Across Time: Across Time Book 1

by Elizabeth O'Roark

  Once he’s gone, I lean my head against the back of the stall. “Kit,” I say quietly. “Why the hell am I here? What do you want me to do?”

  There is silence, of course. Those nightmares drove me to the brink of insanity, but this was obviously all a stupid mistake. I’m not saving or helping anyone. I’m just making their lives worse, and it’s time I left well enough alone.

  7

  My departure plan is less than perfect. I’m not even close to being ready to jump home yet, so I will sneak out tonight after they’ve gone to bed and stay toward the outer corners of the orchard until my strength has returned. They don’t venture out that far much, and if I hear them, I can always just hide in the woods. The blueberries are ripe and I should be able to sustain myself on those until I get back.

  Dinner is simple that night, ham and cheese and bread and fruit. When they are not looking, I push bits of ham and cheese into my pockets. I'm not sure they’ll stay good outside in the heat, but I'm probably going to be getting sick of blueberries before I can get home, so it’s worth a shot.

  Over dinner, Henri is almost pleasant. He’s polite and manages not to call me a single name through the entire meal. What a shame that on the one night he's proven capable of behaving himself, I'm too exhausted and worried to appreciate it. I’m worried for myself, of course—the idea of sleeping outdoors with no shelter in particular—but mostly I’m worried for them. The Germans will be here within the next two years, and it's within my power to warn them. I'm just not sure if I should.

  "If...something bad was coming," I venture, "would you want to know?"

  "No," says Marie-Therese. "Of course not. I don't want to spend years and years dreading something that might not happen."

  I glance at Henri. He looks less certain about that than his sister but finally shrugs. "She is probably right," he says. "It's best we just live the lives we were handed."

  I wish this hadn't been their answer. It’s already too late anyway, I remind myself. If they die in the war, I can’t undo that.

  This fact doesn’t reassure me at all.

  I retire early, but when the house is finally quiet I sneak downstairs in the borrowed dress, the one with its pockets full of food, and write a quick note to Marie-Therese, telling her I hope we meet again, which is true. If I can find her in my time, perhaps then I can explain why I snuck out the way I did. I slip outside with my shoes in hand, holding my breath as I pull the door closed behind me.

  The night is silent. A light breeze and crickets in the distance. There's a bright moon and once my eyes adjust, I think I'll have no problem picking my way through to the orchard’s outskirts. Yet as I put my shoes on, the plan feels a lot less simple than it did during daylight. The prospect of traversing the dark fields in the middle of the night has a chill inching along my spine, and falling asleep in them is difficult to even contemplate.

  I cross the yard, going around the barn so I don’t wake the animals. Even in the moonlight it’s hard to see the uneven ground, and I stumble in a small divot, feet sliding a few inches over gravel before I regain my balance.

  "In the mood for a stroll?" asks a voice. I jump, heart hammering, and turn toward the sound.

  Henri. Sitting against the back of the barn, drowsy but unsurprised to find me here.

  "You sleep outside?" I ask. It's all I can think to say.

  "Not if I can help it," he replies, rolling the blanket under his arm and walking my way. "But I could only think of one good reason a guest would be shoving food in her pockets all night, and it turns out I was right."

  I sigh heavily. "I'm just trying to do what you asked."

  "I don't recall asking a half-dead girl to go sleep in the woods and starve while she's trying to return to health.” He reaches my side. “Don’t worry. I’m not planning to stop you. I could carry you back but I can't watch you all the time. You'd just sneak out again."

  His response couldn’t be more reasonable. I suppose that’s what’s so surprising about it. I look up at him in the moonlight, feeling unexpectedly sad that I will never see him again. I swallow. In two years’ time will he still be on this farm or will he be off fighting? I don’t want to know. I’m glad I’m leaving here before I start to care.

  "Well...goodbye. Please tell Marie-Therese I was sorry to leave so suddenly.”

