Kissed by an Angel Page 10

  "Somebody help her! You've got to save her!"

  But he could not hold on to the paramedic, could not even pull on his sleeve.

  "No pulse," a woman said. "No chance."

  "Help her!"

  The swirling ran long and streaky now. Ribbons of light and dark rushed past him horizontally.

  Was she with him? The siren wailed: I-veee. I-veee.

  Then he was in a square room. It was day there, or as bright as. People were rushing around.

  Hospital, he thought. Something was laid over his face, and the light was blocked out. He wasn't sure how long it was out.

  Someone leaned over him. "Tristan." The voice broke.

  "Dad?"

  "Oh, my God, why did you let this happen?"

  "Dad, where's Ivy? Is she okay?"

  "My God, my God. My child!" his father said.

  "Are they helping her?"

  His father did not speak.

  "Answer me, Dad! Why don't you answer me?"

  His father held his face. His father was leaning over him, tears falling down on his face-My face, Tristan thought with a jolt. That's my face.

  And yet he was watching his father and himself as if he were standing apart from himself.

  "Mr. Carruthers, I'm sorry." A woman in a paramedic's uniform stood next to him and his father.

  His father would not look at her. "Dead at the scene?" he asked.

  She nodded. "I'm sorry. We didn't have a chance with him."

  Tristan felt the darkness coming over him again. He struggled to hold on to consciousness.

  "And Ivy?" his father asked.

  "Cuts and bruises, in shock. Calling for your son."

  Tristan had to find her. He focused on a doorway, concentrated with all his strength, and passed through it. Then another, and another-he was feeling stronger now.

  Tristan hurried down the corridor. People kept coming at him. He dodged left and right. He seemed to be going so much faster than they were, and none of them bothered to move out of his way.

  A nurse was coming down the hall. He stopped to ask her help in finding Ivy, but she walked past him. He turned a corner and found himself facing a cart loaded with linens. Then he faced the man pushing it. Tristan spun around. The cart and the man were on the other side of him.

  Tristan knew that they had passed through him as if he were not there. He had heard what the paramedic said. Still, his mind searched for some other-any other-explanation. But there was none.

  He was dead. No one could see him. No one knew he was there. And Ivy would not know.

  Tristan felt a pain deeper than any he had ever known. He had told her he loved her, but there had not been time enough to convince her. Now there was no time at all. She'd never believe in his love the way she believed in her angels.

  "I said, I can't speak any louder."

  Tristan glanced up. He had stopped by a doorway. An old woman was lying in the bed within.

  She was tiny and gray with long, thin tubes connecting her to machines. She looked like a spider caught in its own web.

  "Come in," she said.

  He looked behind him to see whom she was talking to.

  No one.

  "These old eyes of mine are so dim, I can't see my own hand in front of my face," the woman said. "But I can see your light."

  Tristan again looked behind him. Her voice sounded certain of what she saw. It seemed much bigger and stronger than her little gray body.

  "I knew you would come," she said. "I've been waiting very patiently."

  She has been waiting for somebody, Tristan thought, a son or a grandson, and she thinks I'm him.

  Still, how could she see him if no one else could?

  Her face was shining brightly now.

  "I've always believed in you," she said. She extended a fragile hand toward Tristan. Forgetting that his hand would pass through hers, he instinctively reached out to her. She closed her eyes.

  A moment later, alarms went off. Three nurses rushed into the room. Tristan stepped back as they crowded around the woman. He suddenly realized that they were trying to resuscitate her; he knew they would not. Somehow he knew that the old woman did not want to come back.

  Maybe somehow the old woman had known about him.

  What did she know?

  Tristan could feel the darkness coming over him again. He fought it. What if this time he didn't come back? He had to come back, he had to see Ivy one last time. Desperately he tried to keep himself alert, focusing on one object after another in the room. Then he saw it, next to a small book on the woman's tray: a statue, with a hand outstretched to the woman and angelic wings spread.

