Jessie was at the end of her rope; there was no solace for her now in the
endless loops of lacy creations of crochet, no solace for the barren beauty
in the arms of men, no solace in the silent times in the night. There was
only emptiness here in her life.
Born a full month early, Jessie was a creature of emotion, a creature that longed for company and love unconditional. Her eyes were green, and her hair was long and red-gold as freshly combed satin. Her skin was porcelain-cream, and dewy smooth.
Currently, Jessie Wilding was twenty-six, single, and lonely. Her eyes had, of late, taken on a desolation far beyond her years.
The date was August first, three days before her birthday, and Jessie lay in bed beneath a pure white cotton comforter. The sun streamed in mercilessly through windows freshly cleaned, and puddled on a freshly- scrubbed hardwood floor. There was nothing to do. Nothing to wish for. Nothing to love. How restless were these days, how cold and lifeless! There was nothing Jessie could look forward to. How she wanted children, boisterous, joyous creatures to fill the great seaside home with sunshine from their brimming, bright smiles.
At her bedside table was an ornate confection of smooth blown glass, colored emerald and crimson, and thin, finely-wrought silver, a jar of sorts. The lid was close-fitting and tapered up into a smooth peak, then like a diminuendo flowed down to rejoin the silver at the sides of itself: a tear-bottle, nearly full with Jessie's tears, shining its colors in the sunlight. A foolish trinket. Yet it did have its significance. Since birth, Jessie had owned this beautiful trinket. But it only held her tears from the past few years; she had thought it might mean something to someone in the near future, perhaps a little one?
But a visit to the family doctor had dashed Jessie's hopes. The day had been a rainy one, and the clouds heavy on the sky's cup, the air stiflingly close. Jessie had gone seeking an answer, and come back with the wrong one: she was barren, unable to bear children. The doctor had put it so baldly that Jessie was instantly, violently sick, causing the doctor to apologize furiously, his small voice begging her for forgiveness. Soon after, Jessie had gone numb, and agreed that he thought she'd known, that he was not at fault. But a deep, dull ache had remained, and still lay on the pit of her stomach.
Jessie had been plump and witty and amusing before, now she was slender and fragile and serious, sadness icy in her green eyes once so full of sun. What was she to do?
And so she laid there beneath the covers, gazing at the web of blue veins in her slender wrists raptly, and contemplating ending it all. Instant apprehension whenever her mind touched the sore spot, and Jessie couldn't bear to think of ending her own life; who knew? Miracles could happen, Jessie had seen them. So why not to her?
Flinging a last hope to the skies, Jessie fell asleep, her red-gold hair framing her head on the pillow like an aureole. There was a massive internal blink! and a laugh that sounded like two, male and female, and then Jessie's world was changed forever, without her knowing it.
It was late evening when Jessie woke, and the sun's dying blood-rays seeped in through the window like a flood. Two tiny, huddled boys clung tightly against the rousing woman's side, each with a sandy crop of dirty- blond hair and identical features. One's features were gentler, softer, easier, but both boys' faces were fearful, and various wounds adorned their tiny forms.
The sight awoke a motherly instinct in Jessie, and a fierce protective need. "Poor children!" At her soothing alto voice, the twins relaxed from their cowering, and the one with the fierce, sharp expression, spoke, his words tentative at best.
"Don't... don't hurt us." The small pair couldn't be more than five years old altogether, their ages added. Jessie felt a sharp pain in her heart for the children, and she gazed at them with soft green eyes.
"I won't, sweet children. Will you stay here so that I can gather the medicine to treat your wounds?"
The twins, once more clutched tightly in each other's embrace, nodded fearfully, and Jessie slid from the bed, her long red-gold hair in a slightly clumsy plait swinging past her rear. "Mommy..." said the sweet- faced one, and Jessie spun in disbelief.
What had the child said? Had the beautiful little boy called her his mother? Jessie's heart caught painfully on a beat, and she looked to him. He repeated. "Mommy, can we stay with you?"
Jessie didn't know where the precious children were from, but she had a heart and plenty of money to support them handsomely for as long at they might live and then some. So she nodded, and said, "We'll try, okay?" Her smile was brilliant, and when she knelt, the children rushed toward her and hugged her, as they would a mother.
The very action sent warm happiness seeking through Jessie, a pure vitality, and she gazed long into the pair of violet-blue eyes before her. They looked nothing like her, but they were beautiful little boys, and sweet as they could be. Jessie smiled again. Her beautiful, sweet twins -- hers -- her little boys, she would live for.
"Would you like baths?" Jessie asked, her alto voice soothing as a syrup. The little twins nodded in perfect unison, and followed Jessie into the bathroom.
The bathroom had been one of Jessie's great solaces. It was great, with vaulted ceilings and walls painted cream-white, and real ivy from planter-boxes on the ground grew up the walls in profusion. There were Grecian pillars of veined marble that soared high into the ceilings as well, with little niches in them for storing knickknacks, in which Jessie had placed many statuettes of angels and mythical beasts and unicorns, each lovely in its own way.
A particularly large carving looked more skilled than the others, but yet its appeal was undeniable: carved of alabaster, the statue was more precious than gold with its glossy sheen. The figure depicted a demure unicorn mare, her head lowered, her eyes half-opened. Only that had been darkened, and it had been done tastefully with an enamel the exact gloss as the stone itself, leaving a tiny touch of white just so it looked that the lovely mare was gazing directly at one. The long, spiraled horn was flawless, as was the delicate arch of the neck, the perfect carving of the forelock, mane, and tail.
The floor was tiled with smooth white porcelain, and a soft damask cloth stood right outside the deep marble tub, and in the far part of the room, an in-ground fishpond sat, where koi of many colors swam tranquilly, nudging the water lilies that grew within, and occasionally an onlooker's hand, if it happened to trail into the cold water. The twins gazed about at all this in wide-eyed amazement, and Jessie, smiling, ran warm bath-water with her custom-made sweet lavender-and-honey bath bubbles into the deep tub.
"So what are your names, my little ones?" she asked, kneeling to gently coax the twins' clothes from their small bodies, careful of the cuts and bruises as she went.
The sweet-faced one responded promptly. "I'm Koutoku, and this is my twin, Shunkaku." Jessie was surprised at their adept speaking, and slightly dismayed at the names. However was she to pronounce them? She was American; her tongue could not make such contortions.
She said first one name, then the other, trying not to frown when one corrected her pronunciation. "Do you have nicknames, loves?"
Once again it was the sweet-faced Koutoku that spoke. "I'm called Amiboshi, and my brother, Suboshi."
Jessie breathed a sigh of relief, then eased both Amiboshi and Suboshi into the warm bath-water, and sat at their side while they splashed and played, occasionally scooping bubbles in heaps onto their little heads.
After the bath, Jessie sat cross-legged on the great bed, with her sons dressed in small white-linen trousers that had once belonged to her younger brother, treating the worst of their wounds. Gentle little Amiboshi chattered on and on, while the other, Suboshi, sat quietly sullen, as though moody over something.
"You'll be sleeping with me tonight," Jessie said, pleased. "Are the pair of you hungry?" Amiboshi and Suboshi instantly perked, and she laughed softly. "All right -- to the kitchen, troops!"
So the three of them marched to the kitchen, Amiboshi and Suboshi chattering excitedly in what Jessie's confused mind translated as gibberish. She knew it was some sort of Oriental language, and was puzzled. What were the children talking about?
She opened the refrigerator, and the little twins scattered for cover behind her legs, and Jessie laughed, her voice a pleasing alto. "It's all right, loves, it's a refrigerator." She enunciated clearly for the pair, smiling gently, and she squatted to put an arm around each little boy. The big old house seemed so fresh and new for the little ones, and she had to remember their age and their seemingly nonexistent knowledge of technology.
And so Jessie fixed the twins' first American meal, on their first stove, and smiled in delight as they enjoyed every bite.
And that night, Jessie, Amiboshi, and Suboshi lay in bed, and the twins were restless. So Jessie began to sing to them, the darkness seeming to lull the little boys into a pacified state, and they easily fell asleep.
Long after the boys were asleep, Jessie remained awake, watching them breathe, listening to every soft noise made in sleep. She would devote herself entirely to the raising of the beautiful little creatures that had been such a blessing.
