Histories of the Void Garden, Book 1: Pyre of Dreams Read Online Free PDF Page B

you’ve
forgotten what keys are for.” Of course, she’d thought he was
impertinent, and had told him as much. She’d always said he had
dreadful bedside manner.
    She felt her
arm lifted from the couch, lifted by the ghost of a dear friend,
and she shivered as he kissed the soft skin of the back of her
hand. She swallowed uncomfortably, breathless and nauseous, she
could feel her pulse in the veins of her neck.
    “Charlene, open
your eyes for me.” The request was soft, not threatening, but she
didn’t know how to open her eyes any more. She felt as if she would
never stop crying if she opened them. Her lips parted and she heard
her own pathetic gasp and moan, her voice cracking as she tried to
speak, “You … You …”
    The room was
dark, the light from the window dull and sunless, illuminating only
in subdued tones and cutting dark swathes where it was unable to
reach. She opened her eyes slowly and he was there, his face picked
out of shadow cut contours. “Anthony?” She spoke the word as an
admission of insanity, surrendering the possibility that she might
be talking to her care worker. It didn’t matter anymore. She could
only see his face. If this was dementia, her mind had conjured the
most vividly real and heartbreaking memory to taunt her.
    She stared at
him, reconciling the details of his features against her memory of
Anthony Statham, and she couldn’t discern any flaws in his
likeness. It was him, down to the soft crow’s feet, the Prussian
blue irises of his eyes, the slight cleft of his chin, the thick
eyebrows.

    West looked at the
faded, but ornate fabric of Charlene Osterman’s couch and started
tracing the pattern of floral swirls with the finger of his free
hand, trying to imagine what the fabric felt like, trying to
remember the softness of fabric. He didn’t want to look at
Charlene’s face as she went through this agony. It was a necessary
pain, he knew. He would be forgiven for it. Probably. He glanced
about the apartment and noticed a large bromeliad on a plant stand,
flowering with a beautiful deep purple cup.
    “You can keep a
plant alive now,” he whispered, “that’s a miracle in itself.”
    Charlene pulled
her hand away from West and covered her face with it.
    West stroked
his fingers against Charlene’s pearl white hair, wishing that he
could feel it, “I know this doesn’t make sense to you Charlene. I
understand that you’re frightened. I’m not going to hurt you and
I’m not going to leave your side until you calm down and talk to
me.”
    Charlene lay
trembling, trying to muster the courage to look again at the man
who knelt beside her.
    She turned her
head slowly, staring into his deep blue eyes, those eyes she hadn’t
recognized when he had come to her door, eyes that she had sworn to
herself a thousand times she would never forget.
    “Anthony?” she
tried the word again, tentatively, unsure how much pain it would
cause to say that name.
    The man shook
his head. “Charlene, my name is West Yestler, although you have
known me, and the name you knew me by was Anthony Statham.”
    Her chest
caught again and a series of shallow breaths gave way to gentle
sobs as she pressed the back of her left hand against her eyes. She
fought against her frailty and self-pity, trying her best to sound
firm and certain, “Anthony Statham was the kindest man I have ever
known, and he would never have stooped to playing evil tricks on
old women.”
    West laughed
gently, not mocking, “Charlene Osterman was one of the bravest
women I have known in many years, and she would never deign to
describe anything in such trivial absolutes as good or evil.”
    She glared at
him firing back quickly, “People change!”
    West glanced
around the apartment again before looking back to her, “Seldom do
people change. You have learned to nurture plants though.”
    Charlene
covered her mouth with her hand, unsure how to respond, not because
she was disarmed by West’s humor, but because of the