Chapter 8

I was awake before the 4:45 wake-up call came. I felt like I did early mornings before a felony trial: keyed up, anxious, and constantly reviewing the strategy I was planning to use. This morning added another layer of complexity to my mental gymkhana as I looked over at the sleeping form next to me. Lauren's face was serene and lovely as she slept, lit only by the red light from the alarm clock's glowing digits, with none of the ills she had suffered evident on her face.

I lay back with a sigh and asked myself what I was doing. I was old enough to be her father. I was supposedly the responsible adult. She was barely 18, and had been through a hugely traumatic event. Maybe it was natural for her to latch on to the only guy in her life that could offer her stability and safety. But I shouldn't be returning her affection like that. I should be acting my age, and with the responsibility I had towards her, and not hopping into bed with her.

On the other hand, I hadn't hopped in to bed with her in any but the most literal sense. We hadn't made love. We had kissed, yes, and that was probably a huge mistake of its own, but that was the extent of the damage. And she had been very clear on her own limits, and done only what she wanted to do, which suggested that she wasn't just blindly latching on to anyone in reach, that maybe she could approach this as an adult.

On the other hand, even if she could be said to be acting in her own best interests with everything that had gone on, didn't I have a professional responsibility to not enter into romantic entanglements with my clients? In my entire career, the issue had never presented itself — apart from a couple of prostitution cases where I was offered freebies after the fact for a defense job well done, and which I had no desire whatsoever to accept.

On the other hand, wasn't she the best judge of...

I sighed and whispered to myself, "Shut up. You're beginning to sound like Tevye."

I froze as Lauren said clearly, "You want to be a rich man?"

I exhaled and shook my head, then asked, "How long have you been awake?"

She rolled on her side to face me. "I think," she said, "that I woke up just after you did." She paused a bit and then said, "Good morning," and leaned in to kiss me. Ambivalent after my mental self-admonishments, I turned to catch her kiss on the cheek. She pulled back and looked at me. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing,"

She frowned. "Rick," she replied, "either I have a bad case of morning breath and this is your lame way of telling me to gargle, or something is wrong."

"Lauren," I said, looking away, "This isn't right. I can't be your lover. It's wrong for me to be with you like this. And I have to stop for both our sakes, before we do something even more wrong. I'm sorry for letting you get the imp..."

"Bullshit," she cut me off. She reached over and turned my face to look at hers. "What I said last night, I meant. And I know you're trying to do the right thing right now. I get that. But ask yourself this: when do I get to make a decision about my love life? If not today, when I'm past my eighteenth birthday, then when? Nineteen? Twenty-three? I think I was mature and self-aware at fifteen, personally, but OK. A hundred and fifty years ago I'd have chosen a husband by now, or had one chosen for me, be married with at least one child, and maybe another on the way. I'd be trusted to run a household while my man plowed the back forty or drove the herd to market. Did the last hundred years sap something from our blood so that I can no longer decide who to kiss, who to love? That girl a hundred years ago didn't have the advantages I have. I can take a pill every day and control my chances of conceiving a child. I can be a doctor, a scientist, even..." she punched my shoulder for emphasis "... a lawyer, things that my ancestress couldn't dream of doing. Why should I be considered incapable of one of the few things her backward society let her do?"

"I..." I began.

"Rick," she interrupted. "If you don't like me that way, you just have to tell me. But I know that's not what you're going to say. I know because of what I feel from you, and you know what you feel from me. So don't you dare throw this away just because we found each other in the middle of the craziest thing to ever happen in all of recorded history. Don't you dare walk away from this to protect me. Don't you dare."

"I..." I tried again.

"And another thing," she bore on relentlessly. "Think about this. We're dealing with something here that can change reality, can change minds and memories. How do I know this is even real? Maybe this whole thing is a fantasy created by my keepers; maybe I'll wake up in the next instant and find myself back in that cave about to be turned into another sex toy, be paraded in front of an audience and told who gets to rape me next. Maybe.

"But because that's a possibility, should I stay in a corner, huddled in fetal position, and wait for it? No! Fuck that! All I can do is treat each moment as it comes, make each choice based on what I see, what I feel, what I know right then."

She touched my cheek. "You are my choice, mister. Not because you helped me, not because I'm traumatized, not because I'm a ditzy teen who doesn't know any better. Not even," she said archly, "because you've got a nice ass under that charcoal gray suit you were wearing the other day." She grinned, and then turned serious again. "You are my choice because you have a kind heart, because you have a sharp mind, because people matter to you and because I feel a connection every time I look at you."

She paused, and then said steadily, "And if you honestly believe that I am not able to make that decision, fine. I won't beg and plead to be with you. I'm too proud."

I stared at her. Her eyes were fierce but I saw the hint of tears back there as well. I sighed. "OK, Lauren," I finally said. "You're right. It's against every rational standard that could be brought to bear here, but you're right. You know how I feel about you even though I haven't said a word aloud. And you're right, too, that I know how you feel about me without your saying it. Please understand that I worry simply because... well, because it's hard to trust myself. I ask myself if I really know those things, or if I'm just telling myself I know them because that's the way to score a hot chick, to live out a fantasy that so many middle-aged guys probably share. Hell, not just middle-aged guys: I bet you were the star of many fantasies from boys age eleven onwards. My reluctance didn't come from not wanting you, from not wanting this. It came from knowing that I did want this, and not knowing how much self-deception I might be capable of to get it."

I lay back on the pillow and stared at the ceiling. "That's why we have rules and societal expectations about age," I said.

She rolled on top of me, straddling me. "Yes," she agreed. "That's fair. But if we're gonna talk about the rules, then let's do it fairly. I'm eighteen years old. The rules say I can do this." And she leaned forward and kissed me.

I had no response except a vigorous kiss back. Sometimes you just have to admit when you've lost an argument.

We spent a delightful few minutes not the least bit self-conscious about possible morning breath when the phone by the bedside erupted into noise. I looked at the red glowing digits announcing 4:45 and mumbled, "Some complete idiot left a 4:45 wake-up call."

Lauren grinned and said, "Yes, good thing that guy's nowhere in sight just now."

I answered the phone, which was not even a real human being but a recorded voice courtesy of the hotel's automated phone system, and pushed '1' for "I'm awake, don't call again."

She paused on her way into the bathroom, looked back me archly and said, "If we had more time and the fate of several lives weren't resting on what we do this morning, I'd invite you to come help me wash my back."

I looked at her steadily. "The first time I put my hands on that naked back," I said, "it'll be when we have enough time that I can make it an experience you'll never forget."

She shivered a bit, and looked wonderingly down at her arms, then raised one to me. "Look," she said. "Goosebumps." And she vanished into the shower.

I caught a glimpse of myself in the room's mirror, and was struck by the goofy, happy look on my face. I shook my head at myself. "Act your age," I remonstrated my reflection. Then I stuck out my tongue and said, "No!"

Lauren proved to be atypical of her gender by finishing her shower and vacating the bathroom in a reasonable time period, and I took my turn, back to running things through my head. When I emerged, freshly shaved and clad in the hotel's terrycloth robe, she was wearing jeans and a yellow chambray blouse, with a wide leather belt providing a nice color contrast.