Page 94 of Across Time

She rubs a finger over her lower lip. “I’m not sure how long we’ll need to recover once we arrive.”

She’s being diplomatic, using the term we. Jumping back a few decades won’t affect her at all. I’m the problem. “It’ll take me a day, I think. Two at most.”

She nods. “So we should aim for November 11th, since she told you to go on the 12th. We’ll jump back and stay in the barn,” she says. “We can sleep in the loft until you’re strong enough. My mother will be in the process of giving birth, so I doubt we’ll be seen.”

I stare at her across the table. “Marie, I need to come back to him, okay? We both do.”

“Of course,” she says. “I just want to watch from a distance. I just need to know for certain…that she’s gone.”

I think of the hour after Kit drowned. How I dove, looking for her, and screamed, and flailed, long after it was too late. I’m not quite sure Marie understands the way desperation will make you do insane things.

“You’ve got to promise that no matter what you see, you’ll only watch. If you decide to intervene, I’ll have to as well.”

She reaches for my hands. “I want to know what happened to my mother,” she says. “But what matters most is that you come home to Henri. I swear I’ll put you first.”

I don’t want her to put me first. I want her to put herself first. But if protecting me is what will keep her safe, so be it.

* * *

I find Henri out by our hay bale, staring at the moon.

I sit beside him and pull his hand into my lap as I rest my head on his shoulder. "I'm sorry," I tell him. "I hate that I’m making you worry.”

His lips brush my hair. “My mother used to tell me when I was younger that I should enjoy my life while I could, because once I fell in love, I’d never know a day that was completely without fear. Now I see what she meant.”

Have I made a mistake? Perhaps I should have just left him alone, to marry a normal girl and lead a normal life. “It never occurred to me I’d be making your life harder when I came back here.”

“My life was going to be hard whether you were here or not. And if worry is the price to have you, I will gladly pay it.”

“It’s going to be fine,” I promise him. “Marie and I talked it out. We’ll watch from a distance. If there’s even a hint of trouble, we’ll leave. She’ll be gone three days at most. It might take me a bit longer, since I have to recover there a day or two, but that’s a worst-case scenario.”

His hands dig in his hair. “That’s hardly the worst-case scenario,” he says, his eyes dark as night. “When will you go?”

He isn’t going to like my answer, but we definitely need to get it done as soon as possible. Not simply because of the stress this is causing him, but because I suspect that even after Marie knows her mother isn’t coming back, she’s not going to want to move. Not when Father Edouard remains here. And we’ve now got less than a year before the war begins.

“Tomorrow. I just want to get it over with.”

He flinches. “You said we’d be married before you jumped again.”

I rest my head on his shoulder, wishing he truly understood how I feel about him. “A piece of paper isn’t what’s going to bring me back to you.”

“No, but when you’re not here it’s all I’ll have to prove you were mine.”

Were. The word sits uneasily in stomach. “You make it sound like I’m not coming back.”

He stares at the ground. “I will never know for certain that you are, any time you leave. And…” he stops himself, shaking his head. “I have a bad feeling about this. Perhaps it’s because I just got you back, or because I’m so close to having everything I want in the world. But I wish you’d reconsider.”

I can’t say his words don’t give me pause. But what option do we have? “Marie is going whether I’m there or not. And neither of us will be able to live with ourselves if we let her go alone and she doesn’t come back.”

He rises and begins to pace. Unable to agree, unable to disagree.

I follow him, resting my head on his back, wrapping my arms around his chest. “I swear I’ll return,” I whisper. “Go pick up the papers. I’ll marry you the minute I’m home.”

He remains silent. I slide my hands away, preparing to retreat, and he spins, catching me and pulling me tight against him, finding my mouth. I feel his desperation in the pace of his breath, in the urgency of his hands. In the fingers, making quick work of my buttons, of his belt and his pants. He lifts me to the side of the barn and pushes inside me so fast and so hard that I forget how to breathe. He’s acting as if our time is about to run out.

And suddenly I’m no longer certain it isn’t.

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