Promise of Souls

by Holly Hampton

  I had been visiting the lake house since I returned to Denver a year ago. It was dark and lonely every time I came. I wanted to knock and see if Max would be there, but I was terrified that he would not know who I am. Souls that were promised for each other will always find each other. I wanted to believe my Nana’s saying, but it could not be true between Max and me. We did find each other, but like the first time, I still could not let him know me.

  How can fate be too cruel? I wondered. He loved me when I could not be Larni. Now that I could be who I am, he only wanted me to pretend to be as the Larni he loved. Somehow, Max had known the truth that Maddison Morgan was not my real name. He thought that I lied to him with the intention to defraud him. I felt his anger towards me - towards the Larni, who he loved. The crime I committed against him was unforgivable.

  “You’re awake,” Max said when he turned to me. He grabbed a shopping bag from a chair and put it on the bar stool. “Get dressed and I’ll have someone come to pick you up.”

  I rose from the couch and walked slowly to him. He looked at me with suspicion and anger. I knew that he recognized some parts of me and I prayed that he would ask me about it. I wanted proof that he still believed that I was alive. That I was not that evil woman who died in the yacht.

  Those who kidnapped me three years ago brought me to Miami. They used me to blackmail my Dad into telling them where he hid the evidence that could exonerate him and pin the real culprits. They would kill me anyway and I thought that I might as well die with them. I tricked one of the goons to untie my legs and I would be his slave, doing everything he wanted. The gullible pervert believed me. Once he untied my legs, I kicked him and did everything to escape from the yacht.

  I bumped into a more foolish goon. He was playing with a grenade on the yacht. He dropped the grenade when I bumped into him. I picked it up and threw it at them. I jumped out of the yacht before the grenade exploded. But, unknown to me, the yacht had illegal explosives hidden in the cabin. The yacht exploded when I was only a feet away from it. The explosion swallowed me. It was all that I could remember.

  A year later, I woke up in a hospital with my father and newborn baby beside me. Dad explained that I fell into a comatose state after I was brought to the hospital by the people who found me. Almost all of my face was burnt and beyond recognition. I was only identified because of my biometrics.

  Dad thought that I died and became vigilant in proving his innocence. He discovered that I was still alive after his acquittal. Max never knew that I was alive. The police found the woman who took away my ring. She was having sex in the cabin when the yacht exploded and was burnt alive. The woman was known to use different identities and they declared that Madison Morgan was one of her fake identities.

  No one corrected the findings because I was not there to object. My father had no idea about Max, too. He thought that it was safer on my part that Madison Morgan died. I was pregnant while in comatose. Dad thought that I was raped by the goons and wanted to abort my daughter, but he changed his mind. Thankfully.

  Fate was still cruel, I thought. My daughter did not tell the lie, but she was punished for it. She was diagnosed with myelogenous leukemia. The best person to save her was someone with the same rare blood as hers, her father. But I could not just confess to Max. He would not believe me. I was also afraid that because of his anger, he would take away Maxine from me. I needed to convince him to donate his bone marrows without knowing that she was his daughter. I already lost Max and I could not lose Maxine, too. She was all I had from him.

  “Can I make you an offer?” I said while reaching for the bag.

  “An offer?” Max said with his mouth twitching into a frown.

  I took a deep breath and explained Maxine’s situation and how his bone marrow could save her. “You are her hope,” I told him.

  “Should I care?” he asked coldly.

  She’s your daughter. I almost countered but stopped myself. He would think I’m crazy for claiming that Maxine was her daughter. He did not know me and would not have picked me if my name was not Larni. I tried to hold back my tears but they created mist in my eyes. Max’s face mellowed when he saw my tears, but he looked away when I caught him.

  “You want me to donate my bone marrow?” he asked and I answered with a nod. He flashed a short grin and questioned, “What would you offer me in return?”

  I kept staring at the bar counter as I answered, “I will pretend to be her. The woman you love.”

