Transcendence t-1

by C. J. Omololu

The thought of coming back without him sends a stab of pain through my chest. “Does it ever end? Do people ever stop coming back?”

  “Maybe,” he says. “Some forms of Buddhism think that once you no longer need the earthly experiences anymore, you go permanently to a higher plane.”

  “Like heaven?”

  “Probably where the idea of heaven came from,” he says. “But I personally can’t imagine no longer needing earthly experiences.” He starts running his fingers through my hair, each contact with my scalp sending shivers straight down into my feet. I close my eyes, giving myself up to the sensation and the sound of the waves in the cold dark night.

  The transition into the vision isn’t as jarring as it has been before; the first thing I feel is the scratchy fabric at my throat, and the familiar rhythm of someone gently running a comb through my hair.

  I sit at my dressing table, staring blankly out the small window to the courtyard down below. The grounds are unnaturally green, and contrasts with the dull brown cobblestones that run between the buildings. I can’t see any workmen from here, but I’ve been listening all morning to the sound of nails being driven into lumber as they prepare the site.

  Anna tries to hide her emotions as we complete our daily routine, but the occasional sniffle as she draws the silver comb down my back gives away her true state of mind.

  “Anna, please,” I say, turning toward my lady and taking her small hand in mine. “Do not waste your tears, all will be well.”

  “Yes, Lady Allison,” she says, staring at the intricate comb in her hand. Two tears form parallel lines down her ruddy cheeks. “I know that you have done nothing to deserve this fate and that a just God will spare you. ’Tis only…” A sob rattles in her throat as she turns away from me.

  “You musn’t lose faith,” I insist, my words bolstering my own failing conviction. “The good will triumph. It says so in the Book of Prayers.” My eyes flick to the prayer book that lies on the trunk at the foot of the bed. We’ve been up all night, listening to the commotion in the yard down below and reading comforting passages from the only book I’ve been allowed these long months. I glance up, although I don’t know what I expect to see except the heavy beams that cross the ceiling and stray cobwebs that adorn the corners of the room. So far, God has not come to intervene on my behalf, but I have no doubt that I will not be abandoned.

  As Anna finishes tying the ribbon around my plait, we hear a shuffling outside the heavy door, followed by a gruff knock and a metallic sound as the lock is disengaged. Her pink cheeks fall instantly pale and her hand flies up to cover her mouth, for we both know these are no idle visitors. “It is time!” she says in a hoarse whisper.

  Squaring my shoulders and drawing myself up to my full height, as Mam would have expected, I stand and smooth the heavy black skirt that falls nearly to the floor. I wrap my hand around the pendant as Anna reaches up and frees the clasp from around my neck. The metal is still warm as I drop the necklace into the small silk pouch, tears filling my eyes for the first time since this nightmare started. As we stand waiting for the door to swing open, I grab Anna’s hand in a gesture of comfort. “Take heart, Anna, for we are well protected.”

  “Hey.” Griffon’s insistent tone brings me back to the present. “Everything okay?”

  I nod slowly as the last traces of the image slip from my mind. “I’m fine.”

  “Where were you?” His voice is gentle now. “Did you see Veronique again?”

  “It was different this time. I was at the Tower again,” I say, trying to orient the image of the room with what I’d seen on my visit there. “Inside one of the buildings, looking out. I … I think it’s just before the vision I saw at the scaffold.” My heart starts racing as small pieces of the puzzle begin to fit together. “Oh my God, she called me Lady Allison!”

  “Who did?” Griffon asked.

  “The girl who was with me. She was brushing my hair, and she called me Lady Allison! When I had the memory in the hospital, the woman at the cottage called me Allison.”

  Griffon pulls his fingers from my hair and wraps his arms around me. “It could mean anything,” he says. “Maybe you’re seeing a different life altogether.”

  “No,” I insist, a little puzzled about why he isn’t as excited as I am about the discoveries I’m making. “It’s the same, I can feel it. The girl in the cottage on the cliff is the same person who was beheaded at the Tower.”

  “I don’t think so,” Griffon says. “I’ve been on my Dad’s tour hundreds of times. There were only a few people who were actually beheaded inside the Tower walls, and none of them were named Allison.”

