by A M Russell
‘You believe me?’ I feeling a little put out that she isn’t gobsmacked with surprize. But then I meet her eyes, and see the bright glow of childlike amazement. She is both boggled and challenged by her own memory and logic at the same time. A regular genius. Marcia doesn’t need to waste time going through the preliminaries to get to the ultimate conclusion. She has already arrived. I am just as fast. But I don’t have the capacity for remembering all facts; that is Marcia’s speciality.
‘The alternate version of this house; is it indistinguishable from this one or not?’
‘There are differences,’ I said, ‘there are always things that are similar but not quite the same.’
‘Give me an example.’
‘I could be something like the shape of something. Like say, a rounded vase instead of a straight one. Or the colour of a smaller object could be different.’
‘How do you know all this? You must have swotted it up pretty recently.’
‘I…. think I must know it from a long time ago. It’s just been dormant until today.’
‘And Cloud Field?’ she stared away from me then, and I felt lost, ‘do you remember what you said to me at the pool?’
‘I…. don’t know. I want to know but I’m not sure if it’s right…. Marcia, I’m sorry.’
She turned back to me, tears in her eyes. ‘You mustn’t apologise. That is in the remit of the bastards who locked us in that experiment for all that time. But I remember all the times you were with me by that pool. I hide them all in my heart Jared. You know I do.’
‘Forgive me.’ I said and reached out to her.
‘I do.’ She kissed me again, ‘there is nothing we can do about it. I will just remember.’
‘Please tell me.’ I begged her, ‘Please say those things word of word. Then I will say them again. And keep saying them.’
‘Do you want that? Your alternate self…. laid bare?’
‘I suppose I do. I don’t want to miss something because I didn’t understand what had actually happened between us from your point of view.’
‘You would do that?’ She looked into my eyes, ‘you would do this, for me?’
‘Yes…. anything for you Eve.’
‘Jay I Love you. I have loved you from the first time I met you. I loved you when you had other girls, and even when I had other men. Do you see? I was avoiding you. I was running away too. And now I’ll stop running. In all those times there were two things that stood out the most; one was your tenderness….and the way you….’ In the dim light I couldn’t see if she was blushing or not.
‘Tell me more.’
‘And then you said something….’ She stopped.
‘What? Tell me. I can tell you again.’ I tried to get her to face me. But she resisted.
‘You will think that I have the power to trick you. I could say anything, and you have only my word for it….’ She looked at me again, confusion clouding her hazel eyes.
‘I don’t need to know. Because I think I already know. I think I asked you to come home with me. To stay with me. I asked you…. If you would bind yourself to me?’
‘Yes….’ Marcia’s eyes were alive again.
And together we spoke those same words “Will you bind yourself to Me?”
There on the edges of memory was the trace of gold, a sparkle of something. I struggled to remember. It seemed so important.
‘I was swimming in the pool. There was just me and you. And then…. I dived down to see the rocks at the bottom……and, and…. I brought something to the surface.’ Here I was struggling, ‘Please tell me.’
‘You brought something to the surface.’ Marcia continued, ‘And you gave it to me.’
‘Wait! Yes… I think I recall something. Something bright. The sunlight on the water. No, in the water, from the bottom of the pool. Something small. Something Gold!’
Marcia pushed something she had been holding into my hands.
‘What is it?’
‘Open it.’
It was a small drawstring bag. We eased apart and out of the little bag spilled six small glowing stones. They had a heart of fire that was more than just reflected. Red gold. Beautiful gems from Summerland.
‘Six? Oh dear God Marcia! Six times!’
‘Yes.’
‘Why are you so patient?’
‘A little faith goes a long way.’ She said.
‘Then….’ I could feel my chest getting tight with nerves, ‘I want to complete the set. Marcia Anne Eve Ellis…. Please, please Marry me?’
She jumped up and dragged me to my feet. The little gems glowed on the bench like miniature fairy lights.
‘Will all my heart I will say Yes! Yes…. yes…. yes!’
