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69: Play my songs for me


069: Play my songs for me

Maille hung the wedding dress up in her closet  and laid the ice green tea length cotton sun dress on the bed. She wanted to dress perfectly for his baptism, in something memorable. Their first morning as married people... she thought of it as betrothed, not married since they wouldn't be sleeping together. Betrothed sounded so sweet.

After her shower, she did her hair in ringlets and wispy tendrils coming down. She almost felt like wearing flowers. It was that type of a morning. But that would be too revealing. Two baptisms in two days, of her two most beloved people. She couldn't believe it.

She drove to the car facility to see Shawn. He was waiting.

"How are you feeling?" she asked briskly.

 "Lousy." 

"You 're a member of God's Kingdom here on the earth, that should make you feel better anyway." 

"I do," he  smiled. "But Joann was in and she says it's just a matter of time. I'm failing fast Maille. You know that right?"

"Sure, Shawn. We both know that."

"I may go into a coma, I may not be able to talk." Tears came to his eyes. "Why are you all dressed up?"

"I 'm going to another baptism. Kell is being baptized." 

"I'd like to have seen that," he whispered.

"I know he would have wanted you there." Her eyes were filled with tears now too. "You want to play guitar?"

He nodded but his thin arms didn't lift. "I want to but I can 't."

"If I hold it for you?"

"Why don't you just play my songs for me so I can hear them one more time?" 

"Shawn ..."

"Ah, Maille, you've made these last days so much easier, don't cry now."

"I can 't help it. I will really miss you." she knew talking about it helped, but it also made it so permanent. She couldn't help that either. What was, was. There was no denying it, and they both knew it. She got the guitar and softly strummed the chords he'd learned and put together over the last five days. Then he pushed a piece of paper toward her, one that she hadn't noticed sitting on the nightstand alongside their picture that she'd framed and put there. Both of them holding their guitar and singing, just three days ago, three days when he'd had the energy to hold the guitar.

The paper was a song, with beautiful words about childish love. She knew which set of chords he'd composed them for and her voice found the melody easily. But it cracked as she attempted to sing and then faltered altogether.

He couldn't sit up, but he wanted to hold her again, to comfort her once more. "It's okay, Maille."

"I can't believe I did it again." she sobbed. 

"What? Ruined your mascara?"

His attempt at humor wrenched her heart and she tried to smile through the tears. ''No, become so attached to you. Like Myndee."

"It's weird like that when you haven't got much time left. You sort of just latch on, ya know?" She  set the guitar down and scooted alongside him on the bed. 

"It's gonna be okay, Shawn. Really. I know it is. You 've done the right thing and nothing will stop you from achieving the very most that you can."

"It hurts right now." His watery eyes focused on her dark ones.

"Here?" she indicated her heart.

"Everywhere," he said. 

"I hate it too. I hate it for you," she reached out to stroke his cheek and his little bald head. It was then that the door opened and another figure stepped into the room. Kell's eyes lit on Maille's still form comforting the frail boy on the bed. Shawn 's eyes turned to Kell.

He raised an emaciated hand limply, and Kell came to the bedside. "What are you up to?Breaking my lady's heart, Shawn?"

He sensed that Shawn hadn't always liked him, and thought that maybe it was because of who he was and what he was still able to do. Things that Shawn couldn't do. He came to the side of the bed and his eyes strayed to Maille's tear streaked ones. He shook his head. A hand ran down the side of her face.

"Yeah, Kell. I'm breaking her heart."  A slight deprecating laugh escaped his lips.

"Well, I can't let you do that, man. She's a strong girl, but she can break." he pulled the chair closer and leaned forward.

"She's my friend," Shawn said. 

"A good friend too, I'd wager."

"She stuck by me all this time. She taught me to play the guitar." his voice was growing weaker and Maille had to lean forward to hear him. Kell's hand on her soft and shiny ringlets kept her upright, as everything seemed to whirl around her.

"Hey, Shawn. Give me your hand." Kell said and he lifted Shawn's too weak hands and placed them in his upon Maille's hair. He held them there together, a magic moment, the strong healthy man helping the thin frail boy to experience one last moment of pure elation. Maille turned those jeweled eyes on them both and her mouth opened in a wordless oh, which Kell ignored, but Shawn took to heart. She leaned closer at both of their behest till they were all just inches apart, and then Kell whispered, "We'll never forget you, little brother."