  For days after, all Ivy could remember was the waterfall of glass. The accident was like a dream she kept having but couldn't remember. Asleep or awake, it would suddenly take over. Her whole body would tense, and her mind would start reeling backward, but all she could remember was the sound of a windshield exploding, then a slow-motion waterfall of glass.

  Every day people came and went from the house, Suzanne and Beth, and some other friends and teachers from school. Gary came once; it was a miserable visit for both of them. Will ducked in and out on another day. They brought her flowers, cookies, and sympathy. Ivy couldn't wait until they left, couldn't wait until she could sleep again. But when she lay down at night, she couldn't sleep, and then she had to wait forever until it was day once more.

  At the funeral they stood around her, her mother and Andrew on one side, Philip on the other.

  She let Philip do all the sobbing for her. Gregory stood behind her and from time to time laid his hand on her back. She'd lean against him for a moment. He was the only one who didn't keep asking her to talk about it. He was the only one who seemed to understand her pain and didn't keep telling her that remembering was good for her.

  Little by little she did remember-or was told-what had happened. The doctors and police prompted her. The undersides of her arms were full of cuts. She must have held her hands up in front of her face, they said, protecting it from the flying glass. Miraculously, the rest of her injuries were just bruises from the impact and the seat belt restraint. Tristan must have swerved, for the car had swung around to the right, the deer coming in on his side. To protect her, she thought, though the police didn't say that. She told them he had tried to stop but couldn't. It had been twilight. The deer had appeared suddenly. That's all she remembered. Someone told her the car had been totaled, but she refused to look at the newspaper photo.

  A week after the funeral, Tristan's mother came to the house and brought a picture of him. She said it was her favorite one. Ivy cradled it in her hands. He was smiling, wearing his old base-ball cap, backward of course, and a rarry school jacket, looking as Ivy had seen him look so many times. It seemed as if he were about to ask her if she wanted to meet for another swimming lesson. For the first time since the accident, Ivy began to cry.

  She didn't hear Gregory come into the kitchen, where she and Tristan's mother were sitting.

  When he saw Dr. Carruthers, he demanded to know why she was there.

  Ivy showed him Tristan's picture, and he looked angrily at the woman.

  "It's over now," he said. "Ivy is getting over it. She doesn't need any more reminders."

  "When you love someone, it's never over," Dr. Carruthers replied gently. "You move on, because you have to, but you bring him with you in your heart."

  She turned back to Ivy. "You need to talk and remember, Ivy. You need to cry. Cry hard. You need to get angry, too. I am!"

  "You know," said Gregory, "I'm getting tired of listening to all this crap. Everyone is telling Ivy to remember and talk about what happened. Everyone has a pet theory on how to mourn, but I wonder if they're really thinking of how it feels for her."

  Dr. Carruthers studied him for a moment. "I wonder if you have really mourned your own loss," she said.

  "Don't tell me you're a shrink!"

  She shook her head. "Just a person who, like
you, has lost someone I loved with all my heart."

  Before she left, Tristan's mother asked Ivy if she wanted Ella back.

  "I can't have her," Ivy said. "They won't let me!"

  Then she ran up to her room, slammed the door, and locked it. One by one, those she loved were being taken away from her.

  Picking up an angel statue, one that Beth had just brought her, Ivy hurled it against the wall.

  "Why?" she cried out. "Why didn't I die, too?"

  She picked up the angel and threw it again.

  "You're better off, Tristan. I hate you for being better off than me. You don't miss me now, do you? Oh, no, you don't feel a thing!"

  On the third try, the angel shattered. Another waterfall of glass. She didn't bother to pick it up.

  After dinner that evening, Ivy found the glass cleaned up and the picture of Tristan sitting on her bureau. She didn't ask who had done it. She didn't want to speak to any of them. When Gregory tried to come into her bedroom, she slammed the door in his face. She slammed it in his face again the next morning.