We kissed and kissed until I simply had to breathe. ‘I have an exhibition in May,’ I said while kissing her again, ‘the next painting becomes a gem for you. A ring fit for a lady!’
‘I know a good designer.’ She said, ‘they wanted to make something to order for me. But I think this would be right.’
‘A friend?’
‘Yes. She’s wanted to make a special piece for me for a while. I made a lot of chocolate fudge cake for her birthday.’
‘I glad she liked it. Shall we tell anyone?’
‘Oo err. I hadn’t honestly thought about that.’ Marcia carefully gathered up the little gems into the bag again.
‘Well; can I tell Laura?’ I asked her.
‘Can I tell Davey?’ Marcia looked at me, and suddenly squeezed my hand; ‘Who is going to tell your sister?’
‘Which one?’ I said and kissed her neck through a foam of chocolate bubbled hair. She wriggled round and looked at me, then broke into a smile. ‘If they don’t notice what’s happened,’ she said, ‘they’re all being thick. I vote for act casual and tell only when questioned.’
‘Okay.’ I said.
‘Okay it is….’ She seemed so bright, ‘just one thing before we go back in….’
‘What is it?’
‘Will you come to my room later?’
‘Yes, whatever you wish for…. it’s yours.’
‘Don’t look so terrified! I’m not the sex mad woman everyone thinks I am. Let’s cuddle, and talk. You seem kind of exhausted. Anyway it seems a bit weird, with parents here and such.’
‘I don’t think they will be jumping down my throat about it. I am actually a grown up.’
‘Only just sweetheart. Boys and men…. Same thing.’
‘I agree…. I do. So when?’
‘Eleven. Well elevenish. And no pressure Jared…. I really think you need to sleep. You look knackered!’
‘I’m happy… and knackered,’ I said, ‘and in need of a really stiff drink’
‘I’ll find the tequila.’ She kissed me yet again. So sweet and womanly; and open and expressive in her affections. Arm in arm we went back inside.
*****
Four
I could hear something in the distance. A faraway sound. I cracked open an eye. I was laid diagonally across the bed with the quilt tangled around my waist and legs. I saw that the window had been opened. It was Spring. I remembered it now. There was something significant about the day, somewhere in my mind a ripple of thought travelled outwards. Then my brain reminded me where I was. I rolled over and felt the blood warmth on the sheets vacated a moment ago. Marcia. I was in the room that Karis often stayed in when she was here. Karis had elected to use a guest room at the other end of the house this time. Then I thought of the time.... What was it? My watch was missing. What happened? Last night? I came up here.... Oh! I think I talked a load of nonsense while Marcia tried to get me to sit still. Eventually she had pinned me down and kissed me, so I couldn't talk. I guess I just crumpled then; all that tension for months. It was blurry and indistinct. I had been drinking. I make a morbid drunk; and Marcia decided to cut open the wound. I think she's either glad of what happened, or wondering what she's taken on. I feel overwhelmed by her acceptance, and that strange alchemy that makes me fee
l compelled to confess all to her. What is she? I am utterly disarmed.
With a sudden shock, I realised I've got nothing on below the waist either. I really don't know what she did with me. I felt bad for not remembering. I rolled over onto my stomach, and then curled right up again in a foetal position. I closed my eyes and listened to the sounds from the garden and the distant peel rising and falling as it transmutes on the breeze into a sound of the gong in a temple high on a mountain.
Marcia crept back with two mugs of tea. I didn't quite register anything until she characteristically rolled me over towards her. Marcia knows what she wants; but she also knows how I'm feeling: fragile like ice on top of a lake. Do we know what is happening? Marcia ran her hand down my cheek, and then to my neck and chest. She circled her palm over my heart. I wish I knew why I was being rewarded with this magnificent creature.
'I bring Tea....' Marcia whispered, 'Jared? Are you awake, or is it a hangover?'
'What? No hangover...' I look upwards as she bends over me, 'You really have the most beautiful curls you know; like chocolate ribbons. I want to know If....'
'Shh.... It's fine. And no, we are still technically "waiting for the right moment".'
