by K.N. Lee
“Here in Chicago I am, I suppose, but at home, where I’m from it’s quite the opposite.” His smile was one of longing; he wanted to be home again.
“And where is that?”
“Far away,” he deliberately avoided looking at me, to hide the sadness that I heard in his tone.
“Okay…” something told me it would be best not to press the issue here, at least not yet. I hoped that there would be a better time to bring it back up.
I stared out the window not sure how to continue the conversation. There was so much left to find out about him. I was afraid to move forward. It wasn’t really a product of fear, more like listening to my instincts. Before, I would have ignored it, that thing that sounds the alarms and warns me to retreat. This time I would listen to it and back off. Eventually, the reason for that urge to pull back would come to light, so I put little effort towards trying to figure it out.
His house was nothing special; actually, it was pretty plain, although very large. It blended in with all the other beige and brown colored homes that neighbored it; very suburban. He turned the car into the driveway and stopped inside the garage. The door closed before the engine stopped running. I waited for him to move before getting out of the car.
The garage that was connected to the side of his house seemed fitting for him. Closed off from the world, it was as Jazz had described him. I wondered if his neighbors ever saw his face. With his tinted windows and remaining inside of his car until the garage door closed; if I were his neighbor, I would have been suspicious. Concocting theories of bodies buried in the basement. Maybe they saw him as that creepy guy on the block, the one no one would ever approach.
Come to think of it, it was possible that my own neighbors may have similar theories about me. I lived pretty much the same way, hidden away from the world, never being seen. We were the same, well if you take away the cookie cutter house.
The décor inside was annoyingly ordinary. I wanted to see something that screamed Lacal, but there were only the necessities and not much furniture at all. It appeared that he lived alone; which had me wondering about his family. Where were they and why wasn’t he with them? I supposed that was the reason for the sad tone in his voice when he referred to home being ‘far away’.
My heart ached as I cataloged the similarities between our lives. We were both alone, and longing for families that we could no longer be with. I followed him through the house and into the kitchen. Everything was modern and once again simple, only what was essential. There were black granite counters, with tile in neutral tones, beiges and browns, surrounding all the stainless-steel appliances.
He took two bottles of water from the refrigerator, handed me one and nodded for me to take a seat at the counter. He didn’t say anything, just stared at me, the longer the silence lasted, the more uncomfortable I became.
“You look nervous…why?” He tossed the bottle in the air with his left and caught it with his right.
“Honestly?” I played with my bottle in my hands.
“Preferably,” he took the cap off the bottle and started guzzling it apparently, he was thirstier than I was. He tossed the empty bottle in the trash and went for another one.
“This isn’t what I had in mind for the day, that’s all. Now that I am here, I kind of feel like I ran into a wall and I can’t figure out how to recover.”
“Good to know I make you feel injured,” he chuckled and tossed the second bottle in the trash before walking over to sit next to me.
“No, that’s not what I meant. You make me feel, I don’t know how to explain it. I’m just not sure what my next step should be.” Biting my bottom lip and second guessing my words, I waited for him to respond
“You don’t need to think so hard about this.” He reached over and took the water from my hand. I thought he was going to down it like he had the other two, but he sat it to the side and wrapped my now empty hand in his own. “I wish this felt as natural to you as it does to me. Being with you does something to me. I think the same thing happens to you as well. Only I embrace it, where you seem to want to run from it.”
He was right. The last time we were together I ran away from him, back to the safety of my house. It wasn’t really him I was running from. I had to get away from ‘us’ and this bizarre connection we had, but the moment he was close to me again, I looked into his eyes and decided to give in to him and the pull of gray I had been trying to avoid. Heat pulsed through my veins and I could feel it again, that loss of myself. Instead of fighting it I tried to maintain it and enjoy it without letting it override my senses. I focused on his hands, the feel against my own and enjoyed the warmth of his skin, that magical flare of electricity.
Everything slowed and once again the gray was no longer just the shade that rested in his eyes. It was all around us. It escaped him and became an entity of its own filling the room. It blocked out everything and wrapped around us just as it had in the car, only this time I was aware of it, I watched its magic and captured its beauty in my mind. It shielded us giving us protection from the world, nothing else existed. We were all that were.
“Can you feel that?” I didn’t want to speak, but the words flowed from my lips regardless.
“What is it that you feel?” His words were heavy and covered in fire, each one landing on my skin and burning right through me. Their touch was not pain. It was raw pleasure in its most pure and simple form. I embraced each one, each impact and allowed them to burn me and leave their imprint on my skin.
“It’s all around us; pulsating. Like a heartbeat.” I touched his chest with my fingertips. “Like your heartbeat Lacal. Can you see it?” I didn’t take my eyes off his. He had to see it. If I focused hard enough, I knew that I would be able to open his eyes to what I was experiencing.
“See?” He didn’t see it, but he wasn’t confused by my question. “What do you see?”
“Gray,” the word flowed from my mouth and spiraled around him. I saw slithers of gray and as they passed his eyes, he was able to see what I saw.
