The Reunion (22 page)

Ebony shuffled her chair near to the stove and tried to get some warmth back into her trembling body. Tilting her head forward, she wrung the water from her hair, then quietly watched Ethan walk to the bed and spread blankets on the large mattress.

“There’s something we have to do.”

“What?” she asked, looking up at him with her teeth chattering.

“We have to take off our clothes.” He looked her in the eyes. “Because if we don’t, I’ll probably get pneumonia, and you will for sure. So take off your clothes, and dry yourself with one blanket. Hang your clothes on the chair beside the stove. Then crawl into bed and get under the other blankets.”

“Okay.”

“When we got here, I noticed a box outside. There may be some things in it that we can use. When I get back, be in bed. You need warmth right now. Your life depends on it.”

He walked out the door. Ebony quickly removed her clothes and did as Ethan instructed. She felt dry, gloriously dry, and though she was undressed, a tremendous sense of security and comfort swept over her.

“That’s the best place for you,” Ethan said when he returned, placing a lantern on the table and lifting the glass to light it.

“Do you think we’ll be all right?”

“We’ll be fine,” he said, lowering the glass as the room filled with lantern light.

He turned his back to her, removed his shirt, and draped it across a chair near the stove. Ebony gazed at his muscular back. As Ethan brushed the water out of his hair, his muscles twitched, and the bulky thickness of his masculine frame moved in a way that fascinated her. But she turned away and faced the wall. Only then did she realize how violently the storm raged outside. Gusts of wind shook the cabin and howled along the overhang of the roof, whistling eerily, like howling demons escaping from a cave. The rain pounded against the cabin and lashed against the windowpanes. Lightning flashed, and thunder rumbled, echoing through the forest.

Outside raged a storm of the elements. Inside Ebony raged a storm of emotions. She felt a tremendous surge of love for Ethan. He had come back to her, and she knew he would never leave her again. Desire blossomed and grew. She wanted to touch and hold and squeeze her man. But just as strong as this urge was a blissful sense of security. She wanted things to remain exactly as they were and never to change. Here, alone with Ethan at this moment in time, she was happier than she had ever been in her entire life. She felt whole and fulfilled.

Without thinking, Ebony rolled over and faced Ethan. He was naked and beautiful in the soft lantern light. His body was powerful and taut from rowing, his cock heavy and full. He was raw, but to Ebony he looked spectacular, like an erotic dream in the early morning. Ethan stoked the fire, squatting with his powerful, muscular legs, his strong buttocks attracting her in a fascinating way. Suddenly he turned to her, smiling so handsomely that it sent a chill down her spine. Then he blew out the lantern and candle.

It was pitch-dark for a moment as everything went black, but light emanated from small holes in the bottom of the stove where flames and light from the glowing embers danced.

“Ethan?” Ebony whispered.

“Yes?”

“Do you love me?”

“Yes, Ebony, I truly love you.”

“Are you sure? Could you make a total commitment?”

“I already have.”

“What about trust? Can you trust me to trust you?”

“I think we both already answered that question.” He paused. “When I was searching for you, things became clearer to me than ever before. All that matters to me is you. You are my life, my hope, my breath. You are me. I cannot live without you.”

“But can you accept being just an ordinary man?”

“This is no ordinary love. I think love makes a person extraordinary.”

“I knew you would come back. I knew it in my soul.”

“You are my soul, Ebony. You are a part of me. I want you to be my wife and the mother of our children. We’ll go to church arm in arm every Sunday. We’ll coach the Little League baseball team together. I never want to be separated from you again.”

“But will you tire of me?” Ebony asked gravely, still not convinced.

“No.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure.”

Ethan leaned over and kissed her forehead. Then he slowly and tenderly pressed his lips to her neck and bare shoulder. The rain pounded on the roof and lashed against the windowpanes. Outside, the storm unleashed its fury, but inside, the fire crackled and blazed, sending flickers of dancing light scampering across their two bodies as they touched, parted, and moved closer together again. She could feel his heat, his heft, his manly presence merging with her.

“Tell me, Ethan,” Ebony said after pulling away from a passionate embrace, “when you were away those five years, did you remember me often?”

