The Day Before Forever (14 page)

“Rebecca?”

I squinted up at Henley.

“Thank you for humoring me,” he said.

After a round of photos, Henley thanked the man and retrieved the camera. He stuck it in the backpack.

“Do you want to get something to eat soon?” Henley asked.

We ducked into the shade of one of the nearby tents. It was a face-painting one, filled with kids asking for princesses, mermaids, and Batman on their faces.

We had been playing carnival games like the ring toss for the better half of the last hour. Henley won most of them, but I beat him during the sack race, so all was forgiven. Henley also continued taking photos throughout the festival until the camera ran out.

“Sure. I was just getting hungry.”

Henley and I scanned the food carts near us.

“Any idea of what you want to eat?” he asked.

We continued walking to see the various food carts. We
passed giant pretzel stands, cotton candy trollies, and popcorn pushcarts. My mouth was watering thinking of all the different possible sweet and salty flavors.

“I think I'll go with a hot dog,” I said, spying a cart selling gourmet hot dogs with every possible topping a person could think of.

Henley handed me five pounds to give to the woman selling the hot dogs. Wrapped in tinfoil, it was warm in my hands. It smelled absolutely delicious, but I wanted to wait for Henley to get something.

“What are you thinking of getting?”

Henley was already talking to the owner of another cart, and he was waiting for his food.

“I got a corn dog,” he said. “It's a similar thing, but an amazing idea. Imagine a sausage wrapped in something like corn bread . . .”

I shook my head. Henley's amazement at the simplest things would never cease to amuse me.

“And it comes on a stick!” Henley looked pleased when it was handed to him.

“We should probably find shade to eat,” I said.

The sun was hotter than usual today, or maybe we felt it more because we hadn't spent too much time outdoors in a while. I felt it most on the back of my head, which was blazing hot to the touch.

So Henley and I walked until we came to a square granite stone jutting from the sidewalk. The top was flattened and polished. It was one stone of many in a row. They were all set evenly apart, dotting the sidewalk by tall buildings that blocked off the
sun. I didn't know if they were actually supposed to be benches, but I saw that other people were sitting on them, and one stone seemed to comfortably fit two people easily.

“Here?”

Henley sat to my left at such an angle that to see his face when talking to him, I'd have to turn my whole body a little.

“This corn dog is
divine
.” He stretched out the word.

“You're eating already?”

“Wasn't that the plan?”

“I mean you're not waiting for me.”

“Everything's better when it's still hot.”

I followed suit and unwrapped my hot dog. I took a bite and relished the warmth of the sausage, how it was a little salty but tasted just right with the sweetness of the ketchup and the little kick of the onions and peppers.

“Exactly what I needed,” I mumbled.

“I never thought of warm food as a privilege before.” Henley laughed, setting down his food momentarily.

“It's always the little things . . .”

And it was always the little things that made the biggest difference when you traveled from one time to the next. It was the little things that you missed and—thinking of Henley in the grocery store—it was the little things that you were astounded by.

“What was it like being married?” My question came out more abruptly than I had hoped.

Henley looked a bit taken aback and then proceeded to wring his hands. “It wasn't that different from not being married, truthfully. Part of the reason it felt like that was probably because Eliza was a friend from before, and I didn't see her
differently after we were married.”

“I suppose it wasn't a conventional marriage?” I only said this because it lasted so briefly.

“No, not really,” he said. “But it was a good one. It worked.”

I knew it had been dear, sweet Eliza, but the thought of Henley married to another person was . . . strange, to say the least. I couldn't get it out of my head. “You two slept in the same bed.”

Henley scratched his neck. “Well, yes, for a bit when we were first married . . . Don't give me that look. Nothing went on! Eliza's health was much too fragile for
that
.”

I wasn't aware I had been giving him a look.

“And besides, like I said, I didn't see her like that. She was like a younger sister. I married her to give her a home. To protect her . . . and also to save me from marrying her sister, of course.”

Henley tried to make a joke out of that point, but I was far from laughing.

“And what happened after that?”

“Well, Eliza's health declined.”

“And?”

“And she died,” he said bluntly.

“And then?”

“And then? Then I lived alone.”

“In the rebuilt house in the country?” I asked.

“No. In the house in the city.”

I was confused. I remembered Henley telling me the house in the country was his favorite and that he had never cared for the house in the bustling city much.

“The country home . . . had too many memories. Memories
of you. Even when I had it rebuilt, your ghost was still there.”

After he said that, I couldn't ask any more questions. We sat in a comfortable silence until Henley felt ready to talk again.

“What do you miss the most?” Henley said.

There was a beat before I said, “Pardon?”

“I'm sorry . . . It's just that I've never really asked how it was where you came from. We always talk about my time, but I've never asked much about yours.”

“Does it really matter?” My words came out more downhearted than I intended.

“Yes. Yes, it does,” Henley said intensely. “I want to know. I want to know about you, where you came from . . . all of it. I want to understand the context you grew up in.”

“I've changed since then.”

“I still want to know.”

“Okay then . . .” I didn't know where to start. “The last time I remember it being
my
time was 1954 . . . I was eleven and still playing with dolls. That was the type of girl I was. I knew I was much too old for them, but I couldn't let go. And . . . what else do you want to know?” I took a bite out of my hot dog. Somehow, after starting this conversation, the hot dog tasted less good to me.

Henley was thoughtful. “Did you have any siblings?”

“No,” I said. Then, more carefully, “Not that I remember.”

Henley chewed on his corn dog. “What were your parents like? Was your father anything like mine?”

“My father . . . ,” I began. In truth, when I said those words, a specific scene came to mind.