  I turn toward the orchard, but within seconds I hear the sound of feet behind me, matching my pace, as if the two of us are out here for a leisurely walk, nothing more.

  I stop and round on him. "What are you doing?"

  "I assume you were planning to sleep near the orchard, but I can't have a dead girl on my property," he says simply.

  Oh my God. And to think I was getting all choked up at the idea of him going off to war. "So you're escorting me off your land so I don't die here?"

  He shrugs. "No, I'll just come with you and make sure you leave in one piece."

  I huff in frustration and pick up my pace, but as we approach the orchard, the trees begin to block the moon and it’s so dark I can barely see a foot in front of my face. Anger keeps me walking fast despite that fact. "Your presence defeats the purpose. And you can't leave Marie alone. She'll panic."

  I stumble and his hand reaches out to grab my arm. “She'll be fine for a few days."

  He’s making no sense at all. How has he gone from incessantly worrying about Marie-Therese to she’ll be fine for a few days?

  After five minutes of walking, we've reached the orchard. He points to a small clearing near the woods. "This seems like a good spot to sleep?" He’s already begun spreading his blanket.

  I hate him for ruining this. I was trying to do the right thing and now it feels as if I'm a tantrum-prone child being humored by her dad. "I'm not sleeping with you."

  His mouth twitches. "Well, that definitely removes some of the fun from the evening. But there are wolves here, so you might at least want me close by."

  Any pride I might have had goes skittering away at the word wolves. I slide down to the base of an apple tree across from him, leaning against it with my arms folded.

  He spreads himself out on the blanket and glances over. "Didn’t you bring something to sleep on?" he asks. "You're not very good at this running away business."

  God I hate him.

  "I didn’t want you calling me a thief for the rest of my life. Just leave the blanket for me and go. I promise to drag myself off your property if I'm dying."

  "That's exactly the kind of promise you won't be able to keep if you're being torn apart by wolves,” he says, his tone conversational. “They are regrettably less than thorough, wolves are. They'd leave your head and bones behind."

  I sort of want to laugh, and I sort of want to throw something at him. His hands fold under his head and he closes his eyes. Wishing I’d planned more thoroughly, I lie down on the patchy grass beneath me. "I wouldn't do that," he says, eyes still closed. "Not if you haven't checked for snake holes."

  I freeze. "You're making that up,” I hiss.

  "Am I?" he asks with a small tick to his lips. "I guess we'll see."

  I know he’s just messing with me, but within five seconds I'm off the ground and marching over to his blanket. "Move over," I demand.

  “Decided you’d like to sleep with me after all, then?” he asks without opening his eyes.

  “No, I just figure that you’re larger and slower, so the wolves will kill you first,” I reply, lying down beside him.

  Compared to the bare ground, the blanket feels surprisingly luxurious, and there’s a breeze keeping the air almost pleasant when it was stifling in the house. It would be okay if I were here with pretty much anyone else.

  I try to picture Mark in Henri’s place but I can't. Mark and I would never find ourselves out in the middle of an orchard on a hot night with nothing but a blanket beneath us. His one and only camping experience took place on the golf course of his parents' country club, where a staff provided all their meals and even set up their tents. I’d
laughed at the story and he had too, but I remember thinking I wanted that: a life where you could pick and choose your hardships. Where even the worst experiences were shaped into something soft and mild enough that you could survive them.

  "I did this once," he says, "as a boy. My mother followed me, just as I've done to you."

  "Was she as annoying about it as you are?"

  "Worse,” he says. “She brought an entire pie and a tub of cream and began to eat in front of me."

  The idea of it makes me smile. I’d like to be a mother like that one day, but can you be a good parent if you weren’t raised by one? I’m not sure. “I think I’d have liked your mom.”

  “She’d have liked you as well,” he replies. “She had terrible taste in people.”

  To my surprise, I laugh. "I don't suppose you've brought a pie?"

  "Unfortunately, no,” he says, rolling toward me and propping himself up on his forearm. “And I don't suppose you'd know how to make one."

