Still

by Camilla Monk

  In the driver’s seat, an old guy with a tracksuit and flat cap sat behind a flashy red racing wheel, frozen like everything else. Faust extended his hand to me. “Do you have a cell phone?”

  My mouth fell open dumbly. I understood each word and the question they formed. Yet none of this made any sense.

  His fingers flicked impatiently. “Emma, please?”

  Short-circuited, numb, my brain commanded for my hand to reach into my jeans pocket. A distant part of myself watched me drop the phone in his hand . . . only for him to toss it through the door. I jolted back to my senses when it crashed on the asphalt. “Hey! What the—”

  Faust ignored my protest and raised his cane. “Are you ready?”

  Ready for what? I curled in the seat, hyperventilating. “N-no! I’m not . . . I don’t want—”

  “Excellent,” was Faust’s reply, before he lowered his cane.

  I felt it then, pulsing deep in my marrow, my veins, like never before, the familiar shockwave when Faust’s cane hit the floor mat.

  Time roared back to life.

  I was instantly crushed against the backseat as the minivan dashed away from Katharos’s SUV. I inhaled cigarette and car freshener—the latter dangling from the mirror—as the doors slid shut automatically. We bulleted past a blurry ribbon of buildings, the wheel spinning fast in the old dude’s evidently expert hands. In the mirror, I saw the SUV make a 180 in the middle of the street to race after us.

  A grunt reached us from the driver’s seat. “Cintura.” Seatbelt.

  Faust complied with an easy smile, while my own hands were shaking so bad it took me several tries to clasp it right. We took a series of sharp turns that shook my internal organs like a martini, while sad Italian rap blared from the speakers. I gripped the roof handle like a lifeline with one hand while the other clawed at the seat. A warm touch on my fingers had me snatching my hand off and tucking it safely between my knees.

  Faust’s hand still rested next to my thigh on the seat. He tilted his head to me, and I could have sworn he could see me, somehow. Yet his gaze was unfocused, the kindness in those silvery depths directed at a point past my shoulder. “It’s going to be all right, Emma. Silvio is a five-star driver.”

  My eyes bulged out from my head as the Uber drifted left and right in a maze of small streets. I blinked at the lampposts flashing by, looking for the Mercedes tailing us. After I realized we’d lost them, I managed to stutter a coherent sentence. The only one that mattered to me at the moment. “Y-you did this! Holy . . . shit. You did this . . . with your cane.”

  I caught the old driver checking us in the mirror, but his sunglasses snapped back to the road just as fast. Faust scratched his beard, while in the speakers, the rapper wailed that God had abandoned him. “Well, it’s complicated—”

  “No, it’s you!” I shrieked, panting from the mounting realization of all it could mean, the staggering consequences of this overwhelming truth.

  “It is me,” he confirmed with an apologetic smile.

  I thought of the clatter of his cane in my dream, of that day when the seagulls had stopped. I tried to breathe, ride this wave of shock, collect my thoughts, and my second question was, “How?”

  The car had slowed down and was now gliding silently down a deserted avenue. Faust’s right hand rested on the cane while he reached with the left one to rub a tattoo circling his wrist that I hadn’t noticed before. A flash of coppery light from the street splashed it. I clenched my jaw when I recognized a row of the same ancient characters that were engraved on the table. He sighed and leaned back in the seat, retreating behind his trademark easy smile. I sensed bullshit loading in the chamber. “Well, Silvio happened to be in the neighborhood, and he called to tell me, ‘Oh, aren’t those Katharos employees following our new friend Emma? Shouldn’t we—'”

  “You had him follow me . . . What the fuck is going on?” I near-yelled.

  “To be honest, I was hoping to ask you the same, Emma.” Faust’s mouth twisted as if he weren’t sure what to say next. “I was quite surprised to find you . . .” He cleared his throat.“. . . unaffected by my intervention.”

  Unaffected. Able to move when everyone and everything else went still. I held on tight to the roof handle, my stomach lurching as if I were freefalling from the sky, seconds away from the final crash. He was the one stopping time, and he’d just said I was a glitch in that . . . thing. He could stop anything but me. Memories rushed back all at once, all those times I’d prayed people would move at last and time would resume flowing. Faust had been out there, somewhere, unaware of what he was doing to me. “It’s never worked,” I rasped. “Ever since I was a kid. I’ve felt time stop. I can move, but if I touch people, it does nothing. It’s like they’re dead. Nothing happens.”

