…but I gave hope to no other woman but you.”
He sat there for an eternity. Time passed. The day got hotter. But as the shadows lengthened while his tears slowed and dried, the dying rays of daylight hit him oddly. Stone cooled beneath his forehead, and the rays of light brought stripes of heat along his body, warming the cold places and cooling those that were too hot…and in spite of it all, the grass stayed deliciously cool and damp under him.
Only then, when the grave had sufficiently embraced him with Bess’s very final farewell did he rise to leave…and on the distant winds just stirring his hair in the coming evening, he could have sworn he heard a bird singing a melody he knew all too well.
Maybe it wasn’t a bird…maybe it was a woman, crooning an old sweet song he hadn’t heard since the Coney Island circuit, when a pixie of a brunette with an angel’s voice first caught his wandering eye…
“Believe.” He whispered to the wind, his steps never faltering as he continued to walk away from his past. “You did once, just a little while longer. I promise you, baby…I’ll see you again.”
By the time he reached his car, the song on the air was gone again.
Muse: Tommy Karras
Fandom: Original Character
Words :760
Brighter laughter rang in his next to the carefree intimacy of another low chuckle. The memory of warm, luscious curves and of lean planes of skin burned under his fingers as he thought of two different loves, two different women.
He wondered about her soul…wondered if it recognized his.
When he finally gathered his courage to approach the tombstone of Wilhemina Beatrice Rahner, a bouquet of flowers in hand, so much of his fear melted away that it was hard to remember he’d been scared. He feared Bess Houdini on even her best day when he’d lived before, to be sure…but she knew his worst and still she’d mourned.
He didn’t feel disrespectful as he placed his bouquet of cheerful orange poppies in the vase before her headstone and sat, drawing up one knee to rest his arm on. It satisfied something in him to be here with the sun on his face…lounging in the grass where his sweet girl rested.
“I’m sorry it took me so long to get here.” He finally whispered, his own voice sounding strange in his ears. “It’s…been a long eighty two years. I was lost for a long time, but I’m back now. I’m found, and so are you. I’m just sorry you didn’t get your space, sweetheart. It’s still there.”
The sun warmed his skin. The grass was sweet and damp under his fingers. Somewhere on the air, a bird sang.
“I should have told you the truth about me.”
He wasn’t aware of speaking until the words left his mouth, a truth borne of some deeper knowledge hidden in the memories still not fully known to him. Maybe it was a resurgence of Houdini’s essence, maybe it was just him, but now that the words had started he couldn’t stop them…or the tears that came with them.
“There were other women and other loves, other touches that I found peace in when things fell apart. You know that, knew that after I was gone. But Daisy, Charmian, the girls from the films…I loved them, Charmian above all, but I gave them nothing that I gave you. I abandoned my calling, Rosabelle…I gave up my life’s work for you, and I never told you. The destiny I was born for, the legacy I left my people…it was a lie.”
His tears were a silent river, his guilt and his grief a solid knot in his throat as he reached out to touch the well-worn marble…whether the sun or the spirit made it warm, he didn’t know, but the heat under his fingers was a comfort.
Raising up slightly, he leaned in and pressed a kiss to the name engraved there. Bess. Rosabelle.
“I should have told you.” He breathed, resting his forehead against the marble. “I gave them everything I had, sweetheart…but I gave hope to no other woman but you.”
He sat there for an eternity. Time passed. The day got hotter. But as the shadows lengthened while his tears slowed and dried, the dying rays of daylight hit him oddly. Stone cooled beneath his forehead, and the rays of light brought stripes of heat along his body, warming the cold places and cooling those that were too hot…and in spite of it all, the grass stayed deliciously cool and damp under him.
Only then, when the grave had sufficiently embraced him with Bess’s very final farewell did he rise to leave…and on the distant winds just stirring his hair in the coming evening, he could have sworn he heard a bird singing a melody he knew all too well.
Maybe it wasn’t a bird…maybe it was a woman, crooning an old sweet song he hadn’t heard since the Coney Island circuit, when a pixie of a brunette with an angel’s voice first caught his wandering eye…
“Believe.” He whispered to the wind, his steps never faltering as he continued to walk away from his past. “You did once, just a little while longer. I promise you, baby…I’ll see you again.”
By the time he reached his car, the song on the air was gone again.
Muse: Tommy Karras
Fandom: Original Character
Words :760