“No,” Ethan answered immediately and sincerely, rising to stoke the fire.

Ebony felt stabbed to the heart. She had asked the question simply because she wanted to hear Ethan tell her how desperately he’d missed her. But he had not remembered her. A stinging anger rose within her. For a moment she considered running away—anything to be free of this man. But she was too weak, too sore, too tired. She decided to simply not speak with him no matter what he said.

At that instant Ethan turned to her with the stove door open and the fire bathing his body in a mellow glow. “I didn’t remember you,” he murmured, “because you can remember only what you have forgotten.”

Ebony paused for a moment, digesting his words. Then her heart opened to him.

“I love you,” he said. “I love you, I love you, I love you.”

The rain pounded and lashed with tremendous intensity, but to Ebony, it sounded like music. Though the darkness was filled with sound, Ebony was being irresistibly drawn into a silent world where only she and Ethan existed. She felt nothing but the gentleness of his hand stroking her arm, the warmth of his body, the fullness and girth of the male form. It soothed and relaxed her. As Ethan stoked the fire, Ebony rolled onto her back and stared at the ceiling.

* * * *

“Can I tell you a story?” he asked.

“Only if it’s happy.”

“It’s not only happy, it’s about us.”

“By all means then,” Ebony whispered, “tell me our story.”

“There’s an old Greek legend,” Ethan began, “that says long ago, before the beginning of time, all people of this earth—past, present, and future—lived in heaven. But, unlike the human beings we know, these people were not split into men and women. Each individual was a man and a woman sharing a single body—mind, heart, and soul. No division existed between them. Each individual was a perfect, harmonious whole. But then the devil split these unions in half, separating men and women into different persons. For the rest of time, these two halves of one person search for each other, trying to reunite. But the devil erects many barricades in order to prevent the reunion and sends the two halves down the wrong paths and into dark places, doing anything he can to keep them from reuniting. Many people are born thousands of years apart or thousands of miles away from their other halves. When, by some strange chance, the divided masculine and feminine halves do meet and come together, the evil force tries everything in his power to separate them. He raises pride in one, casts mistrust in the other. Usually he is successful, but once in a great while, when love is so powerful that nothing can stop it, the reunion takes place. And that is a moment of pure beauty.”

“A reunion of souls,” Ebony said.

“A reunion of souls,” Ethan said with a nod.

As he lay next to her, Ebony coughed. She coughed again. She felt miserable and weak, and a fever took hold of her. Ethan hugged her, trying to keep her warm, but as time passed, she got progressively worse. Around midnight, she fell into a restless sleep, tossing, turning, muttering incoherent sounds. Ethan could make no sense of what she said. He just held her and prayed with all his heart that her fever would break. But Ebony began to groan and labor for breath. If he could have carried her to a doctor, he would have, yet the howling wind and lashing rain forced his hand, leaving him with only hope.

“If I die tonight,” she said, her eyes weak and sick, “let us be joined one more time.”

“You are not going to die,” Ethan said.

Ebony rolled on top of him, and her warm, soft body brought him to readiness. They joined as one and stared into each other’s eyes.

“Now the reunion is complete,” she said weakly. “Heart, mind, body, and soul.”

Ethan held her trembling body.

“Please don’t let me die, God,” Ebony whispered.

Chapter Eleven

The rays of the early morning sun streamed into the cabin. The storm had passed and given way to a beautiful sunny day. Birds chirped outside, and squirrels scurried along the ground. Outside, everything was coming alive, but inside, there hung an undisturbed silence. Ethan stirred the coals and laid a couple small pieces of wood on them. Soon they were crackling, and flames licked across their lengths. He dressed in his stove-dried clothes and turned to Ebony. A single ray of clear light, as if from the heavens, shone on her tranquil, motionless face.

Ethan walked outside and sat on a rock near the river. He stared at the rushing water and, lost in thought, saw the passage of time. His life unfolded before his eyes: an eager boy playing baseball in the schoolyard, athletic accomplishments, a descent into alcohol and recklessness, his love for Ebony, his betrayal, the return, the insane events, the reunion.

“My angel,” he said quietly, looking at the cabin.

