Tempus (37 page)

“Come with me, Jessie.”  He was barely touching me now.  “Let me help you remember.”

I sat very still.  He placed his hand under my chin, leaned in close.  His scent rolled around me, a familiar and comforting smell.  He barely brushed my lips with his own, not kissing, just touching lightly.  My heartbeat quickened and I closed my eyes.

I could imagine the feel of his lips.  I remembered kissing him in my dreams. 
They weren’t dreams
.  I remembered kissing him. 

“You loved me, Jessie.”  He placed his cheek against mine; my skin ached where he touched.  “I would give up everything for you.”

The air crackled and hummed.  The hair stood up on the back of my neck and my arms.  If lightening were going to strike, this would be what the moment just before it felt like.

Gabriel suddenly leapt up and away so fast and hard that he slammed himself into the door.  “No!”  He said in an angry voice. 
“NO!”

Time is the school in which we learn,
Time is the fire in which we burn.

—Delmore Schwartz

He looked like he had lost his mind!  His eyes were wild, looking around the room, and his breath was coming in gulps and gasps.  I didn’t know what was happening, and I was partly afraid of him.  Almost.

He jerked the door open and it slammed against the wall.  He stalked out of the room, and I was left alone on the floor, more confused than ever.  From somewhere in the house, I could hear his voice shouting angrily for his father.

I stood up on shaky legs and peeked out the door.  Everything looked familiar, but
not
.  I didn’t remember what I saw, but I knew I had seen it before.  I could close my eyes, and imagine every room. 

I left the bathroom and found my way to the vestibule.  I looked up the narrow stairs, which appeared to jitter for a second.  I had been up those stairs before, and I knew it, but I couldn’t
remember
.  I started walking up, slowly.  I knew there was a stair that would creak if I stepped on the wrong spot.  I knew which spot to avoid, even though I didn’t know how I knew.

At the top of the stairs, I could hear voices behind a door.  I knew the room was a library.  I knew it was similar to the one in the mirror.  I knew there was a mirror inside; the one Gabriel had stepped into.

I turned and noticed a door. 
The door to Gabriel's room
.  So he wanted me to remember, did he? 

I put my hand in the bottom of my shirt, using it to turn the knob.  I knew it wouldn’t squeak, but still I turned it slowly and carefully.  I stepped through to the stairway, closing the door silently. 

I crept up the stairs to the landing.  His door was open a crack.  ‘
Open it
.’  A memory of Gabriel's voice.

I pushed carefully, and it swung open.  It looked exactly as I knew it would, even though I had not imagined it ahead of time.  Everything was where it should be.  Where I remembered it?

I felt like a thief about to be caught.  I had no idea what I was looking for, if anything.  I may just be snooping, but I told myself I was looking for answers.  My eyes kept going to the bed, to the pillows.  I pictured Gabriel carrying me there, placing me on those pillows.  I knew how they would smell.  Like freshness, and
him
.

I walked as cautiously as possible, always listening for a sound from the stairs.  Voices didn’t carry well in this house, I
knew
.  When I reached the bed, I debated.  I could sit on it, or I could touch it.  I wanted to smell the pillows.  Scent was supposed to be closely linked with memories.  That was the reason I hated pancakes.

I leaned over, closed my eyes, and took a deep sniff of the pillows.  At first, all I felt was a calmness settle over me.  I felt at ease.  I sat on the bed then and buried my face in the pillow, breathing through my nose, letting the scent go through me.

I put my arms around it, pulled it close against me, and eased farther onto the bed, curled up around it.  I felt so close to a break-through
.  Memories, not dreams
, I told myself.  I tried to release control of my mind, remove the part of it that kept telling me I was crazy, that Gabriel was crazy.

I dug my hands into the fluffy pillow. 

“Please don’t forget me, not this time.”

I tried to roll over and he loosened his arms so I could.  “You’re insane.”  I snuggled in close; put my lips against his neck, and his arms tightened.

“But you will, when I’m gone.”

“Then don’t go anywhere.”  I said. 

“I don’t get to choose”

“Then I’ll choose.  I won’t let you go.”

  “I wish it was that simple.”

“It is.  Now shhh.  Stop talking and kiss me.”
 

Memories, not dreams.  I couldn’t reconcile it in my mind.  It felt more like dreams than memories, but there were things that popped into my head that I knew I never dreamed.  At least I didn’t remember dreaming.  The problem was, I didn’t remember them happening, either.  They existed somewhere else,
sometime
else, and I only knew about them.

I didn’t think I had been there long, but it could have been a while.  I heard the door, and felt Gabriel enter, I knew it was him by the charge in the air.  I rolled over and pulled the pillow away from my face.

He looked at me with those blue eyes. 
Beautiful
, I thought,
breathtaking
.  His entire face was beautiful.  I tried to look at him as I had looked at the portrait.  I had talked to
it
, told
it
what I thought.

“You have a beautiful face.”  I said.  “The most beautiful eyes I have ever seen.”

Was he blushing?  “You’ve never said that to me before.”

“Really?”  If there had been some kind of ‘before,’ then that surprised me.  I couldn’t stop thinking it.  I sat up on the bed, still clutching the pillow tightly.

“Really.”  He walked toward me, that deliberate-seeming movement from before.

I felt unusually calm here in this room, with only a pillow as protection.  “You said you would tell me everything.  What if I don’t believe you?”

“I’ll take that chance.  I wouldn’t have before—I
didn’t
before—but I’m willing to try anything to bring you back to me.”  His words sent a shiver up my neck.

