Across the Winds of Time (25 page)

I froze. Sara cocked her head with interest. “Really?”

A dull red flush crept up Darius’s face. He dropped his gaze for an instant and raised a self-deprecating hand.

“Please, ladies. I have never aspired to the stage in my life. I am a simple carpenter.”

“No, I think someone in the movies,” said Laura as she cocked her head and studied him.

“Moovees?” Darius repeated the word slowly. I shot him a warning look, but his attention was on Laura.

“What about that one actor? The one in that one movie set in... Where? It was a western. A romance.” Laura turned to her sister. “You should know, Cynthia. You love romances.”

“I don’t know which one you’re talking about, Laura dear, but I can see Darren as the lead of a romantic western.” She beamed again while he fidgeted in his seat.

“Would you like to see what we got for the house today?” I piped in with an overly bright smile. “Why don’t I just go get our bags and then you can tell me what you think of our rugs and curtains and stuff? Could you help me, Darren?”

I jumped up with an urgent look in Darius’s direction. He rose without hesitation and strode down the porch to the stairs.

“Well, this is getting awkward,” I mumbled under my breath as I opened the trunk.

“I admit to feeling somewhat...inspected. It is as if my...nieces...seem to know what I look like?” He ducked under the trunk hood to reach for bags.

“Of course, they know what you look like, Darius. I told you there was a photograph of you in their box of family photos. You still had the mustache, of course, so I think they haven’t recognized you...yet.” An imp urged me on. “And Cynthia practically swooned over it...if that’s still a word today.”

Darius lifted his head and hit it on the hood.

“Ow!” he muttered, rubbing a spot on his head with his free hand. “Swoon, indeed,” he fumed.

I crossed my arms. “Oh, yes. Cynthia has had a crush on you for years. As did her mother.”

A dull red stain colored his cheeks. “Good gravy!”

“I’ll say,” I muttered.

Darius straightened with all of the bags, and I grabbed several from him.

“I was thought to be quite homely in my youth,” he murmured.

I turned to eye him, modern in clothing but still Victorian in speech. “I find that hard to believe.” I stalled. “Are you all right with all these questions from the women? Is there anything I can do to help?”

Darius met my gaze. The flat expression in his eyes almost brought me to my knees.

“I am holding up reasonably well. I can manage. It is not for too long at any rate.”

He turned and moved away.

“Darius, please,” I whispered almost to myself.

He paused. His back stiffened, and then he stepped forward without a backward glance.

I looked skyward for a moment, my hands too full to attempt to wipe my eyes. As soon as the quick tears receded, I plastered a smile on my face and hurried back to the porch.

An hour later, the ladies left, and I announced I was going to make supper on the new stove that was now functional—according to Darius.

“What do you think about grilled cheese sandwiches? I may not be much of a cook, but I can whip a few of those up!”

Sara looked up from the kitchen table where she read a magazine and sipped a cup of fresh coffee from the newly purchased coffee pot.

“Sounds good.”

“Dariu-Darren?” I called. He had gone into the basement, and the door stood open.

I heard his footsteps on the stairs. When his head emerged, I marveled again at how charming he looked in modern day denim.

“Would you like a grilled cheese sandwich for dinner?”

Darius wiped his hands on a rag.

“Grilled cheese?”

Sara’s head lifted. I winced.

“Do you mean melted cheese?”

“Haven’t you ever had a grilled cheese sandwich?” Sara asked.

“Yes, yes, of course. We called them melted cheese in our house.” Darius wiped his hands more vigorously. “Yes, that sounds lovely. I will be downstairs. Call me when supper is ready.”

He made a hasty escape, and Sara turned to me.

“Is it just me, or is there something distinctly odd about that man?”

“Hmmm?” I turned away and bustled about in the kitchen, pretending not to hear. I relished the increased brightness of the lighting with the new wiring, but at the moment, I could have used a little more shadow on my face.

“Nothing,” Sara muttered. I stole a glance at her from under my lashes. She continued to stare at the empty door leading to the basement with a frown marring her usually happy face.

