A Chance for Charity (The Immortal Ones)

  chapter seven

  REVELATION

 

  “I met Roger when I was nineteen. I was attending San Diego State College and studying to become a teacher. He was twenty and worked as a mechanic at a local service station. I was alone; my parents had died in a car crash the year before. You said yours died in a crash too so you know how I felt,” I looked into his eyes.

  “Yes, it was awful for me,” he said quietly.

  “Roger filled me with joy in a way that I so desperately needed. We had a six-month courtship, and then suddenly, one day, he asked me to marry him. We were engaged on March twenty-second, nineteen hundred forty-one. It was my twentieth birthday. He gave me a ring and also handed me his enlistment papers,” I paused, picturing that bittersweet day.

  “Grandpa said he joined the service before we entered the war.” Link broke the silence.

  “Yes, that’s true. At that time, much of the world was embattled in World War II, but not the United States. Roger was sure the U.S. would be joining the fight soon and wanted to serve his country. He had enlisted in the Navy and would begin his training in April, right there in San Diego. We made plans for our future. I would have my degree in two more years and would teach sixth grade. We painted a rosy picture of his naval career and my teaching career. I would take time off from work to have and raise our three children and then would go back to teaching when the kids were older. We had a plan.” I smiled at the memory.

  “He finished his training and was given orders to join the crew of the USS Arizona when it docked at Long Beach that summer. The ship would sail from Hawaii for a brief stop on the mainland and then would immediately return. This time with Roger onboard.

  “It was terribly lonely when he left and I was able to find comfort in the husband and wife team that ran the clinic next to campus. The majority of students went there to fix their various ailments. I visited the clinic a few weeks before Roger shipped out, when I was struck in the arm by an errant baseball hit from a field near campus. Roger insisted that we go to the clinic to have it looked at. I told him the arm was fine but he was always so overprotective of me. The doctor was kind and had the most reassuring smile. His wife, his nurse, seemed to take an immediate liking to me and we chatted like old friends. After proclaiming me to be in perfect health, they invited us over for dinner,” I took a breath and searched Link’s face to make sure he was still with me… still okay. “They are still in my life today.”

  “The couple who ran the clinic? Are they your aunt and uncle?” Link asked; his voice was calm.

  “Yes, that is correct. The night before Roger departed for Long Beach to join the ship, we had dinner at their house. The conversation edged toward the predicament the world was in. I didn’t want to think about it. I only wanted to think about Roger and me – together. We thanked them for dinner and excused ourselves. Their home was right on the beach. When you exited their back patio, you walked out onto the sand. It was there, with our toes in the sand, that Roger and I had our last tender goodbye. It was peaceful and private, just the two of us, without the shuffle of other people near. We vowed to love each other forever,” my voice broke and a tear escaped my eye.

  Link reached out to brush the tear away. “Go on,” he said.

  “Our final, tearful goodbye, was filled with promises of me coming to Hawaii during the Christmas break from classes. We would be married on a beach, our toes in the sand again, joined together as man and wife.

  “I turned to my new friends often, over the next few months. It seemed I was over their house for dinner every other weekend. Then it became a routine. Every Sunday night I would drive down to their beach house. We ate, we talked, I read to them from Roger’s letters. They alleviated the loneliness I felt with him being so very far away.

  “My weekend routine also included Roger’s family. I had dinner with them most Saturday nights. Roger’s little brother carried a toy ship around with him always. After dinner we would sit on the porch swing and imagine all the places on the ship that Roger might be and what he was doing at that exact moment. It was a game that the two of us played every time we were together. That was your grandfather,” I said to Link

  “He spoke of you every now and then. He was sad when you stopped coming around anymore,” he recalled.

  “One of the last times I saw that little boy was December sixth, nineteen forty-one. After dinner we sat on the porch, with the toy boat as always. Before I went home, we imagined Roger asleep in his bunk, deep within the ship. The next day I heard the news on the radio, Pearl Harbor was attacked. I had dinner as usual with the doctor and his wife that night, their real names are James and Catherine. I was almost frantic with worry. They did their best to calm me down. We all just kept hoping that Roger was among those who escaped harm.

