Across Eternity

by O'Roark, Elizabeth

  Did it mean anything? Did he say the same sort of thing to Yvette a few months later? Somehow, even after what he’s done, I’m incapable of believing it.

  Luc lifts my chin. “Where’d you go, Amelie?” he asks. I see pity in his eyes.

  I smile too broadly. “Sorry. I’m easily distracted. Show me again?”

  We dance, and it feels as though if I can keep moving, I can stave off my sadness. But once we sit, it returns. Despite all the champagne and the shots, I am painfully sober again, and desperate for some new answer. Could Luc be it? He’d sleep with me tonight if I asked it of him, I’m sure. Why shouldn’t I? I saved myself all those years for nothing, for a man who didn’t wait three months for me.

  “The next time we come I’ll teach you to tango,” Luc says.

  I shake my head. “I leave in two weeks.”

  His hand covers mine. “Stay. Give me a chance. I can make you forget him.”

  My eyes flutter closed. It’s late. Something Cecelia wants badly is on the cusp of happening.

  Is it this? I can’t have children, so she isn’t my daughter…but do I raise her with Luc? None of it makes sense, but maybe it doesn’t need to. Everything seems meaningless at this point. Maybe I should give into it and have some meaningless fun with a man who isn’t lying to me about it to make it happen.

  The words why don’t we go somewhere private rest on the tip of my tongue…and fall silent when my eyes open again. Henri looms over the table, glowering at the two of us as if we’ve been caught naked together.

  “I came to bring you home,” he says, his jaw stiff as steel, his mouth flat.

  I’ve been through too much to be treated like a child with a curfew by anyone, but especially by him. “You came all the way here for that?” I ask incredulously. “I’ll ride home with Luc.”

  A muscle twitches just beneath his cheekbone. “Amelie,” he says softly. “Please.”

  I thought there was nothing he could say to sway me, and yet he’s found it. That single word, please, is imbued with so much desperation, so much pain, that I’m unable to deny him.

  I’m probably not the meaningless fun kind of girl anyway. I turn to Luc. “I’m sorry. I should go.”

  He grabs my hand. “I’m here when you’ve figured this out.”

  I lean down and brush my lips against his cheek. “Thank you,” I whisper, and then I turn and follow Henri outside the bar.

  The car sits just down the street. He holds the door for me and I scold him as I climb in. “I can’t believe you wasted the petrol on this trip. After the baby comes, God only knows where you might need to drive, and drive quickly. Why are you even here?”

  He slides into the driver’s seat. “That’s a fast crowd,” he says. “I’m sure it seems innocent now, but they do things I don’t want you exposed to.”

  My fists clench. His overprotective bullshit was bad enough back before he’d ever hurt me. Now, it’s unbearable.

  “What kind of things?” I ask. “Will one of them take my virginity, talk about marrying me and then knock someone else up instead? No. Only you sink that low. I’m going back.”

  My hand goes to the door but he catches my arm. “Sarah,” he whispers. “Please.”

  I jerk away from him. “I told you not to use my name again, and I don’t need your help. Have you forgotten what I lived through over the past year? A situation like this is laughable by contrast. And I’m capable of disappearing at will, remember?”

  His eyes narrow. “Yes, turning invisible in front of the men from my town is just the kind of attention my family needs.”

  “Is that why you’re here?” I demand. “Because you’re worried I’ll embarrass you?!”

  His shoulders sag. “No.” He sighs heavily, staring at his lap. “I’m here because the idea of you with one of them tortures me. And I know how unfair that it is, under the circumstances. Marie told me so, a hundred times before I left. But I’ve never claimed to be a saint.”

  “Tortures you? How could that be true? You’re married, for God’s sake.”

  He glares at me. “Do you really think this marriage of mine could possibly change how I feel about you?”

  “If you felt enough,” I reply, my voice choked, “you’d never have married her in the first place.”

  “You’re wrong,” he says. “What I told you was true, about finding your skeleton, how it destroyed me. What I didn’t tell you is what happened afterward.”

