Chapter 15

I had never, in either timeline, had any desire to visit New York City. None. And now, with the World Trade Center towers still standing? I was terrified of how I’d react, and how I’d explain my reaction.

I wasn’t the only one not looking forward to this excursion. Trish was looking a little lost, just shaking her head and muttering, “Why?”

Jenny didn’t seem to care one way or the other. I envied her.

Fortunately we got in after dark — one of the hazards of flying standby. I could see the city in its lights but it was abstract enough that it didn’t trigger any emotional response. It turned out the hotel was high rise; downtown — I ineffectually wished that it were on the other side of the state.

Sleep was hard to come by that short night, and when it came a predictable set of images dominated my dreams. A plane, buildings, the collapses, people running for safety.

Jenny woke first me, then Trish early the next morning.

“What’s with you two? You were both thrashing around all night!”

I sat up to hug her and let her know how much I loved her, but the curtains were open and there before me were the twin towers of the World Trade Center. I just sat there, trying to steel myself to act as though nothing was wrong, when I became aware that more was wrong than I had understood.

Trish sat up, took one look then crumpled and started to bawl! Great wracking sobs, and in between them she was repeating, “No! April! Please, God No!”

I was confused for a moment, then it all fell into place. The memory of my dreams came back and I finally knew who was holding that book. So many things from the last five years made sense at last!

“Jenny, sweetie, would you please close the curtains? Please — she’ll be okay but it’ll be a lot easier without the view.”

Jenny looked horrified at what was happening to our lover then she turned to me and said, “The view? This has something to do with the view?”

“I know that sounds strange, but if you love Trish please, please shutout that view!”

That got her moving and while she was scurrying to the windows I turned to Trish and said, “Trish, honey, what does nine eleven mean to you?”

Oddly, that actually calmed her down. She managed to pull herself together some — both because of my voice, I think, and the fact that we could no longer see the New York skyline. Jenny was just getting back to the bed when Trish turned to me, her dark eyes wide, and in a flat voice said, “I’ve wondered ever since we met — I didn’t remember you being that so sweet. I was even more sure after we started sleeping together but I just wasn’t quite positive. I’m so, so sorry. It wasn’t supposed to affect you.”

Jenny was looking back and forth between us, confused and bordering on panicked, so I motioned her to me, took both of her hands in mine and said, “Jenny, the first thing to remember — now and forever more — is that we both love you. Please tell me that you believe me.”

“Jeff, I know you both love me, but what’s wrong with Trish? And what is she talking about?”

“It’s a long story, little one,” Trish replied. “And it’s stranger than you can imagine. It’s almost stranger than I can imagine and I’ve lived it. I need to tell you about it — and Jeff, too — and it’s going to be hard to believe. You have to trust me, though — I’ve never lied to you and I never will. Do you believe me?”

Jenny took a moment to compose herself before answering. “Trish, I love you — whoever you are and whatever has happened to you. I will try hard to believe what you tell me.”

I shifted my position on the bed and helped Jenny down to where I could hold her — she was about to hear things that could hurt her terribly and I wanted her to feel my love, our love, every second of the time.

“Okay,” Trish replied, “this is going to be really hard for me so please, let me talk no matter how strange it sounds. We can go back afterwards, and try to make sense of it.

“It all started more than 40 years ago when I first met Jeff Larson.”

Jenny gasped when she heard that and turned to look at me. All I could do was nod to let her know that Trish was telling the truth and hold her tight.

“He was 10 years old,” Trish continued, “short, bright — a bit of a pest but he seemed to like me and he tried to be nice to me.

“My sister, April, hated him. I never found out why, but April absolutely hated Jeff.

“I didn’t understand it at the time but over the next couple of years she poisoned my thoughts about him — she was forever talking him down, telling me what a little brat he was, that he was stupid.

“He wasn’t stupid, anyone could see that. He sometimes seemed a little immature, but then he’d show flashes of being all grown up. I didn’t know quite what to make of him but I think April’s words were part of that.

“Shortly after April and Bob moved back in with us Jeff and his brother Dave were sent up to Washington to spend the summer with their mother. As soon as they were gone April started working hard to make sure they’d never be allowed back. Every time she saw Mom or John she’d talk about how much quieter it was without them, how much nicer it was, just generally how much better life was without them there.

“Mom wasn’t over fond of them either and John was a wimp — he wouldn’t stand up to April, let alone Mom. Eventually they convinced him to force their mother to take custody of his boys. Then Karen and Butch moved back in and there wouldn’t have been any room for them anyway.

“I only saw them one more time — their grandparents brought them down to Denver the summer before my senior year. Jeff had grown some and he tried very hard to be nice, but my mother barely let him speak to me. And that’s the last I saw of Jeff Larson.”

By that point tears were pouring down Jenny’s face as she shook her head from side to side, trying to deny what Trish was saying. I just held her and stroked her back while Trish continued.

“It was around then that I realized just how badly my sister had treated our stepbrothers. We’d never been close but after that I wouldn’t have anything to do with her. I got an invitation to her 2^nd wedding and tore it up. The birth announcement for her son, Jason? Straight to the trash. An invitation to his high school graduation? Same thing. In fact I only met my nephew a half dozen times — all at family functions.

“After high school I didn’t go to college — I wasn’t any good at math and didn’t want to try to get better. Instead, I went to secretarial school and did fine. After that I worked as a secretary, first in Denver and then in Los Angeles. I never got married, never had kids, never had much of a life. Sex was infrequent and never much fun. The men I went out with were mostly jerks who were only interested in their pleasure. I began to wonder if all guys were like that.

“Then, let’s see, it was on January, 28th, 2000 that Jason was killed in a car accident. That was the event that started a thaw in my relationship with his mother. I realized that I had missed his entire life just to spite her. April and I never became friends, but I was at least civil to her. Even when I asked her to she never apologized for her nastiness toward Jeff and Dave, though. She wouldn’t explain why she was so hateful toward them, but she wouldn’t back down.

“In mid-August 2001 my employer decided to retire and I was suddenly out of work. I wasn’t happy about that — 42 year old secretaries aren’t a hot commodity in a down economy. April offered to fly out to L.A. and spend some time with me. She was on United 175. Along with a lot of the world, I watched her die.”

I know I gasped at that and I had tears streaming down my face for someone I didn’t even like.

“I lost it then,” she continued. “I couldn’t concentrate, I blamed myself — I thought more than once about just killing myself and getting it over with.

“It must have been the next June that things turned around for me. I was homeless, living in a park in L.A., when a woman came up to me, completely out of the blue, and handed me a black book.”

I nodded when she said that and Trish cocked an interrogatory eyebrow at me, but I just shook my head — I’d tell her about my dreams later.

Continuing, Trish said, “The woman didn’t introduce herself or anything, she just said, ‘You need this. You don’t know why yet, but someday you will. When all of your options are gone, you’ll understand. Until that time here’s some advice. There’s a real estate company on the next block,’ she pointed to the south down a minor side road, ‘that is looking for a secretary. Tell them Holly sent you.’

“Then she turned around and walked away without another word. I never saw her again.

“The book was weird. It was flat black with some sort of silver writing on it — I still don’t know what the cover said. Inside there was more writing in the same script and, on the center pages, a pattern, traced in silver. The pattern drew me, but it also scared me so I closed the book almost as quickly as I’d opened it.

“Not knowing what else to do I took the book with me and went to the realtor’s office. I thought they were going to throw me out until I mentioned that Holly had sent me to see about their secretarial opening. Instead of throwing me out, they hired me on the spot.