Chapter Twenty Nine #3
“Whatever it is, we’ll deal with it. Okay?”
Laurie
scanned the letter, holding it so that Sasha could read it too. He
wasn’t sure which one of them got the gist and began laughing
first—only that Sasha braced him harder, hushed him for the sake of
his stitches and the sleeping child at his side. The letter was
from a management company in North Hollywood, appointed to deal
with bankruptcy proceedings in the name of Douglas Brett and Ivory
Gate Studios. There would be further details to come, but this
preliminary notification was simply to inform all personnel
involved with IG’s current and future projects that filming had
stopped, and IG and the management company would work towards
releasing all contracted actors under mutually agreeable
terms.
“Looks like you’re free, chirilo.”
“What’s a chirilo?” Laurie almost didn’t have to ask him. There
was such a sense of joy in the word, an uplifted liberty, as if
Sasha knew about the dream-hawk and had come to fly with him, wing
to wing in Carpathian skies. “Will you teach me Romani one
day?”
“What, so you’ll know what I’m calling you?” Sasha smiled,
brushed a kiss to Laurie’s face, just above the torn-up skin.
“Chirilo is a bird.”
***
Time
passed strangely for Sasha after that. He was so tired he had
passed beyond the ability to sleep, and he didn’t want to—for the
first time in a long time, didn’t want to miss a second of his
life. Medical staff came and went, none of them disturbing him from
his place by Laurie’s bed. Marielle Fitzroy materialised in a cloud
of sparkling fragrance and fur, still largely detached from reality
but genuinely glad to see her son awake and able to talk. Her
attempt to reclaim Clara devolved into protests and tears until
Elena Dracinsky strode into the room, snapping the child to
obedient attention. The dragon and the queen of Mayfair regarded
one another across the abyss of the differences between them, but
left together peacefully, each holding one of Clara’s hands. Before
Sasha could exchange a glance with Laurie or draw a peaceful
breath, the door bounced open again, this time admitting—of all
people—Laurie’s former agent Arnie Hamlin, all past resentments
forgotten in the drama of hearing his protégé had been
shot.
Sasha did retreat from Laurie’s bedside then, just far enough
to make room for Arnie’s personality, and to frown at him when his
cries of dismay threatened to undo Sasha’s good work on the subject
of rakish, attractive facial scars. Leaning against the window
sill, Sasha wondered at the changes wrought by time. There was his
haughty midwinter prince, apologising with deep sincerity for his
rudeness in letting Arnie go. Stranger still, Arnie was explaining
that the fault had been entirely his, that an Orthodox Jewish
upbringing had clouded his vision with regard to the people he
still unfortunately referred to as the
gays. Arnie had a new gig: was accompanying
one of the UK’s most outrageous and political drag queens on a tour
East Africa, where Sasha guessed his re-education would soon be
completed.
Arnie
apologised to Sasha too, and the three of them were in the process
of awkwardly shaking hands all round when a cautious creaking of
the door heralded the entrance of a walking bunch of flowers—Alison
Jones, still blushing over her misdemeanours, as if Laurie hadn’t
outdone her by a thousand times in his own encounter with the
world’s media. Close on her heels was Paul Jacobs, and then—Sasha
subsided onto Laurie’s bed, clutching the hand his poor lover held
out to him for anchor in this storm—John Kucharski and ex-WPC
Christine Foster, and last of all a staff nurse, mouth open wide in
outrage at the invasion. “Two visitors at one time! Two visitors
only!”
She
didn’t make much impact on the chattering crowd. John Kucharski
cleared his throat. He’d been leaning on the foot of Laurie’s bed,
exchanging friendly greetings with Sasha, but now he straightened
up. He drew his badge, flashed it round and barked, without a trace
of shame for the theatrics, “Interpol! Everyone but Mr Petrica to
clear the room at once.”