Steam rose from the verdant green of the lush forest floor, enveloping the world in a surreal and soft mist. The clean, pure, pristine air, the sounds of unspoiled nature, the reflection of the trees and sky on the Stillwater, it all inspired in Ethan a feeling of peace and harmony he had never before known. He would not, under any circumstances, change a single thing about it.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” a soft voice said behind him.

He snapped from his reverie and turned to Ebony, also dressed in crinkled, stove-dried clothes. “I was hoping you’d sleep a little longer. I didn’t wake you, did I?”

“No.” She limped, and he helped her reach the rock he had occupied. “I feel fine now, except for my ankle.”

“Your fever broke just before dawn. For awhile I was very worried.”

“I brought something,” she said, taking the stained glass picture from her jacket pocket and unwrapping it.

As she moved the cotton, they saw the picture was again broken, a long, thin slice cleanly snapped in the middle, on an angle. Ebony frowned at the unhappy discovery, but Ethan picked up the two halves, leaving the broken piece behind. He held them together, and they fit perfectly, in an uncanny way. Now the man in his boat and the woman onshore seemed to overlap, as if they were no longer two individuals, but a single person, half male, half female. They looked at each other with amazement.

“Sometimes I think life itself is stained glass,” Ethan said, gazing from the picture to the pristine backwoods lake. “Our lives are pieces of glass—fragile, pure, transparent. But great pains come to each of us in our turn. The death of loved ones, personal failures, abandoned hopes. The glass of our perfect lives is stained with these sorrows and this suffering. But it is this suffering that gives us depth, an understanding of truth, a soul. The stained glass is what makes us human. It makes us real. And in that there is an inherent beauty.”

“In some ways,” she said, touching his hand, “you and I share the same stained glass.”

“True.”

“You know, I could be in Africa right now.”

“I have an idea about that,” he said. “There’s this program where you help out less fortunate people in other countries.”

Ebony eagerly nodded. “Are you thinking of sponsoring a child and paying for his basic needs?”

“Not a child,” Ethan said, “a whole village. We send a regular monthly contribution that helps an entire village develop agriculture, fresh drinking water, schools, medical facilities.”

“That sounds wonderful.”

“I’d like to start right away,” Ethan told her. “We could visit someday.”

Ebony hugged him. “I love you, Ethan.”

“I love you,” he said, kissing her forehead. “Will you marry me, Ebony?”

She smiled and cried at the same time. “Yes!”

Suddenly they heard voices and saw Bern Baxter emerge from the trees. Ron, Bill, and McKenzie walked behind them. All but Bern hurried up to them, asking about their condition. They were soaked from the forest, but obviously very pleased to find Ebony and Ethan unharmed.

“They tried to search last night,” Ron said to Ethan, “but the weather was impossible. Bern was the only one who didn’t stop. He came in and found you, you know.”

“Really?” Ethan said, surprised. He looked at Bern. “That took a lot of determination.”

“He walked right up to the window and saw the two of you asleep side by side. He came out and called me and Rebecca. We called Jenny, then Search and Rescue. Bern led us right to you this morning.”

Ethan walked up to Bern and extended his hand. “Thank you, Bern.”

Bern nodded and shook Ethan’s hand. “I can see Ebony hurt her ankle,” he said. “There’s an aluminum boat up at Twidling Runs I use for fishing. I can go get it if you want, and you can row her right back to Shad Bay on the river. It’s high now, and you’ll only have to stop shy of the Pyramid. They can get a truck close to that spot.”

“That would be much appreciated,” Ethan said, deeply touched.

“I’ll be back shortly,” Bern told everyone.

McKenzie walked up to Ethan and also shook his hand. “You’re all right for a white collar, Harrington.”

“I’m trying.”

McKenzie proceeded up the river with Bern, while Ron and Bill walked into the cabin to look around.

Gazing upon the water, Ethan and Ebony were enveloped by an inner spiritual peace. The two lovers, long separated by destiny and tormented by the trials of their love, felt that this day, for them, was the dawning of a new and wonderful beginning. The storm was over, the barricades overcome, the reunion complete. The man and woman who had been split in half before the beginning of the ages, were now one, forevermore, for time without end.