  I wait, and my heart begins to thunder in my chest. The shame of whatever it was weighs so heavily on him I can see it like a visible scar.

  “I put Marie up in a hotel,” he says. “And then proceeded to get so drunk that I don’t know what bar I was in or when I left. But I thought I’d found you. I remember that. I remember believing I’d found you—out having a drink in Paris. I was enraged. I couldn’t believe you’d been in Paris all along, hadn’t even told us you were safe. But you apologized and I was so happy that I couldn’t stay mad. And you kept begging me to forgive you. I remember that. You kept saying, ‘show me you forgive me.’”

  My pulse is in my ears now and I stop breathing entirely.

  “And then I woke up beside Yvette. She’s never admitted to trying to trick me that night, and I was so drunk that I can’t be sure enough to accuse her of it. But two months later, she came to the farm and told me she was pregnant.”

  The image of it hurts so much I press my hands to my heart. “So you married her,” I whisper.

  He reaches out and slips his fingers through mine. “What else could I have done?”

  I can think of several alternatives, but they are nothing he’d have ever considered because he’s honorable, and because he will always do the right thing, no matter how much it hurts him. I love that about him.

  “Are you even sure the child is yours?”

  He stares straight ahead. “Only time will tell. But I didn’t even know her last name until we filled out the marriage certificate. We’d never even shared a meal. I knew nothing.”

  I wish I’d known. I’ve been so broken up over this, and I’ll remain broken, but knowing he cared might have made it bearable, at least. “Why didn’t you tell me this when I first came here?” I ask. “I’ve spent weeks believing you just moved on.”

  His tongue darts out to his upper lip. “Because she is still my wife. It seemed…disloyal…to admit that I don’t love her, and that this marriage is not what I’d have chosen.”

  And yet, he’s never going to leave her. He’s never going to abandon this child that may or may not be his, and all I’m doing here is causing trouble. And making my own situation worse. Was I seriously considering sleeping with Luc just moments before? Sleeping with him and remaining in this time instead of my own? It was insanity.

  “I’m going to go home,” I tell him. “This situation…it’s only going to cause us both pain.”

  “I thought you were staying until the end of the month,” he says. His voice rasps, a quiet plea.

  I shake my head. “There’s no point. I don’t know why Cecelia insisted I stay, but nothing good can come of it.”

  He closes his eyes. “Will you ever come back?”

  There’s a fiction we tell ourselves when we’re saying goodbye to someone we love. We always pretend there will be another time, because it would be too painful to acknowledge it’s the last. But I want to feel the pain of my answer, because I think it might haunt me less to get it out of the way right now. “No,” I tell him. “I won’t be coming back.”

  The ride home is mostly silent, beautiful and also painful. One last chance to be with him, knowing what we had before wasn’t all a lie, and knowing it’s going to end. “What are you thinking?” he asks as we turn onto the side road that leads to the farm.

  I lean my face against the window. It’s surprisingly cool. “I wasn’t thinking, really. I was just pretending this is how it would always be.” His hand reaches for mine before he realizes what he’s doing and pulls it back.
>
  “It’s what I’ve done every time we’re alone,” he says.

  He turns toward the farm and we both see it at the same time. It’s late, but every light in the house is on. We exchange a shocked glance. Something is very wrong.

  Marie-Therese is out the door the moment we climb from the car, tugging at her hair the same way Henri does when he’s beyond upset. “Mon Dieu! I told you not to go after her!” she screams. “The baby is coming. Go get the doctor!”

  He takes one last glance at me, and then he is gone.

  * * *

  Inside Yvette is screaming. Not that she ever struck me as the stoic type, but her face is lined with agony right now. “Make it stop,” she begs, again and again. She hardly seems to notice us, but when her eyes fall on me she flails in the bed. “Get her out! I don’t want her in here.”

  I walk from the room, pacing in front of the windows, waiting for the sight of Henri’s car. I’m torn. I can’t wish ill upon a child, especially not a child of Henri’s. But the baby is early, and I’m not sure how he’ll fare here, without an incubator and oxygen and whatever else preemies need, and if the baby doesn’t survive…would Henri stay married?