"Thank you," Shawn said and then Kell let the hands fall back softly and Shawn's eyes closed. He was sleeping and Kell took Maille's hand and lifted her from the bed tenderly. ''You did a good thing here, momma ," he turned her into the curve of his arm. Maille felt the rush of sadness well within her. She'd known Shawn was going to go on, but again, she'd let fantasies of him alive and well haunt her dreams. Once again she tried to understand God's plan and failed. Once again she found herself wallowing in the pain of separation. Kell had her out to his car and down the road before she got a hold of herself.

"I'm a mess." she whispered.

"A beautiful mess." Kell agreed with a sweetly understanding smile.

 "I love you." she whispered.

Kell grinned. "Now that's the first truth I've heard all morning." 

"You've heard a lot of truth this morning." she protested.

"Yeah, I guess I have at that. But I'm about to make it all happen." he pulled into the church parking lot and got out to shake hands with the missionaries and Steve and Richard. Tracy and Megan were there to help Maille out too.

Kell was whisked off without warning and Tracy held Maille's hand as they entered the Relief Society room and sat down one row from the front. A large picture of the Savior stood over the piano. Tracy smiled at her daughter. "So, he's getting baptized, you must have shared more than you realized with him." she said softly.

Maille nodded. "I don't know. He read the Book of Mormon on his own and Steve arranged for the discussions with him. I wasn't even there."

"l was there." Megan leaned over the back of the seat. "It was awesome. The spirit was so strong. I know he knows it's true."

"I know he does, too," Maille said remembering the night they'd spent at Temple Square, and how he'd taken it all in.

"Are you two planning to stay together?" Megan leaned forward.

Maille cocked a shoulder, knowing she couldn't quite lie, but that she didn't have to reveal the entire truth. She nodded, and smiled, staring into her sister's eyes.

''That's how it was for me and Steve." Megan said. "We knew right from the very first moment it seemed." Megan smiled. "But I didn't convert my guy at all. He was already the strong one. Good thing too."

Her mother glanced at her out of the corner of her eyes. "Megan are you saying you didn't feel like you had your own testimony?"

"No." Megan laughed. "I had one, but I was pretty messed up, when Steve came back into my life."

"Well, Kell sort of opened my eyes to so many possibilities. It was the least I could do to share the gospel with him. But actually, he was interested way before he met me. Steve had already been talking to him."

"But you took him to Temple Square." Tracy remembered.

"At his insistence." Maille laughed, and then turned as her father came in and sat beside her. He put an arm around her, leaning close to kiss her cheek. Megan leaned back waiting. Then Steve and Kell entered both wearing the customary white gym suits that members of the church usually were baptized in. Kell was barefoot, and he'd taken out his earrings.

Maille looked down at her new ring. The diamonds barely twinkled, but for her they sparkled like the stars above the atrium in their upstairs room.

"Shawn couldn't come?" Richard whispered in her ear.

Maille pulled her eyes reluctantly away from the ring and stared at the back of Kell's head in front of her.

"No. He took a turn for the worse. Joann, his nurse, told him it's just a matter of time. Maybe in the next two or three days. He's very tired." Tears had welled up in her eyes, but then Kell turned and indicated with a peremptory nod that she should come and sit beside him in the front.

Maille got up as the Bishop of the ward nodded at her. She squeezed between the Elders and Kell's lithe form, and he took her arm and laced her fingers with his, one finger gently covered her ring, and caressed it gently as if to say it was special between them, something they held together that no one else had. A reminder.

She looked up into his eyes which were resting on hers, strong, full of confidence, that same confidence that had always been uniquely Kell 's. One of the Elder's spoke first about baptism. Kell paid attention but he never stopped rubbing her finger over the ring. Then Steve got up and they all walked into the cultural hall where the font doors were opened and Maille stood next to her father, looking down as her brother-in-law performed the first ordinance of the gospel for her husband. He came up out of the water and his first hug was for Steve, but his first look, his first smile, was for her.

Richard and Tracy watched as Kell kept Maille close to his side at the small reception after his baptism. He looked incongruous in his new black suit and white shirt and tie, with his dreads, his beaded goatee and his earring back in place. But there was an awesome glow about them both that had Richard whispering to Tracy.

"You know what? There's something about the two of them. A secret." 

