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She’d been here, just now, a vision of perfection, shockingly real after I’d had to contend with only the memory of her for so long. When I’d first laid eyes on her as she’d entered the cave, the reality of seeing her again had rocked me to my core, razing all pretense of the role I’d needed to play, stripping me of any logic but the one that said I needed to yank her into my arms and never let her go.
It had taken all of my considerable control to wrestle that impulse into submission and continue with the charade I needed to keep up. Still, those barely leashed urges to close the distance between us and touch her in the ways so achingly familiar, to talk to her without the pretext of not knowing her, kept rising to the fore.
Because I did know her, and treating her as if I didn’t sliced nauseous wounds across my heart.
And so I’d given in, had ventured onto perilous ground by re-creating the scene that had, once upon a time, changed so much between us, hoping against hope that she might remember.
With the result that I now had to watch her run away from me, wrenching away that little sliver of surcease from the pain her absence had been causing me.
Damn it all to Heaven.
I was about to follow her despite her snarled warning, when a female voice coming from the back of the cave, where a tunnel led to smaller rooms and another exit, froze my muscles.
“Well, that went well.”
With a sigh, I turned toward the source of the voice. “How long have you been there?”
Naamah leaned against the curved opening to the tunnel, her lips pressed together and a twinkle in her eye. “Long enough to see that the reunion with your long-lost love went quite smashingly.”
I rubbed a hand over my face. Hell save me from maternal inquisitiveness.
“I mean, you were so very careful,” she said as she straightened from the wall and sauntered toward me, illustrating her points with lazy hand waves, sarcasm drenching her every word. “Moved slowly. Gave her time. Resisted the ill-fated idea to push the reenactment of a memory onto her at the very first meeting.” She nodded in false approval.
“Mother,” I grated.
“No, no.” She made a shushing gesture, coming to a stop next to me. “Credit where credit is due. After all our meticulous planning, you certainly made sure to play your part and ease her into this”—her hands imitated laying a sleeping baby in a crib, or maybe positioning a ticking bomb carefully onto the ground—“to lay the groundwork so you can subtly try to jog her memory over time.” At that last line, she shot me a pointed look.
I gritted my teeth so hard a muscle popped painfully in my jaw. “I fucked it up.”
She clucked her tongue. “Negligibly. Whatever happened to your infamous patience?” Those eyes of warm turquoise, now clear and cunning and without a hint of pain or mental confusion, pinned me to the spot. “You’ll have to take your time with her. Don’t rush it. You don’t know whether springing information about her past on her without preparation could cause her mind to splinter. This requires a delicate approach.”
My hands balled into fists without my conscious doing, frustration and longing and an ache that pulled at my soul scratching me bloody on the inside. “I know. It’s just—I’ve waited so long.”
“Exactly.” My mother fully turned to me, empathy softening the lines of her face. “You’ve waited eight years for her. For this. What are a few weeks more? A few months, if that’s what it takes? You’ll have eternity with her.” She laid her hand on my shoulder and squeezed.
I closed my eyes, relishing the casual maternal caress that had seemed impossible only a few years ago. For millennia, I’d been deprived of this simple yet profound contact with my mother, and part of me still couldn’t believe I now had her in my life again—even if the contact had been restricted, our only chance to speak during those monthly visits of hers on Earth. It was still more than I’d thought possible not that long ago.
Not that long ago…
I scoffed, half amused and half annoyed at myself.
“What?” Naamah asked.
“Time,” I replied. “Our perception of time is a curious thing. When it comes to Zoe, those eight years I’ve been waiting to see her again seemed like forever. But having you back in my life for the same amount of time feels like it went by in the blink of an eye.”
“It’s because we measure the absence of someone we love far heavier than we do their presence.”
I scowled at her.
She winked and turned away in a swirl, humming and singing the line “You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone.”
“For the record,” I grumbled as she moved in graceful circles to the place where Zoe had dropped the dagger, “I did know what I had in her, while I had her.”
“Always so literal,” she mused and picked up the dagger, examining it closely. “You should lighten up.” She sniffed the blade and then held it to her ear as if listening to some melody worked into the metal. “You are in Heaven now, after all. The place of love and light and all things sparkly.” She made an appropriate gesture, wiggling her fingers in the air.
The stirrings of a smile pulled at the corners of my mouth. Whatever being in close proximity to God’s power had done for her shattered mind, it had not diminished the idiosyncrasies of her personality. This was who she was at her core, beautifully eccentric, delightfully peculiar. Only now without the abyss of darkness swallowing her time and time again.
“As for your dear, amnesia-plagued wife,” Naamah continued, now using the dagger to pick dirt out from under her nails, “I will make sure she’ll be back here tomorrow.”
