Giles, floating in emptiness, should have felt peace.

He was finished. He had done more than a person could really hope to do in a normal life.

He had saved the world.

The world had its blue sky back, the demons (whatever they were) were … well, whether gone or not, they were at peace with the humans.

He could see scenes from many places and times. He saw Tiffany arrive with Silver Mary at the shores of the moonlit pool at the base of the waterfall. He had sacrificed himself to give them this but he could not see where Mary Hammond and Tiffany went after that.

He saw RJ and Hiyako arrive at Mrs. Benz’s house to pick up Jasmine. They all shared a meal. The old woman, at last off the endless cycle, spoke wistfully of her long life with Jerry until he passed peacefully away in his sleep. She spoke of the children who had played on the ketchup and mustard climbing set and who were now grown men who visited occasionally. And as they too drifted into a future he could not see, Jasmine turned her wise little face and for a moment, seemed to look straight at him.

It was stupid to regret anything. But even more strongly than before he felt the ancient grief that he had let Melanie Greyfire walk away from him.

He had held the love he always craved in the palm of his hand and he’d let her go without telling her how much he loved her.

How had he taken a love like that for granted? He should have cherished it every day. But she was dead, years dead, and better so. She, she…

There was nothing good about her dying in a senseless accident.

If he’d only looked up from his stupid video game, the hypnotic screen, the carnival colors that gleamed in his eyes, he could have had a final image of her pulling on a jacket, closing the door behind her. And then if he had only put down the goddam coffee mug and shaken off the snake fascination of a higher and higher score…

From between her mother and father, Jasmine’s deep, solemn, joyful eyes looked into his. Her lips moved but he couldn’t hear her. That was nuts, he’d heard everything old Mrs. Benz had said. Maybe she only moved her lips so that only he would know what she said. “The beloved,” she seemed to say.

The Beloved…

The red letters from the walls of the corridor, the writing which now floated free in the world. “The beloved, long mourned as lost, was found again…”

More and more vividly, he saw the grainy pixels, the clown-beep and blip, the jagged numbers which gave his highest score ever. He held the coffee mug in his left hand, felt the chip in the handle, rough cream in silken smoothness, clicked with his right hand so fast that the mouse didn’t even register all his clicks…

The mug hit the table and cold coffee with half and half sloshed onto the back of his hand. He looked up at Melanie’s blacklight poster on the wall, heart pounding with chance and opportunity.

His feet seemed too clumsy to carry someone as light and filled with purpose as he was. He lurched upright, ran and caught the door just before it closed behind her angry feet.

He’d forgotten how plain she was. Over the years she’d grown prettier in his memory. There was nothing classically beautiful about her as she turned to see why he was following her.

But she stopped his heart with her look: longing, guarded longing.

She’d been hoping he would follow her. Walking out the door leaving an argument hanging had been hard for her. Behind her guarded eyes he now saw what he’d seen in the beginning and forgotten: a throbbing passion, warm as a red cat, ready to gush like a spring in a high meadow.

She watched, careful but ready to be in love again as he stopped before her and said with no planning at all, “To hell with the stupid game, I want to be with you and I can’t even remember what we were fighting about but I’m sorry for my part in it, can I come with you now?”

It was too abrupt for her to really trust an about-face as full as that. But she held out her hand silently and he took it. “Ummm, doof, aren’t you going to lock the door?” she chided.

“Right, right,” he laughed and went back and did that. With his heart jumping and pounding, he walked beside her, this woman who had died four years ago.

When he stole little glances, she was doing so many things he had treasured at first and then taken for granted. Her face was quizzical as she noticed things and then got lost in a reasoning process. Her free hand shaped diamonds and fractals in the air as she worked out some thought train and her body relaxed against his side, right where she wanted to be.

The rest happened so fast. Outside the apartment door, she made to dart across the street to the bakery, still working out whatever puzzle would make her fail to look where she was going.

Without thought, Giles tugged her hand. Surprised, she turned to him. He smiled at her and kissed her, like he had to do spontaneously when their love was fresh. She kissed back happily as a bright red motorcycle roared harmlessly by, the motorcycle that would have hit her just wrong and flung her to crack her skull against the curb.

She laughed and said, “Doof, you made me lose my train of thought.” Her eyes got tender. “Holy kittens, are you crying, sweetie?”

Hands slick, he held her close. Yes, he was crying against her face. He also looked frantically around to avoid anything else that would kill her; he’d heard and even told stories where someone goes back in time to save their beloved but it’s fated that they die. But nothing came to swallow her up.

The sun shone on them, her arms went around him with unquestioning comfort and acceptance. “Something big happened, tell me what?”

Could he tell her? Would he tell her? You can’t have a deep and healthy relationship with someone where you’re lying about something as basic as “I let you die but it’s okay, I came back in time to save you.”

Another day! For the moment he steered her to the crosswalk, looked tremblingly both ways and walked with her to the bakery for the corn rye rolls that already smelled good, and a future where he wouldn’t let love slip away or take it for granted again.

***

Some demons yawn at human affairs and others are outright mischievous.

And then there’s Tiffany.

The demons are in our world now for good. For Good, in both senses. Tiffany has seen to that. She saved a storyteller and the teller told the tale.

And now she hears the thunder of white water, holds her beloved’s hand in her own. She begs forgiveness with eyes and touch. But Silver Mary faces away, hollow eyes not seeing the gleaming waterfall in the blue night.

For she looked back, like Lot’s wife, just before the gateways closed, and she saw her only son fall to his knees and die, and knew what he had done.

How long they sit there Tiffany cannot tell. She has saved the world but her beloved will not look at her. There is nothing worse than to hold love in your golden palms and to lose it. Inwardly she weeps but her face is calm. She waits for Silver Mary to tell her what they must do. She cannot even tell her, “I only did it because it was needed, the world would not have been saved without his sacrifice.”

Somehow she senses her old teacher returned to her own time, standing in moonlight like this with her two men watching a gravity car swish and hiss down the rails on a shining night on a mountainside. This happened more than a hundred years ago but it is happening now, and it pulls Tiffany back to the world.

Jasmine is working rich brown clay on the wheel, the sensual stuff sliding beneath her gifted fingers. She can no longer walk the corridors, the corridors have exploded their stories into the world and are no more. But as she works, she can see Tiffany and Silver Mary. Tiffany can see her as though she looks over their shoulders at the waterfall in the County Kerry of Mary’s youth.

Jasmine tries to catch Mary’s eye. She wants to show her something.

Behind her are visitors. Giles and Melanie have come to call in this new reality. He still looks at her with wonder and tenderness, refusing to take any moment for granted. Jasmine wants Silver Mary to see this. But Mary will not look up.

Emboldened by the revelation, Tiffany tries to get the attention of her beloved. If she will only look, she will see that Giles is not dead at all, that he is happy. If she will only look, she will see that everyone in this story gets a happily ever after, even the son she thought she’d outlived.

Mary’s fingers curl around her stiff knees and the moon glints off a tear which trails down her cheek and still she will not look.

Tiffany knows not what to do.

But Jasmine has been shown to be incredibly persistent.

The End