Eternity

by Teresa Federici

  Truth was I was terrified to put my trust and faith in another person. I had too many people that I cared for that left; friends that had said they were steadfast and turned out to be fickle, lovers who pledged undying love and then walked away, relatives who’ve died. Any normal person probably would think that I should deal with it and move on because everyone goes through the same things I have, and it’s wonderful that most people have a coping mechanism for that; I do not.

  That people let you down was a lesson I was taught early in life, and I learned to step back and distance myself. Now I wished that I were able to confide in people, because I really needed someone to talk to.

  I had no idea if I was going crazy, imagining things, or if I was truly experiencing something spectacular and beyond the realm of normal perception. My mind, ever active and over-reactive, had started drifting to places that I hadn’t explored since childhood, and fantastic and unbelievable theories were starting to surface.

  I wasn’t ready for those thoughts. The logical, sensible side of my brain, the one that helped me get through eight years of college and look at things from a formulaic aspect, shut the doors on that thought process.

  I stepped off the elevator and scanned the room, trying to decide if there was anyone in the lab that I could talk to about Gareth, someone that I could trust and who might have an open mind, but there was no one. I had never taken the time to get close to anyone and any interest I had in someone now would just look false.

  I sighed and sat at my station and tried to get back to work. I thought that the team may be close to a breakthrough on the medication we were working on, and I really needed to put forth my own effort.

  At quitting time I found myself sitting in my parked Jeep, again waiting for it to warm up, half expecting to see someone peering at me from behind the evergreen, but no one was there. I didn’t feel like I was being watched, and both times yesterday I knew someone was watching me.

  I made a spur of the moment decision to go to a bar for a drink. I usually wouldn’t go alone to a bar, but since I didn’t have anyone to go with me, I decided to be brave. I made sure I had my wedding band on, just to make sure I didn’t attract anyone I didn’t want to, and drove over to a little pub that I had passed on many occasions.

  I walked in and was thankful it was nearly empty. It was a typical pub, one that tried to look authentic, with wood beamed ceilings, darts and pool tables, leather banquettes, and a long mahogany bar that gleamed in the low light. A mirror ran the length of the wall behind the bar, and reflected dozens of bottles of liquor.

  Instead of sitting at the bar, I sat at a little table by itself in the shadows and signaled to the waitress. She came over to take my drink order, so I ordered a rum and coke and asked to see a menu. I might as well eat if I was going to hit the hard stuff.

  I looked around again, noticing the people that were there. A young couple seated at the bar, their heads together in hushed conversation; an old man sitting alone at his own small table, peering into his pint morosely.

  I heard loud laughter, so I let my gaze travel to the back of the main bar room and noticed a group of people standing at a pool table. I couldn’t see the player, but I could hear the repeated thunk of pool balls as they dropped into the pockets. Someone was running the table, and the crowd was enjoying themselves watching the spectacle.

  I enjoyed the sounds, the oohs and ahhs that could be heard following each shot. As the group of people shifted to give the player room to make a shot, I gave a gasp of recognition when I saw who it was.

  Gareth stood there surrounded by admirers. He looked unbelievably sexy, a broad grin on his generous mouth, his black hair slightly mussed, a lock falling across his forehead. He was wearing a white oxford shirt, with a black tie, black vest, blue jeans and black loafers.

  If I could have dreamt up the perfect male in the sexiest clothes, this would be he. He was rugged and sophisticated all in one package, and I was not the only woman who thought so. At least half a dozen women were in the crowd around the pool table, and all of them were flirting so outrageously it was obvious even to me from where I sat across the other side of the bar. For some reason it bothered me. Annoyance was building in me like steam in a pressure cooker. I could feel myself getting irritated as one particularly busty blonde put her hand on Gareth’s where he clenched the pool cue, and she leaned in to whisper something in his ear.

  A wave of possessiveness rolled over me and I frowned at my reaction, and watching Gareth as I was, noticed him frown too, as if he didn’t like what the blonde was saying.

