by Alice Ayden
A weird sense overtook me, but it had to be my imagination. I continued down the hallway and then up the side steps. I stopped outside my room. Something hinted I shouldn’t go in. I shook it off.
“It’ll only take two minutes.” I rushed in the door and went to the last drawer of the armoire. It took a while since that one usually got stuck when opened an inch. “Perhaps I could get Alexander to fix it.” A good way to get him in my room.
I grabbed the ear Fanny Dingo cherished, turned back around and stared at my door. I’d left it open, hadn’t I?
I was chilled. I stood still. I wasn’t alone in my room. I wanted to flee. I should have, but I couldn’t get my legs to move. With a quickness of a hawk, Johnston lunged out from behind the curtain.
I jumped out of my skin. I turned around and tried to escape through the connecting bathroom, but he’d already locked that door.
“I’m sorry, Jane, but I’ll do what I have to do…”
* * * *
I came to in Alexander’s room. Cowering in the corner, I didn’t know how long I’d been there or what had happened. After I don’t know how long, the door opened. I hid out of sight and watched from the corner as Alexander walked in.
He glanced in my direction and jumped. “Jane, where have you been? I checked your room but...” He stopped when he saw me. I had no idea what I looked like, but, from the shock on his face, it wasn’t pretty. He kneeled down. “What happened?” He slowly stood back up. “I’ll kill him. This time I’ll kill him.”
I shook my head as tears streamed down my face. I reached out for him.
He sat down beside me.
I fell into his arms, and he rocked me back and forth. I couldn’t tell him what happened. I didn’t know.
33 Jane
I don’t know how long I slept. When I woke, darkness crept through Alexander’s window past the blue and yellow plaid curtains Mrs. Kiness used for all the male staff rooms. The fireplace provided the only light, and Alexander still held me. I didn’t want to move, but I must have shifted a bit.
“Are you awake?” Alexander whispered.
“I think so.”
He stood up and helped me. “Stay here tonight.” He turned down the dark blue comforter, plaid blankets and brown flannel sheets, and I crawled under the covers.
“Don’t go.” I held his hand.
“I can sleep in the chair.”
“Please.”
He lied on top of the bed. Since it was just a single bed, we were close. We faced each other, and I looked into his eyes. I thought I could tell him anything, but I didn’t know where to start. “I don’t want to take over your bed.”
“Don’t mind.”
I looked over his white t-shirt and jeans. “You should get into your pajamas.”
“Don’t wear pajamas.”
I could feel the blush creep up my neck past my cheeks and over my ears like a flush wave. I wanted to say something grown up, but giggles prevented me from continuing. “Why do I revert to a little girl around you?”
“I make you nervous.” He answered without once taking his gaze from me.
I nodded.
He raised up on one arm and looked down on me. “Good.”
My mouth dried. I had to tell myself to breath.
He gently pushed my hair away from my face. “What do you remember?”
I closed my eyes. He gripped my hand. I didn’t know how he always knew exactly what I needed. “I went back to my room.”
“To get Fanny Dingo’s toy.”
“Right. There were tourists or—”
“New staff for the party,” he answered.
I sat straight up. “And Mrs. Kiness told them to stop dicking around.”
“Think she worded it different,” he smiled.
“And I waited cause I thought she’d flit off somewhere. I hoped…” I blushed again.
“You hoped what?”
I couldn’t tell from his expression if he wanted me to say everything out loud or he really didn’t know. At the edge of the cliff, straight down was the fastest way to go. “I hoped you’d follow me back to my room.”
This time, he sat up. “Oh.”
“Now I’m making you nervous.”
“It’s all good.” He smiled his crooked smile.
If I could have stayed in the moment indefinitely I would have, but I had to remember. “Then I felt all weirded out. Creepy, you know? Like someone else was there.”
He narrowed his eyes as he looked at me. He listened to my every word. Someone actually cared what I thought and said.
“According to Mrs. Kiness, Ausmor is haunted,” Alexander said.