And so it went, idyllic, for years, and Amiboshi and Suboshi blossomed into tall, slender, strong youths. The pair excelled in school, and Jessie was happier than she had been in a long time. She was an active catalyst in their lives, she and her younger brother Michel, who was her children's age, strangely enough. Amiboshi, Suboshi, and Michel were unafraid to bring their teenage friends home, because Jessie dressed, spoke, and acted as they normally did, her long red-gold hair was quite in style these days, worn braided, loose, or thrown into a ponytail. Jessie didn't interfere, and they got many questions and comments on their 'sister'.
Still sometimes, late at night, lying between her beautiful twin sons, Jessie would feel a vague discontent, and the tear-jar began to refill from where the old tears had evaporated. Suboshi never caught her crying, but Amiboshi, who pretended to sleep, had seen and felt his mother's racking silent sobs, and it had touched the gentler twin deep within his heart.
The routine went as it always had, on one night, first Suboshi then Amiboshi showering beneath the strong shower Jessie had installed through dint of bloodied knuckles, then a family dinner where Jessie would listen enthusiastically to her twins' stories of school and play, then Jessie would help them with their homework, and then they had an hour to themselves.
It was usually within this hour that Jessie cried her precious tears, wondering where the years had gone with her beautiful, innocent children, wishing she could go back and be a better parent, or go to some different form...
For that was it, when it all boiled down to it, wasn't it? Jessie was deeply in love with every aspect of the young men she called her sons, whom she had raised up so carefully, so gently, with so much love. What would happen to her? She was past being needed. Her sons were self-sufficient. They no longer needed her. The thought stuck its wing into the fresh wound, and a fresh round of tears poured down Jessie's face.
What was she now? A woman of thirty-seven with looks like a teenager, long red-gold hair, emerald eyes, and a slender, supple, youthful figure that would yield no fruit from its barren womb. What man would want her? None. She was no woman! she scorned herself, seeing her own tear-streaked face in the reflection of her tear-jar.
As if through some utter miracle, Jessie found herself encircled in the arms of the older, more sober, gentler twin, Amiboshi. His eyes were solemn and calm. "If it's time to cry, then you must cry with all of your heart, and you must know that above and beyond anything, I love you."
And Jessie did. She cried. Cried. Wept out every tear in her chalice until there were only dry, shapeless sobs left in her throat and still she cried, and yet Amiboshi only held her close, this child who was his mother, this facet of her he'd never seen.
"Do you do this every night?" he asked, his voice full of anguish, his face moon-pale in the darkness. Jessie, ashamed, merely nodded. "Heaven, Mother, and you never showed it to Suboshi or I. We could have comforted you like this!" He raked one hand through his profuse crop of baby-fine dirty-blond hair.
"I'm sorry." Jessie's voice was a hoarse croak, and she cleared her throat, and what came out was very much like a sob. "I'm sorry. You're just so... so grown up." She managed a tearful smile. "I remember the day you came to me, Koutoku. Amiboshi. Nothing is so clear as that memory, not even this very moment. You and your twin were so beautiful, and you came into my life like angels, like a hot desert wind, and you set it right-side-up again. And I have fallen in love with both of you since, and it is a mortal love that cannot be shaken. If you feel that I am a senile old lady, then you can leave me here in the dark!" Jessie spoke in a low, intense voice, and she quivered, gazing up earnestly into her son's beautiful blue eyes.
That piercing gaze shook Amiboshi to the core. He did not move. He couldn't. There was nowhere he could move to, and he knew that haunted look his mother wore now would be with him for an eternity. That look of fear in her deep emerald eyes.
Jessie, then, resolved to live until the pair of them moved out to start their own lives. And then, if no prospect turned up, she would be gone, and there would be no more loneliness. No more. She couldn't bear it. Her heart couldn't take it.
Suboshi came in later that night to find Jessie and Amiboshi asleep in the great bed, and so he slipped off his day-clothes and on his night- clothes, and slipped into the gentle embrace of his mother, and there slept peacefully.
Jessie had known the day would come, but she could never have predicted the time or the place, or the way it would end.
It was college graduation day, and the boys were clad in caps and gowns, standing proud and tall to their full heights of 6', Amiboshi with his silver-rimmed glasses looking scholarly, Suboshi trying his best to be serious, and Jessie numb with pride in the stands.
The head professor of the selective university stepped up to the podium, adjusting his own glasses and smiling timidly out to the stands.
"Ladies and gentlemen, we are gathered here today, every one of us, to recognize the achievements of two very special students who are both near and dear to every heart. We will first acknowledge the salutatorian.
He came here a rebellious, fidgety young man with a quick-flash temper and even quicker fists, but with a ready sense of humor and an easy touch with the professors. He was eager to learn, and from the first made the second highest marks in the school. Ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you Shunkaku Wilding?"
Suboshi's eyes lit, and he fairly glowed with excitement as he slipped silently up to the stage where he received, around his shoulders, a drape of violet silk with tassels of silver and a certificate.
The professor cleared his throat, adjusted his spectacles, and continued. "Now we will acknowledge the valedictorian.
This fine young man came here a quiet, studious, well-liked person with a deep desire to learn. Often he had the professors in tears trying to figure out a particularly difficult equation or solve riddles he concocted for them. This is why he deserves the honor of valedictorian. May I now present you with Koutoku Wilding?"
Amiboshi was stunned, and Jessie in the audience clapped both hands over her mouth. Her boys received the two highest honors in the college! Valedictorian and salutatorian! Her boys! Her beautiful twins had done it!
Amiboshi also made his way through the crowd to the stage to be presented with a deep blue silk drape, stiffened with effusive silver stitching and that ended in six-inch silver tassels.
Jessie wept for pure joy, waving to her boys from her place in the crowd. Amiboshi leant to the professor and whispered something in his ear, and the professor nodded, and handed Amiboshi the microphone.
Amiboshi first cleared his throat, pushed up his glasses, then began to speak. "I would like to take a moment to point out that my mother, Jessie Wilding, took us in eighteen and a half years ago, when we showed up in her home, and she did it with no questions. She has raised us single- handedly, without the help of a male, since then, and our life has been heaven." His eyes fastened on her. "Mother, will you please come up to the stage?"
Jessie did so as though floating on air, her fragile slenderness breathtaking in a white muslin dress with but a touch of homemade, cream- colored lace at the throat and at the hem, and the sleeves poet-styled. Amiboshi had never seen his mother looking so fragile, so gentle, with her red-gold hair free and streaming gently over her shoulders. Her face was porcelain-white, and by far the most beautiful thing Amiboshi had ever seen in his twenty years.
Jessie stood beside her sons, her fragile, beautiful face lowered demurely, reminding Amiboshi of that particular statuette of the unicorn mare in the bathroom pillar, powerfully, movingly beautiful. He suddenly realized he continued to hold the microphone. He spoke again.
"She may look fragile, but within her is a strength that pulled Shunkaku and I through so many years. I truly must thank her with all of my spirit, my heart, and my mind. She is the child of a thousand days, and the innocent who raised twin boys." By now there were tears in his eyes. "She is a child, but yet a woman. She is an unresolved beauty, and yet, a rough- edged doll of alabaster. Perfection with edges -- true loveliness." Amiboshi could no longer speak, and he handed the microphone back to the professor, and the trio embraced, Jessie's serene smile bringing peace to Amiboshi, however slowly.
It was that week that Amiboshi and Suboshi moved out, and Jessie lost all hope for survival. Despite the moving speech, Jessie could not survive without her boys.
And so she was back in square one, without a hope. She lay in the tub for hours on end, in the hottest water she could stand. If she had been slender, she wasted into thinness. Jessie did not eat. The intriguing stir of the surface of hot water as she moved entranced her, and finally she got out.
Wrapping herself in a plush, soft towel, she went to bed where she had once laid with her sons. Sleep did not come, no matter how Jessie tried to relax.
Sometime around midnight, there was a strange shimmer in the air, and it formed into a solid being that clucked quietly at Jessie's state. "What have you done to yourself, Jessarine Wilding?"
