30
The end.
All stories, however long and arduous, however epic the tale, barreled toward those two little words. A good ending justified
any means. A bad one disqualified the whole endeavor. What to make of a story that had no end?
backbreaking work, marriage, and child-rearing, she readily accepts, leaving it all behind, betting everything on the promises
of the future.
July had invented a variation of that story as a girl, while home alone after school.
In the hour or so before her mother returned with dinner, her loneliness vanished once reunited with the dolls, plush toys, unicorns, and dragons that made up her imaginary world.
She revisited these characters as a graduate student and found them as familiar as old friends.
She scrapped her original master’s thesis and crafted a new one, centering Azealia and her magical companions, adding elements of race and women’s rights to the narrative.
She later sold the manuscript at auction.
However, in her childhood imagination, the story did not end.
Every day, she picked it up where she’d left off, every day a new adventure.
However, now she had no choice but to end it, and she had to do it in such a way to satisfy the ambitions of the professional writer she was today, but also the dreams of the child who had first crafted the world.
“How does it end?” Leo asked.
“You don’t want me to spoil it, do you?”
“Why do you think I’m sleeping with the author if not to get insider information?”
It was early morning. They lay in bed, face-to-face, his hand flat between her thighs. They talked in hushed voices, each
sentence punctuated with long kisses.
“Tell me how it ends,” he insisted. “Do Azealia and Nicholas stay together?”
“That’s so expected!”
“You’re not planning on breaking them up, are you?” he asked, almost accusatory. “Not after all they’ve been through!”
“Spare me the outrage. You can’t be that invested!”
“I’m fully invested,” he said. “I’ve been holding it back because I don’t want to scare you.”
“I’m not scared, Leo. I’m skeptical.”
“I can smell fear,” he said, sniffing her neck. “Despite your claws, you’re nothing but a frightened kitten.”
“What exactly am I afraid of? I missed that part.”
“My feelings for you,” he replied. “I’m obsessed with your thoughts, your words, your moods, your silences. I’m a man obsessed,
and it’s no longer an option for me to hide it from you.”
“Lucky for you, I love being worshipped.”
“Come on, tell me.”
“Fine! I’ll tell you but you won’t like it.”
“I’m all ears.”
“Azealia learns that the jolly wizard at the portal, the one she struck the deal with, is a devil. There was always a price
to pay, and that price is her soul.”
“So she dies,” he said flatly.
“The novel opens in 1990, the start of her final decade. She will die at midnight, December 31, 1999, playing into the Y2K hysteria.”
“You’re right. I don’t like it.”
“You of all people should appreciate a nuanced ending.”
“If I’m going to follow the love story of two lost souls over the course of three books, I don’t want nuance. I want a happy
ending.”
She reached under the sheets and stroked him. “I can give you one of those.”
“You might have to, to get me over my disappointment.”
“Leo!” Jules cried, panicked. “She and Nicolas can’t live happily ever after. It wouldn’t be realistic.”
“And time travel is? And deals with the devil? And all the other stuff Azealia did?”
“I hear you, but I don’t want a sweet and syrupy ending.”
“That’s another way of saying you don’t want happiness.”
“I’m not Azealia,” she reminded him.
“Give them a happy ending,” he insisted. “It’s what the fans want. I know because I’m a fan. You already killed Malachi. You’ve
done enough damage.”
“I had to kill him!” The death of Azealia’s first love, Malachi, had earned her the ire of thousands of readers. “‘Someone
has to die in order that the rest of us should value life more.’”
He groaned. “Don’t quote Virginia Woolf before coffee.”
“I can’t help it. I pray to Woolf every morning.”
“Give them a happy ending,” he said. “It’s what we all want.”
“Fine!” she cried, exasperated. “They’ll live happily ever after! Happy now?”
He pinned her down and kissed her deeply. “People do find happiness, you know.”
“Do you know any?” she asked him. “Because I don’t.”
“Ayesha and her husband,” he replied without hesitation. “Andre is a great guy. Also, I think Matty and Vicky have a chance.”
“In a perfect world, they have a shot,” Jules said. “But in this world with all its conflicting rules, it’s more difficult
than you might think.”
He kissed her again, slowly. “What conflicting rules?”
“She’s rich,” Jules answered. “Rich people have rules for everything, mainly money.”
Leo made a face. “Isn’t she rich enough to keep the Key West power grid going? What does she have to worry about money?”
“You think people with money don’t worry about money? It’s their favorite thing to do.”
“You’ve got a point there.”
“How about you?” Jules asked.
“What about me?”