  I squeeze my eyes shut, trying not to think it, trying not to allow that secret hopeful piece of me to exist. I need to be better than that.

  “Shouldn’t we take her to a hospital?” I ask Marie when she steps out of the room. “The baby is six weeks early. You’re not equipped for that here.”

  “A hospital?” Marie asks with an unhappy laugh. “The nearest one is in Reims. Even if we had enough petrol to get there, I doubt we’d make it in time.”

  My jaw tightens. “I didn’t ask him to come after me, if that’s what you’re trying to imply.”

  She sighs. “Of course not. You’ve done so much for us. And you’re doing so much by remaining under these circumstances. It’s him. Henri. He’s about to be a father. He can’t go running off to Paris after a girl like a schoolboy.”

  Which he did because of me. The birth must be why Cecelia insisted I stay…but why? As far as I can tell, I’ve only made things worse.

  Henri arrives moments later with the doctor, who goes into Yvette’s room with Marie and shuts the door behind them. Henri turns to me, with the weight of the world on his shoulders. “It’s too soon,” he says, slumping into the chair beside mine and placing his head in his hands. “The child won’t live.”

  “He might,” I reply. But all I can think of is JFK’s first son, who will be born more than a decade from now, six weeks early, and will not survive because his lungs aren’t developed.

  “I’ve made such a mess of things,” he whispers. “I’m not sure how it’s possible for one man to make as many mistakes as I have, and to potentially ruin as many lives without trying.”

  My heart twists. Only a few years ago, he was at Oxford with a magnificent future ahead of him. He’s tried to do the right thing, again and again, even with Yvette, and his life has detonated instead. I live in a time where every teenager and college kid expects good things, and even expects the bad to be followed by good. But how can I promise Henri it will all work out when I know what lies ahead?

  My hands reach out to surround his. “Don’t lose hope just yet,” I tell him. It’s the best I can do.

  It seems only a few minutes later that Yvette’s cries stop, and, after a half-second of silence, we hear it: a tiny, fledging wail, warbling and pathetic. Henri jumps to his feet, and rushes to the door. When it opens, Marie is smiling. “You have a daughter,” she says with tears in her eyes. Henri’s eyes hold mine for a moment, scared and hopeful and apologetic before he follows her into the room.

  I breathe deep, brushing a hand over my dress as I rise and go to the family room. This is a time for family, and I’m not family. Now, especially. Marie and Henri share a blood link to Yvette. Their loyalties will be to her and the baby. It’s how it should be, and maybe that makes this the perfect time to leave. No drama, no weeping goodbyes. A chapter that ends just as a far more exciting one opens.

  My chest hurts at the thought of it, but I wanted to know what it was like to love someone so deeply that it felt like I couldn’t breathe when he walked into the room, and I got it. I will never have this again, I know. But I had it once—how many people can say that?

  I’m writing them a note when Dr. Nadeau and Henri exit the room, Henri carrying a tiny white bundle so small it hardly seems possible there might be a baby inside. I walk toward them gingerly.

  “A girl,” he says to me with awed eyes, so full of love already for this tiny thing. His life has moved on, as it should. And if I care about him at all, I need to let him have this moment, not ruin it with my bitterness.

  I force myself to smile, though all I really want to do is weep. “Congratulations. Do you have a name?”

  He shakes his head. “Perhaps Rose, after our mother, but I have to discuss it with Yvette when she wakes.”

  Doctor Nadeau hoists his bag and frowns. “She is very early, and very small. You’ll need to be extremely careful with her if she’s to survive the next few months. Constant tiny meals. Her stomach is too small to hold enough yet. And if she stops breathing, use the pump I gave Marie-Therese. She’ll show you how to use it.”

  The possibility that she might stop breathing is enough to make me take a step backward. In spite of all the death I witnessed in 1918, it’s not those women I picture…it’s my sister, being carried out of the lake. And I don’t want to live through that again. I don’t want to be at fault if it all goes wrong.