Jessie did not respond, only watched through pain-filled green eyes. The pit of her stomach gnawed painfully, but she could not oblige it. The only part of her that did not quite reflect the gauntness was her bosom, which jutted full and awkward over a thin waist. "I want..." she said slowly, clearly, "... I want Amiboshi. And Suboshi. My boys." Her lips were cracked and blistered, and speaking appeared painful.
"I can give you your boys, Jessie." The creature's skin was like peach marble, so delicate, and its eyes seemed to forever shift colors. "I can give you youth and a new heart to fall in love with one of them all over again."
Jessie nodded, her parched lips fumbling for the eager words. "Please... please?"
The being nodded, and then stepped close. "But you must not be Jessarine Wilding any longer. You must assume a new identity, and you will. But you will recall vaguely being yourself. Are you willing to give up this life entirely?"
Jessie nodded eagerly again, and sat up painfully, her muscles showing beneath the skin. "Yes. Yes!"
Then the being nodded quietly, and intoned a few soft, sweet words, and there was a moment of blitzing pain that Jessie could hardly stand, and then there was no longer pain of any kind.
Jessie stood, looking into the full-length mirror, and she gasped. Her hair was no longer wavy red-gold silk, but past her thighs and to her knees dusky dark brown, her eyes were fathomless silver with stars dissolved in them. Her face had not changed much, except the eyes were large and wide and framed by thick, long, dark lashes. Her lips were full and naturally pinkened, silken. Her body, still bare, was slender as a reed, with delectable curves. Her collarbones based a long, aristocratic neck and an ivory throat. Her feet were smaller, delicate, and she looked altogether fragile.
She looked to see the being, and it was beginning to fade.
It spoke one last time. "Remember. You are not Jessarine. You are Alexandrine Merwin, a twenty-year-old French girl. You no longer live in Paris, France, but you once did."
The newly-named Alex nodded in wonder. And then, in a flash, the mysterious being was gone, leaving Alex to fend for herself.
So she settled down to sleep, excited about the great new day before her with young resolve. No one could stop her now!
The next morning, Alex woke with no idea of what she had been the night before. She had no recollection of being a forty-year-old spinster, and none of wasting away into gaunt thinness.
But there was a strange picture of the perfect man in her mind. Fairly tall, with baby-fine dirty-blond hair grown slightly long in back; blue-violet eyes, a light complexion, an expression of seriousness, and infinitely kissable, strong, smiling lips.
Alex shook off the image, stood, sliding her delicate feet into satin slippers that fit her perfectly and, wrapping her form in a plush robe, padded toward the closet, a walk-in affair filled with many clothes that fit her as perfectly as had the slippers.
Finally she decided upon a simple dress of cream-colored silk that caressed her slender curves lovingly. The ruffles were eyelet lace, soft and cool as she slipped it on. As Alex modeled in the mirror, some snippet of a memory came to her.
Chill, slender beauty. Red-gold hair, emerald eyes. A temper like fire. A sudden reprieve, so short, then nothing at all.
And through the memory, the words 'child of a thousand days' and 'unresolved beauty' spoken in the most delicate of tones, as though one were going to weep, echoed reverberatingly though her mind. When she surfaced from it, Alex was shaken to her spirit.
It wasn't long before Alex reached her destination, the high school where she knew the beautiful man of her dreams was a professor, and a young one, but he related well to them.
Amiboshi taught Advanced Art, and he was slightly absentminded; his gray painting smock was usually stained with streaks of various brilliant colors, some days reddish-golds and bright emeralds, and other days deep mahogany browns and silvers.
Shyly Alex stepped in to begin her first class as an assistant teacher in Advanced Art five minutes late. Amiboshi was in the middle of one of his soft-voiced lectures about watercolors, their first lesson in Advanced Art, and his soft, long hands were folded before him as he paced the rows of desks.
"Ah, so the prodigal assistant is come?" he asked, smiling good- naturedly, and swept up the aisle in his well-tailored dark dress-pants and white muslin poet-shirt to greet Alex, taking her hand and drawing her up to the front of the class. "Ladies and gentlemen, this is Alexandrine Merwin, our assistant teacher. I trust you will respect her. She as well as I will be available to assist you in all your studies. Is that clear?"
There were general murmurs of assent through the classroom, and a few dim, muttered complaints, a symphony to Alex's ears as she blushed lightly.
And so Amiboshi, with a reassuring squeeze of Alex's hand, continued his lecture, smiling as he reviewed vital points she had missed so that her adept hands could note it all in swirling, delicate feminine cursive.
"... and I expect you all to bring your paintbrushes and a cheap set of watercolors to class tomorrow. Understood?" Amiboshi iterated, leaning against his desk, and the class agreed. "Class dismissed. Go on; shoo."
Dashing down a last few notes, Alex gave a sigh of relief, and pushed her slender hand through her thick mass of dark hair, causing a gentle ripple of muscles beneath the cream-white skin of her wrist that Amiboshi duly noticed. "Welcome, Miss Merwin."
Startled, Alex nodded, and blushed. When she spoke, her words were honey-sweet with her soft French accent. "Thank you, sir. Pray, call me Alex..?" She left out the words, because I've known you well in my fantasies already.
With a gentle laughter, Amiboshi bowed, his full, generous lips parting in a dazzling smile that showed even, white teeth. "As you wish, Alex. Will you call me Amiboshi, then? My mother always did, for she couldn't pronounce my real name." A cloud drifted across his sunny features, then cleared as fast as Paris skies after a thunderstorm. "Perhaps you would consider taking lunch with me? I'd like to know you better if I'm to teach alongside you."
Alex nodded, swallowing hard. "Yes, certainly. It would be my pleasure." Her silvery eyes, in an effort not to fasten on Amiboshi's blue- violet ones, roamed about the room, fastening on a certain portrait of a slender, delicate woman with eyes the color of gentle emeralds and red-gold hair that framed a fragile face, and tears that ran down a melancholy expression. The lips were generous and full, and seemed to tremble, even in the painting. "Pray, sir... ah, Amiboshi... who is that woman?" She pointed at the painting, a long, slender finger showing just which one she admired.
He nodded proudly toward it. "That is my mother, as I remember her. She never looked more than eighteen, even when she was past thirty. Such a beautiful creature." His eyes, behind their silver-rimmed glasses, scanned her slender form, and Alex could not help but feel loved. "You remind me of her. I'll have to paint you, as well, Alex." A faint, artistically absentminded smile tugged at his generous, strong lips, and tugged at Alex's heart as well, causing a warm blush to cross her cheeks. Lord knew she'd love to sketch him, tall and magnificent... and bare. He looked like some Greek god, his poet shirt lending him elegant Old World grace that jerked Alex's attention.
A moment before the next class arrived, Amiboshi gave her an encouraging nod, gestured to the ceiling as if suggesting she'd have to have the patience of a saint for this class, and a brilliant smile.
Alex barely heard what he said through the entire hour. She was too busy capturing the lines of him, completely at ease, as he leant against the desk. But pencil could not define eyes that deep, hair that baby-fine and beautiful, that certain sleepy, undeniably sexy subconscious smile. But Alex did her best, and the penciled portrait was skillful and seemed to capture his slender, easy elegance. She pulled the portrait from her notebook, settled it on Amiboshi's desk while he was assisting a student, then went to her own task of assistance.
Lunch was a long time in comng, and when it did, Alex almost shouted in glee. How annoying it was to sit around and try to help uncooperative high-schoolers paint preschool figures!
Finally the bell rang, and Alex seized her lunch bag, shot a smile at Amiboshi, then nodded toward the cafeteria. In agreement, he gave his own nod, then mouthed to her over the thunder of high-schoolers' screaming, 'Meet you there.'
Alex found herself swept up in the current of moving bodies, and carried, to her chagrin, to the lunchroom, and she fought her way free after she arrived there. Blushing quite warmly, she ran her hand through her hair to straighten it out, and adjusted her skirt, which had been hiked to immodest heights.
Amiboshi soon followed, her portrait in one hand, and he was staring at it in disbelief. He slid into the seat, then looked to Alex, placing the portrait on the table before her. "Did you do this, Alex?" His voice was soft, silken with amazement.
Alex blushed, averted her silvery eyes, and nodded. "Yes, sir." Her soft French accent made her sound shy and sweet. "I apologize; it looks terrible."
