Especially after I had first turned into a vampire, being apart from Jack was physically painful. Now, I still felt it, but it usually wasn't so bad if I was only gone for a day or two. Last year, I went on a mission where I was away from him over a week, and by the end, the ache had bordered on unbearable.
"Yes, I do know that feeling," I said.
"I never stopped feeling that for Elise. Not completely. It's manageable now, just a dull ache. Not the consuming agony it was at first when she died, or even what it was like with you. But I don't long for you anymore."
"I'm happy to hear that."
My hand was on the armrest between our seats, and Peter accidentally brushed against mine. When he noticed it, he looked down, and gently, almost tenderly, he touched my hand with his, rubbing his thumb across the back of my hand.
"Sometimes, I do still wonder what it would've been like to be with you," he said, his voice low. "To really be with you."
"And?" I asked, because I felt there was something more he wanted to say. Something he was holding back.
"And I think it would've been very... intense."
He bit his lip as he stared down intently at his hand touching mine. His normally cool skin felt more temperate as he stroked my ever-warming skin.
"I'm sure it would've been. But I don't know that this is the kind of conversation two friends should be having on a plane," I said, but I didn't pull my hand away from him.
"Maybe not," he agreed with a soft laugh. "But it is keeping me from thinking about where we're going."
He stopped caressing my hand and simply placed his hand over mine, holding it gently. He took a deep breath and leaned back in the seat before looking over at me.
"Was part of the problem with ... us... that you felt guilty about caring about someone other than Elise?" I asked.
"Oh, yes. Absolutely," he said. "That was a huge issue for me. If I loved her as much as I did - and I honestly did love her with every part of my being - how could I feel anything at all for you?
"But after a lot of soul-searching, and far too late for it to be meaningful to you, I realized that love is not a finite resource," he went on. "I can love her, and I can love... another, and it doesn't take away from either."
I smiled dourly. "Yeah, I think I had a very painful road coming to that realization, too."
"You must understand that better than anyone. You were in love with both of us."
It was so strange hearing him say it aloud. Everything about this felt so surreal. Sitting on a plane with Peter, him holding my hand, and us having a real open conversation about the way we felt about each other and everything that transpired between us.
There were no games. No fears. No ulterior motives. Just the two of us, being truly honest with each other, maybe for the very first time since we'd met.
"I was," I admitted. "And it was brutal."
"Everything worked out the way it was meant to," he said finally. "And even with all the pain and the mess that went along with it, I'm still glad that I met you. That you're in my life. In a strange way, you showed me that it was okay to live again. These past five years have been so much better because of you."
He rested his head against the seat and closed his eyes, and I couldn't help but notice that his temperature never went down as he held my hand. The whole time he touched me, his blood pumped harder, his heart beat faster, but he never let go.
PETER DROVE THROUGH THE DARK Irish landscape as we travelled from Dublin all the way to the west side of the island. We'd rented a tiny blue VW Polo, and Bobby sat crammed in the backseat with his bag, watching out the window at what little he could see in the darkness.
"This trip would go faster if you let me play my music," Bobby suggested, not for the first time. Since we'd gotten in the car, Peter had been in control of the music, playing operatic songs by a composer called Giacomo Meyerbeer, according to him.
"I sincerely doubt that," Peter said dryly.
"He does make pretty good mixes," I said, coming to Bobby's aid.
In defiance, Peter turned to the stereo up louder. "My music is fine."
He sat rigidly in the seat, appearing even more austere than normal, with his hands firmly clamped on the wheel and his eyes locked on the road before us.
"Do you want me to drive?" I asked.
"You don't know where we're going," he said.
"Are you sure still remember how to get there after all this time?"
Without looking over at me, he replied, "It's something that I'll never forget."
It was a little after three in the morning when Peter turned off the main road and began to slow. His whole demeanor changed - his anxiety seemed to be replaced by quiet resignation. He didn't need to panic about arriving anymore, since we were practically there.