To his credit, Darius bit into the sandwich as if he’d been eating them all his life. He didn’t scrunch his nose or bat an eyelash when he tasted the processed American cheese—a product I was certain did not exist in the late nineteenth century. He happily snacked on the potato chips which accompanied his sandwich, pausing often to wipe his fingers on a paper napkin.

I watched Sara watch Darius but relaxed when I saw that Darius had the situation under control. He’d become quite the expert at subterfuge—as had I. I kept my attention on my food, unwilling to see Darius go through the pretense of smiling at me without really smiling.

Hours later, I still lay in bed wide awake, thinking about Darius and wishing I could creep downstairs to see him. I imagined marriage to him and all the complications that process might involve such as birth certificates and identification. I continued to shy away from any thoughts of children though, still unable to cope with the unknown.

Sara slept soundly beside me, and I envied Sara her fairly uncomplicated life of career as a teacher, engagement to a successful attorney, and mutual plans to have three children, one within the first year. No human life was without its difficulties, but Sara’s life came very close to near perfection. She worked hard at stability, much like our father, a retired college professor of economics. I took after my mother—a dreamer, an artist who taught art history at the local community college when she felt like it.

I rolled on my side into the fetal position and sighed. I missed my mother and wished I could talk to her. But they were out of reach on the cruise.

I shrugged mentally. I couldn’t discuss Darius with my mother at any rate, but it would have been nice to hear her voice.

Sara turned over and mumbled something unintelligible. I closed my eyes and hoped for sleep.

****

It seemed as if only moments had passed when I smacked my alarm clock to stop its incessant beeping and rolled out of bed, certain that I had not slept at all.

“Why is that thing going off?” Sara mumbled from under the covers.

“The plumber is coming this morning,” I answered as I fumbled in my dresser for a T-shirt and shorts and dragged them on. The breeze coming into the now sunny room felt wonderfully warm, and I welcomed the chance to wear shorts instead of the usual jeans suitable for cooler Pacific Northwest summers.

“You can sleep in if you want,” I murmured. “There’s no hurry to get up.” I left the room and paused in the hallway to listen for Darius. Dishes clattered in the kitchen, and I ran into the bathroom to rinse my face and brush my teeth before tripping down the stairs.

“Good morning,” I said breathlessly as I stepped into the kitchen. I caught my breath. Darius, in his light blue denim shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, continued to make my heart flutter.

“Good morn—” Darius turned from the stove and stopped short, his gaze riveted on my legs. “What in the world are you wearing?”

I looked down at my knobby knees.

“What? Shorts.” I looked back at him and saw a dull red stain on his cheeks. He looked away quickly and returned to stirring something in a saucepan on the stove. His back was rigid as he spoke to me.

“I would say they are very short, indeed. Do you sleep in those?”

I dropped my gaze to my shorts again.

“Sleep in these? No. They’re just shorts.”

“Do you mean to say you wear those in public?” Darius’s hand stilled, but he didn’t turn around.

“Well, yes, of course. This is the twenty-first century, Darius. We get to do a lot of things that women couldn’t do in the nineteenth century. Thank goodness,” I mumbled the last words.

“So it would seem,” he muttered.

“I heard that,” I retorted. Feeling somehow semi-naked, I stepped behind him to open the refrigerator in search of something to drink.

“Good,” he threw back. “I am preparing hot chocolate. Would you like a cup?”

I stiffened. I should say no, I thought.

“Sure.” I turned a shoulder on him and went to stand at the back door looking out onto the fields beyond, doing everything in my power to prevent myself from running upstairs and switching the shorts for jeans.

“The plumber should be here soon,” I muttered.

“Yes.”

I refused to look at him. Fine! If that’s how he was going to be...

“Some of the supplies should be delivered today. I’m not sure which,” I tried again.

“Good.”

I took a deep breath to loosen my jaw.

“You have lovely limbs. I always wondered...”

Startled, I swung my head to look at him, but he continued to stir the saucepan. The lobes of his ears beneath his chestnut hair glowed red. The corner of his mouth twitched. He raised his head and looked at me, the twinkle back in his blue eyes—at least for the moment.

“Thank you, Darius,” I choked, holding back a laugh. “So do you.”

