A Ripple in Time

by David Berardelli

  “I’m still right here with you,” I told her as we walked. “And I’m still curious about why you took me to the airport.”

  “That happened two years after…after my stepdad…after I—“

  “What happened with that? Did you get in trouble?”

  “As I told you before, it wasn’t murder.” As she spoke, she continued staring straight ahead, at the hill veering off to our left. “He’d been drinking all day, and when I came home from school, he was waiting for me. He was worse than…than I’d ever seen him before.” She stopped walking; her eyes glistened in the sunlight. “He’d touched me before. Many times.”

  “I saw him hit you. Is that what you mean?”

  She turned and gazed at me. I could see the anger, the hatred and the hurt in her eyes. I could only imagine how much damage that bastard had done to her. “He…did both. When I came home that day, it was different. I saw something in his eyes I’d never seen before. I actually thought I saw death in them. My death. The darkness on his face and the strange smell coming from him that day scared me worse than anything I’d ever been through. It was like…like he’d turned into a wild beast.” She resumed walking.

  “Did his mind just snap?” I asked, catching up to her.

  “I don’t know what happened. I only know that whatever was coming out of him that day wasn’t anything I’d ever known before.”

  I didn’t reply.

  “He’d worked himself up to rape me, and when I came home, he was blind drunk and all over me. And before I knew what was happening, he’d pushed me down to the floor, straddled me and ripped my blouse open. I struggled with him as much as I could, but he was big and heavy and, as I just said, wild. I got my hands on his throat and tried hard to strangle him, but it was too much for me. His neck…it was so thick…so solid. I could hardly get my fingers in there and…” She sighed and went silent.

  After nearly a minute of silence, I said, “We’ve come this far… Tell me what happened next.”

  She shrugged. “He just stopped moving. His face was mashed against the top of my head, and just when I thought I was gonna suffocate and die, he moaned and kinda snorted—almost like a snore—and the next thing I knew, he got really heavy.”

  “You said it was his heart?”

  “It was weak from all the booze, and he just collapsed on me and died. I lay there the longest time, thinking he’d just passed out. But after a while, I could tell something was different. I could no longer feel his heart thumping against me, and the hot breath coming out of his nostrils had stopped. When I finally got the courage to take my hands away from his neck, I searched for a pulse.”

  “He died before you had the chance to kill him.”

  “I wanted to. I really did. I wanted to so badly…”

  “I can’t say as I blame you.”

  “Once they came and took him away, I knew I couldn’t stay there, so I got in touch with my brother Danny and asked if I could stay with him and his wife Sharon. I stayed with them for about six months or so, but that didn’t turn out very well. Sharon didn’t really want me with them and made it clear that I was cramping their lifestyle. I’d been waiting tables all this time, saving up as much money as I could. Since I’d spent so much time staying away from home in those days, I didn’t have much of an education, so I took my GED and tried to get a better job. I thought I had one, but the guy who’d hired me hadn’t hired me for the right reasons, and I had to leave that place right away.”

  “What were you doing at the airport?”

  “I needed to get away from this area. I thought maybe I’d have better luck if I was living somewhere else. I decided to try my hand at working at the movie studios in Hollywood. Not acting, of course—doing makeup and stuff like that. I’d always been good at makeup and even set designing. After all, I’d been covering up my bruises since I was little. Applying makeup was really no big deal for me. And I’d always had an eye for arranging furniture and making things look really good. I’d helped design a set at our high school for one of their plays. Everyone liked what I’d done and said it really looked professional. It was my first attempt, so I figured maybe I had the knack for it. I decided to take a gamble and head off to L.A. and try my luck out there. As I said, I’d saved up a lot of money, enough for a one-way plane ticket and a month’s rent. That’s what I did. I took every cent that I’d saved and used it for my trip. Then I got on the plane and flew to L.A.”

  I didn’t want to ask but knew I had to. “How did it turn out?”

  She smiled. “It was all right for a while, but after eight months or so, it fizzled out. I just didn’t have the drive, I guess. I’d never been very aggressive with people—which is how you have to be when you’re out there. You also have to be very self-confident—which was something else I never had. I landed a few jobs and even managed to get on a couple of movie sets, making up some of the extras. I made a little money for a while. I met a lot of guys, too. A lot of bad ones.” She went silent again, withdrawing quickly into her own little world.

  “Tell me the rest, Jenna.”

  “One of them turned out to be a real bastard—even worse than my stepdad. He was about thirty, good-looking, and ran a car dealership.” She paused, and when she spoke again, her voice sounded much weaker. “He liked rough sex and especially loved batting women around. He beat me up during one of our dates. First, he slapped me around. Then he punched me in the kidney—the same place my stepdad had punched me just a few years earlier. My kidneys were both already damaged from all the beatings and from the leather belt my stepdad had whacked me with, so…” She sighed. “I just couldn’t take much more.”

  A flurry of seething anger rushed through me like a ruptured water main. I had to clear my throat to get the words out. “How bad…were you hurt?”

