Soulmates (16 page)

“This picture demonstrates what would happen to a human body if it were to go back to Earth through the port hole, past the time their life would have originally expired. If Jesse was to go back with you, he would age to 186 years old on Earth. He’d be dead. He would age and die rapidly, within seconds. No, he cannot go back with you. You and Paulette can still go back. Paulette would age, but she could live out the rest of her life on Earth. Or, she could stay here and remain 15 until she dies here. That is if you can save her from Fiend. I know that the journey here was long and exhausting, and all of this information is completely draining. Both of you must stay here tonight and get some rest."

“Is there a place where Jesse and I can be alone?” Presley asked wearily.

“Of course,” Manna could sense the distress is her voice. “We’ll talk more tomorrow and discuss possible strategies we can use to get Paulette back. For now, you both need rest."

Manna opened the door and led them down the hallway and another flight of stairs. Tucked away at the bottom of the stairs was a room, separate from the rest of the castle.

“Rest here for the night. Everything you need should be in this room. There are extra clothes in the dresser and a bathroom to your right." He walked out of the room and shut the door behind him.

Presley sat on the large, soft bed. The blanket looked worn and tattered. The room felt cold and had a musty smell. It would have been completely dark if not for two small candles flickering on each side table.

Jesse sat on the floor and faced Presley, “Are you okay?”

“I don’t know,” she answered.

“I know that you’re confused. I am too. But there is not a doubt in my mind of who you are-or who you were. You
are
the same person I fell in love with long, long ago. And you
are
the same person I’ve been in love with for all of these years. I have never stopped loving you. I’ve never stopped thinking about you
.
I’m frustrated because I know that you don’t remember being Emily. I wish you could remember. I have the love of my life in front of me right now and she doesn’t remember me,” he shook his head slowly.

“For so long I’ve wanted to see you again, to hold you again, even for a brief moment. And now, even though I had wished for only a moment, I’m realizing a moment isn’t going to be enough. This hurts all over again because I know you are going back. You have to go back -I know that we can’t be together. I know you cannot stay here. It isn’t safe."

Presley’s eyes began to fill with tears again. She had a strong desire for Jesse, that up until now, she had been trying to suppress. The feeling hadn’t made sense to her.

“This isn’t fair,” she mumbled. “I’m just having a hard time processing all of this. I know my feelings for you are strong and real. I now have a deeper understanding of
why
this feeling is so strong. I’ve been questioning my feelings for the last few days.”

“You’re thinking too much. You’re thinking with your head,” Jesse said in frustration.

“Stop. Quit thinking and close your eyes." Presley closed her eyes and Jesse sat beside her on the bed. Jesse took Presley’s hand and held it closely to his chest. He leaned in closely to her face. He turned her head slightly to smell the hair right above her ear.

“You smell the same,” he said, with his eyes closed. Presley’s arms filled with goose bumps.

“Do you feel that?”

She opened her eyes and Jesse took her other hand and held it gently, staring deeply into her eyes. He asked her again, “Do you feel that?”

“Yes,” she answered.

“This feeling is undeniable. It’s love. Agape love. You are trying to make sense out of an emotion. True love is supposed to last forever. Even though we can’t be together, it comforts me to know that our love has truly lasted.”

Presley listened intently as he confessed his undying love for her. She had never felt anyone love her so deeply. Ever. Not her mother and certainly not Tyler.

Jesse scratched his head and took deep breaths as he tried to keep the tears from falling.

He laughed nervously, “I don’t want to lose you again.”

He wrapped his arms around her and they fell together on the bed. Typically, she would have been skeptical of a guy’s intention, lying there on the bed with her, but not Jesse. She felt more secure with him than she had with anyone ever before. She curled her legs up and he held her tight. She could feel his heart against her back and his breath on her neck.

“Sleep,” he whispered, as he stroked her hair.

Presley slowly drifted to sleep. Jesse stayed awake and stared at her face as the candlelight flicked against her skin. He wanted to stay in that moment forever. He wanted to be present. He wanted to remember how she felt, her soft skin, her familiar intoxicating smell and he wanted to remember how he
felt. Being with her again made him feel as if he was home. He was grateful to be with her, but he felt the agony gnawing at him, knowing that he was going to lose her forever. He finally realized she would inevitably have to go back, but for this night they were together. In Jesse’s mind Presley and Emily were only words. Her spirit was the same and it was her spirit that he had been in love with so long ago. He fell asleep with his arm gently embraced around Presley’s waist, his head resting against hers.

Chapter Eleven

As Presley slept, her dreams sent her back to her past life as Emily. She was under their favorite tree,
Sacred
, and Jesse was sliding a simple thin gold ring on her finger.

Presley slowly awoke beside a still sleeping Jesse. Facing him, she lay in the early morning light quietly, trying not to wake him. She found herself concentrating on every line and pore on his face. She tried to remember specifics about her previous life, but her mind drew a blank. The only way she could remember her past life was through her dreams.

