Steamside Chronicles

by Ciar Cullen

  “Why?” I stopped with burger halfway to my mouth.

  “It’s how I pictured this. With your hair down. I don’t want to offend any feminist sensibilities…”

  “You pictured this?” Oh boy. Nerves on fire again.

  “You haven’t pictured this?”

  “Maybe a few times.” Maybe four times an hour for the last year. Maybe while falling asleep every night, changing the fantasy a hair each time.

  “What did you picture, those few times?”

  I shook off his question and downed my wine. He refilled my glass and stared. I pushed at the second cheeseburger, but went back to the wine instead.

  “Liquid courage.” I pulled the pins from my hair and it tumbled to my shoulders. Honestly, it felt a little silly as I shook it out, like some bad shampoo commercial.

  “Why do you need courage? We’re not strangers, not strangers to a bedroom. You’re having second thoughts?”

  “I’ve had nothing but second thoughts since that night in Petti’s tent of mystery. Except about you. On that topic I’ve been consistent.”

  A smile pulled at one side of his mouth and he let out a sigh. “Tell me more.”

  “Egotistical much?”

  “Emily, I think you’re waiting for me to make a move. I’m waiting for me to make a move.”

  “So that makes two of us waiting for you to do something. How long you think that might take?”

  “I need something first.”

  “Condom?” Hell. He did not forget that.

  Jack laughed and shook his head. “No, got that covered. I hate to bring this up and ruin the moment. If we’re having a moment. I guess we’re not, because I won’t make a move.”

  “For the love of God, Jack. You’re going to tell me not to take this seriously, aren’t you? Or that there’s no future for us, or some shit like that? Just save it, okay? I knew it.” I caught the lump in my throat before it moved north and manifested as weepiness. No, I didn’t see it coming at all. I stood and drained my wine before heading for the door.

  “Oh, no, you don’t.” He was on me in an instant, his grip like steel on my arm. “You don’t listen. Ever.”

  “Say something worth hearing, and I’ll listen.”

  “Shut up for a minute.” Jack took a deep breath and led me to his chair, pulled me down on his lap. “Come to Santa. Are you listening?”

  I nodded. My pain/pleasure center battled it out in my brain as I bathed in Jack’s nearness and embrace and feared for my heart.

  “I’ve said this to Petti. I’m not ready to tell the rest. But you deserve the truth before we become more involved. We may be together for a long time. A very long time.”

  Okay, so far, so good. No, this was very good. Aha, the penny dropped.

  “You don’t think we’re leaving. Ever.”

  “Right. I’ve never known what to do about it. I haven’t had a single good idea since I got here, and I’m no closer to figuring it out. Just because you went home for a while…”

  “Yeah. Not especially interested in experiencing the rest of my death.”

  “But what if you don’t die, Emily? What if you went back, and nothing much was wrong. You could have your life back.”

  “And I could end up dead, with no world to call my own.”

  We regarded each other from a distance that sizzled with thought and emotion. I wasn’t ready to make a commitment not to try. But gut wrenching fear of reliving the pain of Modern served as good insurance I’d be Steamside a while longer.

  “Do you think you’ll try?”

  “Do you want me to? I know it matters for everyone.”

  He sighed and ran his fingers through my hair. “I don’t want to think about it now. I only know I want to be with you, right here, where I can touch you.”

  “Well, don’t they say that’s all we ever have? The here and now?”

  We both knew I was lying. We both thought about the future. About me and the damned anachros, about whether anyone besides me could return. I didn’t like being the key to anything.

  “I wouldn’t mind a lot of here and nows strung together.”

  “Did I ever tell you why I went in Petti’s tent that night?”

  “I’m not sure you did go into her tent. Maybe into the hospital. But go ahead.”

  “Right. Anyway, my memory is that she advertised psychic readings about love. I wanted her to tell me I’d meet a Tom Hanks guy.”

  “Tom Hanks? Really?”

  “No, not really. I mean, a regular guy, looking for someone like me. Exceptionally handsome, of course. Preferably blue collar, emotionally available. Two out of three ain’t bad.”

