by Rebekah Pace
“Come on, Peter, you have to try!”
I shook my head. “You’re too good for me.”
“Didn’t you ever learn to dance properly?” She lifted the needle and put on a different record— “Lustig ist das Zigeunerleben”—a waltz. This time when she held out her hand, an excuse about my knees not being what they used to be nearly escaped my lips.
She tilted her head to the side and quirked an eyebrow, waiting expectantly. Hoping I’d catch on to dancing as quickly as I’d learned to play the piano, I faced her and let her guide my right hand to her waist. She put her left hand on my shoulder and then clasped my left hand and raised it to the proper position out to the side. “Don’t worry. There’s nothing to it. Just let yourself move to the music.” As we swayed, she nestled closer, and my hand slid from the curve of her waist around to her back. She smiled up at me. “See, it’s easy once you have the rhythm. Now for lesson two: the box step.”
Soon my feet and body moved through the pattern with ease. We box stepped around the living room. Just as I was getting comfortable enough to stop mouthing, “back-side-together, front-side-together,” she lifted our arms up and added a simple turn. When the record ended, we started it over. By the third time through the song, I was leading, reveling in the feeling of being in control while I held her in my arms.
“Peter, I don’t know why you were worrying. You’re a lovely dancer.”
I pulled her closer. “I have a lovely teacher.”
When the song ended, neither of us made a move to change the record. I closed my eyes. Her hair smelled like flowers. As I held her, I ceased to exist in the moment, and I sighed as both longing and loss threatened to overwhelm me. When she sensed my pensive mood, she stepped back and turned under my upraised arm, and then spun in until I was holding her close again. “Lesson three: the jitterbug. It’s impossible to be sad when you’re dancing the jitterbug.”
***
Mira never seemed to tire of dancing, and finally, I collapsed on the sofa, protesting, “That’s enough for now. I’m starving.”
She relented. “I could eat. Let’s go out.”
We strolled through the silent city in search of the gasthaus we remembered for its Wiener schnitzel. When we arrived, the door was ajar, and in a corner booth, two plates of schnitzel, heaps of golden fried potatoes, and two mugs of beer were ready and waiting.
It was just getting dark when we left the pub, and streetlamps flickered on as we passed. A few blocks away, the movie house, its marquee bordered with bright neon tubing and lit by hundreds of bulbs, was like a beacon. I asked, “Fancy a movie?”
She giggled. “Sure. I wonder what’s playing?”
There was no title on the marquee. “I guess it’s a surprise.” Inside, the lobby smelled of fresh popcorn. “Do you want some?”
“I know we just ate, but it wouldn’t be a movie without popcorn. Let’s share a bag.”
I scooped the popcorn while she opened soda bottles.
In the theater, thick carpet muffled our footsteps as we headed down one of the aisles. Crystal chandeliers and sconces gave off enough light for me to see and admire the flocked wallpaper and the fringed velvet drapes that framed the screen. I started toward the middle of the theater, but Mira hesitated. “Let’s sit in the back row. I never liked the feeling that someone could come in behind me.” We settled into seats in the center of the back row and waited, but nothing happened.
She took a handful of popcorn. “When does the newsreel start?”
I turned around and peered up at the projection booth’s window. “Guess I’d better go look.”
Narrow stairs led to the projection booth, where I found a film reel in its metal can. I flipped a switch on the side of the machine, and through the window in the booth, I saw a huge rectangle of light appear on the screen below. It took a minute to figure out how to thread the projector, but as soon as I got it humming, I hurried back downstairs to Mira.
“What’s the feature?”
“I didn’t notice. Does it matter?”
“Honestly, no. Not at all.”
I put my arm around her, and she snuggled against my shoulder as the title credits for Somewhere I’ll Find You, starring Clark Gable and Lana Turner, emerged and the music swelled. German subtitles appeared at the bottom of the screen.
Even after living in America for most of my life, I often struggled to find the right words when I spoke English. But I’d had no trouble expressing myself when I talked to Mira.
When I saw the German subtitles, it all made sense. In this ongoing dream, I’d been thinking and speaking in German—the language we’d learned first when we were children.
I didn’t need the subtitles, as I understood English perfectly well, so I turned to look at Mira. As our eyes met, a blazing smile swept across her face. She set the popcorn aside, and when she kissed me, everything but her faded into the background. I couldn’t tell you anything that happened in the film, but when the lights came up, kissing had left her lips swollen and her hair mussed. She was so beautiful that even Lana Turner couldn’t hold a candle to her.
We held hands as we went out through the lobby, where a flicker of movement down the hall past the projection booth caught my eye. By the time I got a proper look, there was nothing there. Believing I’d imagined it, I kept walking, but as I held the door open for Mira, I heard the click of a latch, like a door closing, somewhere in the recesses of the theater. The skin on the back of my neck prickled. Had someone been in there with us? Mira seemed not to notice anything, so I didn’t mention it and told myself there was nothing real in this dream except me. There was no reason to worry.