Amiboshi gave a crow of laughter. "Modesty! I can't even capture that sort of precision in pencil, Alex! What business do you have being an assistant teacher? You're better than I am! Hear me, Miss Merwin, or am I speaking Italian?" His voice was low and intense.
The high color of a maiden was in Alex's fragile, fair cheeks. "I... I hear you, sir."
"I thought I told you to call me Amiboshi." He smiled, calming slowly. His eyes behind the silver-rimmed glasses shone lightly.
"Yes sir -- I mean, Amiboshi," Alex stuttered, and raked her hand through the mass of dark hair again, in utter nervousness.
Amiboshi laughed softly. "Am I really that imposing, Alex?"
Her even white teeth scraped against her full lower lip as she shook her head. Only this man had the power to disarm her so. Curses. Slowly she began to unpack her lunch: a small piece of French bread and an even smaller container of honey.
Amiboshi eyed the meager repast with a critical gaze. "Is that all you brought for yourself, Alex?" He opened his bag, in which resided a deli sandwich, two peaches, and a small container of something that smelled savory and spicy.
Alex nodded, blushing once again. How did this man do it? He managed to put her to the blush with the least of his words! She broke off a bit of the home-baked French bread, dipped it into the sweet clover honey, holding it out to Amiboshi. "It's really quite good..."
He took it, popped the morsel into his mouth, and chewed it thoughtfully, gazing at Alex. "You're right. It is. But it's not enough to sustain half a bird. Here, share mine." His slender hands deftly placed before her a half of the sandwich and a peach.
Still blushing, Alex spoke in French. "Merci, monsieur, c'est tres magnifique." Her lips formed the words easier than they formed English. Amiboshi smiled.
"Il na parle une gross favor. Perhaps you would join me for dinner tonight, as well?" At that Alex nodded breathlessly, then lowered her eyes to the food.
The rest of the meal was shared in companionable silence, until the bell rang to let class back in. Alex was snapped out of her reverie, and she tossed her brown lunchbag away. They had shared her meager meal as well as his abundant one, and she was currently sated to the point of sleepiness. But Amiboshi had spoken to her, and his eyes had twinkled like stars.
It continued in this fashion for months, Amiboshi and Alex growing closer until there was no question that the two dated regularly. Still there had been no kisses, but there had been fond embraces.
The first happened on a cool autumn midnight, and the skies were heavy with rainclouds and stars. Alex was restlessly pacing the beach, her dark hair free-flowing in the cool, strong seabreezes. She had always loved the sea; it was her refuge of freedom, and it smelled sweet, of salt and waves stirring it.
On this particular night, Alex was having a bout of insomnia, so she was dressed in a nighttime confection of soft white muslin that barely reached her slender ankles, and a frothy peach-colored robe over it. Her pretty, pale face was troubled, and thoughts of Amiboshi filled her heart.
Tears began clouding her silvery eyes. What was she to do? How she desired him, how she cared for him!
The silhouette of a tall, slender man appeared on the horizon, and shyly Alex walked closer, her steps slipping in the lustrous white sands.
Amiboshi was on the beach for one reason: loneliness. His own desire had driven him here, and he stood, half-dressed, in the icy wind to try and clear his fogged mind. He recalled willowy Alex pressed so trustingly against him, and a slow, simmering longing boiled up through him. He didn't know what he so desired, he only knew it was something to do with Alex's fine, slender beauty.
Her silvery, French voice rang out behind him. "Amiboshi...? What are you doing out here?" Amiboshi turned to look at Alex and was rewarded with a fresh sizzle of desire, and he knew it showed in his eyes. There were no silver-rimmed glasses to dim the effect; there were stars that revealed revelations of sweet desperation.
"Alex." His voice, when he responded, was breathlessly deep, and Alex pressed one slender hand to her lips. That tone... it stirred feminine awakening into a reality; what had Alex missed?
The next moment she knew, she was enveloped in his bare arms, breathing his fragrance, something musky and warm and undeniably sweet. He was stronger than she remembered, and fiercer, but that something within her, that instinct, was pleased by it.
She gazed up at him, innocent. "What... what is happening? I don't understand."
Amiboshi gave a choked, half-wild laugh. "I love you, Alex. And I want you to love me, too. Do you understand?"
Alex nodded, her eyes wide and silvery. Moments later, Amiboshi leaned down to place his lips upon Alex's.
The kiss was as soft and gentle as any woman could have wished it to be. His lips moved silken against hers, and Alex responded shyly, timidly, only giving as she received. Involuntarily her slender hands tangled in the baby-fine locks of his dirty-blond hair.
It was a pleasure Alex had never dreamed of, something sweet and bubbly as a fine champagne, aged to the color of sunshine. But then there was this bothersome, desirous feeling flooding through her with the pleasurous joy she felt at being held in Amiboshi's arms, his lips against hers so shy and sweet.
When finally he pulled away to breathe, she gave a soft cry of bereavement, and buried her face in his warm, smooth shoulder the bore the scent of the cologne he used and an unfamiliar, purely male fragrance.
When Amiboshi spoke next, his words were a whisper of awe. "I can't let you go, my love. I never knew surrendering to my feelings..." And he could speak no more in that moment, and Alex felt the very depth of his emotion.
That night they shared all of themselves, there beneath the moon and stars, and it seemed that the rushing of the sea celebrated with them. It might have been the thoughts of a woman caught in the throes of passion, but it seemed that the Jessie she had once been rejoiced with her, breathed her shuddering breaths with her.
Once Amiboshi and Alex were spent and sated, they lay close in each other's arms. Alex's silken dark hair made a cape around both, keeping them sheltered from the wind, though it was damp from perspiration.
Amiboshi was the first to speak. "I love you, Alex." His voice was soft and gentle, and he grazed her cheek with his thumb. His eyes shone softly, languorously, as though heaven had dissolved a star within their violet-blue depths.
Alex's response was a soft murmur of acquiescence, whispered against his chest. They had fit together so well, she endless fragile curves, he a paragon of poetic handsomeness, slender and pale, with that beautiful, infernally fine, soft dirty-blond hair. Beneath her hands now, it was damp with exertion and smooth as the finest satin, and her own unique scent blended lightly with his, a perfect complement.
"We should get out of this wind, or you will catch your death, my love." Having long since shed their clothes, Amiboshi could feel the cold raindrops beginning to fall against his sensitized skin, and he shuddered lightly. He eased himself up, his muscles protesting the sudden movement. Desire still simmering through his veins, hardly sapped by the icy wind, he slipped his long, muscled legs back into the white trousers, willing himself not to remember the passion they had so recently embraced and risk thoroughly destroying his self-control.
It was not long before they reached Amiboshi's seaside home, a great monster of a thing which he shared with his twin. Alex looked up at it, and thought driftingly that it was larger than twice hers.
And so they slipped inside, and the moment Amiboshi's heels cleared the doorway, the cold downpour began, not a moment too soon. A merry, warm fire roared in the hearth, and Alex couldn't help but shiver lightly. Was this night the beginning of forever?
And, again, barely a month passed before Amiboshi proposed, and Alex accepted joyously.
Sitting before the great mirror now, a deep calm settled within Alex's heart. Her wedding dress, a glory of cream-colored silk, was hand- stitched with tiny stitches, and fit her perfectly. Her knee-length dark hair had been brushed straight as silk and braided with ivory ribbons. Her high, delicate cheekbones had been accented with the palest of blushes, shimmery and soft. Upon her small feet were cream-colored slippers of silk, perfect for dancing in.
And so the wedding day proceeded beautifully, and the wedding night was the sweetest, most tender fulfilling of a promise possible.
Koutoku and Alexandrine Wilding. Wed at 3:15 PM on the date of August 3. Best man Shunkaku Wilding. Maid of Honor Arianne Dunsfield, flower girl Artesia Dupre. Performed by Rev. Sheridan Lysan.
So the wedding announcement read. And nine months later, so the birth announcement went:
It's a Boy! Julian Wilding, born on June 30 at 4:05 AM in the Summerwind Hospital. 8 lbs. 6 oz. Parents Koutoku and Alexandrine Wilding. Congratulations!
Julian looked just like Amiboshi, but with Alex's temperament, and he swiftly learned art and flute-playing with ease.