  The waitress brought over my menu, briefly obscuring my view. As she rambled through the specials, I tried to look around her, but not wanting to be obvious, gave up and listened patiently.

  “I’ll just take an order of the buffalo wings.” I said, so that she would quit talking. I craned my head to look around her, and she noticed where I was looking.

  “Isn’t he the absolute? I wasn’t supposed to work tonight, but he made it all worthwhile.” She sighed, and another flash of annoyance went through me. Why did women seem to sigh every time they talked about him?

  “Yeah, he’s wicked hot.” I replied, hoping I used the right slang. I just wanted her to move out of my line of vision.

  “Oh, he’s wicked alright. Looks like that blonde might get him tonight after all.”

  I jerked my upper body to see around her, but she conveniently moved out of the way and I saw that the blonde had wrapped herself around Gareth. He had that little smile playing around his mouth, and he was looking down at her and listening to whatever she had to say. It was as though I had been punched in the stomach, which was completely irrational. I had exchanged maybe ten words with this man and I felt betrayed? What the hell was wrong with me?

  I realized then that he had transferred his gaze from the blonde and was looking right at me. This was no phantom under a streetlight, or a ghost caught in the headlights, this was a flesh and blood man staring at me. What had drawn his attention my way was beyond me, but one minute he was caught up in the blonde, next he was studying me, the blonde forgotten.

  With our eyes locked I froze. I was like a rabbit caught in a snare, and his gaze was the wire trap that kept me immobile. I couldn’t have moved if I wanted to. It seemed as though no one else was in the bar with us and that time was standing still. I let myself get lost in his eyes and all the promises they seemed to be making.

  I had no idea how long I sat like that, a second or ten minutes, but the waitress nudged me.

  “How many buffalo wings did you want?”

  I looked at her, tearing my gaze reluctantly from Gareth, barely comprehending what she said.

  “Do you want the ten or twenty piece?” She prompted me, but I just shook my head.

  “I changed my mind. How much for the drink?” I didn’t even want to hang around for the change. I threw a ten-dollar bill down on the table and moved towards the door. I was trying to leave as quickly as possible, but it wasn’t fast enough.

  “Anna! Wait!” I heard him calling my name and I stopped, completely against my will. I shut my eyes, and prayed for him to go away, but he had other ideas. I sensed him stop right behind me, so close that his breath moved the hair draped over my ear, raising goose bumps on my arm.

  I slowly turned around to face him, but I tried not to look into his eyes. I looked at the tie around his neck, noticed the little white diamond shapes in it that I hadn’t noticed from across the room, looked at the strong column of his neck, anywhere but his eyes.

  “Were you going to leave without saying hello?” he asked the top of my head.

  “I didn’t realize you were here.” I replied, but then it hit me how stupid that sounded. He thought so, too.

  I heard him chuckle. I rolled my eyes, knowing as I did so that he caught my annoyance with him. I was so annoyed at the sarcastic sound of it that I lost all resolve to look up at him, but I was determined not to let his eyes capture me again, so I
used my ire as a barrier, blocking whatever hold he had on me. He met my gaze, but it didn’t overpower me, which was good, but I determined that I liked the white-blue better than the weird brown.

  I couldn’t believe that he was standing in front of me, that he had left the side of the blonde to come after me.

  “It’s a little hard to not realize it when you were staring so thoroughly at me and my companion a moment ago.” His answer was laced with arrogance, completely at odds with the way he spoke to me in my dream.

  “It’s a little hard not to notice something so completely blatant.” I shot back, lifting my chin in the blonde’s direction. Inside, my stomach roiled with complete insecurity as I measured her statuesque beauty with my willowy awkwardness, her blondeness with my dark hair and olive skin.

  He chuckled again, glancing back over his shoulder at her. His gaze didn’t linger though, and that made me feel a little better. He put his hands in his pockets and looked back at me, his eyes probing mine now, but I dropped them again.

