by S. K Munt
‘Justin,’ Leigh supplied, and Ryan smirked and nodded.
‘Not exactly- Hunter was a lot funnier but yeah, they were close and Calliope found him endearing but me…’
‘Irresistible?’
He winked at her. ‘I had a bit of game so yeah, I played back.’ He crossed his arms across his chest and shrugged. ‘It got pretty fucking messy, like she wanted it to. I know now that she hoped that we’d sort of band against her but we were both too smitten and she came between us. She had to date him- had to knock his fucking socks off and break his heart; that was the objective, because it would scrape the shallow off him and lead him to tap into the songwriter within. And what better way to break a guy’s heart, then to make him fall in love with you and then betray him with his best mate?’
Leigh winced. ‘She did that on purpose? Bloody hell… even as a human, she had stones.’
‘It was torture for her. She really did love us both, as much as someone can. I saw my chance to have her and I took it, and we had one perfect night together that… that I woke up alone after.’ He rubbed his lower lip with his thumb. ‘And it killed me. It hurt so much for her to fall into my arms, only to run away after, and it cut Hunter deeply too. She lied, telling him that she had a heart condition that was going to kill her, knowing that only her death would hurt him bad enough to bring his destiny into fruition- only optimistic as he was, he held onto that hope. Until the night we opened, as Lonesome October for… shit… I can’t even remember the name of the band now!’
‘The Fork In The Road…’ Leigh whispered. ‘Some of the kids from school went to that concert…’
Ryan looked up. ‘Not you?’
Leigh blushed and looked down. ‘Some of the cooler kids from school went to that concert. Even if I had wanted to go- which I didn’t- my parents wouldn’t have let me go to an actual rock concert. But I heard about it all…’
‘Yes well it was pretty intense, especially from where I was sitting.’ Ryan cleared his throat. ‘Anyway it was our biggest gig and I was supposed to sing this incredible song that Hunter wrote about her… but I couldn’t. I fell apart onstage and Hunter took over. Calliope must have realised that she loved me then- truly loved Ryan Weaver- and she came onstage and kissed me, and then died on the spot.’
Leigh’s mouth popped open- he’d just given her the backstory to the video that Hunter Marks had been trying to bury for almost a decade, and it made her shiver. ‘That was truly you? You’re not pulling my leg?’ Leigh wished that she could recall more, but what had been international news had been a local tragedy, and the newspapers had actually handled it tastefully. Besides, after a few weeks- it was the band’s collapse and Hunter’s stardom making the headlines, and Leigh wondered if that was the muses doing- messing with reality- playing up the fame and covering up the glimpse into heaven.
‘Fraid not. It made him a star, and me… I knew it was the death of me- that I had to keep my end of the bargain with The Harmony. If I didn’t die right away, she’d be stuck in Oblivion until music recovered from her death, and she’d be tortured without music. So I went backstage, left Hunter a note wishing him the best, then locked the door and swallowed half a bottle of Vicodin. It was a way to go out slowly, you know? I ended up in Oblivion with her, and she turned around and saw me- this face- and understood. I explained everything, we exchanged vows of love, and we held each other…. And then I died, both as a mortal and as a demi-god, and she got her life back- and her power, with the biggest star on the planet as her ward.’
Leigh’s eyes clouded over as his did. He turned away, and the weight of all he had lost and the prices he had paid seemed to hang in the air with the weight of the humidity.
‘I’m sorry,’ Ryan wiped at his eyes and turned away. ‘It’s the first time I’ve actually told that story and…’ his voice broke and he cleared it. ‘Anyway, everything’s hazy after that. I was in heaven, sort of, and I got to see her occasionally… and then, the beautiful daughter she had as a result of our one night together. I loved her enough to break through the realms and touch her with music- like a ghost of sorts… sending her songs, getting in to some of her dreams… but this year, she tracked down Hunter and they were married not long ago. She’s using a different face with him and going by the name Melody Marks instead of Callie Clay, and from what I understand, she’s very happy and Zeus has agreed that Hunter is a bright enough star to warrant soul-mate status, meaning that when she’s ready to give up music and pass her gift along to Rya, she and he will die as they are and live as entities together forever, however they choose to.’ He shook his head. ‘But she hasn’t done so yet, and The Harmony is being jeopardized again by her trying to milk his career, and I don’t know who will pay for that…’
Leigh gave up trying to stand and slid down against the refrigerator, fairly certain that she was the one who was going to pay for that ‘That’s… that’s one hell of a fucking story, Ryan. A really, really sad one for you.’
And as the woman who wants you to be HER soul-mate, I’m crushed! Is my destiny to spend my life weeping on the kitchen floor?
