Fortunate Sons

Chapter 42: The Morning After

Sue blinked her eyes open, blinded by the sunlight that poured in through the open window in the bedroom. She felt the rise and fall of Taylor's chest as each quiet breath went in and out of his lungs and his arms around her as he remained in deep sleep. Outside the morning was hot, made hotter still by the pair lying skin to skin beneath the thin blankets that covered the bed.

"Oh God," Taylor groaned as he awoke and stretched his arms. "What day is it?"

"Monday morning," Sue yawned.

The two of them stayed with each other a few minutes longer, listening to the city coming to life right outside the house. Not too far away they heard the bells and the drums coming from the Buddhist monastery, calling its devout members to morning mass along with those of St. Andrew's Church where Father Chu was sure to have returned.

"Think your aunt will give us the stink eye when we go downstairs?" Taylor chuckled.

"Let her," Sue replied with a wry grin. "If she gives us shit for the rest of our lives it'll have been worth it."

The two of them laughed a little before finally deciding to get up and get moving. They took turns with the shower, allowing each their moment of privacy and when they had on a fresh set of clothes, the pair followed the sound of Lin's chattering down the stairs.

Down in the kitchen were her, Dr. Pearlman, Dix and Uncle with the latter three all gathered at the table. Dr. Pearlman held a rag full of ice against the side of his head, cursing the day he had ever decided to drink while Dix and Uncle were engaged in a rather intense card game.

"Hey GI Joe," he said, cheerfully greeting the two of them. "You two sleep ok?"

"Better than I thought we would," Taylor replied. "Beats sleeping on the rock hard ground."

"I'll say," Uncle remarked. "Guess that's not the only good time you two had last night."

"What do you mean?"

"I guess my niece should be nicknamed 'The Bride of Dracula'," Uncle laughed.

Taylor peered at his reflection in the old hallway mirror, his face turning bright red with embarrassment at the dark purple marks that littered his neck. At least I'm not screwing around with the General's daughter......he thought.

"You look like death Ari," he remarked as he took a seat with the rest of his companions.

"Oi gevault my head is throbbing," Dr. Pearlman complained. "I haven't been this hungover since med-school graduation."

"That bad?"

"It wasn't just the booze," Dr. Pearlman replied. "I went to go slip into bed and I fell off and hit my head on the nightstand."

Aside from several of the companions nursing their hangovers, the morning went much better than any other. Auntie Lin made them all her famous sunny side eggs with chili sauce, scallion and French baguette which was gone in less than a half hour. Once the dishes were cleared, washed and put away, the friends had the whole day to do whatever the hell they wanted.

As much as they wanted to avoid the heat, Taylor and Sue decided to spend some much needed time with Tri who was so full of energy that only Taylor could keep up with her. They took her for a walk through the markets where men and women haggled food, clothes and homemade jewelry, GIs spending time on furlough and where people gathered at the pagodas to pay their respects to Buddhist deities. The streets were alive with the buzz of motorcycles, army jeeps and chatter that neither Taylor nor Sue cared to listen to.

They walked the streets through the markets and into an area where the walls of the cemetery ran the whole length of the street and the awnings from the buildings shaded them from the sun that seemed so merciless and unforgiving. They stopped by the church to retrieve the book from Father Chu who had been as glad as they were to have it off his hands. Every time the two of them saw anything that had water or ice on the way back, they were desperate to jump right in and cool off. After a few more minutes, they took Tri back to the house where it was ice cold and they could escape the awful heat.

As soon as everyone in the house had taken a freezing cold shower and rid themselves of the annoying film of humidity that covered them, they all went about whatever business they had or caught up on some much needed rest. Dr. Pearlman however, had been curious to know more of what was in the book.

"My God this thing has everything," he remarked as he and Taylor looked it over at the kitchen table. "How to trap a wendigo, how to properly feed a domovoi in ten easy steps.....oh this looks interesting, how NOT to screw up making a veve to summon the voodoo gods."

"There's a lot more in there too," Taylor said as he stuck a few ice cubes down the front and back of his shirt. "The book can morph into whatever the reader wants to know or needs to know but sometimes it doesn't have all the answers."

Dr. Pearlman watched with awe as the words on the yellowing pages swirled and shifted like a small whirlpool, morphing the inky black text into words and pictures that immediately captured his attention. "Angelic Anatomy and Physiology," he read. "All you need to know, all you ever will know and much more to understand. Now this is something I'd be able to get behind."

Dr. Pearlman was both intrigued and fascinated by the images the book had laid before him, images that very well could have been pulled straight from Da Vinci's journals. They displayed each and every system and its functions, skeletal, muscular, circulatory, respiratory and even detailed illustrations of motion and function. Some he could hardly take his eyes off of, those of the heart and the lungs, the brilliant wings that unfurled from their backs and one of an angel-mother awaiting the birth of her child.

"So Father Chu hung onto this the whole time?" Dr. Pearlman asked.

"Kept it well out of the way until we could stop Cao," Taylor replied. "Good thing too."

"Knowing what this thing contains, I'd say so as well," Dr. Pearlman agreed.

While the two of them looked at the contents of the book, Sue left for the hospital and Uncle left to open up the café. "So I guess this thing has to go back home with you?" Dr. Pearlman asked.

"I'm afraid so," Taylor replied. "But it'll feel good to be home."

"You'd better not go home without Sue or Tri," Dr. Pearlman said, pretending to warn him. "If you do you'll hate yourself in the morning."

"Probably hate myself for the rest of my life," Taylor laughed.

Whether he had laughed to hard or for another reason all together, a sharp stab of pain ran its way up Taylor's back and went straight into his shoulders where it settled for a good minute or two before it finally receded. Taylor's breath hitched in his chest, constricting the muscles in tight knots before its hold had let go and Taylor was able to breathe again.

"You ok?" Dr. Pearlman asked.

"Yeah," Taylor replied as it receded. "I think so."

Dr. Pearlman couldn't get rid of the feeling that something was seriously wrong with Taylor. Whatever had been wrong, he hoped would pass shortly. But as with most things, even the doctor himself couldn't ignore that Taylor would be in for a few rough nights.