The Prisoner Of Shalott
By M Alford
Begun September 2008, finished November 2008
Obligatory disclaimer: This is a fanfiction for entertainment purposes. No copyright infringement is intended.
Chapter Ten: Mirror Clear
It was a bright fall day. The sun shone clear in a cool blue sky. The trees were beginning to die; their last gasps emerging as plumes of warm color, in their final throes.
Bloom recognized the place. It looked much different, much less dreary in the daylight. This was the same railway overpass where he had first come face to face with the Goddess--first seen her in her true form. Where she’d almost ended her life, both their lives, that rain-stained day. Today the trains were not moving, at least none had passed in the time Bloom and she had been standing there. And today she wasn’t suicidal--at least, Bloom sure as hell hoped not.
She certainly didn’t look it. Her full cheeks were red in the cool air, but she was smiling as the wind tousled her mouse-brown hair. She looked up at the blue sky, took a deep breath, seeming to sigh. Whether or not she was thinking of that other day, Bloom didn’t know. He felt dangerously proud of how far she’d come, how much she’d changed, since that day.
“You lied to me.”
Bloom spoke it to the newcomer he had sensed coming up behind them. The ever-present Mayor. The so-called final ruler of the Goddess' heart.
The Mayor, characteristically, was glib. “You sound disappointed,” he observed.
Bloom didn’t look at the Mayor as he joined him at the railing. They both looked at the Goddess from a distance. “You told me she was in terrible danger. You said she was going to die.”
“She did die!” The Mayor sounded nonplussed. “You both died! I died, my henchmen died... hail hail, the gang’s all here!” He snickered. “And it was all your fault, wasn’t it? It happened just like I said it would.”
But Bloom smiled, a grim smile. He knew that this was not the truth. It wasn’t his fault... it wasn’t even his idea. The Goddess had gone ahead and done the exact thing he himself had begged her not to do: had her two criminals die in each other’s arms. It was a ridiculous, stupid ending to a painfully bad story, and Bloom hated it. And he loved the Goddess for sticking to it. Because it meant she wasn’t just venting every idea he’d put into her head. She was sticking with her own ideas, staying faithful to her own plots. Hackneyed as they were.
Bloom sighed, too tired to be angry anymore. “So that whole thing, that whole horror story you concocted to scare me off... it was all a load of shit.” He cast a knowing side glare at the politician. “You just didn’t want her to finish without you. Did you?”
The Mayor sighed, mostly in acquiescence. “I really don’t like you,” he told the liberty of informing Bloom.
Bloom snickered. “The feeling is mutual,” he replied wearily.
But they were much the same, much as they hated each other. Both of them completely devoted to a crazy Goddess as human as they were. Both of them bitterly, jealously protective of her. Both complete chumps for her. And both completely okay with that.
“You’d really think that evolution thing would start to kick in eventually, wouldn’t you?” said the Mayor.
Bloom snickered again, grimly. “I think it has. Gods used to be men.”
##
He stood at her side on the overpass, much the same way he had on that other, darker day. “Well, all things considered, I’d still say you’re better off now than you were,” Bloom said to her. “I was right, wasn’t I? Do you see all you’d have missed, if you’d gone through with it? I mean yeah, you lost your job, that’s a bitch; but you’ll find another. There’s got to be something out there for a writer like you.” Bloom gazed at her face. She was almost pretty, in the ruddy fall sunlight. “And you finished the story. Maybe you’ll start another one. A better one. Boy, let’s hope, right?” He chuckled. “And this punk who’s writing you the fan letters... I guess he’s all right. Better him than Sonny, that’s for sure. Better to spend your nights with him than drinking them away, alone.” He paused, gazing at her profiled face. “Better him than me. An imaginary lover is no substitute for the real thing.”
He felt sorry, somehow. He almost didn’t want to leave her. “I don’t know where I’m supposed to go now,” Bloom realized. “I guess my mission’s done here, right? I mean, what else can I do for you? But so far... no white light, no burning bushes...” He uttered a giggle. “Why do you suppose God used a burning bush, anyway? In His infinite wisdom, surely you’d think He’d have known people were going to be making dirty double entendres out of the term two thousand years later--”
“Are you ever gonna stop talking?” she spoke up suddenly. “Or do you want me to jump?”
Bloom’s rambling chatter was brought to a dead halt. He turned his head, staring at her, wide-eyed.
She was smiling at him. Looking at him through the curtain of her light brown tousled bangs. Her eyes were twinkling for once--she was laughing at him.
Bloom reached out to touch her, to grip her shoulder. He was overjoyed to find his hand met with solid cloth and flesh. He burst out laughing, so stunned by what had suddenly happened. He was back! Back in his body, back on earth--he was alive!
And so was she. He scooped her up in a strong hug that she eagerly returned. The two of them were laughing, hugging on the windy train overpass, as the warmly colored fall leaves skittered by.