  “She is a little,” he paused, searching for the right word, “obvious, but harmless. Just a diversion. No need to be jealous.” He was trying to get a rise out of me, and I almost took it, but I only brought my eyes up as far as his mouth.

  “Why would I ever be jealous of her? I don’t know you. Hell, I just met you yesterday and isn’t this a strange conversation for an employer and his employee to be having?” I stammered, still refusing to look him in the eye.

  He sighed, and his breath stirred the hair at the top of my head. He took his hands out of his pockets and crossed them in front of his chest and started to walk around me. For a brief moment I thought he was leaving, and I wanted to reach out a hand to keep him there, but then he started to speak.

  “Yes, my brilliant new geneticist. Graduated University of New Hampshire fifth in your class with a Masters in Biochemistry, and a PhD in Genetics. Doctoral thesis done on the gene mutation in XP patients. Brilliant stuff, that.” His tone was a little mocking as he circled me, and I could only think that I was being treated like a horse at auction that wasn’t passing muster.

  “You had final approval on my selection, so if you were unsure that my qualifications weren’t up to par, why did you hire me?”

  I spoke callously but I was still miserable inside, my fragile ego taking a beating that was reducing it to nil. He was making me feel as though I had been found wanting, and I didn’t like the feeling at all.

  He circled me one more time before he spoke again.

  “I never said I regretted hiring you. You have huge potential and that’s why I hired you. Your thesis was brilliantly written, meticulously researched, and showed fantastic promise.”

  His praise coming so soon after the mocking tone made me giddy, and I almost smiled at him, but then I remembered my ridiculous reaction to him and the blonde and my back was up again.

  “Look, this was wonderful, but I really need to leave. It was nice to see you and I’ll make sure I won’t bump into you again.” My tone was dismissive and harsh, even if the words were a little juvenile, but as I moved to go around him, his hands shot out and caught my arms. He turned me towards him, and I had no choice but to look up at him; it was as if he compelled me.

  “Maybe it is better that we not cross paths again. You seem to be distressed, and I don’t want to bring you any pain.” I was caught again in his gaze, his eyes expressing regret, but also a hunger that I didn’t understand, that was so strong that my blood started to simmer.

  I leaned towards him, started to rise up on the tips of my toes. Through the fog in my brain, I realized he was dipping his head; his eyes searching mine for a signal, one that I wasn’t prepared to give him.

  With the last vestige of control I had in me, I snatched my arm from his grasp, a little surprised that he let me go that easily, and I pushed out the front door of the bar. I could feel his eyes on me even after the door was closed.

  I raced home, trying to outrun the burning sensation in my chest, located in the vicinity of my heart, which completely unnerved me. It was as though my heart was breaking, and that made no sense to me. I didn’t let myself get attached to people, and just because he showed up in a dream and possibly watched me on two occasions did not mean that he was interested in me. My heart couldn’t be broken, because I refused to acknowledge that I was falling in love with him. There wasn’t any possible way that I could be in love with him.

  Chapter Three

  Considering that I had not slept a wink, I managed to make it to work on time. I had spent most of the night replaying the scene in the bar, and had no desire to get up in the morning, but I was raised with a ridiculously high sense of responsibility and nothing barring bleeding through my eyes would stop me from going to work.

  As I pulled into the parking lot a thrill went through me to see Gareth’s Rover in the lot. In vain, I tried to push it away, feeling along with the thrill a wave of anger. I did not like games, and he was playing a dangerous one. I didn’t know who or what he was, but he was messing with the wrong girl.

  The moment I sat at my workstation, I noticed my voicemail light on my phone blinking like a beacon. Sighing, not surprised in the least, almost as though I was expecting it. Even before I listened to it, I knew what it was about.

  “This is Jessica, Dr. Macgregor’s assistant. Dr. Macgregor would like to see you at your earliest convenience in his office.”