  “Real bad.” She took a breath and looked down at her feet. “I suffered uremic poisoning a few days later and died of cerebral edema one week after that.”

  The tears filled my eyes. I turned away. I couldn’t look at her; I needed some time to absorb all this and collect myself. But just a moment later, her hand gripped mine again. I turned back to her. Her eyes were also wet, but she was smiling. “Are you okay?” she asked.

  “I’m so sorry, Jenna…” I had no other words to express.

  She smiled. “Do you really want to know why I took you to the airport?”

  “Please…tell me.”

  “I’d made a promise to myself that morning. I promised myself that this trip to L.A. would be a one-time thing. Nothing in my life had ever gone right up until then, and if one more bad thing happened before I got on that plane, I’d just turn right around and take a cab back home.”

  I suddenly realized that it had been because of me that she’d died in L.A. “So…your trip to L.A…if I hadn’t given you back your bag…”

  “The moment I saw that jerk running away with it, I knew that I’d made a big mistake—that I wasn’t supposed to go anywhere. In that one instant, I knew that I was going back home. I told myself I’d never amount to nothing, and there was no need for me to try anything else ever again.” She went silent for a few moments. “But I had to at least try and get my bag back first. It had all my valuables in it. I had no idea how I could possibly get it back from that jerk, but I had to try. I told myself that if I didn’t at least try, it would be a definite sign that I didn’t have what it takes to do anything. I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life hating myself for not going after him, or wondering what might have been if I had gone after him. So I jumped up and was about to rush through the doorway when I saw you standing there, holding my bag, with him lying at your feet.” She smiled. “For me, it was a sign straight from Heaven that I should go on.” Her eyes searched his. “Don’t you see the significance of all this? The fact that you were there the same moment I was? That even though so much time had gone by, we still managed to connect one last time?”

  “But Jenna…your future…the fact that you di
ed not long after that…” I couldn’t help feeling guilty for what happened to her once she’d gotten on the plane and flown to L.A.

  She was still smiling. “You did more for me that day than anyone else had ever done. You showed me more kindness those few times I saw you than I’d ever experienced before, and if you hadn’t stopped that guy, I would have gone back home and ended up living in someone’s basement, turning tricks.”

  “Instead, you went to L.A…and died—“

  “I died after I’d done what I promised myself I was going to do. Yes, I died much too soon, and no, I didn’t get to do most of what I wanted to…but if I hadn’t gotten on that plane...” She shrugged.

  “Jenna, if you’d just told me who you were that day—“

  “What would you have done? Changed your plans? Turned your back on your future? Turned down that dream job you’d worked all those years for? Gone all out to do something else for me? You’d already done enough. You gave me hope. You showed me that there was kindness in the world—that not all men were savages and predators. You gave me the courage to venture out on my own and pursue my dream. If it hadn’t been for you, I wouldn’t have even taken my GED in the first place. You might not know it, but if you hadn’t looked at me the way you did or stood up for me those few times we ran into one another, I would have never known that I even deserved any self-respect.”

  I could feel what was left of my reserve beginning to crumble.

  “Do you know what my last thoughts were, just before I died?”

  I was afraid to ask.

  “I promised myself that if I could, I was going to find some way to repay you for what you’d done for me.”

  I had no idea how to respond.

  Still gripping my hand, she led me up the hill, where Mount Lebanon Cemetery stood at the very top. We went up a narrow dirt road, turned left, slipped past a small grove of trees and approached a polished gray marble marker set in the overgrown grass, just ten feet or so from a large oak tree.

  The marker said, simply:

  JENNA RAE CAULFIELD

  1976-1999

  As I gazed at it, my eyes filled with more tears.

  “When my brothers were notified about what happened, they made arrangements to have me brought back here. “

  “Really?” I was surprised they’d made such a kind gesture. But I knew it was much too late.

  “I was surprised, too,” she said with a half-smile. “I think they felt guilty for what happened.”

  “But not for leaving you there with your stepdad?”

  She shrugged. “They were all older than I was. Rick was seventeen, so he was all set to leave home when Mom died. Danny was sixteen, Mike fifteen. They’d wanted to take me with them, but…” She shook her head. “It was just too much. They all had their own problems. I really couldn’t blame them. And by the time I was able to leave and stay with Danny, he’d already begun his new life with Sharon, and they didn’t need me around to complicate things. My other two brothers also had busy lives of their own.”

  I didn’t want to say what I was feeling. Accusations were no good now. It was much too late for justice or ill will. “Well, at least they brought you back…”

  She nodded. “It meant a lot. Mom’s buried right there, next to my sister Pauline.” She pointed to the markers lying in the grass just a few feet away.

  Once again, I kept my feelings to myself.

  “I’ve been watching over you ever since,” she said, smiling at me.

  I was surprised. “You haven’t crossed over yet?”

  She shook her head. “I made a promise. I can’t cross over until I fulfill it.”

  “Jenna, what have you been doing—“

  “As I said, I’ve been with you.”

  The realization shocked me. “You’ve been with me since…since the day you died?”

