Spring 2003

      The heavy oaken door stood wide open, the golden light from within pouring out unheeded. So typical of her to be unconcerned of the cold damp and what or who may wander in from such a bleak night. Standing just outside the arc of loosened brightness, Michael felt invisible. Through the portal, he could catch fleeting glimpses of a shadow figure, pacing and pausing. Occasional syllables of conversation reached him, fading and returning as she changed directions in her course. The phone hung from her hand, the other clutching the receiver to her ear. Always techno-stupid — hadn't she ever heard of caller ID? Or sat-phones? Well, Kate's indifference to such things had enabled him to find her tonight. And the open door signified what? Did she know he would come?
      The cardboard box dug into his arm. The rain had softened the edges, the paper collapsing, disintegrating, losing form and function. The bottom would fall out soon. He felt a shifting and adjusted his grip. He considered the seemingly unconnected items and memorabilia inside. The carton had arrived this afternoon, his mother's gift of his childhood treasures and youthful achievements. He had removed them and, examining each, wondered why he had kept them so long. Sitting with the odd collection around him, a pattern had formed. Memories long banished had returned like bubbles blown through a straw into a milkshake. Rising to the surface with almost painful slowness, trapped beneath the filmy layer of milky time, the final pop taking far longer to materialize than reasonably expected.
      Memories which begged the question — how had he forgotten? Finding Katie in every one. Digging out her number from a dog-eared card in his wallet and calling her answering service, Michael had been hard pressed to form a coherent sentence. The polite voice coolly informed him she would pass the message on, but Miss Zurin had been traveling abroad and an immediate response could not be guaranteed. Katie's call came not ten minutes later.
      "What is it Michael?" Always Michael, never Mike, or Mick or any other diminutive. "My service said you called, something important."
      "I need you," he'd said.
      "I'll come as soon as I can," she agreed and had hung up. Only then had he registered the number showing on his caller ID box. A local number and a vaguely familiar name? He used his laptop to cross-reference the name, Anna Runiz, not even unlisted, and find the address. Local? Katie was here, not a mile away. But her service said Europe? As she no doubt had instructed them to do. Hiding? From him? In his own backyard.
      Gathering the odds and ends into the box, he had driven like a bat freed from hell, eager to confront her. Slowly a growing reluctance percolated up through his urgency. Parking his Toyota, he walked the final blocks to stand outside the hillside home in the rain. In the darkness. Waiting for God knew what? A sign?
      Earlier she had come to the door and opened it. She stood awhile on the deep porch, staring out over the valley. She could likely see his apartment from here, and the lab. Keeping an eye on him.
      Michael hadn't come here to stand a vigil, but the roiling in his stomach and the occasional trembling in his knees nailed him to the spot. Close enough to see her and hear her speaking. To whom? The conversation had gone on and on — it had to be Val. Thinking of Val intensified the shivering, but if that asshole were distant enough to settle with a phone call, he was too far to come in person, at least tonight.
      Michael stepped onto the first step — the remainder towered before him. From this vantage a large wedge of the living room was visible through the mirrored foyer. Katie walked into his line of sight.
      "I don't know what I'll say, yet. Maybe I'll just let him ask his questions. Why borrow trouble?" Katie turned, and their eyes met.
      "He's here," she said into the phone. Val — it had to be him — asked a question. Michael climbed to the porch. Weary. Wary.
      "I think it will be all right. I'll call you. Yes, I love you too." Katie set down the phone and replaced the receiver.
      "Come in, Michael," she invited.
      Her hair had been cut to chin length, carelessly tucked behind her ears. Light brown — now — and streaked with silvery high-lights. Her chocolate brown eyes, flecked with gold, regarded him calmly through funky wire-framed glasses. Wearing snug brown jeans and a loose-necked, short, beige sweater — a dancer's body, lithe and firm. God, she looked good. Hadn't she always?
      A trickle of rain or sweat ran down his spine. He suddenly recognized the creeping emotion which had kept him hiding in the darkness of the pines. She frightened him.
      She laughed — a breath of wind through chimes.
