Timeless (4 page)

After her death, I’d had little patience or
interest in sewing and had only recently decided to begin it again.
Though I’d always enjoyed a challenge before, now I preferred the
monotony of cross-stitching, an easy and mindless pastime that
helped when I was upset. Before Mom died, I’d made all of my
clothes and many of hers, many of them designed from older
patterns—often frilly, feminine gowns we both liked to wear.
Neither of us cared about current trends, preferring our own style
to those found in magazines or movies.

Whatever interest I’d had in clothes had
vanished since her death, however. It wasn’t just that I didn’t
want to sew; I literally couldn’t do it for the first few months
following her death. It was only recently coming back to me, as I
remembered the happy times I’d spent with Mom, her weeding the
garden, me sewing a dress or quilt for us. The less grief I felt,
the more able I was to resume the life I’d lived before she
died.

I worked quietly, not putting the sampler
down for several hours and realizing, as I did, that I dreaded
going to sleep. Who knew what kinds of dreams I’d have?

My eyes finally refused to stay open, and I
climbed into bed. The Duchess jumped on the bed, curling around the
blue and green patchwork quilt I’d made several years ago. She
seemed to understand my need for company, and I was glad to have
her there.

I woke up around nine the next morning,
relieved that I hadn’t had anymore nightmares. I still had an hour
before Ben’s swim meet began—time enough to get a pop-tart on my
way to the school. I was picking Annie up on the way in Aunt Jo’s
old car, which I hoped would still run. It was a red, antique, 1940
Chrysler Saratoga—a stylish car for its day—but a real pain to
learn to drive. Aunt Jo felt sentimental about it because it had
been her father’s prize car. Since we weren’t exactly good at
keeping it in tip-top shape, it wasn’t in the best condition. We
lived close to downtown, however, so the grocery store, post
office, and cleaners were right around the corner. I usually ran
Aunt Jo’s errands for her—literally.But school was too far away for
that.

I grabbed the keys from one of the hooks in
the laundry room and went out the back where we kept the car. After
three tries, I finally got it started, shifted gears, and backed
out, making sure the Duchess wasn’t anywhere near the tires.
Driving the Saratoga was always an adventure.

Annie lived across town and was waiting for
me on her parents’ front porch, an umbrella tucked under her
arm.

“Hey,” I said as she got in.

“Hey,” she mumbled sulkily. Usually Annie
flooded me with a stream of the latest gossip when I saw her. I
must have been more out of it than I’d realized last night.

“So what are you and Zack doing later?” I
asked, hoping to lighten her mood.

“Oh, nothing much,” she muttered.

I took a deep breath. “Listen, Annie, I’m
sorry about last night. I had this really horrible dream yesterday
before Ben picked me up.”

“What about?” she asked, her irritation
dissipating as her interest piqued.

Somehow it was a little easier telling Annie
about my dream than Ben. I gave her a basic outline.

Her eyes widened.

“A knight?” she asked.

“Yeah, I think so.”

“What did he look like?” she asked, her
earlier bad mood evaporating.

How to explain?

“Well, he was very tall,” I began,
hesitantly.

“Taller than Ben?” she asked, a little
skeptical. Ben towered over almost everyone at school. They’d tried
to recruit him to the basketball team, but his heart was always in
swimming.

“Yeah, I think so. Maybe by a couple of
inches, even,” I replied, trying to sketch the outline in my mind
from the haziness of my dream. The knight I saw in my mind
was…fierce, sculpted, raw. Words couldn’t describe him.

“Okay, so what else?” she asked, becoming
more excited.

“He had very intense dark eyes and dark
curling hair. And he had the strongest arms of anyone I’ve ever
seen, like he worked out all the time,” I finished, the details
becoming clearer as I described him, but not because I remembered
it from my dream. Had I recreated someone I knew? Was my knight a
real person? The thought disturbed me.

“And…?” Annie prompted, clearly wanting more
details. But there the vision ended. It was as though a door had
been shut, and I couldn’t open it.

“He looked like he was from a different age,
from long ago,” I said, sad I couldn’t reach him. The feeling left
me unexpectedly breathless.

“Well, he was a knight,” Annie pointed out,
quickly losing interest. I was thankful.