Nestled in the crook of the Inagh River, past the bubbling falls, was the quaint village of Blathanna Gorma. It looked every bit as picturesque as a postcard, like a cross between Norman Rockwell and Hobbiton.
Bobby leaned forward, so he could get a better look. "This is like the cutest town I've ever seen in my life."
"There's a reason Elise stayed here so long," Peter said.
"Why didn't you want to stay?" Bobby asked.
"We didn't age or change or eat with the locals, and we'd been here for too long. They started to talk, and it was only a matter of time before they chased us out or burned us at the stake."
Peter drove straight through the village and out the other side. Then, on a narrow dirt road maybe a mile or two outside of town, he slowed down in front of a large farm house on top of a hill. Even with only the light from the moon, it all looked so lush and green.
Except, of course, for the small blue flowers that were overtaking everything. Vines grew up the side of the house, adding splotches of blue to the taupe exterior. Above the door was a long wooden sign, with the words McGowan Bread and Breakfast painted across the front.
"This is it?" Bobby asked, staring up at it through the window. "I mean, it's a nice place. I just didn't realize it was a B&B."
"Neither did I," Peter muttered and opened his car door.
I followed him out of the car and asked, "But who's McGowan?"
"McGowan was Elise's maiden name." He stood just outside the car, staring up the house, with an unreadable expression on his face.
I'd expected some sort of reaction from him - wistful, anger, sadness, something. Particularly after how openly anxious he'd been the whole way here. But instead, he kept his feelings locked up, and only stared blankly ahead.
The front door opened and Cate Brennan appeared, looking much more plain than she had when I'd seen her last. Her long black hair was in a loose braid, and she'd traded in her low-cut outfit for a more conservative sundress paired with a sweater.
"You made it!" she exclaimed in her Irish brogue. "I wasn't sure if you'd remember how to get here."
"I remember," he replied, and for the briefest of moments, his voice betrayed the anguish he was desperately trying to mask.
Without further prompting, Cate rushed over to Peter and threw her arms around him, embracing him. He didn't know what to do at first, letting his arms hang awkwardly at his side, but then he reluctantly hugged her back.
"I'm so glad you're home, Peter," she said, almost whispering in his ear before separating from him.
"Me, too."
"I didn't realize you'd be bringing guests," she said, smiling at me and Bobby, and he gave her an awkward wave. "But that's alright. We've got plenty of room here."
"I didn't know you had turned this into a bed and breakfast," Peter commented.
"Oh, yeah, I did that years ago. The house was too much for me all on my own," she explained. "But I made sure we had no guests this weekend. We have the place all to ourselves."
Cate turned and headed back into the house, and she began talking about the changes she'd made to the property over the years, starting with what a pain indoor plumbing had been for her.
&n
bsp; Bobby and I grabbed our bags and followed suit, but Peter seemed to lag a few steps behind. In the front parlor room, over stocked with all sorts of antiquities, I finally saw the expression on Peter's face I'd been expecting since we arrived.
He ran his hands along the wall, looking around in mystified awe, and I could tell he wasn't here. When he looked around, he didn't see the quilts or tufted ottoman or the "Bless This Home" needlepoint. He was looking at the house as it had been, as Elise had kept it.
Cate went into the kitchen to grab a bottle of water for Bobby that he had requested, and she had to push through an old swinging wooden door. As she did, the door let out a subtle groan, and Peter looked at it with a start.
An odd smile played on his lips, and in a voice so quiet he was barely audible, he said, "It's the same door."
"What?" I asked, and Cate had already returned with the water for Bobby.
"I heard Elise walk through that very door a thousand times, coming in from the fields with baskets of vegetables and flowers to sell at the market," Peter explained. "I'd know that sound anywhere."
Cate looked around, as if unsure how to react to the sheer amazement on Peter's face, so she simply said, "I tried to keep the original fixtures whenever possible."
"I can tell," Peter said, but now his expression was beginning to fall.