      "I haven't harmed you in all these years. Why would I start now?" she asked.
      He shivered harder at her comment.
      "Come in, you're chilled." She left his field of vision. He could hear water running and the clank of metal. Making tea or hot chocolate, her cure for anything which ailed a soul.
      "Buck up!" he whispered to himself. Having identified the unease within, he firmly restrained it. "Wuss."
      Stepping through the door felt like time travel. The furnishings were comfortable yet spare. The colors of nature; sand and green, brown and yellow. Entirely unfamiliar, but completely vintage Katie. The few ornaments and accessories, utterly right, standing on glass and oak shelving, lighted from above and featured as if works of art. Probably were, Michael admitted ruefully. Fabric cushions and soft chenille throws hinted at cozy evenings. Sure enough — the nights he had longed for her company she had been here, curled up before the stone and tile fireplace, just minutes apart, not half a world away with her far-flung friends or family.
      He stood dripping in the center of the warm room, musing on his surroundings as tiny pricks of needle-sharp memories poked holes through the tight weave of amnesia.
      "Go shower, I'll bring you cocoa." She pointed at the spiral staircase. "At the top of the stairs and to your right. Val's clothes are in the closet dresser. Help yourself."
      Mutely he complied. His Nikes, full of rain water, squished on each riser. Michael set his drooping, pitiful box on the tile floor. Everything gleamed, almost an affront to the murky worry which coiled, gnashed and chomped in his guts. Nausea overcame him. Hanging over the toilet bowl, a new flash of remembrance burst through — college memories, of long conversations and a final vicious argument. Memories which contradicted everything she had let him assume, led him to believe. Lies and secrets.
      Toothpaste in the second drawer. An unopened toothbrush beside it. Familiar Katie-istics. Brushing his teeth felt far too mundane for the recurring disorientation. In the shower, he rinsed away the wretched post-sick feeling with a fresh bar of a softly scented soap, spicy, a Val-like scent. The memory flash the fragrance inspired caused him another bout of vomiting.
      He dried with a thick warm towel, large enough to engulf two. More bits and pieces emerged of sharing such a towel and the silky smoothness of her damp body. How had he forgotten that?! The mirror reflected a face pale with shock which the hot spray of the powerful shower head hadn't fully erased.
      More questions, he thought, and looked toward the box. Gone. She had come in while he showered and taken it. Why? To steal back the physical evidence of her betrayals? His clothes missing too, but there a folded pile of a stranger's apparel lay just inside the door; sweats, too loose and too long, and a soft turtleneck. Wearing Val's clothes. Damn. Just clothing, no reason for feeling defiled. Not like Paris.
      Paris? When would he stop tripping over these sneaking memory fragments? He threw open the door. Katie stood there, holding a tray.
      "You're hyperventilating. Control it. Slowly in — and out." She beckoned with her head. "Come on, we'll talk in here."
      She pushed open the next door with her foot. Bare feet, the flash of pale polish on the toenails. The only sexy feet he'd ever seen, as delicate and finely shaped as her hands. Nimble feet.
      The candlelit room had a glass wall. Ceiling to floor windows overlooked the twinkling town. Flashes of red, amber and white blurring beyond in the rain swept night. Michael could see the balcony of his apartment and the back parking lot of the lab. A telescope stood next to a high chair, a sentinel testifying to another secret hobby. He could imagine her perched there, watching him. Shiver. How long?
      A sitting room, but he could see through an open door to the adjoining bedroom. Erotic visions jolted him, stretching like a hall of mirrors.
      Two mugs, a Thermos pot of hot chocolate and a bottle of Jack sat on the low table. Trickling in, a recollection of a Pennsylvania blizzard.
      His memorabilia had been dried — the waste basket full of paper towels — and laid out neatly. A timeline, he realized. She knew everything. Remembered everything which he had forgotten. Kate was the key, the focal point of all the shining ray-like memories. The clarity of every other portion of his life, Liz and the kids, school and research, even most his childhood contrasted sharply with the soft-focus of his times with Kate. She had always been there waiting. For what? Him, or the breakthrough he'd promised when she found funding for the lab. He could barely remember how the partnership had come about, less than four years ago. So Kate was the forget factor, not the vagaries of time.