“Don’t tell Ben, okay?” I asked, suddenly
afraid she might let something slip. There were some things better
left unsaid, I thought. It was just a dream. Right?

“Why not? I mean, I wouldn’t anyway, but
still…” she said.

“I don’t know,” I said quickly, “Just
don’t.”

“Did he look like someone you know?” Annie
asked, becoming interested again and more persistent.

“No!” I answered a little too loudly.

“Well, what’s the harm, then?” Annie replied,
puzzled.

What indeed?

We drove into the school parking lot, which
was near the indoor pool. I didn’t want Ben to see me before he
swam. If he was still angry with me, I didn’t want to break his
concentration.

Zack met us at the gate leading into the pool
area, a grin on his face. He’d already been in the pool for a
couple of laps, and his hair was slicked back from his head.

“Hey,” he said, a little out of breath.

“Where’s Ben?” I asked, looking behind him.
Zack and Ben were always together when Ben wasn’t with me. I wanted
to gauge how upset he might still be.

“Not sure,” he replied, not meeting me in the
eye.

So Ben was still mad, I thought.

“Wish me luck!” Zack said, quickly pecking
Annie on the cheek before heading back to the pool. At least he
wasn’t still upset, I thought, thinking of Zack’s sunny
disposition. He never held a grudge.

My eyes scanned the pool for Ben.

He was already doing laps. I loved watching
Ben swim. He looked so effortless, so graceful. His strong arms
reached from the water, dipping in and out, and I wondered how he
could do something that made me so terrified.

It was obvious that he wasn’t looking for me.
I’d have to make it up to him later, I thought, a little
chagrined.

“Okay, guys, let’s go,” the coach barked out,
blowing his whistle and rounding up everyone. Juniors would swim
first, then seniors. It was a mark of Ben’s abilities that he’d
been made captain as a junior.

Annie and I took our places to watch the
competition in the bleachers, and we cheered when we saw Zack and
Ben come out from the locker room. Both usually won easily.

Angela Rossi, the most popular girl in
school, was waiting for him at the door. She’d worn a short skirt
and high heels. I felt frumpy in last night’s jeans, which I’d
pulled from the top of the laundry basket. I really would have to
start paying attention to what I wore, I thought, as I saw her
catch his attention. There were still a few minutes before the meet
began.

From where I sat, I could tell that she was
obviously flirting. This was nothing new. Everyone knew she liked
Ben, including Ben. Normally, it didn’t bother me, but today Ben
looked definitely interested.

“Hey, isn’t that Angela Rossi over there
beside Ben?” asked Annie.Trust Annie to point out the obvious.

“Yeah, I see her,” I said, trying not to
sound as irritated as I felt.

“Aren’t you going to go over there?” she
asked.

“There’s no time,” I said. “Besides, why
should I? If he wants to talk with her, fine. I trust him,” I said
belligerently, forcing a note of bravado in my voice.

Annie’s large brown eyes became huge.

“Are you kidding me?” she asked, shaking her
head.

I knew what she was thinking. The prettiest
girl in school—blonde hair, gorgeous blue eyes, great tan, fabulous
legs—was actively trying to steal my boyfriend. What did I have
that could compete with that?

Someone blew the whistle, and Ben took his
spot. But I couldn’t concentrate the entire time; my mind kept
wandering back to the dream and the nagging feeling that I knew the
knight who’d protected me.

The match passed in a blur. Ben and Zack both
must have won, not that I’d noticed much. I clapped and smiled when
Annie did, but I still couldn’t take my mind off my dream.

Annie was the one who snapped me out of my
reverie.

People were starting to file out of the
bleachers and leave. Some of the swimmers had already come out.

“Hey, you need to get over there, quick,” she
said, pulling at my arm.

I looked over and saw Angela Rossi making a
bee-line for Ben.

I quickly climbed down the bleachers, tripped
on the last step and nearly fell into the pool.

“Great,” I muttered under my breath, catching
my balance just before I launched headlong into the deep end. It
was enough to embarrass myself by looking like a drowned rat but
quite another to need one of the swim team to come fish me out.

