Transcendence

continuing. “All of the things you’re seeing happened to you. Sometimes they’re big moments in a life, sometimes they’re just small things triggered by a smell or a place.”

It feels like the truth is dangling there in front of me, just out of reach. All the pieces of the puzzle are right there, waiting to be put together. “Why has this been happening now? I’ve gone my whole life without any of this. Why now, all of a sudden?”

A strand of hair falls in front of my face. Griffon starts to reach up and tuck it behind my ear, but stops himself the instant before he touches me. As he pauses, I realize I’ve been holding my breath, waiting for the feeling of his fingers on my cheek. “Because,” he says, folding his hands around his knee. “You’re starting to remember.”

I sit on the rock, watching the kids slide down the hill, feeling like my sanity is slipping away too. Griffon is studying me as I turn all of this new information over in my mind.

“Starting to remember what?” I finally ask, partly afraid to hear the answer.

“Other lifetimes. Your other lifetimes.”

There’s a catch in my throat as I inhale, and it feels like the wind has been knocked out of me. My other lifetimes. “Like reincarnation?” I say it softly because I can barely get the words past my lips.

“Exactly,” he says. “Reincarnation. Past lives. All of that. Remembering them is what happens when you become one of us.”

I look into his face, trying to find a sign that he’s lying. I want to see his eye twitch, or a glance away for just a split second that will tell me that it’s not true. That people don’t get reincarnated and that the visions I’m having aren’t glimpses into my past lives. But I don’t see any of that. He’s telling the truth. At least, the truth as he believes it. “What do you mean us?” I ask. “Who is ‘us’?”

“Akhet,” he says, looking me straight in the eye. “You’re becoming Akhet.”

Seven

I take the stairs two at a time, making it halfway down the hill before I even realize I’m moving. Everything Griffon said is so horrifying that there’s no way it’s the truth. There’s no way the girl on the scaffold was me. That I was the one who was executed. That I was actually there that foggy morning, climbing the wooden steps to my own death. Just the thought sends shards of fear rushing through my system.

Griffon runs to catch up. He matches my stride in that familiar way he has and we walk in silence for a minute or two. Slowing his pace, he says softly, “Look, I know it’s a lot to take in. And you probably have a million questions.”

“Now there’s an understatement,” I say, walking a little faster.

Griffon continues, even though I’ve given no sign at all that I still want to talk. “Akhet are people who can remember who they were in the lives they’ve lived before. It’s an Egyptian word that’s been used to describe us for thousands of years. We keep our memories while everyone else has to start all over again each lifetime.”

I struggle against the tide of questions that are churning through my brain. Akhet. I turn the word over in my mind. I know I’ve never heard it before, but at the same time it’s almost familiar. It feels like ideas are going by too fast for me to reach out and grab just one to examine. I stop at the edge of the playground and turn to face him. I feel almost angry, like he’s getting something out of making me believe his big joke. “You said ‘us.’ So you’re … one too?” I can’t bring myself to use the word, as if acknowledging it means that I believe what he’s saying. And I can’t believe him. It’s crazy.

“I’ve been Akhet for a long time,” he says simply.

I watch the kids on the swings at the other end of the playground. I look around at all of the people on the lawn, the stoners playing hacky sack by the pond. This is real life, not some fantasy story. I want him to laugh, to tell me that he’s only kidding, to take my hand and squeeze it tight, and let me know that all of this is going to be okay. But he doesn’t. He just stands there, waiting for me to make the next move. So I do. “Now that you’ve gotten the lie out of the way,” I say, “do I get to hear two truths?”

“I’m not kidding, Cole,” he says, his gaze steady on me. “It is the truth. I can help make things easier.”

I reach into my back pocket and pull out the photo from Piccadilly Circus. “Were you following us, then?” I ask, holding it out to him. My hand is shaking, and I know he sees it too.

Griffon smiles like he’s been caught. “No,” he says. “Not really. I was wondering if you’d see me in the picture. We just happened to be crossing the street there that day. Owen and I do that sometimes—get into the background of other people’s tourist shots. Kind of like a real life Where’s Waldo. We must be in hundreds of slide shows all over the world.” He touches my image in the photo. “You made an impression, though. Sometimes you can sense when a person nearby is Akhet. So when you showed up at the Tower, I wasn’t all that surprised.”

“That’s a pretty huge coincidence,” I say skeptically.

“Coincidence,” he repeats, then shakes his head. “I don’t think of things that way anymore. Even the word is meaningless. It’s not about coincidence. It’s about leaving yourself open to possibility. Not letting your conscious mind get in the way.”

I rub my eyes with the palms of my hands until colors shoot through the darkness. This is nuts. Akhet? Past lives? Who believes this stuff? I shake my hands out to get rid of some of the nervous energy that’s building up inside of me. “I need to get out of here,” I say, and turn back toward the path. The sun has started to set over the trees while we’ve been in the park, and most of the kids have been called away by their parents.

Even more disturbing than thinking he’s lying to me is the fact that it all makes so much sense. His explanation feels so right. Like something I’ve been searching for is suddenly right there in front of me. But I can’t let myself believe him. His closeness, the scent of him in the warm evening air, is turning my brain to mush.

“Just take it all in slowly,” he says. “It took me years to even get where you are now.”

“And where exactly is that?”

“The place where you can get some answers.”

“Answers? I can’t even figure out the right questions.” I’m not religious or anything, but let’s say for a second that he’s telling the truth. Where does that leave the whole God issue? What about heaven and angels and all that? Who’s in charge of how you come back and when? I think about that day at the Tower and the vision I had. Of the visions I’ve continued to have. “So how did you know that I’m … remembering things?” The rough wood of the platform and the smell of the damp grass linger in the shadows of my mind. For everything that’s unexplained, I still can’t imagine that I’m anyone other than who I’ve always been. It’s impossible.

“When I touched you,” he says. “After you fell, I reached out to help you up, and I could feel it.” He sighs. “When you touch another Akhet, it sends out a unique vibration. But I could tell from your reaction that you didn’t know.”

I walk, thinking about the things I’d like to know if all this were really true. How does it happen? Where are the others? Do you ever remember everything about your past? “When did you first find out about … all of this?” I finally ask, feeling ridiculous even as the words come out of my mouth. I look behind us to make sure that nobody is close enough to overhear. Maybe I can figure out what’s going on if I pretend to believe him.

Griffon blows out a loud breath and runs his hand through his hair. “It’s been a long time since I transitioned. I haven’t thought about that for a while,” he says. He goes quiet for a moment. “It happened for me pretty much like it’s happening for you—in pieces. I was living in Italy at the time,” he says. “I was an older man —back then, forty was considered ancient—and I began to understand what had been happening to me my whole life. I met a woman who knew about it, and she helped me. She was an Iawi Akhet even then.” He glances at me. “Sorry. ‘Iawi’ are Ahket who have had their memories for many lifetimes.”

“When was that?” I ask, understanding that whether or not all this is true, it’s at least true for Griffon.

He looks at me as if he’s deciding something. “The early sixteen hundreds. Hard to say exactly.”

“How old are you now?”

“Seventeen.”