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Chapter 5
She’d never known Lijah to be clumsy. On the contrary, his movements were usually smooth and purposeful, exuding a lithe confidence that she found… tempting. But here at the cottage he seemed to have lost track of his extremities. His injury the night before, a case in point. Bumping into her, the furniture, barking his shins and knocking things over, further examples. After getting elbowed for the third time she insisted on taking the role of sous chef lest he stab her or make another attempt at lopping off a finger. He agreed, embarrassed, saying it had been so many years since he’d had a visitor, he’d forgotten how to share the space. He declined to tell her how many years, and she teased him for his vanity.
“I don’t want to scare you,” said Lijah.
“Scared by how many years you have? It could hardly trump, you know, being blindfolded. Unless.” Elsa stopped slicing mushrooms and turned to face him. “Hmm. Let me guess, you have twice as many as me, no wait, three times?” She laughed at her own joke; there was no way a man in his 30’s could have 60 or more years. But Lijah wasn’t laughing. Well, okay, gross disparity between age and years was possible but virtually unheard of, and invariably in the other direction, aging prematurely. She turned back to the cutting board. “I should have known. You’re such an overachiever. Please tell me you have at least 20 years.” Also a joke; that would have made him unmistakably pre-pubescent when they’d first met a decade prior.
It was absurd that he refused to answer her.
“Alright then, if you won’t answer me that, tell me this. Why now? By your own admission you’ve been knocking around here all alone for years. What’s changed, why bring someone here now?”
“Not knocking around.” He paused at her raised eyebrow and conceded. “Today being the exception. And not just someone. You.”
Elsa ducked her head and moved to the sink to wash the greens, hoping to hide her goofy grin. “Surely, there have been others.”
“Surely,” he said. He kept his eyes on the fish simmering in wine and herbs in the skillet, but as the silence lengthened, he darted a glance at her. He conceded again. “Yes, there have been others.”
Ah. Not so special after all. “You brought what’s her name here. Marcia? Marcy? Mercy?”
“Mercy?” He winked at her, catching the gibe. “Marilyn, you mean, and no. She was more of a Paul Moshein. Didn’t realize you’d made note. It’s been over and done a year now, almost two.”
Interesting. If not Marilyn, then who, she wondered. Not that it was any of her business. Not that she cared to share her own list of over-and-dones. “Michael tells all, you know, whether one’s interested or not.” She paused. “I’m not the jealous type, so don’t think you’ve ducked the question. Why me? Now?”
“That’s two questions.”
Elsa glared. Lijah slid the skillet off the burner and turned off the heat. He arranged several scones flavored with feta and chive on a baking sheet and slid them into the oven to warm. Using the towel on his shoulder to wipe off his gloves, he relaxed a hip against the counter and faced her directly.
“I brought you here because you are special, rare, possibly among the unique few. Also, I trust you. And I like you, a great deal. I brought you here now because you’ve caught up, all of a sudden, and I wouldn’t have you age beyond me.”
Elsa mirrored his pose, five feet away, her hip against the sink. “I like you too, Lijah. A great deal. Well, for the most part.”
Lijah chuckled and waited for her to continue.
“But the rest of it… the unique few… my age? I don’t understand.”
He turned away. “Food’s just about ready.”
He poured them each a large glass of a pale white wine. Elsa took the glasses to the table and then returned for silverware and napkins, butter and lemon wedges. Lijah whisked olive oil, vinegar, mustard and herbs in the bottom of a wooden salad bowl. He passed the bowl to Elsa to add the mix of greens and toss and managed to knock over the wine bottle right into the colander of lettuce in the sink. Elsa tried not to laugh at him while he plated the fish, pulled the scones from the oven and slid them into the basket, but lost it completely when, handing her the full basket, he bobbled it, dumping them to the floor. Lijah watched and grinned as she, blind with tears, scooped the scones back into the basket, five second rule. She carried everything to the table while he added the finishing touch: nuts, olives and apricots, to the cheese board.
Their feast assembled, they took seats opposite one another. Spanish guitar played softly in the background and early-afternoon sun streamed across the table, sparkling off the glasses and silverware. Still smiling, they sat for a bit, drank some wine, and enjoyed the quiet moment before settling into the meal.
Lijah slid some fish on his fork and raised it in toast. “Good appetite, Elsa.” He ate the bite, took a swallow of wine and reached for a scone.
“How old would you say I am?” he asked.