      She sat in one of the wide cushion covered chairs and tucked her feet under a pillow. An expectant look, a side-long glance from averted eyes. The Katie-look. She poured a mug for him, added a shot of whiskey and motioned to the other chair. The mug warmed his hands.
      "So what do you need, Michael? What do you expect me to do about it?"
      She gazed out the window, tranquil and relaxed. Clearly expecting him to retrieve his shredded composure in the stillness. He sat, sipping from the stoneware cup. He could feel the alcohol burn in his stomach. Where to begin, how to sort out the conflicting memories?
      A question popped into his head. One too foolish to ask, she would laugh in his face.
      "No, but I suggested you may want to forget. However, the decision to do so was all yours."
      Another quick bubble popped. She could read his mind — had been able to as long as they had been friends. He felt her eyes back on him and her calmness stroking his fear with a soft hand. Another of her gifts? This ability not only to divine his thoughts but to alter his emotions? The idea felt right, as if it were another thing he had learned long ago and forgotten.
      "I wanted to forget? Why would I?"
      She sighed. "Because there are things you simply refuse to accept."
      "About what?"
      "About me and my family. Also about yourself, the image you have of the world and your place in it."
      "So I forgot."
      "The medical term is repressed, I think. Humans have all sorts of mechanisms to relieve themselves of burdensome or traumatic memories. You can also lie to yourselves, pretending so well that even you believe."
      "Traumatic memories?" he scoffed. "How could your friendship be traumatic?"
      "We haven't had a platonic relationship, Michael."
      "I would never forget…"
      "Forget sex with me? But you have. You have those memories locked away as tightly as the others. I can see the cubicle in your mind labeled Katie, drawer after drawer, chained and bolted. Each marked with the word I could say to open the niche and set free the prisoner."
      "So say the words."
      "Someone did last time and I feared for your sanity. You have to remember why you forgot, freely accept the memories."
      "Last time?"
      "We've had this general discussion before."
      "When?"
      "Does it matter?" Kate looked angry, a fleeting flash of temper, then a resigned sigh. "College, after your divorce, and most recently Amsterdam."
      "We were in Amsterdam together?"
      "I took you to Holland."
      "I gave a seminar on my gene mapping program in Amsterdam."
      She shook her head and tossed a brochure into his lap. "Your conference was held in Baltimore. You went to Europe with me and Val. Remember Andie?"
      "Andie?" A vague picture of a gorgeous but strange titian-haired woman and Val's overprotective attitude. Michael looked closely at the brochure. A generic pamphlet showing the logo of his professional society and a small picture of a Baltimore hotel. On the second page he found his own name and his topic of discussion. So the conference had been in America, not the Netherlands.
      "Why were you in Baltimore?"
      Katie's lips curled in a small self-deprecating smile. A tiny shake of her head indicated her unwillingness to answer.
      His divorce had been final only weeks before the seminar. Had she come to console him? "Were you looking for me?"
      "Yes." She unfolded herself from the chair and wandered to the window, sipping her chocolate. The rain had stopped, leaving the night sky in a myriad of stars. Michael could see only an outline of her, punctuated by pinpoints of the starlight caught in the rain speckled glass.
      "Why?"
      For a long moment she didn't answer, keeping her secrets from him. "For a brilliant person you are remarkably stupid," Kate snorted. "None is so blind as he who will not see."
      Michael considered her words. Though the specifics had escaped, he knew she had always been the person he counted upon to come through during the difficult periods in his life. He joined her by the window. She glanced up at his face, a measuring judgmental regard. A suspicious look, one of deep pain and distrust. When had he hurt her? How had he gained her distrust? Was it too late to make amends?
      "Until the last breath you take, it will never be too late," she murmured. She sighed and leaned against him. Her feverish warmth took him aback, until he remembered she'd always felt this way. Better for cuddling, the words of a past conversation echoed.
      "Did you hope for us to be more than friends?" Her hair smelled of vanilla cream, a sense of continuity and stability filled him. Kate's signature scent, as much a part of her as grace and humor.