But on the walk home, I couldn’t shake the sensation that I was being watched. We were about a block away from the theater when the lights on the marquee went out, plunging the street behind us into deep shadow. I put my arm around her, glancing behind us as I picked up the pace. Our footfalls on the cobblestone street were the only sound, but my ears strained to hear more.
The warm night air was redolent with lilac—a perfect romantic end to our evening—but still I shivered. I didn’t want to ruin the mood, nor did I want to go back and investigate, so I babbled to break the ominous silence. “This was great. One of our favorite meals at one of our favorite places, plus popcorn and a private film screening. Being here is—”
She touched her fingers to my lips. “Don’t say it. Don’t even think it.”
“I was just going to say it’s too good to be true. I could look at you all night.”
She gave me a sidelong glance. “Then come home with me. Stay the night.” She stopped and put her arms around my neck, pressing the length of her body against mine.
There was a hiss and a pop, like fireworks, and the streetlamp nearest us exploded in a shower of sparks. The flash of light burned into my retinas, and as I tried to blink away the afterimage, I saw a man’s shadowy outline. By the time I rubbed my eyes and looked again, he’d disappeared. But I knew who it was.
It was me—the old me. Though he had pined for Mira all his life, it was I, not he, who belonged with this youthful version of her. In this place, Old Peter was an interloper.
My skin prickled again. He and I should not both be here.
12
When we reached Mira’s house, I locked us in, and as I turned away from the door, she reached up to brush a lock of hair off my forehead. Her fingers trailed down my jawline, and my shiver jump-started my heart.
“You don’t have to sleep on the couch.” She drew me toward the stairs and stood one step above me, so we were the same height. She leaned in, and just like that, we were back to what we were doing at the movies. “Come upstairs, Peter. Nothing bad comes from showing someone you care about them.”
I cradled her face in my hands and kissed her closed eyelids. This time, when our lips met, she drew me into the depths of the ki
ss, her tongue a feather-light touch that set the nerves on the roof of my mouth tingling.
Then I made the mistake of opening my eyes. Over her shoulder, Old Peter was looking in the sitting-room window, hands cupped around his face. Talk about ruining the moment.
She put a finger on my chin to bring my attention back to her. “You are literally the last man on Earth. You win by default. Don’t worry. Don’t think.”
Mind reeling, I realized I was not the last man on Earth—I was actually the last two. My eyes darted to the window again, but my older self was gone. “If I was the last man on Earth and there were a million girls to choose from, I wouldn’t give the other nine-hundred-ninety-nine-thousand-nine-hundred-and-ninety-nine a second look. It’s always been you I cared about.” I took a step back and held both her hands in mine. “But I wouldn’t pressure you if you weren’t ready.”
Tears sprang into her eyes and she looked at me for a long moment before she spoke. “No, you wouldn’t. That’s what makes you—you.” She kissed me on my forehead. “You win. Gute Nacht, Peter.”
“Gute Nacht.” I watched her ascend the stairs and then I hurried to the window and peered into the street, but no one was there. I shut the blinds, but could I shut out any unwanted visitors? I had entered this world through abnormal, supernatural means, and I assumed Mira had, too. Did the laws of physics apply here, or could we walk through walls?
I crossed the sitting room, moving at a steady pace toward the door. I focused on passing through it as if it wasn’t there, but then my body connected with solid wood and I banged my forehead, hard. The resulting thud echoed in the quiet space.
“Peter? Is everything all right?”
“Yes. Fine.” I rubbed the sore spot, thankful for the consistency of physics. Turning out all but one light, I stretched out on the sofa. As I listened to her going-to-bed sounds—water running, the soft click of her door closing—I felt content knowing she and I were in the same house.
Though I meant to stay awake, at least for a while, the next thing I knew I awoke to the traffic noise of Weequahic.
***
It seemed like I wasn’t sleeping at all, yet every time I opened my eyes, whether I was at home or with Mira, I felt refreshed. It was the opposite of the insomnia that had previously plagued me. As I made breakfast and puttered around the apartment, I wondered if time passed at the same rate in the dream as here. Did it continue for her when I wasn’t there, or did it pause when I was away and resume when I returned?
Missing her company, I turned on the radio to find some music, but a talk show caught my attention. The guest was a psychiatrist; the topic was how stress and trauma affected people. I knew from personal experience that stress could take a toll on a person’s mental health, but I did not know trauma could invade the genes people passed to their children.
While I sat at the worktable and soldered tips back on the music box’s cylinder, I wondered what kind of traits I would have passed along to my children if I’d had them. Would my children have been afraid all the time, like me, even when there was nothing to fear, or would they have been impervious to high-stress situations?
The soldering iron started to smell like it was burning. Even though it got very hot, I had never known it to smell like that. I quickly turned it off and opened the window, but the odor of burning plastic grew stronger. I sniffed the air that flowed into the room, but the smell wasn’t coming from outside. I turned back toward the room and saw flames dancing from the hot plate. How could I have left it on?! I rushed across the room to unplug it, then grabbed a towel to move it off the scorched counter, but I burned my hand and the hot plate fell into the sink, where the towel ignited with a whoosh. I dodged the flames to turn on the water with my uninjured hand, and the hot plate and the fire expired in a hiss of steam and smoke.