  “Funny.”

  “She promised me a tall, dark, handsome stranger. If it doesn’t work out, then we’ll have to go to separate corners of the century, okay?”

  “It’s a deal. God, Fenwick.”

  “What?”

  “I haven’t breathed since I came here. You let me breathe.”

  “Breathing is good. Kissing is better.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Drawing the blinds.

  For once, time was on our side. Jack took his time, and it drove me nuts, in a good way. I normally wasn’t shy in the bedroom, but this was the Man, my Man.

  We hadn’t met at a bar and gone back to his place. We’d met in another dimension, and inched our way toward each other for over a year. Of course, I’d probably moved two inches for each of his millimeters.

  Maybe it was magical thinking on my part, but it struck me that this might be my last man, my forever man—dare I say it? The one. But for that to happen, I needed to be his one. And since I didn’t even know if that was possible—if we’d be in the same century or dimension the next day, it changed everything.

  This was new. Jack wasn’t one of the guys from the job, or the softball league. When you aren’t certain a fling will end before it begins, when it’s no longer a fling, romance takes on a life of its own and you lose control. I knew already that if he did the Steamside equivalent of calling the next day, I’d pick up the phone. I hadn’t been that emotionally available in my life. I didn’t need a therapist to tell me that.

  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not repressed. But I think I could have kissed Jack for hours and been completely satisfied. At least my heart would have been. He had this way of putting his hand on my cheek and guiding me, taking over, that melted my brain.

  I stopped for breath and to pull back a bit so I could look at him, his handsome tan face, to touch a stray lock of hair fallen into his dark eyes. I even touched his thick black eyelashes, gently running my finger along the tips. I needed to connect with every bit of him. I loved the freedom he gave me to wander over him with my lips and fingers, to learn all the tiny nuances that made him unique.

  Every inch of him delighted me—the ripple of tendons and muscle in his forearms, the curve of his biceps, the tiny scars on his hands from carpentry. I kissed every bit of him left bare by his clothing, and he seemed to drink it in.

  “You’re something, Emily.” He ran his hands through my hair and caught my gaze, held it, and leaned his forehead on mine.

  “I’ve heard that before.”

  “You know what I mean. I expect you to disappear any minute, shimmer away from me. You’re too good to be true.”

  “That’s a new one.”

  “Come on. You’re beautiful.”

  Really, I’m not. I’m pretty average looking. But in Jack’s embrace, I almost felt beautiful.

  We took little breaks from kissing to sip at our wine, but finally, he moved to the bed and put his glass down. He held his hand out and I went to him, hungry for him, in love with him.

  The candles had flickered out, and as night fell over Steamside, we undressed one another in the low light from the gas lamp on the street. It cast velvety shadows on his skin, on his well-toned body. I hope like hell it hid my flaws, but by the time we were both naked, it hardly mattered.

  He kissed
all of me, sometimes sweetly, sometimes playfully, and sometimes like he wanted to devour me. I’d never let a man have everything, without flinching or pulling away, wondering or worrying.

  Jack traced paths from my chin to my wet womb with his hot tongue and full lips. He teased me into shudders as he sucked on my nipples and nested his fingers in my short curls. When he lapped and kissed my wet folds, I arched to pull him in, empty, dying for him to fill me. I suppose I called out, I must have. But I only remember what he said, how he sounded. Breathy and victorious, moaning my name, calling to God when I stroked his erection. He’d push my hand away for a moment, whispering “Not yet,” and then pull me back to him, unable to resist.

  “I don’t want to wait,” I protested.

  “I don’t know if I can,” he answered.

  He rolled on a condom, and I know we both wondered if we needed it, if it would even work. He prodded my opening with his fingers and I guided him in.

  “Oh. My. God.” I nearly wept when he filled me and nuzzled his face in my neck.