One must wonder: how could Koutoku and Shunkaku have been pulled forward from a torturous past? Is it possible?
Was it? Decide for yourself.
Born a full month early, Jessie was a creature of emotion, a creature that longed for company and love unconditional. Her eyes were green, and her hair was long and red-gold as freshly combed satin. Her skin was porcelain-cream, and dewy smooth.
Currently, Jessie Wilding was twenty-six, single, and lonely. Her eyes had, of late, taken on a desolation far beyond her years.
The date was August first, three days before her birthday, and Jessie lay in bed beneath a pure white cotton comforter. The sun streamed in mercilessly through windows freshly cleaned, and puddled on a freshly- scrubbed hardwood floor. There was nothing to do. Nothing to wish for. Nothing to love. How restless were these days, how cold and lifeless! There was nothing Jessie could look forward to. How she wanted children, boisterous, joyous creatures to fill the great seaside home with sunshine from their brimming, bright smiles.
At her bedside table was an ornate confection of smooth blown glass, colored emerald and crimson, and thin, finely-wrought silver, a jar of sorts. The lid was close-fitting and tapered up into a smooth peak, then like a diminuendo flowed down to rejoin the silver at the sides of itself: a tear-bottle, nearly full with Jessie's tears, shining its colors in the sunlight. A foolish trinket. Yet it did have its significance. Since birth, Jessie had owned this beautiful trinket. But it only held her tears from the past few years; she had thought it might mean something to someone in the near future, perhaps a little one?
But a visit to the family doctor had dashed Jessie's hopes. The day had been a rainy one, and the clouds heavy on the sky's cup, the air stiflingly close. Jessie had gone seeking an answer, and come back with the wrong one: she was barren, unable to bear children. The doctor had put it so baldly that Jessie was instantly, violently sick, causing the doctor to apologize furiously, his small voice begging her for forgiveness. Soon after, Jessie had gone numb, and agreed that he thought she'd known, that he was not at fault. But a deep, dull ache had remained, and still lay on the pit of her stomach.
Jessie had been plump and witty and amusing before, now she was slender and fragile and serious, sadness icy in her green eyes once so full of sun. What was she to do?
And so she laid there beneath the covers, gazing at the web of blue veins in her slender wrists raptly, and contemplating ending it all. Instant apprehension whenever her mind touched the sore spot, and Jessie couldn't bear to think of ending her own life; who knew? Miracles could happen, Jessie had seen them. So why not to her?
Flinging a last hope to the skies, Jessie fell asleep, her red-gold hair framing her head on the pillow like an aureole. There was a massive internal blink! and a laugh that sounded like two, male and female, and then Jessie's world was changed forever, without her knowing it.
It was late evening when Jessie woke, and the sun's dying blood-rays seeped in through the window like a flood. Two tiny, huddled boys clung tightly against the rousing woman's side, each with a sandy crop of dirty- blond hair and identical features. One's features were gentler, softer, easier, but both boys' faces were fearful, and various wounds adorned their tiny forms.
The sight awoke a motherly instinct in Jessie, and a fierce protective need. "Poor children!" At her soothing alto voice, the twins relaxed from their cowering, and the one with the fierce, sharp expression, spoke, his words tentative at best.
"Don't... don't hurt us." The small pair couldn't be more than five years old altogether, their ages added. Jessie felt a sharp pain in her heart for the children, and she gazed at them with soft green eyes.
"I won't, sweet children. Will you stay here so that I can gather the medicine to treat your wounds?"
The twins, once more clutched tightly in each other's embrace, nodded fearfully, and Jessie slid from the bed, her long red-gold hair in a slightly clumsy plait swinging past her rear. "Mommy..." said the sweet- faced one, and Jessie spun in disbelief.
What had the child said? Had the beautiful little boy called her his mother? Jessie's heart caught painfully on a beat, and she looked to him. He repeated. "Mommy, can we stay with you?"
Jessie didn't know where the precious children were from, but she had a heart and plenty of money to support them handsomely for as long at they might live and then some. So she nodded, and said, "We'll try, okay?" Her smile was brilliant, and when she knelt, the children rushed toward her and hugged her, as they would a mother.
The very action sent warm happiness seeking through Jessie, a pure vitality, and she gazed long into the pair of violet-blue eyes before her. They looked nothing like her, but they were beautiful little boys, and sweet as they could be. Jessie smiled again. Her beautiful, sweet twins -- hers -- her little boys, she would live for.
"Would you like baths?" Jessie asked, her alto voice soothing as a syrup. The little twins nodded in perfect unison, and followed Jessie into the bathroom.
The bathroom had been one of Jessie's great solaces. It was great, with vaulted ceilings and walls painted cream-white, and real ivy from planter-boxes on the ground grew up the walls in profusion. There were Grecian pillars of veined marble that soared high into the ceilings as well, with little niches in them for storing knickknacks, in which Jessie had placed many statuettes of angels and mythical beasts and unicorns, each lovely in its own way.
A particularly large carving looked more skilled than the others, but yet its appeal was undeniable: carved of alabaster, the statue was more precious than gold with its glossy sheen. The figure depicted a demure unicorn mare, her head lowered, her eyes half-opened. Only that had been darkened, and it had been done tastefully with an enamel the exact gloss as the stone itself, leaving a tiny touch of white just so it looked that the lovely mare was gazing directly at one. The long, spiraled horn was flawless, as was the delicate arch of the neck, the perfect carving of the forelock, mane, and tail.
The floor was tiled with smooth white porcelain, and a soft damask cloth stood right outside the deep marble tub, and in the far part of the room, an in-ground fishpond sat, where koi of many colors swam tranquilly, nudging the water lilies that grew within, and occasionally an onlooker's hand, if it happened to trail into the cold water. The twins gazed about at all this in wide-eyed amazement, and Jessie, smiling, ran warm bath-water with her custom-made sweet lavender-and-honey bath bubbles into the deep tub.
"So what are your names, my little ones?" she asked, kneeling to gently coax the twins' clothes from their small bodies, careful of the cuts and bruises as she went.
The sweet-faced one responded promptly. "I'm Koutoku, and this is my twin, Shunkaku." Jessie was surprised at their adept speaking, and slightly dismayed at the names. However was she to pronounce them? She was American; her tongue could not make such contortions.
She said first one name, then the other, trying not to frown when one corrected her pronunciation. "Do you have nicknames, loves?"
Once again it was the sweet-faced Koutoku that spoke. "I'm called Amiboshi, and my brother, Suboshi."
Jessie breathed a sigh of relief, then eased both Amiboshi and Suboshi into the warm bath-water, and sat at their side while they splashed and played, occasionally scooping bubbles in heaps onto their little heads.
After the bath, Jessie sat cross-legged on the great bed, with her sons dressed in small white-linen trousers that had once belonged to her younger brother, treating the worst of their wounds. Gentle little Amiboshi chattered on and on, while the other, Suboshi, sat quietly sullen, as though moody over something.
"You'll be sleeping with me tonight," Jessie said, pleased. "Are the pair of you hungry?" Amiboshi and Suboshi instantly perked, and she laughed softly. "All right -- to the kitchen, troops!"
So the three of them marched to the kitchen, Amiboshi and Suboshi chattering excitedly in what Jessie's confused mind translated as gibberish. She knew it was some sort of Oriental language, and was puzzled. What were the children talking about?
She opened the refrigerator, and the little twins scattered for cover behind her legs, and Jessie laughed, her voice a pleasing alto. "It's all right, loves, it's a refrigerator." She enunciated clearly for the pair, smiling gently, and she squatted to put an arm around each little boy. The big old house seemed so fresh and new for the little ones, and she had to remember their age and their seemingly nonexistent knowledge of technology.
And so Jessie fixed the twins' first American meal, on their first stove, and smiled in delight as they enjoyed every bite.
And that night, Jessie, Amiboshi, and Suboshi lay in bed, and the twins were restless. So Jessie began to sing to them, the darkness seeming to lull the little boys into a pacified state, and they easily fell asleep.
Long after the boys were asleep, Jessie remained awake, watching them breathe, listening to every soft noise made in sleep. She would devote herself entirely to the raising of the beautiful little creatures that had been such a blessing.