      She laughed, pulling away. "Oh, Michael! What a self-deluding piece of work you are. We have always been 'more than friends'. This is the longest we've been alone together and managed to keep our clothing intact."
      She returned to her seat, poured a shot of the whiskey in her mug and tossed it back. She stared at the mug with an air of dissatisfaction. "Damnation, I wish I could find forgetfulness in this stuff. You have no idea how lucky you are; able to edit your past to suit your purpose." Kate laughed, a bitter humorless bark. "I would trade addiction for memory loss, any day." She poured a second shot.
      "Getting shitfaced isn't going to change anything." The abrupt change in her mood confused him. She acted annoyed, as if his amnesia of their moments together had been a voluntary affliction. "I want to remember. Why won't you help?"
      Kate leaned back in her chair, stretching. "I'm tired of it. Each time I rejoice, hoping beyond reasonable hope you are sincere."
      "I am sincere. Look, Kate. I adore you. Have I said that before? I hate the loss of the memories linking us."
      "Do you?" she asked. "Yet each time you let me go, again, and forget. But I, lacking the talent, must replay these moments time and again, evaluating and second-guessing where I went wrong. If I had said this first, or withheld that until last. If I had prepared better, or if I had let Val explain."
      "Val? I don't want anything to do with him."
      She glared at him. "How well you lie to yourself."
      "Lie? I despise him. He's an asshole. I do remember that."
      She shook her head. "Val is charming, and caring, and kind."
      Michael sneered, "He's your brother. What else would you think?"
      "Okay, you hate him." She leaned forward. "Why? One good reason."
      Michael stared out the window, looking for the scraps of memory which painted such a clear dislike for Kate's twin. "I think he's a pedophile and a homosexual."
      She snickered. "Pedophile, no."
      A memory flashed into his head, too fast for him to grasp. Something to do with a young cousin.
      "Your cousin?" he began.
      "Miranda and no, you misunderstood the circumstances."
      "If you say so," Michael said, disbelievingly. "He still creeps me out. Not PC of me, I know."
      "He is no more homosexual than you are." A dismissive gesture of her hands punctuated her words.
      "Right!" Michael scoffed. Something else nagged him. "I think…"
      "What?" she asked, suddenly attentive.
      A misty remnant of a memory flitted maddeningly at the limits of his perception. A dark street, blinding pain, and a gunshot. "I think he killed somebody." Remembering more, Val helping him to his feet, and almost dragging him out of the alley. Hissing at him to walk and to pull himself together. Remembered the overwhelming lethargy of shock and stammering questions to be shushed by his companion.
      "He shot a man. Val's a murderer."
      "And you remember nothing else?"
      "Should I?"
      Katie turned her face away. Disappointed, he thought. What else had happened? She obviously considered the revelation only part of the whole story.
      He examined the memorabilia again, something else gnawing at him. Stubs from planetarium tickets and a certificate awarding him his first research grant. An envelope containing an invitation to join Dr. Westphal's staff at CalTech and his copy of the Ruiz Corporation's standard contract for funding privately held businesses.
      Another pattern reared its head, formed by these documents, impossible to ignore. His hands began to shake, his vision grew gray and misty at the edges. Cold shivering, yet beads of sweat dripped from his upper lip. His chest crushed in the tight grip of a particularly cruel, giant fist. Katie appeared at his side, helping him sit down in the gloriously real chair, fetching clear water to sip. A soft cloth on his forehead and her warm hands on his frigid fingers, loving ministrations from a woman he had known so long, but understood so poorly.
      'Help me!' he thought, his mouth capable of nothing more than a series of monotone moans. Heart attack, stroke?
      Kate moved into his field of vision. "You're not dying. You're having a panic attack. Do you want my help?"
      'Yes!' Oh, yes. The pain in his chest threatened his breathing. She kissed him, a soft point on which to focus. The merest contact like the waving of a matador's cape, distracting the bull — his fear. Her tongue sought his and the fear became entangled in the fabric. Did resuscitation feel like this to a drowning victim? His compliance phased through to participation and on to aggression. What his mind had forgotten the fibers of his body remembered with great accuracy.
