The Other Side of Anne (15 page)

“I would not thought it possible,” he breathed.

“Me either,” Anne murmured. She squeezed his hand, pretending it was his neck. Henry’s chest rattled, and he died.

Anne decided to bury him in the courtyard, under the mural of Eliza
beth’s family tree. She, Avery and Nate dug the grave while Benjamin watched from a distance. The digging was difficult going, owing to the hard, cold ground. But at last they were done.

Nate and Benjamin sterilized the body and embalmed it, making it safe for burial. Benjamin had a coffin delivered, and the king was lowered into the ground.

“Goodbye, husband,” Anne said, and peacefulness came over her. Perhaps Benjamin had been right to grant closure.

The next morning, Avery got up early and kissed Anne on the cheek. She remained deep in slumber, and his arms and chest ached from the exertion of grave digging the day before. He went to his back yard and dug a grave about the size of loose-leaf paper. Avery hoped that Anne would stay asleep for a bit longer. Henry’s burial had given him an idea. He should bury Mandy again. The Mandy who haunted his mind with her occasional thoughts and chatter.

He unfolded the piece of paper
he brought. MANDY was written across it in blocky black letters. Avery crouched and placed the paper in the grave. He refilled the grave with dirt and marked it with rocks.

Avery
sat by the grave. “Mandy,” he said.

I’m here.

“Hey. How are you?”

Don’t make me go.

Avery swallowed.

Please d
on’t. I’ll be so lonely. No one else talks with me. Won’t you come get me?

“I am sorry,”
Avery said.

The time machines are up. You could get me, anytime before I’m shot, and let me liv
e the life I was meant to live.

“I would love to get you, honey. But...”

But what? You’re chicken?

“Fades. What if you couldn’t go anywhere or...I don’t know. Leaving history alone is best.”

You love Anne. That’s the real reason. Admit it. You’d get your biological mother if you could.

Goosebumps covered
Avery’s skin. He stood and wiped grass and dirt off his jeans. “Okay. I love Anne.”

Mandy began to reply, but Avery ignored her. He headed inside. To his future. He got undressed and curled up to Anne in bed. Kissed her
good morning.

**

The doorbell rang about eleven a.m., and Avery dragged himself out of to bed to answer it. The visitor was Nate, looking snappy in a business suit.

“Give us a few minutes,”
Avery said. He got Anne up, and they met Nate in the living room.

Nate sat and fixed an intense gaze on Anne. “I want to apologize to you, ma’am,” he said. “I truly had no idea what was happening. I would not have sanctioned it.”

“Thank you,” Anne said carefully.

Nate
sighed. “I suppose the two of you know as well as I do that very little will stop Dr. Franklin.”

“Yeah,”
Avery muttered. What was the point in meeting with Benjamin? They could hurl heavy words and threats around.
You have to stop, the machines have to be destroyed, blah blah blah.
In one ear, out the other. Benjamin would say glib words and spout glib lies.

“I’ve a plan,” Nate said. “But I will not implement it without your permission.”

Avery shifted uneasily. “Isn’t this house bugged?”

“Bugged? Oh no. No.”

Anne cocked an eyebrow. “Really? That’s nice to know.”

“Here’s my idea. When Benjamin fades next, I’ll destroy the time ma
chines. And I could destroy other items if you think it prudent.”

“What other things?” Anne asked.

“Computers. Everything. Maybe the entire building. Undo years of progress.”

“What would you do with Benjamin when he reappears?”
Avery wondered.

“That’s the big q
uestion, isn’t it?” Nate said. “Now, I’ve talked with the others. Not as bluntly as this, but enough. None of them like Benjamin. This project wasn’t what they, or I, signed up for. We were supposed to go into the past to observe history, to see events unfold. We were never supposed to interfere. I wanted to study the Borgias, and I haven’t been allowed into the past yet.” Nate turned his gaze upon Avery. “Two years after I joined, I was horrified to find out interference had already happened, with you.”

Uncomfortable swallow from Avery. “Mmm.”

“We don’t appreciate being lied to,” Nate continued. “It has to stop. We just need to wait for the next fade.” He clasped his hands together. “That’s the plan. The two of you talk it over. Call me when you’ve reached a decision.”

“Benjamin’s a smart guy,” Avery said. “Surely he has hidey-holes. Secret hiding places outside the building. He
must
go out from time to time and secrete time-machine stuff.”