  Faust stayed silent for several seconds, his expression blank for the slight ‘o’ of his open mouth. “All your life?”

  “Yes.”

  His eyebrows twitched. “Every single time I—”

  “Yes!” I snapped. I didn’t want to think of the seagulls. Not now.

  His head lolled as if he meant to nod, but his neck wouldn’t cooperate. “All right. This is new.” His fingers rapped fast on the hilt of his cane. “I like new things. I can work with that.”

  I cast him a desperate look. “So, you don’t know . . . why I’m like that?” I wasn’t sure what I expected—maybe some huge reveal that would suddenly right my world and help everything make sense. What I got instead was this:

  “To be honest, I didn’t even think such a thing was possible. I’m sorry, Emma.” He offered me an apologetic smile. “I have no idea what you are.”

  What—not who. Funny how a tiny word can send your toes curling inside your sneakers. A powerful roar of the minivan’s engine hauled me back to immediate reality. I suddenly remembered our driver and flashed a panicked look at his back while he casually ran a red light.

  Faust waved my concern off. “Don’t worry. You can speak freely around Silvio.” He winked at the old guy in the mirror. “L'ho conosciuto da quando era bambino.” I’ve known him since he was a child.

  One of Silvio’s hands let go of the wheel to respond with a thumb up. A thousand goose bumps popped all over my body in response. Dude must have been what, sixty, sixty-five at least? And Faust couldn’t be a day over thirty. Oh shi . . . I hoped they were just trying to mess with me. He couldn’t be . . . It wasn’t possible.

  Cronus appeared to Faustus and offered him a deal: eternal slavery in his service, in exchange for Caligula’s death.

  My stomach was doing funny flips, and I was probably going to throw up. Or cry. Or maybe both. I risked a peek at him, mentally comparing his sharp profile to Lady Montecito’s sculpture of Faustus. No. There had to be another explanation. A beard doesn’t make you an immortal hobo. Nothing makes you that.

  I ran a hand across my face. It was harder to think now that exhaustion was washing away the rush of adrenaline in my system. A hundred puzzle pieces whirled together in my head, stirred by a mild headache: Faust wobbling around the digging site yesterday, Lady Montecito’s story, Lucius’s magical smoke ribbon—or whatever it was—the way his hand had rotted off, and his claim that Montecito could show me the table’s secrets. Then there was Lily: did she know about any of this? Dubious: Montecito had tried to get her and Dante out of the room to question me, back at the Residenza, and Lily had seemed genuinely shocked to hear about my encounter with Faust. Dante, though . . .

  The primary source of my headache fished for an old smartphone in his coat pocket as Silvio parked the SUV in a narrow-paved street. He swiped across the glass, guided by a digital voice describing every item on-screen. He opened Uber and proudly announced, “Cinque stelle!” Five stars, his own voice echoed by the app’s metallic accent.

  Hilarious.

  I sunk in the backseat and buried my head in my shoulders. “What do you want from me? Why did you drag me into this?”

  His head jerked up. “What do
you mean, drag you into this?”

  “Katharos knows . . .” My voice faltered when I realized I’d been about to say, Katharos knows who you are, but I couldn’t put that surreal notion into words. Couldn’t accept it. “Katharos knows about you. The only reason they went after me is they thought I had something to do with you—like I was your accomplice or something. They saw you talk to me in the street, and they freaked out.” Even I knew there were a lot of shortcuts, and things left unsaid in this summary, but it was the best I could do when my mind had been continuously blowing in slow-motion for the past hour or so.

  Silvio kept staring at us in the mirror while Faust’s thumb rapped on the knots of woods on his cane. “Listen, Emma, I wouldn’t usually be so direct on a second date, but I’d really like to take you home.” His lips pursed. “For a little chat.”

  I instinctively reached for the door handle. Locked. I drew a shuddering breath and smacked my tongue, the sound thunderous in the car. “Sounds like a kidnapping.”

