The Drayton Chronicles by Bertauski Tony

Author:Bertauski, Tony [Bertauski, Tony]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2013-03-10T00:00:00+00:00

X

A week passed.

Drayton was escorted to the third floor. He followed the chambermaid down a long hallway that ended with double doors. He waited while she went inside and announced his arrival. Only when she returned to swing the doors open wide did he advance.

“Madam would like to know if you’d prefer something to drink?”

“Tea would be nice,” Drayton answered. “Thank you.”

“Sweetened?”

“That won’t be necessary. Earl Grey, if you have it. Steeped three and a half minutes.”

The maid nodded. Drayton thanked her, again.

The room was circular with a pitched ceiling that met at a point in the center, just above a round table. The walls were glass, giving an observer a nearly 360-degree view of the ocean and the beach in both directions.

Ms. Ruth was on the far side. She was parked with her back to Drayton, facing the sharp line of the horizon. There was a small window in front of her that looked custom made, large enough to allow the breeze to rustle her hair and the room to smell wide open.

Drayton waited patiently until the chambermaid arrived with a cup of tea. She pulled the chair from the table and gestured for him to sit. Drayton did so and crossed his legs. He lifted the cup and inhaled the astringent aroma of Earl Grey.

“When I was a child,” Ms. Ruth said, “I would dream of flying. I would simply raise my arms and I would float off the ground, over the ocean. It was such a blissful experience of freedom, unfettered by our human condition, this heavy body cursed to plod the ground from beginning to end. But I stopped having that dream when I was still very young. I have rarely dreamed since, until recently.

“I dreamed again that I was flying. I was nowhere in particular, but I was experiencing freedom again, soaring through a grayness towards home, I believe. I was unfettered, once again. Until I felt you.”

She turned the wheelchair around.

“I suddenly felt too heavy to fly anymore, young man. And I awoke in the hospital, in this fettered body. And you were there.”

Ms. Ruth eased up to the table and crossed her hands on her lap. She gestured to Drayton and he sipped from the cup. She smiled. “What is your name?”

“Drayton, ma’am.”

“I see,” she said, nodding.

The stillness was broken by the staff opening the doors and wheeling in a cart. While they arranged their plates with pasta salad, pickled shrimp and crackers, Ms. Ruth only watched Drayton. He sipped again.

When they left, she took a bite and wiped her mouth, chewing slowly.

“Why are you here, Mr. Drayton?”

Drayton simply nodded, as if she already knew the answer.

“I see,” she said, mildly. “Are you an angel? A demon? A dream thief?”

“I am none of those. Simply here.”

She watched him with her lips slightly agape. Her studied gaze took in his expression; her mind piecing together his posture. His energy. Ms. Ruth was a good people reader. She felt like she simply absorbed subtleties of

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