  My conviction is growing stronger as I turn the images over in my mind. The scratchy black dress, the little house on the cliff—the two things were parts of the same lifetime, I’m sure of it. My name was Allison, and I was executed at the Tower of London.

  “Well,” I say, “this time, history is wrong.” I feel like a puzzle with gaping holes, as all of these separate lives are piecing themselves together. How many lives have there been so far? How many more are still to come?

  Griffon pulls me closer to him and rubs my shoulders to warm me. “I’m sure you’re right,” he says. He looks out at the water. “I wish we could stay here forever. Away from Veronique. No school. No Sekhem. Maybe you should just move in,” he says. “With me. Janine won’t mind, and Veronique will never be able to find you.”

  “Right,” I say, wishing it was only that easy. “Not like I don’t have a real life or anything. I can totally picture that conversation with my parents. ‘Um, I’m in danger from someone I may have done something bad to in a past life, so I’m just going to move in with my—’” The word “boyfriend” almost slips out, but I catch it in time. Or so I think.

  “Your—?” Griffon says, leaving the next word hanging. He pinches my side lightly and laughs. “Your what?”

  My mind is racing. I have no idea what we really are, and I’m terrified of saying the wrong thing. “Um, my semi-platonic friend who doesn’t date high-school girls.”

  “Is that what this is?” Griffon teases.

  I pull away from him, suddenly serious. “I don’t know.”

  “I think you do,” he says. A smile drifts across his lips, and he bends down to kiss me lightly. “Why are you afraid to say it?”

  “I’m not afraid,” I say, hoping he believes me. I don’t want to come off like some lame teenager. I can feel my breath coming in short bursts, and I hope he doesn’t notice.

  Griffon kisses me behind the ear. “Two truths,” he says quietly, his breath warm on my skin, “and a lie. My turn.”

  My mind is on overload, the sensations from his touch threatening to take over any remaining rational thought. “Okay,” I manage.

  “I once had a painting hanging in the Louvre. My cat’s name is Stanley,” he says, his lips tracing a route down my neck to my collarbone. “And my girlfriend has the most beautiful eyes in the world.”

  I swallow hard. “I’ve seen your art, so I think the painting one is true.”

  “One for one so far,” Griffon says.

  “And you already said you don’t have any pets. So that’s the lie.”

  “Good to see you were paying attention.” Griffon sits back, his thumb tracing my cheekbone. “Which would make the girlfriend one …?”

  I smile. “A truth?”

  He looks at me and grins, his deep dimples flashing even in the dim light of the moon. “I told you that you were good at this. If you’re my girlfriend, then what does that make me?”

  “My boyfriend,” I whisper. I watch his face, waiting for him to turn this moment into a joke, but his features have turned serious.

  “That’s the first time I’ve called anyone my girlfriend,” he says quietly.

  In this lifetime, I finish for him silently.

  Without taking his eyes off my face, Griffon lifts my left hand and gently kisses the palm, his fingers brushing the edge of the splint that hid
es the angry scar on my wrist. He runs his lips across my fingers, and I think I see a tear shining on his lashes before he closes his eyes.

  I reach under his shirt and run my right hand along his warm skin so that he shivers. “You’re freezing,” he says.

  “Your hands must be cold too,” I tease. I lead his hands tentatively under the layers I’m wearing. He looks at me questioningly as his fingers slide under my shirt, and it’s my turn to gasp as he slowly begins to explore my bare skin. Shifting forward, I press myself against him, feeling the vibrations between our bodies growing stronger. What has been a distant, steady hum now becomes an insistent pulsing between us that matches the beating of my heart exactly.

  Griffon’s breath is heavy as I brush my palm against his chest, which tenses at my touch. I smile and look up into his face, pleased at the reaction I can get from just a small gesture. His eyes are closed, and he’s biting his bottom lip as if he’s struggling for control. He must feel my eyes on him, because his lids slowly open, revealing those golden amber eyes that are at once familiar and endless.

  As my eyes lock on his, I feel a cold stab of fear flash through my body, a sensation so powerful it feels like a tremor.