  Silvio shook his head. “No. È come su Tinder.” No. It’s like on Tinder.

  I dragged a hand over my face. Tinder, of course. Where you swipe right, no one looks like their pic, and you end up stuck in a car with a psycho bum who may or may not have struck a deal with an ancient deity two thousand years ago.

  I turned to Faust. “How do I know I can trust you?”

  A grin cracked through his beard. “You don’t.” As he said this, Silvio unlocked my door and let it slide open—probably to lessen the overall creep factor of this “second date.”

  Faust winked at me. “Maybe a little privacy will help you relax.”

  His cane hit the mat before I could ask what he meant by that.

  It could have been an ordinary night in a deserted Roman street, forever suspended in time. Faust and I treaded away from Silvio’s minivan along dirty ochre facades. I gazed down at the cobblestone under my feet, studied the way the bricks weaved together. The rhythmic clatter of Faust’s cane sent jolts of electricity up my spine as we passed a pair of petrified silhouettes about to straddle a bike. A couple, whose cheeks were pinched in silent laughter, empty eyes staring right through us.

  “You’re going to love my place,” he said conversationally.

  “Which bench is it?” I shot back, feeling the fight return to me.

  He shook his head. “Don’t worry; I only sleep rough when I’m too drunk to drag myself home. I have an actual bed. Running water, private WC in the hallway, Wi-Fi from my neighbor—all the modern comforts.”

  I was ready to lash out that considering all that had happened so far tonight, I couldn’t care less about his no-star bachelor pad, but the smooth surface of a turquoise pool came in sight at the end of the street, and the words died on my tongue. The dramatic, temple-like backdrop and graceful statues standing on fake rocks were familiar. I just never imagined I’d ever see the waterfalls of the Trevi fountain frozen in midair.

  Faust rested his weight on his cane with a smug smile. “I told you you’d like it.”

  “You live . . . here? Near the fountain?”

  “Yes.” He motioned to a vague point across the piazza di Trevi. “Back there.”

  A few tourists lingered on the place, sitting on the fountain’s stone ledge, leaning against the gates of a church, trapped in Faust’s dream. I took hesitant steps toward the aquamarine mirror and sat by the water. I grazed the surface and felt nothing. It wasn’t cold, nor warm. My fingertips remained dry. Faust went to sit at my side, waiting for me to ask.

  I did, my voice oddly serene even as I could barely keep together. “Are you Faustus?”

  His gentle smile turned wry, almost bitter. “I wondered if you knew.”

  I held on to the travertine ledge with a white-knuckled grip as my world tilted on its axis for good. “You’re not really . . . Please tell me you’re not two thousand years old.”

  “I’m not.” My breath of relief hitched when he added, “I’ll be two thousand and five in January.”

  Oh God. Oh shit. I leaped to my feet; he made no move to catch me, but I held my palms to ward him off anyway. “This is . . . not right.”

  He gave a weary shrug. “It is what it is. Eternity is long, though, especially after the first couple hundred years.”

  I clasped my hands together, twisting my fingers in a desperate bid to gather my thoughts. “The table—what is it? Does it have something to do with your power? Lucius said . . . he started to say a lot of weird shit back at the mausoleum, about how Lady Montecito knows the table’s secrets and she would show me if I followed him.”

  Faust’s eyebrows shot up in an amused expression, and he chuckled. “I’d love to see that.”

  I glared at him. “Well, I don’t.” I dragged a hand across my face and let out a sigh of mental and physical exhaustion. “Honestly . . . I have no idea what’s going on. I’m still kind of wondering if I’m not actually tripping balls somewhere in a parking lot.”

  “You’re not,” Faust reassured me.

  Awesome. I went to crash back by his side on the fountain ledge. “Look, this is too much to take in. I’m . . . completely lost, and I’m not sure where to start. All I know is that right now, my stepsister is working for Katharos, and she lives in the Residenza. I need to get her out of there.” I shuddered at the memory of Lucius’s freakish powers and rotting hand. He’d probably show up at her lab tomorrow, acting like everything was fine . . . I had to find a safe way to contact Lily and tell her everything—why would she believe it though? I sure wouldn’t.