He sat next to me on the bed and I squeezed the pillow tighter.  I could smell
Gabriel
, and it wasn’t just the scent of his cologne.  It was his own underlying scent, fresh and clean, but woodsy and masculine.  It sent a thrill up my spine, and I desperately wanted to bury my face in his chest and breathe it in.  I knew that scent, and the recognition seemed to grow stronger.

“Can I smell you?”

He laughed.  “Anything you want. 
I’m yours
.”

Oh, god, why did that sound
so good
to me?  I leaned over, putting my face near his shoulder, and breathed deeply.  I could smell the cleanliness of the detergent, traces of his cologne, and that scent that was distinctly his alone.  I leaned even closer and raised my nose to his neck, not quite touching him, but close.

I thought of this room, lying next to Gabriel, my head on his chest and my hands in his hair, on his neck.  I knew what his skin felt like.  I reached up with my left hand, placed it on his neck, feeling his pulse accelerate.  It felt exactly like I knew it would.  Like I remembered? 
Almost
.

I felt like me, but like someone else at the same time.  I opened my eyes and pushed his chest, pushed him backwards until he was laying flat.  He was staring at me with those incredible eyes, intense, but looking helpless.  It was thrilling, being the aggressor.

I thought of all the times I had imagined myself in a movie, or on some adventure.  Pretending to be someone I’m not. 
Pretending
.  This wasn’t pretend.  It was rash, reckless, and impulsive.  Not like me at all, but—
familiar
.

He stretched his arms up over his head, out of my way.  I watched his chest rise and fall rhythmically.  I could hear his breath draw in and release, watched his nostrils flaring and relaxing.  His lips were slightly parted, and his mouth was beautiful.

I had a glimpse of him on a swing, his hair falling forward and waving back.  I heard the echo of a song, just a few lines, but I knew what it was.

“Sing me the song from the swings.”  I said.  Would he even know what I meant?

“Come Josephine in my flying machine, going up, she goes, up she goes…”

“That’s the song I heard in my head.”  I said.

“It wasn’t just in your head.  It’s a memory,
Jessie
.” 
Jessie
.  The sound of my name when he said it.  It always made my heart race. 
Always
.

His eyes were so dark, so blue, and so brilliant.  I could feel his will like a physical thing.  Everything he did was a physical thing.  When he spoke, my bones ached.  When he breathed, I felt it in my veins and on my skin.  It was too much to endure. 
Almost
.

I leaned down and placed my ear on his chest, he breathed in sharply, and one arm came down over my shoulder.  I could hear that double beating sound for a moment, then it settled into a normal rhythm, thump-thump, thump-thump, thump-thump.  I reached a hand up into his hair, wound my fingers in it.  Everything felt doubled.  His other arm came around me.  I watched it, twice, like trails.

In the movies, when someone was on hallucinogenic drugs, that is the way they saw things—doubled—and in slow motion.  It felt like time was slowing down, and for a moment, everything clicked into place. 

I was afraid to move, afraid to breathe.  I saw us here, like this.  He had picked me up after school, helped me with my homework, laughed at me for struggling with my stupid math.  I pushed him on the bed—more like tackled him—and he surrendered.  I had been in school for weeks.  He picked me up every day.

He didn’t know then what I could do.  I didn’t know what he could do, either.  Everything was normal.  We were normal people, living normal lives.

The feeling was starting to fade, but I wanted it back.  I buried my face in his chest, threw a leg over to pin him down, and locked my fingers in his hair.  He held me tighter.  It was a different day.  We were here, just like this,
exactly
like this.  How many times?

“How many times, Gabriel?”  I whispered.

“Oh,
Jessie
, enough to leave my heart in shreds, and my father half insane.”  He kissed the top of my head.

“I remember you.”  I said it with surprise, but also with certainty.

I pushed myself up on an elbow so I could see his face and his arms gave me slack.  There were traces of tears in his eyes, and one lone trail down the side of his face.  I released his hair, and traced the track with my finger.  He almost looked
too
perfect. 

“I don’t remember anything but you.  Nothing else.”  I had no idea how I remembered him, and why I would remember school, since it hadn’t started yet.  I kept telling myself it would somehow make sense, when he explained.

He turned slightly to face me, still holding me in his arms.  “I hate to do this, but for you to understand, we need my father.”

“I don’t want to go back to the library.”  I said.

A huge smile crossed his face.  “You remember the library?”

“I remember
you
in the library.”  I had a flicker of memory, him standing behind me, hands on my shoulders.  Our reflection in the mirror.  We had done that more than once.  “Why had your dad said ‘it isn’t fair?”

His smile softened.  “One thing we have learned, all of us, is that love never dies.  It changes, sometimes, but it never dies.  I wanted you to feel it.  I knew it was in there and that I could reach it.”

My brows came together and I closed my eyes, remembering the feeling of looking into his eyes in the mirror.  There was something stirring deep inside me, I remembered the feeling.

“He said it wasn’t fair because I knew, and you didn’t.  Not in your conscious mind, at least.  To him, I was manipulating you.  He thought it would be best to start all over, but…”

“But what?”  I wanted to sit up, but I didn’t want to release him.  That feeling of
knowing
was growing stronger, and I wanted to follow where it led.

“But something had changed.  He thought maybe that was why this was happening.  Why it kept resetting faster.  Because I had interfered with you and St…”  He stopped.  “Because I had interfered with your intended future.”

Steve.  He meant with Steve and me.  A wave of guilt washed over me.

“And I can see that maybe I did, maybe I
am
.”  He released me and moved away, pulled loose when I tried to hold him there.

“Don’t go.”  I had no idea what to argue.  I couldn’t remember everything, but I could remember
enough
.  I desperately wanted him to come back, but the self-preservation part of me thought I shouldn’t have to chase him, not if he was telling me the truth.