  That day, she was barely civil to the customers at 'Tis the Season. When she arrived home, she went straight to her room. Opening the door, she found Philip there, spreading out his baseball cards. She had noticed that he no longer called out the play-by-play for his games, just moved the players silently from base to base. But when he looked up at Ivy, he smiled at her for the first time in days. He pointed to her bed.

  "Ella!" Ivy exclaimed. "Ella!"

  She hurried in and dropped to her knees beside the bed. Immediately the cat began to purr. Ivy buried her face in the cat's soft fur and started to cry.

  Then she felt a light hand on her shoulder. Drying her cheeks on Ella, she turned to Philip. "Does Mom know she's here?"

  He nodded. "She knows. It's okay. Gregory said it was. Gregory brought her back to us."

  Chapter 13

  When Tristan awakened, he tried to remember which day of the week it was and what lessons he would be giving at the swim camp. Judging by the dim light in his room, it was too early to rise and dress for work. Lying back, he dreamed of Ivy-Ivy with her hair tumbling down.

  Slowly he became aware of footsteps outside the door and a sound like something being wheeled by. He leaped up. What was he doing there-lying on the hospital floor in the room of a man he had never seen before? The man yawned and glanced around the room. He did not appear at all surprised by Tristan's presence; he acted as if he didn't even see him.

  Then it came back to Tristan: the accident, the ambulance ride, the paramedic's words. He was dead. But he could think. He could watch other people. Was he a ghost?

  Tristan remembered the old lady. She had said she saw his light, which was why, he thought, she had mistaken him for an-"No, no." He said it aloud, but the man didn't hear him. "I can't be that."

  Well, whatever he was, he was something that could laugh. He laughed and laughed, almost hysterically. He cried too.

  The door behind him swung open suddenly. Tristan quieted himself, but it didn't matter. The nurse who entered was not aware of him, though she stood so close her elbow passed through his as she filled out the man's chart. July 9, 3:45 A.M., Tristan read.

  July 9? It couldn't be! It had been June when he'd last been with Ivy. Had he been unconscious for two weeks? Would he black out again? Why was he conscious and there at all?

  He thought about the old woman who had reached out to him. Why had she noticed him, but the nurse and others had seen nothing? Would Ivy see him?

  Hope surged through Tristan. If he could find Ivy before he fell into the darkness again, he'd have another chance to convince her that he loved her. He would always love her.

  The nurse left, shutting the door behind her.

  Tristan reached to open it, but his fingers slipped through the handle. He tried again, and again.

  His hands had no more strength than shadows. Now he'd have to wait for the nurse to come back.

  He didn't know how long he would stay conscious or whether, like ghosts in old tales, he'd melt away at dawn.

  He tried to remember how he had gotten this far and pictured the halls he had traveled down from the emergency room. He could see very clearly the corner where the orderly had gone through him. Suddenly he was traveling the halls to that spot. That was the trick. He had to project a route in his head and focus on where he wanted to go.

  Soon he was out on the street. He had forgotten he was at County Hospital and had to get himself all the way home to Stonehill. But he had driven the route a thousand times to pick up his parents. At the thought of them, Tristan slowed down. He remembered his father in the emergency room, leaning over him and weeping. Tristan longed to assure him that everything was all right, but he didn't know how much time would be given to him. His parents had each other; Ivy was alone.

  The night sky was just starting to fade into dawn when he arrived at her house. Two rectangles of light glimmered softly in the west wing. Andrew must have been working in his office. Tristan went around back and found the office's French doors thrown open to the cool night air. Andrew was at his desk, deep in thought. Tristan slipped in unseen.

  He saw that Andrew's briefcase was open and papers with the college insignia were scattered about. But the document he had been reading was a police report. Tristan realized with a jolt that it was the official report on his and Ivy's accident. Next to it was a newspaper article about them.

  The printed words should have made his death more real to him, but they didn't. Instead, they made things that had once counted-his appearance, his swimming record, his school achievements-seem meaningless and small. Only Ivy was important to him now.

  She had to know he loved her and that he always would.

