"Are you alright? That was a nasty spill, even for a rugrat like you."

I found myself staring into eyes of a shocking green, catching a glimpse of that steely determination mixed with a languid sadness.

"You gave me quite a scare, falling through the ceiling like that. I just had the roof fixed the other day, you know."

The room was a whir. I sat up, groaning lightly and looked at the woman standing over me: she was a slender reed of a woman in her late twenties, splendidly dressed in a sumptuous gown of a deep crimson silk with an odd contraption atop her head from which dangled ostrich feathers dyed a deep green. It was a hat, that's what that was...

She bent down and picked up the book that had clobbered me.

"Reading on rooftops. Is that what young people do these days? You wouldn't have caught me with a book when I was your age, that's for sure," she chuckled, running a finger over the gold embossed title. "Gone With the Wind...not the catchiest of titles, sounds like some sad poem about days gone bye...and written by a woman! But I guess I shouldn't be surprised..."

She turned to me. "Where did you get this?"

"I-I've had it for years."

There was a loud tearing sound; half the book tore from its mate and it landed on the floor in a ruffled heap. "Hmph, that's for sure. I haven't seen a book in years; they stopped printing them a hundred years ago. This must have been one of the last ones."

There was an odd, metallic tang to her voice, the sound of a clock rusted from disuse. And she appeared to notice, for her head jerked up and eyes swiveled to my face. "I do apologize. It's been so long since I've had any guests that I've forgotten how to receive them. Would you like some tea? I can call the maid." She smiled at the look on my face and rang a little bell. A girl appeared out of nowhere, her neatly trimmed skirts and demurely tucked hands belying the cruel black eyes. "I still use human maids; robot dwarfs are all the fashion now, but I miss the human touch." With a careless gesture, she sent the maid on her way and she came back in an instant with a large silver tray and teapot atop her head. It was no child's toy. The silver was unmarred and pure, the bulk of it overshadowed only by the intricate carvings of splendid scenes of days past, of plump cherubs reveling in Paradise, an orgy of men and women contorted in grief and lust, and there was a coat of arms with a lion in the center, roaring its defiance. The eyes were emeralds, the claws beaten gold. I whistled in admiration.

"It's been in the family for a few generations. One of my daughters tried to pawn the thing. Stupid girl, foolish girl...given how scarce gold is now, I'd say you'd be able to buy a mansion or two and still have enough for a private jet."

I didn't care what she had to say. My hands were burrowed into the river of butter interned in a silver monster of an urn. I licked my fingers one by one, and gnawed on a particularly tough chunk of pork. I chewed and swallowed, hurriedly burrowing a belch. Her smile was warm but her eyes were cold. "In my day, children paid attention to what their elders had to say."

"I-I'm sorry, ma'm" I stammered, promptly dropping a hunk of bread. She sighed. "There's no need to scrape the plate. I'm sure there's more in the back. God knows I've eaten more than I should."

Her attentions returned to the book; she beheld the two broken halves and set them together so they were whole. She turned the battered cover and thumbed through a few yellowing, curled pages. Her brow wrinkled and mouth twisted in confusion. She mouthed a few words, a flash of knowledge exploding in those green eyes and she thumbed three-quarters of the way into the book. Her eyes were glued to the page and even in the dim lighting, I could see a faint blush spread across her cheeks. And then she paled. With a shaky hand, she made to turn to the end but drew back, shaking her head and shutting the book. She leaned back, eyes staring up into the ceiling.

"How long have you known?"

"Is that it? Is that all you have to say?"

"When you've lived as long as I, nothing surprises you anymore."

"Was it the name that made you realize who I was, what I was?"

"Names, names," she sighed, "I've had so, so many of them. They're the first things to go, even before the heart does. I had a mother and father once. I loved them and they loved me and when they left, I thought the world had ended. She stared wistfully into the fire, at the cobwebs of smoke. "You know, they say that losing a child is the greatest pain a human being could ever experience but what if I were to tell you I hardly even remember what she had looked like? But I do remember him. He was so young, so full of life; I remember when his eyes looked only at me. I remember when he saw a future..." Her voice trailed off. The fire twisted and danced, throwing contorted shadows against the walls.

"Why are you here?"

"I wanted to know. I had to know how it ended."

"Why don't you ask her?" she asked, tapping one long white finger against the gentle slope of the M. "She ought to know. After all, she wrote the damned thing."

"But she doesn't," I pleaded. "No one does and she made sure it would stay that way."

"So you came all the way here to know how my story ended. I suppose I ought to be flattered, but this isn't a story for children. I wish you a safe journey home. They charge double for the 19th century now."

With a swish of her skirts, she made to leave but I hobbled to my feet, hand extended.

"Wait!"

She stopped in her tracks and turned back.

"I think I've shown enough hospitality for a night. The maid will show you to the door."

"Give me a chance. I-I used up the last of my money for this. You don't understand; it's a horror out there."

"So you broke in here to escape, because you were afraid?"

"I-I didn't mean to-"

"You're a poor liar, but I'll take it." She raked her eyes carelessly over my panic and strode to a large glass vial, from which bubbled a viscous red liquid. She snapped her fingers and a glass appeared out of thin air. She uncorked the vial and poured a generous amount; the red liquid frothed and simmered. She took a sip and stared thoughtfully into space, smacking her lips.

"Nothing can quite beat a glass of red. Nothing."

"But it's a bit masochistic, isn't it?"

"What is?"

"This. Reading." She stood abruptly and floated to the fireplace, staring into the flames. "We all know how this ends and yet we keep reading, hoping for a different outcome."