“I suspect he does,” Nate agreed.

“You can try destroying,” Avery said. “But it might do more harm than good.”

“But we gotta try. Benjamin
might not think we are capable of such actions. Maybe he hasn’t hidden anything.”

**

A few weeks later, Anne surveyed her clothes and selected an outfit. She was leaving soon to drive to Avery’s farmhouse for dinner with his cousin Cindy and her husband. It would be the official “we’re in a relationship, so let’s get to know the family better” dinner. Anne was nervous, but that was to be expected.

The past
few weeks had gone by okay. Avery had spent most nights with Anne at her apartment, and no more nosebleeds had occurred. She felt fine in every way—emotionally and physically. Henry’s quick appearance and just as quick death weighed on her, and she hated Benjamin for putting her in that position. She comforted herself with the fact he would get his comeuppance one day. He had to.

B
efore Anne could leave, Nate knocked on her door.  “Hey,” he said. “It’s done. Benjamin faded, and we destroyed everything.”

“When will he be back?”

“At least not for a week, I suspect. He was gone a week last time, five years his time.”

“What will you do when he returns?”

“Talk to him. Encourage him to fit in and to live his life here. Who the hell knows? We have to play it by ear.”

“Are you sure he faded and that it was not an intentional trip?”

“All the time machines were accounted for.”

“He could have another you are unaware of.”

“Yeah. I try not to think about it.” Nate ran his hand through his hair. “I wish I’d never gotten involved with this crap. I really do. You know, it’s probably fine. If it was a time trip, he would’ve returned to the point when he left. We wouldn’t have noticed he was gone. It was a fade. We’re okay.”

**

Later that night, after Cindy and her husband left, Avery took Anne into his arms. Their tongues parried with each other long and hard. After they made love, they lay entwined. Life could not get better than this, Anne thought. This was heaven. This was her paradise.

“I wonder sometimes,” Avery said.

“Wonder what?” Anne whispered sleepily.

“If Benjamin had something hidden away. And if he did,
would that be so bad?”

“I wonder also,” Anne admitted.

“Would getting my biological mother be so horrible? Anne, you could get Mary. We’d have to figure out the fades first, but that’s doable.
Has
to be. We’d get them young. They wouldn’t have to know who they were. Best that way.”

“You did not know who you were,” Anne said. “And you were angry.”

“I got over it. If they found out, and that’s a big if, they’d get over it too. You want to get Mary. You know it. You told me so. She deserves to live a better life. A proper life.”

Air suffocated Anne
. Sometimes not having a choice was better. Elizabeth’s laughter rang in her ears, and she pictured George picking his niece up, tossing her over his shoulder. Them both laughing and laughing. “We can get them young,” Anne said. “That is true. It also means they will not be the same people.”

Avery kissed her
. “In theory,” Avery said. “In theory only, you would get Mary, right? That hasn’t changed? At what age do you think is best?”

Anne considered the question.
Getting Mary as a baby would be pointless because she would not be the same Mary Tudor who became Queen Mary I. She would not have reached unhappiness, and Anne wanted for Mary the same happiness Anne felt now.

At what age would it be best to get Mary? Perhaps while Anne was still alive. 1535, maybe. Or...

“Well?” Avery prompted.

Anne allowed a ray of sunshine to pierce her heart. A trembling, panicked ray. “In an ideal w
orld, I would get Mary in 1535,” she whispered. “She would be nineteen years old, and she could live a happy, healthy life here. She would miss her mother deeply, but Mary would adjust eventually. She would meet a man who loved her through and through. They would have babies, beautiful babies.”

“We could make it happen,” Avery said. “We could find a way. We could talk to Benjamin when he gets back. In theory. Only in theory.”

Had Charles Franklin known this would happen? Avery truly was his son even if they did not share blood.

Anne put her arms around Avery. “I love you,”
she whispered. “I love you very much.” She drew back. “Do not do this, Avery. Promise me. Please.”

“
I said it was theoretical.”

Anne
used a finger to tilt Avery’s chin up. “Nate and the others did what they did for a reason. You know that in your heart. Maybe we should move. Someplace sunny where it never snows. Somewhere far away.”

“Fine.”

“Promise you won’t talk to Benjamin about this.”

