Artist's Dream by Gerri Hill Read Free Book Online

chimney. The fire gave off a cheery glow, and Cassie found herself relaxing, really relaxing for the first time that day.
    “So, a minister, huh? Must have been tough.” Luke laid the poker on the stones and sat down beside Cassie, although not too close to make her uncomfortable, Cassie noted.
    “You don’t know the half of it,” Cassie finally replied. “He would have been perfectly at home in the Deep South. He was all fire and brimstone, for sure, and could definitely put the fear of God in you.” She smiled slightly. “That was the problem, although he could never see it,” she said. “I was so afraid of doing something that would send me straight to hell that I never learned what I could do to get me to heaven.”
    “What do you mean?”
    Cassie leaned back on her elbows and stretched her sock-clad feet out to the warm fire. Kim was the only other person she had ever told about her father, but Luke was looking at her intently, and she found she wanted to talk.
    “I was eighteen before he would let me go out on a date. It was my senior prom and I had to beg for that.” She tried to laugh, but it came out as a choked cough. “I don’t know if it was so much that I wanted to go or that I was supposed to go. He agreed only if he could take us and pick us up and if I promised no dancing.”
     
    “Eighteen?”
    This time she did laugh. “I was so afraid of boys and what would happen to me if they touched me, kissed me, that I was secretly thankful he was picking us up. You have to understand, from the time I was old enough to remember, he was telling me what they were really after, although he never said what they were after, just that they were after it. I would catch something and become very sick if they kissed me, maybe even d ie. I would get pregnant if they touched any part of my body. And heaven forbid if I touched them. Blindness would strike me immediately!”
    “Jesus,” Luke whispered.
    “Yeah. Really.” Cassie took a swallow from her juice before continuing. “Of course, as I got older, I knew those things wouldn’t really happen, but I was terrified nonetheless. I guess that was the reason I had no interest in boys.” She glanced at Luke and smiled. “I was twenty-two before I slept with a guy. And it wasn’t that I wanted to, really. I wasn’t in love with him or anything. In fact, I don’t think I even liked him all that much. But I was tired of being the oldest virgin at school.”
    “I see you still have your eyesight.”
    “Yes. I came out unscathed. Physically, at least. Emotionally, I felt … empty. I felt nothing,” she said quietly. “I’ve never been able to feel anything,” she added softly.
    They were quiet for a moment, then Luke stirred, leaning forŹward to nudge the logs again. Cassie watched her in the warm glow, watched her hands as they lightly gripped the poker. She had a momentary glimpse of those hands touching her, and her chest tightened. She wished she could feel nothing now.
    “You haven’t mentioned your mother,” Luke said.
    Cassie slid her eyes from Luke to the fire. “She left us when I was five. I know now that she left my father, but at the time, it was me that she left behind.”
    “I’m sorry,” Luke said quietly. “You don’t have to tell me.”
    “No. I’m okay about it now. I don’t blame her in the least. I left as soon as I could, too.”
    “Do you see her?”
     
    Cassie shook her head. “I haven’t seen her since the day she hugged me and walked out. I have no idea where she is.”
    “Your father never said?”
    “She may have tried to contact me, I don’t know. I would like to think that she did. But her name was never mentioned in our house.” She paused again, then spoke softly. “I remember the first Christmas after she left. Her parents, my grandparents, came to the house. My father sent me to my room, and he wouldn’t let them in. They had presents for me, they said. But he sent them away, and we never talked