A/N: A few days ago I had a brief dream about Cowboy Bebop. Faye was in Julia's car and they were eating fast-food burgers and fries, and the women were talking about wisdom accumulated through the years. Julia confessed she pitied Faye, and wished she had the experience of past lives. Instead of ending one life and starting another, Faye had been forced to extend this one. I went with the idea.
NO ANGEL, SHE
It is December 31, 1999, and Julia, of golden hair and luminous eyes, turns her gaze towards the evening sky like the thousands of faces surrounding her in New York's Times Square, and starts chanting the blinking numbers on the massive digital clock in expectant ecstasy. A rainbow of faces bundled up in coats and scarves, of fur and wool, all caught up in this ritual of old, the counting down of time. Every person here carries hopes of a future, amplified by the mythical ruse of a Y2K bug, a potential bringer of modern financial apocalypse, and the selfish knowledge that they are individually, and all together, are relics of a cataclysmic event. The turning of a century, the turning of a new era.
1999. Then 2000.
It is such an exciting time, the air drugged with booze and laughter, the carelessness of those who boast of bravery in the face of doom, but inwardly, feverishly pledge for another day. There are parts of the world who have survived the ordeal, and the television screens mounted so comfortably on the building surrounding the social hub flash with global celebration.
Julia smiles, a wide beam of tranquil sunlight like an afternoon nap under a shady, summer tree, and tugs her knitted hat over her ears tighter. Brushes strands of wavy hair from her face. Her forehead is slightly damp, her nose is slightly numb, but she wouldn't exchange the discomfort of standing and marching and chanting for anything else.
It was a good idea to move to New York, a foolish idea perhaps to a young woman who own no academic titles despite a high school graduation and more than several years of work, but she had dreams. Big ones. A first-generation immigrant from the country above the border, Julia slips into her parents Canadian accent with ease, and thinks of herself as proudly alien.
Ah, but New York. A metropolis of culture, history, and entertainment. Ever the starry-eyed dreamer, Julia filled her little blue Honda with what clothing and possessions she was fond of, sold the rest to curious neighbours and college-tied friends, and placed the key to her tidy apartment in the palm of her stout landlady, a grand-motherly German woman whom also migrated to the States many decades before.
She had no plan, and would have had no place to stay in the Big Apple if not for the lingering fondness from an ex-lover, Cameron, who bought her two-person bistro set and couch at a bargain price, and with a cordial kiss on the cheek, gave her an introduction to his older sister who lived in a decent part of the city. Julia had laughed, tossing back her honey hair, and hugged this man-child who was easily more friend than any sort of boyfriend, and they preferred it that way. The affair had been brief, lasting perhaps a month or two, but intense. The young woman did not want established relationships, and that had been fine with him, and he sincerely believed her when she said there was more out there than just the diner she worked in and the monthly bills she paid.
The person standing on Julia's right wobbled unsteadily as the crowds formed a sort of domino effect on each other, all jumping and waving and attempting to instigate a mob jollity. The movement jostled the lady from her thoughts, knocking her knees together and sent her reeling swiftly to the other side, and she, like the man before her, perpetrated the body wave through the throng quite unwillingly.
"Whoa there," a smooth, male voice called out to her, an arm that was more puffy jacket than anything else reached out and gently stopped the unexpected force of her body with his own. "Rough crowd, right?"
It is February 25, 1905. Julia silently waits behind her mother and father, cornflower blue eyes staring at everything in front and surrounding her, and wrinkles her nose at the smell of industry and ocean. The porters are unpacking the carriage, hefting the weighty trunks with practised skill, and her parents are turned towards each other, whispering in businesslike tones. Liverpool is a dirty sort of place, but so is London, but the sharp flavour of the sea rails her senses and overpowers the young girl, just turned seventeen. Ever obedient, she watches all the commotion in half-attention as the reality of the impending voyage attempts to sink into her bones and fails.
The RMS Caronia on her maiden voyage from Liverpool, Great Britain to New York, in the Americas. There, her new life waited on a new continent, an ocean away. Of course, she would not be alone. There were her mother and father, not important enough to purchase tickets of the highest class aboard the passenger liner, but substantial in finances and society to provide affable comfort for the journey and what lay beyond. And what lay beyond was a banker's son, her fiance, waiting for her arrival.
It was a good match, and she expected as such, being the only child and subsequent inheritor of her family's estate. They would be leaving behind their house and land, to be cared for by an extended relative and their family, and Julia wondered if in the future, after everything was settled properly, if she would see her childhood home again. She had heard of America, it's eternal massiveness, and wondered if the some of the denizens of New York were like the Cowboys and Indians she had read about in her story books. Gifts from another relative who now called the former British colonies home, one always seemed to have a maiden aunt who took to adventure and paved the way for others to follow, in this case, those who shared the same blood.
