Lilacs in Bloom - Part 2 (A Dark Shadows Story)

[sylvia_bond]

The warmth of the day had lasted only slightly longer than the heat in his groin. He'd worked and kept working until both had faded away and the first of the season's big thunderstorms came crashing down upon the roof and against the leaded windowpanes. Not a growing rain, this time, but a tearing rain, one that tossed the trees and scattered new petals of roses and lilacs alike. Whatever blossoms had been on the tree would be gone by morning.

 

He set himself to polishing the entire length of both staircases, starting with the servant's staircase and then moved to the front one. He used the good oil on both, and, were Barnabas to notice, he might be chastised for the waste. Servant's stairs were not worth top-level work, and wasn't he aware of that? Too bad, though, it was the only wood oil he'd had on hand; on his next trip to town he'd have to get more. But it meant, as he'd planned it, that when Barnabas had actually gotten up, he'd catch Willie working. There was no way the master of the house could miss him either, not with old newspapers spread about, and the smell of the polish floating down the hall. Willie had heard the vampire's step and made sure he was elbows deep in it, applying the oil with good vigor to the starting newel.

 

The steps stopped behind him.

 

"This is a remarkable enterprise, Willie, what brought this about?"

 

"Oh," said Willie, pretending to be very absorbed in his efforts, "just makin' up for yesterday."

 

There was a pause and Willie did not look up. "Laudable," said Barnabas, "very laudable."

 

Another word he did not know, and he made a mental note to find out what it meant from the big leather covered dictionary in the library. Not that Barnabas had ever given him permission to do this, but that was too bad, wasn't it. Couldn't go flinging ten-dollar words at a fellow all the time without him wanting to know what they were.

 

Then Barnabas left him in the front hall without another word either about enterprising servants or taking a well-earned rest. Willie was out of oil anyway, finished up the last riser and tread, and then cleaned up after himself. Made a quick supper of eggs and bacon and fried potatoes, and washed up, all the while absently starting at the storm through the window. Watching the wings of greyed trees wave back and forth as the rain lashed down, coming at such an angle that it wasn't actually hitting the kitchen window. He figured the side of the house, the east side, the direction the wind was coming from, would be soaked through. He'd check on the rooms on that side of the house, but in the morning. Now, his bed was calling and, with Barnabas out, there was no one to tell him to keep working.

 

His bed kept calling to him until he sank into the mattress, his pillow almost comfortable, the weight of the layers of wool and cotton somehow sitting just right, keeping in the warmth of his body, but not pressing down on him as they sometimes did. He would be asleep in a moment, quick, sinking down, grateful, lax, like floating in warm water, like it would be if—

 

No, man, don't even go there. Not that lady, above all the others. Not only is she as far away and as unreachable as the stars, Barnabas has his eye on her. One big red flashing stop sign: Don't touch. Got that?

 

Besides, Victoria Winters was a lady. Not just a lady some of the time, when it suited her. Not a lady like Carolyn, Miss Carolyn, if you please, who tramped around and still thought she deserved to walk on water. No, Vicki was a real lady through and through, to her fingertips, and getting into a place and time where he could be wrapped, flesh and flesh, and the sweet feel of—

 

Damnit, Loomis? You gonna cut it out or what?

 

At any rate, with a gal like Vicki, it would take a wedding ring, and nothing less, to get her into bed. The price was too high, and Willie was not free to pay it.

 

Ah, well. I can look. No harm in that, is there?

 

*

 

Sleep. Sound asleep except for a bang from downstairs, which his half-muddled brain dismissed as the echoes of the storm fretting at the front door. Tearing at the shutters, perhaps, or lashing at the roof. But the echo continued, coming up the stairs with a solid, booming tread, making him think for a moment that thunder had entered the house. Was coming down the hall and two seconds before it opened his door, Willie sat upright in bed, shedding the ease of sleep for a heart-thumping, wide-awake state that his body determined was necessary. Anxiety slamming in his throat as Barnabas burst into his room, greatcoat still on.