“Lots of spirits. Have you seem them?”
He shook his head. “Enough of the living to do damage. Don’t worry about the dead.”
“But what I felt wasn’t otherworldly. It was human. So I ran into my room.” I said everything as the images rushed forward. “I found her toy and turned around…” I squeezed my eyes shut and held out my hand as if I could trace the memories into being. I concentrated. “The door. My door. It was closed, but I’d left it open.”
Alexander swallowed hard. “Who was it?”
“I knew someone was there, but I couldn’t move. Why couldn’t I just move?” I wanted to jump out of bed and start pacing, but Alexander squeezed my hand for comfort.
“I’m right here. He can’t hurt you now.”
I forced myself to breathe as the images locked into place. “He cleared his throat.” I grabbed my own throat. “And the smell.” I shook it away. “Vinegar.”
“Johnston,” Alexander whispered between gritted teeth.
“Not just him.” Then the pain started. My pulse lunged forward. It chugged through my veins and skipped a beat every once in a while. My head started to pound: my brain was on fire. That far away pre-migraine thump. Then my stomach churned. Not so pre-migraine. I’d been dumped right in the eye of it. I tried to ignore it. Ignore the pain, the churning, the warnings.
I opened my eyes suddenly. “Warnings. That’s what all this is.” I gestured around my head and stomach and heart. “All this is a warning when I get too close.”
“Too close to what?”
“The truth. But why? What’s so horrible? What’s so awful?”
He shook his head. “You said, ‘not just him.’ Who else was there?”
The room spun around like I was in the mad hatter’s tea cup being thrown across abandoned wheat fields in a vicious game of smash and grab with the white rabbit. I opened them again and grabbed onto Alexander for support. “I can’t.”
He took a deep breath. He was disappointed, but he nodded and smiled at me.
I studied him. His honeyed hair that he’d cut short with some curls stubbornly trying to unleash themselves...his iridescent green eyes that didn’t miss anything...his crooked smile that melted me when he aimed it in my direction. “Am I right in thinking my memories flee whenever something is dangerous or whatnot?”
“Makes sense.”
“Then why wouldn’t I remember you? You’re not a danger to me, are you?” I asked in jest, but his eyes reflected pain. “I didn’t mean...I know you wouldn’t hurt me.”
“Do you? I’m serious, Eva…”
I smiled when he used the name I went by as a kid because I wanted to be more like my cousin, Evan, and got sick of people wondering why my mother named me after a famous writer if we weren’t related.
“How do you know about me if you can’t remember anything about me?”
I thought a bit. I couldn’t say, ‘cause you’re too hot to be dangerous.’ That wouldn’t do it. ‘Cause I don’t want you to be dangerous because I’m falling in love with you.’
His face changed. His features softened: his eyes widened, his mouth opened and curled up a bit on the sides.
“I said it out loud, didn’t I? Why am I always doing that?”
He instantly kissed me. “I’m not falling in love with you because I’ve alre
ady fallen. I’ve loved you so long, I can’t remember a time I didn’t. I’ve loved you when you didn’t remember me. I’ll never stop being in love with you.” He pulled my hand to his heart. “This beats for you, Jane Eva Austen. No one else. Ever.”
I didn’t know what to say. Speechless didn’t suit me. My mind fluttered into various u-turns and wound up a few places it shouldn’t before spinning out again and finding the right way home. I didn’t know what to do. I lied back down on the bed and Alexander did the same. We faced each other. He touched my face, and I rested my hand on his heart.
It was a blur that stood still. A windless wind. A storm without rain or thunder. It was everything and nothing. I just knew it felt right. For the first time in a long time, I was at peace.
My mind didn’t race through dangerous scenarios. My conscience didn’t provide me a detailed list of all my shortcomings. I didn’t hear my sister’s sighs or my aunt’s insane accusations or Mrs. Kiness’ whispers about what I should be doing with my idle time. Evan didn’t patiently persuade me to action. Lillia didn’t trip me up with her incessant twirls, and Grand Maeve didn’t hint I should immediately take every man I met into my bed as I supposed she did. My pulse didn’t go wonky. My head had stopped the pounding. I was free, and he was all I could see. “You’re my Alexander.”