  Henri holds the bundle out to me and I take another step back. “I’d better not.”

  “Nonsense,” he replies. “She’s barely two kilos. I think you’ll manage.” He pushes her at me again so I really have no choice. I curve my arms beneath her inconsequential little body, holding her gingerly as a grenade I might drop, and as desperate to get rid of her as I would a grenade as well. I bounce her in my arms for a second or two and try to hand her back but he doesn’t take her. “I have to drive the doctor home. Can you watch her just until Marie is done getting Yvette cleaned up?”

  My mouth opens to refuse but I can’t think of an excuse. They leave and I take a chair in the living room. Reluctantly, I pull back the blankets from her face, though I’d rather not see her. She has dark hair like Henri’s but otherwise I can’t tell which of them she resembles. Her mouth purses and makes a sucking motion. I find my eyes stinging as I watch her. I loathe Yvette, and I strongly suspect that this pregnancy was not an accident, on her end—but this baby is innocent and when she opens her tiny slits of eyes to look up at me, I see faith there. This baby trusts me to care for her, to keep her safe. In spite of all the evil things I’ve done, and wanted and thought, she believes I will keep her warm and safe and fed. And she is right—I would. Holding her reminds me that there is good inside of me along with the bad. That the good is capable of winning, and I want it to. That rage inside me has been satisfying at times, but ultimately, I’d rather feel peaceful. I’d rather be a person worth this tiny human’s faith.

  When Henri returns, he takes the chair beside mine. “I’m sorry. I thought Marie would be out by now.”

  I shake my head. “It’s fine.” I hand her back to him and the two of us stare at her. “She is what will make this all worthwhile, you know.”

  He swallows, glancing from me to her. “I hope I’m able to believe that one day.”

  “Can you hire a nurse to help you, for the next few weeks?” I ask. “Since she’s so small? If people in town ask where you got the money you can tell them I left it for you.”

  He stills. “You’re not going to stay? I thought maybe this...I thought you might change your mind.”

  I stare at my lap. “You have a family now. You are a family. My presence just makes things worse. But I’ll check on your daughter throughout her life, and make sure she has what she needs.”

  His head hangs but he doesn’t argue with me. When he yawns a few min
utes later, I take the baby from him and cradle her. It feels natural to me already.

  “I want to keep this in my head forever,” he says, watching us. Our eyes hold. I want to hold it in my head too. This is what it would have been like to have a child with him.

  Marie stumbles out of the bedroom just then, her clothes painted with blood and yawning. “How is my niece?” she asks, smiling down at the little face.

  “Excellent,” I reply. “But getting hungry I think.”

  Marie swoops her up with graceful efficiency. “Let’s go see your maman, lovely Cecelia.”

  Henri’s brow shoots up. “What did you call her?” he asks.

  Marie smiles knowingly. “Oh, the baby? Yes. Yvette has named her Cecelia.”

  He and I stare at each other, dumbfounded as it all comes together. This tiny beautiful thing in Marie’s arms, this child who isn’t yet five pounds, is the woman who has saved me twice. And someday she’ll be the richest woman in France.

  “Is it the same person?” Henri asks incredulously.

  I never, in a million years, would have put it together before, but I know that it is. “She knew you. She knew me as Amelie. She knew about Marie and what we could do. Except I—I don’t understand. She knew where to look for me based on my stories. Like the hospital…she came to save me from it.”

  “She wouldn’t have heard them from me,” he says quietly, placing his hand on my knee. “Which means you told them to her yourself.”

  “I don’t see how that’s possible,” I whisper. “I’m leaving. I’ll be gone in a few hours.”

  Marie stands, holding Cecelia, and her eyes go to Henri’s hand, which still rests on my knee. “Henri,” she says, “you should probably go see your wife. Take her the baby, will you?”

  He looks at her blankly for a moment, as if he’d forgotten she was there, or forgotten, perhaps, that there was a wife in all this. And then he rises, gently fixing Cecelia’s blankets before he carries her away.