Mouths
opened. An astonished silence fell. Then, one by one, Laurie’s
small team of friends and admirers deposited their grapes and
bouquets, and beat a subdued retreat. The staff nurse, unable to
argue with Interpol, especially when that authority had come to the
aid of her own, settled for glaring at Kucharski. “Ten minutes,”
she warned. “And Mr Fitzroy isn’t to be stressed in any
way.”
“Of course not,” Kucharski said equably. “Five minutes is all
I’ll need.”
The nurse left the room, and Christine Foster let go of a
snorting chuckle. “For God’s sake, John. I suppose
I’m allowed to
stay?”
“If you’re good.” Kucharski dropped his formal manner. Laurie
was watching him in apprehension, and Sasha, well attuned now to
the shifting sounds of the ECG, gave his hand a reassuring squeeze.
“I’m sorry, Agent Kucharski,” Sasha said. “We know there’ll be
things we need to talk to you about, but Laurie really isn’t well
enough to—”
“I haven’t come here to interrogate the poor lad. I just wanted
to clap eyes on him. He looks much better with a pulse, doesn’t he?
Oh, and to tell him about his car.”
Sasha
and Laurie exchanged a glance. Neither had spared the Merc a
thought since putting her to such dire use in the Birchwood night.
“My car?” Laurie echoed uneasily. “Is it about the fine for using a
resident’s permit? Because I meant to sort that out before I left,
but...”
“We’ve dealt with that, plus your outstanding penalties for the
congestion zone. Pay your own dues in future, please. But what I
meant to say was, if we requisition a vehicle, we’re obliged to
repair or reimburse. Our mechanics said the back seat was beyond
repair—cream leather shows every little mark—so they’ve sourced a
replacement and fitted it. Oh, and they refilled and sprayed that
key mark down the side, nice a job as someone had done with wax
crayon.”
“That seems... almost too generous. Thank you.”
“Well, maybe we wouldn’t have gone to such lengths for
witnesses who hadn’t helped put down a gang of Romanian warlords.
We apprehended the rest of Stefan Petrica’s men on their way out of
Birchwood. We will need your testimony in due course, but...”
Kucharski sobered. “In the meantime, Sasha, I’m sorry about your
father. I know Romani culture values a man according to who he is,
not what he’s done.”
“I’m not wholly of that culture.” Sasha hadn’t had time to
process his memories of the showdown by candlelight in the deep
woods, but every time he thought of Stefan now, all he felt was a
dizzying sense of freedom. “I did feel that way. Not any
more.”
Kucharski surveyed him and Laurie. “Good,” he said. “That
kind of loyalty deserves a better object.”
“What about...” Sasha hesitated. He had wanted to be alone with
Laurie before he opened this box, somewhere peaceful and safe where
Laurie could find his own way of telling him the truth he already
knew. He lifted the lid just a crack, a huge ache of sorrow passing
through him. “The woman who was with you, Elizabeth. What happened
to her?”
“I’m afraid we lost her trail. I don’t anticipate picking it up
again.” Kucharski assumed the sphinx-like look that had presumably
served him so well among the Romanian warlords. “If we ever did, of
course, she’d receive our protection.”
“Even if she didn’t... if she couldn’t act as a
witness?”
“Yes. Even then.”
“Thank you.”
Kucharski nodded. Then he glanced at Christine Foster and
brightened. “Well, we must let your other visitors get back to
mauling you to death, Laurie. I just wanted to tell you both—any
further communications about this case will come from Agent Foster
here. I won’t be available.”
“Are you going undercover again?”
“Are you kidding? No—our non-fraternisation rules make it hard
for us to get married, that’s all. So I’m retiring.” He looked in
satisfaction at Foster, who had produced a deep and rosy blush.
“I’ve been running around with a gun all my life. It took being
dead to make me realise what I was missing.”