 

There was no light, yet still he raised his arm in front of his face as if to block it. To block the rage that glittered in the vampire's eyes, which spread itself over the room like a dense fog over a cliffbank, swallowing him up before he could even muster from his bed. Barnabas was there, at his bedside, ripping the covers off and yanking him upright. Willie’s feet stumbled as they came into contact with the cold leather of Barnabas' shoes and then the floor, feeling the damp and the mud from what must have been a hurried march along the path in the woods. The vampire shook him, and Willie struggled to remain standing, not wanting to fall against the wool of Barnabas' coat, or even to brush against him.

 

"How dare you," came the snarl, and Willie hurried to recount his day's activities, his brain latching on the most recent one: oiling the stairs. Barnabas must have found out about the expensive oil getting all used up, or had time to think about it, and decided that, yet again, Willie had spent his hours wrongly. Used the wrong material. Not done a good enough job. Held his face in the wrong expression.

 

"I-I'm sorry, Barnabas, I just thought—"

 

"You thought?"

 

Now the vampire gripped him with both hands, and though he did not carry his cane with him, Willie did not figure this little question and answer session was going to end very well.

 

"I thought it was what you wanted m-me to do, you know, an—"

 

"What I wanted you to do?" The vampire's eyebrows rose. "Why on earth would you presume I would countenance such a thing?"

 

"B-because the stairs needed doing an' I—"

 

"The stairs?" Barnabas released him, blood rushing into Willie's upper arms that he wanted to rub, so badly, they itched so badly, but to do so was to draw the vampire's gaze to him. Only now the vampire turned away, tipping his head down as if he were trying to regain his patience, to take a deep breath before he actually killed his most faithful of servants.

 

"Y-yeah, the st-stairs, Barnabas," he began, rubbing his arms, "you remember, you saw me doing them, an' you said it was law—"

 

Shit. He'd not looked the word up and now he'd forgotten exactly what it was.

 

"You said—"

 

"I recall precisely what I said." Barnabas turned back around, eyes dark, and presumably, his patience intact and in place. "You are a fool to imagine that I would bother myself with such a trifle when you have committed a very grave error. And an even bigger fool if you would even begin to think that I would let such an error go unpunished."

 

Error? What error? What the fuck is he talking about?

 

"B-but what did I do? I-I—"

 

Mind, struggling to go back even further in the day, in the week even, seizing on one thing and then another. Surely Barnabas wasn't still mad about the lilac tree? The vampire'd let that one go, he'd walked away from it without doing anything, surely it couldn't be that?

 

"I wasn't workin' on the lilac tree, honest. Honest, I wasn't, Barnabas."

 

"Ah, yes," said Barnabas in a breath cold enough to raise the hair on the backs of Willie's arms. "The lilac tree. Shall I tell you a story, Willie?"

 

“A story?” 

 

As Barnabas took a step closer, Willie backed up. Hugging his own ribs, trying not to shiver. Not that there was anywhere for him to go, not that it was going to get any warmer.

 

"Yesterday, I presented Miss Winters with a bouquet of roses. And where do you suppose those roses presently reside?"

 

Willie shook his head. To guess was to court a blow to the head, regardless of whether he answered right or wrong. Besides, he did not know what ladies did with a dozen roses after they were given them. Put them in a vase, probably, but since Barnabas was asking the obvious question, the obvious answer was not going to be the right one. "I dunno, Barnabas."

 

"They ended up in a vase, placed on the piano, in the front room at Collinwood."

 

Willie could picture it exactly, having seen other vases of different flowers there from time to time on his infrequent trips to the Great House. Not such an unusual circumstance, surely, but the way Barnabas said it made him think that there was something he was not seeing. Something amiss that would have Barnabas in his room at this late hour when he was just come home from an interlude with his latest flame.