  I squint up at him. "No, but I think the lack of a stove might be the bigger issue."

  "We could always go back to the house," he says. "There's still a bit of pie left there. There are also beds, and pillows. And fewer bloodthirsty animals.”

  I roll up to my forearm, mirroring his position. "Why?” I ask softly. “You wanted me gone, and it made sense that you did. I even agreed with you. That’s why I’m here.”

  He's quiet for a moment. "I went overboard,” he finally says. “I do worry about Marie-Therese, but she’ll survive. I realized during dinner that half of what worries me is how sad she’ll be when you leave, and it made me feel…guilty.”

  It’s the longest Henri has ever spoken to me without being snide, without insults or sarcasm. It’s a side of him I suspected existed, but never thought I’d get to see firsthand. "Guilty? Why?"

  "Because it reminds me how much happier she might be in another life. If we could move to Paris, or even into town. If she could go to university."

  "Are you sure those things aren't possible? I'm the same thing she is, yet I go to university and I live in a big city and it's never been an issue."

  In the moonlight his face grows guarded. "One of the last things my mother ever asked of me was that I keep Marie-Therese hidden here, and safe. I'm incapable of saving my mother. No matter what Marie wants to believe, I know she’s dead. But the very least I can do is obey her last wishes."

  He blames himself for his inability to save her, and he also blames himself for limiting Marie-Therese. There is no good option for him, no way that he isn’t at fault regardless of what he does. I understand that a little too well.

  "Perhaps when you marry?" I ask softly. "Then there will be another female in the house for Marie?"

  His frown deepens. "A wife would make Marie feel as if this is no longer her place. I won’t marry until she’s found someone and left home."

  Henri is obviously staying here on this farm, alone, to take care of Marie. And she is staying on the farm so her brother won't be alone. How are the two of them ever going to have their own lives if they're so worried about each other’s?

  "You could marry a terrible cook so Marie feels necessary?" I suggest, half-joking, before I realize it sounds as if I'm offering myself as a candidate. "One from your own time, that is."

  He lifts a brow. "So you are not willing to stay here without your air cooling and the thing that cooks a potato in seven minutes?"

  I grin. "I might be able to live without microwaves, but television is really cool. You'll have to take my word for it."

  He flips on his back, and after a moment he breaks the silence, addressing his next quiet comment toward the sky. "You will never hear me say this again, and I will deny it if asked, but I would like it if you'd stay. Until you're better, that is."

  I feel a smile tugging at the corners of my mouth, something soft and warm in my chest. Thank God none of it is visible to him. "Well, since it turns out I know less about wilderness life than I realized, I'll take you up on that. I suppose that means we should return to the house."

  "I suppose." He shrugs, as if he's truly ambivalent about the idea. And maybe I am as well. There’s absolutely nothing special or fancy about lying on a coarse woolen blanket outdoors on a summer night, but it hasn’t been all bad.

  We rise and walk silently back to the house. Once inside, I turn to head up the stairs but feel his hand at my forearm, pulling me toward the kitchen, where he grabs the pie off the counter and sets it on the table with two forks.

  "Come on, little thief," he says. "I know you want some."

  I slide across from him and grab a fork. "Perhaps you could come up with a nickname for me that isn't monster or thief?" I ask. "It doesn't even have to be something good. Just something that isn't uniformly negative."

  He holds the fork to his lips. "So a neutral nickname then. Mon petit fromage, perhaps? Cheese isn’t an offensive word, I assume?"

  "You'll need to say it in English, whatever it is. Even the worst insults sound cute in French."

  "What if I just call you thief, but in French? Voleuse. You see? Accurate, yet not too harsh."

  I raise my chin. "It's not accurate at all."

  "Says the woman with pockets full of ham," he replies, but he's grinning, and to my surprise, I laugh. Since I've arrived, for the most part, every word out of his mouth has tapped into this well of shame inside me. Thief, liar, monster. But tonight there is no rancor in his words. Instead I hear a hint of begrudging admiration: he likes me better for the fact that I stole the ham, that I tried to preserve myself while doing the right thing. “It was brave,” he says softly, as if he can hear my thoughts. “Stupid, but brave.”