'Technically?' I know I'm being a bit thick. At least down by 20 IQ points until I sober up completely.
She slid out of the robe she was wearing and back under the quilt. ‘Drink your tea.’ She said holding the cup towards me. I sat up, and bunched the quilt round me. I guess I was feeling cold or a bit unnerved by her. Marcia had always been very unselfconscious, and didn’t suffer the pangs of embarrassment that the rest of suffered if someone saw us with our clothes off. I took the cup and sipped the scalding liquid gratefully. My head was beginning to ache now that I was upright. Marcia put her cup down and slid her arms around me.
‘I want to try some more of that thing you do.’ she said.
‘Which thing was that?’ I was trying to put my cup down too.
‘That’s alright.’ Said Marcia and took it from me, ‘we have plenty of time.’
‘I think I am getting a hangover now.’ I said, trying not to sound too pathetic.
‘It’s ok. I’ll just hold you for a while,’ she pulled me under the quilt, ‘come here and don’t wriggle about; or I may decide to be a little more forceful.’
‘Oh? Why is that?’
‘Because, you gorgeous man… you turn me on. And although I have principles about not taking advantage of my hosts hospitality, or their dear son; I might not be able to resist you.’
‘You don’t want to take advantage of me?’ I really hadn’t got used to this.
‘Jared…. I love you,’ she pulled me towards her, until my head was resting on her shoulder, ‘you need to relax; just feel safe. Listen to the quietness; forget about the time. This place is warm…. And we’re not fighting every day to just stay ahead of the weather, or other things….’
‘That’s true.’ I mumbled. I felt as if I was floating in warm water. She breathed so lightly and softly, limbs warm, melding into me. I wasn’t exactly in any state of readiness. But that warm sweet tension of being wrapped around with her scent and aliveness, began to unknot the unpleasant sensation of tension in the pit of my stomach. I hadn’t been aware of carrying it around all this time. I must have been hovering between sleep, and a languid half-awake state when Marcia touched her fingertips to my lips.
‘Jay? Do you want to stay here? We can get out of bed soon…. or later.’
‘I Love You Eve…. why are you so good?’ I felt the curls of her hair against my face, like curled fronds of a summer meadow.
‘I am good because you make it so.’ she said, ‘No one else can make anything happen. I am here now, only because of you. I wouldn’t have stayed on the team. I stayed to be with you….’
I could feel something shift inside. Was it a certain common ground of knowledge? Probably not. My memory had more holes in it than a Swiss cheese. The Ice and snow had made me crave warmth. Yet I craved the cold all the more too. I had wanted to feel again. She was full of feeling, and moments and nuances of thought, like the colours of light as they change throughout the day. Could I paint her portrait…? how could I choose what light or what setting? But she made me feel. So much….so very, very much. So much that it made my head spin. Definitely was hitting the hangover by that point.
‘I don’t want to…. But I think I better get up soon…. Experience tells me that the cure for this, is copious amount of tea, and some breakfast.’ I squinted sideways to see what her expression was saying. She was smiling in a calm way, her eyes filled with a strange peace. That was it…. That light; soft, diffuse. And that smile…. I committed it to memory.
‘Will you let me draw you?’ I asked suddenly.
‘Yes. But when?’
‘When we get back to London?’
‘That’s good for me.’ Marcia sat up then, ‘do you want me to be your life model?’
‘I err…. hadn’t been thinking of that exactly. But that would be…. amazing.’
‘Yes!’
‘You have those sorts of curves that should be expressed with line and tone. Traced with a soft pencil.’ I ran my hand over her hip and waist, and up round her shoulder, ‘Voluptuous, yet athletic build…. The best to draw.’
‘How warm is your studio?’
‘I have a heater…. And I suppose I could find a comfortable place for you to recline.’
‘No one has reclined…. for you to draw before?’
‘No.’
‘Do you let anyone in the studio?’
‘No.’
‘But you want me to see what you get up to?’
‘Yes.’
‘I am honoured then.’
