When she woke the next morning, it was cooler and she smelled green roses. She had never smelled green roses before but somehow she knew. She glided into the living room, still damp with dreams.
Her past had slip-covered his smelly chair with smooth khaki canvas. His hair was gelled and combed over, she noticed, as he splashed the last of his travel-sized Aqua Velva onto his freshly shaven face. He tossed the empty bottle onto the floor.
He was wearing a fresh, sweat-stain-free seersucker suit with a green rose in the lapel. An impossibly tiny gray hummingbird hovered over the rose, and as it sipped the nectar its body slowly turned green. When it had sucked the rose to a crumpled gray, it flew straight to her and hung, suspended, an inch from her face.
She knew that look. She had seen it before. It was a warning—change was imminent, and it would be difficult. Once it was sure she had understood, the hummingbird disappeared out the window.
She turned her attention back to her past. On his lap was a red memory book. He patted the arm of the chair, inviting her to sit. “Look what I have found,” he said.
Her body jerked with indecisiveness as she moved toward him, and eventually, lightly, she perched next to him, legs still supporting half her weight. Just in case.
Her past opened the book and revealed the shimmering image of a blonde boy and her heart shook with remembrance. In the image the boy had her arms pinned to her sides, and her face was flushed with fear and excitement, and she noticed that the boy's was, too.
“Today he will return, but only for one night. Remember,” her past crooned arrogantly, “I am not all bad.”
Again she wept, but this time with an angry futility, because she could not stop the love from filling her, and she did not want it. Not at all.
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