Someone addressed her, her father perhaps, and Julia started. Looking up, there was a shade of youthful thrill in his blue eyes, the same shade of blue she had inherited, and Julia reflexively smiled back up at him. She had an innate ability to placate almost anybody, misdirect their attention when unwanted, and slip into the background seamlessly.
"Are you excited, dear?" He most certainly was. A bit unorthodox, perhaps, to show such emotion out in the open, but she couldn't fault him for it. She only wished she shared the same attention as everyone else who were bound to board the ship.
It was a peculiar feeling, like a settling grayness within her, that prevented her from sharing the joy of travel. She imagined that there was at least one other person on this oversized boat whom, aside from the captain and his crew, were familiar with lengthy voyages, but did they share the same sort of apathy she did? It garnered a terrible disposition, a young lady like herself, this odd dispassion. It wasn't shock, for that was an emotion, and it was that which she lacked. Feeling. Absence.
Then again, she had always been a bit of a distant child, staring at landscapes and people with old eyes. Like a baby both with the knowledge of their entire lifespan before them, covered disgustingly in blood and membrane, before being turned upside down and all that wisdom slid from her newborn flesh like a second skin.
The emptiness had remained with her, started to bud at her formal engagement, then swelled at her intended's departure over the dark expanse, then bloomed fully at her parents admission to live in a new country and reunite the couple. It wasn't that she disliked her fiance, that wasn't it.
It was the water. Deceitful, temperamental, cold. Julia had never swam in the ocean, preferring the stillness of the lakes over the hidden seaweed and shattered beach shells, and she didn't care for it now. It beckoned to her like nothingness, wanted to pull her into that oily space of night, and filled her lungs eternally. Very rarely did Julia have nightmares, but when she did, it usually involved the dishonest sea. It yawned underneath her, made her shiver unwanted as the waves licked at her toes, and reflected the cold light of the stars above.
July 1665. London.
Julia is seven and alone. Like everyone else around her, she breathes the sewage and sweat of the summer heat and the plague, and every morning sees more thin, diseased bodies carted off, away from the barely living.
It is not a nice place to live, and perhaps there is more to the city than the cycle of putrid flesh, but it is all she has known. Death is everywhere; in the tepid water she drinks, the crusty layers of bodily grease and oil. The chickens, the priests, the rats.
There is very little real beauty, hoarded by those chosen by God, mostly in the form of feasts, religion, and rich clothing. But sometimes the light of the ever-giving sun will shine on one of the cathedrals, the invisible light shattering into a spectrum of colours from the stained-glass windows, and Julia will almost smile.
Almost.
Death takes us all in the end.
The child dies before the month is over.
February 24, 2014.
"I love this show!" she bellows from the couch. Content with the lazy Tuesday afternoon, Julia sighs contentedly as skips over the previews and with the several impatient presses of the remote, navigates the blu-ray player towards the main menu screen. Giddy with excitement, she snuggles further down into the quilt and waits for her friend.
"You say that about every movie!" He calls from the bathroom. The flush of a toilet, the rush of water, and then the thud of a closing door. "I don't get it, you watch this at least twice a year, ever year, and you watch it like it's the first time you've seen it before."
"Oh Gren," she rebuked, "You're just as bad. You keep playing that jazz song over and over."
He corrected her. "Songs, Julia. Plural. Who am I to deny the genius of John Coltrane?" The roll of her eyes was answer enough. Grinning, he settled down on the sofa beside her and brushed his luscious black hair over his shoulder as the title credits to Forbidden Planet started to roll.
It was an easy companionship, one that lacked strict boundaries and provided lots of easy laughs. They had known each other for several years now, a hostel of all places, each a bohemian traveller in the midst of enchanting London, and remained securely stuck to each other since. He had charmed her like a gentleman, even called her a fairy, and she chided him, scolding him for using that line on all the girls. She was right of course, Julia was not a sassy, petite fae. Maybe an angel?
Their gazes met and their souls bonded in kinship. Underneath those disarming words, there lingered loneliness. Grencia longed for a friend, and Julia had been months without a lasting comrade.
It wasn't too longer afterwards when they finally slept together. Once the act had been completed, their loneliness abated, did Julia lay in his arms and asked the charming foreigner if he wanted to go back to North America with her at the end of the month. She was tired of wandering, searching for the unknown she ached for, and she just might find it in him.
He said yes.
So they purchased one-way tickets to the YQB airport, Quebec City, Canada, and lived as best friends. An adventure of a different sort, an intimacy that superseded flesh and hazy lust, and ultimately required a working driving license, which also meant one of them needed to learn how to drive. That was an adventure.