‘Well… there have been times when I could have gotten awards for feeling sorry for myself…’ he folded his long lean legs and joined her on the tiles, taking his hand in hers. ‘But like I said before…. It isn’t over yet. I was brought back because of a guilty conscience, and the power of imagination- just like Marnie Winters brought back Zeus and Memoria, and just like the troubles in Tibet have brought back Hendra, the muse of war…’ he tapped on the edge of her nose. ‘And I know all that because when Calliope pulled me from the street the other night, she took me straight back to Helicon. I was only there for ten minutes, freaking out while she and Imogen dumped everything on me and I forgot about the time lapse thing.’ He shook his head at her, looking mournful. ‘I got back two and a half weeks- and two minutes after I left you, but you were long gone and I was…’ He squeezed her hand. ‘I love you, Honey, and only you. I would never, EVER have left you if the choice had been mine!’
Leigh shook her head, unable to comprehend the notion of him loving her after who he had loved before, though she took his excuse for the vanishing act like bait and swallowed it whole, and gratefully. ‘I love you too, Ry- so much! But something tells me that a two thousand year old demi-god wasn’t reborn to eat my burnt crackling.’
‘Your crackling is perfect,’ he whispered, kissing her earlobe. ‘Like you.’
That wasn’t true- her crackling was definitely overdone but she appreciated his kindness- wished fervently that it was all they needed to work but she knew that simply wasn’t so. She looked down at her hands and it killed her to know that their time together was limited. ‘You must have some purpose, some calling… and even if you don’t… how am I supposed to compete with a goddess, Ry? I was scared enough when she was slightly famous, but you died for her! You’re so important to the world and I-’
‘Am the reason why I’m back.’ Ryan’s hand slipped down her cheek and turned her to look into tearful blue eyes. ‘A bit of love from a million girls didn’t bring me back to life, Honey… but the complete love of one very old, very powerful soul who wants a love like I do- who would do anything, and believe in anything, for that perfect romance.’ He rested his forehead against hers. ‘I’m alive because of your imagination and heart, my darling, and I think you’re heaven sent, to catch me this time.’
Leigh stared at him, shocked. Was he really saying that her fan-girling had brought him back to life? And what did he mean by: ‘Old and powerful soul.’ ? ‘I don’t understand,’ she confessed miserably. ‘I-’
‘Then I’ll show you.’ Ryan got to his feet and took her by the hand, leading her to the living room and back to the couch, she was about to dig in her feet and protest that making her have multiple orgasms wasn’t going to convince her that she was destined for him any more than any other woman with a working vagina and a set of eyes, but he leaned over the coffee table and passed her the frame
d photograph she’d put out for her parents- the one of her with Santa Claus back in 2000. She looked at the bright red specs she was wearing and the shockingly-tight side-pony and cringed.
‘The fact that you can get it up for me, even after you’ve seen this photo is proof that you’re the one in need of glasses now,’ she joked without humour. Not that we’re soul-mates.’
Ryan tousled her hair. ‘Imogen’s basically told me that she believes as I do- that your heart alone willed me into existence because she found me the way the girl in your fan-fiction story found Ryan-washed up in the Niagara River. But aside from that…’ he turned and wrapped his arms around her waist. ‘I saw that before and it took me a few minutes to work out but…’ he leaned in and kissed her forehead sweetly, his voice croaking when he whispered: ‘That’s the little girl from the field- the one Callie gifted the lyre to.’
Leigh’s blood turned to ice. ‘What?!’
Ryan smiled encouragingly. ‘You’re one I spoke for, and who ran after me until her little legs gave out… that’s you. No wonder those eyes struck me hard, Honey- they were the same eyes that pleaded for my life the first time that I lost it.’ He pushed her hair out of her eyes. ‘You say people have been trying to coddle and protect you since you were born, well, I think I’ve been trying to do it since the dawn of time.’
Leigh snapped up her head to gape at him, mind spinning crazily. Was he serious? Could it be true? Could it-
A knock on the door interrupted her thoughts and then immediately gave her two thousand new ones to panic over. ‘My parents!’ she squeaked, but Ryan was already taking the photo from her hands and running across the room to get his shirt, making her wonder if they weren’t soul-mates after all.
Twenty-One
As Ryan prepared himself, physically and mentally, to meet and wow Leigh’s parents in her ultra-girlie, incredibly pretty Tiffany-Blue bathroom, it was with a racing heart. He was disappointed that the significant moment between them had been interrupted before she’d communicated how his revelations sat with her in the grand scheme of things, but if what she had to say in response was going to make him feel worse than anxious, then he was glad to have the opportunity to show her how their life could be before she burst his balloon of hope.
