Anamnesis by Zorina Alliata (red queen free ebook TXT) 📖

all burned inside the next generation, all their knowledge and thoughts, and emotions. It's called anamnesis. It's our spirituality, what we get from our ancestors. We might not know their names, but they left traces inside of us. I am just one who can see these traces clearly; but nevertheless they exist in each and every one of us. You know that."

"But when you die, no one will see me clearly anymore. I will be a grain of sand on a beach. I lived for only 17 years. I never knew much. What do I live behind?"

"Come here," I said. He put his head into my lap and I kissed his forehead. "You made me happy and kept me company, and you've been a true friend for three years. I love you and I need you. You are sweet and caring and you help me live my horrible destiny. That's what you did. You're now burned into my soul. And before I die, I will accomplish my dream and I will leave my knowledge into this world. How, I don’t know yet. But I will, because I can’t let my gift go to waste. I can't let my family's discoveries be forgotten. So don't you worry. I'll find a way."

He sat there in silence, his blue eyes blurry. "So do you really like this Feliks guy?" he finally asked.

"Like a stupid schoolgirl on her first crush," I admitted.

"Do you think he's the one for you?"

"No," I said. "I don’t think there is such a thing. He's earthly and healthy and doesn't believe in things he can't touch. If I get close, I'll just make him sick and unhappy. So I won’t. I'll just sit here and love him for a while, that's all. It will pass. It always does."

"Don’t wear your low-cut camisole around him then," he said smiling. "You'll drive the man crazy."

*-*-*

Dante opened his eyes yet again to see Bea’s beautiful face. “We have to stop meeting like this,” he said.

She laughed. She had changed her uniform for a pink t-shirt and slacks. She wore pink bunny rabbit slippers and Dante looked at them, fascinated; they had long ears and whiskers and everything. He had never actually met an adult person who wore anything like that.

“I made fresh coffee,” Bea offered. “Please drink. Please don’t fall asleep again. You should try to stay awake for a while.”

Dante gladly accepted the hot cup for her hands. They touched fingers and he couldn’t help notice her tiny, transparent nails, beautifully polished.

“Oh, this isn’t my apartment,” he suddenly realized, looking around.

“Sorry,” she said. “You fell asleep before giving me your address, so I drove here to my place. I hope you don’t mind. I want to keep an eye on you anyway tonight. You shouldn’t be left alone.”

She was a bad liar and Dante smiled, flattered. “So, tell me about yourself,” he said. “I mean, if we have to stay awake, we can at least make some interesting conversation.”

“Sure,” she said approvingly. “Uh… I am from Richmond. I am a nurse. That’s pretty much it.”

He laughed. “God, and I thought I hated to talk about myself,” he said. “At least I describe my life in about 10 words, you only used 8.”

“It’s just nothing interesting, that’s all,” she blushed again.

“No boyfriend? Husband? Former husband? Come on, you gotta give me something. Look, I’m falling asleep again, see? You need to keep me entertained.”

She laughed again. “No boyfriend, no husband, no former husband. I have a major fear of commitment.”

“Oh my God,” Dante said approvingly. “Commitment sucks. I so get you.”

They looked at each other, smiling.

“What else is one of the worst things I should know about you?” Dante asked. “Tell me now before we get to the good stuff.”

“I am invisible,” she confessed after a hesitation. “Nothing happens to me, ever. Nobody notices me. Which is totally fine by me,” she hurried to add.

“I have the opposite problem,” Dante sighed. “Everybody invites me to lunch, I don’t know why.”

She knew why. In the light of the fading sun, Dante looked like a male supermodel at the height of his career; his arched eyebrows, his turned eyelashes, his strong cheek bones, his honest blue eyes, his tender expression – Bea found it hard to believe that he was actually a real person, illuminating so much beauty around him. She touched his hand gently to convince herself he was there on her couch. Dante immediately caught her fingers and held them tight, and slowly took them up and kissed them.

“I love your nails,” he whispered. “So few people know how to take care of their nails.”

She enjoyed his kisses on her fingers; instinctively she pulled closer to him, until their hips touched; they both felt the heat, the chemistry swirling through their bodies. Dante turned his attention to her face and gently took her head in his palms, and kissed her trembling lips. She tasted of honey and strawberries, and he could feel her passion underneath all that neat surface, waiting to be discovered and brought forward.

“One last thing you should know about me,” she whispered. “I’m a control freak. Hence the perfect nails.”

“I was hoping you were,” Dante whispered back. “Control freaks are the best.”

They kissed again, incapable of keeping apart.

