CHAPTER SIX #2
Penn didn’t sit but hovered close and hooked a large hand around the railing post. A web of blue-green veins bulged underneath the not-pale but not-overly-tan skin. A red welt bloomed—had he been bitten by a mosquito? He really was a time capsule of his last day on the planet.
“I was thinking about it before I said anything, trying to see if that opened up more memories.” He shook his head. “Just the one. This is Oregon, right? I’m from here—somewhere.”
“Okay, that’s something. Penn from Oregon.” I tugged the stringy hem of my Levi’s cutoffs.
“Sylvie from Los Angeles,” he said, smiling.
“It was the wood. Your aunt had those big chunks of oak, freshly cut. The smell took over, and this strong sensation pulled me forward. Something clicked, and Oregon was just there.” My eyes darted up, but before I could respond, Penn asked, “She makes furniture, right? That’s impressive. ”
“Yeah, among other things. She’s most famous for her trinket boxes,” I told him.
“Famous? Now, that’s impressive.”
I shrugged. “In the art world, at least. Dream boxes, she calls them. A few celebrities bought them way back when, and she couldn’t make them fast enough—until she stopped years ago. Now she’s taking preorders again, and collectors are lining up to pay fifteen grand for one.”
Penn gaped. “For one box? Damn.”
“Right? She’s earned it, though.” I gazed back toward the workshop. “Her modern stuff is different. Like, grander. The words ‘prodigy’ and ‘genius’ come up in lots of press. She actually spent time here in Oregon working with local artisans before I was born.”
“Maybe all that helped me remember this as my birthplace,” he mused. “You never said we were even in Oregon last time.”
He was right. I lifted the still-ticking watch. “I also didn’t say that there’s no record of this ever being at the antique store. When I brought it back, the owner said he’d never seen it.”
“Somehow I’m not surprised.”
I gave a half smile. “I was. That’s part of the reason I was a little freaked out the last time you saw me.
” When he nodded in understanding, I went on.
“But now we know you’re from here, so maybe that explains why the watch found me here too.
Oregon must mean something to your life, and maybe your . . .”
Penn reached out over the cabin steps. Thinking he might touch me, I shuddered, but not out of fear this time. Unlike our frantic meeting in the alley, my eyes were wide open.
But he didn’t touch me. His hand poised over my arm briefly before he drew back. “I still don’t know why I come here or how I’m linked to your watch.”
“Not yet,” I said. And there it was. “What if I could help with that?”
His mouth sprang wide for a beat. “Really?”
“Really.” I nodded once, making it true.
“At least, I can try. We’ve already proved that the more you’re here, the more you remember.
” I leaned forward, clasping my hands over my knees.
“We have to see if it’s possible for you to move on and, I dunno, be released from the watch.
I’m having trouble with cell service around here, so I need to figure out a way to research.
Hopefully, I find out who you were and how you died.
Maybe it’s all connected, and you need to remember something or complete an unfinished task in order to move on for good. You still want that, right?”
“To not feel like a genie squeezed out of an old lamp? Yes. But why did you change your mind?” he asked.
“You’re alive, Sylvie. In a really beautiful place.
You probably have tons of other things you could be doing instead of traipsing around with me, trying to solve some weird, paranormal mystery.
You’re the one who winds the crown to bring me here. You could just . . . not.”
Could I? The watch believed otherwise. And with each ticking second, I was believing that more and more too.
Penn’s presence was mystifying, and the unknowns surrounding his existence were still a bit terrifying.
But he wasn’t. When I studied the angles of his face, the shadowy scruff and bloodshot eyes, it wasn’t fear I felt.
Over the past few days, I’d learned to see this situation for what it was, and what it could be for not only him, but also for me.
With Penn, I was only a few ticking seconds away from something I’d always wanted. A big, big life. A summer of a thousand thrills.
This summer my friends were on the Cape, and I’d thought I was getting the gift of Portofino or Positano until my parents changed their minds.
But I got Penn instead, an entity (a curious nation, a grand principality) that existed far outside the bounds of any globe I’d ever spun.
Our time together was a fragment, not a lifetime commitment—those, I mainly knew as flawed anyway.
The tie that bound us would inevitably sever, just as soon as we solved the mystery of his life and death.
He would move on to his final resting place, and I’d move on with my postgrad plan.
I’d need him to go if Sylvie’s Perfect Triangle was going to be truly perfect. Selling a spirit-free watch was the launching point of my future, but I kept this part to myself.
I stood then. We weren’t close to being the same height, but we were on the same level. “I’ve never had a real summer vacation, or much of any kind of adventure,” I said, and pointed at his chest. “Until now.”