 

Barnabas was eyeing him now, askance, from the side of his eyes, and it was as if he didn't expect that Willie would get it, and was planning to enjoy it a great deal when the final bomb went off.

 

"During the course of the evening, as you may or may not have noticed, a storm blew in from the sea, and as the windows had been opened on that side of the Great House, they all had to be closed and the house sealed against the storm." Now Barnabas' eyes slid away from Willie, but Willie knew that the vampire's attention never left him, not even for a second. "I happened to be assisting Miss Winters in closing the windows in her chambers, along with my cousin Carolyn, and what do you suppose I chanced to see there?"

 

All Willie could do was shake his head. He did not know the answer, and Barnabas knew it. Then the vampire whirled on him, eyes focused and dark.

 

"I saw lilacs."

 

Willie felt his jaw drop before he could stop it.

 

Oh, shit.

 

Barnabas didn't even need to finish his story; Willie could finish it for him, word for word if necessary.

 

"Vases,” Barnabas continued on, “and bowls, even, filled with lilacs. The entire room was awaft in the scent of them."

 

A shiver rippled through Willie, and he backed up far enough to hit the backs of his legs against the mattress. At the very least he might try and explain what had happened. Maybe that would lessen the beating that was surely to follow, though Barnabas was in a pissed-off enough mood to want to deliver a beating for something, even if it wasn't entirely deserved.

 

"Enough lilacs to spread over the pillows and the sheets, and I was made the confidant of my cousin, who informed me that Miss Winters prefers lilacs to any other flower, including anything from a hot house. Roses, for example. Miss Winters was also kind enough to tell my cousin as to how she came by them. How solicitous and helpful my servant had been in granting Miss Winters her dearest wish."

 

Lilacs are my favorite...thank you, Willie.

 

You're welcome, Vicki. Any time.

 

Now it was very clear what the problem was. Willie’s brain marched out the facts in an orderly fashion. Barnabas had not only misread the situation and not given Miss Winters her heart’s desire, he had dismissed the very thing she loved. But wait, it was worse than that. Willie had taken it upon himself to give away his master's goods and given Barnabas' girl flowers. Flowers that she'd taken and spread upon her bed like a blanket. A blanket of cheap, undesirable, common flowers. While the very expensive hothouse roses languished unloved and unadored in the very fine front parlor of the Great House.

 

Evidence was that she planned to sleep on the lilac blossoms. While Willie could picture it exactly, he knew that Barnabas could see it, too: Vicki, asleep amidst the snow of purple and white, while the scent tangled in her hair and pressed against her skin. Unlike the rose petals, which would whither unappreciated and eventually be swept away and thrown in the trash.

 

I'm about to die, aren't I.

 

It was not a question, nor even doubtful query to trouble him, at least not for long.

 

"B-barnabas, wait, I—"

 

"I will not wait," said the vampire, sweeping off his coat to lay it across the back of a chair. "Where is your belt?"

 

A jolt ran through him from the bottom of his bare feet, through his spine and up the back of his head. He could not stop the shiver that followed, nor the words that sprang from him.

 

"But I only—"

 

Barnabas backhanded him sharply, and he landed on his bed, in a thump of blankets and sheet. Head ringing, feeling cold against the sudden imagined heat of the beating that was to follow. He struggled up on his elbows, trying to catch his breath, and swallow the anxious saliva in his mouth.

 

"Tell me now, where is your belt? And I warn you Willie, not to make me ask you again." The vampire stood over him, now in his suitcoat, perfectly calm, with the rage showing only in his eyes like iron-dark blasts that would scorch and burn if not answered to with the utmost promptness.

 

Shivering, Willie unclenched a fist long enough to motion to his dresser, where he'd laid his trousers when he'd undressed for bed. He was giving it up, he knew he was, but the alternative would be a thousand times worse, he could tell just by Barnabas' manner. The vampire believed that the beating he was about to deliver was well deserved, for any number of reasons, most of them based on his fond-held expectations of how a servant should behave. What they should and shouldn’t do in their master's absence. And Willie, the only servant he had in his household, had broken a number of those rules. Rules which, unspoken and unexplained, were nevertheless expected to be followed. To the letter.