      How to kiss her, how to hold her, how to find the places where his touch would please her best. The touch of her mind as compelling as her hands. The novel yet wholly familiar shape of her breasts and rump. Like a teenager on the beach, a summer love story ending in a glorious finale under Labor Day fireworks.
      Lips rarely parting, yet somehow everything within his grasp. Skin on skin, inciting wonderful, invited, gentle violence. Heart still pounding, but now with passion's strong accustomed rhythm in place of the fibrillation of fear. Too soon, the indescribable power of orgasm. It had been far too long. The gradual return of awareness, followed by a wave of utter relaxation and calm acceptance, the help Katie promised. The realization of incompleteness, neglect of one important aspect of their lovemaking. Missing something, though he could not name it.
      She withdrew from his embrace, her reluctance as deep as his to call an end. He watched her leave through half-opened eyes and heard water running. He felt not drowsy but calm. A side effect of her kisses? Her clothes lay strewn in the haste of his fervor. A hard object dug into his thigh. Her glasses bent and cracked, lost at some point barely recalled. A light caress through his hair announced her return. He held up her glasses.
      "You don't really need these do you?" he asked, surprised by the level of calm control his voice held. "Just a disguise, to make you look older."
      She nodded, her eyes gleaming with a feral glow. "And to camouflage my eyes in the dark. Contacts work better, but I've never gotten used to them."
      His heart tried to skip, but settled quickly. "Making love with you, pheromones? To sedate me? To make me forget?"
      "My saliva sedates you, when we kiss." A ghost of a shy smile flickered across her face. "Making love is just making love. Medicinal in its own right, but not because of me."
      "No, especially because of you," he claimed. "I do love you. Whatever else is also true, please believe me." Of all his missing memories, not remembering falling in love with her distressed him the most. Because he did love her and had forever. The emotion felt true and comfortable, unlike the terror engendered by the items from the box.
      She shrugged into a light cotton robe.
      Without touching it, he knew the texture would be fine and soft. No fabric stiff, starched or rough had ever abused Kate's skin. Silk, suede, brushed cotton, and cashmere were acceptable. Flannel or satin sheets, chenille blankets and down pillows would cover her bed. A creature of comfort but, somewhere in his mind, he considered her a hard worker and a tough cookie. Contrary aspects, born of long acquaintance. He knew her, far better than he remembered. The pieces of disjointed knowledge were intimate, far beyond the reckoning of the level of friendship of which he had convinced himself.
      Michael forced his attention back to the documents. Why had the sight of those particular objects panicked him? Jarred him towards a forbidden thought? Suddenly the mists parted, and a flash of his terror sprang into the light. He gathered several of the documents, considering. Her expectant attitude annoyed him. If she could sense his question, why did she wait until he could frame it with words?
      The contract, the grant, the invitation. Had Kate instigated them all?
      His first grant application had been returned, with a request to consider another line of research. Steering him from his chosen area into the development of software applications for genetic studies.
      How had he met Dr. Westphal? Why would such an eminent researcher, with the entire country of grad students to winnow, choose an assistant from a backwater university like Placid State?
      The funding from the Ruiz Group — interesting how the offer appeared just as his software company, Genetech, had been bought out.
      "How long have you been fucking with my life?" the question tore from his throat. If she could read his mind, his anger should burn her in its fierce heat. "What gave you the right?"
      She faced his ire without flinching. "You were ten when we met. But I didn't really start fucking with your life until you were old enough to give me permission."
      "Permission?"
      "More or less. You may not have realized my intent, but you voiced approval on a related rhetorical issue."
      The comforting feeling of righteous anger ebbed as he vaguely recalled a conversation about informed consent.
      "Philosophical discussions are not permission."
      Kate sighed. "What in hell was I supposed to say? Oh, by the way, Michael, I'm planning for you to become a premier expert in computer applications to the human genome mapping project which won't happen for decades?" She laughed. "You already thought me unstable, had already rejected certain things about me. You found it easier to believe in my madness than in my possible sanity. You'd rather I'd been a liar or a lunatic than the things you had discovered me to be."
