Whom The Muses Love Short Story

Whom The Muses Love         

by Deanne Kearns

           

Dillan Malone had been trapped in the condemned warehouse with the serial rapist for exactly two weeks, three days, sixteen hours and fifty-four minutes.

 At fifty-five minutes, Tyler Kirkland kicked her chair back from her desk and shut down the computer without saving.

”Crap!”

Tyler, best-selling author of four Dillan Malone novels, was stuck. There was no way out for Malone that she hadn’t already used. Malone’s partner (her fifth) was dead, and Tyler had sent Malone in without backup.   Tyler sighed. “That’s why I don’t like partners. You get to depend on them then, BAM, they get themselves killed and you’re falling from skylights and hanging from the rafters wondering how you got there.”

Tyler stretched in her chair and put her hand to her back.  Another day wasted, killing her back in this chair. She needed to get a new one, but she’d been locked in this wrestling match with her manuscript and never thought of it. Her mind whirled constantly. Where to go? What was Dillan’s next move? What was the rapist’s next move? What was her next move? 

She sighed. Maybe a mocha would help; some fresh air and a good cup of coffee always picked her up. She could feel herself relaxing already.

The phone rang, shattering her precarious mood. ”Damn it!” She snatched it out of her pocket and barked into it.

“Kirkland!”

“You’re in rare form today,” a dry voice observed.

“Bill? Please tell me Pratt agreed to the extension?”

“Pratt is getting restless. I told him I’d call you, ask you if you couldn’t put a bit more speed on it. A month is a long time.”

“I’m serious, Bill, I need the time.  He’s been battering my door down for three more Malone outlines, too. I really need a break here.”

 “I don’t think he’ll be happy, but I’ll sell Pratt on another month’s extension.” Bill hesitated a moment. “Try to get hold of this thing. I know blocks are hard to handle; you just have to write through it.”

 “I know, Bill. Thanks.” Tyler sneered as she closed her phone. “Jesus, trying to tell me to ‘write through it.’” She smacked her fist into her palm, frustrated.

Her eyes wandered to a bookcase and her feet followed.  One book called out to her and she touched the spine. ‘Reaching For The Muse: The Classical Writers And Their Impact On Today’s Literature.’ Farther down, she let her fingers follow the letters. They were worn and almost unreadable. ‘Tyler Kirkland.’

‘I need more time.’

Tyler walked out her condo door into the lobby. She ignored the security guard as usual and stepped out into a gorgeous fall day. She had been ready to call a taxi, but the weather was so beautiful, she decided to walk.

She took a deep breath of the crisp air. She already felt better. She’d go to her favorite coffee shop and spend a few hours there. Hill of Beans Coffee Shop was twelve blocks from Tyler’s condo. The walk was always invigorating and got her mind working again. A raspberry mocha would help her feel more like herself. She started down the sidewalk, appreciating the sights and sounds of the city in autumn.

It had never occurred to Tyler to question whether or not she was happy. Those questions were for the feeble-minded. You took what came your way and you used it, good or bad. She had a job that kept her in good style. Her friends were intelligent; not like those clingy, needy fans that mobbed her at book signings and conventions. She had the occasional woman to wear on her arm and enliven her dark nights. She didn’t let herself think any deeper than that. She came and went as she pleased; no one told her what to do or how to do it. Well, except for editors and publishers.

Tyler was pleased with her neighborhood. Nearly every other place in this suburb was infested with homeless and indigent. They seemed to spontaneously spread like a malaise through the city. Those people could wreck real estate value just walking down the street.

Tyler spent the afternoon with a large raspberry mocha, jotting in her notebook and watching people. Real, live people were fodder for her novels; characters to fill the gaps and die at their appointed time. ”I don’t even have to edit most of them,” she told some groupies once at a cocktail party. ”Most of the slobs on the street make better characters than I could think up.”

“Wow, that’s so observant,” a willowy blond said, slinking up against her. Tyler checked her ID and took her home after the party.