It was dinnertime and my father came home—it must have
been from work, though I couldn't remember what work he did. My father would come in through the front door, take his hat off, hook it up, take his trench coat off, hook it up—in the winter it was a dark wool coat; black, maybe?—and come into the kitchen to kiss my mother.

That was what I remembered when I spoke the words “my father.” Not a face. This man I remembered didn't even
feel
like my father.

“He loved my mother,” I said. It was as if I were sitting there, trying to deduce a stranger's character by his actions. Only this wasn't a stranger. It was my father.

Henley let it go, choosing instead to finish the rest of his corn dog in one bite. “And your mother?”

“She was beautiful,” I said. Not because I remembered her face, but because I remembered other women—many of them my mother's friends from some club or other—telling me so.

“Then that's something you kept from them,” Henley said. “They must have been wonderful parents.”

“I-I don't remember.” It was strange. I didn't feel any sort of love toward these shadow people in my—or more accurately, Cynthia's—memories. I actually didn't feel
any
sort of emotion toward them. I felt ambivalent.

“It must be difficult,” Henley said. “Forgetting, I mean.”

“It's not really forgetting.” It was hard to explain. “Forgetting implies you knew it before. Me . . . Well, I feel like a completely different person. Cynthia isn't me, so in a way, I feel completely fine not knowing her memories.”

“Cynthia.” Henley breathed.

It hit me that this was the first time Henley had heard my
original name.

“Yes, Cynthia.” It was silly, but I felt nervous. For some reason, though it wasn't mine anymore, I wanted him to like the name.

“Cynthia . . . Do you remember your last name?”

I shook my head.

“No matter,” Henley said. “Cynthia.” He was still trying it out on his tongue.

I liked the way he said it. It sounded sweeter in his voice. Less uncertain than in mine.

“I'm not sure it suits you, but I like the name,” he said.

“A lot of things changed when Miss H—your mother—came.”

“And yet you don't speak of her in disgust.”

I turned so I could better see Henley's face and read his expression. “What do you mean?”

“She pulled you out of your life and changed you forever so you couldn't return to it. Most people would despise a person like that.”

“You don't understand,” I said. “She was my stability. The only person I had—”

“Only because she made it that way. I don't know why you don't find that disgusting. She took everything you had—”

“It's different,” I said quietly. “She had her reasons too, you know. Everyone does.”

“It must have been hellish to get used to that life.”

“Miss Hatfield was one of the few comforts I had. She taught me everything I know now.”
Even if I had no intention of passing on that knowledge
, I thought. Still, I wished I could consult
her on our current situation. I just had to hope that Miss Hatfield truly
had
taught me everything I needed to know. “Other things are much harder as an immortal.”

“Such as?”

My remaining hot dog had gone cold . . . not that I had any appetite left. I poked it once before wrapping it back up in the tinfoil to save for later.

“Such as taking care not to form attachments,” I said. I sounded like Miss Hatfield.

“Attachments? Like me?”

“It wasn't supposed to happen like this.”

“I'm glad it did, though.” Henley's hand found its way toward mine and lingered atop my fingers. “You'll never be alone anymore once I become an immortal. I'll always be by your side like I am now.”

There was a crash as one of the food carts near us fell over. The poor old man running it was yelling at someone in the crowd while he picked up packs of chips.

I pulled my fingers away from Henley. “I-I don't think I can stand by and watch that happen.”

“What do you mean, Rebecca?”

“I wouldn't wish immortality on anyone. Least of all you,” I said. “Don't you see? You of all people should know what it does. You can never
stay
. You can never build a life. You're left without a time to belong to.”

“And what of that? We can wander together then.”

The thought of having Henley forever . . . I shook my head. I couldn't be blinded by that. He wasn't getting it.

“Your life loses meaning without death,” I said. “I don't
want that for you.”

“And you're also not understanding. I'm not going to lose you again. I'm not going to let you walk away from me again.”

“Henley, I don't want this for you.”

“I'm not asking for permission anymore. You need someone. You can't go on like this—even you know that. And I need you.”

There was a break in our conversation, as I didn't know what to say next.

“What were you thinking of doing?” Henley asked. His voice was soft. “You know you have to leave this time period soon. Your body just can't take it. Were you thinking of leaving me behind too?”

“I-I don't know. I wasn't thinking that far.” And it was true. I had been so focused on the fact that I had finally gotten Henley back—with a body too—that the thought of me leaving hadn't crossed my mind. “Maybe I could leave and come back . . .”

“And what then? You'd keep doing that until my life in this body is over?” Henley tightly crumpled the trash in his lap. “People would notice you not aging.”

“I don't care—”

“
I
care.” Henley's gaze held my eyes. “You'll be alone again after I'm gone. But this time,
truly
alone. No one deserves that.”

The irony was that we were back to where we had started. In 1904, I had been forced to leave because I was immortal and Henley wasn't. This wasn't any different.

“No one deserves giving up their life either,” I said.

“This? You call this a life? I don't
exist
to anyone in this time period except you. I'm the man everyone glimpses while passing on the street but never talks to. I might as well not be
there.”

“Turning you immortal won't fix that . . . if anything it'll only intensify it. You won't be able to connect with anyone—”

“As if I connect with people now,” Henley scoffed. “But at least we'll have each other.”

“You just . . . you don't understand.” I stood up and Henley stood up with me.

“You're right. I don't,” he said.

“Being immortal is like . . . It's like reliving a year of your life forever. You're never going to change. Things only change around you, but you can't even stay to watch that happen. You're always leaving people behind.”