"Could you point me to the nearest powder room?" Bobby asked. "I'd like to freshen up."
"Yes, of course. I'll show you the one off your room," Cate said.
Bobby grabbed his bag and followed her as she led him upstairs, to the second floor of the house. The steps groaned and creaked under her feet, which only seemed to deepen the anguish on Peter's face. Cate looked back over her shoulder at us once, but said nothing more.
Once she was gone, Peter leaned back on a sideboard cabinet and let out a shaky breath. Tears were already forming in his eyes as he looked around the room.
"Are you okay?" I asked.
"Yeah," he said, thickly. "I'm... Just being here, in this house. I've never been here without her. Not really." He paused, swallowing hard. "And even with everything so different, I still keep expecting her to appear from around the corner."
"Do you want to leave?" I asked him.
"No." He smiled sadly at me. "I haven't missed her this much in a long time, but I haven't felt this close to her, either. I want to stay."
I DON'T KNOW HOW I'D expected this visit to go, but it wasn't like this at all. Bobby and I had come along as protection, in case Cate went berserk on Peter, but we ended up feeling much more like third wheels.
For the past several hours, we'd been sitting around the dining room table, watching and listening as Peter and Cate talked and laughed and reminisced about someone that we knew nothing about. I had never seen Peter laugh or talk or appear as happy as he had since we'd gotten here.
I wondered if this is how Peter had been before me, when Elise had been alive. When she died, she had taken a huge part of him with her, leaving a shell of his former self.
After he'd turned Jack, he'd purportedly shown hints of the happier, kinder version of who he had once been. But this was my first glimpse at the real him, at the ease of his smile and the light in his eyes. He appeared so much younger, like a normal teenager as opposed to a world-weary immortal.
Cate explained how she'd managed to care for the house all these years without raising suspicion that she never aged - she would move on for a while, leaving a tenant to care for the property, and then come back some years later as the granddaughter of herself, when she'd promptly take over again. That's why she went by Cate now, but she'd used the names Eliza, Margaret, and Mary, among others.
While Bobby slowly sipped the glass of bourbon Cate had poured him, I learned that Elise had a wonderful singing voice, a horrible habit of cracking her knuckles, and terrible handwriting. She loved Shakespeare and wildflowers, and she was afraid of bats, even after being a vampire for years.
"And that damn dog!" Cate was saying with a laugh. "He kept digging up our garden, and she would just smile and say he's having fun. I could've killed you after you got him for her."
Peter smiled and shrugged. "But he was so cute, and she loved him so much."
"She loved all the animals so much," Cate said. "It doesn't mean they all should come and live in our house and tear up our garden."
"I know." The smile on Peter's face changed, turning sad once again. "Elise... she loved everything."
"That was her greatest fault, really. She loved too much," Cate agreed sadly.
"Very true."
Cate yawned and looked at the light that was beginning to spill in through the curtains. "The sun's coming up. I think I should head to bed."
"Do you mind if I go out back and see her?" Peter asked. "I think I'm ready."
Cate appeared shocked for a second, then hurried to erase it with an easy smile. "Yes, of course."
He motioned to the backyard. "She's still out there, yes?"
"I would never move her from here," she promised. "This is her home."
He smiled gratefully. "Thank you."
"Take as much time as you'd like," Cate said as she slowly rose to her feet. "I showed Bobby where your rooms are, so he can take you. When you're ready."
"Good night, Cate," Bobby called after her, but she didn't look back or say anything before leaving us alone in the dining room.
"Do you want us to come with, or would you rather go alone?" I asked Peter.
He thought for a minute before deciding, "I think I'd like you there."
Peter got up and went out the backdoor of the house. The sky had begun to lighten, the dark indigo giving way to bright oranges and pinks of the morning. It was the golden hour, making the land look even more beautiful than it had last night.
Directly behind the house were large raised garden beds, already filled with all sorts of vegetables and flowers. Between them was a long dirt trail, and we walked down the path, to the blue fields of flowers beyond it.