  “I was with you in Florida and when you flew back here. I was also with you when you were mugged and dragged into that alley behind Gino’s. I’ve been watching you while trying to stay out of the picture, but when you were dragged into the alley and it looked like something really bad was about to happen, I had to step in. I couldn’t possibly let anything happen to you.”

  Then it dawned on me. She’d been the voice all along.

  “You were the voice that helped me…”

  “Guilty as charged.”

  “You also must’ve been the one making the nine-one-one call—“

  “I had to get you to the hospital, didn’t I?”

  Confusion set in again. “How could you possibly make a phone call if…if you’re—“

  “We can do a great many things when we have to—especially in an emergency.” She shrugged. “We can also make sudden sounds when we need certain mortals to look the other way at the right time. I had to distract those thugs so I could get you out of there.”

  “And you also knew about E&S, obviously…”

  “As I said, I’ve been with you a long time.”

  “I should’ve known.” I felt stupid for not figuring this out sooner.

  She smiled. “You had no idea what was happening. You hadn’t seen me since we were kids. You can’t count that episode at the airport because you had no idea that was me. The bleached hair made things even more complicated.”

  “Why did you bleach your hair?”

  She shrugged. “A new look, silly. I wanted to start a new life. But you’re missing the point. In the alley, you couldn’t have possibly known it was me talking to you because you didn’t even know I was dead in the first place. Even if you did know, you couldn’t have known that I’d been watching over you ever since I died.”

  Once again, the realization slammed into me. “You’ve actually been watching over me…all this time?”

  She nodded.

  “For seventeen years?”

  “Time is much different on the other side. For us, a year goes by in an instant, a decade in a single afternoon. When we’re busy doing something in the mortal world, the moment go by slowly. Time is but a ripple, separating special moments. But it was a real pleasure because I didn’t mind being with you—not at all.” She smiled. “It was the least I could do.”

  I was experiencing a genuine warmth for this gentle soul, one I’d never felt for anyone else before in my life. “You saved my life. I’m sure you know that.”

  Another nod.

  “I’ll never forget you, Jenna. I’ll never forget any of this.”

  “I know that, too.”

  I knew right then that our time together was rapidly drawing to a close. I struggled hard to keep the sadness from taking over. “Then I guess you can cross over now. I think I’ll be all right from now on.”

  She shook her head. “Not quite yet. There’s something else I have to do.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Before I can cross over, I have to release you.”

  “Release me?”

  “Haven’t you ever wondered why you’ve never married? Why you’ve always shied away from any permanent commitment?”

  I shrugged. “I’m not an easy guy—“

  “Don’t give me that. You can’t possibly lie to me, Bill. You’re the best man I ever knew. You’d be an absolute dream to live with.”

  “Jenna, you really don’t—“

  “You never married because of me.”

  “I…don’t understand.”

  “I told you that I’ve been watching over you all these years, but I didn’t tell you the times I’ve actually interfered with your life during all this time.”

  “Interfered?”

  She lowered her head. “There were several women you could have easily taken to the altar, but because of me, it never happened.”

  “How can that be?”

  She shrugged a shoulder. “I didn’t like any of them.”

  I didn’t understand what she was saying. “So? I didn’t like them, either.”

  “Yes you did. That’s why you were engaged to them. But no
ne of these engagements worked out, did they?”

  “A couple of them changed their minds. Then I changed my mind—“

  “Why, Bill? Why did you change your mind?”

  “I don’t know…” Just a few months ago, Sarah had been a strong choice, but a week or so into our engagement, I decided that I couldn’t imagine sharing the rest of my life with her. “I was engaged to a lady named Sarah. She—“

  “The tall, slender redhead? The one who did paralegal work in Orlando?”

  “How did you—“

  “I was right there with you. I saw everything you did.”

  I gawked at her. “Everything?”

  She laughed. “Don’t be embarrassed. She was actually a very good choice. Your best choice, in fact.”

  “Then what happened? Why’d I change my mind?”

  “That was my fault. I was watching you as you slept one night, and something came over me. I’m sorry, Bill. I couldn’t help it, but I bent over you and kissed you. It was all very innocent, of course—just a peck on the cheek—but as I said, I just couldn’t help myself.”

  I was stunned and extremely uncomfortable.

  Jenna gazed at me the longest time before she started talking again. “I’m afraid my kiss did something that I wasn’t expecting. It caused your subconscious to come to me as you slept.”

  My cheeks reddened, and suddenly I knew exactly what she was talking about.

  “You remember, don’t you? I can see it in your eyes. You’ve had dreams with faceless women you couldn’t identify, haven’t you?”

  “Many times...”

  “Didn’t you ever wonder who I was?”

  “It was…you all along?”

  Jenna smiled in embarrassment. “I just couldn’t help myself.”

  It cleared up a lot of things, but it still didn’t tell me how Jenna had been responsible for all my engagements breaking up. “All right, you came to me in my dreams. And by the way, they were really terrific dreams. But how did that change my relationships?”