The flames danced in her eyes, her pale skin set aglow. Her words flowed as smooth as honey, her cadence as gentle as smooth waters; she spoke as if she were from a different place, a different time...

"So do you?"

"Do I what?"

"Do you ever see him again?"

"I was at Tara when it happened. I was on the hill, the one with the old oak tree. Pa used to stand there with me and tell me about our ancestors, about County Meath, and about Tara. I was his special girl. He never did so with Careen and Sue or even with Mother. I was the only one who understood him and he was the only one who understood me. But the birds had gone silent that day; even Will was worried but nothing was going to stop me. I climbed up that hill; I went up and up and up. The tree was still there but the branches were all gone and I was so angry, but then she...called for me."

"Who?"

"I don't know. But she did and I saw it: an opening at the base of the tree and I came closer and closer and then I fell."

"I don't understand."

"My dear girl, you will if you would only let me finish. It was as if all the feeling had gone away, the hurt, the pain...I came out of that hole and I was...reborn."

"Please," I begged. "Does that mean-"

The faintest of smiles danced across those red lips. "Oh, but I did see him again. Exactly twelve years to the day. There had never been so finely carved a coffin."

I stared at her in horror.

"I almost felt sorry for the poor woman: first her husband, then her grandchild, her sons and then her daughter, so much loss in so short a life. I was the only one she had left at the end, the only one she could count on. I'm not sure if we ever truly appreciate the irony of that."

"But you loved him-"

"Sure I did. And so did he. And my daughter as well, perhaps even more so. But that didn't stop him from doing what he did. Given the sort of man he had been, he probably bedded his first woman as soon as nature called and yet I was in the wrong for mere desire. And yet, for the longest time I agreed with him, my husband, my love: I thought it was all my fault and perhaps it was. But I was half a child when I met him and hardly a woman grown when he decided to marry me. I wanted, as any human being with a mind of her own does, what I could not have. That was my only sin, my only folly. But he knew and decided to mark me for his own despite it or perhaps because of it. And whose fault was that? I'm sure they never discuss that in any of the articles you've read."

"But I wonder why it hurt so...I was sad but then I realized that there was nothing to be sad about. How long would I have had with him? Ten years, maybe fifteen, if he had quit smoking those cigars of his...but I could no more change him than he could change me. He ought to have gone his merry way, carrying on as he always did, drinking and whoring and dying with a breast in one hand and pistol in the other, but he just could not let go."

"But he was a most dutiful stepfather, I'll give him that. There were always letters to the children and gifts during the holidays, but before long they all grew up and even those stopped. I recall one of them was a Rhodes scholar and graduated from Yale, became a judge or something. I have a picture of her right here," she gestured to a black and white photo, brown with age. The girl's face was hardly distinguishable amidst the grease marks and stains but I could see that mop of straggly hair, the freckles amidst a crooked smile and merry eyes. By her side was a slender weed of a boy with fair hair and a rather foolish expression. She picked up the photo and stared at it fondly. "They were my first, you know. I brought them into this world and was by their side when they left it. In many ways, they were the only people who ever truly belonged to me. My mother always told me that children were life itself or had that been someone else..."

She sighed. "Who knows anymore? But my poor mother...she always did her duty but I don't think she was ever truly happy in her life. She had been in love with a man who wouldn't have spared her a second glance had she been some common girl, although I could probably have said the same about them all."

"I remember the morning after: there had never been such a beautiful sunrise, red and gold, like one of those old paintings...there was naught but silence and that's when I knew."

"Knew what?"

"That my chances of seeing him again were about as high as my seeing her."

She slammed the book shut and whipped around. "I think we've talked long enough. It's time for you to go."

My mouth went dry. The fire was warm, too warm and the colors were soft and red.

"Please, ma'm. Can't I stay here, even for a night?"

She folded her arms, her lips tight.

"This isn't a place for orphans."

"Please," I whispered. "I have nowhere to go."

For several long moments, there was naught but silence but then her eyes softened as she took in my bedraggled appearance, my tangled black hair, and scraped knees.

"I suppose you can stay in the spare bedroom. It's not as if anyone was using it. But God forbid I catch you rifling through the silver. I was never the best shot in my past life but things have been different for quite some time. I can catch you between the eyes from a hundred yards away now."

My limbs were numb and my eyes were heavy, but my tongue couldn't stop.

"Are you lonely?"

She laughed. "I know what they all say. The first person I confided in about my situation had the gall to feel sorry for me. He asked how I could stand it, watching as my children grew up and grew old and sick and weak before my eyes, of holding newborn babes and then being by their side as they were administered their last rites."

"Then it's not all that it was cut out to be?"

"What? Being immortal?"

"It's been a bore, really. A plague every hundred years or so, an earth shattering quake now and then. The wars are no fun; the slogans and uniforms change but it's all the same. First it was to bring civilization and Christianity to the heathens, then it was to protect our Glorious Cause, and then to bring freedom and democracy. I just sit back with a glass of Chardonnay and watch. But I'll admit to you that it gets to me sometimes. I can't even get drunk."

"I've never paid politics any mind. After all, what's a woman to do in a man's world? But the first woman President? Now I had to vote for that one. I admired her gumption, her steel. It didn't quite pan out but it was interesting while it lasted."

Something nudged my leg. A fat Scotland terrier sniffed inquisitively at my tattered shoes, his milky-white eyes fixed on a vapid nothingness.

"This here's Jasper. He's the twelfth of his name. Perhaps I ought to try a different one..."

She sat on the sofa, crossing her legs at the knees, a knuckle in her mouth.

"It's strange. I've never met you before and yet I feel as if I've known you for years." She cocked her head, "What's your name?"

"My name? It's Ashley. My name is Ashley."