“Nonsense.” He turned away to pour the hot chocolate into two cups. A third cup stood by. “Does your sister still sleep?” He kept his back to me for a moment. I sighed. It seemed as if I’d seen more of his back than his face over the last few days.

“Yes. She always liked to sleep in—ever since she was a little girl.”

I gazed at the curve in the small of his back, emphasized by the cut of his jeans. We’d forgotten to order a belt, I realized. Against my will—or maybe propelled by my will—I moved toward him and wrapped my arms around his waist, pressing my face against his back.

“I love you, Darius,” I murmured against his back.

Darius stiffened. I closed my eyes and savored the moment, fully expecting rejection. Warm hands covered mine.

“I love you, too, Molly. That will never change.” He raised the palm of my right hand to his lips before pulling out of my arms and striding past me out of the kitchen.

With an agonizing ache in my chest, I stared at the empty doorway. I heard the front door open and close—the sound so final—a wall between us.

“Oh, no, you’re not, mister,” I whispered as I roused myself out of self-pity. “I’m not letting you go.”

I ran through the living room and wrenched open the front door. Darius leaned against the railing on the porch. He didn’t turn around to face me.

I came to stand at his side but did not touch him.

“Darius. Please don’t walk away from me. I hate that. Don’t run from what is wrong with us. Stay and fight. Fight for me, fight with me. I don’t care which. Just stay.”

Darius dropped his head for a moment. His shoulders sagged as if my words took the fight out of him instead of challenging him.

“I cannot change what I am, Molly.”

“I don’t want you to change.” I quirked an eyebrow. “Well, I’ll admit to wishing you were...not as complicated as you appear to be, but I love you just the way you are.”

He turned to me then, the blue in his eyes darker than I’d seen. He took my hands in his and pulled me to face him.

“I would fight for you for the rest of my life if I thought I was the right man for you, my love—if I were not as I am.” A tremor ran through his hands. “But even I repulse myself. I shudder at the thought of what I must be.”

I moved against him, pressing myself into his arms. He held me against his chest in a tight embrace.

“How do we know you’re a ghost, Darius? Where is your tombstone? Are you buried in the cemetery?” I leaned back to watch his face.

“I do not know,” he said quietly.

“Do you remember dying?” My voice squeaked. What a stupid thing to ask. How did one remember dying?

“Molly.” He gave me a slight shake as if to snap me out of my fantasy. “Of course I do not remember dying. How could one know that? One moment, I was in the cemetery, standing over a grave, and the next moment, I was here...in your time.”

I grabbed the front of his shirt. “I know it’s crazy, but what if there is a chance that you traveled through time? A chance that you’re actually alive. Not...”

He covered my hands with his. His smile, though patient, seemed dubious.

“How would we know?” he asked with despair.

In unison, we both turned our heads toward the road at the end of the drive.

My heart began to race.

“No!” I said with an anxious look in his direction. “Absolutely not.”

“We must find out some day, Molly.” He squeezed my hands. “
I
will find out some day, Molly. Why not today?”

“Oh, no. That’s not what I meant. I don’t know what I meant, but no, no, please don’t go out there.” I gave his shirt a tug.

Darius cocked his head and bent to kiss my lips.

“If something feels wrong, then I will step back onto the property. I do not know what happens beyond the colors and the weakness. What if I wait it out? If I can make it to the road without...disappearing, that will prove that indeed I am no ghost. Perhaps you are right. Perhaps I am not...undead after all. Perhaps there is hope for us.”

He pulled my hands from his shirt and moved past me. I grabbed his hand.

“Oh, no, you don’t,” I almost growled.

No match for his strength, I felt myself in tow as Darius stepped down from the porch and onto the dirt and grass drive. Marmaduke, having watched us with curiosity from the love seat, jumped down to follow.

“Darius, please don’t do this.” I tried digging my heels in, but Darius continued moving forward. I clung to his hand with all my might.

“Come, Molly. Watch over me. I may need you if I go too far.”

“No, I don’t want you to do this. What if you can’t come back? Stay with me, Darius. Please don’t leave me.”

We reached the end of the drive, and I pulled against him.