by Jason Letts
“No,” I said, getting her attention. “I’m a friend of Nathan’s!”
A subtle look passed over her eyes, and she seemed to recoil into herself just a little more at the sound of his name. There was something between Gladys and Nathan, or Nate rather, and it wasn’t good. It was possible she was remembering how he’d put her in here as soon as his mother died.
“Oh,” she muttered, but I shook my head because we were getting off track and I was bringing up bad memories. Unlike with Nate, beating around the bush wouldn’t do me any good here. I had to be as direct as I could be.
“Where is Cammie? I have to find her,” I shouted into her ear, my own frustration and desperation slipping through. If Gladys looked at me like I’d been a ghost before, now I was something one hundred times more horrifying. Her mouth gaped open more than it had, and she struggled to take in enough air.
“Cammie’s dead,” Gladys mumbled in her warbled voice.
My stomach dropped and I could’ve sworn I was falling. I clutched the arm of the chair, stricken by what the old woman had told me.
“No, that’s impossible!” I said, my fingers grasping at the lime green sweater draped over her arm.
If it were true, it would ruin everything, and just thinking about it made me shake. How could I be in the right world where Cammie found the cure for Huntington’s if she’s dead? I’d never be able to get home because I’d be trapped here forever. Without my Nathan, I’d have no purpose. Cammie being dead meant I had nothing to live for. I was writhing in my seat, holding myself frantically.
“It was at the lake. Cammie drowned at the lake,” Gladys went on, the memories clearly paining her as well.
I was beside myself for the terror of it. And then I gasped as it suddenly made so much sense. When Cammie was five, Nathan had saved her from drowning, and that had been the root of their ferocious devotion to each other. Without that, I had to wonder what Nathan would be, and the answer was clear enough, Nate. Whether it was because of carelessness, inattention, apathy, or anything, Nate’s failure to save his sister was what defined this entire world.
“Miriam felt terrible,” Gladys went on, though I was so distracted I could barely follow. “She had been right there. It all happened so fast. So long ago, but it feels like it was just yesterday.”
“I’m sorry. I have to go,” I mumbled, lurching out of my seat and heading for the door. I needed to scream, to feel the cold, uncaring dirt pressed against my face. Tears flooded my eyes to the point I could barely see, and I trudged through the halls trying to find an exit.
I burst through the doors and spilled onto the snow-covered ground by the entrance. There was no hope anymore. I would never see Nathan again, I couldn’t save him, and I wouldn’t even be able to save myself from spending the rest of my days trapped in a horrible world that made the one I’d known before seem like a dream.
“Why?” A shrieking, shrill sob escaped from my lungs and echoed amongst the bare cedars and willow trees. Without Cammie I was all alone, lost to everything that ever mattered to me.
Chapter 11
Nathan spent long stretches of the day sprawled out on the couch watching TV. It was something he’d always dreamed of doing while he was at work, but now that it was happening it seemed horribly boring and mundane.
He got the idea to pick Eve up from work and surprise her with something fun to do, and so he immediately got dressed and hopped in his truck. Getting her in a good mood would probably be the best way to sneak in a question about the changes she’d been going through lately, and he mulled over how exactly to bring it up.
When he arrived at Ben & Jerry’s, he found Eve sitting outside on a bench, the fluffy snow that was falling speckling her dark coat. When she saw him, she bounced off of the seat and tottered toward the truck.
“Why are you out here?” he asked as she climbed in.
“Because I knew you’d be coming to pick me up,” she answered. So much for any great surprise.
“No,” Nathan corrected her. “Why aren’t you inside finishing up your shift?”
“I got fired,” she smiled, and Nathan gawked at her in disbelief. “Yeah, I was telling people exactly what they’ll look like in a few years if they keep eating ice cream. Apparently you’re not supposed to do that.”
“So you were fired? Are you ok?” he asked, cringing.
“I’m fine, but can we just hurry up and get to the mall? I’m anxious about having some fun.”
The way she said it was off-putting to Nathan, more because of the devious glare in her pretty eyes than because she already knew where they were going. He pulled into traffic anyway though and tried not to let his nerves get the better of him.
This wasn’t going to be the best date he’d ever planned, but he hoped it’d be special because of how it touched on some of their memories together. He parked outside of the mall’s main entrance and escorted Eve inside. Their destination waited before them, an arcade right beside the food court.
“I don’t think you’re going to be happy if we go through with this,” Eve warned, but Nathan wouldn’t hear it.
“Come on. We’re going to have a great time,” he urged, setting his hand on her lower back to help her forward.
“Ok,” she consented, a high note of condescension in her voice.
Most of the arcade’s customers were a good six or seven years younger than Nathan, but that didn’t stop him from joining in their fun. Elaborate video games had people driving monster trucks, shooting dinosaurs, or beating up ninjas. Everything looked great and he already had his hand on his wallet, ready to get in on the action, but Eve appeared as though she were about to fall asleep.
The first thing they did was play a game of air hockey, but knocking the thin blue disk back and forth didn’t seem to interest her at all. She easily beat Nathan even though he thought he was good at the game.