“Oh, that’s easy. Thirty-seven, thirty-eight. You’ve been the same age as long as I’ve known you.”
“You’re right, on both counts. But you,” he said, pointing his fork as if at a lectern. “You have jumped in the last year from your mid-twenties well into your thirties. I’m guessing you’re 34 now, give or take. I’m curious if your aging is intentional and if so, how old you plan to get? In the near term, I mean, over the next couple years.”
Elsa had been eating with zeal, but she switched to pushing food around on her plate while she assembled her thoughts.
“I’m not sure how intentional it is. Aging is that strange alchemy of biology, experience, and will. I suppose, subconsciously, I was done with my twenties. The novelty of being out in world, independent and self-reliant had worn off. I’ve racked up some experience, professional accomplishments, you know, failures too, and personally I’m feeling pretty settled.
“Settled?”
“Yeah, you know. Comfortable in my skin. I have a pretty good idea of who I am, the sort of life I’ll lead, and in the instances where I might have once denied certain aspects of myself or been disappointed with my prospects, I’ve come to accept them.”
Lijah’s hands lowered to the table and his chewing slowed to a stop while she spoke. Elsa paused and waited for his response which prompted him to sit upright, swallow his mouthful, and reach for his glass.
“If you mean all of that, you’ll be in your 60s by summer.”
Elsa rolled her eyes and resumed eating. “Your turn. You landed in your thirties, God knows when, and haven’t budged. It’s a curious choice. I don’t mean choice, literally, but I wonder how you explain your stasis.”
“It is a choice. I am the age I am because I choose it and no other. In truth, I’d prefer to be in my 40s but for now it behooves me to stay where I am. Don’t look at me like that. It may not be fashionable, but you know it’s possible. You’ve seen the stories. Even children, recovering from war or trauma, able to reverse the aging process and recover their childhood. Rare but documented. It’s far easier to consciously slow or still the aging process. It’s a technique, requires discipline, nothing more. I could teach you.”
“Why would I want to disrupt the natural process of aging?”
Lijah once again ate with gusto, talking between bites. “Aging deliberately is no less natural than aging haphazardly. It’s the same alchemy. No drugs. No magic.”
“I never said aging naturally was haphazard. Haphazard sounds accidental – like, oops, tripped on 18, landed on 26. Aging naturally is… synchronized; experience, will and biology are allowed to combine, or realize, harmoniously, without undo external influence and without over-emphasis of one factor over another. External trauma or illness can upset the natural process. Likewise, deliberately willing yourself to stay forever 37 denies simultaneous expression of experience and biology on age. That’s unnatural.”
“Eloquently put, Elsa. But in this instance, dead wrong. You have conflated ‘natural’ with ‘passive’. As if we age naturally only when we are looking the other way. Not your fault. Passivity has become the mantra of our time – so pervasive as to be universally accepted and therefore virtually invisible. Natural. But it’s a fundamental fallacy, a cultural sleight of hand. Because passivity is purposefully not paying attention.”
“Hang on. You’re saying that passivity is purposeful. As in active. Passive is active. Sounds like sophistry to me.” She took a swallow of wine. “Twice in one day, Professor. What’s gotten into you?”
“What I am saying is that we choose to be passive or active. So in that sense, yes, passivity is an active choice. There’s no sophistry there; we either choose to actively guide the aging process or not. The problem arises when we ascribe one choice or the other to nature. If something is innate or natural, it’s no longer a choice. To say aging passively is aging naturally is lazy thinking. Worse, it’s just lazy. Self-determination, whether it’s age or… other aspects of personhood, requires us to act, to make explicit choices. More fish?”
“What? Oh. Ah, yes please. This meal, it’s fantastic. Can I split the last scone with you?”
Lijah broke off a corner, handing the rest to Elsa, then sopped up the last of the sauce on his plate before helping himself to salad. He gestured for her to do the same, eager, she could tell, to continue the conversation. He was eating with a hearty appetite, they both were, and was clearly enjoying the meal and her company. She loved this moment, seeing Lijah like this: at home, at ease, happy.
“You’re feeling better,” she said.
He looked up mid-bite, caught her eye and smiled. “I am, thank you.”
“Good. Maybe now you’ll tell me how many years you have.”
Lijah pushed his plate forward, wiped his mouth, and sat back, carefully smoothing his napkin over his crossed legs. “Elsa.”
