I release a shaky breath, not certain I want the responsibility—
But then, she untangles the hold we have on each other’s wrists, reaches for my hand, and with a delicacy that takes me aback, presses a kiss to my palm.
The gesture is so sweet, so tender, I can’t freak out. I mean, I want to. But I can’t.
Whether she needs help or not, she’s too open for me to shut out.
It would be like kicking a puppy.
I clear my throat. “Didn’t you ask your friends to explain?”
“They’re all over the world. It wasn’t like they could come into the hospital. They didn’t believe the emails they sent either.”
Clearly, the doctors had believed she’d sent the emails.
Even as I questioned if that was true, if maybe she had created these friendships, she sighs. “You don’t believe me either.”
“I’m not sure what to believe,” I reply honestly.
“I have wings.”
“If that’s supposed to convince me—” I start, my tone rueful, until she twists over and shows them to me.
They’re mostly hidden beneath her camisole, but I can see the ink playing peekaboo.
Of course.
So, her every delusion is founded in a truth.
I get what she’s saying.
The ink is definitely not new, but still pristine. All swirling curlicues for feathers, and when I peer closer, I can see that each curlicue is a word.
It’s not something I can read. No language I’ve come across. It’s neither Latin nor Greek.
I can no more stop myself from reaching out to trace a word than I can stop my pulse from pounding.
“What language is it?” I ask thickly.
“Aramaic.”
My brows rise. “You speak it?”
“No. I was told what to inscribe there.”
I shy away from her justification, and it’s quite clear why the specialists thought she was mad.
I mean, I think she’s nuts too. And when she says things like that? It sounds nuttier still.
But, even if I’m a shitty priest, we’re taught to find miracles, to embrace them, not outright reject them.
Even if it all sounds a little too insane to be believed.
And with her past? Her illness?
Even a priest could be forgiven for discounting her story.
“I showed the doctors Diana’s pictures, the ones she sends me, and they said she was a figment of my imagination. I told them what I did, but they wouldn’t look into it. Her father is in prison, for God’s sake. No matter what I did, no matter what I said, they wouldn’t listen,” she whispers. “So I lied. But I won’t lie to you. I promise.”
She sounds so heartsore that I let my hand press to her back, to the smooth curve.
“I believe you.”
And God help me, I’m not lying.
My words have her flipping over, and excitement fills her eyes. I’m surprised when she jumps off the bed with more exuberance than sense considering her condition, and pads out of the room. For a second, I sit up, unsure what’s happening.
Light spears my eyeballs as she turns into the hall and hits the switch beside my door, and then I hear rummaging around in her room before she returns.
Phone in hand.
I settle back, waiting for her to climb into bed—I don’t even think to question how right it feels for her to come to me the way she is. My focus is elsewhere.
She didn’t turn off the hall light on her way back to me, and it halos around her as she moves. It falls on her in a way that’s uncanny, and I look away because it’s disconcerting. Sure, light pools that way around everyone, but it almost makes her skin gleam like gold and that’s nothing to the way it hits the blonde notes in her hair.
When she climbs into bed, I’m glad, because it means I can’t see that anymore, and she tilts her screen to me.
I see it’s two AM before she pulls open her messaging app.
She finds a conversation, then types.
Andrea: Diana, you awake?
For a few seconds, nothing happens, and I eagerly await a response.
It doesn’t come.
She huffs. “She lives in Madrid, so it’s not that much of a surprise. I just thought she’d be awake—”
“We can try again later,” I soothe, finding myself in the odd position of wanting to make sure her feelings aren’t hurt.
“Really?” She turns to look at me. “You mean that?”
“I do.”
Like my words are fate driven, her phone pings.
Diana: What’s wrong? You’re never awake this early.
My heartbeat soars at the words.
“You could never show the doctor this?”
“She lives weird hours. Whenever I tried, it wasn’t the right time. They didn’t care that she’s in a different time zone. They thought I was just feeding the delusion, trying to make them believe the lie.”
“What about your other friends?”
“It just never worked out. Bad luck, I suppose. When they came for an appointment with me, they’d be in work or school.” She shrugs. “It doesn’t matter. So long as you believe me, that’s all that counts,” she tells me even as she sends a text back to Diana.
Andrea: It’s okay. I just wanted to prove you exist.
Diana: Lol. Put the fucking doctor on the phone. I’ll tell them I exist.
Andrea: It’s late, babe. I was just telling a friend about you, not a doctor. Going to sleep some. Love you.
Diana: Sleep well. Love you too. XOXO
Reading her messages, I muse, “She doesn’t know you’re in Rome, does she?”
Andrea pulls a face. “Technically, no.”
“I thought you didn’t lie. But those are two lies you’ve confessed to.”
She heaves a sigh. “Technicalities aren’t lies.”
I reach out with my free hand, and though it’s strange, I brush my fingers through her hair.
The side closest to me is spiky, short, and a little crispy, but moving around against a pillow has mussed it up some. My fingers drag against the scar, and the ruffled skin rams home just what this woman went through.
She deserves my empathy, my sympathy, and yet, that isn’t what I feel.
In all honesty, I don’t even know what the hell I’m feeling.
Gnawing on the inside of my cheek, I watch as she kind of stretches like a cat being stroked at my touch. Her eyelids flutter closed and she turns her cheek toward me, like she’s giving me better access.
The sight does strange things to me.
My belly feels like it’s in a freefall, my body wants to move closer, but my head knows this isn’t possible.
She’s sick.
It’s wrong.
“I’m not sick.”
Her words have me tensing.
How the—
“Doesn’t take a genius to figure out what you’re thinking,” she rumbles, sighing some more as she snuggles into the covers which, for some reason, puts her scant inches from me, because I can feel her breath on my chest.
My bare skin.
I shudder.
It’s been a long time since someone has been this close to me, and it feels good.
Beyond good.
And it’s not the kind of temptation I thought I’d face after so many years in a cassock.