  Max’s face dimmed in grimace. He slammed his fist on the counter and I looked at him with fear. He glared at me and said, “You want me to save your daughter and in return, you will pretend to be my Larni? The woman who hurt me? The woman I hate?”

  My chest became heavy when his words dropped like tons of bricks against my heart. The woman he hates? His words confirmed what I was afraid of. And if it was not enough, he officially turned down my offer by saying, “You can’t be her. You’re ugly.”

  Tears sprung down my cheeks, but I laughed at myself on the inside. He was right. I was ugly. I was blinded when he kissed my scar and thought that he looked beyond my face. He did not. I was only a substitute for my old self. Should I tell him instead? I wavered. He can have Maxine as long as my daughter would be saved, but would he believe that she was his?

  #

  “You should just tell him,” Dad told me when I arrived at the hospital.

  Maxine had a scheduled transfusion on that day. Max never called me after I left the lake house the other night, but he kept his end of the deal and donated his blood. I looked at my daughter and thought of following my Dad’s suggestion. Max should know about her. He would not let her daughter suffer.

  I was thankful that the Sinclair Foundation granted a medical fund for Maxine, but it was not enough. Dad’s pension and my small flower shop was not enough to fund all her expenses. I had to stop the reconstruction of my face because of her sickness. Maxine was only a toddler. She did not have to pay for all the wrong things I did to her father.

  “Do not worry about custody,” Dad explained. “You are the mother. You have the sole right until she’s seven.”

  “But, what if he demands it?” I asked.

  “Then, he did not deserve you,” Dad responded.

  I laughed a little. It was I who did not deserve him. Maxine deserved him, too. I looked at my daughter who was busy playing with her bricks. She looked like me, but she was more like her father on the inside. They loved to build things and knew how to manipulate their smiles to make me do what they wanted. I should just tell him, I decided.

  My phone sounded before I could tell Dad of my decision. “Max,” I answered with both fear and happiness.

  “I’m outside the room,” Max said.

  My eyes widened in shock and my body trembled with panic. He was outside the room. Did he? I turned around and quickly rushed out of the room. My mouth dried and I forgot to breathe when I saw him with his sharp eyes and clenched jaw. He must have heard everything, I assumed.

  “I want you in the lake house tonight,” Max demanded. He grabbed my hand and placed a key in my hand. He looked at me sharply and said, “You do not have to beg her father. I will do it for her. But you have to keep your end of the deal.”

  I was confused for a moment. Max heard everything, but he thought that we were talking about Maxine’s father and not him. I did not know if I should be thankful or be hateful for this comedic fate. His eyebrows curve and his stare became angrier when I did not reply. He grabbed me closer to him and leveled his face to mine.

  “Is the deal still on?” he said in a raspy voice filled with anger. I opened my mouth to speak, but it was too dry that I could only answer with a nod. He flashed a half-grin and said, “Wait for me there tonight. Wearing nothing.”

  He stepped back and returned to his stern face. He glanced inside the room before walking away from me. She’s your daughter. You’re saving your daughter, I wanted to tell him desperately.

  #
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  I sighed while giving up on cleaning the couch. I came to the lake house earlier than Max wanted me to come and the litter from the other night surprised me. There were still traces of our union from the other night on the couch. I tried to remove the stain of our juices, but the blot remained.

  I stopped cleaning the couch and walked to the bedroom. The lake house changed a lot but our room remained the same. The walls were still made of glass and everything that happened in the room can be witnessed by the birds that flew across the lake and the small forest across it. The room tickled my naughtiness and I began to strip just as what Max wanted. The thought of making love to him in our bed excited me.

  “What are you doing here?” Max asked as he appeared at the doorway.

  “M-max, I was only,”

  I gasped when he grabbed my hand and dragged me to the other room of the house. He pushed me to the bed and told me, “I don’t want you in that room. Never enter that room.”