***
Late
evening, and all the visitors gone. Laurie was sleeping. The
hospital room faced westward, and the light that filled it had a
stained-glass brilliance, shifting through shades of apricot, ruby
and gold. Sasha knew this light had its own purpose and beauty. He
knew there was a whole planet out there, minding its business and
waging its wars, but all he could care about was how the world and
its light dealt with the man beside him. Sasha understood and loved
the copper glow because it burnished Laurie’s brow, caressed the
injured side of his face. He loved this sunset because Laurie was
alive in it, heart beating steadily in the holy light.
In the
midst of this sanctity, Laurie surfaced, drawing a fearful breath.
He sought Sasha’s eyes, the bronze light turning his own to
deep-sea indigo. He said, as if carrying on a conversation from
just a moment before, “But the birds, Sash. The mirror
birds.”
Sasha
frowned. He felt Laurie’s brow, but there was no trace of fever
there. He was due his evening meds, and his gaze was lucid, if
still shadowed by his dreams. “Are you thinking about the chirilo,
sweetheart?” The mirror was still by the bed: perhaps that was
haunting him. Sasha set it face-down. “You don’t have to worry
about that. You don’t have to worry about anything at
all.”
“I do. Because Kucharski was right—sometimes you do have to
die. To realise what you’ve got.”
“You didn’t die.” Sasha smoothed back strands of his hair.
“Stefan’s gone, and Clara’s fine, and even the big tough Interpol
guys are getting married.” He smiled. “It’s a bloody fairytale
ending, other than you getting shot.”
“That’s just it. The getting married part, I mean. Every time I
think of it, I see the mirror birds.”
“Would you like to try and make sense for me? You don’t sound
delirious, but I’m more than willing to panic and hit that
buzzer.”
“Please don’t.” Laurie struggled to sit up, and Sasha pressed
him back, found the remote control and raised the head of the bed
for him. “Thank you. I’m not delirious, Sash. I do want to explain.
When Nicole told me what she’d done—that she’d filmed me with
Wesley, put it on the internet, sent it to the bloody papers—that
was how I saw it. Millions of little birds made of glass shards,
shooting out in all directions. And it wasn’t just that they were
made of glass, glass with sharp edges to... tear up anyone I loved.
They were mirrors. I could see myself in them. Everything that was
happening, all that pain—it was my fault. Just me.”
“That’s forgiven, Laurie. Didn’t I say so?”
“Yes. On the heath, right beside Mama Luna’s camp fire. And I
believed you, because...”
“Because it felt like she was still there, and I’d never have
lied to her spirit.” Sasha laid a hand to Laurie’s chest, the place
over his heart where the electrode pad still recorded and confirmed
his existence. “Or to yours. What does it have to do with marriage,
though?”
“This. If the damn birds are gone—really gone...”
“They’re gone.”
“Then I want to do what every decent person I’ve met lately
seems to have had the balls and the sense to do. Gibson, Charlie,
John Kucharski, Foster...”
Sasha
broke into soft laughter. He took both Laurie’s hands in his own,
mindful of the drip feed, otherwise tight enough to squeeze bone.
“Are you proposing to me, my one and only beautiful
Loz?”
“Yes. God, Sasha—will you?”
“Yes. Yes.”
***
The dark
was almost down. The window was open to the sweet late-summer dusk,
and Sasha leaned with his elbows on the sill, looking out over the
city that had become his home. Behind him in the room, the doctors
were settling Laurie down for the night.
Sasha
had a glass bird of his own, he supposed, though its edges weren’t
sharp, and its colours were warm desert russet and gold. He had
heard from Mateo. The email said that he’d been accepted for the
DACA programme—that his paperwork was being processed, all his
prospects good. It had also contained an invitation.
Sasha
reached into the pocket of his jeans. Mrs Gibson had brought him
several changes of clothes, but in his distraction that morning
he’d pulled on the same pair he’d worn on the day he’d left the
states. Gently he pulled out a dry, still-fragrant jacaranda
blossom. Sasha smiled. He raised the flower to his lips and kissed
it. Then he held it out of the window, where it lingered for a
second on the palm of his hand before the breeze caught it, bearing
it off into the night.