      "Which is?" He pounced on her words. Instead of answering, she snatched up a Polaroid and tossed it in his face.
      "You just look — really look," she hissed.
      The faded photo showed him with his arms around a young woman, laughing together, caught in time. The girl, tousled hair, hand inside his shirt, head tilted back, lips parted, looked freshly kissed. He could feel her skin on his, the silky texture of her hair against his arm. A slice of memory served warm. Katie, in short dark hair, her eyes and face appearing not a moment different.
      Her lips in the picture, a red he could barely remember, but had been unable to forget completely. The color, when worn as lipstick by any woman, caused instant arousal, a surprising and occasionally embarrassing development.
      He raised his regard to the Kate before him. Not merely well-preserved, not a good bone structure and competent care. Unchanged. The cold trembling in his knees began again.
      "Are you immortal?" he asked in a whisper.
      "I'll live 'til I die, just like you," she answered.
      "A very long time?"
      She shrugged. "Potentially. Accidents happen."
      An important piece flashed. "But you are immune to human illness and disease. No cavities, no colds, no cancer." He recalled something else. "You don't get drunk or high, none of our vices effect you." He pointed to the whiskey. "Just for show?"
      She nodded, the glow of her eyes unimpeded by glasses or her lashes. Her cat-like eyes inspired a question. "You see in the dark?"
      She shrugged again, like a dance movement, graceful and eloquent. "You ask such irrelevant questions."
      "You want a relevant one?" he said, bitterness slicing through his guts with a serrated blade. "Why me? What possessed you to choose me?" He picked up the bottle and took a gulp. "Did I look particularly gullible? Or just easily manipulated?"
      Katie shook her head and averted her face.
      A cloak of black-iced rage rose from some dark recess of his ego. Exploding from his chair, he grabbed her chin, forcing her eyes to met his. "Damn it, tell me."
      Moments later, astounded by the speed of her reaction, he rubbed his benumbed wrist, wondering if it had been broken by her defensive blow.
      She had fled, and now crouched near the door. The rhythm of her breathing suggested a nearness to tears.
      "God, Katie. I'm sorry."
      Gradually she regained her full height, relaxing slowly with controlled breathing. "Never again. Next time you touch me in anger it won't be your wrist I break."
      "It won't happen again," he promised. "Is it broken?" The pain had grown sharper as the numbness had receded.
      "Let's have a look." She opened the door and, gesturing for him to follow, returned to the guest bathroom. Retreating to more neutral ground he supposed, or indicating her willingness to begin again. Under the bright lighting of the mirrored room she examined his wrist, manipulating the joint and listening carefully.
      "What do you hear?" he asked, amused in spite of the discomfort.
      "No grinding, no popping, and no unusual clicks. Not broken — probably," she answered seriously. "Sprained. I must have restrained my punch at the last second. Lucky you." A hint of bitterness crept into her voice.
      "I'm glad it's not broken. Thank you."
      "I meant to break it."
      "Why? Did I frighten you that much?"
      She didn't answer until she finished wrapping an Ace bandage around his hand and wrist. "No, I can defend myself adequately." She examined his fingers, making sure the bandage hadn't restricted circulation.
      With his free hand he caressed her hair, saddened when she stiffened under his touch. "Why did you want to hurt me?"
      She stood abruptly. "To see if I could. I can't."
      He waited, sensing more explanation to follow.
      "If I can intentionally harm you, then there is some hope for me to be free of you. To stop caring. To be blissfully unaware of your existence."
      "Free of me?"
      "Yes, free. You asked why I chose you? You are not the only individual I have helped, and there are others who sought our aid. Most remain completely oblivious to our nature."
      She splashed water onto her face and dried with his discarded towel.
      "Oh, it smells like you." Shoulders slumped, head bowed, she looked defeated. Finally she turned to him. "I despise myself for it, I fought against it. I love you."
      "That's bad?" He thought love a pretty wonderful thing. He stood, intending to embrace her.