  I wanted to ask for the reason, but it became obvious to me. That room was only for Maddie and I was no longer her. “I’m sorry,” I said in a shaky voice.

  Max looked at me and let his eyes wander all over my naked body. My heart sank at the way he looked at me with nothing but anger and lust. It was different from all the stares he gave me in this house. He hated Maddie and he let it out on me. Funny, I thought angrily.

  “Lie on the bed,” Max ordered as he removed his clothes.

  Max climbed on the bed and pulled my legs towards him. I looked at him and our eyes met. I wanted to look away, but he kept his eyes on me. We remained looking at each other as he spread my legs. I wriggled on the bed when he suddenly caught my folds with his mouth. I could not feel his passion, but I felt a strange anger from him. He seemed to be proving something to me - to the both of us. And that it was only sex between us. I was only there to satisfy his wanting and nothing else. Something clasped my heart and amplified the hurt I felt. To him, I was already nothing but his slave. A woman who had to spread her legs whenever he wanted to remember the Larni he loved. He would be using me as a substitute, but I would be making love to him just as I always wanted.

  I only wished that as his cock reached down inside me for an orgasm, he would be reaching for my heart again.

  #

  Max

  I sat on the bed and looked at Larni. She covered half of her face with the blanket as she slept. The exposed part of her face reminded me of Maddie. I pulled the blanket from her face to see her difference from Maddie. A small smile curved from the corner of my lips. She was not ugly. Her face was distorted, but I could see that her features were good before the accident. I wondered if her daughter’s father left her because of her face.

  You should just tell him, I remembered what Larni’s father said. My jaw clenched from a sudden surge of jealousy. It was the same feeling I had after hearing it this morning. She asked me first to save her daughter and now, she was going to ask the father to do it. I did not want her to. What if Maxine’s father demanded that she returns to him? Or worse, what if he only wanted her as his doll, too? I looked at Larni for a while. It was better that I would have her instead.

  Larni turned to her side and faced me. A tear rolled down to the bridge of her nose. Guilt struck me after seeing her cry. I was inconsiderate to her tonight, but it was an act. I did not want her to think that she was special. No. I did not want to think that she was special. Everything between us was only a contract and nothing else.

  I reached her face and gently wiped her tears. My heart jolted when she suddenly grabbed my hand and said, “I’m sorry, Max. I’m really sorry.”

  Her words echoed in my head and made everything around me spin. My Larni used to tell me that too in her sleep. She was guilty of something that she could not tell me. Then, why is this Larni being sorry to me?

  “I love you, Maxwell,” she added after her repeated apology.

  Larni! My head became crazy. The scene happened to me before. It was in a different room and a woman with a different face, but the words, the voice, and even the feelings were the same. I held Larni’s face and she opened her eyes slowly. She froze when he saw my face close to her.

  “I’m sorry, I passed out again,” she said.

  I held her by the shoulder and pushed her flat on the bed and asked, “Who are you? Who are you really?”

  Her lips trembled as she became confused of what to reply. I shook her and repeated my question. She stuttered as she replied, “La-Larni.”

  I lost my mind again and became desperate to be with Larni. I spread her legs and entered her forcefully. She tried to stop me, but I did not listen to her cries. I was angry, confused, and lost.

  “Maxwell, please,” Larni begged.

  “Never call me that!” I yelled as I thrust inside her with more force than I ever did before.

  Larni stopped pleading and received my rough thrust. Her tears flowed down her cheeks as I took her like a wild ram. Then, my eyes caught her misty stare and my body automatically stopped. Shit. I was hurting her and my heart burned with guilt. I stopped thrusting in her and her walls quivered angrily around my cock.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered to her.

  I cupped her face and wiped her tears with kisses. She refused to look into my eyes as I whispered my apology. The furious and disappointed look in her face felt like knives stabbing me in my heart. She was not my Larni. She did nothing to me. I should not be punishing her for the lies Maddie made against me.