Why can’t I remember anything when I’m awake?
she thought. Her brain just wouldn’t allow it. She extended her finger and lightly ran it along his warm, strong arm. She traced
I love you
with her finger. Still afraid to speak these words aloud, she knew them to be true. She was conscious of the fact that she had always loved him, even before she met him in Porha. She had been searching for him her entire life. She struggled with her emotions and seriously contemplated whether to go back to Earth or stay with him in Porha.

His eyes gradually opened, “Good morning,” he smiled. He cuddled up closer to her, his strong arms tightened around her small waist. They lay comfortably engulfed in the moment, wishing it would never pass. Both anxious and aware that it must. Their eyes locked.

“I want to stay. I want to stay with you,” she said softly.

He smiled.

“After everything we’ve been through in the past few days, and you want to stay?” he said surprised.

“Yes, I want to stay,” she said.

His smile faded, “I can’t let you stay. Porha is too dangerous. You have to go back,” he insisted.

“We could help Paulette get back home and then we could go back to town and I could help you with the farm and we could… be together,” she said hopefully.

“No, you have a life, a real life to get back to. If something were to happen to you here, I couldn’t live with myself.”

“You don’t want me to stay?” she asked pitifully.

“I would do anything for us to be together, aside from endangering your life. Presley, I love you more than I love myself. Asking you to stay was selfish of me. I know better. I need to know that you are safe. I need to know that you will go back and have a great life. I can live the rest of my life out here -knowing that you are home and out of harm’s way.”

She left the bed and slowly walked over to the corner of the room, hoping he would say something, anything, to make the outcome of their situation end the way she wished. He didn’t. He couldn’t. There was nothing either of them could do.

The information that Manna had presented to her the night before began to invade her psyche once again. She never doubted what Manna had said. She knew, with everything in her, that she had known Jesse before, and she knew that she loved him. That much was evident. Even though she was unable to express her feelings into words, just like Manna’s gift, she knew it to be true. Her mind was racing with countless thoughts, running rampant through her head. Jesse anxiously paced the floor and then finally broke the silence.

“We need to get around and talk to Manna again. We can’t waste any more time here. Paulette needs us.”

“Okay.” She wanted to stay in the room with Jesse forever. She liked the fact of being tucked away, secluded from the rest of her world, alone with him. He took her hand and pulled her up from the bed as she dragged her feet.

He opened the door and went up the stairs and down the hallway to Manna’s room. Jesse was just about to knock when they heard a faint voice.

“Come in,” the voice said.

They found Manna sitting at his desk as he was the previous day.

“I hope that you are well rested,” he stated. “Were you comfortable?”

“Yes,” replied Jesse, as he pulled a book out of his bag and placed it on Manna’s desk. “The Book of Codes. Did you write it?”

“Yes, I wrote it, with some help from the other psychics here at the castle. I wanted you to find it along with the crystals and I wanted you to find me. That’s why I let myself be known throughout the book. The other writers wanted their names omitted because they feared not only Fiend but also the human race. You see, when Fiend and the Manes unsuccessfully infiltrated our castle, the members of The Panacea Gnostic
were terrified.

“I was quite aware that you, along with others from your planet, would inevitably be transmitted here through the open port hole so we made a safe place for you to live. We designed the small town where you have been living and supplied it with virtually everything you would need to survive: livestock, fields to grow vegetables, wood for shelter, and cotton for clothes. We built your town around Gracie to keep you safe from Fiend. As I said before, we studied your world for a long while. We knew long ago about your different cultures and tried to make the town conducive to your human needs. We were unsure of how you would react to us so we had to keep our distance from you.

“But we’re an extremely compassionate group, and we knew that if we didn’t help you, then all of you would surely die.”

Jesse glanced up from the book, “You made the town for us?”

“Yes. We felt profound empathy for all of you who would, without intervention, unavoidably face the same fate as the porits, caused by Fiend’s seduction. So, after our civilization was destroyed, the other members of The Panacea Gnostic and I worked together to gather information and knowledge about these demons. We learned two valuable pieces of information. First, the crystals that nourish Gracie’s soil fend off the spirits like a repellant. Second, the crystals that you hold work slightly differently. They make the spirits visible to you. Without them you would not see them, not in their true spirit form anyway.”

“So these crystals don’t keep the spirits away?” Jesse held up the gems.

“Right, Gracie’s crystals are different than the ones that you hold. They each have completely separate powers. The magic crystals in Gracie’s soil travel through her root system, enabling her to carry the enriched nutrients from the crystals, and spread them to the other trees throughout Porha.

“However the ones you carry are different. You need those crystals to make it possible to see the spirits. If you can maneuver around the spirits you have a good chance of getting back home,” Manna concluded.

“How
do
we get Presley and Paulette back to Earth?” asked Jesse.

“The same way they came, the same way you came,” Manna simply stated.

“The same way! Why didn’t you write that in the book? Obviously you know English. You couldn’t have thought of a better way to warn us of Fiend other than by using scripted messages that I can’t decode? You couldn’t just plainly write ‘Hey Jesse! If you want to go back home just go back the same way you came!’ I mean what was your plan? What were you going to do? Just let us rot here? You couldn’t have shared this information with us? Now it’s too late. It’s too late for me to go back home. And it’s too late for me to see my family and it’s too late to be with Emily.”