      Her eyes, as hard as brass forbade him. "We pair bond, my kind. I got you. Imagine my delight, Michael. I will love you until you die and longer. The short span of years granted for us to share I've spent pretending to be your — friend. All I've ever wanted is to mean as much to you as you do to me."
      "But you do."
      She snorted. "Yes, for now. Until you remember everything and all the ramifications. Then you fear me, as you did earlier. Not as a child fears the dark unknown, but as a man fears with the full knowledge of the contents of his fear. Beneath your exquisitely complex and maddeningly logical mind with its tricks of binary smoke and digital mirrors, you are a hypocritical coward." She practically whispered her final accusation, but some feature of the room reverberated her judgment like the echo in a cavern.
      Stung, Michael met her eyes in the mirror. "Maybe I forget because your accusations and condemnation allow me no room for choice or self-determination. Your way or the highway. No middle ground." He felt some satisfaction at the uncertainty his words caused. "Do you require my slavery? Or are you hoping for a companion?" The doubt deepened in the color of her eyes. "Is it my cowardice which separates us? Or is it your need for my complete approval? I can disagree with you but still want to be near you. Must I be entirely submersed in your life?"
      "There is a danger in your memories to me and my family."
      "What? Who'd believe me? Where's my proof?"
      "Even a hint or rumor could draw attention and close scrutiny would develop enough proof."
      He thought a moment, admiring the tone and hue of her flawless skin. "So if I can't follow your script for a lived-happily-ever-after ending, I'm sentenced to an amnesiac existence in the half-twilight of your shadow?" She buried her face in the towel, inhaling deeply to finally exhale with a mournful sigh. The tiny hairs at the base of her neck caught his attention. Brushing with his fingers, he made them stand on end. A shiver passed through her.
      "There are worse alternatives," she whispered.
      "Like what?" he said with a laugh. "Killing me?"
      Her grim expression ended his amusement. A tiny grain of memory took shape and expanded. "That's what Val does? Isn't it?"
      She flung the towel down and stalked away. He heard her light footsteps on the stairs and followed warily, uncertain of his welcome. He found her in the spacious kitchen, pulling two plates from the oven.
      She glanced up at him. "Hungry?"
      As if to answer, his stomach growled loudly. She laughed, face flushed, perhaps from the heat of the oven. "Grab a bottle of water for me and whatever you find for yourself." She tilted her head toward the refrigerator and carried the plates to the breakfast nook at the back of the kitchen. Michael opened the door, found a bottle of spring water and a beer.
      She had uncovered the plates and stood stirring a cup of dressing for the salads. Unable to resist, he kissed the side of her bowed neck. She cringed then leaned into him. If he drew back the hair hiding her face would he see a smile or bitter tears, he wondered.
      "I forgot the pepper mill," she murmured.
      "I'll get it," he said, giving her a moment to herself.
      The dinner, though re-warmed, had been expertly prepared and tasted fine. "When did you learn to cook?" he asked.
      "During your orthopedic period."
      He laughed, remembering the years in which one of the other of his kids had been in casts or splints. Legs, arms, wrists and ankles had been victims of overzealous participation in activities which usually were considered non-contact sports. Kyle had broken a leg in soccer, an arm in basketball and had shattered his collarbone while bicycling. Kim, true to form, had bested him. She broke a wrist in ballet, an ankle in gymnastics and, on one memorable occasion, a rib and her elbow while diving into a pool. She had been watching him, even then.
      "You seemed happy and settled. I left you alone and not four years later you and Liz separated. What happened?" she asked sadly.
      "I don't know. The kids were a glue, I guess. Once they had lives of their own, the stick wore off." He shook his head. "And fight! God. You didn't know her, Liz has a temper."
      "I met her several times, she was always gracious, once she won."
      "Won what?"
      "You."
      "She won?"
      "You married her. You only fucked me."
      "Oh."
      She left the table and stood looking at one of the prints in the doorway to the living room. "How'd that Theta Chi saying go? Use 'em, abuse 'em, and lose 'em?"
      "Don't be ugly. I never treated you that way."
      She glared at him shortly, then shrugged. "How would you know? You don't remember one way or t'other."