As soon as I saw it, I recognized it from my dream, but I wasn't surprised. The smell was already overwhelmingly familiar. The flowers, the earth. It was all from my dreams. I half-expected to see Elise floating over the fields toward us. But she didn't.
Just before we hit the patch of flowers, Peter stopped short. I was about to ask him if he was okay, but then he took my hand in his. He stared ahead, and I squeezed his hand, and then he could take the few steps forward to her gravesite.
There, in the center of the field of flowers, was a large boulder with a simple dedication engraved on it:
None of us said anything. We just stood in front of her headstone as the cool morning breeze blew over us. I stared down at the spot where she was buried, and I concentrated on her, trying to see if I could feel her presence.
But there was nothing. Only silence and the cold air.
Finally, Bobby broke the quiet by asking, "Why does it say McGowan? Weren't you married when she died?"
"We were," Peter replied. "But Cate made this for her. She must've thought her maiden name was more suitable, somehow."
"How come Cate stayed here and not you?" Bobby asked, and I shot him a look, but he didn't appear to notice.
"I couldn't stay here. If I stayed, I would've died along with her. Ezra made me leave to protect me, and Cate swore to always look after her."
"That seems a bit obsessive, doesn't it?" Bobby asked. "I know they were good friends, but she's been tending to this grave for over a century now."
I swatted his arm gently, so he'd look at me, and I gave him a warning glare, reminding him that this was not the time to interrogate Peter about his dead wife.
"It never seemed obsessive to me," Peter replied, unruffled by Bobby's questioning.
"Well, Cate was her maker. I think that bond can last a long time," I said.
He looked sharply at me. "Cate was her maker?"
"Yes, she told me that when I talked to her before," I explained awkwardly, since I had fo
rgotten that Peter didn't know. "Did you ever suspect it?"
"No." He shook his head, his forehead creasing in confusion, and then he looked back at the headstone. "She never... I never knew. I don't think Elise knew. Why wouldn't Catherine have told me?"
"She must've had her reasons," I said simply, since now didn't seem to be the time to posit all the theories on why Cate kept things from Elise and Peter.
"Would it be sacrilegious for me to dig her up?" Peter asked at length.
"Honestly?" Bobby asked. "Kind of, yes."
I moved, blocking Bobby some and putting myself more in front of Peter, so he'd have to look at me and not just the flowers that covered Elise. "I don't think it would be good for either of you."
He looked up at me with a solitary tear falling down his cheek. "I just want to see her again."
"Do you ever dream of her?" I asked.
"Not anymore," he said as he wiped at his eyes. "I used to. For a long time, actually. But it was too painful, and I eventually trained myself not to anymore."
"Maybe you should try again," I suggested gently. "Maybe it's time to let yourself remember her and see her again."
THE BANGING DOWNSTAIRS WOKE ME up, pulling me from a deep and dreamless slumber. I lay in a lumpy bed, in Elise's house that she had shared with Peter, and I hadn't heard from her once. I hadn't seen her or felt her or had even a hint of a dream.
Assuming it was really Elise that visited me in my dreams - and that was the assumption I was working on - I would've thought her presence would've been even stronger here. That she would've been able to appear with even clearer instructions.
But instead, there had been nothing.
Feeling confused and deflated, I got out of bed and went downstairs to investigate the noise. The sun was just beginning to set, and other than the kerosene lamps burning around the room, the red glow of the fading sunlight coming through the thin curtains was the only real light.
But, apparently, that was enough for Bobby to work out. Wearing only a pair of sweatpants, he was on the floor, alternating between one-handed pushups. Tattoos and a few battle scars covered his torso - which, I had to admit, was surprisingly ripped. He took vampire hunting very seriously, and he worked hard to stay at his physical peak so he could work alongside me.
When Bobby saw me, he stood up and wiped the sweat off his brow with his tee shirt. "You're up early."