  I moved my head to her shoulder and kissed her scar - the proof that she was not Larni. She did not object as I continued to plant kisses on her skin, while my cock painfully waited for her body to accept it freely. “Tell me to stop and I will stop,” I told her.

  Her eyes widened with delight, as if she remembered something. She smiled softly and shook her head as a reply. My guilt-battered heart jumped with joy and kissed her torridly. I did not know what it was, she became overflowing with willingness and something else - something like love. The same thing that seemed to leak into my heart - a love that I only kept for my Larni.

  Our body mirrored each other’s temperature. I thrust in her again, gently and with more compassion. She countered my movements and matched my tempo. We both smiled lovingly at each other and I stopped for a moment. This memory was similar to the first night I met Maddie - the night after we danced the tango. This real Larni and I were not dancing the tango on a dance floor. We were dancing on the bed and yet the feeling was the same. That feeling where everything stopped and the world was only for the two of us. That feeling that was better than the first time I felt it. Perhaps, because I was with a real Larni and not with someone who only pretended to be Larni.

  #

  “Where are you going?” I asked while half of my face was buried on the pillow.

  Larni sat back on the bed and scratched my back. My eyes closed again as that gesture often put me back to sleep. My Larni used to do that when she wanted me to get more rest. Larni! I opened my eyes again and rose from the bed. Larni was already clothed and ready to leave the lake house.

  The memory of the night we shared flashed back to me. We had a beautiful night and it was the same as the night before I lost Maddie and it scared me. For the first time in a long time, my heart was filled with joy and I wanted it to last for a long time. If ever - forever. I did not keep Maddie by my side after having a beautiful night with her and I lost her the next day. I was afraid that I would lose Larni on that day, too. She had to stay by my side.

  “You are not going anywhere,” I demanded.

  “What do you mean? I have to go. I need to take care of my flower shop and Max...ine,” she pointed out.

  “You’re not going anywhere!” I insisted.

  “Max, what is wrong with you?” Larni asked. Her voice had a hint of frustration.

  “We had a deal,” I reminded her while pulling her back to the bed. She tried to stand again, but I hugged her from the back and kept her close to me. “Yo
u have to do what I want or you can kiss our deal goodbye.”

  “I have to leave,” Larni insisted.

  I groaned at the back of her ear and released her. She crawled down from the bed and glared at me. Something in her glare tickled me. I liked how she would argue with me, but it did not change the fear inside me. Instead it only wanted me to keep her beside me more.

  “Leave and the deal is cancelled,” I told her.

  “I did my part last night,” she replied.

  Part. The word angered me. She was only doing her part of the deal. I gritted my teeth and retorted, “I’ll donate another bag of blood then.”

  “Max?” she blurted

  “Leave this house and you would have to crawl to Maxine’s father and ask for his bone marrow instead,” I said angrily. I threw the sheet to her and walked to the bathroom.

  “Should I remain clothed or naked?” she asked with her eyes filled with tears of anger.

  I clenched my jaw and remained stubborn. I would rather that she was angry than lose her. I turned on the shower and said, “It’s your choice. You can join me in here if you like.”

  #

  “What do you plan to do with her?” Henry asked through the phone.

  I looked out to the porch to see Larni. She had not talked to me since our argument. I had Henry find someone to take care of her small flower shop, but I did not expect that my childish act would cause more worry for her. Maxine was to be released from the hospital that day and I forced her not to be there because of my fear. I forced her to stay with me for a week and she did it against her will - for the hope that I can save her daughter.

  “She’s only doing this for the operation,” Henry continued. “After you successfully donate your bone marrow to her kid, she would be out of your life. You said it yourself. She’s not Larni.”

  “I don’t know,” I told Henry.

  I did not want to lose her. That I was certain. This crazy feeling was more intense than what I felt for my Lar… no… for Maddie. I just want her to be mine for no reason at all. I wanted Maddie then because she was beautiful. My heart fell for her angelic face before I knew anything about her as a woman.