Deep down, he knew that she loved him and a fathom or two above that, he knew that she believed him. But when she’d looked at him, her eyes had been guarded, and that worried him. It took an incredibly powerful, very rare imagination to accept everything he’d just said as fact, and now he could see that that imagination was working overtime to dream up all of the things that could go wrong, while her intellect was telling her that the odds of it going right- given how he’d already been dead twice and had one soul-mate- were stacked against them. He, on the other hand believed that the opposite was true- how much bad luck could one guy have? Surely he’d exhausted his by now, with the death by stoning and the eternal virgin and amnesia stuff?
But he could see why the idea of being with a former demi-god was troubling him… how insecure had he felt at the sight of a random blonde guy opening her door? How could he expect a shy, studious and practical girl to throw caution to the wind and assume that her Vegas husband was going to prove to be a safe bet?
He would be, but Leigh simply wasn’t in the position to accept that yet, and so he’d have to give her time. He’d always been a romantic like her, but unlike her, he’d ridden the wave of fate for long enough to know that you could only fall off so many times before you learned how to keep your balance in any condition. And that was what destiny was; an endless tide that ebbed and flowed, threw tsunami’s at you out of nowhere and then went suspiciously calm right before a squall. Sometimes you got dunked and sometimes you got a long perfect ride but at the end of the day- every wave washed up somewhere. He’d gone to hell over Calliope- there really couldn’t have been a worse outcome for him as a mortal or a god than the hand he’d been dealt- and he’d washed up on the rocks to find himself gazing out at the ocean, peaceful, content and aware that the harmony had replaced the blood in his veins and kept him just as warm as life had. He hadn’t thought for a moment that he’d come back, and he’d been okay, and that was the faith he had to hang onto now.
Naturally, Ryan wanted his eternal life back, just so that he could stay with Honey forever the way he was supposed to have had Calliope forever, but that was asking too much and so he’d gratefully take a human life with his Honey, whether it be five days or fifty years, knowing that was more than what most people got, and make the most of every long ride and calm sea. There would be problems and maybe, he’d drop dead the moment his child was born because The Harmony had decided that he’d had enough happiness, but he’d accept that yet again if it meant that some other lucky bastard out there got to experience happiness with their own soul-mate for a little while… so long as it wasn’t Calliope’s ego that cost him time with his honey.
And he knew that Honey would come around to his hopeful way of thinking too… if only she’d open her eyes and see that while he had died for Calliope- he would never, EVER die for Leigh, for he couldn’t bear to sacrifice a second of time with her. He’d swallowed pills for Calliope to prove his love but with Leigh, he’d hang onto her tightly with both hands and be unable to open a bottle. Maybe that made his love more selfish but for a martyr like him, it was a clear sign that he’d given up putting anything between himself and his heart and that was growth, in its own way.
And he knew she was the little girl from the field, he just knew it. Some souls like Hunter’s were new, and some like Honey were ancient- it showed in their every word and action. Besides, as he listened to her parents babble through the thin floor sheeting between both levels of the flat, it became apparent that they were every bit as fussy and protective as she’d claimed. And when she heard the air-con guy come in and offer to fix the problem in exchange for a slice of watermelon, and then heard her father say something about Honey being let off a traffic infringement the day before, it further solidified his theory that this girl had something about her that made men lay their jackets over puddles and mothers weep on wedding days. She was the girl whose big green eyes had compelled him to offer up his life in exchange for hers back in Ancient Greece, no doubt- but why? What was she to the universe? Just his true soul-mate? Or was she truly meant to be something special?
The two gay guys returned while Ryan was rolling up the cuffs of the only dress shirt he owned, and the babble from downstairs became louder, less fussy and incredibly welcoming, making Ryan smiled for the possibilities. All he’d ever wanted was a family… was he about to meet his?
He trotted downstairs with the wrapped Christmas gifts in his arms that he’d bought before coming. He had another one in the car for Honey that he’d picked upon the way, along with the dog he’d scouted on the Internet, that had been too big to lug in and now he feared, too big to fit in her apartment. He was careful as he walked down the stairs, and when he reached the landing and saw that the stack of presents that had been there before had doubled in size, he smiled, knowing that he was going to have to take his spoiling her up a notch to compete with her parents! He could barely see the tiny tree for the stack of parcels they’d bought in with them!
‘… Just saying that if you’d invited that nice police officer to dinner…’
‘I’m telling you Leigh you’ve got a happy ending for that story now and you need to use it- so I can benefit!’ Lachlan was artfully arranging the fruit that Ryan had cut on a white plate while her parents bustled around the kitchen opening cupboards and oven doors, a strange man in work fluro was taking the cover off Leigh’s air-conditioner, and Lachlan’s partner was on the floor with the puppy, waving a piece of pink tinsel at it like it was a kitten rather than a sharpei. And amidst it all, there was Leigh, spray and wiping the table top, no doubt trying to make it hygienic after what he’d done to her on it, and his heart made kissy noises at her as he slid his gifts on top of the others.
&nb
sp;