And so it went, idyllic, for years, and Amiboshi and Suboshi blossomed into tall, slender, strong youths. The pair excelled in school, and Jessie was happier than she had been in a long time. She was an active catalyst in their lives, she and her younger brother Michel, who was her children's age, strangely enough. Amiboshi, Suboshi, and Michel were unafraid to bring their teenage friends home, because Jessie dressed, spoke, and acted as they normally did, her long red-gold hair was quite in style these days, worn braided, loose, or thrown into a ponytail. Jessie didn't interfere, and they got many questions and comments on their 'sister'.
Still sometimes, late at night, lying between her beautiful twin sons, Jessie would feel a vague discontent, and the tear-jar began to refill from where the old tears had evaporated. Suboshi never caught her crying, but Amiboshi, who pretended to sleep, had seen and felt his mother's racking silent sobs, and it had touched the gentler twin deep within his heart.
The routine went as it always had, on one night, first Suboshi then Amiboshi showering beneath the strong shower Jessie had installed through dint of bloodied knuckles, then a family dinner where Jessie would listen enthusiastically to her twins' stories of school and play, then Jessie would help them with their homework, and then they had an hour to themselves.
It was usually within this hour that Jessie cried her precious tears, wondering where the years had gone with her beautiful, innocent children, wishing she could go back and be a better parent, or go to some different form...
For that was it, when it all boiled down to it, wasn't it? Jessie was deeply in love with every aspect of the young men she called her sons, whom she had raised up so carefully, so gently, with so much love. What would happen to her? She was past being needed. Her sons were self-sufficient. They no longer needed her. The thought stuck its wing into the fresh wound, and a fresh round of tears poured down Jessie's face.
What was she now? A woman of thirty-seven with looks like a teenager, long red-gold hair, emerald eyes, and a slender, supple, youthful figure that would yield no fruit from its barren womb. What man would want her? None. She was no woman! she scorned herself, seeing her own tear-streaked face in the reflection of her tear-jar.
As if through some utter miracle, Jessie found herself encircled in the arms of the older, more sober, gentler twin, Amiboshi. His eyes were solemn and calm. "If it's time to cry, then you must cry with all of your heart, and you must know that above and beyond anything, I love you."
And Jessie did. She cried. Cried. Wept out every tear in her chalice until there were only dry, shapeless sobs left in her throat and still she cried, and yet Amiboshi only held her close, this child who was his mother, this facet of her he'd never seen.
"Do you do this every night?" he asked, his voice full of anguish, his face moon-pale in the darkness. Jessie, ashamed, merely nodded. "Heaven, Mother, and you never showed it to Suboshi or I. We could have comforted you like this!" He raked one hand through his profuse crop of baby-fine dirty-blond hair.
"I'm sorry." Jessie's voice was a hoarse croak, and she cleared her throat, and what came out was very much like a sob. "I'm sorry. You're just so... so grown up." She managed a tearful smile. "I remember the day you came to me, Koutoku. Amiboshi. Nothing is so clear as that memory, not even this very moment. You and your twin were so beautiful, and you came into my life like angels, like a hot desert wind, and you set it right-side-up again. And I have fallen in love with both of you since, and it is a mortal love that cannot be shaken. If you feel that I am a senile old lady, then you can leave me here in the dark!" Jessie spoke in a low, intense voice, and she quivered, gazing up earnestly into her son's beautiful blue eyes.
That piercing gaze shook Amiboshi to the core. He did not move. He couldn't. There was nowhere he could move to, and he knew that haunted look his mother wore now would be with him for an eternity. That look of fear in her deep emerald eyes.
Jessie, then, resolved to live until the pair of them moved out to start their own lives. And then, if no prospect turned up, she would be gone, and there would be no more loneliness. No more. She couldn't bear it. Her heart couldn't take it.
Suboshi came in later that night to find Jessie and Amiboshi asleep in the great bed, and so he slipped off his day-clothes and on his night- clothes, and slipped into the gentle embrace of his mother, and there slept peacefully.
Jessie had known the day would come, but she could never have predicted the time or the place, or the way it would end.
It was college graduation day, and the boys were clad in caps and gowns, standing proud and tall to their full heights of 6', Amiboshi with his silver-rimmed glasses looking scholarly, Suboshi trying his best to be serious, and Jessie numb with pride in the stands.
The head professor of the selective university stepped up to the podium, adjusting his own glasses and smiling timidly out to the stands.
"Ladies and gentlemen, we are gathered here today, every one of us, to recognize the achievements of two very special students who are both near and dear to every heart. We will first acknowledge the salutatorian.
He came here a rebellious, fidgety young man with a quick-flash temper and even quicker fists, but with a ready sense of humor and an easy touch with the professors. He was eager to learn, and from the first made the second highest marks in the school. Ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you Shunkaku Wilding?"
Suboshi's eyes lit, and he fairly glowed with excitement as he slipped silently up to the stage where he received, around his shoulders, a drape of violet silk with tassels of silver and a certificate.
The professor cleared his throat, adjusted his spectacles, and continued. "Now we will acknowledge the valedictorian.
This fine young man came here a quiet, studious, well-liked person with a deep desire to learn. Often he had the professors in tears trying to figure out a particularly difficult equation or solve riddles he concocted for them. This is why he deserves the honor of valedictorian. May I now present you with Koutoku Wilding?"
Amiboshi was stunned, and Jessie in the audience clapped both hands over her mouth. Her boys received the two highest honors in the college! Valedictorian and salutatorian! Her boys! Her beautiful twins had done it!
Amiboshi also made his way through the crowd to the stage to be presented with a deep blue silk drape, stiffened with effusive silver stitching and that ended in six-inch silver tassels.
Jessie wept for pure joy, waving to her boys from her place in the crowd. Amiboshi leant to the professor and whispered something in his ear, and the professor nodded, and handed Amiboshi the microphone.
Amiboshi first cleared his throat, pushed up his glasses, then began to speak. "I would like to take a moment to point out that my mother, Jessie Wilding, took us in eighteen and a half years ago, when we showed up in her home, and she did it with no questions. She has raised us single- handedly, without the help of a male, since then, and our life has been heaven." His eyes fastened on her. "Mother, will you please come up to the stage?"
Jessie did so as though floating on air, her fragile slenderness breathtaking in a white muslin dress with but a touch of homemade, cream- colored lace at the throat and at the hem, and the sleeves poet-styled. Amiboshi had never seen his mother looking so fragile, so gentle, with her red-gold hair free and streaming gently over her shoulders. Her face was porcelain-white, and by far the most beautiful thing Amiboshi had ever seen in his twenty years.
Jessie stood beside her sons, her fragile, beautiful face lowered demurely, reminding Amiboshi of that particular statuette of the unicorn mare in the bathroom pillar, powerfully, movingly beautiful. He suddenly realized he continued to hold the microphone. He spoke again.
"She may look fragile, but within her is a strength that pulled Shunkaku and I through so many years. I truly must thank her with all of my spirit, my heart, and my mind. She is the child of a thousand days, and the innocent who raised twin boys." By now there were tears in his eyes. "She is a child, but yet a woman. She is an unresolved beauty, and yet, a rough- edged doll of alabaster. Perfection with edges -- true loveliness." Amiboshi could no longer speak, and he handed the microphone back to the professor, and the trio embraced, Jessie's serene smile bringing peace to Amiboshi, however slowly.
It was that week that Amiboshi and Suboshi moved out, and Jessie lost all hope for survival. Despite the moving speech, Jessie could not survive without her boys.
And so she was back in square one, without a hope. She lay in the tub for hours on end, in the hottest water she could stand. If she had been slender, she wasted into thinness. Jessie did not eat. The intriguing stir of the surface of hot water as she moved entranced her, and finally she got out.
Wrapping herself in a plush, soft towel, she went to bed where she had once laid with her sons. Sleep did not come, no matter how Jessie tried to relax.
Sometime around midnight, there was a strange shimmer in the air, and it formed into a solid being that clucked quietly at Jessie's state. "What have you done to yourself, Jessarine Wilding?"
Jessie did not respond, only watched through pain-filled green eyes. The pit of her stomach gnawed painfully, but she could not oblige it. The only part of her that did not quite reflect the gauntness was her bosom, which jutted full and awkward over a thin waist. "I want..." she said slowly, clearly, "... I want Amiboshi. And Suboshi. My boys." Her lips were cracked and blistered, and speaking appeared painful.