 

"I didn't know, I'm tellin' ya, I didn't know, Barnabas, an'—"

 

"Did not know what, Willie?" asked Barnabas, grabbing the belt and sliding it out of the pantloops with one motion. He spun back around, eyes still glowing, mouth turned down. "Didn't know that a servant should not interfere with his master's courtship of a lady? So obvious, surely, even in this day and age, that you should not meddle in the affairs of the one who holds your well-being in his hands?"

 

"Yeah, I know," Willie began, dizzy with trying to follow the very lengthy logic of this statement. "I know you're courtin' her, I know that, but—"

 

He pressed back against the mattress as Barnabas took a step closer, grim in expression, silently folding the belt in half, gripping the buckle end with one hand, and tapping the looped end in the flat palm of the other. Willie had to tip his head back to see the vampire's eyes, but when he did, his neck tensed up, and he dropped his gaze, and, finding the only item within focus to be the belt in Barnabas' hands, closed his eyes altogether. "I didn' mean anythin' by it, honest. I would never—"

 

He stopped as the fine wool of the vampire's suit brushed against his legs. The vampire was that close and the beating even closer than that. There was no saving him, none at all. "She wouldn't have me anyway, an' you know it."

 

"Ah." There was a spark of darkness in the vampire's voice. "So you have considered it, haven't you."

 

Not a question. An observation, made with the tart surety that only Barnabas could inflect in a statement like that. Making it seem the worst of sins, and Willie, all aware of his transgression, deserving the worst of punishment.

 

"No, it ain't like that, honest, I only—" Willie stopped himself this time, images flicking through his mind, and his body remembering. Miss Vicki, sweet, like the day, flipping her dark brown hair over her shoulder, lashes fluttering down as the petals soaked into her skin. And his own response, like the blossom of spring, so fleet, like the lilacs themselves. A transitory lushness, brought to life by the heat of the morning, and scored down when the darkness and the rains came. So foolish he, to even entertain such thoughts, let alone express any part of them to the master of the house.

 

"You only what, Willie? You only wanted her?"

 

Willie shook his head, slowly, opening his eyes but keeping his head down.

 

"You will look at me," said the vampire. "And you will speak when you answer me."

 

Barnabas waited with the silence of the room, and Willie forced himself to look up. First with his eyes, then lifted his head, and focused now on Barnabas, soaking in the darkness behind that gaze.

 

"That's better. Answer me now. Did you want her?"

 

How in the hell was he supposed to answer that? If he said no, Barnabas would know he was lying. If he said yes, well, Barnabas could use that as the ultimate excuse to rid himself of Willie forever.

 

A hand grabbed the cloth of his t-shirt and pulled him up, snapping his neck, and Willie knew that his answer should have been a bit more forthcoming. He was quick to breathe past the hiss of Barnabas' breath, to clench at the hand that held him and to answer as fast as he could.

 

"I dunno what I was thinkin', Barnabas, it was just the day, the sun an' everything." He caught a glimpse of the expression in Barnabas' eyes as he was cast down to the bed once more. "I didn't touch her, I swear, would never—I only gave her what she wanted, what you would have—honest, p-please, ya gotta believe me."

 

In the silence of that glower, he tried once more. "How was I to know she didn't like roses?"

 

He saw the flicker in Barnabas' eyes as they narrowed, blocking off all light and movement, seeming only cavities of blackness now.

 

The wrong answer of course, the wrong everything, and Willie felt the blood melt away from his skin, sucked dry in that moment, leaving his bones pale and exposed, and him strung and waiting.

 

"P-please, Barnabas—"

 

"You will turn over."

 

No, no, please, no.

 

"Now, Willie."