  “Oh, Sugar.” He moaned, again and again. I braced myself on his shoulders as he moved gently at first, then clutched the bed as we rode together, finding our own secret rhythm. His eyes were dark, sexy slits as he gazed at my face, watching me come, watching me love him. The waves that broke through my body brought him to release, and he pressed his lips to mine and groaned in ecstasy.

  I don’t know how long we lay in one another’s arms, or who spoke first, but we kissed and murmured bits of half-love talk. We sat and sipped wine, told tales of our past, caressed each other’s egos.

  If it had ended there, I’d have been satisfied. But that was the beginning of our evening. I think we were trying to fit into one night all the fantasies of a year.

  You see, I think my fantasies had been about romance, his about sex. When we brought the two together, we were bound in a way that took both of us by surprise.

  Jack took me by surprise, literally and figuratively, when he pushed me onto all fours and rubbed me from behind, playfully biting and swatting at my ass. He kissed my neck and pressed into my womb and whispered, “I don’t want to see your face when I say this, in case it’s not what you want to hear. But I’m falling for you. I have fallen for you. I love you, Emily. I’m in love with you. I don’t want it to end. Tell me that’s what you want.”

  I could barely remember my own name, but I remember exactly how he sounded, how the room smelled, how my body felt as he pushed into me. Perspiration rolled from his forehead onto my back—I remember how the drops felt as they hit my skin. My chest ached with his words, filled to the brim with his words.

  “Yes,” I managed, through tears I didn’t want him to see. Lame, but I made up for it later. He pushed hard, very hard, as if he wanted to claim me. I remember one moment when a voice deep inside me told me to let go. To let him in, to let myself accept what he said at face value. I soared; we soared together. When we finally faced one another in the darkness, I found the courage to put my hand on his cheek and tell him everything.

  How my crush on him had begun. How it had turned into an obsession. When the obsession turned to friendship and admiration, when the fantasy turned to lust, when the lust and friendship turned to love. I told him how I looked for him everywhere, waited for him to appear, even looked forward to the pain of shredding just for the chance to be near him. How I had kept a shirt of his I’d ruined and hid it under my bed, like an adolescent girl.

  I confided my worry that he’d find me too much of a tomboy, how I’d burn with anger if I saw him talking to the female Punks, how hard I’d worked to get a book for his birthday.

  He stared at me, sometimes frowning, mostly smiling as I went on and on.

  “But you knew all that, didn’t you?” I asked him.

  Jack leaned up on one elbow and brushed my hair through his fingers. “More or less. But it’s really, really nice to hear.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  In which an error in judgment results in tragic occurrences for our friends.

  A lot of things are hard in life, much harder than what I did at sunrise. At the time, it was like running a marathon, swimming the English Channel, and climbing Everest, sequentially. I left the comfort of Jack’s bed, of his arms, his scent. Comfort isn’t quite the word. That multiplied a thousand times, and then multiplied exponentially. Screw would be able to do the math.

  But I had promises to keep, and miles to go… Okay, a few hundred feet, but it felt awful. Jack slept as if he hadn’t done so in a long time. I watched him for a while, in that way you do when you’re in love. Where morning beard stubble is more beautiful than a sunrise, and a tiny mole you hadn’t noticed becomes a beauty mark.

  I’d sworn on a stack of imaginary Bibles to Petti that I’d go with her to Normal that morning. Still obsessed with speaking to Cleopatra’s Needle, and unable to extract the secret tripping formula from Screw or Jack, Petti wanted a go at it. I knew by now that one would have an easier time stopping a train with a toothpick than stopping Annalise Pettigrew when she had her mind fixed on something. I thought of ratting her out to her brother, but decided I’d be enough of a safety net. I could use a gun, could overpower a woman the size of a fifth grader if I needed to, and didn’t think she’d get anywhere.

  I spruced up in the public shower without going back to my room. Screw would have a lot to say about me and Jack, and a hell of a lot more to say about Cleopatra’s Needle. I wasn’t in the mood for any of it. I wanted time to savor the lingering phantom hands of Jack, his lips, the aftersex muscle warmth and shivers.