“Let’s try something else,” he suggested, glancing around at the various games. A group of kids was playing a video game consisting of shooting zombies that appeared on the screen. A grin crept onto Nathan’s face and he immediately ushered Eve in line. Eve crossed her arms and yawned while the kids struggled to fight off their enemies before losing their turns.
“So just aim at the zombies when they pop up and pull the trigger,” he explained, handing a bulky orange pistol to Eve. She held it to her own head as Nathan pumped quarters into the slot. When the game began, she extended her arm and blasted the head off the first zombie that squirmed out of its grave.
The game progressed around a haunted village, and Eve was able to perfectly anticipate the arrival of each enemy. Shifting the gun into place before anything even appeared, she didn’t miss a single shot. Some kids gathered to watch and cheer as she easily defeated the villains who had thwarted them.
“How many do I have to kill before this becomes fun?” she droned, staring blankly at the screen and repeatedly clicking her index finger against the trigger.
“Oh, come on. Give it a chance!” Nathan pleaded beside her. Eve closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and then turned to Nathan.
“That’s the thing. There is no chance for me. The outcome of each shot will always be exactly what I want it to be, and this game will never produce anything that I’m not already aware of.”
Even though she was facing Nathan, she still pointed the gun at the screen and continued to blast away zombies. Kids gasped as she defeated the boss of one level without even looking. Only the sound of gunfire and groaning undead made it into Nathan and Eve’s argument.
“But don’t you remember how much fun we had at the haunted house and at the fair on the fourth of July? Those were games of skill and chance, but you actually managed to get excited about them.”
Eve put one hand over her mouth to feign contemplation as she pulled the trigger every few seconds.
“Let’s see if we can do some deductive reasoning here. If games like this are boring to me, and I appeared to have fun, then I must
’ve been…” she trailed off.
“Faking it,” Nathan glowered, any sense of enjoyment suddenly vanishing. “You were faking it, weren’t you? Well that’s just great. Maybe our whole relationship has just been one big game of smoke and mirrors.”
“Now we’re getting somewhere,” Eve said, her eyes lighting up. She handed the gun to one of the kids and put her arm around Nathan, leading him toward the arcade’s exit. “I’ve got a better idea for something we can do. It’s called ‘I give you some bad news and watch you squirm’. Doesn’t that sound fun?”
They sat down at one of the small tables in the food court. People around them were munching on fast food, but that didn’t stop Eve from taking Nathan’s hand in hers despite his obvious surliness.
“Do you remember the day you came home from class and found Cam and I working on her machine in the living room? The thing neither of you could know and I prevented you from figuring out is that her experiment actually worked.”
Eve gazed at Nathan as though she were staring at a sunset, subtle enjoyment relaxing her soft features. Nathan, already more than a little upset, squinted at her.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” he said.
“It means Cam successfully switched a person into a parallel universe. Now let’s think hard about who that person might be. To overcome the mental block, it takes some abstract reasoning. You’ve got the evidence, which is that one of us disappeared, and yet both of us are still here. Hmm,” she implied.
It wasn’t Nathan’s fault it was hard to make the connection, the division between the universes made it so, but because Eve spelled it out for him, the answer struck him like lightning.
“You’re from another universe!” Nathan gasped, withdrawing his hand and staring blankly. As soon as he’d said it, he could grab hold of the idea and realize it was true.
“Very good, but you’re not exactly right. The person you thought I was is long gone, but the truth is I’m not from any universe.”
“How could you deceive me like that? Who are you and what’s going on?” he stammered, the dark meaning of it all creeping in under his skin. The only thing he could be sure of was that he had a good reason to be angry.
“I’m Eve, and I come from Infinity, just like Apoxy did, well she calls herself Sarah now, but anyway, it’s not the name that matters but the person inside.”
“So this has just all been a lie? Why would you do this to me?” The strain was making him start to sweat. He kept staring at Eve, trying to find the girl he loved inside her eyes, but he saw nothing but cruelty and manipulation.
“Don’t take it so hard,” she urged, grinning. “When the girl you knew vanished without a trace from this plane of existence, there wasn’t going to be anyone there to switch with because she only exists in a very narrow spectrum of worlds. I wanted to see how she could possibly have gotten trapped in a human body, and to be honest I still haven’t figured it out even though I’ve gotten much closer to you than she ever has.”
Nathan’s lip quivered as another epiphany struck him. He winced, suddenly disgusted, not only with Eve but himself.
“So why did you trick me into sleeping with you if you’re not my girlfriend?” he spat, forcing Eve to sigh and brush away a strand of hair.
“It’s complicated, Nathan,” she pleaded.
“Because you wanted me to betray her?”
“Ok, maybe it’s not that complicated.”
Nathan looked like he was restraining himself from strangling Eve. His blood was boiling over, and he was breathing hard.
“You’re despicable, you know that? And you’re not nearly as clever as you think, either. I had an idea about all this back when we were on the mountain and you said you could see the genius of what she did. I didn’t know what you meant or who you were talking about, but I could see from the look in your eyes that you were not the person I knew. If only I’d known the truth…” he raged.