He smiled. “I am.”
“I trust you Alexander Cardenia Ravenswirth.”
He touched my lips. “You don’t have to until you remember everything.”
“I don’t remember it all. I don’t know why, but…” I didn’t know how much he wanted to hear.
He nodded. “Tell me. You can talk to me.”
I hesitated. Does he want to hear everything? “Okay, it’s a little weird that you’re connected with my memory loss.”
“Which means I’m around when something bad happens to you.”
I nodded.
“Maybe it’s because I push you to remember. Push you to know the truth.”
His words floated and then sank in. “Makes sense.”
“We can’t be together until you’re sure. Your whole life you’ve been told how to act. What not to do.”
“True.”
“I won’t do that to you. I want you to choose to be with me. Not to choose me out of fear or regret or pity. You’re my everything. Don’t know if you’ll ever feel that about me.”
“I want to.” Spiraling out of Alexander’s spell, I was a little girl again peering into the oven waiting for Mrs. Hodges’ Death by Chocolate to finally be finished.
Mesmerized, I stared through the smudged glass oven door. Watching Mrs. Hodghes spin her magic sifting the powdered sugar and cocoa. Waiting for the decadence to cook for over an hour. Finally counting the minutes until it was cool enough to taste after she’d transferred it out of the pan. Alexander was my Death by Chocolate without the calories or guilt.
He studied me. “What are you thinking about?”
“Death by Chocolate.”
“Mrs. Hodghes? You’re thinking about Mrs. Kiness’ sister?”
“I’m comparing you to her famous recipe.”
He thought about it awhile, nodded his head and smiled. He got me. I rested my head on his chest and listened to his heart. He twirled my hair around his fingers.
I didn’t know who else would understand me like Alexander. If I’d compared Byron to flour, sugar and chocolate, he wouldn’t have heard it. Wouldn’t have known what it meant. “Why do you bring out the worst in Byron and Johnston?”
“Glad of that. Those two pricks deserve each other.”
“I think Byron was there. In my room.” I said the words fast to avoid the pulsating pain that provided protective detail for my memories.
Alexander’s body clenched. He had to prevent himself from jumping out of bed and tracking Byron down. “You sure?”
“Yeah.” I ignored the pain in my stomach that felt like a thousand layers of stomach lining peeled away like a sardine can. “I heard him. I remember his voice. He said, ‘I’m sorry Jane, but I’ll do what I have to do.” I sat up and grabbed my stomach. Maybe the memories want to be purged completely from my system. Can’t even digest ‘em.
Alexander sat up. “I’ll kill him. Knew he was hurting you. Know he’s your whatever he is to you but…”
I put my hand on his shoulder. “Should I not have told you?”
“No.” He quickly said. “You need to tell me. You have to tell me everything. But you can’t ask me to let this go.”
I shook my head. “It’ll still be his word against mine. With this…” I pointed to my head. “I can’t know for sure. They’ll say I was jealous. Delusional like my mother. They’ll twist my words, and Byron will smile his smile. It’ll be forgotten. His smile gets him out of anything. I know.”
Alexander shifted.
“Please don’t do anything until after the party. I’m so tired of being the freak everyone whispers about.”
“No one whispers about you.”
I gave him the patented stink eye I’d seen Mrs. Kiness use for years.
“They don’t. Not around me.”
“I won’t be the reason another Ausmor party ends early and condemn my family to the gossip and shame of my existence.”
Alexander grimaced. “Karenda’s words?”
I nodded.
“Always was an icy little bi..” He stopped and glanced at me. “Glad I’m an only child.”
“Just promise me nothing until after the party. Please?”