  Petti handed me my pistol with a frown. “Where’s your hat? You look like hell.”

  “I can turn this car around, little missy.”

  “Oh, for Pete’s sake.” Petti knocked on one of the dorm rooms and ordered a groggy Punk to get me a hat. It wasn’t more terrible than any I owned, just not my style.

  I pinned the silk and feathered monstrosity on, straightened my dress to Petti’s satisfaction, and we were off.

  Normal’s morning quiet knocked a bit of nostalgia into me. I’d always enjoyed Sunday morning in Manhattan, before the city woke up and needed coffee. After working the toughest shift—Saturday night—I’d stroll off my nightmares and stop in Dean & DeLuca’s, grab a paper to read the baseball box scores more than the hard news, and in nice weather, settle in on a bench. Petti caught me fantasizing about doing that with Jack.

  “If you need to tell me all about your undying love for my brother, do it now, before we get down to business.”

  “Maybe some other time.”

  “Good.” We took the path under Greywacke Arch to the obelisk. Petti settled on a bench and stared at the granite needle. I sat next to her. Two ladies out for an early stroll.

  “Miss Pettigrew, before you do anything stupid, I want to offer this warning. If you endanger yourself, or me, or my newfound romantic bliss in any way, you will die a slow, painful death. Got it?”

  “Did you get your scarab back?”

  “God, and Jack tells me I don’t listen.”

  I unfastened the chain and handed it to her. So clearly, Petti thought the scarab was a secret decoder ring to the Obelisk. Who was I to argue? Likely the Ra Society passed them around like Masonic rings—symbols only, not to be used like magical whatnots.

  Right, you see it now, what I didn’t at the time. And of course, I wouldn’t be mentioning it if it weren’t important to what transpired. Hindsight and all that crap. All I had in 1890 was hindsight. And a really, really good looking boyfriend. Who I was about to leave behind.

  Despite some understanding of Star Trek lore, I’d never thought of myself as the girl wearing red. The one the scriptwriters will off on the planet when the alien monster attacks. I thought of it years later, that despite Jack’s orders to wear blue, I’d been in the red guy’s position a lot in those first few years.

  Petti mumbled something about Ra and held the scarab up to the morning light to compare it
to the weathered hieroglyphs on the obelisk.

  “I’ve been doing some research on old Cleo here. And…”

  “Is it there?” I wanted to go home. To Jack. She wouldn’t be rushed, and held up her hand to shut me up.

  I saw it when she did. I’d carried the scarab my whole adult life, and never thought much about it, assuming it either named some ruler or place, or said made in Egypt.

  In fact, that’s what it did say. Petti squealed and held her hand to the cartouche containing the right inscription. She turned to me in amazement. “It matches! It matches yours and Claudin’s and Jack’s—well, those are really the same one, and I suppose Percy carries one as well. I suppose all the society members do, to remind them of what to do. What do you think, Fen?”

  “Doesn’t that just confirm what Screw said?”

  “Screw hasn’t said a word about how they do their shredding to other places. And Jack won’t tell me.”

  “Then back away from the monument. It’s called a vortex for a reason.” I reached out to grab her wrist. Jack and Screw knew she wasn’t above trying something clever that wasn’t clever at all. They’d been right on.

  “It says…”

  “Come over here and tell me what it says. Come on, Petti. I’m serious.”

  “The son of Ra, Thuthmosis III, the ever-living, made this monument.”

  As I pulled one way on her arm, I felt a stronger pull back, and my heart dropped to my stomach. We were shredding, all right. Before the pain subsided and I could open my eyes, I knew we wouldn’t manifest Steamside. I called to Jack, to make it better, to hold me in his arms and rest his chin on my shoulder from behind, to tell me he’d never let go. But he hadn’t let go. I’d been the one to let go. I hoped like hell he’d understand I didn’t leave him.

  * * *

  When Annalise and I were on the Turnpike that snowy night, we were returning from an appointment with her oncologist at Sloan Kettering. The news was good, very good. She was a survivor, and except for vigilant check-ups, should live a great life.