  “Roger’s family phoned me when they received official confirmation. He was listed among the dead, trapped in the ship when it sank to its current resting place. The fires onboard raged for two days and there was no hope for finding further survivors. I fell apart. I cried for days, refusing to leave my apartment. I just stayed in bed and let my grief consume me.

  “I even tried to kill myself. I sliced my wrists fully expecting to let the blood flow out of me. I would weaken and my heart would stop. That, I was sure, would end the pain of losing Roger.” I froze at the memory. “I still can’t believe I was irrational enough to do that,” I whispered.

  Link put his arm around me, “What happened next?” he urged.

  “I watched in horror as the wounds slowly closed. That was impossible, it was inhuman. How could my body be doing this? I became hysterical, I screamed and cried even more. A few minutes later I worked up the nerve to try again, only to achieve the same results. James found me as I was making my third attempt with the razor sharp knife. My neighbor had called him, the screams coming from my apartment had frightened her,” I explained.

  I spoke faster as the story poured out of my memory, transporting me back to that fateful day, many years ago.

  “‘Charity, what are you doing?’ James cried out as I slammed the bathroom door shut.

  ‘James, it won’t work, the blood won’t flow. I can’t live without Roger, but it won’t work. Why won’t it work?’ I screamed wildly at him through the closed door.

  ‘Charity, calm down and let me see your arms. I saw the knife in your hand. I know what you’re trying to do.’

  ‘Something is wrong with me. I want to die. Why won’t I die? Help me die,’ I cried out to him from where I lay on the bathroom floor.

  James broke open the door to find me crumpled on the floor, wide eyed, staring at the new wounds on my wrists. He saw the last of it close and heal, again. Little splatters of my blood dotted the floor tiles. James gathered me up and into his arms and my body let go into a flood of gut wrenching sobs.

  ‘Three times, James, I did it three times. But I can’t bleed enough to end my life. Why?’

  ‘Charity, please calm down and let me take you into your room. You need to sleep. I’ll call Catherine. She’ll come over and stay with you,’ he soothed as he stroked my hair, and brushed away my tears. Then he led me to my bed and excused himself to the other room. I heard him pick up the phone.

  ‘Catherine, please drive over here without delay. Charity is in a terrible state. She’s tried to kill herself, more than once...’ he paused listening to her. ‘No I didn’t get here in time. You don’t understand. She is one of us.’

  One of us – that term rattled around in my brain as I drifted off into exhausted sleep. When I awoke, Catherine was sitting beside the bed. The perpetually happy smile that I had come to know so well over the previous few months, was composed upon her face.

  ‘How do you feel dear?’ she asked. Her eyes held concern, but her face was still smiling.

  ‘My head hurts,’ was my hoarse whisper. ‘Thank you for being here. I’m sorry to have bothered you both.’

  ‘You are not a bother, my dear. But you
must promise me to never do anything so rash and stupid again.’

  I turned my wrists over and searched for the wounds that I had tried so hard to inflict. All I could find was a thin, faint, pink line where the knife had gashed open my flesh the night before. The tears started streaming down my face again.

  ‘Why?’ was all I could ask as I held out my arms.

  ‘We don’t know why,’ she answered.

  ‘What did James mean by – one of us?’ I sniffled.

  ‘I don’t want you to upset yourself again. So you must promise to try to stay calm.’

  ‘Tell me,’ I pleaded.

  ‘If James or I were to do the same thing, to cut ourselves, our body would quickly heal... just as your body did last night. Apparently you are one of us, my dear... Immortal.’

  ‘Immortal?’ I whispered.

  ‘We don’t get sick, our wounds heal, and we stopped aging a long time ago. Does that frighten you?’ she asked with concern.

  ‘No, it more... confuses me. How do you know I am an Immortal too?’

  ‘Well, James suspected when you came into the clinic the first time. There were trace markings of a bruise and he thought there might have been a fracture from the baseball hitting you. But you insisted you were fine. The knife wounds to your wrists healing over and over and over again. That, my dear, is a clear indication. Only time will tell, but my guess is that you will stay twenty forever.’

  ‘But I don’t want to... I want Roger,’ I sobbed.