He said no words, he just sighed in awe and grabbed the sides of my seat and pulled me closer to him until our faces were only inches apart. The heat grew between our bodies. “If I kiss you now, do you promise not to run away?” His question was serious, a stern blanket wrapped around his eagerness. He wanted me to say yes, it shot from him like an electric bolt landing in my chest.
“Promise,” my body froze and waited for his lips. If I didn’t move and didn’t breathe, keeping myself planted wouldn’t be that hard.
His lips were on mine, soft with gentle urgency. He hesitated and tried to keep his movements restricted. While he was able to maintain his composure, I had failed miserably. I climbed on top of his lap and pulled him into me; my hands once again filled with his hair. He gripped my waist tightly reminding me to reel in my urges.
I pulled away from him slowly and looked into his eyes again; searching for the calming gray I usually found there, but this time as it poured out around me, it was different. It was streaked with pulsating lines of red. Like the blood running through my veins, rushing with adrenaline.
I was beginning to feel more comfortable with this force around us. How it fed off our emotions, our wants and needs and changed itself to mimic that. It was a tangible, visible form of our desires. I was still unsure of where it came from or why I was able to see it. More so, I wondered how I was beginning to understand it.
“I want to try something,” I whispered as I climbed off his lap and sat back in my seat. He didn’t question me.
We kept our eyes locked; our breathing matched, and as my pulse slowed, so did his. The streaks began to retreat. I took my finger and ran it across his arm slowly. I could feel his pulse quicken; moving the air around us with every beat. This caused the red streaks to grow again, but only a little bit.
I went up his arm and across his chest; checking our shield, pulsing faster, the red growing steadily. I touched his lips then traced the outline of his
neck, down to his chest again, it grew even faster. I continued my path down his body. The lower my finger went, the faster it grew and the brighter it got. When I hit the top of his pants, he grabbed my hand.
“Wow!” I looked around seeing how much the red had spread; there was barely any gray left around us.
“What?” He slowed his breath, I hadn’t noticed his panting. “What are you doing?”
“Testing a theory,” I said as if no further explanation was needed. He looked at me waiting for one.
“Testing? What theory?” He released my hand and stood up.
“You couldn’t see the red?” I expected the red to come streaming out and around him like the gray had, but there was nothing.
“What red?” This time his control broke and showed his impatience and agitation. He wanted something from me. There was something I was supposed to say or do, and he seemed disappointed that I failed to comply. How could I, when he hadn’t told me what it was that he wanted?
“It was like the more excited you became, the redder it got. The red grew and began to replace the gray, like a fire growing and taking over.” The connection was broken the moment he stood up, but the shield was still there. I wanted it back more than anything, to experience the effect it had on me. It fueled my body, filling me with primal energy, and I wanted more of it.
“Really?” He walked to the other side of the counter, this time breaking the shield that surrounded us.
“Did I do something wrong?” My mind raced to figure out what I had said or done to incite this reaction from him. I stood from my seat and wanted to tell him to come back but I didn’t.
“No,” he sighed, “and that’s the problem.”
“Problem?” I started to walk over to his side of the counter, but he motioned for me to stop.
“Alexa, there is something I need to tell you.”
19
He suggested that we move into the living room to continue our conversation. Apparently, whatever we needed to discuss was so bad that cushioned seats would be necessary for me to handle it. Once we were in the living room he didn’t say anything. I watched him pace back and forth for nearly ten minutes before his speed slowed and his expression softened from tortured to anxious. I took this as a sign that he was getting closer to telling me whatever it was that he had to say. Abruptly he stopped in front of me as if forcing himself to get on with it.
“Do you remember much about the magic your grandmother used? Did she ever explain anything about it to you?” His question threw me for a loop. What did Nana have to do with any of this?
“No, not really,” I tried not to fidget in my seat, but I was uncomfortable.
“Well, that would have made this a lot easier.” He sighed and ran his hands through his hair.
“I don’t understand. Why would my grandmother’s old magic tales have made this easier for you? Are you trying to tell me that you believe in all that stuff?” I looked up at him and tried to find the gray, but something was blocking me. It shouldn’t have been so hard to believe, especially now, that I was not only seeing these fields around him, but I was looking for them. Magic was real; I knew it, even if I still chose to try to appear skeptical.
He walked over and sat next to me, close enough for our arms to touch. Staring straight ahead, he lifted my hand from the couch where it sat beside me and held it tightly. Was he trying to hold me there because he was afraid that I would run away from what he had to tell me? Would I want to? What could he possibly say that would be so alarming? So, what if he believed in magic, he wouldn’t be the first person I had known to admit that.
“I should start by saying that Jasmine was right when she assumed that I was looking for someone.”
“She was?” He avoided my attempt to look him in the eye.
“Yes. I was looking for someone. I was looking for you Alexa.” He rushed the words so that he wouldn’t lose his nerve. I wasn’t sure I had heard him correctly.