"I can give you your boys, Jessie." The creature's skin was like peach marble, so delicate, and its eyes seemed to forever shift colors. "I can give you youth and a new heart to fall in love with one of them all over again."
Jessie nodded, her parched lips fumbling for the eager words. "Please... please?"
The being nodded, and then stepped close. "But you must not be Jessarine Wilding any longer. You must assume a new identity, and you will. But you will recall vaguely being yourself. Are you willing to give up this life entirely?"
Jessie nodded eagerly again, and sat up painfully, her muscles showing beneath the skin. "Yes. Yes!"
Then the being nodded quietly, and intoned a few soft, sweet words, and there was a moment of blitzing pain that Jessie could hardly stand, and then there was no longer pain of any kind.
Jessie stood, looking into the full-length mirror, and she gasped. Her hair was no longer wavy red-gold silk, but past her thighs and to her knees dusky dark brown, her eyes were fathomless silver with stars dissolved in them. Her face had not changed much, except the eyes were large and wide and framed by thick, long, dark lashes. Her lips were full and naturally pinkened, silken. Her body, still bare, was slender as a reed, with delectable curves. Her collarbones based a long, aristocratic neck and an ivory throat. Her feet were smaller, delicate, and she looked altogether fragile.
She looked to see the being, and it was beginning to fade.
It spoke one last time. "Remember. You are not Jessarine. You are Alexandrine Merwin, a twenty-year-old French girl. You no longer live in Paris, France, but you once did."
The newly-named Alex nodded in wonder. And then, in a flash, the mysterious being was gone, leaving Alex to fend for herself.
So she settled down to sleep, excited about the great new day before her with young resolve. No one could stop her now!
The next morning, Alex woke with no idea of what she had been the night before. She had no recollection of being a forty-year-old spinster, and none of wasting away into gaunt thinness.
But there was a strange picture of the perfect man in her mind. Fairly tall, with baby-fine dirty-blond hair grown slightly long in back; blue-violet eyes, a light complexion, an expression of seriousness, and infinitely kissable, strong, smiling lips.
Alex shook off the image, stood, sliding her delicate feet into satin slippers that fit her perfectly and, wrapping her form in a plush robe, padded toward the closet, a walk-in affair filled with many clothes that fit her as perfectly as had the slippers.
Finally she decided upon a simple dress of cream-colored silk that caressed her slender curves lovingly. The ruffles were eyelet lace, soft and cool as she slipped it on. As Alex modeled in the mirror, some snippet of a memory came to her.
Chill, slender beauty. Red-gold hair, emerald eyes. A temper like fire. A sudden reprieve, so short, then nothing at all.
And through the memory, the words 'child of a thousand days' and 'unresolved beauty' spoken in the most delicate of tones, as though one were going to weep, echoed reverberatingly though her mind. When she surfaced from it, Alex was shaken to her spirit.
It wasn't long before Alex reached her destination, the high school where she knew the beautiful man of her dreams was a professor, and a young one, but he related well to them.
Amiboshi taught Advanced Art, and he was slightly absentminded; his gray painting smock was usually stained with streaks of various brilliant colors, some days reddish-golds and bright emeralds, and other days deep mahogany browns and silvers.
Shyly Alex stepped in to begin her first class as an assistant teacher in Advanced Art five minutes late. Amiboshi was in the middle of one of his soft-voiced lectures about watercolors, their first lesson in Advanced Art, and his soft, long hands were folded before him as he paced the rows of desks.
"Ah, so the prodigal assistant is come?" he asked, smiling good- naturedly, and swept up the aisle in his well-tailored dark dress-pants and white muslin poet-shirt to greet Alex, taking her hand and drawing her up to the front of the class. "Ladies and gentlemen, this is Alexandrine Merwin, our assistant teacher. I trust you will respect her. She as well as I will be available to assist you in all your studies. Is that clear?"
There were general murmurs of assent through the classroom, and a few dim, muttered complaints, a symphony to Alex's ears as she blushed lightly.
And so Amiboshi, with a reassuring squeeze of Alex's hand, continued his lecture, smiling as he reviewed vital points she had missed so that her adept hands could note it all in swirling, delicate feminine cursive.
"... and I expect you all to bring your paintbrushes and a cheap set of watercolors to class tomorrow. Understood?" Amiboshi iterated, leaning against his desk, and the class agreed. "Class dismissed. Go on; shoo."
Dashing down a last few notes, Alex gave a sigh of relief, and pushed her slender hand through her thick mass of dark hair, causing a gentle ripple of muscles beneath the cream-white skin of her wrist that Amiboshi duly noticed. "Welcome, Miss Merwin."
Startled, Alex nodded, and blushed. When she spoke, her words were honey-sweet with her soft French accent. "Thank you, sir. Pray, call me Alex..?" She left out the words, because I've known you well in my fantasies already.
With a gentle laughter, Amiboshi bowed, his full, generous lips parting in a dazzling smile that showed even, white teeth. "As you wish, Alex. Will you call me Amiboshi, then? My mother always did, for she couldn't pronounce my real name." A cloud drifted across his sunny features, then cleared as fast as Paris skies after a thunderstorm. "Perhaps you would consider taking lunch with me? I'd like to know you better if I'm to teach alongside you."
Alex nodded, swallowing hard. "Yes, certainly. It would be my pleasure." Her silvery eyes, in an effort not to fasten on Amiboshi's blue- violet ones, roamed about the room, fastening on a certain portrait of a slender, delicate woman with eyes the color of gentle emeralds and red-gold hair that framed a fragile face, and tears that ran down a melancholy expression. The lips were generous and full, and seemed to tremble, even in the painting. "Pray, sir... ah, Amiboshi... who is that woman?" She pointed at the painting, a long, slender finger showing just which one she admired.
He nodded proudly toward it. "That is my mother, as I remember her. She never looked more than eighteen, even when she was past thirty. Such a beautiful creature." His eyes, behind their silver-rimmed glasses, scanned her slender form, and Alex could not help but feel loved. "You remind me of her. I'll have to paint you, as well, Alex." A faint, artistically absentminded smile tugged at his generous, strong lips, and tugged at Alex's heart as well, causing a warm blush to cross her cheeks. Lord knew she'd love to sketch him, tall and magnificent... and bare. He looked like some Greek god, his poet shirt lending him elegant Old World grace that jerked Alex's attention.
A moment before the next class arrived, Amiboshi gave her an encouraging nod, gestured to the ceiling as if suggesting she'd have to have the patience of a saint for this class, and a brilliant smile.
Alex barely heard what he said through the entire hour. She was too busy capturing the lines of him, completely at ease, as he leant against the desk. But pencil could not define eyes that deep, hair that baby-fine and beautiful, that certain sleepy, undeniably sexy subconscious smile. But Alex did her best, and the penciled portrait was skillful and seemed to capture his slender, easy elegance. She pulled the portrait from her notebook, settled it on Amiboshi's desk while he was assisting a student, then went to her own task of assistance.
Lunch was a long time in comng, and when it did, Alex almost shouted in glee. How annoying it was to sit around and try to help uncooperative high-schoolers paint preschool figures!
Finally the bell rang, and Alex seized her lunch bag, shot a smile at Amiboshi, then nodded toward the cafeteria. In agreement, he gave his own nod, then mouthed to her over the thunder of high-schoolers' screaming, 'Meet you there.'
Alex found herself swept up in the current of moving bodies, and carried, to her chagrin, to the lunchroom, and she fought her way free after she arrived there. Blushing quite warmly, she ran her hand through her hair to straighten it out, and adjusted her skirt, which had been hiked to immodest heights.
Amiboshi soon followed, her portrait in one hand, and he was staring at it in disbelief. He slid into the seat, then looked to Alex, placing the portrait on the table before her. "Did you do this, Alex?" His voice was soft, silken with amazement.
Alex blushed, averted her silvery eyes, and nodded. "Yes, sir." Her soft French accent made her sound shy and sweet. "I apologize; it looks terrible."
Amiboshi gave a crow of laughter. "Modesty! I can't even capture that sort of precision in pencil, Alex! What business do you have being an assistant teacher? You're better than I am! Hear me, Miss Merwin, or am I speaking Italian?" His voice was low and intense.