  I know those eyes.

  They’ve been burned into my memory as one of the last things I saw before the metallic flash that brought total darkness. The same eyes that had shown no mercy, the only things visible beneath a hooded cloak on top of a wooden scaffold on a gray, foggy English morning. I’ve seen them in the vision—replayed that scene over and over in my head a hundred times—but failed to recognize them in real life. Everything else about him has changed, but the essence that’s behind his eyes is the same.

  I cannot save you, my lady. The words seem to echo around us as if they had been spoken out loud. I search Griffon’s face, desperate to be wrong, but as I look into his eyes one more time, there is a recognition that can’t be denied.

  They are the eyes of my executioner.

  Twenty~One

  “Oh my God!” I cry, scrambling backward and falling to the sand. “It was you!” I jump to my feet and take a step away from him. I stare at Griffon, but it’s like I can’t see him anymore. All I can see are the memories.

  “Cole!” Griffon shouts, standing up quickly. There’s confusion in his voice, and I can tell he doesn’t think I know the truth, that I’m as clueless as I’ve been since the second we met. “What’s wrong?”

  I keep my eyes on him as I pull my jacket tighter around me. How can I have missed it all this time? Even now, as he stares at me, I recognize those eyes from that morning so long ago. “I can’t believe you lied to me!” I say, glancing toward the bonfire. My heart is racing as I calculate how quickly I can reach Rayne.

  Understanding flickers across Griffon’s face, and he takes a step toward me. “It’s not what you think! Cole, you’ve got to believe me.” He reaches for my arm, but I push him away.

  “Don’t touch me,” I say, trying to keep my voice even. I hold out my hands, ready to defend myself if he lunges toward me again. Instantly, I feel the difference in our sizes and know that if he wants to grab me, I’ll have a hard time stopping him.

  “Just hear me out,” he pleads, taking a step back from me. “It’s not what you think,” he repeats, his voice attempting to calm me.

  “It was you on the scaffold that day,” I say. “You were the one who…” I can’t even bring myself to say those words out loud. Sobs are hiding in the back of my throat as I realize that everything up to now has been a complete lie. His words. His touch. His concern. None of it is real.

  Griffon seems to collapse from inside. “It was me,” he says, not taking his eyes off mine. “I knew the second I touched you at the Tower who you were. And who I was to you. But I also knew you wouldn’t understand—”

  “Understand?” I shoot back. “You killed me! You raised an axe and cut my head off. What else is there to understand?” There it is, out in the open. As the words hang in the air, I have an overwhelming urge to get away from here, to put as much distance between us as possible.

  There’s a catch in his voice as he tries again. “It wasn’t like that!”

  But I can’t get the image of his eyes, just barely visible above the black mask, out of my head. I’m through listening. I wish I could put back the years, the centuries between us. But right now all I have is a wide-open beach.

  The sand is damp and I sink into it with every step as I run toward the orange glow of the bonfires. I can hear Griffon’s footsteps behind me, and he catches up with me just as I reach the edge of the scattered group, grabbing me by the shoulder and twisting me around to face him.

  “You have to listen to me,” he insists.

  “I don’t have to do anything,” I say, trying to shake his hands off me. “I know everything I need to know. Let me go!”

  “Not until you hear what I have to say!” he roars, and I notice the silence that descends around us as everyone turns to watch.

  “What’s going on?” His friend Peter pushes his way between us, and Griffon lets me go.

  I look around frantically. “Where’s Rayne?” I ask, my breath coming in bursts from running.

  “She went to the store with her sister and some other people,” Peter says. “They just left.” He turns to face Griffon. “What happened?”

  “I’ve got this,” Griffon says to him. “Just a misunderstanding.” He looks steadily into my eyes, and I know he doesn’t want to have this conversation in front of all these people. “Come on, I’ll take you home.”

  I step closer to Peter. “I’m not going anywhere with you. I’ll walk if I have to.”

  Peter looks down at me. “You don’t have to do that. I’ll take you.”

  “Don’t do this, Cole,” Griffon pleads. “You’re making a mistake.”

