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Helena should have known that it wasn't over.
But it was easy to think such things in retrospect, pointing out all the obviouslies and clearlies that left a breadcrumb trail all the way back to how when she'd cleverly joked that he would've been a lousy addition to the service industry, his laughter had abruptly dissolved into a confused, "What?"
At that moment, the world (and Helena's surety on the identity of the man standing before her) had tilted off-balance, but she wasn't a circus brat for nothing and righted herself up with a segue as smooth as a three-ball cascade.
"Circus humour," she'd said. "You get the hang of it."
The expression he gave her then had been part confused and part intrigued — but it was had also been so utterly human that it had made the hopeful thing that had bloomed in Helena's chest to stutter and go still.
But that was months ago.
Today, it was Helena's turn to frown and go, "What?"
"You were there!" His hands fluttered frantically. "You were..." His voice trailed off in the face of her confusion, the pathetic uncertainty of his expression very much like a puppy waiting for the kick it has coming.
Helena sighed and put down her sketchbook. "Do you want tea, or something? You look like you could use it."
"Yes, tea!" he said, relieved. "Tea would be good."
Tea was just an excuse; a technique her mum used all the time to keep the hands busy while the brain set itself to order. So Helena did exactly that, moving around the apartment kitchen while he sat on the stool and wrung his hands. His worried little eyes were alien things on a face that Helena still couldn't look at directly without getting a strange sort of double-vision.
"Jason, drink," she said, pushing a cup into his hands.
He mumbled under his breath before setting his lips to the cup. Those eyes again lifted over the edge of the ceramic to look into hers, and there it was, that little flutter beneath her ribcage that she'd told herself had no right to be there because he was—
Or rather, he wasn't.
"We're friends, right?" he said suddenly. "I mean, I know we've only known each other a short time but..."
"Yes, Jason, we're friends," Helena said. "Wait, does my dad know you're here? Are you missing rehearsal?"
"To the yes, and to the no, and to the if you care so much about rehearsals, what are you doing here mucking about in your nighty things, hmm?"
There it was again: the double vision, except this time it was double hearing, not that Helena had ever thought such a thing could exist. She turned away quickly and busied herself pouring another cup for her guest.
"Was that not...?" Jason said, his voice lilting in the other direction, softer and kinder. "Sorry, I didn't mean it like that."
"It's okay," Helena said, wincing at the naturalness of his apology, and didn't that pretty much sum up the last couple of months.
His name was Jason, and since he had a completely banal Anglo-Saxon family name, Helena had taken to calling him Jason of Ipswich in her head. She'd never actually told him that, because then he'd ask why and she'd have to make up a lie on the spot, which she really didn't want to do because Jason of Ipswich was, by all accounts, a normal young man with a normal young man's history, and any excuse she could give would just illicit that same uncomprehending look of "What" that she was really starting to loathe.
"You've been with us for, what is it, three months now?" Helena said, joining him on the other stool. "In circus time that's practically forever so yes, we're friends."
Three months of trying to find the trapdoor, the trick sleeve, the hidden ace. She'd tried (oh yes, how she'd tried) to weave a new thread between them reminiscent of what she'd thought had been left behind, only to find that Jason of Ipswich had no hackles that she could raise. Which was just wrong.
There was probably a better word for it, but Helena had settled for just wrong.
Oh sure, the hardworking and sweetly polite thing that he had going for him would've endeared him to any girl, but only if that girl weren't Helena.
Three months and he hadn't once made fun of her performance constume.
That should have been enough to discard any notion she had of him being the other. The cracks were clear between the two, like etchings that wouldn't align no matter how hard she squinted.
So it had been three months of looking and not understanding what manner of reality this was; then two and half months coming to terms with the thought that maybe this was just the way things were, for if Helena deserved this place and its real life brand of glamour, then Jason of Ipswich was what she deserved as well. She'd not wanted to think about that quiet loss and what it meant, for there was nothing in the world worth regretting now that mum was up and about again.
It was a small price to pay, all things considered. Helena might even be growing up, if she could think such things with only the smallest of aches.
And yet, the little knot in Helena's tummy that she sometimes thought of as her instinct bladder had simply refused to let this go, for there were times when he would look at her just so, an eyebrow raised and mouth wide in a grin that was too knowing to be anything but the mask of the very same man she'd seen dazzled by shiny things and the promise of dessert. But then the moment would pass and he'd be Jason of Ipswich again, only a little bit handsome between the unremarkable softness of his eyebrows and nose.
