Page 58 of House of Hearts
Panic has robbed the air from my lungs and buried this room several feet under. I’m left with a pocket of air, each shallow gasp depleting the oxygen further. I breathe in what I can, and it’s as unpleasant as a mouthful of soil, heavy and dry on my tongue.
I need to get the hell out of here. Logically, I know I’m not buried alive, but my nails are seconds from clawing at the walls, splintering my fingers down to jagged stubs of plaster and paint.
I have no idea where I’m going when I slip out of the girls’ dorms. My feet carry me on a path my brain doesn’t know. Wet leaves crunch underfoot, and I dodge bare branches. I’m lucky the rain has ceased, but the storm has left a nasty chill to the air and I shiver with it. I cup my pink-knuckled hands to my mouth and shiver with the cold.
Floodlights burn a beacon forward; they’re attached to a shadowed building a couple of yards away. Through the gloom, I recognize it as the school chapel. I can’t imagine it’ll be open at this hour, but my body carries me toward the somber building regardless. I’m shocked to find that the door swings open at my command. Stepping into the shadows, I’m greeted by miraculous warmth. And then I see a portrait I know all too well now.
Perhaps when this building was first constructed, there were portraits of saints adorning the walls and weeping statues of Mother Mary. Now there’s a gallery of the dead. My dream hangs on the wall inthe front entrance, featuring Helen’s solemn expression and her bouquet of violets. Her husband stands tall beside her, his palm possessive on her shoulder.
Violets, please.
She was adamant in my dream, imploring me to paint over her bouquet. “Flowers convey what words cannot,” that’s what my mom always told me. That was how she felt about violets. They’re a symbol of loyalty, modesty, and humility. All perfect traits for a wedding, and yet, I don’t understand why she was so insistent.There’s rue for you, and here’s some for me…
Her words come spiraling back to me, and they’re no longer a nonsensical ramble but a quote. I’ve heard it before in my Shakespearean Lit class, the teacher assigning a popcorn-style class reading ofHamlet. A guy in the front of the class had squinted down at the book and recited a stilted, monotone passage.
There’s fennel for you, and columbines. There’s
rue for you, and here’s some for me. We may call it
herb-grace o’ Sundays. O, you must wear your rue
with a difference. There’s a daisy. I would give you
some violets, but they withered all when my father
died…
Sure enough, I look back at the portrait, and the flowers are subtly painted beyond their prime, their stalks bowing in a limp bouquet.
This isn’t a picture of a happy couple.
This is a woman mad with grief.
I don’t know what to do with this information, but I don’t have long to dwell on it, either. The chapel’s tranquil silence dies, and the atmosphere is reborn with the haunting rumble of an organ. It’s aviolent whirlwind of blaring pipes and slammed keys, a villainous concerto by Johann Sebastian Bach.
I follow the notes as if hypnotized. The arcade arches above me are enveloped in darkness, and the path forward is streamed silver with moonlight. The stars wink off the golden pipes and illuminate the arched spine of the player hunched over the keys as I approach.
Calvin is swept away in his playing, each note striking harder than the last. His profile paints a severe portrait. He’s split apart at the seams, no longer the paragon of perfection but untethered from the world as we know it. Like a monarch gone mad, the beautiful and dreadful King of Hearts.
“Calvin?” I try, but he can’t hear me.
The playing grows louder, more discordant and unrefined. It’s horrifically shrill and out of key, like the frenzied, wild strings at a bacchanal. That moment when one transcends their humanity and enters their most primal and unrestrained state.
I make the mistake of pressing my palm to his shoulder. The music stops all at once, breaking off in a violent clash of keys as he stiffens on the bench. He’s quiet beneath me, so perfectly frozen I wonder if he’s alive at all, before he whips around.
I hardly recognize him. “So, let me guess,” I say to diffuse the tension. My voice sounds funny in the air and not quite my own. “You’re a vampire, aren’t you? Handsome, perfect, doesn’t need to sleep. You sit here all night, playing the organ like some brooding, bloodsucking monster.”
He curls a lip to show me his teeth. “Not a vampire, just an insomniac. On really bad nights I can’t stand to be alone in my room, staring up at nothing, so I come here to play.” He sits with that answer before adding, “It feels like praying for me.”
“I didn’t think you’d be the religious type.”
“You think of me often?”
“Only that you strike me as some sort of heathen.”
In the light of the stained-glass window, he’s a fallen angel, his beauty a sin in itself. Some gorgeous abomination.
“You really shouldn’t be here.” His voice rumbles over me like the swell of a passing storm.