Tyler’s pleasant escape was interrupted by two older women asking for autographs. She resented the interruption, but they were two paying, repeat customers. She supposed that was worth a couple of signatures. They cackled and cooed over Tyler while she signed a couple of napkins. As they continued to pour out their adoration, Tyler reflected the two biddies merited a page or two in her notebook. She had an idea these two ladies would end up being the first victims of a…strangler. Yeah.

Pleased she’d come up with the antagonist for the next Malone adventure, Tyler finished her notes then gathered her notebook, pen and half-full coffee and headed for the door. She dropped a quarter in the tip jar on her way past, turned to rush out and nearly ran down an old woman.

She looked at Tyler with faded, watery blue eyes. Tattered cuffs and elbows on her sweater, grubby and stained, marked her as a homeless woman. Her blouse still had a bit of lace clinging determinedly to the collar. A skirt with pastel flowers on a dark blue background clashed badly with white support stockings and a pair of bright red sneakers.

Tyler backed up fast to avoid colliding with her, then stopped.  Her face captured Tyler’s imagination. Like a wrinkled and petrified apple, it was stamped and seamed by the ravages of time and indigence. Even so, it was clear; free of blemishes; its color smooth and even. The woman’s gray hair was thinning but still silky; Tyler could see its natural shine in the sunlight streaming through the window. Her cheeks were ruddy and there was a twinkle in her eyes as she watched Tyler. What the hell was she doing here? The homeless never ventured this far south.

‘This old gal must have been a looker in her day.’ She burned the old woman’s features into her memory while a new scene formed in her mind. Somehow, this woman was going to get Malone out of that warehouse. She could almost see the scene…

“—young lady?”

“Hmm? What?” Tyler blinked.

"I wonder if you might spare the cost of a cup of coffee, young lady?” The woman’s voice was scratchy and hoarse but mellow, oddly alluring; Kathleen Turner with a cold.

"Uh. . .” Almost in a trance, Tyler looked in her wallet. All she had were twenties. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the manager bearing down on the old woman, ready to pitch her out the door on Tyler’s word. She waved a hand. ”Hold on, Walter,” Tyler said. ”If you stick with a small house blend, you should get five or six cups out of this.” She gave Walter a twenty. The fog she’d felt come over her when she’d looked into the woman’s eyes was beginning to lift, but not before she said, “Keep count for her, Walt, and give her the change.”

She paused. Walter and the old woman watched her; Walter with his jaw hanging.  ‘Did I just set up an old homeless woman with a week’s worth of coffee? The old gal sure has expensive taste. Why doesn’t she hang around Joe’s on Sixth Street?’ 

‘When you say you’re going to do something, Ty, you’d better keep your word,’ her mother’s voice droned in her head.

Walter stared at her. ”Ms. Kirkland, are you—"

“I said it, didn’t I?” Tyler snapped. She turned to leave, but the old woman hadn’t moved.

“Bless you, young lady,” She gathered Tyler’s hands in hers. ”You’re a generous soul.” Her hands were soft when she folded them over Tyler’s.

The old woman’s eyes burned into her. Tyler almost lost herself in those eyes. For a moment they were sparkling sapphire blue and they held her captive. The weight of years shone from them, and a love and compassion Tyler never saw in all the people she met or called friends. She shook herself and quickly pulled her hands away and dodged around the old woman to escape without saying goodbye.

As she walked back home, she saw the old woman again; she was across the street on a bus stop bench. No—that wasn’t the woman she’d seen. It wasn’t possible for the woman to have gotten here before her. And this old gal was dressed in a track suit with a jacket pulled over the top. She raised a cup of coffee and Tyler almost tripped over a fireplug. No, she had to be…a sister. ‘Yeah, twins. That’s it.’

When she got back to her condo, she grabbed a legal pad and fleshed out four characters and scenarios. Then she booted her computer and began writing. She wrote through dinner, past Letterman and Ferguson, until the moon sank behind the cityscape and her eyes began to burn.

“Man,” she whispered when she read the final scene. The old woman (she’d named her Callie Cooper) had opened the floodgates for her somehow.  “Don’t be ridiculous.” Maybe she’d provided some inspiration, but the work was all Tyler. She saved it and pushed her chair back.