By this time, Angela had already beaten me to
him, and of course she looked as immaculate as ever. I hoped that
Ben wouldn’t start making comparisons. He flicked his eyes over to
me and then continued talking to Angela. So that was the way it was
going to be, I thought, starting to get more than a little
angry.

“Yeah, I thought the Chem test was hard too,”
he said to her. “Mr. Clayton is tough,” he finished.

“But you’re good at everything, Ben. I mean,
you beat everybody here. I’m sure you’ll be a state champ this
year,” she said, almost purring.

Was she really saying this right in front of
me? I rolled my eyes. Really, wasn’t he seeing through this?

Obviously not. He smiled down at her.

“Well, I work hard, I guess, but I’m not good
at everything,” he said. Was he actually smiling at her?

Angela had the world’s most annoying laugh—a
kind of snort.

“We should really get together sometime,” she
said in a low voice, edging a little too close to Ben than was
strictly necessary.

It was definitely time for me to step in.

“Hi, Angela,” I said, stepping between her
and Ben.

“Oh, hi, Emily,” she said, disappointed. She
glanced briefly in my direction and then pointedly ignored me.

“I better go,” Ben said to her. Was that
regret I heard in his voice?

“Oh, okay. I guess I’ll see you around then,
Ben,” she said, turning to walk off, but not before she flashed me
a nasty smile.

“Yeah, see ya,” he replied. His eyes followed
her.

I was fuming.

“What was that about?” I asked.

“What?” he replied, shrugging his shoulders
and sounding a little too innocent. Something was up.

“What do you mean ‘what’?” he asked. “I see
your mood hasn’t improved since last night,” he finished, starting
to walk off.

I could still see Angela out of the corner of
my eye. She’d left the immediate vicinity but hadn’t gone away
completely. Instead, she’d taken a seat on the bleachers, watching
us. I needed to change my tactics.

I whirled around, meaning to grab his arm but
suddenly stumbled, falling into the deep end of the pool.

The cold water enveloped me, and I felt the
old, familiar dread begin. I tried to remember what Ben had once
taught me about swimming but I couldn’t stop the rising panic from
overtaking my mind. I could feel myself sinking further, a dead
weight in the water.

A bright light forced open my eyes, and I saw
her, glowing beneath the waters with her dark, burning eyes, bloody
lips, and hair that blazed out around her. She swam from the depths
below and caught at my ankle, pulling me farther and farther down.
I tried to extricate myself but couldn’t break her iron hold. We
were nearly to the bottom of the pool, and I could feel her
overtake me, her hands clawing at my throat.

I could no longer hold my breath. The cold
water slid like a knife down my throat.

Suddenly, the light faded, and her hold
broke. I felt a new force pulling at me from behind. We moved
swiftly from the lower depths, eventually breaking the surface.
Several arms pulled me out, and someone applied pressure, forcing
out the water. I threw up, gasping for air. I could feel strong
arms circling me and finally opened my eyes to see Ben beside me,
with Zack and Annie standing over me.

“Do you think she can hear us?” I heard Zack
say through a tunnel.

“Emily?” Annie said from faraway.

I couldn’t answer. My throat felt raw, as if
a knife had really cut it.

“Where are those marks from?” Zack asked,
looking down at my battered legs.

“She must have hit her legs going over the
side or scraped them when we pulled her out,” Ben said.

“No, I didn’t see that she’d hit anything
going in,” Annie said, puzzled.

“Let’s get her out of here, away from the
pool,” I heard Ben say, lifting me. I still had not found my
voice.

“Emily, can you hear me?” Ben asked gently as
we walked. I nodded, burying my face in his shoulder. I still had
the lingering sensation of danger. Who was this woman haunting my
dreams and literally trying to kill me? Could I have imagined all
of this in my panic?

The locker room had cleared, and Ben set me
down on one of the benches, making sure that I wouldn’t fall over.
He must have signaled for Annie and Zack not to follow because it
was just the two of us.

He grabbed a few towels and started drying me
off as best he could, trying to make me warmer. I was shivering and
not just from the cold.

“You really should take off those clothes.
You’ll never get warm if you stay in them. I have some shorts and a
t-shirt in my locker. You can take a hot shower and change. I’ll
keep watch,” he said.