“Come on, Lijah. You’ve asked a lot of me, bringing me here, insisting I trust you. But you haven’t given me anything but riddles and abstractions. Give me something concrete, now, or take me home.” When he remained silent, she pressed. “How many years do you have?”
Lijah continued to smooth the napkin on his lap, but finally spoke. “One hundred. I have one hundred years.”
Elsa looked at him stunned. “You’re shitting me,” she laughed. “That’s preposterous.”
Lijah shook his head. “As of today, actually.”
Based on his expression alone, she believed him. Except it was impossible to believe. Five years, up to 10, between age and years wasn’t terribly uncommon. Fifteen or 20, rare. Much beyond that, unheard of. A 100 years? That meant he had 60 more years than his age. 63.
“Prove it.”
Without a word, he got up from the table and moved about the cottage, rifling through drawers, and assembling a small pile of objects, pictures and documents. A birth certificate, hand-written, the paper brittle and yellowed. A picture of a man, with Lijah’s face, leaning against an antique car in what looked like a 1930’s movie set. Another likeness of him in a military uniform, World War II. His father’s pocket watch, engraved with the dates 1844-1932, a gift from his mother after his dad died. There were other items without specific dates but obviously old and sentimental. Any one item could have been faked or explained away, the photos doctored or of relatives with striking family resemblance. Not that she could think of a single reason for doing so. Besides, she saw how he held them, with nostalgia, remembering his own life, not someone else’s.
She picked up the birth certificate, checking the date. One hundred years. Today. That milestone had to have existential weight, heavy enough for a reckoning, and as good as any explanation he’d offered for why he’d brought her here and now.
“Had I known, I’d have baked you a cake.” Her smile was strained. “This is your home? You grew up here?”
“I wasn’t raised here, no, but the property’s been in the family for generations.”
Generations. A lifelong endeavor. How else could this place be hidden if it hadn’t already been that way for… decades? Elsa picked up her wineglass and left the table, retreating to the corner of the room and an easy chair that could be swiveled to face out the window. Her back to the room, she stared out into the brilliant sunshine while Lijah changed the music to reggae, cleared the table, put leftovers away and cleaned up in the kitchen.
Twenty minutes later the clattering of dishes came to an end. In the relative quiet, she heard the music from the kitchen, a live version of the Jimmy Cliff classic, The Harder They Come. It occurred to her, he could’ve attended the debut.
Lijah came over to where she sat staring out the window. He took a seat on the floor beneath the window and leaned against the wall legs outstretched. She lowered her gaze from the blue-white brilliance of blazing sunshine on snow. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the still bright but filtered light indoors. She appraised him frankly.
“You’re pretty spry, I’ll give you that. And it certainly explains how you can be such a fucking know-it-all. God, Lijah. Why did you bring me here? It must give you some kind of perverse pleasure, duping people. Me. And then showing off, the big reveal. What’s next? Introduce me to your wife? Kids? Grandkids?” A tear escaped, which she swiped away angrily. She so wanted anger to win over hurt. What she needed was an explanation. “Why bring me here? Just tell me why.”
“I brought you here…,” said Lijah slowly and quietly. “I hoped… to show hands with you.”
Her eyes saucered with shock then flashed hot and angry. “Oh, that’s rich. We haven’t even slept together, Lijah. Which is… shit… Can you even get it up?”
She held up her hand, as much to silence herself as to keep him from responding. She closed her eyes against her tears and shook her head. She’d imagined him saying those exact words, asking to show hands with her. Someday. After they’d been intimate with one another, passionate, for months, and the statement a sign that he wanted to move their romance toward permanence, a lifelong commitment. Lifelong. What did that even mean with him 70 years ahead of her? God, her fantasy, her fledgling, not until this moment fully acknowledged hope for a shared future turned out to be a tired trope. Like a student’s infatuation for a teacher. Worse. Like a pubescent crush on her best friend’s father. God, it was oedipal. Grand-oedipal.
She felt outed; that her crass comment had revealed a fantasy for something that could never be. She would have preferred to sink into the floor. Instead she faced him. “Sorry. That was inappropriate and uncalled for.”
“I’m not married.” He paused. “Currently.” He grimaced. “I have no progeny of any kind. I may have a hundred years, but in mind, soul and,” he cleared his throat, “body, I am 37.”
Fucking Lijah. Forging ahead. “Nice. I get it. The plumbing still works. And you’re telling me this, why?”
“Because you asked. I wouldn’t presume…”
Elsa jabbed a finger at him. “Like hell you wouldn’t. You presume… everything.”