  “Can we go now?” I ask Peter, turning my back to Griffon and walking away. All eyes around the bonfire are trained on the three of us.

  Peter hesitates, but trots to catch up with me. “I’m parked in the lot over there,” he says, pointing to the left.

  We walk in silence toward his car, the only sound is that of his keys jangling as he takes them out of his pocket.

  “Are you okay to drive?” I ask.

  “I haven’t been drinking,” he says. He opens the door for me and walks around to the driver’s side. “Are you okay?” he asks as we slide into the front seats.

  I nod quickly, feeling the ache in my throat as I think about what just happened. For weeks, Griffon has pretended to be the perfect guy, the one with all the answers. Apparently I haven’t been asking any of the right questions.

  Peter puts the key in the ignition just as a motorcycle roars to life behind us. I barely have time to look out the window before Griffon speeds past us, my helmet still attached to the side of his bike, the back wheel fishtailing wildly as he accelerates onto the Great Highway.

  “That idiot’s going to get himself killed,” Peter says quietly. He pulls out of the parking lot and drives in the direction of Griffon’s quickly disappearing taillight. I watch the bonfires get smaller and smaller in the side mirror as we climb toward the Cliff House. My heart is still racing, and although I’ve recovered from the run, it feels like I can barely breathe. In the darkness of the car, all I can picture is Griffon’s face. The curls that always beg to be touched. The curve of his lip as his face widens into a dimpled grin. The eyes that have betrayed me from the beginning. Everything has been a lie. From the moment we met, I’ve been part of some kind of sick joke. The tears spill from my eyes, hot rivers flowing down my face faster than I can wipe them away.

  Peter reaches into the console and hands me a wad of fast-food napkins, but doesn’t say a word, and I don’t trust my voice enough to say thanks. We drive in silence for a few minutes as I stare out the side window and try to get a grip on myself. The least I can do is wait to lose it until I get home.

  “Cole?” Peter finally asks quietly. I close my eyes and try
to breathe deeply to stop the suffocating feeling that’s settling into my chest. I can’t handle any questions right now, and how will I answer them anyway? Griffon betrayed me five hundred years ago? He was my executioner in a past life? The secrets that come with being Akhet are starting to intrude into real life, and I can’t guarantee I’ll say the right thing.

  “Cole?” Peter asks again. “I don’t know where you live.”

  I sigh with relief. “Haight,” I manage.

  “Where on Haight?”

  I press my head against the window, suddenly exhausted. “Anywhere. At Masonic is fine.”

  “I’ll take you all the way home,” he says, glancing over at me with concern.

  I shake my head. “That’s close enough.” I need to walk a couple of blocks to clear my head before I show up at home looking like a wreck.

  Almost too quickly, Peter is pulling up to the curb near Ben & Jerry’s. My neighborhood is always busy, but Friday nights are crazy. The sidewalks are crowded with people spilling in and out of the bars, clubs, and cafés that line the few short blocks between here and my house. It’s the perfect place to lose myself for a little while, and I’ll be as safe here as I will anywhere.

  Peter looks out the front windshield. “You sure this is okay?”

  “It’s great,” I say, grabbing the door. “Thanks.”

  I step out and let the swarming crowd envelop me and pull me along the sidewalk, not thinking, just moving my feet toward home. All I want is to crawl into my bed and forget everything that’s happened over the past month. As I walk past my corner where the homeless people always camp out, the sound of bongo drums and the smell of pot smoke hanging in the air is oddly comforting. The quiet of my street after the chaos of Haight is like slipping into a tub of warm water. Here and there people walk up the sidewalk toward the lights of the clubs, but mostly I have several blocks all to myself.

  As I approach my house, the door suddenly opens at the top of our steps, and the light from the hallway shows Griffon in perfect silhouette at my front door. He isn’t carrying his helmet, but his hair is wild, as if he’s just yanked it off in a hurry. I press myself against the shadows of our neighbor’s front wall and watch as he talks to Mom. I can’t hear what he’s saying, but it must be convincing, because in a few seconds, she steps back from the door and ushers him into the house, closing the door behind them.