The ELLIE Stories

<Do I look easy?  Do I have sucker written all over my face?  Boy.  I'm
losing my touch....>

Ellie sighed as the yellow cab sped off, it's eastern European driver
forty five dollars richer -- fifteen dollars more than he should have
gotten.

<No way would that have happened in the old days....  Good thing I left
this place while I was still capable of coping with the crap.  Shit, am
I getting old to let something like *that* happen!>

She smiled as she thought how embarrassing a tale this would be when
she related it to Owen.

Of course, in a panic to get from Providence, Rhode Island to JFK in
Queens, New York, Ellie had arrived at the airport much too early. 
Resigned to a long wait, the thought that she'd be amongst the first to
check in was small comfort.

<Cannot believe I once thought airports were exciting.  Look at this
place.  It's depressing is what it is!  Everyone here looking
absolutely fed up -- far from the excited world travelers I want to
see...>

The terminal was buzzing but not manic.  Bags checked, boarding ticket
secured, Ellie easily found a seat where it was possible to watch the
jets taking off.  She was able to ignore the steady hum of humanity
around her, occasionally pick out the whine of a child or the raucous
laughter of the young black and Hispanic people passing through.  There
was a pang she almost did not recognize inside her, a longing for the
diversity and colour of her native land.  She did not recognize it
until now, how the faces, the patterns of speech, the slang and
mannerisms conspired to awaken that sense in her that this was truly
home.

Home.... and not home.

It had been a weekend of classmates who were alittle too loud and
alittle too rude in restaurants and shops.  A town in central England
was home now, where tolerance was the general rule and Ellie had
forgotten the subtle reminders every non-white in the United States
endures, or chooses to ignore, that he or she is not quite and never
will be equal to those members of the dominant race.  But it had all
rushed back to her, as if she had never spent nearly ten years
experiencing a different quality of life.  After only a weekend of
American life, she was ready to put this visit behind her, anxious to
turn away, for awhile, from this dark land.

Her thoughts drifted to England.  Owen would be at work, the children
at school by the time she arrived home.  Spring had been rainy and the
miles of fields along the motorway would be rolling and green, cattle,
sheep and horses grazing contentedly in stark contrast to the 21st
century rush so near to them.  Already, as if in anticipation of her
house, her bed, a calm descended upon her.

In the distance, on the tarmac, a jet prepared to take off.  The
revving of its engines was clearly audible.  With half of her mind, she
listened to a young German boy and his father and uncle discuss their
itinerary and the planes.

<Flugzeug.  There's a word I should have forgotten long ago.>

When the Germans moved on, Ellie was left alone to watch the planes and
ponder.  It was time to face all of the demons.

<Anna.  How could we have said so much to each other and at the same
time, so little?  I wanted to tell her so much more, try to explain how
I felt so estranged from everyone in New York, how friends whose lives
used to be so much a part of mine, I don't really know anymore.  I
wanted to tell her about Kate.  I wanted to explain where I think my
relationship with Owen is now.  I wanted to understand  how she's
feeling about her life now -- really feeling.  Not the sugar-coated,
my-life-is-interesting spiel one practices for acquaintances at these
reunions!  I wanted to say so much more to Jack.>

Jack?  How did he slip into these thoughts?  It was, she realized, what
had happened at the Campus Dance.  Ellie remembered with some
embarrassment and a tinge of something else the first looks they
exchanged across the few tables separating them.  Jack Shaw, to her
eyes, had hardly changed.  He was still devastatingly handsome.  Her
heart still stopped when she caught sight of him and there was still
that something in his eyes as he looked at her.  It was yet one other
thing to regret, as if he knew of her undying love, his unwillingness
to take advantage of it and his inability to return it.

<Hell.  If only he'd been less honourable.  I might not spend the rest
of my life in love with him and wondering what it would be like.  The
absurdity of it, more than twenty years hence and still longing like a
teenager for an unrequited love!  Goodness only knows what *he* thinks
about it all....

I need to be on that plane and out of here.  But gods was he handsome. 
Time stood still as we embraced.  No. Existence ceased as he drew me
even closer.....  and he was *such* a father, chatting immediately
about his girls.  I wanted to tell him about my two little ones....>

But jetlagged and exhausted, she could only blurt out the first thing
that came into her head and it seemed a fortuitous event when he caught
the eye of someone else he wanted to greet.  Ellie had smiled at him,
not attempting to hold him or to follow.  She had suddenly felt then
that perhaps she might be able to lock the longing away.

She sighed with the memories and looked out at the private jet taxiing
to its place on the runway.  It's running lights were clearly visible,
winking at her.  She shifted in the barely comfortable seat and
prepared for the past to take her.    