 

Willie swallowed. There was no brooking denial, not with that tone in Barnabas' voice. Willie clenched the muscles in his stomach and made himself turn over to lie face down across the bed. His hips barely hit the edge of the mattress, the blankets creasing in the hollow of his thighs, and he struggled to remain still. Arms encircled over his head, skin feeling so terribly exposed beneath the thin layer of cotton that he wore, pajamas and T-shirt no barrier to the force of Barnabas' anger.

 

And even though when he was expecting it, when he heard the shift of Barnabas' weight on the floorboards, or the whisper of cloth as the vampire flicked the belt back, when it landed across his thighs, it was still a shock. The heat and force of the blow went right through him, right to his bones and vibrated there, feeling like it was a live thing and vindictive in its coursing through his system. Alive, and angry, and knowing how much it hurt, the second blow was a cousin to the first, joining in and stirring the first whimper out of him before leaving him, allowing for the third blow. Right across his backside, hard, worse than a slap against bare skin, thudding right down to his spine, and the teeth, oh, the teeth of it, locking in and holding on. And the blows that followed, eliciting throat-sharpened cries that he could not control, nor find the power within him to deny. The belt slammed into him, soul-breaking, regular, bringing up welts that soaked down deep, and the shivery heat that raced sweat up his spine, even as he twisted into the blankets and found himself slipping off the edge of his bed. His hips caught him there, feet tracking damp across the wood of the floor, and then, with Barnabas' hand in the center of his back, the belt stopped.

 

"Going somewhere, Willie?" asked that voice.

 

Willie shook his head, quickly, in denial, voice pattering fast after, "N-no, Barnabas, I promise, I'm not—I'm sorry, sorry, I won'—"

 

Barnabas thrust his thigh forward and Willie found himself pressed against it, and hefted there, felt the cord of cold muscle beneath the cloth, the hard bone firm against his ribs. He had to cling to Barnabas or slip and be accused of trying to escape, to avoid his justly deserved punishment. His hands found grasp on the fold of cloth at Barnabas' waist and he clung to that, gasping as the belt continued to come down once more, slamming him against Barnabas’ cold thigh, the iron-hard form racking him in the ribs as a ship tossed against the rocks in a storm.

 

With one last, final blow, the belt slipped around his hips, biting the shy flesh above his hipbone, and Barnabas released his grasp and pushed away, leaving Willie to clutch the blankets and sheets to keep himself from slipping to the floor altogether. He was breathing hard, tears mixing with the sweat that stuck strands of hair to his face. Waiting, his mind racing.

 

Never touched her, never touched her.

 

And part of him knowing, even as he wanted to forget, that he would have, given the right opportunity. Given the right, spare, and precious moment, like the lilacs in bloom, lasting only so long as to grace the air with their presence, he would have lain with her in the wild field and allowed his hands to stroke her soft, white skin and gather her hair like a bouquet, and soak his face in it like cool water. Then they both could have slept in the sweet shade of a sweeping fur, with the clouds racing overhead, her hair trailing through his and the waves of grass hanging down while their breath stirred the wild clover crushed beneath them.

 

"You will not presume," Barnabas was saying now, oblivious to the racing tumble of Willie's thoughts, "to honor a lady with any gifts from this house, do you understand? You will not presume to give lilacs whilst—"

 

Here the vampire stopped, and Willie found that his own breath had stopped also. Waiting in his lungs while he listened, and while his mind grappled with the obvious.

 

"You will not do it, and that is the end of it."

 

Willie could almost see Barnabas nodding, though his eyes were closed and he let his lungs echo with air once more. He could hear the vampire laying down the belt and gather up his great coat, imagining with great ease that in the short pause the vampire was sweeping the length and breadth of his room as if to scan it for more illicit gifts.

 

"You are a servant," Barnabas said, his voice sounding as if he'd come to some new conclusion, "and in no position to be giving gifts." 

 

Willie swallowed. "Y-yes, Barnabas," he said, his body reminding him that Barnabas liked answers addressed to him to be spoken aloud. "I won't, I p-promise."

