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will, i said, will, wake up. he rolled over and opened his eyes; they shone at me, wet and black in the faint glimmer of moonlight that had leaked through our department-store-sale curtains.
lyra, he said. his voice was wracked with pain and harsh sadness, with sharp longing that cut at me, sure as any knife.
no, i said, and watched the slow slide through broken glass, as he remembered who he was. you were dreaming.
jenny, he said, slowly. satisfying himself.
yes, i told him. my fingers slipped to the side of his face, caught the curve of his cheek. his skin was slick with sweat; he had been screaming. are you all right?
they're all atoms, he whispered, bound together, so nothing can break them apart. how can i be anything but all right?
the cat at the foot of the bed was staring at me with calm, eerie eyes, her tail twined close around his ankle. i couldn't make out much of her, just the glowing slits of her eyes.
--
we met at one of the university do's, you know the kind. the ones where you sit around a table and sip at cheap wine and listen to deans and professors and all of them tell you about your future, about how exciting your field is and then someone gets an award, and you clap politely and just really want to go home. we were both students at the time, bored out of our brains and oblivious to the intrigue that filtered through the room, to the grants and backstabbing and good words for your friends, not so good words for your not-friends.
we were stuck at the same table. i didn't want to circulate the room; i'd worn uncomfortable shoes, because a boy i liked had told me he was coming too, and i hadn't realized he was bringing his boyfriend. my friends, such as they were, had no such qualms, and had left me to pick at stale crackers and drink the flat champagne that was sitting on the clean white linen. we'd sat in silence, for a bit; they were piping something that might have been simon and garfunkel over the sound system, and it curled into my ears and sat there, warm and comfortable and easy.
i watched him quietly; he was watching me too. my first impressions of him were mostly that he was not very tall (though still taller than me; admittedly not a hard thing) and that he had the saddest eyes i had ever seen on a person. in one of my english classes, in my last year of high school, we had seen a picture of a man, a jewish man; an old man and it had been a recent photo. he'd had eyes like that, standing at the side of a grave; sharply sad, but an old sadness, a sadness buried deep. they were brown eyes, fringed with black lashes.
he got up and sat next to me. "no point being alone," he said.
i smiled. "don't you just hate these things?"
"can't stand them. will parry, theoretical physics." he was wearing a black suit, and it was a little crumpled at the cuffs when he offered me his hand. i thought that he must have been in a hurry to go.
"jenny davies," i said, engaging his grip, "anthropology. this is an anthro thing," i added, "what are you doing here? not to be rude, but um." his palm was dry and warm, his fingers wrapping loosely but steadily about mine.
he shrugged. "i'm taking a class. my professor suggested that we show up tonight."
i grinned. "oh, that kind of suggestion?"
"the kind of suggestion accompanied by a throwing star," he said, wryly. "not that the metal detectors would have let her bring in a thing, but you know. she's got a whole sword collection, apparently. japanese relics." his mouth was curved up, just slightly, at the corners. it made his eyes look much, much kinder, though no less sad.
"wow," i said, "that's pretty intimidating."
"yeah," he said. he was holding a glass of the red; i asked if it was any good. he shrugged. "depends on your definition of good. good-for-one-of-these-things. yours?"
"it's flat," i said, "but otherwise, you know. what you said."
the room was going quiet, people drifting back to their seats.
"oh god," i said, "speeches."
he winced. "i think i might just duck out to the loos and not come back, you with me?"
"but your professor," i muttered, out of the corner of my mouth. "japanese swords."
"i think i can handle them," he said, "what about you."
"yeah," i said, "okay, lead on."
we sat in the parking lot, out in front of the building. it was dark, stars pricking the sky very brightly. i was wearing a cocktail dress and shivering; without a word he slipped out of his jacket and handed it to me.
"are you sure?" i asked.
"you've practically got goosebumps," he said, "i'll be fine."
it was still warm from him, and the sleeves were too long for me. i tilted my head up. "you ever try to count the stars?" i asked. "i used to, when i couldn't sleep. we lived second-floor from the top, in one of those apartment building blocs? and i'd go and sit on the fire escape and count the stars. i could barely see them, 'cause of the pollution, so it was hard. i usually fell asleep after a hundred or so, my dad kept finding me curled up next to the ladder. scared the shit out of my mum."
he shook his head, not saying anything; i thought that i might have said something very wrong, and did not speak. after a little while, he sighed. "it was too bright. i'm from london, there were always lights." and then he looked at me, turning his head, calmly. his eyes were level with mine, and still.
my phone buzzed in my pocket; it was gwen, inside. where are you? it said, owlford is looking for you. "shit," i blurted; owlford was my least favourite professor in the world. "i need to go back in." i shrugged out of the suitcoat and handed it to him. "thanks," i said, "see you around, okay?"
he tilted his head, like he was appraising me, for a minute. "see you at the coffeeshop at two tomorrow?" he asked, "i'll buy you a drink."
i blinked. "i've got a better idea," i said, "do you have a pen?"
out of the pocket of the coat i'd just given him back, he handed me a blue ink pen, the kind art students carry around, the kind that leak on their shirts. i caught his hand and wrote my phone number on the inside of his wrist, and my room number right after that. "come by, if you like," i said, smiling, and went inside.
there was always something about will, something safe, like you could trust him with anything. like you already had, even.