Panting, I cradled my throbbing hand against my chest. What a forgetsik I was getting to be.
***
When I woke up on the sofa in Mira’s sitting room it was morning. My hand showed no sign that I’d burned it on the hot plate. Mira poked her head out of the kitchen. “Peter? Oh, good, you’re awake. Come have breakfast.”
I stood and stretched before I joined her at the table, where she’d set out bread, butter, and jam. As I sat, she poured hot cocoa into mugs. “Are you always this quiet in the morning?”
“Usually.” I took a sip of cocoa. “When did you get up?”
“Hours ago.”
In the dream, she could be awake when I wasn’t. Did that mean I was leaving her alone and vulnerable whenever I transported back to Weequahic? “Did you hear anything last night?”
“Besides you banging around? No, I slept very well.” She gave me a quizzical look as she sat down across from me. “Are you worried that you snore or something?”
“No.”
“Then what’s bothering you? Are you afraid of me? Have I done something wrong?”
“Kissing is one thing. Talking presents its own challenges.”
“Oh.” Her face fell. “You don’t like me. Is that it?”
“I do like you. I’ve always liked you. You’re perfect.”
She laughed. “That I am not.”
“I want to get to know you: what you think, what you like, what drives you nuts. And there’s so much I can’t—”
She wrapped her hands around her mug. “The universe is full of questions that have no answers.”
She was still talking in riddles. I couldn’t tell her I wanted to get reacquainted with the real Mira, not make small talk with a facsimile.
When I didn’t answer, she said, “Fine. I’ll go first. Why is it considered good to respect the dead more than the living?”
“I don’t know. Maybe because the dead aren’t here to defend themselves.” I started to get angry as I thought about it. “The living can change. They can stop doing things that hurt or disappoint us. The dead leave us stuck with the hurt and the damage. So why shouldn’t we speak ill of them?”
“No one is perfect.”
“You always were, to me.”
“But I’m not.” She looked down in her mug before she went on. “Although maybe if we’re to reconcile whatever damage people—alive or dead—have caused, we have to focus on the good things about them so we can forgive. Now you ask a question.”
“All right.” This was kind of like playing chess with myself. “Is the future pre-determined?”
“Like fate?”
“Yes. If something terrible happened”— I caught a warning glance from her— “could we have prevented it, or did it have to happen that way?”
“I’m going to answer that question with a question: do we have free will?”
“Of course we do. We can choose good or evil. Animals aren’t evil because they can’t make reasoned choices. A cat can’t decide to stop hunting mice and birds and become a vegetarian.”
“Fair point.”
“So then why doesn’t God intervene? Shouldn’t He step in before the evil gets out of control?”
“Because we’re not puppets. The freedom to make bad choices has been a problem since the Garden of Eden.” A mischievous smile played at the corner of her lips. “Do you really think that was an accident?”
“But wait—what if the Garden of Eden was a setup? Did God mean all along for Adam and Eve to eat the apple?”
She leaned forward. “Ah, but then some outside force would still be predetermining the future. Do we only assume we have free will when we do not?”
I held up my hands in surrender. “Got it. Everything is out of our control.” That was more in keeping with what I believed.
“That’s not what I’m saying. Adam and Eve gained awareness. Our sense of awareness ties into our concept of passing time: that the past is fixed, and the future unknowable.”
“Time runs out for everyone.”
She got up and refilled her cocoa. “You have a narrow and fatalistic way of looking at things, Peter. Some people believe that everything there is, and all that ever will be, goes through cycles, percolating and recycling souls into different lives, over and over.”
“One life might not be all there is?”
She laughed and glanced around. “Do you seriously have to ask that?”
Hope welled up inside me at the thought of a do-over. My spotty religious training had offered me nothing on this topic, but perhaps what I was experiencing was another chance. Maybe it was one of many chances. “But do we remember our experiences? Would you and I remember each other if we met again?”
“I don’t know. Maybe deep inside. Haven’t you ever met someone and, within an hour, felt as though you’ve known them all your life? To remember everything—especially the saddest things—might be too heavy a burden for a child to bear.”
“Agreed. Okay, I’ve got another question.”
“Go ahead.”
“How do we know when something is real?”
Her face was unreadable. “What do you think?”
“In the heat of the moment, we can’t rely on our senses. We’re too easily fooled. But photographic evidence and sound recordings—”
“Those are just things we collect and treasure to remind us of what we think is real. Have you ever looked at a photograph and thought the people in it looked happy? You don’t know what they were really thinking. We remember things in the way that serves us best. Does it matter if it’s real or not?”
“Yes.” I took her hand. “Mira, are you—”
“Am I what?”
I wanted to say real, but I couldn’t. “Happy. Are you happy?”
“So happy, Peter. Aren’t you?”
“Yes. I’d rather be here with you than anywhere else.” When I leaned across the table to kiss her, her lips tasted like cocoa.
She stood and reached for my hand. “Come see what I found.” She led me into the sitting room and brought out her family’s brown leather photo album. We sat on the sofa and she opened the album across our laps. “The photographic evidence, as you say, is what keeps my memories alive.”