“I promise,” Avery said. “It was for fun. What’s the harm in throwing around dreams, you know? Of course we wouldn’t get
anyone. It would never end.”

Anne
touched her lips to Avery’s mouth. “You are right. You are exactly right. It would never end.”

They fell into slumber
, and Anne dreamed she talked to Benjamin and traveled to get Mary. The young woman was asleep, and Anne rubbed her awake. Mary’s eyes went wide. “Your hair!” Mary said.

Anne pressed a finger to Mary’s lips.
“Shh. You are to come with me.”

Mary gasped. “That light
behind you,” she said. “What is it?”

“Come with me and find out.” Anne helped Mary out of bed, and Mary was trembling. They stepped into the light together. “Welcome,” Anne said to
this lovely nineteen-year-old girl she had wronged beyond measure. “Welcome to the rest of your life.”

THE END

Chapter One

Celia Hall sighed, trying not to say her husband’s name, even if it was just in her mind. But she could not help it.
David. David. Where are you? There’s no excuse. It’s 10 a.m.!

Their son was five hours old, and the labor had lasted ten hours. So why was David not at the hospital yet? Yeah, he and Celia had fought. And yeah, Celia had accused David of behavior bordering on emotional abuse. She had threatened separation.

But this was a baby, their baby. Maybe Celia was not worth more to David than the plastic crap at Dollar Tree, but the baby was. David getting a hotel room had nothing to do with the child. So why was David not at the hospital yet? Celia and her mother, Lynn Zimmer, had left so many messages on David’s voice mail that it was full. The front desk clerks at the Holiday Inn probably hated Lynn’s raspy ex-smoker’s voice. No one at the law firm had seen or heard from David.

Maybe because the baby had come a couple of weeks early, it had not entered David’s mind that all the messages were about the arrival of their son. Better to believe that than other things.

Celia reached for the picture a nurse had snapped of her and the baby. “For David,” the nurse said with a sympathetic smile. Celia hardly recognized herself. She usually had a perfect part in the middle of her head for the dark hair down to her waist. Not so in the picture. From the neck up, Celia epitomized a classic horror movie damsel in distress, maybe having just fled Freddy or Jason. Manic lurked in her eyes, and her hair struggled to escape its ponytail. Red splotched her cheeks, and sweat shone everywhere on her face. She looked forty-five, not thirty, and her body was a new mother’s funhouse-mirror mixture of willowy and bulge. The photo did not show one of her prettier moments, but her son was worth it. If only she could focus on him and not on the whereabouts of his father.

Celia studied her mother, who cuddled the baby and rocked him. “You’re a good boy, good boy, yes, you are,” Lynn cooed. Celia’s mother was nearing sixty, but years of alcohol abuse, cigarette abuse, and sun worship had accelerated her aging. She was rail thin and possessed a fondness for gaudy jewelry. Today’s necklace centered around a plastic rhinoceros, courtesy of David. The guy sure did know the way to his mother-in-law’s heart.

Lynn met Celia’s eyes. “He’ll come,” Lynn said firmly. Like mother, like daughter. They would not say David’s name to each other, not yet. They would keep it unspoken that something could be gravely wrong.

But things already
were
gravely wrong.

“What the hell,” Celia muttered. Time to say the name out loud. “David doesn’t love me, Mom. Not anymore. We’re done. It’s too exhausting.”

Lynn raised a disapproving eyebrow. “You’ll work it out. Be patient.”

Anger rushed through Celia, and she forced a deep breath.
Calm down. The person you’re really mad at is David.
At least Lynn had come. At least Lynn had been with Celia when the baby was born.

“Oh, David,” Celia muttered. “Where are you?”

Her husband, of all people, was supposed to be different. He was older, fifty-six. He had salt and pepper hair and lines of wisdom crinkling his eyes. David admitted readily that he had used to sleep around but had not for years. He was done sowing his oats. Right? Perhaps not. Celia had no idea anymore what to think. If nothing had happened to David, that meant he was acting like a child, pouting and not coming to the hospital to be with his wife and new baby.

“David loves you,” Lynn persisted. “He does.”

Celia did not answer. No point. Lynn knew squat about romantic relationships. She was a busy bee who found joy in sampling countless flowers. Kind of like Oliver, David’s adult son from his previous marriage. However, Oliver was in a relationship now, if on and off seemingly every other week for one year counted as a relationship.