Alexander took a deep breath and set his jaw until his muscles flinched a jig. “After the party. Then you won’t hold me back in doing—”
I held up my hand in surrender. “After the party, Grand Maeve has promised to tell me everything. Once I know the truth, if I don’t wither away or flush myself down the toilet…” I didn’t know if I could say the words. “If Byron is responsible for…” I gestured to my head. “Or these…” I pulled up my sweater sleeve to show the four deep scars on my left arm and the gash around my wrist. “I don’t think…”
I bowed my head. “I hope he isn’t.” But I was tired of defending him. Tired of pretending he was what he used to be to me. He was my everything. Past tense. Or maybe he wasn’t. Maybe he never had been my anything. Maybe it was another truth I couldn’t face. “What an asshole.”
“Yes, Byron’s the ultimate asshole.”
“No, me. Why am I such an asshole all the time?” I’d been living in the past. I couldn’t allow sentimental wishes to blind me. I thought of Marianne Dashwood from Sense & Sensibility. “If Marianne had only faced the truth about Mr. Willoughby she wouldn’t have been caught in the storm, almost died and forced her sister to lose years off her life with worry…So, he’s handsome. Everyone knows the most handsome are the evil ones in disguise. It’s pure Jane. I should have known that. Why didn’t I learn from Jane? I’ve read everything she wrote a thousand times.”
“That’s the Jane I remember.” Alexander smiled at me. “You’re becoming you again. Guess I’m glad I’m not handsome.”
“Right. All those giggly maids and tourists who undress you with their, what would writer Jane Austen say, furtive brows and shyer glances which mistaketh not their true intentions.”
“Jealous?” he asked with his eyebrows raised.
I couldn’t hide my greedy grin. “Maybe.”
“Not jealous when they drool over Byron.”
That pained me, but it was true. I guess I’d gotten so used to everyone wanting Byron. The attention didn’t phase me. That had to mean something. I think that meant everything.
Alexander pushed me to the bed and kissed me quickly. “I’m yours, Jane. It doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks or wants. I only see you.”
I didn’t think I’d ever get tired of hearing his words - his southern accent spilling into each syllable and merging one to another. No one spoke to me like that and fewer cared whether I was alive and well or maggoty rich in a ditch.
34 Alexa
nder
I finally heard Jane say those words. Hoped she wouldn’t forget. Had to find a way to make sure she remembered. I wondered if I was pushing her in the wrong direction. Was I making everything worse? Then she said she was falling in love with me. I had to let that be. For just a few minutes, I wanted it to be enough. I didn’t want to think how I’d protect her from Johnston or Byron. Johnston was dead. He just didn’t know it yet. And Byron? I knew what he was capable of. Jane had to remember on her own. She was there. She knows what happened.
Maybe she had to realize the truth of Byron before she could remember everything. It was linked to that day. That horrible day when I was so stupid to open the wrong door. If I’d gone the other way, everything would have changed. Part of me wishes we could leave Ausmor, but Jane loves this house. I love this house. If Jane were the older Austen, everything would be different.
Someone knocked on the door.
I grinned at Jane. “Wanna bet that’s Mrs. Kiness looking for you?”
“Oh,” she said. “Too bad you still have your clothes. If you went to the door naked with me in here, springs would come out of her head.”
“You do realize I can hear every word you are saying, don’t you Jane?” Mrs. Kiness asked.
Jane pulled the sheet over her mouth and laughed. “Sorry.”
I opened the door.
Mrs. Kiness stepped inside, looked at me and then looked at Jane lying in my bed under the covers. She clasped her hands behind her back. “And are we enjoying a sleepover I did not realize was about to occur?”
“I didn’t want to be alone,” Jane said. “Alexander found me in his room. I’m the guilty party. He didn’t do anything.”
Mrs. Kiness looked me up and down. “Mr. Ravenswirth?”
“It’s true,” Jane said. “That prick—”
“Jane Eva Austen!” Mrs. Kiness shook her head. “Language in this house I cannot tolerate.”
“But it was Johnston. How else could I describe Mr. Johnston Morgan Stonston?”
Mrs. Kiness thought a moment then shrugged. “Proceed.”