“You were looking for me?” It would have had more of an impact, but I had already known. It was the truth that I had just begun to accept.
“Yes. Only I didn’t know who you were. This may sound crazy to you, but I have spent the last three years searching for you.” He closed his eyes. I should have been concerned about myself, but I only felt protective of him, he seemed so vulnerable.
“You’ve spent three years looking for me; someone you didn’t even know existed? That doesn’t make any sense,” I tried not to sound judgmental, he needed to finish what he had to say, and I wanted him to because I knew there was more to his story.
“It was what I was born to do. I had no control over it. I exist to be by your side. It’s usually a direct link, something inside of us turns on and we are drawn together. That didn’t happen. I couldn’t feel you and I didn’t understand why.
I thought something was wrong with me I figured maybe through the years the bond had been tainted or weakened somehow, but I’ve never heard of it being so hard. It was my sister who finally pointed out that maybe there was nothing wrong with our bond. She suggested that maybe someone did not want you to be found.
Now that I think about it, that’s probably the same reason I couldn’t get closer to you that first night. No matter how much I tried to force it, my body just wouldn’t move. I begged for my limbs to carry me to you, but nothing happened. It had to be your grandmother’s potion that removed the barrier.” He looked out the window to the left of the black couch we sat on. My hand was still in his, but the impulse to pull away was not there. Logic said I should want to get away, but I only wanted to be closer to him.
“Okay, wait a minute, back up; you think you were born to be by my side?” My brain screamed for me to run away, but I didn’t. I couldn’t.
“Yes.” I could tell he believed everything he was saying. I wasn’t sure if his certainty was comforting or frightening.
“You’re serious, aren’t you?” Part of me wanted him to laugh and tell me that it was all a joke, but he didn’t.
“Please let me explain.” Another wave of emotion radiated from him, unhappiness again, this time it hit me harder and stronger. I still couldn’t see that field around him, but he was unable to keep everything from me.
“Okay,” I couldn’t stand to see him so sad, which made about as much sense as the fact that I was still sitting next to him. I barely even knew this guy and what he was telling me should have been setting off warnings that I should get away. Regardless of our attraction, my body should have been on high alert, but it wasn’t. I was calm, leaning into him, wanting to hear more. I had accepted his words; I knew there was truth in them even before he said them.
“I am…we are…essentially… from a culture that isn’t long lost, or even forgotten, but more like long hidden. Our people aren’t exactly from here. By here I mean Earth, this world, or even this universe. The original groups were brought here over 5,000 years ago.” His words came out rushed.
“Okay wait a minute,” I had to interrupt him at this point. “Say I believe all of this, how and why did ‘our people’ decide to come here?” Magic was one thing; aliens were a totally different story. Rational thought retuned to me and began to override my physical response to be closer to him.
“It was for the most basic of reasons; sustenance. We live a long time, but in order for our lives to be sustained we have to use the life forces of others. Our planet had a source, but, people got greedy and before long, the natural source was tapped out.
Scouts were sent all over the universe to find other sources. They went from world to world mostly returning home empty handed. The sources they did find were not resilient enough to provide the amount of life force that we required. When they were lucky to find one that was durable enough, they were not very plentiful.
The problem was that most sources, when brought to our home planet, couldn’t live very long in our atmosphere no matter what precautions were taken. This wouldn’t have been a problem, but combined with thei
r slow reproduction rates, we were taking them out at on average, ten times what they were able to reproduce. Eventually, they would all die off and our people were running out of options.
The scouts were dispatched on what would have been their last search if they came back empty handed. They thought it was over, but then came upon what they described as a line at the edge of the universe. No one knew what it was, so the High Arc was consulted. She demanded that she be taken to this ‘line’ immediately. Once she arrived she could sense that this was the answer to all their problems. She used her abilities to open it like you would a zipper and on the other side was this world.” He paused, and I took a deep breath and tried to process what he had just said. How could I not want to head for the hills, he was basically telling me that I was an alien; or least the spawn of an alien, generations of aliens. Inside I was battling myself, I needed to leave. I didn’t want to hear any more.
“So, I assume that this High Arc is like your queen?” I decided to go with it; if he was crazy enough to kill me, I damn sure wasn’t going to start provoking him by calling him insane.
“Yes, something similar, only she has no one to answer to, she is ruler of all.” His words were filled with an underlying sense of pride and he wanted me to feel it too. He pushed his energy towards me and for a moment I gave in to it.
“I guess that’s cool, a woman in charge,” I tried to make a joke to ease the tension that was quickly building between us. He was nervous about continuing and I was nervous about hearing more. “So, what exactly were her abilities? I assume that you are saying that she had magical powers?” Tying in my grandmother was starting to make a little more sense now. Maybe he thought there was some connection between her and them.
“Yes. Her abilities were the same as every High Arc. Some of our people are born with maybe one or two basic gifts, like telekinesis, or mind reading, even control over the physical world itself; shaping and molding things to fit their needs.