*-*-*

Wednesday night I met Dante at Wings & Claws for beer; to my surprise, he was not alone – a cute girl was holding his hand.

“Hey, Anna, this is Bea,” he announced loudly as soon as he saw me.

“Really great to meet you,” I said, shaking her hand. “So are you guys on a date?”

“This is one continuous date we had since we met,” Dante explained, laughing. “Yesterday she called me in her office and I fell asleep from the flu pills! She took care of me last night and then we took today off and just stayed at her place… and then it was time to meet you, so here we are! By the way, we’re both control freaks, neat freaks, and we both hate commitment!”

He was so changed; he was happy and excited. His aura sparkled with pops and crackles; he was in love. I smiled; the numbers seemed to have fallen in the right place around him; she completed him in many ways, enough to keep him interested and comfortable for many years to come.

They had ordered cheese fries and were eating them in the same manner, cutting them in small pieces with a fork and knife held in the correct position as suggested by Miss Manners; when Bea spoke, she politely covered her mouth so we wouldn’t see bits of the food in her mouth.

I reached and grabbed a fry with my bare hand and bit into it. As far as I knew, that was the normal way of eating those in a bar. But Dante and Bea missed the point I was trying to make. They were too preoccupied looking at each other.

“So, Bea,” I said, my mouth open while I was still chewing a piece of fry. “Why did you have to call Dante into your office? Is he sick or something?”

“Oh,” she said. “The Manager of Security called me and said Dante’s acting weird, and that he needed a head test. But then I don’t think there’s anything wrong with him.”

“Well, of course not,” I said. “He just had a bad week, that’s all. Lots of unusual things are going on at the Company. That shareholders meeting has made everyone crazy, and all those layoffs – now half the floors are empty and creepy.”

“I know,” Bea agreed. “I will file a report tomorrow and say he’s okay.” She turned and smiled at Dante.

“Well,” he joked, “it’s good to get confirmation from an expert that you are okay in your head.”

“I’m no expert,” she blushed.

“You are the best expert ever,” he said playfully, “Yes, you are.”

“Hi,” I heard suddenly. I turned around and, to my great surprise, I saw Feliks.

“Hi,” I said. “What are you doing here?”

“Just hanging,” he said.

I introduced him to Dante and Bea, and noticed that Dante was winking in my direction as if he figured out what Feliks meant to me. I looked back at him with an annoyed expression, and he responded with an innocent face.

“Please join us,” he told Feliks. “We’d be delighted.”

I looked at Dante again, but he was doing it because he didn’t want me to feel lonely while he was enjoying Bea’s company. So I didn’t say anything and slid over a chair to Feliks.

He sat down and held his own in our drunken binge, downing bottles with that Eastern European good-natured ability to get wasted at any time for any reason. He and Dante hit it off right away; Feliks had a sense of humor and a natural charm that made him irresistible to anyone. Dante appreciated a male friend, and soon was babbling with Feliks about wars and battles in the Balkans, things I never knew Dante was interested in.

As for me, I noticed that I could not get drunk that night. It took all my concentration to pretend there was no other feeling there except friendship – which I really felt, too, but was overcome by a burning desire of holding him against a wall and pressing my body against him. My brain was so busy with all the pretending, no amount of alcohol could get through to it. At times I talked too much, in a rush to explain myself to him, to make myself look interesting and intriguing; but most of the time I was quiet. Nothing was to come out of this; the despair was silencing me.

Feliks was not a big talker either; he listened really well, which was part of his charm. He wasn’t as good looking as Dante, but easily equaled Dante’s success with women; I saw them every time watching him with hungry eyes, talking to him in softened voices. He was just above average in height, had dirty blonde hair and common brown eyes; and yet he had a charisma that made people notice him as soon as he stepped into a room. It was hidden in the numbers around his neck, a string of unexpected prime numbers in an otherwise ordinary setting; it was almost like an accident, like that glow and light got there by mistake and could have disintegrated at any time; but I have seen too many accidents like this, and came to believe it was them that made us who we are.

He did not talk much about his fiancée; he also stayed late drinking with us and never called her to say when he’d be home. I saw these things and was satisfied.

In my head, I talked with Feliks all the time; I called him ¸abo, and told him about my life and my troubles; I fantasized about him saying that he didn’t care, that he wanted me anyway; to just hold me and grow old with me. That he would die for me and not regret it; that a year with me was worth more than a lifetime with his fiancée.

At home, I dissected this love thing over and over again. It was a different feeling this second time around, much stronger than it was when