The Day Before Forever

by Anna Caltabiano

  I instinctively gripped his hand, and he gave me a little squeeze back. That was the feeling of reassurance I missed when Henley was without a body.

  “I wonder where they’re getting all these photographs from,” Henley said.

  “The better question is, who are ‘they’?” I didn’t know who would be running a site with access to all of these photos.

  With a few clicks, I came to the home page of the website.

  Beauford Family Estate, it said.

  “You have a family estate?”

  “Of course I do” was Henley’s response. “It’s probably run by some descendant of mine.”

  My eyes went wide. “B-but you didn’t have any children . . . And you don’t have any siblings . . . Is there anything you forgot to mention?”

  “Not that I know of. I meant distant relations. Like the great-grandchildren of my cousins or something along those lines,” he said.

  “Thank God.” I let out the breath I didn’t know I had been holding.

  Henley raised his eyebrows. “Were you thinking I was going to admit to having four children you didn’t know about?”

  It sounded absurd, but I guess I hadn’t known what to expect. “It’s just that—”

  “You know I’ve told you everything.”

  Except about your life after I left, I thought to myself.

  “I haven’t kept anything from you,” he went on. “And why should I?”

  I bit my tongue. We only had a minute left on the computer, and I wanted to find out more about who was running this site.

  I scrolled down to the bottom of the page. There was a small “About” section.

  Muffy Beauford. Great-granddaughter of Philip Beauford—

  That was all I could read before the computer cut off. We were out of time.

  “Damn it,” I said.

  Henley looked appalled. “I haven’t heard you swear like that before. A woman like you . . .”

  “I was just disappointed,” I said. “Wouldn’t you have liked to find out more about Muffy Beauford? Wait, maybe we could go to the front desk and pay a little more for a bit of extra time.”

  “It’s not worth it.”

  I was surprised that Henley thought that. “What do you mean? You’re related in some way to this Muffy Beauford. Don’t you want to know more about her?”

  “And what good would that do? It wouldn’t make her any less of a stranger to me,” Henley said. “Besides, we now know that a Beauford Family Estate exists. That’s helpful. It’s a perfect backstory. We can tell the auction house that the jewelry was passed down from them.”

  “But aren’t you curious? All I got was that she’s the great-granddaughter of a Philip Beauford.”

  “Philip was my father’s younger brother. They didn’t get along much, so I don’t remember seeing him. Supposedly I met him once, but I must have been young—I don’t remember.”

  I couldn’t understand. “Don’t you want to know Muffy, though?”

  “Reading about her won’t let me know her. And if you’re going to ask me if I ever want to meet Muffy, or any others, no. I don’t know them. They’re not family.”

  I knew I had to let it go. It wasn’t as if it would be easy to contact them either. They would laugh if we told them Henley was their long-lost great-uncle. Or worse—call the police. “Then let’s get back to the hostel so we can call the auction house before it closes today.” But I still couldn’t understand why he wasn’t interested.

  We hardly had time for conversation on the walk—not that we had much to say—as we tried to walk briskly to make it back in time to call Carter House.

  So it was very strange when Henley suddenly stopped short across the street from the hostel.

  “What are you doing?” I asked. “It’s right there. We need to call before—”

  “That man’s there again.”

  I had no idea what he was talking about until I saw him myself.

  It was the man from last night. He was there, pacing in front of the hostel, with his oversized sweatshirt and his sweaty hair. He obviously hadn’t changed since last night.

  I walked toward him before Henley could stop me.

  “There you are,” the man said when he saw me. “Took you long enough.”

  Standing in front of him now, I could see a brown stain near the front neckline of his sweatshirt. It was as if he had missed his mouth when eating something and hadn’t bothered cleaning it up.

  “You were waiting for us?” I braced myself as he got closer to me. I didn’t want to know what his breath smelled like.

  “Didn’t we have business to take care of, you and me?” The man ignored Henley, who had come up protectively behind me.

  “We want—”

  “Not here.” The man turned and walked around the corner of the hostel.

  It took me a second to realize I was meant to follow.

  Trailing him, I walked into the narrow side street between the hostel and the next-door apartments. I realized this was the small street I could see from the window in our room, but now, actually walking the road, it seemed more like an alleyway than an actual street.

  The man was flattened against the wall of the hostel. It was the perfect location: devoid of people, no security cameras, and not suspicious at all, especially in broad daylight. The man stood precisely where he could not be seen by either the windows of the hostel or the windows of the apartments. He was practiced.

  “Next time you wait ten more seconds before following me, yeah?”

  I nodded quickly.

  “Now, what is it that you want?”

  I thought on my feet. We ultimately needed passports to leave the country, but we surely didn’t have the funds to pay for them right then, and it was likely there would be some deposit to pay ahead of time. But we needed something to show the auction house—or any other pubs—should they ask.

  Henley had talked about using the Beauford Family Estate as part of the cover story on how we came to own the Tudor jewelry. Should we need to produce a form of identification, the auction house would surely ask him instead of me—as far as they would be concerned, I wasn’t involved.

  “We need two IDs. One for me and one for him.” I pointed at a fidgeting Henley. He had a deep furrow lining his forehead.

