Free Enduring Service by Regina Morris Page B

program hung framed on the wall. The booklet was an odd shape which wouldn’t fit in a conventional frame. Dixon had originally offered to make a frame for the program, but, of course, Sulie refused the help and did the job herself. She was always independent that way.
    Under the framed program sat a small bookshelf. Dixon noticed Ben carefully pulling out each book and thumbing through the pages of each one. Poetry. Sulie was a sucker for poetry and many of the books held some of her favorite poems — many of them love poems.
    Dixon looked away and watched as Raymond searched through Sulie’s clothing from her hamper. Dixon had seen her in those clothes over the last week during their shopping errands, during their lunches and dinners where he was the only one eating, and during last week’s poker game when she made him nachos. She had run out of sour cream for the nachos and thought mayonnaise was a good substitute. All food tasted like sawdust to Sulie and she didn’t know any better when it came to cooking what foods went together and which ones did not. Dixon ate the nachos anyway because he didn’t want to hurt her feelings. He just scraped the mayo off.
    As Raymond held up a pair of jeans and inspected the pockets. Dixon saw the salsa stain on them, the one he caused as he and Sulie laughed together in the kitchen the night of the nacho fiasco. He forced himself to turn away. He needed to focus on another area of the room and concentrate on finding her.
    He gazed over Sulie’s writing desk and found nothing out of place. Not even dust had settled on the furniture. He picked up a framed picture of the Colony team. The picture was one of the few pictures the Colony members had taken together. Thanks to digital photography their images were no longer blurry on camera. All of them had consumed enough blood to bring them to their Jahrling Year age, even Mason, who worked as a double for the president. It was a good picture of them all, with Dixon being the lone old fogie in the mix. Putting the picture back down, he realized that since several of the Colony members were married and had or were having children, that another picture needed to be taken. Dixon winced at the thought. A new picture would be nice, but perhaps he shouldn’t be in it. By the time Sterling’s twins were born, he’d be retired — his mind wiped.
    As Dixon set the picture down, his eyes focused on the image of Sulie. She stood in the center surrounded by all the men in their group. He knew the Colony members were like family to her. She stood among all these men and was incredibly lonely. He had never realized that before.
    Dixon searched the first drawer of the writing desk, but found nothing. He closed it in frustration. There wasn’t anything but stationery and correspondence with friends. As much as Sulie embraced the computer age, she still wrote handwritten notes to friends. He found her quirks quaint and charming, but the papers only pained Dixon to think of her sitting at this desk, where he was sitting now, and writing her letters.
    The middle drawer had pictures of babies, and Dixon realized they were of the babies she had helped to deliver. Two photo albums lay on top of a small calendar. He fished out the calendar and realized it was her birthing schedule with the contacts of the vampire families listed in the back. The last vampire birth had been several weeks ago, and to a couple she had known for years. The note in the margin read that this was the couple’s third child she had helped them deliver. Dixon flipped the page of the calendar and realized that no other vampire births were scheduled until the week when she would help Kate deliver her twins. That date was weeks away.
    In the bottom drawer of the desk lay the winter knit set he had given her last Christmas. She didn’t own any warm gloves, hat or scarf, so he picked out a beautiful green set he knew would compliment her delicate features. He wanted her to keep warm