They never slept together again, but sometimes they did share a bed and cuddle through the night when one of them returned to the house and found the other crying from a broken heart.
They both swore they would never get married for anything less than True Love, and perpetrated rumours amongst their circles of friends there was a marriage pact between them should they suddenly turn forty and both be childless. Gren, naturally, would be the sperm donor for all of Julia's supposed future children. All five of them.
Life was a riot. Grencia, a dancing instructor by trade, taught Julia how to sway her hips and kept her in shape. Julia, endlessly fascinated by fantasy, educated him in the subculture of foreign film and science fiction. He taught her how to drive, and Julia was insufferably pleased knowing she was the better operator, and took them halfway across Canada, to her native province of Alberta, and introduced him to her parents.
There in her hometown, that they watched Forbidden Planet, a lasting tradition for both of them. The film ended and Julia was left in a daze, her mind living life in black and white. Then as the world started to regain colour again, a restlessness overcame her. Eager to feel the laughter and grit of modern day cynicism, they made their way to one of the many local bars.
They drank coolers and agreed on the merits of Robocop's film remake. It was a good night.
And it was there that the cruel line of True Love turned Julia's head. A man had just exited the corridor that led to the washrooms. Julia didn't know why she decided to look in that direction at that particular time with that expectant look, as if waiting for someome. She couldn't explain it, she just did. She caught sight of him before he saw her, and Gren, catching her gaze, started to smile.
Nice, very nice.
Tall, lanky, and very much an out of towner, she gathered from the look of his clothes. The man sat down at what she surmised was his table, and the sullen-looking man waiting for him must be his friend. There was a playful look about his eyes, and he carried a shine about persona that made it hard to her to look away.
The man turned his gaze towards her as if he knew all about the magnetic pull. Completely ignoring his friend's speech, he flashed Julia a brilliant, heartbreaking smile.
Julia's heart fluttered in the base of her throat.
She didn't want the stranger to leave, but his angry-looking friend had left the establishment already. Handsome (a nickname Gren picked out for him), slid out of the chair, and much to her anxiety and delight, slid all the way across the room to stop at the bar where they were. He tipped his head like a gentleman rested his weight on one leg, leaning closer to her, and Julia dragged in a breath, inhaling his cologne.
Handsome initiated in some casual but very much intentional conversation. Gren was having the time of his life, watching his best friend melt into a puddle of starr-eyed goo and directed the lines of talk towards Julia, reading the shimmering happiness in every pore of her skin.
Eventually, the stranger sighed and said he had to go, his friend was expecting him and he wasn't the most patient of men. Then he rendered Julia speechless by paying for their bill and slipped his phone number into the pocket of her leather jacket like a thief.
It was the call that never came. The piece of paper that was meant to be opened and touched many times in wonder. It was the catalyst to everything that had never gone before. The two friends left the bar a fateful eighteen minutes too late, and as Julia giggled absently, recalling some smooth compliment the stranger had given her, she leaned against the headrest of the passenger seat, tucked her slender hands into her jacket pocket and touched a pointed piece of something -
A truck, manned by someone who shouldn't have been on the road, rammed into them out of nowhere. They never had a chance.
Quebec City, 1627.
Julia is a rare woman indeed. One of less than a handful of women, they step foot onto the ground that is not like the motherland and look around at what is to be the beginning of a new settlement. Trees, trees everywhere. Tall, like the ones she is familiar with at home, but still entirely foreign. It's the air, she thinks, the primitive feel of everything in this place. It is so wild, it frightens her nearly senseless, and fails to convince herself to attend to the work needed to be done.
She busies herself with the mending, directs the men carrying loads of root vegetables who wander into the kitchen, and falls into halting conversation with the other women. There are many meaningful looks directed towards the ladies, and perhaps the owner of one of those wistful gazes may end up marrying her.
The prospect of darkness scares her at night, more than the number of men in this l'habitation, more than the idea that this large plot of trampled land, numbering no more than a hundred of French blood, are easy prey to both human enemy and wild beast.
She hates the dark. It is unknown, unseen, and everlasting. It whispers to her things she doesn't want to pay heed to, to believe that the human soul is stronger than the ageless gods that dwell in this newly Catholic land.
A year later, the town is attacked. In the midst of screaming and stinking gunpowder and blood, Julia runs for the trees. Terror grips her, and she is more afraid of the prospect of capture behind her than the irrational fear before her. She is a woman after all; nature did not give her the stamina nor the strength of a man, and civilization has restricted her movements with whale-bone underpinnings.