  ‘You have us now, dear. And if you would like, you can have us forever.’ Catherine promised.”

  I finished my story. What had happened to me since that moment seemed unimportant right now. Link wanted to know what I was and that was the simplest explanation.

  “Charity,” he said aloud.

  “Yes, Charity is my given name. My parents said I was a gift from God, his charity to them.”

  “That suits you much better than Emily.” He half smiled.

  “Yeah, I’m not a big fan of that one. Catherine picked it out,” I admitted.

  “Catherine and James... not Rachel and Jason?”

  “We need to switch names, security reasons,” I offered.

  “You heal yourself,” he was stuck on half statements, still trying to absorb all the information I had thrown out there.

  “Yes, my body heals itself. Blood stops flowing, open wounds close on their own, bones set and heal. It was broken by the way, my ankle,” I explained.

  “I’m glad I wasn’t crazy on that one.” He smiled in return.

  “Why aren’t you ordering me out of here, saying I’m the devil, calling the police, the government, whatever?” I asked him. “Our biggest fear is being discovered.”

  “You, whatever you are, you are a link to my past. You are a part of my history, a part of me. I told you before... I don’t think I’d ever be able to stay away from you.”

  “I probably should have tried harder to keep you away. I let myself feel things, do things, and look what I’ve gone and done. I’ve exposed us all,” I worried, wringing my hands together.

  “I’m not running to the press, or to the government. Don’t worry about that,” he said as he turned my face to look in my eyes. “So you’re not seventeen, you’re twenty, that makes me feel a bit better.”

  “Closer to ninety, how does that make you feel?”

  “Wow, I hadn’t thought of it that way.”

  “I’m sure there are a lot of things we haven’t thought about. We need to talk to James and Catherine. I need to let them know what I’ve done.” My voice strained as I thought of how they might react when they heard of my betrayal.

  “I’ll be there with you. We’ll tell them together.” Link held my hand, trying to reassure me.

  I took out my phone and sent a text to both of them. “Semi-bad news. Need to talk. Come home NOW pls.” Then I seized the photo album and we walked out his apartment door. As Link drove me home, not another word was spoken. But my mind was racing.

  Link and I sat in the kitchen, waiting for Catherine and James. My fingers were rhythmically drumming on the granite countertop, my foot bobbing up and down, my nerves getting the best of me. Link reached over and placed his calm hand on top of my fidgeting one.

  “Relax, what is the worst that can happen?” he said. “They can’t kill you, apparently.”

  “They could cut my head off. They could burn my body,” was my monotone response.

  “Really, would that do it?” His eyes widened.

  “Yep, Catherine told me that’s how it was done during the witch hunts in Scotland,” I answered, my eyes solemn.

  “Did she see it? Was it someone she knew?”

  “Catherine knew about it by legend. Then later, James and Catherine witnessed it together, here in America. The victim was a stranger,” I answered.

  “Well they aren’t going to do that to you, why would you say that,” he looked disappointed in me.

  “They won’t, but someone else might. If you found me out then someone else could too,” I worried.

  “I had a family photograph of you. Grandpa had shown your picture to me since I was a kid. I think I was meant to find you,” he said as he wrapped his arms around me. “I do have one other question.”

  “What?”

  “When you look at me, do you see me or do you see him?”

  I looked at him, I mean, really looked at him. Yes, now that I knew it, I could see the traces of Roger within him. But truthfully, he favored his grandfather. It was Lincoln Knight that sat beside me. It was Link that opened something within me, something I had closed up and locked away when Roger died. A little bit of my former fiancé was there, but… “I see you,” I assured him.

  “Then this is exactly where I should be.”

  I still couldn’t get over his ease with this situation. Most children are taught not to believe in the unnatural. There are no boogey-men in the closet, no ghosts in the attic, no witches flying on Halloween, and nobody can live forever. I’m sure he was raised this way too. Yet here he was, in my kitchen, holding onto me – a woman suspended in time, with a body could heal itself, would never grow old, and may never die.

  “Catherine’s here,” I stated as my ears registered the sound of her car pulling into the drive.

  “How do you know,” he asked.

