The Real Reason Why
Delores had done a bit of sight seeing with the rest of her time. She felt great. The colors of the city were more vivid. The sounds more distinct. The smells. . . She didn’t really want to think about those so she moved on. She couldn’t wait to find Terry again. She’d been upset that morning about his timing, but honestly it was hard to stay mad at him. He was just so darned earnest about everything. It was like being mad at a puppy for being excited to see you. She knew he’d be happy to hear about her advancement.
She came walking down Canal and as she got near the Aquarium she saw the benches she’d remembered. They were actually closer to Riverwalk, but close enough. And there he was. Terry was sitting on a bench. She waved an arm in the air at him as she approached and, strangely, he didn’t do anything. He just sat there. She thought he may have dozed off, but as she got closer she saw his face and she had to stop herself from running.
He looked hollow. Defeated. She sat down next to him on the bench. She made sure to sit closer than he might be comfortable with in the hopes that he’d say something, but he just sat there with a empty stare. It frightened her, just like the last time she’d seen it. This time she worried what it meant for him, instead of herself.
“Terry?” She asked. “Are you ok?” He didn’t respond. Not to her. His eyes narrowed. She grabbed his face in both hands and turned him to face her. She took the excuse to check for illness but she didn’t find anything. Then his eyes met hers and she gasped. She spoke before she thought.
“What did they do to you, Terry?”
He blinked and finally seemed to see her. He didn’t look anything other than empty. Done with everything. She knew the look entirely too well. She held his face, willing him to come back.
“What haven’t they done? All of them? Me?”
She didn’t move her hands. She just got closer to his face so that he would stay focused on her.
“I want you,” she said, “to tell me what happened. Can you do that? Just stay here with me.”
“Ok.” Was all he said at first. She gave him a sympathetic look and something seemed to click into place in his mind.
“I’ve been given a secret mission.” He said. She waited for more. That was it.
“And that’s all you can tell me?”
“I,” his eyes unfocused, “They had me take an oath. I can’t tell you, or anyone else.”
Delores thought quickly. She remembered something a therapist had used on her once that had helped her work around painful topics she couldn’t discuss.
“That’s fine. I understand. Let’s talk around it.”
“What?”
She smiled at him. He was talking, at least a little.
“We can’t talk about it, so tell me what you think of it. Tell me how it makes you feel.”
He closed his eyes and breathed. She brushed his cheek with her thumb. If this has destroyed him, she thought, I will tear the Order down, brick by brick, with my bare fucking hands.
He opened his eyes.
“How I feel about it.” He said, tasting the concept. Light started to come back to his eyes. “Every fiber of my being says that this is wrong. I understand their reasoning for it. It makes perfect sense on paper. This is going to hurt people, D.” He looked straight into her eyes with a terrifying intensity. “It’s going to hurt people I care about very, very much.”
She nodded. Ok. It was going to hurt her. Maybe others too, but he definitely meant her.
“Couldn’t you turn it down?” she asked, still holding his face there.
“Delores, I have to do this or I have to resign from the Order.”
Her eyes widened. They couldn’t do that, could they? Well, she supposed they could do anything they wanted.
“That’s not fair.” She said. He sneered. It was not a look she wanted to see on his face.
“Nothing’s fair any more.” He whispered. She let go of his face and took his hand. He looked at it. Good. Stay with me, she thought. Please.
“Besides what you can’t tell me,” she said, “what aren’t you telling me?”
“It’s punishment for what I did to Lawless.”
“WHAT?!” She shouted.
“Not in so many words,” he continued, “but this should have been his job. The Elders in the Order wanted me punished for overstepping my bounds and decommissioning him. I think this is Takewell’s compromise.”
The more she learned about the Order of St. George, and the more she saw the way it tried to tear Terry apart, the more she hated it. She needed to get him out of it somehow. She knew that would probably kill him.
“When do you have to start this mission?” she asked.
“I’m on it now. No one knows how I’m supposed to accomplish it so I don’t have a time frame.”
“Ok. That’s good. It can be a future-Terry problem.” She said.
“Future-Terry?” he looked confused.
“Yeah,” she said, “We just punt it down the road a little ways for the later you to handle when he’s capable. BUT. . .”
“But?” he asked.
“But, I’m not worried about future-Terry handling it. Or present-Terry for that matter.”
“Why?”
“Because you have only ever done what you thought was the right thing. When you get there, and you are supposed to do what they want you to do, if it’s not the right thing I don’t think you’ll be able to do it.”
He stared at her.
“That’s what Takewell said.” He met her eyes. “You’re putting a lot of faith in me.”
She looked at him in sympathy and curiosity.
“What have you ever done to not deserve my faith in you, you silly boy?”
He looked down, and looked ashamed. She squeezed his hand.
He let out a bitter laugh.
“That’s not even all that happened.” He said.
She put her hand on his face and turned it gently to face her.
“Like you always say, no judgements. What else happened?” She trailed her fingers down his cheek and he gave her a sad smile.
“I got into a bar fight.”
Here eyebrows started climbing her head.
“What were you doing in a bar?”
“Fighting.”
She sighed.
“Why did you go into a bar in the first place?” she asked patiently.
He looked at her, again, with shame. It was such an alien thing to see on him.
“To fight.”
She decided to NOT take that bait and let him tell the story himself. Eventually he did.
“D, after that meeting, I’ve been questioning everything. Why do I do this? Is it worth it when no other knights care? I went numb for a while. I just wandered around until I found a knight bar.”
He looked angry.