Tyler went to the bookcase again on her way to her bedroom. This time she pulled the volume from the shelf and ran her hand over the cover. A photograph of a bust of Hesiod, and a foil-stamp: Best Literary Non-Fiction; Educator’s Literary Council. “New York Times Bestseller” above the title. She put the book back and headed up the hall to her bedroom.

‘I need time.’

*****

Even after her epiphany at the coffee shop, she wrestled with Callie Cooper, the device that made closure for Malone possible.  She’d had to rewrite a bit of her manuscript here and there to fit Callie into the role, but she fit beautifully. So much so that in the end, Callie refused to die. The final scene in the warehouse was fraught with action and wrenching emotion. Tyler accepted the old woman’s will to live and finished the book, leaving her and Malone alive at the end.

*****

‘Malone’s Price’ was released to rave reviews and hailed as the best yet in the series. Her publisher celebrated the release of the fifth Dillan Malone novel with a party at a Manhattan club.  Sam Pratt invited corporate big-wigs from nearly every publishing house in New York and their husbands/wives/lovers. The only people there that Tyler really knew was Sam Pratt, Bill Moore and her agent, Dave Brooks. There were at least a dozen women looking like heart attacks in dresses.

“I know how you love the ladies, Ty,” Sam nudged and winked like Eric Idle, then made a fast break to fawn over a Passageway executive.

Tyler desperately wanted to pass on the party. Still, she understood the game and she endured questions and congratulations; women in glittering cocktail dresses moved close and exclaimed over her skill, mini-celebrities wanted to press the flesh and brag they’d met Tyler Kirkland. Two or three executives slipped her business cards.  Agents followed her around like puppies. Nearly every one of the ‘cocktail women,’ as she’d come to call the single women floating about the club, had pursued her until she wanted to hide in the bathroom. She was getting tired and ready to leave.

In a brief lull in the crowd’s noise, Tyler heard a lyrical voice blending with mellow piano. The crowd turned toward the sound. She pushed her way to the front and was stunned.

A woman in a black off the shoulder evening dress stood on a low stage next to a Steinway, pouring her voice into an old-fashioned microphone. Black hair cascaded over her shoulders and disappeared into the folds and shadows of her dress. She was a siren pulling Tyler closer into her aura.

Tyler approached the stage through the parting crowd, and when the singer’s eyes locked into hers, her heart jerked in her chest, making her breathless. The woman sang for her alone. When the song ended and the music faded, Tyler’s feet took her to the stage and she held out her hand. Her hand in Tyler’s was a blessing, her smile a benediction.

She heard whispers behind them about “flavor of the month,” but Tyler ignored them; there was nothing in the club for her but the raven haired woman who held her hand.

Without a word between them, Tyler took the woman’s wrap and her jacket from the cloakroom. She placed the wrap around the woman’s shoulders and put her jacket on. The woman took Tyler’s arm and they left the club. Tyler did not hail a taxi; she wanted to enjoy the night air with the woman beside her. it never occurred to Tyler to ask her name; she felt almost as if she knew her in her heart. Names became a burden that held you back.

They walked to Tyler’s condo while the normally busy and jittery boulevard emptied itself as they passed. Ahead and behind, she heard horns blare and cabbies curse.  As they passed the park, the late buskers drew a last tune from their instruments, looking for one more dollar. But Tyler and the woman walked in a place of silence hollowed out from the rumble of the city.

Occasionally Tyler would look sideways at the woman on her arm. She was a beauty with her flashing sapphire eyes and black hair. She had high cheekbones, a smooth forehead and full lips. The dress she wore revealed creamy throat and shoulders. She was nearly as tall as Tyler and walked with a confident step that was in synch with Tyler’s own gait.

They reached her condo after an unhurried stroll. Tyler held the door for the woman and took her wrap while she turned about in the middle of her living room, looking around Tyler’s home. She walked slowly to the bookcase and studied the volumes lining the shelves; Dillan Malone first editions, compilations of Twain, Shakespeare, Vonnegut, and Steinbeck. There were nonfiction titles Tyler had written on modern literature and ancient culture’s influence on modern writing; all published before she began the Dillan Malone series. She took ‘Reaching For the Muse’ down and browsed through the pages, smiling to herself here and there.

