“I don’t understand.” I shook my head. “Am I dead?”
He smiled then, softly. “No. But this is taking a great deal of effort for me. I only have a few moments.”
I launched myself at him then. “Please, stay.”
“I can’t. But I had to see you again once more. I had to make sure you were all right.” His voice sounded strained. “To say a proper goodbye.”
“No.” My eyes pricked with tears. “Please, not again. It’s been so hard.”
“I know. It is hard for me as well, but it is what must be.” He pulled me away from him. “These are the cards we have been dealt.”
“Please … ”
“You do know that we shall find each other again, don’t you?” he asked, tipping my chin up and forcing me to meet his eyes, and all at once I thought of the dark-haired boy of my dreams. The one with Alex’s eyes.
“You do know this life is only one stopping place—and one day, this time will seem to have been no longer than a blink?” he asked.
“I wish it were a blink,” I told him.
He took me in his arms again. “No, you cannot think that. You have to go on and you have to live this life—fully. If you give up, it will affect the next life and the next. If you give up on all the possibilities of this life, you will not be the person you were, the person you are meant to be. You will not be mine any longer.”
I knew he was right. Each life, Mama Legba said, influenced the next. If I curled up and gave in now, I wouldn’t be the person Alex loved—not in this life or in the last. I thought again about the dark-haired boy of my dreams and wondered if that wasn’t some promise of what might be. Someday. In some other life.
“Will you come see me again? To get me through?”
He pulled back. “No, Lucy. I cannot come back again. I’m not sure I should be here now, but I had to see you once more. Hold you like this, once more.”
“Then this is really it?” I asked, knowing the truth before he answered.
“For now.”
He leaned down and kissed me gently on the lips. “I love you, Lucy Aimes. I loved you as Armantine Lyon, and I will love you again, whoever you may one day be. And I will find you. Have faith in that.”
He kissed me again, then, as my heart was breaking.
“I love you too, Alexandre Jourdain,” I said. But he was already gone.
I woke the next morning, my eyes rough from sleep, and realized that none of it had been real—it had only been a dream.
But I had something in my hand. A card.
I instantly recognized the iridescent ink, the interlocking doors from Mama Legba’s deck. And on the face of the card, an image of a man and woman tangled together in an embrace, guarded by an angel with arms outstretched as if in benediction and wings of fire. The Lovers, the card read. I traced my finger over the picture, and the angle’s flaming wings seemed to dance in the morning light.
And then I set the card on my bedside stand and forced myself to get up, to get dressed. To go on.
The End
Acknowledgments
I don’t think anyone was more surprised than I was that this story became the book you’re holding in your hands right now. There are so many people who helped to get it to this point—people who believed in the story, and who believed in the possibility that I could be a writer, much less get published someday. What follows isn’t enough to thank them properly, but I hope that it’s a start:
First and foremost, I need to thank my amazing editor at Flux, Brian Farrey-Latz, who believed in this story enough to buy it and whose keen insights made it better than I could have made it myself. To Sandy, my astute copyeditor, who found all the problems I managed to miss and helped me polish my prose. The whole team at Flux has my heartfelt thanks for their support—especially my incredible cover designer, Lisa Novak, who created the most perfectly haunting image to introduce Alex and Lucy’s story to the world.
Before the fine people at Flux, Nathaniel Jacks found my story in the slush pile and took a chance on it. My amazing agent, Kathleen Rushall, has had my back for this whole wild ride, and for that I’m profoundly grateful. I’m so lucky to have her support and to be a member of TeamKrush.
Many people read early drafts, but Karoliina Engstrom’s comments were especially astute and her support inspiring.
Mountains of thanks, bourbon, and donuts to my friends at www.OneFourKidLit.com and in the Fall Fourteeners blog group. You’ve all helped keep me sane for the last year. And to all my virtual friends on Twitter, who make long days of writing a little less lonely.
Thanks also to my family—to my mom, who read an early version of this and didn’t even seem all that surprised that I came up with it. And to my dad, who is the one that I owe my knowledge of photography to. Lucy’s talent all started back in the hours I spent in his darkroom, watching him work and learning the magic of photography. Together they make one heck of a publicity team.
Finally, it isn’t an exaggeration to say that this book would not exist without my husband’s support. He is always my first reader and my most trusted reader, and has been cheering me on ever since the day four years ago when I told him I might, maybe, try writing a book. His honesty saved the first draft of this book. He keeps the house from falling down around us and wrangles our two wild monkeys when I lose myself in the glow of a screen. He even braved the streets of New Orleans with a two-year-old, just so I could do research. There aren’t words or years enough to express my thanks—not in this lifetime at least.
© Cameron Whitman Photography, LLC
About the Author
Growing up in Northeastern Ohio, Lisa Maxwell liked reading so much that she gave up her rather sensible idea of becoming a lawyer and decided instead to get a not-so-sensible degree in English. And then she got another … and another. It seems to have worked out. When she’s not writing books, she teaches English at a local college. She lives near DC with her very patient husband and two not-so-patient boys. You can visit her online at www.lisa-maxwell.com or find her most days on Twitter @LisaMaxwellYA.
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