“I knew what would happen if I went in there. I KNEW and I did it anyway. I went against my better judgement and I went in looking for someone to hurt. Did you know they already hate me? The rest of the Order? Just like everyone else in New Orleans?”
“Wait, wait,” she said waving a hand, “back up. What about New Orleans?”
He looked her in the eyes again and she shivered.
“D, I know now. I see it. People hate knights. They hate the Order. They treated me like a leper while I was walking around. It’s because knights. . . They really are all like Lawless. There’s nothing good in them, is there? It’s all been a lie.”
“We should have told you.” She said. “I think neither of us wanted to spoil you with the truth.”
“Why?”
She cast around for the right words and it took a minute. She still wanted to spare him. To spin a pretty fiction. But he needed honesty, and she thought this truth might help.
“Terry, the way you see things. It’s, I don’t know. It’s contagious. You get inside our heads. You see broken people like me and Elton and you treat us like we wish we could be. It makes us want to be that person. And it makes us want to try to make the world like you see it.”
She looked away. She felt guilty.
“We both wanted to protect that. It’s. . . It’s special to me, Terry. It’s important.”
He looked down at the ground, the pain obvious on his face.
“Not much of a point now. I don’t even know why I’m doing this. I came out here to be a knight. What does that even mean?”
“NO!” she said, far more loudly than she intended. She softened her tone, but remained as forceful.
“No. No, Terry. That is NOT why you came out here. When you convinced me to follow you out here it wasn’t because you said you wanted to be the awesomest knight ever. You told me you wanted to help people. You said people needed help, and guidance, and everyone could be better if they tried.”
He didn’t say anything. He didn’t move. She spoke again, much more quietly.
“I didn’t come out here for the Order. Or for chivalry. I ran away with you, Terry. I ran away with you because you were kind.”
Terry rubbed his fingers over his eyes with his free hand. She still hadn’t let go of the other.
“Going forward, you’re going to have more moments like this.” She said. “Maybe you never had them before because you never got to be around people. People are going to be terrible to each other. But every little thing you do has an effect. Little ripples. You have to think in little ripples. Little ripples affect the whole pond.”
Terry finally covered his eyes with his hand and leaned forward. He rested his elbow on his knee and didn’t speak for a long time. She leaned her head on his shoulder and rubbed his back. She felt like she’d had to drag him by one hand from dangling over a cliff. When he was finally ok to talk, he leaned back and looked at her. He looked terrible, but that terrible was a vast improvement over the hopelessness. He was still here. He could fight this.
“Thank you, Delores.”
“You’re welcome. Like I’ve told you a hundred times, I’m right here when you need me.”
They sat in silence for a while and watched the people on the street. She didn’t want to let his hand go. Not this time.
“What’s that book?” he asked.
She looked at it, and then looked at him. She hadn’t realized he’d noticed it.
“I’ll tell you later. You’ve had a day. It’s a good thing though. I promise. There’s still good news in the world.” She smiled at him.
Terry seemed oddly nervous. He opened his mouth to say something when they both heard Elton from half a block away.
“HELL YEAH! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”
Delores stared in surprise. He was wearing a foam trucker hat with boobs on it in a bikini, blues man sunglasses, and was carrying not one but TWO giant plastic daiquiri glasses.
“Oh my god.” She said as she stood and dragged Terry up with her. She picked up her book and looked at Terry. He just looked at Elton with a level of exhaustion she’d only seen on him a few times. They both walked to meet him. She held on to Terry’s hand still.
“How in the name of Minnie Pearl are you supposed to drive in that condition?!” Terry shouted at him. Having something he could focus on seemed to be helping him.
“Nuhnuhnuhnuhnuh” was all Elton really got out before they reached him.
“Really, Elton?” Delores said. She sniffed him. “I didn’t even know they made that much rum.”
“Shoosh.” The bard said. “I ain’t gotta drive. I have done us a flavor.”
Terry took a sniff as well.
“Is it strawberry?”
The bard jabbed Terry in the chest and shook the pain out of it from forgetting his armor again.
“NO, you furious little cimminon roll, you. I realized that we need.”
“YOU need.” Corrected Delores.
“WE need,” he continued, “to rest. In confront. COMFORT. I got us hotel rooms. We’re staying here tonight and c’n go in the mornin’.”
“Elton,” Terry said, “I can’t afford a hotel room. Not till work picks up. You know this.”
“SSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.” Elton said as he sloppily pressed a finger on Terry’s lips. “Uncle Elton has got this. You guys. . .” The man started tearing up and his face collapsed into sadness. “I just love you guys so much, man. Yer all I got.” He broke down in sobbing for a minute, appeared to forget why he was crying, and then smiled at both of them.
Delores looked at Terry who, to his credit, looked concerned. To Elton she said,
“NEVER call yourself Uncle Elton again. I feel like I need a shower just hearing it.”
Terry grabbed one of Elton’s arms and threw it over his own shoulder.
“C’mon, Elton. See if you can remember what hotel this is, then. I do appreciate it. I really do. Especially after the day I’ve had.”
Elton’s eyes made their way to Terry’s face as the man guided him down the street, but it was a hell of a journey for his eyes.
“You hada bad day? Ohman. You don’t deserve bad days. Wuh happah?”
Terry smiled. God, Delores was so happy to see that smile after everything he’d just told her. That smile said that he could still care.
“I promise I’ll tell you about it tomorrow, ok? I want you to have aaaaaall your faculties when I do.” Terry told Elton as they wobbled down the street.
Delores hoped the hotel wasn’t some disaster like the Crescent on Canal used to be.
It was not.