  The voice on the phone gave the impression that my earliest convenience would not be at the end of the day. For a brief moment, I had the brilliant thought to ignore the voicemail, erase it, and pretend that I never got it, but it wasn’t like me to back away from anything, let alone a slightly annoying, but irresistibly compelling man who happened to be my boss.

  With another half-hearted sigh, I got up and walked back through the lab, passing people hard at work, sure that everyone knew where I was going, and would break into excited gossip as soon as I was gone.

  I stepped into the elevator and pressed the button for the top floor, my hands shaking a little. I grasped them together, twining my fingers into an intricate knot, willing them to stop quivering before I stood in front of him. I could feel my heart racing, and I tried some deep breathing to calm it down, thoroughly disgusted with myself. Why was I letting him affect me this way? Shouldn’t I be more infuriated with him, stalking me as he essentially was?

  It wasn’t fear that had my heart racing and my hands shaking; it was the excitement of seeing him again, not cornered in a bar or at the mercy of dreams. It was the bright light of day, in a controlled environment, where I could question him at will and not be afraid of repercussion.

  Well, sort of. I guess I could get fired.

  The doors slid open silently, into an equally silent hallway. I studied the plaque on the wall, not sure what direction to go in. Noting his office number, I walked down the hall in that direction, concentrating on my surroundings instead of the thoughts running through my head. An empty office was on my right, looking forlorn with not even a desk, and the walls of the hallway were hung with black and white photos of the New England countryside.

  A receptionist sat at a big desk, talking into a headset, her movements precise and controlled, almost robotic. I felt like a fool, like a kid sent to the principal, as I stood in front of the desk, my hands still clasped in front of me, and I gave myself a good mental shake. I had to get control of myself. I had questions and wanted answers.

  She looked up at me finally, a slight smile on her face, which made her look more human than the robot she had resembled when I first saw her.

  “Dr. Greer?” She asked, her voice softer than in the message she left me. I nodded with an answering smile.

  “Let me see if he’s available.”

  Nodding again, I stepped away from her desk to study one of the photographs on the wall, not expecting him to be available so soon. He was a busy man, after all, not someone just sitting around waiting for an underling.

  I
had just started to really analyze the photo, to appreciate the clarity and technique when he spoke from behind me. I jumped at the sound of his voice, the cadence sizzling along my nerves.

  “Do you like it?” He asked, his breath a cool whisper on my neck. I shivered slightly, but recovered quickly. I didn’t want him to see what he did to me physically. Not after last night.

  “It’s very good. Who’s the photographer?” I held my voice steady, proud of myself that my words didn’t shake apart like my insides were doing.

  “I am.” He replied, his tone matter-of-fact, not even a slight hint of arrogance in those two words. I was impressed; the photos would have done National Geographic proud. Gathering courage around me like a shield, I turned to face him, not prepared for exactly how close he was to me.

  My nose was almost pressed into his chest and it would have only taken a fraction of a step forward for him to rest his chin on my head if he wanted to. My resolve almost faltering, I jerked back a step and looked up him.

  “You wanted to see me, sir?” I asked with false bravado, my voice coming out in a high falsetto, cracking a little at the end. I cleared my throat and tried to look normal, tried to picture him fat and balding. It just wasn’t possible.

  A slight smile quirked at the corner of his glorious mouth, but I could see laughter brewing in those odd eyes. It had the curious effect of putting me at ease, and I almost laughed at loud.

  “Sir? That’s a little formal, no? I think Gareth would be fine, but if you’re too uncomfortable with that, you can call me Dr. Macgregor. Shall we?” He motioned to his office, and I waited for him to move ahead of me.

  “Ladies first.” He prompted, so I reluctantly moved forward. His eyes on me were like weights, and the feeling of being at ease slipped away and the nervousness came back in a rush. I heard him tell Jessica that we weren’t to be disturbed, and that shot my nerves through the roof. What was he planning?

  I heard him shut the door softly behind me, and I stood still as a statue, looking anywhere but at him as he came around and moved into my field of vision.