Jodi Meadows - Incarnate

There were few doors in the house — nothing between the parlor and kitchen — which probably meant that only bedrooms and washrooms were private. Sam probably never needed to worry about strangers wandering through his house.

Light had faded. I’d fallen asleep, and a heavier blanket was tucked up under my chin.

Sam wasn’t at his piano; the silence must have awakened me. Water gurgled through pipes, stopped. New silence, deeper like snow silence. In the dim parlor, I listened for his footfalls, creaks in the ceiling, but either this house was much sturdier than Purple Rose Cottage — that was very likely — or he wasn’t moving around upstairs. Perhaps he’d decided on a bath, as I had.

I blinked away imaginings of him reclining in the tub, long limbs stretched out, and water in his hair.

No, no, no. I pushed myself off the chair, muscles groaning, and tapped a lamp by the piano. Pearlescent light illuminated the ivory and ebony, and the thick paper with music written as dots and dashes and other indecipherable things. I settled on the bench, blanket tight around my shoulders, and studied the pages.

“Figure it out?” Apparently Sam wasn’t happy if he wasn’t sneaking up on me. How unfulfilling his hundred previous lives must have been.

“Maybe.” I scooted over to give him space, then pointed at the first sheet. “So far I’ve been thinking about the dots here.”

He nodded. “That’s a good start.”

“They’re the thing that seems consistent throughout, like the notes in the music. They go up and down like the music, too, so I was guessing they tell you which key to press.”

“And how long to hold it.” He laughed and shook his head, like he couldn’t believe I might be smarter than a squirrel who’d learned how to steal food without setting off the trap. “If I’d left you down here for an hour, you’d have been playing it yourself.”

I clenched my jaw and slid off the bench. Just when I’d thought we were getting along.

“What?” He had the nerve to sound confused.

“You keep patronizing me.” I faced away from him and crossed my arms. “You keep saying things like that, acting like I should appreciate your praise because you’re so much better than me. After all, you’re not new and trying to catch up to everyone else—”

“Ana.” His voice was so soft I almost didn’t hear. “That isn’t it. Not at all.”

“Then what?” My jaw hurt, along with my chest and head, and I was tired from the long trek, and tired from trying to guard myself.

“I wasn’t patronizing you. I meant everything I said.”

“You laughed at me.”

“At myself, for not realizing how serious you’d been when you said you taught yourself to read. Because you were on the verge of reading music a moment ago, and you’d only been at it, what, five minutes?”

I couldn’t speak around the knot in my throat.

“Ana,” he whispered. “I’ll never lie to you.”

And how was I supposed to know he wasn’t lying now? About that? Maybe watching me was like watching a newborn kitten, blind and mewing for help, food, and love. Cute, but helpless. Little victories like finding its mother’s milk got praises. Little victories like figuring out which markings were musical notes got praises.

“A long time ago, before the Council, before we realized we were going to keep being reborn no matter what happened, there was a war. We fought each other, thousands against thousands.” Suddenly he sounded old, as if the millennia weighed down his words. “I didn’t have much of a stake in the war, and I didn’t want to fight. I stayed away most of the time, but I had friends on the battlefield. While I was experimenting with different sounds one day, I realized that a string stretched on a curved stick made a pleasant twang, and different lengths made different notes. If you used a bunch of them together, it would make music. I rushed to show my friends what I’d discovered, thinking they could use a respite from the war.”

Wordlessly, I sat on the corner of the bench again, but still couldn’t bring myself to look at him.

“They were so pleased, and since archery had just been discovered, there were a lot of strings on curved sticks to go around. But when they thought I was out of earshot, I heard everyone start laughing and plucking the strings on their bows in a tune. They’d been practicing it for weeks already.”

I let my hands fall to my lap. “It’s not the same thing.” My words didn’t come out as fierce as I’d intended.

“Certainly not in this case, because I truly am impressed. But I imagine growing up was like that. Discovering how to read, only for someone to laugh because they’d known how to do it for thousands of years. Realizing more efficient ways to do chores, only to discover someone else had always done it the easy way and decided not to tell you.”

“Assuming something has gone horribly wrong, even when it’s normal and no one had told me. And—” I shook my head. Past lives or no, I didn’t want to talk to him about my first menstruation, or pimple, or anything.

“Being laughed at.” He played a few notes on the piano and hmm-ed. “Did you have friends?”

“I’ve read about them, but I don’t believe they exist.”

“Your cynicism is amazing.”

“Even if other children had visited Purple Rose Cottage, children aren’t like me. They wouldn’t have wanted to do the things I did. They were waiting until they were big enough to survive on their own to get back to their lives. Not explore the forest and collect shiny rocks, or read books about great discoveries and accomplishments. They were there . We’d have had nothing in common.”

“I think you and I are friends.”

“Nosouls don’t get friends. Neither do butterflies. Don’t you know?”

“So all our time together in the cabin was nothing to you?”

I remembered listening to him read aloud, telling him about the roses I’d brought back to life, and falling asleep leaning against his shoulder. “It was everything,” I whispered, half hoping he didn’t hear.

Four notes sounded on the piano. “I saw how you looked at this earlier, and just a while ago you got up to study the pages. On your own. Because you like it.”

I shrugged. “That doesn’t mean we’re friends.”

“It gives us somewhere to start.” Four notes filled the silence again. “In my experience, friendship happens naturally. By talking, doing things together, learning.” He didn’t give me time to ask what he could possibly learn from me. “I like your company, which is fortunate since you’re living here now. Friendship isn’t reserved for people who’ve been reincarnated over and over. Even a newsoul is allowed happiness.”

There were still so many questions, like why should he bother with a nosoul and why was this so important to him, but I just bowed my head. “If you think it’s worth it, we can try.”

Sam touched my shoulder, ran his hand down to my elbow. “Let’s go to bed. Tomorrow will be busy.”

I shivered with the memory of waking up after drowning, his body behind mine, his hand over my heart. That probably wasn’t what he meant by ‘go to bed.’ And good thing, too. Good thing.

“Play for me again, first.” Something was wrong with me, with the way my insides squeezed up when he was near. I turned straight on the bench, next to him, and rested my hand over the keys. “Please.”

“Of course.” He adjusted the pages on the shelf above the keyboard; there were several still empty. “Pay attention, though. You’re going to learn music. I hope you’re okay with that.”

It was probably the light, or weariness, but even though his voice was as level as ever, from the corner of my eye, he looked nervous. My retort died before it left my tongue. “Please,” I said again, and before he could tilt his face away, I saw his relief.