  The man rubbed his short beard.

  “Something like a London driving license of some sort?” I offered.

  “Of course not. That won’t do. Do you take me for an idiot?”

  “Um . . . no?”

  The man crossed his arms. “You have an accent. Where are you from?”

  “The States,” Henley said.

  “Of course I know that,” the man snapped. “I meant what state.”

  “New York,” I said.

  “Him too?” He jabbed his thumb in Henley’s general direction.

  “Yes.”

  “Then you want New York driver’s licenses,” the man said. “You’re obviously not from around here. A British license would raise questions.”

  “And you can do New York driver’s licenses?” I asked.

  “Of course we can. Don’t insult me. You have an address and a name you want it under?” The man took a scrap of paper and a pen out of the pocket of his sweatshirt.

  I took it and tried to write out Henley’s name, but the capless ballpoint pen the man handed me didn’t work.

  “Do you have another pen?” I asked.

  “Do I look like I have another pen?”

  I took that to mean no and kept scribbling on the corner of the paper. At last some ink came out, and I carefully wrote out Henley’s full name, my name, and Miss Hatfield’s address.

  The man took the pen and paper from me when I was done.

  “Two names. Two cards. Same address,” I said.

  “How much would that cost?” Henley asked.

  “I’ll give it to you for eighty pounds.”

  “We’re ordering more than one,” I said, giving him a look.<
br />
  “Fine. Sixty.”

  “And how do we know it’ll be good enough to pass?” Henley said.

  “Oh, it’ll be good. But if you’re so worried, why don’t you pay half now and pay the other half when you see it?”

  Henley looked at me. That sounded reasonable.

  “Give him the money,” I said.

  Henley dug into the backpack and emerged with the money. Each bill was folded neatly down the middle.

  The man was quick to pocket the cash and produced his phone. Even a shady man like this had a glossy iPhone.

  “I need to take a picture of both of you.” The man pointed to the white-painted brick wall behind us. “There.”

  The photo was taken as soon as Henley got in front of the wall.

  Henley opened his mouth. “But I—”

  “Wasn’t ready?” The man sniggered. “That’s the first thing about fakes. The photos aren’t supposed to be good. If you look too good, it’s a telltale sign the ID’s a fake.” He jabbed a finger at me. “You next.”

  He quickly took my photo.

  “How long will it take?” Henley asked.

  “Calm it down, boy. It’ll take as long as it takes. I promise quality, not speed.”

  Henley’s face flushed. “We need it fast. We’re paying—”

  The man looked at me with his hard eyes. “I don’t like this boy. You should lose him as soon as you can.”

  I ignored that and tried to ask in a way the man would understand. “We want to use the IDs as soon as possible . . . that is, if they’re good enough.”

  “Of course they’ll be good enough.” The man mopped his sweaty forehead with the sleeve of his sweatshirt. “You have something in mind?”

  “We’re putting them to the test as soon as we get them,” I said.

  “Oh, they’ll pass. You’ll see.”

  “I sure hope they do.” I surprised myself with how cold I sounded.

  The man grinned. “I like you better than your boy there. I’ll tell you what—I’ll rush my guy for expedited service and I’ll only charge fifty percent more. Because I’m that kinda businessman.”

  I nodded to Henley, and he gave the man fifteen more pounds.

  “The IDs will pass whatever test you throw at them.” The man turned and walked away from us.

  For a second, neither Henley nor I moved. When the man was long out of sight, Henley finally turned toward me.

  “So that was that?” Henley said. “The man will find us when he’s done making the fake licenses?”

  “He’ll probably be pacing in front of the hostel again,” I said.

  We walked into the hostel. Henley made to go back to our room, but I stopped him.

  “Aren’t you forgetting something?” I pointed to the phone number scrawled on the back of his left hand. “We were going to call the auction house, weren’t we?”

  “Oh, right. Yes.” It was obvious he was a little out of sorts from the encounter we had just had.

  “I don’t know when exactly we’ll have the IDs, but maybe we won’t need them for our first meeting . . .” I felt as if I was talking to myself more than Henley.

  I rang the bell at the front desk and waited a few minutes. I didn’t want to come across as too impatient, but when I didn’t hear anything, I rang it again.

  I heard a distant “Yes!” through the walls. A minute later, footsteps.

  “So sorry,” Aaron said as he came through the door. He tried to wipe what looked like flour from his shirt, but he only managed to smear the white powder even more. “I was just baking. Can’t leave the oven unattended for long! What can I do for you?”

  “Sorry for taking you from your baking,” I said.

  “Oh no, I’m here for you to ask me questions.”

  “We just wanted to ask if there was a phone we could use?”

  Aaron reached behind the desk and pulled out a phone. It was a landline and connected to the wall, so he made sure to move the cord around the computer monitor. “There you go.”

  Thanking him, I reached for the phone and stopped.

  “Why don’t you make the call?” I said to Henley.

  Aaron was still awkwardly standing behind the desk, watching us. He didn’t look like he was going to move anytime soon.

  Henley picked up the receiver and began dialing, looking back at his hand every few seconds. He put the phone to his ear, and I could hear it ring.

