A Long and Lonely Mile

Chapter 18

Author's Note: The brief song lyric is from a lovely little piece called "Sweet Sir Galahad" by Joan Baez. Just so there isn't any confusion, it was the "lullaby" from Marigold's childhood that she sang on the car ride home a couple of chapters back. I don't own it and could never even begin to dream up lyrics like the ones Baez writes- but I do recommend giving it a listen. It's just so... Tavington. Especially from Marigold's perspective.

Neither of them could bring themselves to regret the trip to Charleston. But as Tavington sat, trembling at the edge of the bed in Marigold's guest bedroom; he could hardly deny that traveling again before the 18th was out of the question. His fingertips were always the first to grow numb. He struggled with his buttons as a result. Thankfully, Marigold intervened. She asked him to rest his head in her lap for another few minutes while his t-shirt and flannel pajama bottoms were being warmed in the dryer.

"You know, I never learned how the story ends," he shut his eyes as she cradled his head, "in the song that you sing for me every night. Since our first trip home from Charleston."

"That's because you always conk out before I have the opportunity to finish it." She teased, stroking his long strands of hair.

"The girl is very sad because she feels like a failure. So, she confides in him," Tavington recalled, "she puts down the mask that she wears when she is around her neighbors and friends. That is all that I can remember..."

Marigold continued to weave her fingers through his dark mane and sang softly, as a mother would to a child,

"He just put his arm around her and that's the way I found her eight months later to the day. Lines of a smile erased the tear tracks upon her face. A smile that could linger even stayed! Sweet Sir Galahad went down with his gay bride of flowers, the prince of the hours of her lifetime. And here's to the dawn of their days, of their days..."

"The dawn of their days... Well, I did ask for you to sing me something hopeful, didn't I?"

"You most certainly did. What else are we to be if we are not hopeful?" Many things, of course.
"Realistic" was among them. But that word meant nothing here- at least not now. "Just this morning," Marigold could hear the dryer going off down the hall and nudged him slightly, "the only thing on my mind was job hunting. I had no idea I would go to bed engaged to the love of my life. If you don't think that is cause for hope, you couldn't be more wrong."

She stepped out and returned not a minute later with his warm, clean loungewear and a glass of ice water. After helping him reach the edge of the bed, she rubbed her hand against his back while he drank and then assisted him in dressing. As she was unbuttoning his dress shirt, the surgery scar on his chest came into view. With his permission, she stroked, then kissed the raw flesh of his wound before giving it a new dressing. The angry red incision across his heart bore much resemblance to her own. She would have opened a conversation about their similarities, but Marigold found herself terribly conflicted as she moved her hands across his bare skin. He was in a heightened state of vulnerability. Nobody, no surgeon, no lover had ever seen him so defeated. And yet, a lustful darkness stirred in Marigold's heart as she dressed him. Despite his frailty, she longed to lay him down and make violent love to his body; to suspend his mortality and take him to a heaven of her own making. If they could bring one another back to life merely through touch, she thought, imagine what wonders might unfold if they surrendered to desire. If only for just a while...

Allowing his clothes to warm in the dryer didn't help as much as Marigold had hoped. By the time she positioned him against his pillow and folded the sheets over him, Tavington was shaking with more aggression than before. Frightened of what this might mean, Marigold suggested giving his doctor a call, but he convinced her that he was only chilled and nothing more.