 

"See that you remember it in future."

 

The vampire strode away, closing the door behind him with a firm click, leaving Willie in the darkness behind his closed eyes, the silence of his thoughts broken by the thunder that he could suddenly and inexplicably hear through the glass panes of the window. Hear the wind howling above the gables and trees outside, and knew in his heart why he had been punished. Of course he knew. It was not for giving Vicki the lilacs, not exactly. They were, after all, flowers from a common tree, and not really worthy of being given. What he had been punished for was the fact that he'd upstaged Barnabas. Upstaged him right and proper with free flowers that had cost him nothing but a walk through the woods with Miss Winters. It was now Willie's lilacs that Vicki was sleeping upon her breath was, no doubt, stirring the petals even as Willie thought about it. Even as Barnabas walked down the stairs and hung up his coat on the coat rack. It was Willie she was appreciating, while any thoughts of Barnabas were vanquished by the sweet smell of a flower from a scrub tree. The servant had outperformed the master, and that was why he'd been punished.

 

And maybe Vicki, too, had had thoughts of an afternoon spent tarrying in an abandoned field of grass. Perhaps she too, when she'd flipped her hair his way, had felt the stirrings of spring and the young man at her side had seemed, for a moment, some spare unexpected bloom, the means by which she would find her way back to the childhood memory of a string of lilac trees. It was impossible, of course, but he could still hear her voice, the sweet chime of her gratitude, deep inside of him.

 

Lilacs are my favorite...thank you, Willie.

 

You're welcome, Vicki. Any time.

 

Any time would be never, of course. Barnabas was likely to double his efforts at this point, bringing conversations with Miss Winters around to the place where she would feel comfortable revealing more about herself. Giving up information that the vampire could use to further woo her with, and never knowing how it could be that he could understand her so completely as to know the secret desires of her heart. Further conversation between Willie and Vicki would be as limited as Barnabas would be able to make them, and with Willie's chores and Vicki's duties, that wouldn’t prove to be very difficult. Their paths would likely never cross again. Not like that. Not like an unexpected day in spring, after the snows but before the rains came, a moment that only existed in the eye of a storm.

 

Willie let his legs slide down the edge of the mattress and made himself stand up and open his eyes. The backs of his legs were screaming at him, sweat making his garments stick to his skin, the rage of the storm making the room chilly. He shivered as the sweat on his body dried, head pounding, blood pulsing up his thighs. He knew he had to clean up and get to bed. Tomorrow's chores would not wait, and Barnabas was hardly likely to have any patience with him for a while. He had to be on his toes or he'd catch it again.

 

One sweet moment, though. He’d had that. He still had it. Vicki's hands held out to catch the falling petals and her eyes opening to look at him. With dark stars shining through the fringe of her eyelashes.

 

You weren't there, Barnabas, and you'll never know. You'll never see it, and I did.

 

Even Barnabas knew, surely he knew, just as Willie did, that some people could not be bought. But for all his posturing about how Vicki was one of those individuals above materialistic persuasion, he continued to behave as if she would, someday, crumple and become his beneath his onslaught of gifts and expensive gestures. Because if it couldn’t be purchased or persuaded, it wasn’t worth his time. He would dismiss the opportunity and then he would miss out.

 

Just like he would never see the lilacs in bloom.

 

Willie smiled. Tipped his head down and felt the warmth of the courting candle behind his half-closed eyes. Barnabas hadn’t been able to whip the memory out of him, never could, and it stayed with him as he got a towel to wipe his face. Lingered while he crawled into bed and pulled the covers up. Rain made good sleeping weather, and his body, even while it sang a nasty and neverending chorus through his nerves, reached for sleep. Taking with it the smile on Vicki’s face as she looked at the array of blossoms, somewhere in the bright spring morning that lingered in his heart.

 

~fin

 

Comments

Hoping to get involved

[(Anonymous)]

Hey - I am certainly happy to find this. Good job!