Chiral Mad 4: An Anthology of Collaborations by unknow

Author:unknow
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Written Backwards
Published: 2018-10-22T16:00:00+00:00

12

“Here you are,” Gloria announced as she wheeled the encoignure into the auditorium. “The real deal.”

Jean-Pierre Lemieux had worked in a style that did not make for lightweight furniture. With all its gold-plated bronze trim, the encoignure weighed a ton. Or seemed to.

She’d wanted to take Durant to her storage area but he’d refused. He insisted on staying right where he was while Gloria brought the encoignure to him. Too many chances for Kevin to escape en route, he’d said, leaving him with no bargaining chip.

So Gloria had traipsed over to her storage space. Along the way she’d seriously considered calling Durant’s bluff by driving home and leaving him in the lurch. But that crazy talk about searching for two hundred years because he’d given up his heart to some piece of furniture was a little too off-the-wall. But he actually might be deranged enough to kill Kevin. Then where would she be?

In her brain, Mom’s and Diana’s voices joined in a cacophonous harmony that went on and on and on ….

So she’d lightened the encoignure as much as she could before hauling it to her car and easing it into the trunk. Back at the performance space a custodian in the building found her a dolly and she’d wheeled it to the fourth floor via the freight elevator.

“This is true?” Durant dragged Kevin to the dolly. “You are not trying to trick me?”

“How many copies do you think I have?” Gloria wanted done with this whole fiasco. “See for yourself.”

He released Kevin and ran his hands over the gleaming top of the encoignure.

“Yes! This is the Lemieux!” He dropped to his knees and embraced it like he might a woman. “Retour ce qui est le mien, Retour ce qui est le mien, Retour ce qui est le mien! ”

Kevin whispered, “He told me the whole story while you were gone—about Shade, about giving up his heart, about how he returned for it to find the mansion razed.”

“I’m sure it was an enormously fascinating tale,” Gloria said, taking Kevin’s arm and backing him away.

“He’s done bad things, really bad things, but he’s not a bad man.”

“Sounds like you two had a little male-bonding session while I was gone.”

“Aunt Gloria, he really is almost three hundred—”

“Something is wrong!” Durant cried.

Gloria wanted to say, In your head, but thought better of it.

“Now what?”

He rose and slammed his hands down on the top, screaming, “Retour ce qui est le mien, Retour ce qui est le mien, Retour ce qui est le mien! ”

He held the pose for a few heartbeats, then turned to them with an agonized expression.

“It’s gone!”

“Your heart?” Kevin said.

The boy had totally bought into Durant’s delusion.

“Yes! It was here … I can sense a residue of it … but now it’s gone! Someone else must have taken it!”

Kevin’s naïve, wide-eyed wonder was almost comical. “Someone else could take your heart?”

“Yes. If they said the proper words, they—” His head snapped toward Gloria. “You! You know the words. You were alone with it!”

He whirled and grabbed her arm.

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