In any case, David had not slept in the same bed as Celia for the past three weeks. He refused to say why and barely spoke to Celia, except to criticize her or to inquire after the pregnancy. The freeze-out had begun about six months ago with no apparent cause. Was there another woman? David had said no.

David got drunk and ran away with the other woman, the mistress.

David’s
been in a car crash.

David’s
ignoring me because he thinks I’m tiresome. Because I have crazy hormones.

David’s
pulling a gigantic April Fool’s joke.

How
long should I wait before calling the police?

I’m
going to kill David.

The door opened. “Hello!” came two excited shouts and a trail of blue balloons. David’s parents. Richard and Shirley had driven the eight hours from Rhode Island to the Inova Fairfax Hospital in northern Virginia.

“Hey!” Celia smiled. David’s parents were good people, and she was glad to see them. Sometimes she had a hard time believing Shirley and Richard were eighty-two years old. They looked more alive, more energetic, than leathery Lynn.

Shirley darted for the blue bundle in Lynn’s lap. “He’s beautiful,” Shirley exclaimed, awe filling her voice.

“He’s the spitting image of David,” Lynn agreed, letting Shirley take him.

Shirley cradled the child. “He has your beautiful blue eyes, Celia.”

Thank goodness he doesn’t have Richard’s ears.
Richard was a beanpole with high, floppy ears. Shirley was her husband’s opposite, plump and barely topping five feet tall. Her hair was mostly white, but a few black skunk-like streaks survived. She and David had brown eyes, but Shirley’s tended toward friendliness, while David’s were almost always intense. No gaudy jewelry for Shirley; she would not be caught dead with a plastic rhino on her chest. Her necklace was pearl, simple and understated. She was from old Providence family money and had married Richard, a poor boy from the wrong side of the tracks.

“What’s the baby’s name?” Richard asked.

Celia shrugged. “I haven’t decided.” She liked the name Brandon for a boy; David liked the name Caleb. The baby was one of the few subjects David talked about with her in more than one-sentence or two-sentence replies. They had been discussing a compromise: Brandon Caleb Hall or Caleb Brandon Hall.

“I called the hotel right before we arrived,” Richard said. “Seems like David hasn’t been back to the room.” Richard did not ask why his son and Celia had been fighting, although the curious lilt of his voice gave his interest away.

“Did we miss Oliver?” Shirley asked.

Celia stifled a snort. David not being at the hospital was unsettling and upsetting. Oliver’s absence, on the other hand, was same old, same old. Celia and Oliver were not close. Oliver’s choice, not hers. Probably the curse of a same-age stepchild. Well, mostly same-age stepchild. Right now, Oliver was twenty-nine, but four months out of the year, they were the same age.

Celia could not resist Shirley’s beaming, expectant face. Shirley wanted good news, and by golly, she would get good news. “Oliver’s coming,” Celia murmured. “He’s out searching for David.” Oliver, like his father, had not answered his cellphone, but Celia would give her stepson the benefit of the doubt.
Be a good stepmother. The baby will need his big brother, especially if David’s out of the picture.

*****

Celia’s best friend, Janet, and her husband, Chester, stopped by and threatened to kidnap the baby because he was too adorable for words. Janet and Celia had been friends since their diaper days, and Janet was a big reason Celia had come through the past few months relatively sane.

And then Oliver appeared in the doorway. Celia blinked; could this really be her stepson? Her indifferent stepson deigning to visit her and the baby?

“Door was open,” Oliver mumbled. His voice was slightly off, and if this were just another day, Celia would not have picked up on the tremor in his words. Oliver’s brown hair, which he kept casually tousled, was now a messy bramble thicket. It hung in his eyes and reminded Celia of her own
Nightmare on Elm Street
hair in the picture with the baby.

Celia peered closer at Oliver. Was that a five o’clock shadow? And dirt and grease streaking his hair? Last but not least, why was the lower half of his left arm in a fresh cast?

“Oliver!” Shirley exclaimed. She passed the baby off to Richard and strode to her elder grandson. She placed a delicate hand on the cast and tried to look into Oliver’s avoiding eyes. “Your arm! What happened?”

Oliver muttered something, Celia had no idea what, probably a platitude to tide his grandparents over. He let Shirley brush his hair out of his eyes.