"No secret. They're in love."

Richard considered this point of view and then put h is lips to Tracy's. "He wasn't who I pictured for this daughter." 

Tracy shrugged her shoulders elegantly. "No, I agree with you there. He's different than I would have picked, but he's a brilliant choice." 

"You mean as an actor?"

Her eyebrows raised. "As a person. He's dynamic. Full of character. I'm totally captivated, as are we all. After the initial reaction, that is."

"So you're saying that you 're original animosity has dissipated?" Tracy gave him a quirked brow again. 

"Yes."

"Now that he's a member?"

''I'll admit that makes a difference." "He wouldn't like to know that."

''No, I don't suppose he would. He doesn't like being compared."

Richard squeezed her hand. "You're a tough woman to please, Tracy Mann, but you're usually right." he backed her out of earshot. "It's just that Maille's life has taken such a drastic turn from anything I would have planned for her."

''That's why we only have to worry about the planning till they're around 18 or so. At twenty they usually make their plans themselves." she grinned as he gave her a sweet peck on the cheek. Across the room, Steve had Megan by the waist and be was talking animatedly with Kell about their upcoming houseboat trip. This was all news to Maille and she kept her hand in Kell's but felt a little awkward as they all talked about things she'd been left out of.

Kell extricated himself from the houseboat conversation, and gently eased his way toward the door. He had plans for the afternoon that included only himself and Maille. $

It wasn't  long before he made their excuses and speeding down the highway with his sweetheart.

Hand on gear shift covered with Kell 's warm dark one, Maille felt that wave of care wash over her. She didn't ask where they were going, she didn't care. But she recognized also that fuzziness that indicated her lack of sleep.

Kell got off the freeway and drove up the canyon into the hills. It didn't take long at all to be completely out of the city and up enjoying the cliff and the trees. The place he had located wasn't far. As he pulled the car to a stop, he noticed that Maille bad closed her eyes.

He shook her a bit. ''Not yet, darling," he said with that really low, soft voice that she loved, and her eyelids fluttered open. She smiled at him.

"Aren't you sleepy?" she asked.

"You know I never sleep." 

There was a trail, and Maille wasn't dressed for it, but Kell urged her on. He carried a blanket and Maille kept eyeing it. But the trail ended in a small opening in the mountain, a cave.

"Are we going in there?" Maille asked.

Kell nodded at her as if to say, would I bring you to the opening of a cave and not go in?

Maille knelt and peered into the opening which wasn't really large enough to actually fit inside, and was shocked to feel a very strong wind at the mouth of the cave. Her hair blew back away from her face. She closed her eyes, anticipating dust or other debris in her face, and felt Kelt's hands undoing her carefully piled ringlets. He had spread the blanket in front of the cave opening and now was gently urging her to sit on it. Maille turned her face away from the cave and the wind and her hair now covered her face.

She felt him position himself behind her, turning her back to face the cave opening. His chest pressed to her back, his arms came around her, his legs framed hers, and her hair streamed out in their wake.

"It 's like flying," he whispered to her. The noise wasn't great, there was no smell, and if she kept her eyes closed, she could easily imagine that she was sailing across the ocean.

Kell wrapped his arms around hers which were now around her knees. She was cooler, but not cold.  "Relax against me." he said, and she did, that sweet release of control, like a submitting of herself to him. It was the biggest indication to him of her trust, the way she surrendered herself to him, and always had. Even from the very first, when he'd felt her relax and give over care of herself to his keeping, he'd marveled at how she could do that, unless there was something else there, something besides just a guy and a girl. They had to be meant to be.

 He rested his chin on her shoulder, where it joined her neck, let her hair wash around him.

"I love you." he whispered. His eyes were closed, and the image of flying assailed him, weightless, yet secure, silent wind penetrating their bodies, holding them up. "It's like the spirit." 

"I feel it too." 

"Like you can't see it, but you know it's there..." 

"Because you can feel it."

"Are you glad that you married me?" she asked. 

He nodded against her. "Immensely so."

"But Kell, you don 't really know me that well."

His eyes opened and narrowed against her cheek. "I do know you."

"You don't know everything about me, what if you find out something you don't like? Then you're stuck with me."

He smiled. "Still insecure, little one?" he rubbed her ring on her finger. ''Don't be."

She relaxed back against him and felt herself drifting off.


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