As she fixed drinks, Tyler glanced at her often, wondering what was making the black haired beauty smile.

Tyler approached the woman with a drink; she took it with a smile and let Tyler guide her to a sofa in front of the fake fireplace. When she was seated on the sofa, Tyler placed her own drink on the table and turned to her with her hands in her pockets. Back in her home, she felt less bespelled, but still felt the force of her beauty and mystery.

As they watched each other, Tyler became certain she knew her. Without thinking she said, “Haven’t we met before?”

The woman laughed; a low, sensuous sound. ”Look out. She’s winding the watch of her wit; by and by it will strike.”

Tyler felt a flush rise from her neck, but covered by saying, “I didn’t think anyone attending one of Sam’s parties would be quoting Shakespeare.”

The woman’s face glowed in the light of the simulated fire. It became youthful and the lines of her lips and cheeks became full and round. Tyler wondered how those lips would taste. Her heart pounded a little faster.

“You may find I am not just anyone. I like Shakespeare. But tell me, do you often bring nameless women home to your loft, Ms. Kirkland?”

Tyler went to the couch and sat casually beside the woman.  “They don’t stay nameless long,” she said lightly. She smiled, but Tyler felt her disappointment.  She felt as if she were stumbling through a high school dance. None of her lines were working and the woman made her feel like a gawky teenager. How had she come to value this woman’s opinion of her more than anyone in her life, in mere minutes? More seriously, she said, “I’ve been accused of doing so; but that’s not what this is. What is your name?”

The woman touched her wrist lightly.  ”You named me Callie Cooper.”

Tyler stared. ”Callie Cooper—" She couldn’t process what the woman said. ”What?” She tried to understand her words.”You—she—you’re Callie?” Tyler pinched the bridge of her nose, remembering each detail he’d memorized about the old woman in the coffee shop. “That’s impossible!”

“In truth, my name is Calliope. My sister, whom you saw on the street, is Thalia. She saw all of our encounter, and encouraged me to pursue you.”

Shock gave way to anger.  Pursue? Tyler Kirkland was not pursued. She was the one who hunted and claimed the trophy. She shook Calliope’s hand off her arm and stood up.  “This has Sam’s stink all over it. How much did he pay you for a joke and a tumble?”

“I don’t know this Sam; no one has paid me for anything. I give and I take what I will.” She stood and in the dim light of Tyler’s living room she seemed to transform into a goddess.”Suspend your disbelief and listen to what I have to say.”

Tyler backed into her reading chair and carefully lowered herself into the seat. “You’re Calliope. The old woman. The woman in the bus stop was Thalia.” She took a gulp of her drink. “You’re Muses.” Calliope nodded, her blue eyes locked on Tyler’s own shocked ones.

“I met you and realized your potential. Thalia and I watched your treatment of Callie Cooper. You showed compassion for a stranger, and one whom you would normally scorn.

“But you’ve grown hard over the years, and that hardness found its way not only into your writing, but into your heart. You have taken indiscriminately and given nothing back.” Calliope’s words stung Tyler and made her want to hide from the beautiful woman in front of her. Before tyler could sink any further, calliope changed her words to compassion and encouragement.

“You have only forgotten how to give and receive compassion, and the art of writing is not lost in some vague past. It still resides in you.”  Calliope’s eyes flashed with the joy of creation and discovery that Tyler realized she had lost years ago. “You must only reach out, open your heart, and take hold.”

Tyler looked up the ceiling, her eyes welling. She tried to get a full breath but her heart was beating too fast. ”I wanted to be a great writer. Not another Shakespeare or Faulkner or Plath, but I wanted to at least leave a sentence or a paragraph that would…live after me.” She rubbed her jaw. ”Then on a whim I sent a hacked-together manuscript to Bill at Passageway, and I was locked in. I tried to hold some back for myself, but the deadlines were ungodly…and the money was good.”