So long ago, it now seemed barely part of her life, the sun rose and
set at Jack Shaw's command.  The next breath she took depended on
whether or not he stopped by to say hello to Anna and her.  He was
perfection on two legs, the stuff of which heroes and warriors were
made; big, broad with his abundant auburn hair cut in a quirky manner
that reflected his humour and his style.  No, it had been impossible to
imagine Jack with any other hairstyle and when he had acquired the
motorcycle, that suited him as well.  Square jaw, prominent chin,
generous mouth; impossible that any male could be so good-looking and
impossible that anyone so inutterably perfect could look twice at
her.

Still the most amazing memory of Providence was that early spring day
when leaning out their ground level dormitory window, Ellie caught
sight of Jack preparing to go for a ride on his bike.  Dressed in an
old, faded rugby shirt and well fitting jeans, his helmet tucked under
an arm, Ellie only had to see that large hand push unruly locks off his
forehead and she had jumped out the window before she realized what she
was doing.  He had not protested, seemed genuinely pleased as he dug
out a second helmet from somewhere and instructed her to fasten it
securely.  Then, they were off.

The thrill of riding behind him, pressing her body up against his,
hard, solid, with the hum of the motorcycle beneath them; she wished
they could ride into eternity.  No words were exchanged.  There was
only unfamiliar districts of Providence, tiny streets lined with
flowering trees: other traffic had disappeared.  The beauty of the
town, of the spring day, of Jack so close to her absorbed her
completely and made her oblivious to anything else.

Why Jack suddenly decided to ride through a graveyard, Ellie never
knew.  The road  would have been narrow for cars:  the graveyard itself
was hilly in places.  Jack cruised slowly enough for her to notice the
headstones, the flower pots, some lovingly arranged others looking
haphazard in their placement and some graves so obviously long
forgotten.  He did not seem the sort of person to need a reminder of
his mortality.  It was more comfortable to decide that the decision to
drive through had been made on the spur of the moment.   She drew
closer to him all the same, realizing at the very same moment, the
quiet peacefulness of the place, standing in stark contrast to the
manic existence of university life.

Suddenly, it was over.  Ellie had barely registered the return of
familiar landmarks.  As he pulled up in front of the dorm, he turned to
her and mentioned a party that was taking place later that evening, if
she would like to go.

Finally, it seemed, whatever gods there were had heard her prayer.

Everything else about that day and the early evening that followed was
lost in the indistinct gray of the past.  She could not remember what
Anna had planned that evening.  She could not remember the name of the
boy who had been Anna's boyfriend at the time.  She only remembered
that later that evening, as she sat alone in their dorm room, Jack
Shaw's big hands appeared on the window ledge of the open front
windows.  Seconds later, his broad form fell through and with a laugh,
he climbed into the room.  Minutes later, they found themselves at the
small locked gate of Wriston Quadrangle.  Jack effortlessly heaved
himself onto the wall and then reached down for Ellie.  The touch was
electric.  His eyes were dancing.  Ellie could not breath.

Then, he had scrambled over and jumped to the ground, looking at her
expectantly and not wasting a second, Ellie jumped.

<Who can remember one party out of so many?  One party on any night,
more than twenty years ago?  Gods.  I don't know who we saw, what we
did....  surely there was a keg of beer -- what frat party doesn't have
a keg of beer?  I think it was the only party Jack and I ever went to
together.  A date?  No one *dated* in those days....  I was besotted
with him but all that night, it felt as if we were buddies, best
buddies hanging out.  Then, he turned and kissed me.....>

It was the briefest of kisses, so unexpected, as they ran down a flight
of stairs in a fit of giggles.  Ellie was thunderstruck, searching that
handsome face for meaning or explanation and finding only something she
could not interpret.  Why she did not throw herself into his arms then
and there, she never, ever knew.  She could only stare at Jack, mental
processes looping as she watched him, his mouth set, his eyes
mysteriously veiled, one strong hand on the stairwell railing, the
other pressing the wall. 

<He does this to me all the time.  He always has.  My brain just
malfunctions.  Other bits of my anatomy take over and my mouth is open
before I realize it.  Words I would never utter in a million years are
out almost before I'm aware of thinking them....  >

Stay with me tonight.

A simple request, a most complex request.  What was it in his eyes, in
his kiss?  The sort of love shared by siblings?  The sort of love
shared by the best of friends?  It was not the love of passion and
desire and his words that followed, though not unexpected, pulverized
her heart.

<I don't think it would be good.>

She remembered them exactly.

Only years later could Ellie understand what Jack had meant by those
words.   Only years later could she contemplate what they might have
cost him and it only made her love him more.  With time the passion
mellowed, gone from something indescribable and consuming to something
she kept with her always and allowed to surface now and then to examine
and to fan the flames of speculation.

The boarding of her flight was being announced.  Ellie came back to the
present with a start, amazed that the hours had slipped by so swiftly. 
A fatigue that had nothing to do with the physical demands of this
journey suddenly overtook her.  She would be asleep before the plane
took off and when her eyes opened, she would be in that part of the
world where the lingering shadows of past loves would be banished by
the bright rays of the love of two little hearts.  

Like what you've read? Have suggestions or constructive criticism? Email me! tlyr (at) tlyr.co.uk