  “I hear her car outside.”

  “How?”

  “Another mystery.” I shrugged.

  “What is the semi-bad news?” Catherine called out as she walked through the side door. She entered the kitchen and then came to a halt. “Hello, Link. I wasn’t expecting to see you here. What is going on?” She asked as she surveyed our expressions.

  Unable to speak, I slid the open photo album across the counter to her.

  “Where did this come from?” she asked after she looked at the photographs. Her voice was calm and steady. Catherine, as always, was a pillar of strength.

  “Link showed it to me today,” I whispered.

  “And how did Link come by these photographs?” She was being vague, not wanting to admit that the young woman in the pictures was clearly me.

  “That little boy,” I pointed at the photo, “is Roger’s little brother. That’s Lincoln’s grandfather,” I answered. “Link remembered the photograph when he saw me dressed this way,” I said looking down at my outfit.

  “James is here,” Catherine breathed. “Let’s continue this when he gets inside.”

  “That super hearing thing is kinda creepy,” Link said.

  Catherine froze, realizing she’d let her guard down.

  “I told him, he knows,” I admitted.

  “What is the semi-bad news?” James echoed Catherine’s greeting as he walked into the kitchen. “And why is Link’s vehicle in the drive?” He’d obviously caught what Catherine had missed.

  I pointed to the photo album. “Link knows, he figured out who I was - am. Roger’s little brother was Link’s grandpa,” I repeated the semi-bad new
s again. It got less semi-bad the more I said it out loud. Now it was becoming just a simple fact.

  James stared at the photograph for a few seconds. It seemed like an eternity as I waited for his reaction.

  “Well kid, it looks like you didn’t destroy all evidence of your past when you torched that scrapbook after Roger died. I’m glad you now have something to remember him.” His smile was comforting and he reached out to stroke my cheek. James shifted his gaze to Link. His eyes narrowed and his expression hardened, “Can you be trusted?” he asked.

  “Absolutely, I wouldn’t tell a soul. I knew there had to be a reason all this was happening to me, why I chose to come to Telluride and why I just couldn’t stay away from Emily, I mean Charity, from the moment I spotted her.” He smiled at me and pulled me tighter into his embrace. “Now I know why I was so drawn to her. I want nothing but her safety. But I don’t understand the alarm,” he told James, his expression puzzled.

  “The alarm, as you put it, comes from our fear of discovery. There are those who want to kill us because they believe our kind to be an abomination, something evil. There are others who would love to capture us and make us their little science experiments. I cannot have either of those groups of people knowing our whereabouts. I’ve worked very hard to cover our tracks and make us disappear each time we relocate and start over,” James explained.

  “When you say those do you actually know who they are?” Link asked.

  “The Lords, an aptly named, family of religious zealots who kill in the name of God, have been on the hunt for Immortals since before the Civil War. They have passed down tales of our kind through each generation. Another threat comes in the form of Adrien Beauvais. He is a European billionaire, obsessed with immortality. A decade ago he placed an underground bounty out for anything that will make him live longer, or perhaps forever. Those are just the first two that come to mind of the many that I am aware of at the present time. There is no doubt in my mind that there are many more out there. So, there are seekers, and we do not wish to be found,” James finished and waited for Link’s reaction.

  “You have my word, that I will keep your secret safe. I will do everything in my power to protect it, and your family.” Link immediately gave his fervent promise to James. “Is there an immediate threat?”

  “We relocated to Telluride because the Lord brothers began snooping around the last hospital where James was working. They were posing as corporate risk assessors and began making inquiries. They questioned every department head in the hospital about unconventional methods of practice, doctors with unusual traits, and unexplained healings. We were not aware of their presence until one of the nurses felt harassed and complained to James.” Catherine spoke quietly, not completely at ease revealing so much information to an outsider.

  “The Lord boys departed with few answers, but we knew it was time to move on. To not arouse suspicions, we waited almost three months before relocating. I secured the proper documentation for our new identities and we made a clean, quiet exit,” James continued on. “Telluride is the first small town that we have resided in since Charity joined our family. My hope is that the residents here will feel some loyalty to us, as members of their community, and promptly inform us if anyone starts snooping again.”

