On the eastern horizon, where the dark of night met the depths of the sea, a golden ribbon crested the waves stretching north to south, as far as the eye could see, a subtle glow that began to wipe the darkness from the night, pushing away the shadows, ushering in a new day.
And in those final moments, no longer able to breathe, his lungs on fire as his heart struggled to burst from his chest, Cristos knew that he wouldn’t escape death for the second time. Jack struggled to his feet, blood pouring from the wound in his chest. He grabbed Cristos, lifted his weakened body, and tossed him over the cliff to be smashed on the rocks below.
• • •
Jack raced down the rock face, slipping, sliding, his hand seeking purchase, the sharp rocks cutting his palm. With dawn’s early light still in the far-off distance, he struggled to see through the last shreds of night that danced along the rocky slope. The precarious path provided no firm footing as he tried not to slip and perish on the rocks below. He glanced at Cristos’s broken body, folded over a rock near the base of the cliff, momentarily lit by the sweep of the passing lighthouse beam. A pool of blood coated the sand beneath him. And Jack slipped. He skidded downward, trying not to tumble over and split his head open. As he grabbed a weathered rock with his left hand, it gave way, the sharp edge cutting into his left forearm, turning the tattoo into a shredded mess.
Jack leaped the final eight feet to the rocky beach, where Mia lay facedown in the shallow water, bent, contorted, motionless. Jack fell to his knees at her side, quickly turning her over to see the spreading wound on her chest.
Finding no pulse, no breath, Jack laid her on the sand, tilting her head back. He began CPR, forcing air into her lungs, life into her soul. He placed his hands just above her sternum and began rhythmically pumping, forcing her blood to pump. And he could see his efforts forcing the blood to accelerate its escape from the wound.
“Please, Mia. Breathe. Breathe, dammit.” Jack locked his lips over hers once again and gave her the breath of his life.
“You can’t die. Let it be me, please, let it be me. Let me trade my life for yours.”
He forced more air into her lungs and quickly set about pumping her chest. He tore open her shirt, laying his hands just below her bra strap, and looked at the wound. It was above her heart, mercifully missing the vital organ. Maybe, just maybe…
With a heaving gasp, Mia exploded with life, hacking, coughing, an eruption of water shooting from her lungs. Jack lifted her, taking her into his arms, holding her in his lap.
“Jack…” she whispered.
“Shhhh…”
Mia looked up, her eyes drifting up the rock face to the cliff so far above. “How could I have survived?”
“The water must have broken your fall.”
She reached her hand up to the bullet wound, wincing at the contact. Jack pressed his hand over it, trying to stop the flow of blood.
“How did you…?”
“Frank’s dead.”
Mia looked at him. “What do you mean?”
“He was shot.”
“I know he was shot. Everyone knows he was shot. It wasn’t your fault.”
“I know,” Jack said, his head tilted to the side, confused.
“You do? After all these years, to finally release all of that guilt…”
“I don’t understand. What you mean?”
“Jack, Frank died fifteen years ago. Are you OK?”
And as if caught in a whirlpool, Jack’s mind began to fracture and reconstitute. Frank “Apollo” Archer, shot by those two kids, dying in Jack’s arms… Yet Jack saw Frank that very day, was with him all day until he died minutes ago up in the mansion, the same scenario… shot by two… pinned down… a bullet through his heart.
“Oh, my God,” he whispered. “That can’t be…”
And he thought about his father, his regrets for never speaking to him, never telling him how he felt, how he loved the man in spite of everything. He never got to tell him all of those things before he passed away six months earlier.
And the letter he couldn’t remember writing to Cristos, the one he kept in his pocket, the one where his handwriting disappeared.
His dog in his kitchen this morning, killed in front of him more than twenty years ago when he was seventeen, run over before his eyes in the driveway. If only he was there a moment sooner to save him…
Things from so long ago, lost to time, things that could never reappear.
All dead… But Frank was seen by others, had interacted with everyone. He was no ghost, no figment of Jack’s imagination. Frank helped him save Mia, helped hunt down Cristos. Jack glanced over toward Cristos’s broken body, and his mind snapped, for Cristos was not there. There was no blood, no sign of him ever falling on the rocks.
And he thought on Ryan’s words, on Emily’s suggestion that it was all in his mind. The tumor. Was it causing the delusions, causing him to see the dead, to imagine those he lost around him? But Jack couldn’t be losing his mind. Mia was there before him. And then he thought, if they were dead, did that mean that he…
“Jack, don’t you fall apart on me,” Mia begged, seeing the pained look in his eyes.
“Mia, Ryan said I would become delusional, see things. The tumor must be pressing-”
“What tumor?” Mia said in shock.
“I tried to tell you, early in the week. I’m sorry, I didn’t know what to say…”
“What, Jack?”
“I’m sick.”
Mia looked at him, confused. “Jack, you’re not sick. You’re as healthy as could be; you just had a full physical a month ago.”
It was Jack’s turn to be confused.
“Jack,” Mia whispered, her eyes filling with tears as if revealing the death of a friend, her heart breaking with her every word. “It’s me. Don’t you remember?”
“What? No, the file, in my desk…”
“That’s my file, Jack. It’s me. I’m the one who is sick. I’m dying!” she cried. “Maybe six months…”
Jack stared at her, his mind a jumble. And he held her tight, his mind becoming unhinged with grief. “No, please…”
“Oh, Jack, please don’t lose it. You have to survive for the girls. You have to be strong.”
“No. Mia, you have to survive. I saved you.”
“Oh, Jack. I will fight, but you remember what Ryan said the chances are?”
Jack’s heart was breaking anew. Everything he had struggled for, everything he had gone through to save her…
Mia looked up into his eyes with her warm, caring heart. “You saved me today… and you’ll go on saving me, day after day, until you can save me no more.”
Jack held her close. He had fought so hard to change fate, but it was all for nothing.
His senses were suddenly filled with the smell of Mia, the odor of her perfume, as if it filled the air around him. Her smell from the powder room that had sparked his memory, that he smelled on her pillow at night, that was forever part of her.
Jack looked at his wrist. He saw the large cut he had sustained coming down the cliff face. And as he looked at it in the light wash from the lighthouse, he became aware of a stunning reality. The tattoo that had so frightened him, that had scared Cristos, was gone. No evidence was there of the Cotis artwork. Not a drop of ink, not a word, just his arm bleeding profusely.
And the light from the lighthouse softened, becoming moonlight…
Jack’s eyes flashed open. He found himself lying on the riverbank, the raging Byram River just feet away. Moonlight danced off the wet leaves and rocks, the thundering river painting the soundscape. There were pieces of the car washed up on the shore by his feet, packages and bags from the rear of the Tahoe. The air was filled with Mia’s perfume, her signature smell, as if it inhabited the world around him.
And as he turned his head, he saw Mia lying facedown in a shallow eddy of water. He scrambled to her,