But here in this godless town, they gave her a gun. Meant to bring down beasts for her protection, Julia's hands are stained with the blood of no animal. She trips over her skirts and lands face-down, gracelessly onto bloodied mud, but she pushes herself up, adrenaline filling her veins, and hopes she will survive the blight.
The night swallows her whole, she slips into its embrace like a hand slipping quietly into oil, and she is safe.
October 2022. Florida, USA.
Someone calls her name. Julia looks up from her computer screen, a word puzzle in the process, and searches for her schoolroom teacher. Cornflower blue eyes set in a childish face, light yellow hair that promised to darken to honey blonde over the years, the girl raises her hand in formality, public education already training her well to respond when her attention is needed. She is six years old.
Today is supposed to be an important day, she remembers. This morning she caught her mom watching the television nervously, smartly clipped fingernails drumming against the wall as she mouthed a silent stream of words against the apparent news. Something about a Moon Gate. Maybe a Lunar Gate. Something about space, travel, and the stars. She had tried to delay coming into to work as long as she could, the country could spare one astrophysicist for just one more hour, and young Julia ate her sugar cereal and hazelnut-spread toast with gusto.
Her other mother would be here soon with the vehicle, she had left early to grab some special coffee and a bouquet of flowers for the two favourite ladies of her life, and take their daughter to school.
Julia didn't understand it all, why Mom was hesitant and angry and worried the past few months. She was a scientist and studied the cosmos, and Julia desperately wanted to be exactly like her. She wanted to be an astronaut, she had told her teacher upon the first week of school, she already knew all the names of the Solar System and all their moons, and the idea of stepping onto a new, un-peopled planet was terribly exciting to her developing mind.
It wasn't always that way. When she was just a baby, her mom like to tell this story often, Julia was afraid of the dark. She believed in monsters hiding under the bed, in the goblins that hid in her closet and liked to steal her left socks, and while the older woman had tried to be patient and rationalize that there were no such terrors to kidnap her, Julia's fears had remained steadfast.
Things changed drastically when her parents took her to the planetarium. There, very much in the dark, a new world was opened to Julia. The darkness she had feared had its own secrets, ones that not everyone could see, but with science and technology, discovered light. Supernovas, beautiful, purple galaxies, Red Dwarfs and Earth-like planets, all of these wondrous things existed in the void, the velvet inkiness of space. How could something be so scary after seeing the pretty jewels it held?
Julia dreamed of the night, of flying in it like a bird, and sometimes that bird became a large boat, or a space ship. But whatever mode of transportation her mind conjured, Julia could finally breathe.
Planet Mars, 2071.
Julia did not need to dream of the stars anymore, she lived on one. She was one of many, many people who decided to inhabit the Solar System when Earth no longer became sufficiently habitable since the Lunar Gate Accident. It rendered much of the planet's population underground, the ones that survived, and that wasn't enough to ensure survival. The humans took to the stars, and became stars themselves. It was a dream borne from tragedy.
Pioneers, all of them. Humans who crossed oceans of space and time, and transformed into celestial beings.
And at last, Julia found what she had been searching for, a need that spanned beyond her physical body and made her feel a little more whole. An old soul, just like her, who moved like liquid through human circles, the one who made her think of the ancient, lost art of film noir. He was a fickle shadow she had been chasing, an idea not fully realized, flitting about the corners of her perception, and he haunted her.
This time, it was Spike who first noticed her.
This time, she had been involved with another man.
It was a terrible mistake to fall in love with one man and still care for the other, a sin that pressed down on her head like an angry hand, and Julia was still human enough to feel guilt despite the Martian planet she lived on. It almost wasn't fair, that two lovers should hold the responsibility of one man's descent into monstrosity, but they had chosen this path, all three of them. And karma expected to be repaid.
The syndicates are dying. They can't survive anymore.
And time moved on.
The continual ebb and flow of balance, incomprehendable to any single person, and yet encompassing all.
Cornflower blue eyes set in a pale face. Julia clung onto the idea that one day her transgression was part of a bigger scene, one that would lead her to an early end. She didn't want it, of course, but she was prepared. Funeral-like. The years had not been kind to her, and left scars underneath her skin. The accelerated decay of the underworld, the underbelly of civilization that thrived on guns, drugs, and money, assisted in her final acceptance.
The question was, was there goodness left in her to beg for another recycled beginning after the light in her eyes had gone out?
She loved Spike. She had loved before, but not like this. Now that they had met, their fates were entwined indefinitely. Julia wondered if she ever saw him again, if she would beg him to come away. Escape, leave and forget about paying the debt. But in her gut, the woman knew her pleas would not change his mind.
"Spike," she spoke his name like he was her last hope.
"Julia," he whispered her name like a prayer.
It was just a matter of time.