The high color of a maiden was in Alex's fragile, fair cheeks. "I... I hear you, sir."
"I thought I told you to call me Amiboshi." He smiled, calming slowly. His eyes behind the silver-rimmed glasses shone lightly.
"Yes sir -- I mean, Amiboshi," Alex stuttered, and raked her hand through the mass of dark hair again, in utter nervousness.
Amiboshi laughed softly. "Am I really that imposing, Alex?"
Her even white teeth scraped against her full lower lip as she shook her head. Only this man had the power to disarm her so. Curses. Slowly she began to unpack her lunch: a small piece of French bread and an even smaller container of honey.
Amiboshi eyed the meager repast with a critical gaze. "Is that all you brought for yourself, Alex?" He opened his bag, in which resided a deli sandwich, two peaches, and a small container of something that smelled savory and spicy.
Alex nodded, blushing once again. How did this man do it? He managed to put her to the blush with the least of his words! She broke off a bit of the home-baked French bread, dipped it into the sweet clover honey, holding it out to Amiboshi. "It's really quite good..."
He took it, popped the morsel into his mouth, and chewed it thoughtfully, gazing at Alex. "You're right. It is. But it's not enough to sustain half a bird. Here, share mine." His slender hands deftly placed before her a half of the sandwich and a peach.
Still blushing, Alex spoke in French. "Merci, monsieur, c'est tres magnifique." Her lips formed the words easier than they formed English. Amiboshi smiled.
"Il na parle une gross favor. Perhaps you would join me for dinner tonight, as well?" At that Alex nodded breathlessly, then lowered her eyes to the food.
The rest of the meal was shared in companionable silence, until the bell rang to let class back in. Alex was snapped out of her reverie, and she tossed her brown lunchbag away. They had shared her meager meal as well as his abundant one, and she was currently sated to the point of sleepiness. But Amiboshi had spoken to her, and his eyes had twinkled like stars.
It continued in this fashion for months, Amiboshi and Alex growing closer until there was no question that the two dated regularly. Still there had been no kisses, but there had been fond embraces.
The first happened on a cool autumn midnight, and the skies were heavy with rainclouds and stars. Alex was restlessly pacing the beach, her dark hair free-flowing in the cool, strong seabreezes. She had always loved the sea; it was her refuge of freedom, and it smelled sweet, of salt and waves stirring it.
On this particular night, Alex was having a bout of insomnia, so she was dressed in a nighttime confection of soft white muslin that barely reached her slender ankles, and a frothy peach-colored robe over it. Her pretty, pale face was troubled, and thoughts of Amiboshi filled her heart.
Tears began clouding her silvery eyes. What was she to do? How she desired him, how she cared for him!
The silhouette of a tall, slender man appeared on the horizon, and shyly Alex walked closer, her steps slipping in the lustrous white sands.
Amiboshi was on the beach for one reason: loneliness. His own desire had driven him here, and he stood, half-dressed, in the icy wind to try and clear his fogged mind. He recalled willowy Alex pressed so trustingly against him, and a slow, simmering longing boiled up through him. He didn't know what he so desired, he only knew it was something to do with Alex's fine, slender beauty.
Her silvery, French voice rang out behind him. "Amiboshi...? What are you doing out here?" Amiboshi turned to look at Alex and was rewarded with a fresh sizzle of desire, and he knew it showed in his eyes. There were no silver-rimmed glasses to dim the effect; there were stars that revealed revelations of sweet desperation.
"Alex." His voice, when he responded, was breathlessly deep, and Alex pressed one slender hand to her lips. That tone... it stirred feminine awakening into a reality; what had Alex missed?
The next moment she knew, she was enveloped in his bare arms, breathing his fragrance, something musky and warm and undeniably sweet. He was stronger than she remembered, and fiercer, but that something within her, that instinct, was pleased by it.
She gazed up at him, innocent. "What... what is happening? I don't understand."
Amiboshi gave a choked, half-wild laugh. "I love you, Alex. And I want you to love me, too. Do you understand?"
Alex nodded, her eyes wide and silvery. Moments later, Amiboshi leaned down to place his lips upon Alex's.
The kiss was as soft and gentle as any woman could have wished it to be. His lips moved silken against hers, and Alex responded shyly, timidly, only giving as she received. Involuntarily her slender hands tangled in the baby-fine locks of his dirty-blond hair.
It was a pleasure Alex had never dreamed of, something sweet and bubbly as a fine champagne, aged to the color of sunshine. But then there was this bothersome, desirous feeling flooding through her with the pleasurous joy she felt at being held in Amiboshi's arms, his lips against hers so shy and sweet.
When finally he pulled away to breathe, she gave a soft cry of bereavement, and buried her face in his warm, smooth shoulder the bore the scent of the cologne he used and an unfamiliar, purely male fragrance.
When Amiboshi spoke next, his words were a whisper of awe. "I can't let you go, my love. I never knew surrendering to my feelings..." And he could speak no more in that moment, and Alex felt the very depth of his emotion.
That night they shared all of themselves, there beneath the moon and stars, and it seemed that the rushing of the sea celebrated with them. It might have been the thoughts of a woman caught in the throes of passion, but it seemed that the Jessie she had once been rejoiced with her, breathed her shuddering breaths with her.
Once Amiboshi and Alex were spent and sated, they lay close in each other's arms. Alex's silken dark hair made a cape around both, keeping them sheltered from the wind, though it was damp from perspiration.
Amiboshi was the first to speak. "I love you, Alex." His voice was soft and gentle, and he grazed her cheek with his thumb. His eyes shone softly, languorously, as though heaven had dissolved a star within their violet-blue depths.
Alex's response was a soft murmur of acquiescence, whispered against his chest. They had fit together so well, she endless fragile curves, he a paragon of poetic handsomeness, slender and pale, with that beautiful, infernally fine, soft dirty-blond hair. Beneath her hands now, it was damp with exertion and smooth as the finest satin, and her own unique scent blended lightly with his, a perfect complement.
"We should get out of this wind, or you will catch your death, my love." Having long since shed their clothes, Amiboshi could feel the cold raindrops beginning to fall against his sensitized skin, and he shuddered lightly. He eased himself up, his muscles protesting the sudden movement. Desire still simmering through his veins, hardly sapped by the icy wind, he slipped his long, muscled legs back into the white trousers, willing himself not to remember the passion they had so recently embraced and risk thoroughly destroying his self-control.
It was not long before they reached Amiboshi's seaside home, a great monster of a thing which he shared with his twin. Alex looked up at it, and thought driftingly that it was larger than twice hers.
And so they slipped inside, and the moment Amiboshi's heels cleared the doorway, the cold downpour began, not a moment too soon. A merry, warm fire roared in the hearth, and Alex couldn't help but shiver lightly. Was this night the beginning of forever?
And, again, barely a month passed before Amiboshi proposed, and Alex accepted joyously.
Sitting before the great mirror now, a deep calm settled within Alex's heart. Her wedding dress, a glory of cream-colored silk, was hand- stitched with tiny stitches, and fit her perfectly. Her knee-length dark hair had been brushed straight as silk and braided with ivory ribbons. Her high, delicate cheekbones had been accented with the palest of blushes, shimmery and soft. Upon her small feet were cream-colored slippers of silk, perfect for dancing in.
And so the wedding day proceeded beautifully, and the wedding night was the sweetest, most tender fulfilling of a promise possible.
Koutoku and Alexandrine Wilding. Wed at 3:15 PM on the date of August 3. Best man Shunkaku Wilding. Maid of Honor Arianne Dunsfield, flower girl Artesia Dupre. Performed by Rev. Sheridan Lysan.
So the wedding announcement read. And nine months later, so the birth announcement went:
It's a Boy! Julian Wilding, born on June 30 at 4:05 AM in the Summerwind Hospital. 8 lbs. 6 oz. Parents Koutoku and Alexandrine Wilding. Congratulations!
Julian looked just like Amiboshi, but with Alex's temperament, and he swiftly learned art and flute-playing with ease.
One must wonder: how could Koutoku and Shunkaku have been pulled forward from a torturous past? Is it possible?
Was it? Decide for yourself.