  “Carter House Auction Specialists.” It was a young female voice that picked up on the other end of the line. “Hilary speaking.”

  “Um, yes, Hilary. I’m Henley Beauford, and I was hoping to come in to talk to you about a piece of jewelry I would like to sell.”

  “Jewelry. I can most certainly put you in touch with one of our jewelry specialists for an evaluation and consultation.” Hilary spoke crisply, enunciating all her letters, so even I could hear every consonant she uttered. “Might I ask the decade this piece of jewelry is from?”

  “Uh, well it’s a set. A jewelry set. A woman’s necklace and earrings. It’s very old. Um, early 1500s?”

  Hilary didn’t miss a beat. “Could you briefly describe it for us? I’d like to take a few notes to give to our specialist before the meeting.”

  “Sure . . . it’s gold. With rubies.”

  “Or garnets,” I whispered.

  “Or garnets,” Henley repeated. “Red stones. Um, and the earrings match.”

  “They’re in very good condition,” I prompted Henley.

  “They’re in very good condition. Preserved very well,” Henley said.

  I glanced at Aaron. There was no way he was not listening to this conversation. I wondered how much he could hear of the woman on the other end, but needless to say, this was probably not the type of phone conversation he usually heard at the hostel.

  “Yes.” Hilary sounded like she was taking notes furiously on the other end. “And finally, when would be most convenient for you to come into our offices for us to assess the jewelry and discuss our process with you?”

  “We—my . . . girlfriend and I are traveling from the States and will be staying briefly in the UK, so as soon as possible would be ideal.”

  “We can see you first thing tomorrow morning at ten, if that would be convenient for you?”

  “Yes, that would be fine. Thank you.”

  “We look forward to meeting you, Mr. Beauford.”

  Henley and I stood still, waiting for the click of the phone on the other end. When we heard it, it was accompanied by a sigh of relief, but I didn’t know if the sigh was from me or Henley.

  Henley put down the receiver, and we both thanked Aaron once again.

  “We’re trying to take care of a few things while we’re in town,” I tried to explain.

  Aaron asked no questions.

  I asked for some paper and a pen, and wrote down the number from Henley’s hand before we left.

  Henley and I walked back to the room.

  “So ‘girlfriend,’ huh?” I said suddenly.

  Henley chuckled. “What else was I supposed to call you? I heard Peter use the term when he described you. That was appropriate, right?”

  “Yes,” I said. It wasn’t perfect, but there wasn’t really a word for what I was to Henley and what he was to me. I guessed it was close enough.

  SIX

  I KNEW IT was morning before I opened my eyes. Light streamed into our room, and I could feel it through my eyelids.

  I kept them closed and turned over onto my side. I could feel Henley next to me—his palpable warmth, the cadence of his breath, and the way his body fit around mine. In that moment, everything else was secondary. Henley was here next to me. That was all that mattered. With him there, I was the happiest I had been in a long time.

  I sighed and turned onto my back once more. It was so comfortable in bed, but I knew I should start to get up.

  I unglued my eyelids and stared straight up at the ceiling. It was plain and set lower than I had realized. My
eyes followed every bump and bubble of the paint. Uninterested, I turned to Henley again. This time, with my eyes open, it was different.

  With my eyes closed, Henley was Henley alone; he was the Henley that I loved and the Henley that existed in my memories. With my eyes opened, Henley was Henley and Richard.

  Henley had come back to me and I still loved him, yet he was so different—this was so different. Every morning when I woke up, would it be like this? Feeling Henley, hearing Henley, and expecting to see Henley, only to be met with Richard?

  Frowning, I turned away.

  “Good morning.” I heard Henley groan as he stretched beside me. “Sleep well?”

  I turned toward him, almost expecting to see Henley’s clear blue eyes, but I was met with Richard’s caramel.

  “Yes, I did,” I said.

  “I had a dream I was back home,” he said.

  Home. It was amazing he still considered it that. With more time, Henley probably would stop thinking of the house in his original time period as his home.

  “What was the dream about?”

  “Not much.” He tucked his hands behind his head. “I was walking the grounds of the country house. Everything was there—the tree we sat by, the stables you loved, the original main house before it burned down . . .”

  We sat in silence for a while.

  “We have a long morning ahead of us, don’t we?” Henley finally said.

  I knew he meant our meeting with the auction house. “Yes . . .” I glanced at the clock on the bedside table. “We have enough time, but we should get dressed and eat a quick breakfast before we leave.”

  Henley sat up without warning. “What do we wear?”

  I had slept in a shirt, and Henley had slept in his pants. We couldn’t really go as we were.

  I shrugged. “The nicest we can manage. You can wear that button-down shirt with the jeans, and I can wear my skirt and top set.”

  “And shoes?” Henley ran his fingers through his hair. “What about shoes?”

  I shrugged again. It was just like Henley to panic about shoes.

  We both got up and changed into our respective outfits. I was spreading peanut butter on a slice of bread when Henley came back into the room. I was hungry and so absorbed in preparing breakfast that I hadn’t noticed that he had left in the first place.