| �Second Chances�
By Christy Chapter 13 Quasimodo raced down the steps in a frenzy, remembering nothing of what the Archdeacon had told him except for two words: �Minerva�s hurt,� which had been all he needed to trigger his legs to move as fast as they were capable. His body often swayed forward in danger of toppling over, but his quick reflexes would fight with gravity and pull him back up. Upon reaching the spot where Minerva was slumped against the wall, Quasimodo felt his breath taken away from him for a moment. Her peach face had turned a sickly shade of white. Her royal blue eyes were streaked with red, bulged open, staring ahead without reacting to his presence. A trail of redness extended from a horrid bloodstain in her favorite magenta skirt. She was breathing heavily, as if she were drowning an struggling for air. �Minerva?� Quasimodo choked. �What happened??� �She wanted you,� said the Archdeacon. �She says you know how to treat her wound.� He gave Quasimodo a concerned look. �Is this true?� Quasimodo�s mouth hung open as he stared at Minerva, having to remind himself to give a stiff nod at the Archdeacon�s question. �Es....Esmeralda t-t-taught me how to t-t-treat wounds l-like this...� he stammered, not adding the fact that he had never actually treated a wound before. �Excellent,� said the Archdeacon. �The Lord smiles down on you, Quasimodo. Is there any way I can help?� Quasimodo probably would have loved for the Archdeacon to stay and offer him emotional support, yet his head was moving from side to side without his brain giving it permission, signaling the Archdeacon to leave him alone with the bleeding Minerva. �Qu-Qu-Qu-Quasi.....� the injured one whispered, her mouth feebly trying to smile at him. Quasimodo kneeled down by her side. �Minerva....what happened to you?� he whispered back, struggling not to shiver. Minerva�s loud breath came out in long heaves, interrupting her words. �Soldiers....remember me.....they know.....they know.....� �They know what???� Minerva�s heavy gasps seemed to overtake her voice, preventing her from answering. Her eyes once more seemed to be looking at him without seeing him, blinking irregularly, bulged to their limit, as though she was a breathing corpse that had forgotten it was dead. �Oh Minerva.....� Quasimodo whispered in his softest voice. He bent down over her frail body and gathered her in his arms. He bit his lip as he felt her skirt, which was horribly sticky from her blood. Her body shivered in his arms as violently as a fish on the land gasping out for air, causing Quasimodo�s grip to tighten in grim determination to not let her fall as he began carrying her up the stairs to the bell tower. The ascension was long and silent. Even with Minerva in his arms, Quasimodo probably could have moved faster than he was, but questions in his mind were slowing him down. Minerva....once so strong, so full of life....now a helpless limp doll in his arms for an unknown reason. Every so often her legs would suddenly straighten out like she was kicking something, as if she had no control over their movement. Her eyes were open, but she still appeared to be deep within her mind, inaccessible to the outside world. Once in the bell tower, Quasimodo hastily set Minerva down on his bed, gasping slightly when he saw that the red stain on her skirt seemed to be growing larger. �Minerva....� he said as gently as he could muster, �....can you please tell me what happened?� �They know!!� Minerva suddenly shouted. �They know who I am!� �Who??� Quasimodo asked in complete bewilderment. Minerva�s head sank into the pillow and went back to complete silence and open-eyed apparent unawareness. As Quasimodo reluctantly left her side to fetch the items he�d need to treat her wound, he felt as if he were in a trance, being controlled by an outside force. His chest felt tight, as if something was preventing him from breathing. His mind whirled as if he too had been stabbed. He returned to find Minerva staring blankly at the ceiling, her mouth moving ever-so-slightly, emitting a barely audible voice that almost seemed to not be her own, like she was under a spell. After a moment of straining his ears, Quasimodo recognized the soft song as the same one he had heard her sing on the bridge that one night. Once again, the meaning of the German words eluded him, but not the melancholy tone of the voice. �Minerva,� he whispered when he reached the bed, abruptly stilling her voice, �I need you to be calm. This will hurt, but it will help you to heal.