“I wouldn’t presume that showing hands implied a willingness to sexual intimacy.”
God. His comment embarrassed and outraged her even more. Her fantasy wasn’t ill-fated, it was one-sided and delusional. “Oh no, your presumption is far more basic. You presume I share your indifference. So what if friendship is built on honesty and trust. So what if intimacy is earned. So what if showing hands is a sacred covenant, the ultimate expression of trust and acceptance. Elsa and I? We can just skip to the chase. Well, sorry to disappoint. You should have asked for a mindless fuck.”
Elsa ended her tirade out of breath. Out of breath and out of steam. It helped that Lijah accepted her rage, neither ducking the onslaught nor duking it out pointlessly. It helped too that railing at one another had been the norm since they first met. Arguing was safe and venting cathartic. They both understood this.
While she slowed her breathing and regained control, he reached up overhead and plucked a piece of sea glass from the windowsill. It was the remnants of a blue bottle, the ring of the top and a bit of the neck still intact, dulled smooth and opaque. He dropped it inside his loose glove and proceeded to play with it, absentmindedly moving it around on the palm of his uninjured hand. Elsa had no idea what he was doing, or why, and it niggled at her. She refused, however, to be the one to break the long silence. He could fidget all he wanted. She’d said her piece. Whatever came next was on him. She swiveled the chair, enough to raise the footrest without hitting him, reclined and closed her eyes.
Lijah got up and walked away but returned almost immediately. She opened her eyes to see him standing by, offering a throw blanket.
“You’re not going to say anything?” asked Elsa.
“I figured… the timing was bad.”
“To talk?”
“To ask for a mindless fuck.”
It took a moment for the words to register. Elsa barked a laugh despite herself and Lijah’s cheeks gathered in a widening smile. Stretched long in the chair, she turned on her side, snatched the blanket from his hands and tucked it under her head. He pulled up a wooden chair alongside her and sat so they faced one another at eye level.
“My interest in showing hands with you, Elsa, may not be traditional, at least not in the sense of culminating a courtship, but it is to me, no less sacred. I know, that sounds like another vague riddle. I intend to explain exactly what I mean. But before I do, you need to know that with respect to the traditional understanding of showing hands, I have no intention of skipping to the chase. On the contrary, I am looking forward to commencing at the very beginning and lingering over every step on the way with utmost, some might say, obscene, attention to detail.”
Elsa soaked in his words like heat from the sun. “You are, Lijah…” And there she paused while habit brought any number of scathing remarks to mind. Tempting as they were, it turned out that a smiling, earnest and forthright Lijah charmed the pants off her. “You are… surprisingly good at, you know, bawdy banter.”
Lijah chuckled. He reached forward and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. His hand lingered, then stroked down her check. He tilted her chin, leaned in, and kissed her lips. The kiss was soft and chaste, an overture, but only if she chose to accept it as such. She did. Mimicking his gesture, she tucked an errant curl behind his ear and cupped his cheek. Lijah grinned. He kissed her again, more firmly, with an intent that Elsa matched, drawing him to her as she eased onto her back. Quickly their kisses turned voracious, all tongue and heat and sloppy spit. Elsa tugged and pulled, wanting him closer, and Lijah climbed right up onto the chair, pressing his weight, doing his best to accommodate.
An abrupt clank and precarious tip of the chair had Lijah jerking away, throwing his weight at her feet to keep the recliner from toppling over backwards. The near miss left them frozen in place, Elsa’s head tucked protectively to her chest and Lijah awkwardly balanced. Between the ardor and the shock, they were breathing hard, practically panting.
Slowly and carefully they resumed more natural positions. Lijah returned to his chair, wiping spittle from his chin. Elsa cranked the lever that dropped the footrest, bringing the chair into the upright position.
Lijah spoke first. “I am not, and have never been, indifferent to you, Elsa.”
“Right,” said Elsa. “Good to know. Likewise.”
Shy laughter danced between them, the kind that accompanied impossible but incredibly welcome good fortune. They hadn’t kissed, they’d detonated, and for a time neither one of them seemed capable of reassembling.
“We should,” said Elsa. “We should talk about that other stuff.”
“Other stuff,” repeated Lijah, his eyes dropping to her mouth and neck, sliding to her chest.
She ducked her head, catching his eye, laughter crinkling at the edges. “Quit it. You promised an explanation. Your reason for showing hands. Or was that kiss a calculated diversion.”