  “Were these Lord brothers aware of your departure from the hospital?” Link asked James, wanting to fully understand any possible threat.

  “I’m not completely sure. I left when a group of interns were moving on. It was my intent to get lost in their shuffle. We can only hope that the Lords didn’t unearth any new leads.”

  “Link.” Catherine drew his attention away from James. “If I may be so bold, what are your feelings toward Charity?”

  “Catherine,” I protested loudly, my cheeks flushed pink in embarrassment.

  “It’s a valid question,” she responded, with genuine curiosity.

  “You don’t have to answer that, Link,” I turned to him.

  “No, it’s okay, I want to. To be honest, I have been struggling with my need to be near her and the conventions that say we should not be together. A high school girl and a twenty-two year old man - not always completely acceptable. However, I’d like to ask your permission to court her, as you will. I believe that would be the proper course of action, traditionally speaking.” He turned to both James and Catherine seeking a sign of their approval.

  “I am going to assume your words are sincere. We have no reason, yet, to believe they are not. Just remember, we know how to disappear. We are quite good at it. If I feel that you’ve become a hazard to our family, in any way, you may wake up one day to find that we are gone,” James warned Link. “That being said, I trust Charity’s judgment. And, the events that preceded your introduction to each other are too astounding to be ignored. I firmly believe that there is a reason for everything.”

  “You have our permission, as long as Charity is in agreement. You seem to illuminate her.” Catherine held my eyes with her own as she spoke.

  “Thank you both for coming home so quickly and being a voice of reason and sanity. I needed to know I hadn’t disappointed you. Right now I think I just need to catch my breath, to process all that has happened here. Most of all, I need a moment alone with Link. We’ll be upstairs for a little while, if that is alright.” I smiled a weary smile at Catherine.

  “You have done nothing wrong. Everything will be alright,” she tried to reassure me.

  I hugged them both, took Link’s hand in my own, and led him up the stairs and into my room. Once the door was closed behind us, I turned to him. I still wasn’t quite sure what all this meant for us. I opened my mouth to ask a million questions that were dancing around in my head, but found myself unable to utter the first one. My voice held no power, my lips could form no words.

  Link pulled me into his arms, hugging me tightly. I wilted in his embrace, exhausted from the day. I buried my face in the hollow of his neck, holding onto him securely, not wanting to let go. He kissed the top of my head and then loosened his embrace to pull my chin up so he could look into my eyes. His gaze was steady, searching my eyes for acceptance, permission, I wasn’t sure. I stood up on the tips of my toes to raise my lips as he lowered his. The kiss was tender, his lips brushed lightly against mine.

  I leaned away from the embrace, “This is no good,” I whispered in despair.

  “It feels good to me,” he said with a smile and bent his head to mine again. This time, to leave a trail of kisses from my chin to my ear.

  “That’s not what I meant. This situation, your mortality, my immortality, we shouldn’t be doing this.” I shook my head.

  Link shook his head, in disagreement. A mixture of disappointment and determination appeared on his face, as he replied, “No, you are wrong. We should be doing this. We were meant to find each other, and now that we have, I have no intentions of letting you go.”

  “How can we be together, when physically I will never change? What will people say?” I worried.

  “They’ll say ‘Look at that old coot with his gorgeous arm candy. How’d he get to be so lucky?’ But maybe that’s not really your only concern,” he stated.

  “You’ll leave me one day. You won’t have a choice. Time will take you away. I don’t know if I could handle that again,” I admitted.

  “The advances in medicine will only continue to improve. It’s more than conceivable that I am going to live well into my ninety’s. That gives us upwards of seventy years to be together. Can you handle that?”

  I processed the information. Seventy years was a long time. I could hold onto him for seventy years. He would grow old, but he could be mine for seventy years. I was pretty sure that I could handle that.

  I pulled his head down to mine again and pressed my lips to his. Seventy years, I thought, and deepened my kiss.

  “Yes,” I breathed against his mouth, “I can handle that.”

  He smiled that brilliant smile, the one that made my heart melt and sent a tingle
down to my toes, and kissed me again.

  ****