  It was a little brave, I realize. And stupid, yes. But brave first and foremost.

  I hide a smile. For the first time in ages, I feel as if I’ve done something right.

  8

  I spend the morning planting Marie-Therese’s pumpkin and watermelon seedlings in the sunny patch of ground to the side of the house.

  When I come in at lunch time, Henri is already there. On the surface, nothing has changed between us. And yet I can feel the change before he even opens his mouth.

  "Still here then, I see,” he says.

  "Apparently God has answered your prayers."

  "The only thing I've prayed for of late is more wild game to shoot." He looks me over, as if perhaps I am the wild game.

  I grin. “So we’re back to death threats.”

  He shakes his head. "I've given up on that plan. My day is already too full. There'd be no time to dig you a grave."

  "You could always burn me," I suggest.

  "Like the witch that you are," he says with a smile, rubbing his chin contemplatively. "I like it."

  "Dieu," says Marie. "I have no idea what to make of this conversation. And who ate all the pie?"

  For the first time that night, my body is not weighted by sleep when dinner is over, which is when I discover how very dull their evenings are: Marie is in the other room, working on a lesson plan, and Henri is reading. I pick up a book, but not only is it in French, it’s also about economics, which I wouldn’t be willing to read in any language.

  “Why did you run away?” I ask Henri.

  He looks up from his book. “Pardon?”

  “Your mother sounds like she was nice,” I elaborate. “I’m just surprised you wanted to run away at all.”

  “I wasn’t actually running away from her,” he says. “There was just something I wanted to see outside of Paris, and she refused to take me so I decided to go on my own.”

  I tilt my head. “What did you want to see?”

  “Corbusier had just completed this villa in Garche. He’d used the golden rectangle—this pattern in nature—in its design.” He smiles. “I thought I could just head toward the sunset, since Paris is due west, except it turns out the sun doesn’t take very long to set. I left late and it was dark by the time I got to the end of the orchard. I was too proud to act
ually return home, so my mother came to me.”

  “I had no idea you were so interested in architecture. Did you ever consider studying it?"

  He nods, something darker coming over his face. "I did study it," he says. "School was not for me. I prefer to stay on the farm."

  I’m not sure what just happened, but I miss the warm, open version of him that was here a moment before. "I understand wanting to remain where you grew up," I say softly. "Lots of people prefer small towns and places they know.”

  He looks at me for a long moment. "But not you,” he says. “You’d hate it.”

  My childhood has more bad memories than good, and I want to get as far from what I know as I can possibly get. “No,” I reply. "Not me.”

  Marie enters the room, looking a little shocked to see me and Henri actually speaking, free of sarcasm or insults. She picks up her sewing and sits beside me on the couch.

  "So this is what you do every night?" I ask with a sigh.

  "We don’t have to do this,” she says, putting her sewing down. Her eyes widen. “I know! We could play hide and seek. Time traveling hide and seek!"

  "No," Henri intones. "Absolutely not."

  Marie pouts. "You just know you’d lose.”

  He returns to his book. “Yes, or perhaps I just don’t care to repeatedly witness my own sister running around in the dark naked,” he replies.

  "It must have been so fun, growing up with a sister," Marie says dreamily.

  There's a small pit in my stomach. Did I momentarily forget? "I was the only time traveler in my family, so it wasn't as fun as you might be imagining."

  "But did you play tricks on them at least?" Marie asks, eyes alight. "Once I learned how, I used to jump in and hide things. My mother would be cooking and I'd practice sneaking in to move her stuff." She laughs. "Do you remember, Henri? She used to get so angry with me."

  His mouth lifts at the corner. "As I recall it led her to blame you anytime anything went missing."

  She sighs. "Well, yes. But it was fun at the start at least."