I assume Matt will go in the house first, say hello to the others, maybe give Seymour a shot of the new vaccine. But the instant he steps out of the car, he walks toward the cottage. I swallow. The long wait is over.
Moments later he stands in the doorway. He’s dressed in a white shirt and gray pants, with a charcoal sports coat. His expression is impossible to read. It appears empty of all emotion, which does not reassure me. I try to form a welcoming smile but my lips are frozen. I have to cough to speak.
“This is not easy for either of us,” I say.
“No.” He enters and sits on the corner of Seymour’s bed. I curl my knees to my chest. At least he has sat down.
“Your mother insisted on speaking to you. That was not my wish. I wanted to tell you myself.” I pause. “When I leapt in front of your laser, this was the last thing I expected to happen.”
“It just happened? You had no role in it?”
Now that he’s alert to the situation, it will be useless to lie to him. His truth sense is equal to my own. “No conscious role, although John says my soul wanted to remain here.”
“You talked to him about what happened?”
“I felt confused. I had to talk to someone.”
“Did John say Teri wished to leave?”
“He indicated it was her time.”
“That’s what I told you. Her body should have died that night.”
“I know. But . . . it was hard, too hard, to let her go.”
He nods. “And if you had, then we would have lost you both.”
“Probably.”
“I wish I could speak to John and ask him these questions.”
“He’s in the house. You could try talking to him. But he’s difficult to approach. The other night was the first time we really spoke.”
“But you trust him.”
“Yes.”
“He says that you remained here for a reason. That you have an important task to accomplish.”
These are points I passed on to Umara to improve my case.
“Essentially,” I say.
“And if I kill you, I go against the word of God.”
“The child is not God. Kill me if you wish. I won’t fight you.”
“You can’t fight me. Not until you’re back in your original body.”
“Is that why you’re here? To wait until the switch is complete so we can have a fair fight?”
“The idea did cross my mind.”
“Better kill me now and save everybody a lot of trouble.”
“You know I can’t harm Teri.”
“You don’t have to worry about that. Teri’s gone.”
My words sting him and he grimaces. “Is that definite?”
“According to your mother and John.”
It takes time for him to absorb his girlfriend’s death sentence. But finally he asks the question I have most dreaded. “Why didn’t you just tell me the truth?”
“At first, I went through a period of disorientation. You were with me, you knew I wasn’t myself. It was only at the funeral, when John gazed into my eyes, that things came into focus. It was then I knew who I was.”
“You could have told me when you returned to the hotel.”
“I wanted to. I took no pleasure in deceiving you. But I remembered your anger on the mountain. I was afraid how you would react.”
“We made love that night.”
“I know. I’m . . . I’m sorry.”
“That’s not it. Teri and I made love. She was there, I felt her.”
“I know. When you took me in your arms, I felt her, too.”
Matt sits up. “Then there’s hope.”
“You can’t think that way. It kills me to keep saying this but she died on that mountain.”
“But you have all her memories. A part of her must still live inside you. If we could reawaken it . . .”
“Matt. Please. I understand little of what’s supposed to happen tonight. Your mother refused to give me any details. But I do know she brought you here so you could let Teri go. Your mother understands how painful this is for you. She wouldn’t put you through this anguish unless it was necessary.” I pause. “Teri’s dead.”
He closes his eyes and grips his hands together so hard they shake. His internal struggle is palpable; it heats the room. A part of him wants to scream in anguish. Another part wants to fight for her life. And what’s left wants to strike out at me for putting him through such agony.
“This is your fault,” he whispers.
“It’s both our faults.”
His eyes pop open and he glares at me. “How dare you!”
I meet his furious gaze. “We both dared, Matt. We both contacted Teri and interfered with her life without asking her permission. Without telling her what we were. You’re half vampire, half Telar, and you brought the whole threat of the Telar into her life when you chose to pursue her. At least I didn’t know about the Telar or the IIC when I first made contact with her. But that’s no excuse. I knew from experience that death follows me. I had no more right than you to involve myself in her life.”
He leaps to his feet and is suddenly inches away. I feel the fire of his breath, the choking ash of his loss. He’s so close to killing me I know it will be over before I’ll feel it begin. He raises a hand above my head.
“I’ve read your history,” he swears. “Everyone you’ve ever loved, everyone you’ve ever touched, has always died. That’s your legacy, not mine. There was never a chance I would have harmed her.”
My fear has left me, my death feels inevitable. For that reason I’m able to look up at him and speak in a calm voice. “That’s not true. You can fool yourself but you can’t fool Teri. You’re right, part of her does still live inside me. Her memories are all there, and I have only to glance at the day you met her and the days that followed to know that you were constantly battling with yourself whether it was right for you to let her fall in love with you. Well, you convinced yourself the answer was yes, when it was no. No, Matt, I’m no more to blame than you for what happened to her. So if you decide to rip my head off please be a sport about it and end your own life when you’re done with me.”
The life goes out of him right then and he plops down on my bed. He sways as if he’s been stabbed and I instinctively reach out to steady him but I end up hugging him. He seems to melt in my arms, or perhaps it’s our tears that create the sensation, as they mingle and flow together and drop into the lap of a young woman we both loved more than we could say. It seems he accepts my words, or else Teri’s memories, since he stops threatening me and falls into a cold and lonely silence.
FOURTEEN
My body lies in front of me on the altar. I sit on my knees to the left of it, near my head. John is beside me, above my long blond hair, and Umara is to the right side of my body, a puja kit near her crossed legs. At the feet of my body is Matt. At the last moment John stopped Paula and Seymour from attending. No one asked him why.
Umara has built up the fire, and the last of the chill of the icy stream has left my body. The thousands of rubies embedded in the inverted triangle sparkle; the central pearl glistens. The Kali symbol reminds me of my daughter, Kalika, and how fearlessly she offered her life to save John. I wish to imitate her courage now but a thread of fear has woven its way back into my heart. I wasn’t afraid when I leapt in front of the laser that originally killed me but I had no time to think then.
Now I wish I could stop thinking and turn off my mind. I have no idea what is to happen next but I’m overwhelmed with a strange sense of the abyss. Kali is supposed to represent extinction, the loss of all individuality. At another time and place I might have viewed such a state as related to enlightenment but now it just feels like another form of death.
I know who I am and I want to go on being me.
I don’t like the odds Umara plays with. She has only done this once before. She doesn’t know whether it’s going to work any more than I do. Nevertheless, I watch closely as she removes a small blue bottle from the folds of her red robe. As she uncorks it, I smell blood and give her a puzzled look. She nods.
“It’s Krishna’s,” she says.
“Did he give it to you for this purpose?” I ask.
“I was with him when he left this world.”
“But you were in Egypt with Yaksha.”
Umara shakes her head. “I was with him.”
“But—”
“Silence. He’s here. We must begin.”
For several minutes Umara closes her eyes and sits in silence. Unsure what to do, I follow her example. The feeling of the abyss grows, but out of nowhere a wave of love expands inside it and suddenly I don’t feel so alone.
I hear Umara’s eyes open and peep over to see what she’s doing.
Her puja kit is used to perform Vedic ceremonies. It’s similar to a variety of ceremonial kits from all over the world. There’s a brass candleholder, which holds a narrow white candle, and two small brass dishes: one for rice, the other for water. There are three other pieces: a tiny vase that supports a burning incense stick; a small dish equipped with a handle that’s filled with camphor; and a two-inch plate smeared with sandalwood paste. To Umara’s right, in a neat pile, are fresh fruits, flowers, and a brand-new white handkerchief.