  He left Andrew to pore over the report, though he didn't understand why he would be so interested in it, and took the back stairs. Slipping past Gregory's room, which was above the office, he crossed the gallery to the hall that led to Ivy's room. He could hardly wait to see her, hardly wait for her to see him. He trembled as he had done before their first swimming lesson. Would they be able to speak to each other?

  If anyone could see him and hear him, Ivy could-her faith was strong! Tristan focused on her room and passed through the wall.

  Ella sat up immediately. She had been sleeping on Ivy's bed, her thick black fur balled close to Ivy's golden head. Now the cat blinked and stared at him, or at the empty air-after all, cats did that, he thought. But when he moved toward the other side of Ivy's bed, Ella's green eyes followed him.

  "Ella, what do you see, Ella?" he asked quietly.

  The cat began to purr, and he laughed.

  He stood by Ivy's side now. Her hair was tumbled over her face. He tried to brush it back. More than anything he longed to see her face, but his hands were useless.

  "I wish you could help me, Ella," he said.

  The cat walked over the pillows toward him. He kept very still, wondering what exactly she perceived. Ella leaned as if she would rub against his arm. She fell over sideways and yelped.

  Ivy stirred then, and he called her name softly.

  Ivy rolled onto her back and he thought she was going to answer him. Her face was a lost moon, beautiful, but pale. All of her light lay in the golden lashes and her long hair spread out like rays from her face.

  Ivy frowned. He wanted to smooth the frown away but couldn't. She began to toss and turn.

  "Who's there?" she asked. "Who's there?"

  He leaned over her. "It's me. Tristan."

  "Who's there?" she asked again.

  "Tristan!"

  Her frown deepened. "I can't see."

  He laid his hand on her shoulder, wishing she would awaken, certain that she would see him and hear him. "Ivy, look at me. I'm here!"

  Her eyes fluttered open for a moment. Then he saw the change come over her face. He saw the terror take over her. She began to scream.

  "Ivy!"

  She screamed and screamed.


  "Ivy, don't be afraid."

  He tried to hold her. He wrapped his arms around her, but their bodies slipped through each other. He could not comfort her.

  Then the bedroom door flew open. Philip rushed in. Gregory was close behind him.

  "Wake up, Ivy, wake up!" Philip shook her. "Come on, Ivy, please."

  Her eyes opened wide now. She gazed at Philip, then glanced around the room. She did not pause at Tristan; she looked straight through him.

  Gregory rested his hands lightly on Philip's shoulders and moved him aside. He sat down on the bed, then pulled Ivy close to him. Tristan could see that she was shaking.

  "Everything is going to be all right," Gregory said, smoothing back her hair. "It was just a dream."

  A terrifying dream, thought Tristan. And he couldn't help her, couldn't comfort her now.

  But Gregory could. Tristan was overcome with jealousy.

  He couldn't stand to see Gregory holding her that close.

  And yet he couldn't stand to see Ivy so frightened and upset. Gratitude to Gregory, as powerful as his jealousy, swept through him. Then jealousy again. Tristan felt weak from this war of feelings and backed away from the three of them, moving toward Ivy's shelves of angels. Ella followed him cautiously.

  "Was your dream about the accident?" Philip asked.

  Ivy nodded, then dropped her head, running her hands over and over the twisted sheets.

  "You want to talk about it?" Gregory asked.

  Ivy tried to speak, then shook her head and turned one hand over, palm up. Tristan saw the jagged scars running up her arm like the traces of lightning strikes. For a moment the darkness came up from behind him, but he fought it back.

  "I'm here. Everything's okay," Gregory said, and waited patiently.

  "I–I was staring at a window," she began. "I saw a large shadow in it, but I wasn't sure who, or what, it was. 'Who's there?' I called out. 'Who's there?'" From across the room, Tristan watched, her pain and fear pressing upon him.

  "I thought it might be someone I knew," she continued. "The shadow looked familiar somehow.

  So I walked closer, and closer. I couldn't see." She stopped and glanced around the bedroom.