White eyes. Clear eyes. Largely uncommunicative, yes, par for the course when Oliver was around Celia. The main thing: Oliver wasn’t in pieces. He wasn’t distraught. He hadn’t been crying—and surely he would if his father was dead. Other than the cast, Oliver was fine.

No, not really. Oliver wasn’t fine at all.

Celia’s stomach became a lump of clay. David’s son had escaped whatever happened with a broken arm— and David had lost his life.
My husband is dead. Dead. And the last time we saw each other, we were angry.
Celia’s last words to David had been: “Fine. Run away! You know what that tells me? That you’re guilty. You’re hiding another woman! Is she waiting for you at the hotel?”

Oliver shuffled over to Celia’s area of the room, and Shirley took the baby back from Richard. “Look. Isn’t he precious? Your little brother.”

Oliver managed a glance and a tight-lipped smile. At least he was trying.

“Hey, Celia,” Oliver said. He ran his non-cast hand over his cheek, and Celia’s heart squeezed. David had the same nervous tic.

Celia attempted a brave smile for her stepson. “Hey, Oliver. Are you okay?”

A quick nod, a hooded gaze. “Fine. Yeah.”

Celia let the lie linger a long moment until she could no longer bear the silence. Didn’t mean she was ready to hear David was dead. No, she’d comment on something else entirely. “Your eyes are brown right now.”

Oliver blinked. “What?”

“Sometimes they’re brown. Green other times. But rarely brown
and
green at the same time.”

Oliver frowned. “My eyes are brown.”

“They’re hazel,” Shirley put in. She held the baby in the crook of one arm and used her other hand to lift Oliver’s chin. “Yep. Beautiful hazel, just like your mother’s.”

“Grandma, they’re brown.”

Shirley chuckled and summoned Richard for his opinion.

Celia gave herself a figurative pat on the back.
How’s that for a stalling tactic?

Hard to believe sometimes that David and Oliver were father and son. While David was militant about his appearance, keeping his hair perfectly combed, his face shaven and his business suits fresh and crisp, Oliver was all about jeans, T-shirts and comfort. The son was lanky and laid back in a way that the father, with his sharp lines, intensity and drive, was not. They were both toned, however. Both jogged and worked out, although the middle-age battle of the bulge had a thirty-pound advantage on David.

Celia’s husband liked the more material aspects of life, while Oliver did not care about money or status. He had gotten his bachelor’s degree in art history, and a month after graduation, decided art history was not for him. He spent the next three years backpacking around Europe, spending time with his mother’s family in England and “finding himself.” Much to David’s relief, Oliver was back in school, working toward a master’s in business administration. Oliver also worked nearly full time as a bartender and refused financial support from David for graduate school.

“Did you find your father?” Janet asked.

“Dad is…” Oliver glanced toward the doorway. As if on cue, a policeman and an unfamiliar doctor appeared.

The fight flashed before Celia’s eyes again. David’s scowling. David’s biting voice. David’s squint.
I’m about to find out my husband is dead. Think of something good about us.
David whisking her away on a picnic.
See. We used to have good moments. A decent marriage.
More nice moments poured out: skiing at Snowshoe, getting lost in Paris on their honeymoon. Where and why had their marriage gone wrong?

Oliver sank onto the bed and met Celia’s eyes. That was how Celia knew for sure that something was wrong. Nothing hostile skulked in Oliver’s gaze. Just sorrow. Pity.

We’re on the same side now
, Oliver’s eyes said.

He looked up at his grandparents. “Give us a minute.”

“No,” Shirley said, choking on the word. “I’m staying right here. What’s happened with your father?”

“Give us a minute, then I’ll explain.”

“I am staying right here. He’s my son!”

“Fine,” Oliver whispered. He swallowed then said: “Dad’s been in an accident.”

“What kind of accident?” Shirley demanded.

“Car accident.” Oliver returned his focus to Celia. Took Celia’s hands in his. Oliver’s cast was sandpaper rough, but his skin was hot. Alive.

Celia’s flesh prickled. “You’re touching me.” Oliver and Celia had known each other four years, Celia had been his stepmother three and a half years, and Oliver had rarely condescended to touch her. When he did, it was for a quick handshake or in stiff acceptance of a hug. Now here Oliver was, touching Celia to
comfort
her.