  Resting his cane between his legs, Faust turned his head my way. “I’m assuming you mean Professor McKeanney’s granddaughter?”

  I nearly fell backward. “You know Lily and her grandpa?”

  “Not personally. But Silvio and I have been doing some digging up about Katharos, and a few interesting details popped up.”

  “Like?”

  He flicked his wrist. “Old stories . . .”

  I narrowed my eyes at him. “You’re not really answering any of my questions so far. You were doing the same back in the car, by the way. What is Chronos’s Table? What does it do? What’s the deal between you and Katharos?”

  His chest heaved from a sigh. “I’m sorry, Emma, but there isn’t much I can tell you about the table, save for what you probably already know. I’m bound by the kind of contract one does not break.”

  Like a contract with an old god of time. I looked around at the glass-like surface of the water, the frozen tourists. Despite the evidence, that new warped reality still wouldn’t fully set in. I kept expecting to wake up on a sweat-soaked pillow any moment from now, just like I had last night.

  “So, it’s all true,” I said tightly. “You’re Chronos’s slave. You gave him your life . . . for eternity. What about Katharos? What are they?”

  Faust’s hands moved back to rest on his cane, and he went silent for several seconds before he asked, “Do you want to hear the official pitch?”

  I blew my bangs up in aggravation. “No, thanks. I read the booklet back at their HQ. It didn’t say anything about Lucius being . . . Yeah, I don’t know what he is, but he’s not normal, I can tell you that.”

  “I wouldn’t quite call you ‘normal’ either,” Faust retorted.

  I went tense as a violin string, overwhelmed by a rush that was at once red-hot anger at his nonchalance and ice-cold fear when I figured out what he meant. Me, here with him, outside time.

  He cocked his head, the same way he had back in the car, as if he could see me. “You do realize that your case is . . . highly unusual, right?”

  I clenched my fists so tight my fingers hurt. “What’s wrong with me?”

  He shook his head slowly. “I honestly have no idea, Emma. I can’t say I mind your company, but, as I told you already, this is definitively new.”

  I couldn’t take his laid-back act anymore; I inhaled deeply and detonated, jumping to my feet. “I’ll tell you what’s new for me! Lucius who tried to kill m
e with . . . with his smoke ribbon or whatever. That was pretty fucking new! And the way his hand literally rotted when he touched me. That was new too!”

  After I said that, Faust didn’t react immediately. He stared ahead for several seconds like his brain was a beer-soaked Cheeto until he eventually raised an eyebrow. “Now . . . did he?”

  “Yes!” I gritted out. “I don’t know . . . He was trying to strangle me, but his skin started to dry up and peel off.” I squeezed my eyes shut and clenched my fists at the memory. I was going to need a dozen showers after that.

  Without warning, Faust reached for my arm, and he felt his way down to my hand, squeezing it. He blinked, keeping my fingers captive even as I tugged to free them.

  “Hey . . .” I warned.

  He let go and nodded to himself. “As expected,” he murmured.

  “What? What did you expect?”

  “Nothing. You can’t rot my hand off.”

  “Well, no, and you should be glad I . . .” I trailed off when I realized what he meant. “Do you think it was me, not him? Lily touched me, though—”

  “That just proves your stepsister isn’t trying to stave off death with wonky spells.”

  “I’m sorry, come again?”

  He grimaced and got to his feet, dusting his pants with one hand. “I’m afraid there’s a lot I need to tell you about Katharos—not all good. Why don’t we go discuss that in my love nest?”

  Love nest. Really?

  My jaw hung slack as he strolled past me, up the steps leading back to the piazza surrounding the fountain. When I remained stuck in place, he lowered his cane, hitting the pavement once. A soft laugh echoed somewhere across the place, covered by the relentless hum of water cascading down the fountain’s stone décor. A couple embraced each other and kissed under the stern gaze of marble gods.

  Faust called me. “Emma, are you coming? I need to feed my cats.”

  My gaze flitted back and forth between the couple making out by the fountain and Faust’s fingers rapping impatiently on the hilt of his cane. What was it that Silvio had said, back in the car? È come su Tinder . . .