“No. No,” said Lijah, instantly stern and serious. “Not calculated. Not a diversion.”
Whiplash came to mind. Land mines. Whatever she said had tripped another. She held her breath, fearful of what he would call it. Another mistake? Or worse. Would he insist they discuss the kiss, subject it to analysis and debate?
The moment crackled for another beat before he abruptly dropped his vehemence. “It was a demonstration. Hard evidence, if you will, of my youthful virility despite my many years. Had you any lingering doubts.”
Lijah’s delivery was deadpan, and Elsa cracked up, enormously relieved. “Rest assured. Your point. Was noted. But right now, we’re having a conversation. About hands.”
Lijah eased back in his chair. Tension banked, he presented his usual self: precise, observant, guarded. “Last night. This morning, rather. You saw the markings on my hand. They are evidence of an ability, a power you might call it, that I have spent my life learning to understand and control. I have come to a point where I need help. Your help.”
“Go on.”
“I believe, Elsa, to the core of my being, that this power is a gift. A gift that shouldn’t be hidden or ignored. Self-determination is a matter of realizing our gifts. That’s true of everybody, but in my case the gift is particularly rare, and particularly powerful. Realizing my gift must be done cautiously and deliberately. Because with power comes responsibility.”
“In other words, you’re not an everyday Crafter. You’re a super-Crafter. You’ve been exploring the extent of your superpower, carefully, in secret. You need help, but only from someone you can trust to keep your secret. How am I doing?
“Remarkably well. The details are off, but so far you have the basic gist. What else have you deduced?”
Elsa looked out the window, concentrating. “In secret. Because you think your power is super enough to be dangerous. It could be abused by someone. If they knew about it, that is. If they knew, they would come after you.”
“There are those who know to look. And yes, they would come after me. Either to abuse the power or destroy it.”
“You mean you,” she said, looking at him directly. “They would abuse or destroy you.”
“To them, I’m just a vessel, inconsequential.”
“To them, but not to you. To you, this power is your essence. Integral to your… personhood. Personhood! You said ‘other aspects of personhood’, before, when we were talking about age.”
Her gaze drifted as she followed the thread of her thoughts. “So… by analogy, your power, my power for that matter, anybody’s power is not something innate. It’s realized, just like age, deliberately, actively, in the choices you make.”
She looked up now, to see Lijah marveling at her.
“Exactly. Elsa.”
She blushed. “I have steam coming out of my ears, don’t I?”
“Don’t stop now.”
“What? Oh.” She grimaced and drummed her fingers on the table. “Alright. So you’re super-Crafter, or at least are trying to be. To you, it’s like some sort of existential imperative. So, you hide away here, forever 37, while you self-realize. But now you want help. My help. Usually you use me to help clarify your thinking. There’s something about this super-power that you are having trouble figuring out and two brains are better than one.”
Lijah’s expression was blank, neither confirming nor denying.
“Okay. You want to do more than talk. You want to show hands. Meaning… you want to show me your hands? To help with your research? Because you can’t be your own test subject. You need me to experiment on you.”
Elsa waggled her eyebrows, then blushed, suddenly realizing that bawdy banter had more bite now that they’d gulped each other’s saliva.
“Let’s be clear,” said Lijah. “I want to show hands with you. You see mine. I see yours. See. Touch… Taste.”
Elsa started. Lijah caught her eye and waggled his eyebrows. Elsa made a face at him.
“Experiment and learn,” said Lijah. “Completely uncovered, in every sense.”
Elsa shook her head, trying to figure it out. “Doesn’t make sense. I mean, sure, we work together. We’re a good team. Your yin. My yang. But I’m not… Or, maybe you thought, but… Lijah. I’m not Crafter. Surely you’d benefit more by collaborating with another Crafter, someone who had the same type of power, even if not the same magnitude.”
“I’m not Crafter,” said Lijah.
“What?”
“I’m not Crafter. Or more precisely, I’m not only Crafter. I’m Crafter. And Feeler. And Knower. I’m all three. Combined. Or possibly something entirely different, but I don’t think so. It’s more likely that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. But regardless, I am …”
“Unique,” breathed Elsa, her voice little more than a whisper.
“Rare. Among the unique few. There’s more…”
“Wait.” Among the unique few. She’d heard him say that before. About her. “Wait,” she said again.
“That’s right, Elsa. I think you and I share the same gift: Feeler, Crafter, Knower. Combined. I brought you here because you need me as much as I need you.”