He had that look now as he finished his second cup of tea, humble and contemplative. Then he put down his cup and cleared his throat. "I kissed you."
Helena sputtered a little, grateful that she had finished her own cuppa. "What?"
"Earlier this evening, I kissed you." He was serious.
Helena's neck felt warm, because he was definitely looking at her lips now, though the eyes darted back up quickly in some semblance of being polite again.
"I'm pretty sure you didn't," Helena said. "Did you skip dinner? You look a little pale."
"No, what? You're changing the subject."
"I'm changing the subject because the previous subject was rubbish," Helena said. "You didn't kiss me. I'm pretty sure I'd remember."
"No, well, yes, but no," Jason said. "It was this evening, in the — what was it — you know that little clearing just outside the costume-change area? Right there. And it was you, but it wasn't you."
It wasn't you.
The words echoed heavy in Helena's ears. Suddenly she was wide awake and staring hard at Jason.
"Describe it to me — I mean her, describe her to me." Her heart was starting to pound out a harsh beat, and it was lucky thing that she had enough feeling left in her fingers to put her cup on its saucer without a clatter.
"Well, she was, she was... not quite you," Jason said. "Though she sure as hell looked like you."
"You knew she wasn't me?" Helena asked.
"It's a little..." Jason paused, trying to find the words. "You know how when you're on a ferris wheel that's spinning, and you're upright but the horizon's not as straight as it should be? Just like that. Only with a person."
Oh, Helena knew that feeling exactly. "But you kissed her anyway."
"Oh I do protest, she kissed me, mind," Jason said quickly. "And she said something about bringing me home, or bringing me back, it was very strange."
Something in Helena found a quiet eureka. Perhaps it was her forte in life to find patterns and hunt for hidden signs. Now that she she knew what to look for, she could see it bright as day.
Staring her right in the face, even.
She should have known. The knowledge was buried in her bones of how the story was supposed to end, and the ending she'd got three months ago wasn't an ending at all.
"Wait, she said she was going to bring you home?" she said.
"You can't expect me to quote the crazy lady, no space for crazy lady rantings in here," Jason said, tapping his forehead.
"We've got to go now, get up, come on." Helena moved quickly, rushing back to her room to grab a jumper and pull it on. She could feel the buzzing under her skin now, her entire body warming up and bracing itself.
"What're you on about?" Jason said, watching as she pulled on her sneakers.
When Helena looked up, he was standing in the doorway, only the light from the window was falling across his face in such a way that it was—
His mouth fell open in a scream: "Helena!"
She turned her head.
The shadows were close, but she was fast, grabbing Jason's arm as she ran. "Come on!"
"What is that, what is that?" he said, his voice going high.
"Just keep moving!"
She could hear it now, too, the soft creaking like broken springs of a music box. She knew exactly what kind, too.
They made it out of the apartment as the dark things swept close, and Helena headed straight down the stairs without pause. Jason thankfully sensed her urgency and kept up, only once in a while gasping whenever he looked over his shoulder.
Helena only came to a stop when they made it out to the street. She looked up, and sure enough, the trees were the wrong shape, and the night sky the wrong colour.
"What's happening?" Jason whispered, out of breath.
"You've got to trust me right now," Helena said, turning around to take his hands in hers. "Whatever happens from this moment on, you've got to trust me. And I'm going to trust you to know when it's me, and not her. Can you do that for me?"
"You're a very strange young woman," Jason said.
"And you're a very important man," Helena said.
Jason stopped to consider that. "I am?"
"You are," Helena said firmly. She could see the clearness in his face now, and how easy it had been to misunderstand the wrongness she'd seen in him.
It was wrongness, but not the kind she'd initially thought.
"You're incomplete," Helena said, squeezing his hands. Butterfingers. "But don't worry, I'm going to fix it."
"Fix it?" The skeptical hesitance on his face clinched it. It made sense that when the trickery went the other way, her eyes had gone all black; his had gone human, but the effect was almost exactly the same. He leaned a little closer and said, "How can you fix something when you're not even sure that it's broken in the first place?"
"Valentine, just trust me," Helena said.
"I trust you," he said, no hesitation, no pause.
Helena grinned. She should have known that it wasn't over.
And thank goodness for that.