Calliope nodded in understanding. ”I have seen it with so many wordsmiths. The pressure is enormous to please others.  But you are different, Tyler. I can guide you back to your joy and passion to write. The critics heaped laurels upon you for this last book, but they don’t understand why.

“Tyler Kirkland, you let yourself into your writing for the first time since you began.”

“Was it an accident?” Tyler felt her hopes fall even as they had begun to climb.  “Did you do something I won’t be able to do again on my own?”

Calliope moved forward until she was standing before Tyler. ”It is inside you. I only unlocked the doors that had been sealed by the fear of failure, ruin and judgment.

“These modern literati understand very little of what it means to move the world with words. I’m here to give you guidance.” She played her fingers across Taylor’s face, and drew her close. She bent over and softly pressed her lips to Tyler’s, taking her breath away. There was promise there; promise of companionship and comfort in the nights. There was also promise of hard work ahead. But the muse had found her, and she wouldn’t resist.

She felt herself, her whole being, surrendering to this Muse who had chosen her.

Calliope stood and held out her hand. Tyler took it. The thrill of Calliope’s touch made her tremble and Calliope caressed her face. As she led Tyler through the hall to her bedroom and touched her tenderly in the dark, a passage from Hesiod came to mind:

He is happy whom the Muses love.

*****

Sam and Bill stood outside Tyler’s door, waiting for the superintendent to unlock her condo. ”I haven’t heard a word from her since the party. She’s not returning my calls or emails,” Sam said.

“She was acting strange at the party,” Bill said. ”If I didn’t know her, I would’ve said she had the first book jitters.”

“There ya go gents. Lock up when you’re done. If you find something…I don’t wanna know about it, right? I’m just the super.” He walked to the elevator and left Bill and Sam alone outside Tyler’s door.

At first look, the condo looked normal; no signs of burglary or attack. They walked through the living room to Tyler’s office. Sam pointed to Tyler’s desk. ”Bill.”

Tyler’s desk was cleared out; all the drawers of the desk and file cabinet were open and empty.

“Jesus,” Bill said, and ran for the bedroom. ”She wouldn’t!” The closet and most of the dresser drawers were half-empty. He smacked his fist on top of the dresser. ”Damn it!”

"Look here, Bill,” Sam said. He held a half-sheet of legal paper. Bill snatched it, and they read: “Hey, guys, I wondered how long it would take you to realize I was gone. Well, with Malone’s Price done, my contract is finished. Sorry, Sam, I never did any of those outlines you wanted. Maybe I knew I wouldn’t be around to finish them. Send the royalty checks to the same place. It’s been great— Ty.”

They looked at each other. ”That bitch!” Bill shouted.

“Ungrateful ass,” Sam agreed.

*****

Thalia talked about poets and writers she had known throughout her life. She no longer had the aspect of an old woman; she had auburn hair falling in waves over tanned shoulders. She was dressed in a shirt and pants of lime green and pink that stuck to every curve and line. Every man who passed their table kept his eyes on her as long as he could, hoping for a glance from those emerald eyes; a smile from those lips. 

But Tyler only had eyes for the woman beside her.  Calliope sat next to Tyler, her fingers running through her hair as Tyler gazed at her between sips of coffee. ”We should probably go or we’ll miss our flight.”  The three gathered their coats and headed for the door; Tyler and Calliope holding hands and whispering and laughing together. Thalia rolled her eyes.

Tyler stopped at the counter. The manager came out of the back room and did a double-take. ”Ms. Kirkland! Where’ve you been? It was all over the news, how you disappeared.”

“We’ll I’m here in plain sight, Walt; so I guess I haven’t disappeared, have I?” Tyler smiled. ”I’m just back in town to take care of some business. We’re on the way out again.

“By the way, here are a few bucks. Next time one of the homeless folks comes in, treat them to a cup of coffee.” She laid down a small wad of twenties and Walter stuttered. His eyes were wide as he looked at the two gorgeous women accompanying Tyler.

"Where have you been?  Where’re you going, Ms. Kirkland?”

Tyler smiled at Calliope and gave her a soft kiss. ”Wherever the muse leads me.”