“You deserve to find happiness with some nice girl.”
He kissed her throat. “If you think I’m into nice girls, you’re not going to like what I do next.”
It was Leo’s turn to share his work. Once the breakfast tray was cleared, they went up to the tower. While he rummaged around
the desk for his notes, Jules drifted to the rear window. The tender morning had given way to a bold sunny day, but you wouldn’t
know it by simply looking out at the garden. It sat, glum, shrouded in darkness, as if yesterday’s rain clouds still hovered
above it and refused to move on. Jules heard the call and silenced it. She would not allow that paralyzing dread to sink into
the narrow spaces between her bones.
“Shit,” Leo mumbled under his breath. He couldn’t find his notebook, the one he carried with him everywhere.
“Need help?” she asked calmly, though transfixed by the view below.
Every little detail stood out to her. She noticed a brown lizard racing along the stone path, the rough bark on the grand sycamore that spread its branches, the morning dew still glistening on the leaves of the hibiscus.
Nothing out of the ordinary, yet it disturbed her. Why today? Why now?
“No, thanks,” he said. “Your body is distracting enough.”
Jules had slipped on one of his T-shirts. The soft cotton embraced her bare skin. He was never getting it back.
Leo continued his search, opening drawers, shutting them, moving stacks of books around, until, finally he exclaimed, “Found
it! Strange. I know for sure I didn’t put it there.”
Jules turned her back to the window and sought out Leo’s light instead. Waking up beside him had been a dream. She’d never
seen a man so happy. He was practically incandescent. She was happy, too, but more cautious about it. She kept her happiness
wrapped tight in butcher paper and twine, like a precious gift to herself. She’d unwrap it only when she was sure destiny
wouldn’t swoop in like a hawk and snatch it away.
“Love, come take a look at this.”
Jules hadn’t noticed when his expression turned somber. She went to him. “What is it?”
He held open his notebook. She scanned the pages. At first glance, nothing unusual. Names, dates, a hastily drawn street map
of Old Town. “Isn’t it just your research?” she asked.
“Not this,” he said, tapping two lines of script at the bottom right of the page. “I didn’t write this.”
Dile que él la espera al otro lado.
Dile que la ha esperado tres vidas.
The sentences were scribbled in the palest blue ink, so faint you had to squint to see it.
“Spanish . . .” she said. “Something about waiting . . . I don’t get it. What does it mean?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t write it.”
“When was the last time you used the notebook.”
“Yesterday, when I sat with Dr. Flores.”
“Do you think he might’ve written it? Jotted a few lines to supplement your notes?”
“No,” he answered. “His right hand was in a splint. He could hardly play dominoes. Besides, I don’t pass my journal around.”
She read the phrases again, sounding out the words. “Three lives? This makes no sense.”
“Your Spanish is as good as mine,” he said. “Let’s run it through Google Translate.”
“Or we could ask Vicky,” Jules suggested. “She may be able to put it in context.”
“Good idea.”
Jules used her phone to snap a quick picture and sent it to her friend along with a request for a translation.
Vicky called right away. “What is this? A love poem?”
Jules ignored the question. “What does it mean?”
“‘Tell her that he’s waiting on the other side. He’s been waiting three lifetimes,’” Vicky said. “Very romantic. Did you fall in love in Miami? Is that why you’re not returning my calls?”
“Someone wrote this in Leo’s notebook,” Jules replied, before it hit her. Oh, crap. She’d forgotten the web of deception from which she dangled.
“Leo is in Miami with you?” Vicky asked.
“More like I’m in Key West with him,” Jules admitted.
The line went dead, then her phone flashed again, but this time with the request for a video call.
Jules looked pleadingly at Leo. The moth caught in the web was certain to die there.
“Guess you never told her,” he said with a smart-alecky smirk.
“No,” Jules said. “None of it.”
He kissed her forehead. “For luck, my love. You’re gonna need it.”
She shoved him off and accepted the call. Vicky glared at her through the screen. “I need you to look me in the eye and lie to my face.”
“I can explain,” Jules said.
“Give it a shot.”
“First, how’s your grandmother? Any updates?”
“She’s stable, but please don’t change the subject.”
Leo took the phone from her. “Hey, Vicky. It’s exactly what it looks like. Jules came back for me. We spent the week in bed,
and it was fucking great. Does that clear it up?”
Vicky screeched so loudly Leo nearly dropped the phone. Then doubling over with laughter, she managed to say, “I knew it!
Swear to God, I knew it!”
Jules loved a man who could think on his feet. Leo had bought her time. That bit of red meat would keep the wolf satisfied.