      "Everything I do remember says otherwise."
      She relented, rubbing her face tiredly. "Whatever."
      "Why don't you just tell me why you're mad?" he said. "Is this more about me remembering, or me not remembering?"
      "I don't know." Her voice broke. "I can't do this again."
      "Do what?"
      She wandered back to the table. "I die, waiting for you." A single tear slid from her eye, pausing at her cheekbone like some exotic face jewel. "This could take days, or only minutes. I've never figured out for which I'm hoping. On the one hand, I want to be with you as long as possible. On the other, the quicker it's over, the shorter the pain of not knowing if you will stay or go. Every new episode is just the beginning of another end."
      She smiled ruefully. "Come on, Michael. Let's go to bed."
      "After all that? I've never felt less like it," he observed.
      "No one said anything about sex, though I'm not ruling out the possibility." She reached across the table and patted his hand. "Sleep, then we'll talk again, or not."

      Curling around her — like a second skin — felt as familiar as the rest.
      He enjoyed cuddling and had regretted when the kids had outgrown the desire. He remembered a long night when Kim had been nine, already a bit uncomfortable with physical displays of affection toward her parents. She had been feverish and couldn't lie down for coughing. He'd spent the night in the recliner with her toasty body as a blanket. Awaking stiff, but rewarded by the moment of quiet in which he had been free to watch his daughter sleeping normally; no fever, no painful hack. The lashes of her closed eyes laid against her peachy skin, the wavy tendrils of her auburn hair falling in twisted designs on her favorite lilac nightie. Her hands, loosely fisted, rested beneath her chin against his chest. The solid delicate weight of her comforted him and he had kissed the top of her tousled head. Her green eyes had flown open, lashes fluttering like startled butterflies, until caught by his. A minute smile accompanied her languorous stretching.
      "Morning, daddy."
      "Hiya, babe."
      She slid from his lap with a child's complete obliviousness of knee and elbow placement, unconcerned with the level of restraint he'd needed to not grumble about stiffened joints and muscles. Just before she disappeared into the bathroom, she had turned back, her face peaking around the corner.
      "I'm all better, dad. Thanks."
      Her statement saddened him. The short sentence had engendered sadness, having the awareness of adulthood and all the accepting innocence of childhood.
      In some ways Katie reminded him of that moment with Kim. Awareness and acceptance, rarely manifested except in children approaching adolescence, defined her dealings with him.
      "So Katie, is this when I begin to forget?" he whispered, thinking her asleep.
      She nestled further into his cuddle. "Do you want to?"
      Did he want to forget? How could he turn from this mystery? Like a favorite book read first in the distant past, now almost fresh in this revisitation. Some chapters better than others, some passages displeasing, yet others which may cause him to denounce the entire story.
      Could he delve into this with the mixture of awareness and acceptance of a youth? Maybe it would require suspending credulity and judgment and allowing wonder and marvel to replace them.
      There probably were lots of things in heaven and on earth which were undreamed in his philosophy. Things which, at first glance, were unexplainable by present science and logical thinking. His favorite line in sci-fi movies and books had been about certain theories being proven impossible by so-and-so's equations. Invariably the alien or time-traveler would respond, "We developed different theories."
      Hadn't Einstein shied away from certain equations because clearly defining their meanings would rock the world's perception of accepted physics?
      "Remember or forget, Michael?" she asked again, nuzzling the tender skin on the inside of his elbow. He could feel the soft dampness of her tongue, darting between her lips.
      "Remember, of course," he murmured distractedly. Her kisses were stirring him, as she had intended, no doubt. The robe presented no barrier, only serving as wrapping for a especially desired gift. His explorations were interrupted by the sharp nip of brief pain in his arm as her teeth broke his skin. A thin thread of dizziness reached into his mind, strengthening exponentially in each second, becoming a tornado's funnel shaped cloud. Drawing him in, lifting him up, tearing him synapse from synapse.
      "Then remember," she said, turning in his loosened embrace. The perfect red of her lips momentarily anchored him. Her blood-red lips. His blood. Then he was swept away.

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