“And yet you gave yourself to me anyway. How perfect,” Eve cooed, leaning back in her plastic seat and getting comfortable. “See now this is fun to me. The one thing I could never predict or control is how you react, and so seeing you get so emotional tickles me.”
“You may have gotten my body, but I don’t care for you at all, and I’m done letting you trick me into playing your stupid games,” he said, but it didn’t faze Eve. She was twirling her blonde hair in her fingers. Eventually she leaned forward and winked.
“You really love her, don’t you?” she asked.
Nathan bit his lip, wondering what she was getting at, but for how awful he felt he had to do something to set it right, and at this moment that meant speaking his heart.
“All of the things you can do, like seeing the future or playing with fate, they’re nothing compared to her empathy and compassion. She cares about other people, about me, and I love her for it. It doesn’t matter if you have the same face or if the sound of your voice is the same, hers are so much more beautiful for the radiant light they bring to the world.”
“Yeah, you really noticed the difference, didn’t you?” she snickered, putting her hand to her chest to empathize. “But that’s touching. Really. I’m touched. Yet there’s one thing I’m having a hard time figuring out. If you love her so much, why were you so terrible to her? I seem to recall lots of yelling, some brutal insults, and some icy glares. Care to explain that?”
Nathan scowled at Eve, who was clearly loving every minute of this. Meanwhile, his heart was being dragged over a cheese grater.
“You’re my punishment for that, aren’t you? I guess I deserve you after everything I put her through. I’ve been having a hard time dealing with Huntington’s disease and I took a lot of it out on her because she did fight so hard to help. It was a mistake and I wish I could tell her I’m sorry. But now she’s gone. Hopefully wherever she is now she doesn’t have to put up with the stuff I threw at her.”
Eve clicked her tongue against her teeth and scratched her fingernail along her temple.
“No, I wouldn’t say she’s somewhere better at all. In fact, she’s someplace pretty positively awful, if you can believe it. Torturous is the best way to describe it really, and she went through it all for you, but now there’s no hope left at all.”
Nathan’s eyes started to water and he gritted his teeth.
“I want you to take me to her. Now!” he ordered, but Eve crossed her arms over her chest.
“No, I’m not going to be doing that. You’re probably best off just forgetting she ever existed, because you’re not going to be seeing her again.”
“Do it, or else!” Nathan growled, and Eve smirked, leaning forward.
“Is that a threat? There’s nothing, absolutely nothing you can do to me, Nathan, but please try. I would love it if you would try.”
Nathan and Eve glared at each other for a moment, both of them looking like they were ready to pounce, but neither moved and after a while it became obvious neither would budge.
“I will find a way to stop you,” Nathan promised.
Eve merely sighed.
“You’d better find a way to do it soon, because my fun with you has about run its course, and then I’ll be gone too.”
Stunned, Nathan froze to contemplate her words. The only thing worse than having her around would be if she left, because then he’d have no way of getting his love back. He’d have nothing.
“You can’t just leave me like this!” he demanded, but his voice faltered halfway through and slipped into desperation. Eve smiled and threw her head back.
“That’s the thing. I’ll do whatever I want depending on what seems the most amusing. So you’d better pray that I can squeeze a little more enjoyment out of you, or you’ll both be stuck a world apart with no way to ever reach each other.”
A repulsed look took to Nathan’s face.
“I can already tell what kind of sick things amuse you, and I don’t think I want to have any part of them.”
“We’ll see if tha
t’s your choice,” Eve winked as she got up from her seat. It alarmed Nathan to see her go, but she made sure to give him a few parting words. “If you were to get her back, are you sure you wouldn’t start missing me?”
She left him sitting alone at that small table in the food court to stew over the treachery she’d perpetrated against him. As she got to the doors and prepared to find a place free of eyes in which to disappear, Eve turned to take one more look at him. Nathan’s face was in his hands, and he was crying amongst a sea of strangers. The white of Eve’s teeth flashed as a broad smile stretched her lips.
*
In my craven state of anguish, I staggered over to the cemetery, which was within eyesight of the nursing home. I’m not sure what kind of city planner would do such a thing, dangling such a reminder of death in front of those who have the most reason to fear it, but it seemed to ring true alongside every other heartless facet of this world I’d been cast into.
I needed to see for myself the proof of what Gladys had told me, that Cammie had drowned at the age of five. It was a large cemetery, and the lightly falling snow collecting against the gravestones made them even harder to read, but somehow I knew right where to go. Cammie was buried in the same space her mother Miriam had been in my world, and now her mother occupied the grave beside her.
Never before have words struck me so powerfully as the ones I saw on Cammie Wheeler’s gravestone. I was fragile, yes, but they obliterated me completely, forcing me to collapse into a teary heap and crawl against the frozen ground. I touched her name and knew in my heart that my last chance of seeing Nathan was gone forever.
There was nothing more heart-rending than the epitaph chiseled into stone that memorialized the loss of such a brilliant girl at so young an age. It is the fate of every rose given that its life be cut short.
There was nowhere for me to go, nothing for me to do but bawl my hysterical eyes out. At least this desolate, morbid place would allow me the solitude to grieve for Cammie, myself, and my intractable separation from Nathan, but then I suddenly realized even the solace of being alone had been revoked.