‘No…. you are making my strange world a different place. It needs to be a different place…. you know that I will get obsessed with your hair and your bosom and the swelling of the hip line….an exclusive beauty; I think I want to paint you.’
‘I don’t mind your obsession. I was always rather obsessed in my job too.’
‘The perfect chocolate cake?’
‘Exactly!’ she laughed in an easy joyful way, ‘and other things too. Come on sleepyhead, let’s go and find you some toast and marmalade.’
I huddled in my coat. There was a chill in the air; the clouds had obscured the sun and it was one of those afternoons that were back in winter again. I zigzagged along the path. The others where way ahead of me. Marcia stopped and turned and waited for me to catch up.
‘Come on. We’re nearly there.’
‘I’m not in the mood for this.’ I grumbled, ‘why do we have to walk there?’
‘Because the track is too narrow for a car, and too bumpy for a bike.’ Marcia tried to catch my eye.
‘I’ll catch you up.’ I said.
Marcia didn’t react. She just smiled and held out a hand. I scrambled up the next bit of path. She slid her hand into mine, and we continued up the uneven track at a slower pace.
A little further along it opened out. The others were there. Leo saw me and came forwards; ‘Hey Jared.’ He smiled easily, ‘Come and see this.’
I went forward and joined him. In front of us, was the most curious sight.
Jules stood a little way from us with a clip board. He looked at me over his glasses, and grinned in an excited way. In the misty indistinct air beyond him was a swirling, spiralling disturbance that appeared to glow slightly in the dim overcast light. Then Sam and Kyle turned and greeted me. I saw George bent over a camping table just inside an awning. He looked up as Jules passed me and started to walk down a small incline into a little glade surrounded by a belt of heavy dark trees.
Leo and I followed him. In the bowl of this treeless space was what I can only describe as a special ripple on the surface of the space. It was if it was painted on….and yet it moved periodically. The glow was all around. It was kept from us by the safe distance in front of us, of a taped off area. Janey was sitting on a bench in a little covered vi
ewing area. And there; turning and greeting me was my old friend Aiden! He shook Leo’s hand in a rather formal way. Perhaps he was a little nervous of him.
‘Tell us Mr Lee…what is happening here?’ Leo’s voice was quiet, yet penetrating. Aiden looked startled to be so addressed. I think he had forgotten who he was for a moment.
‘Err…. yes. It’s Aiden. Aiden; if you don’t mind. I have a little trouble with surnames. A lot of us do…. erm. sorry. Can I call you Leo?’
‘I’d rather you did.’ Leo inclined his head slightly; that odd little gesture of respect, from another place in time, ‘I too am at odds with the use of surnames and other such titles….in a traditional human sense.’
‘I suppose you mean in human tradition?’ Aiden’s expression was writ with a question that he was perhaps too polite to ask. Something he sensed about my father. But then he had known me a long time; in the Sandglass experiment, as well as for a time before that. Aiden was usually more confident than this. I wondered what had set him in this frame of mind. He came forward and gave me a rib squeezing hug. ‘Good to see you; old friend.’ He said quickly; then…. ‘I will go and get Ellen in a minute. Is Marcia here?’
‘She’s in the tent with George.’ I pointed back up the slope.
‘Who else is here?’
‘Laura Jones; Karis Arden, and a policeman Mr Morel.’
‘What about Oliver?’
‘Laura did speak to him this morning on the phone. He is on his way here.’
‘Driving?’ Aiden was smiling in an amused way.
‘Of course.’ I said.
‘Look, Janey’s got the readings for the morning. She can explain them. I will meet you back up there in about ten minutes. George will take over in half an hour and then I can tell you more in the main tent. We have tea and chocolate biscuits.’
‘Is anyone else here?’ I asked as Leo went over to stand near Janey and Jules.
‘You mean from my team?’ Aiden seemed worried.
‘Yes of course….’
‘They all appear to be void cases; except Ruben. And he’s refused to get involved for now.’ Aiden glanced at Janey, ‘You seem to have gained complete retention. Even I hear Andrew?’