--
he sat next to me in the car. i said, will, and he said, you'll be late for church. that was always something he had hated about me, that i went every sunday, unless there was something really important.
the air freshener that hung from the mirror was shaped like a pine tree. it didn't smell like anything, anymore; we needed to throw it out.
his cat was sitting in the back seat; he was going to the park after he dropped me off, and kirjava liked chasing pine needles, like a kitten. she licked her paw, eyes half-lidded against the sunshine.
i got out of the car.
--
the first time i met kirjava, it was three in the morning and i was just shy of completely wasted. i'd gone out with friends, completely forgotten where my dorm was, and stumbled into his. his roommate was out, like i'd been, probably, so i knocked three times and kissed him when he opened the door. "hey," i said, "is it okay if i sleep here tonight?"
he blinked at me, owl-like. "okay?"
i looked past him, into the dark warmth of the room. there was a prickle of green light on the bed, like stars; i followed it, found a cat, all dark molten grace. "hi," i said, holding out my hand for the animal to sniff, "will, you know you're not allowed pets, right?"
"what?" he said, "i don't--"
"she's sitting right on your bed," i told him, and then i curled up next to her, shoes still on my feet, and fell asleep.
in the morning, he said, "her name's kirjava, she's a special kind of cat."
i was hungover, dazed and out of it; i said, "that's pretty awesome," and ran the tip of my finger along her back, without thinking.
he looked at me, stunned for a moment, and then pressed me against his pillow and kissed me until i couldn't breathe.
--
i love you, i told him; i wrote it on his ribs with the tip of my ring finger, the lightest i could manage.
you've got a pinemarten, he said, sitting up, did you know that?
--
"have you ever been in love?" he asked me, one morning. we were sitting out on the fire escape of our new apartment; our lease had just come through. the sunrise flushed, red-gold, across his wrists where they lay next to mine, and shining across the pelt of his cat.
i thought about it. "i don't think so," i said, "not really. it doesn't count when you're a teenager, does it?"
he shrugged. "depends on the kind of teenager you were," he said. we lapsed into silence, again.
a sparrow landed on the roof across from us, tilted its head into the sun. "have you?" i asked. my voice sounded abrupt.
"yeah," he said, kind of wistful.
"tell me about her," i said. i don't know why i said it; masochism, maybe, or curiousity; i remember, though, that his eyes were a little less sad when he said her name.
"lyra," he said. "her name was lyra. she was blonde and angry and she had-- she had this friend, pan, and they saved me. they saved me, and then she left me. i left her. she told me to be happy. she told me to love someone else." he was distant, reality three times removed. his hand was curled into a loose fist, nails dragging on the concrete.
i put my hand on his shoulder. "that's hard," i said.
he barked a laugh, no mirth in it. "tell me about it," he said.
--
i am trying, he told me, to be a good person. but i cannot help this.
you're a physicist, i said, you're going to change the world.
but not the worlds, he muttered, under his breath. he noticed my look, questioning. don't worry.
i do, i said, i love you.
he winced, and i got up, couldn't breathe, couldn't stand it. i'm sorry, he said.
i shrugged, stalking across the room to the window, where i pressed my face against the glass and took a deep breath. the city roiled under us, cars and people and noise.
what would you do, he asked, if i told you there was no such thing as god. if i told you that i'd killed him, or that i'd watched him die.
i'd tell you, i said, that that's a pretty heavy metaphor, right there. i did not turn to look at him. i couldn't.
yeah, he said. he was warm against my back; he kissed my cheek and said, it will be all right.
i have to go, i told him.
he said, i know. his arms fell away from me and i felt suddenly very cold.
i have work, i said.
yeah, he said. yeah.
--
i stopped at the park on the way home from work. he was sitting on the bench; he waved to me, and i waved back. it was painfully civil.
i kept going down the path, and then i couldn't; i stopped and turned back and he looked at me, surprised.
"will," i said. "be real. stop counting down the days." my voice cracked at the end.
"jenny," he said.
"you have to mean it," i said. "you're looking for reflections."
he smiled at me. "you sounded like her, just then," he said.
"thanks," i said, and i left. my feet crunched on the dead leaves. that night i counted the stars to get to sleep, but it didn't work.