T. Bunn - Winner Take All

Her taxi rounded a corner, took a second sharp turning, and suddenly entered a world of cathedral greens. The forest was so ancient all Kirsten saw were vast spaces and living pillars. The taxi driver took deep breaths through his open window and pointed to the ancient growth. Kirsten nodded her understanding. She had entered the city’s lungs.

From the outside, the church was singularly unimpressive. All she could see when she rose from the taxi was the wall of a forest hut. A thick coat of gold-green moss bound the structure to the forest floor. Once inside, she found that three of the sanctuary walls were glass. As she took her seat, the wind flung a fistful of apple blossoms at the glass, as though the trees sought to join the congregation.

The service was a standard midweek rite, intended primarily for fellowship. Kirsten sat and listened to her own internal discourse. She was not yet able to examine her flaws and come to terms with all her emotional baggage. But she had an instinctive understanding of Erin Brandt. Their motif was the same; to appear to be someone else, to form a wall no one could breach.

Until now.

After the service, people flowed good-naturedly into the adjoining kitchen-dining area. The covered dishes emitted a rainbow of odors-curries and chilies and cumin and spices she could not identify. Kirsten remained standing by her chair and observed the casual intermingling of Europeans and Asians and Arabs and Africans, the diversity a living condemnation of most American churches.

The couple waited until the congregation had dispersed to approach. Only one other person remained seated up by the nave, a gray-haired matron who appeared to study Kirsten even with head bowed and eyes diverted.

The younger woman demanded, “You’re taking on Erin Brandt?”

“I represent an attorney acting on behalf of her former husband.”

She had the weak countenance of many redheads, as though the effort of inserting such brilliance into her hair had drained her features of strength and clarity. “I sing with the opera. My husband is one of the lead dancers with the Stadtsballet .”

The young man was slender and muscled and held himself with taut grace. He asked his wife, “Does she look like a lawyer to you?”

“And just exactly what is a lawyer supposed to look like?” The woman did not turn around. “Male?”

“This is your career we’ve got on the line here. Our careers.”

“Where else would be safer? Tell me that and we’ll go there.”

“You heard them the same as I. This case is high profile. People are watching.”

Kirsten asked, “Who has been talking about me?”

“I can’t tell you that.” She seemed irate with her own need to talk. “Look. If there was a support group for left-behind parents, we couldn’t ever discuss it, you understand?”

The young man continued to glare at his wife. “The German government takes a very hard look at any resident foreigner who makes trouble.”

“This isn’t just a problem for Americans. It’s a dilemma facing people from nations right around the globe. And it’s getting steadily worse. Word is out.”

Kirsten asked, “What can you tell me about Erin Brandt?”

“Almost nothing. She got her start singing in a convent choir. I know that much.”

“It could be a lie,” her husband muttered.

“I don’t think so. She was too angry with herself for telling me.”

The gray-haired woman on the front row remained intently focused upon the hands in her lap. Kirsten asked, “When was this?”

“Not long after she returned to her position as resident diva. Erin was furious after she said it. So angry she frightened me. Like I was suddenly a threat.”

“Because she had spoken to you?”

“Because I listened . Erin knew I’d been paying attention.”

“But why was this important?”

“I don’t know. But it was. To her, it was something vital.”

The gray-haired woman rose from her seat and turned their way, revealing features cast into permanent resignation. The couple said nothing as she slipped into the pew in front of Kirsten. She spoke in German with heavily accented weariness. The singer translated, “You have succeeded in worrying Erin Brandt.”

“May I ask who you are?”

The couple exchanged glances with the woman before the singer responded. “Goscha is Ms. Brandt’s housekeeper.”

“Goscha.” Kirsten turned so she faced the woman directly. “Can you tell me how the baby is doing?”

The woman made a careless gesture of clearing away sudden tears. The singer translated, “Erin and her manager took the baby away this morning. She has no idea where to.”

Kirsten touched the woman’s sweatered arm. “Was Celeste all right this morning?”

The woman struggled to respond directly. “Is beautiful child. Please, you are forgiving my English, yes?”

“Of course.”

“Celeste is little angel.”

“Why did they take her away?”

The woman switched back to German, which the singer translated, “Erin is preparing to travel again.”

“When?”

“Tomorrow. She has agreed to sing at a gala function.”

“Where?”

The housekeeper replied with a gift bearer’s determination. “New York.”

Kirsten joined the crowd drifting into the forest and the night. The path back to the main forest road was poorly lit and furrowed from recent rains. Women in high heels pitched like drunken ballerinas and grabbed at whoever was closest. The atmosphere was gay and soft as the air, good friends reluctant to leave the dusky respite. The trees were blue-gray shadows etched against the fading summer light. An orchestra of birdsong made a mockery of the autobahn’s distant thunder.

Kirsten felt an urgent need to talk with Marcus. Yet the flush of pleasure over sharing these events also raised the specter of panic and flight. Which saddened her, thinking that perhaps this would remain a part of her forever, an addictive craving for the needle of isolation.

A hand gripped her arm. For an instant she thought it was another parishioner offering support over the rocky path. Then the thumb searched out the soft point in her elbow, and punched down like a stake going for blood.

The pain was a white flash against the backdrop of falling night, so severe she had to gasp first, before the scream could be formed. Another hand was there and ready, this one gloved and closing over her throat and dragging her back the three paces into the first line of trees.

A man breathed into her ear, “Sometimes there ain’t nothing as real as pain. Tell me I’m right.”

Kirsten struggled for a purchase against the hand over her throat. The man lifted her up slightly so that her toes scrabbled across the leaves. Her nostrils became filled with the man’s stench. The odor was as strong as his grip, a revolting combination of old sweat and cheap cologne.

“Know what I think? Pain’s like a flower. You get inside deep enough, you find it just keeps on opening up.” His voice was muffled by cloth. “One level to the next. On and on. And you can’t decide which is worse. Living with the pain you know, or worrying about how bad it’s gonna get.”

The man slackened his grip on both her elbow and her throat. The dual agonies were replaced by a single throbbing ache that coursed through her entire upper body, melded together by sheer terror.

“Now you just calm down and listen hard. Either that or I’m gonna introduce you to the next level. Nod that you’re paying attention to what I’m saying.”

The distant road flashed with the brilliance of a car pulling away. Another car started and turned on its lights. A spectral glow lit their tiny corner, the tree trunks turning silver on one side and black on the other. The man was so strong he could hold her full weight by the gloved hand gripping the bones of her lower jaw.