� He wasn�t sure why he felt the need to warn her about the pain. Perhaps some part of him thought it would help to ease her suffering. He sat on the edge of the bed, swallowing hard at the sight of the drying blood on her skirt, turning a disgusting brownish color. The metallic smell of her blood filled his nostrils, nearly seeming able to be tasted by his mouth. He held his breath as his fingers grasped the sticky edge of her skirt, slowly peeling it off of her leg. His mouth unexpectedly took in a large, sucking inhale as her flesh was revealed to him. Peeking out from behind the red stripes of her blood were shining areas of peach that seemed to call out to him, encouraging his eyes to stare at them. He found that he had to remind himself to pour the wine on her wound to cleanse it. Minerva sucked in her breath through her teeth, but gave no further reaction to the sting. Nor did she react to Quasimodo stitching her leg afterward. It seemed to grant Quasimodo more pain to have to stick a needle through that perfect skin than it did for Minerva to actually experience the needle. As he worked, the bell-ringer felt unusual, fleeting urges constantly nagging at his hands. Embarrassing urges. Urges to grasp the edge of her skirt and pull it further up, revealing her forbidden areas. His breath came out in long heaves as he gradually realized what was happening. The stiffness was returning...the same stiffness he had once felt around Esmeralda. And not just the stiffness. Quasimodo�s every blink brought him visions of their visits, their German lessons, their lively conversations, their dancing, nearly every moment they had spent together. His heaving breath gradually broke into small gasps as he cut the thread, a single word overtaking his mind. Minerva. Merely her name was giving him an unexplainable pleasure as he repeated it in his head. Minerva, Minerva, Minerva. What was it about her name that was exciting him so suddenly? Finally he dared to once more look at her face, finding her lips pursed and her eyes scrunched tightly shut, trapped in a sound sleep brought on by pure exhaustion. She appeared so...helpless - something of which Quasimodo had previously thought her incapable. She breathed uneasily, her lips occasionally shaking, as if even when she was this deep into unconsciousness, she could still feel the horrible pain. As he cut the thread, the bell-ringer could only stare at her, absorbing her every detail. Even the stray wisps of hair that were made visible by the candlelight caught his interest. Even her creased eyelids fascinated him. Even her heavily chapped lips appeared beautiful to him. Beautiful? Minerva was beautiful? He had never thought of her that way before. Why was he thinking that now? What was making him think that now? He couldn�t place the exact thing or the exact reason, and yet as he looked at her now, he wondered what had blinded him in these past few months. Her beauty was obvious now. How could he have ever failed to notice it? He tried to remember why he had thought her so plain when he first met her. Was he really so smitten with Esmeralda that he was deprived of the ability to notice another woman�s beauty? Yet now...the sight of Minerva was tightening his thighs with an intensity he had never felt before. Everything he had previously felt for Esmeralda had returned for Minerva - but this was even stronger. How so? He couldn�t tell, but he knew it was. As he fixed his eyes once again on her gorgeous chapped lips, waves of both exhilaration and shame passed through him, each one equal in strength. This was, after all, the sister of the very man who had taken away the first woman he had loved - when he thought of that, it was slightly embarrassing to be infatuated by her. It was silly. Yet when he looked at her face glowing in the candlelight, any awkwardness connected with that notion disappeared. Her lips were deathly still, and yet they seemed to be silently calling to him, entrapping his own lips in a spell, pushing them closer to hers. He vaguely tried to resist, his logical side attempting to tell him that she was sick, that she was asleep, that she didn�t love him, but its power waned with her spell. His lips touched hers, ceasing all logic in his mind. All thought immediately went to the intimacy passing between him and Minerva. The taste of her rough lips seemed to send a bolt of lightning through his body, making him want nothing except to remain in this moment. Yet the yearning in his soul persisted. The unresponsiveness on Minerva�s part further reminded him that this was incomplete, a mere attempt to satisfy his urges. The participation, the passion, the love from Minerva was missing. It was a kiss spent alone. He raised his head back up, his lips feeling the coldness of being separate from Minerva�s. As he looked at her tortured face, a wave of shame passed over him. He had just taken advantage of her passive situation for his own benefit. Suddenly he felt that he couldn�t stand to see her anymore. He closed his eyes, but Minerva�s face refused to wane in his head. He breathed heavily and quickly, as if he had just been drowning in the water and was now hungry for air. Part of him wanted to kiss her again, but he commanded himself to resist. It took every bit of willpower he had to turn away from her and begin moving away from the bed. His body moved like it was in a trance, slowly, stiffly, one step at a time as his mind could only process one thought. He was in love with Minerva. Go to Chapter 14 Back to Fanfic Back to Index |