The Best Gift by Wendy Markham
Like, “I’m visiting you from the past and I’m clueless—where are you? Where’s our child?”
In the end, she settles for a heartfelt “I love you,” before hanging up the phone, tears running down her face.
Thank God.
Thank God he’s out there somewhere.
But deep down, you knew he was really okay, didn’t you? Just like you knew Dickens was really Dickens.
You didn’t really believe something terrible had happened to Drew.
No. She didn’t.
She only let herself wonder because nothing was making sense. She didn’t understand why he wouldn’t be here with her for Christmas, or why they’d be moving from their dream house, or where their child is.
She still doesn’t get it, but there must be a logical answer to those questions. . . .
And to another one that’s been nagging at her: why wouldn’t Drew have left a message when he called? He’s never done that before.
Things change, she reminds herself yet again. Maybe he was in a hurry.
Things change. . . .
What if it wasn’t Drew who was calling her at all?
What if it was someone else, using his phone? Someone who’d found it, or stolen it . . .
Once again, her imagination takes flight, carrying her to the dark place where the only easy answers are the ones she can’t bear to consider.
Chapter Nineteen
Drew didn’t miss the troubled shadows in Clara’s green eyes when they faced each other on his parents’ front porch earlier.
Before she could tell him what was wrong, half his family came running out to see if she was okay, effectively curtailing their conversation.
The rest of the visit was strained. Watching her go through the motions with his family, Drew realized that she had been acting skittish all day—and last night, too, come to think of it. Something’s been bothering her.
When was the last time she was her cheerful self?
Christmas morning, when she told him about the baby, and he gave her the puppy.
Then came the earthquake—and ever since, she’s been oddly distant.
But there was no earthquake when they were sitting around his parents’ table. What triggered her sudden departure?
He’s been going over the nostalgia-laced conversation leading up to it, but he can’t figure out what it might have been. One minute he and his family were talking about old times, and the next, his wife was fleeing the table in distress.
He’d assumed it was the sight and smell of eggs, making her sick. But maybe he was wrong about that. Maybe something else is going on.
Whatever it is, it isn’t going to be good news—of that, he’s certain.
As soon as they get into the car, he turns to her.
“Are you okay?”
She nods.
“No, you’re not.”
She pointedly over her shoulder. “Someone’s waiting for this parking spot.”
“So? They can find another one.”
She just looks at him.
He sighs, starts the engine, pulls away.
From here it’s just a few blocks to the bridge. As soon as they’re on the access highway, he says, “You have to tell me what’s going on.”
“I know. I will. But not here. Like this.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’re behind the wheel, and what I have to tell you might upset you.”
That sends a sickening stab of fear through him. He gazes bleakly through the windshield at the red girders rising into the fog.
“Let’s go somewhere to talk instead of driving all the way back home,” he suggests. “We can stop in Sausalito and—”
“No, Drew, please. I don’t want to tell you in public.”
His mind teeming with horrible, intrusive thoughts, he navigates the bridge traffic, then the coastal highway toward San Florentina.
Was it just a few hours ago that they were heading in the opposite direction, talking about this being their lucky day?
Then again—that had been his take on it.
She hadn’t seemed nearly as enthusiastic.
She yawns deeply as he speeds north, leaning her head back against the seat.
Is she leaving me?
The thought barges into his brain and his hands clench the wheel.
No. He can’t fathom that. He knows his wife. She loves him. He loves her. Their marriage is solid. Of that, if nothing else, he’s absolutely certain.
Then what else could be so difficult for her to say?
Is the cancer back?
Another cruel notion, storming in, demanding to be entertained.
She was just given a clean bill of health by her oncologist. She’s pregnant. There’s just no way.
But what else would upset her like this?
He glances over at her, certain she’s fallen asleep. But her eyes are wide open, her jaw set grimly.
She’s exhausted, yet obviously too disturbed by whatever is looming to sleep.
At last—or too soon?—they arrive home.
After pretty much speeding north over the bridge and up the coast highway, anxious to hear whatever it is Clara has to say to him, he does everything he can think of to delay the moment of truth.
He empties the car of a few months’ worth of take-out napkins, straw wrappers, and empty water bottles. Then he goes into the house and lets the dog out. Upstairs, he changes out of the jeans and long-sleeved T-shirt he’s wearing into another pair of jeans and another long-sleeved T-shirt. He lets the dog back in and feeds him.
Watching Dickens inhale a bowl of puppy chow on the kitchen floor, Drew knows he can’t delay this any longer.
They’ve been home for almost fifteen minutes now. Time to go find out.
“Wish me luck,” he tells Dickens, petting his soft black fur.
The puppy doesn’t even glance up from his food bowl, probably holding a grudge for having spent much of the day in a crate.
He’ll get over it.
Drew just hopes he himself will be able to get over whatever his wife is about to say.
In the living room, he finds Clara sitting on the couch, the room draped in winter shadows as the day wanes beyond the windows. The television is on, tuned to the Weather Channel.
For a moment, he thinks she didn’t bother to change it. But then he realizes that she’s watching avidly.
“What’s the verdict?” he asks, and she looks up at him, startled.
“What?”
“The forecast—is it still going to be a beautiful day tomorrow?”
“Yes. And then it’s going to start raining at night, and it’s going to rain for a few days straight.”
He shrugs. Typical weather in the Pacific Northwest.
He turns on a couple of lamps, plugs in the Christmas tree, the electric candles, the white twinkle lights. Now the room is bathed in a soft golden glow—the better to see the worried expression on his wife’s face.
“There,” he says, “that’s better, don’t you think?”
“Mmm-hmm.”
“Do you want me to make us some tea or something?”
“No thanks.”
Okay. Nothing left to do but sit beside her on the couch.
He does, and takes her hand. It’s cold.
“Clara. Tell me.”
She nods. “Okay.”
He can tell she’s uncertain where or how to begin—even though she’s had a couple of hours now to try and figure it out.
But clearly, she’s about to deliver a bombshell that deserves a real sit-down, face-to-face, private conversation. And now that the moment is here . . .
“I’m so afraid you’re not going to believe me, Drew,” she confesses.
“Why wouldn’t I believe you?”
“Because if it hadn’t happened to me, I wouldn’t believe me, either.”
Something happened to her.
Cancer?
No! Stop that!
“Look
“That’s easy for you to say now, but—”
“Tell me,” he repeats, taking her other ice-cold hand in his as well and clasping them both.
She takes a deep breath. “Do you remember how you were talking about that game, Magnetic Jack Straws, back at your parents’ house?”
Huh?
Whatever he’d been expecting her to say, this wasn’t it.
He’s so relieved that she didn’t begin with “My oncologist called” that he merely nods, indicating that he does, indeed, remember.
“Remember how no one else in your family remembered you playing it, but Grandma said she had the same game?”
Another nod. Of course he remembers.
“Didn’t you think that was kind of . . . unusual?”
What on earth is she talking about? Why this? Why now?
“Do you mean,” he asks, trying to follow, “did I think it was unusual that my grandmother and I played the same game?”
“Growing up generations apart. Right.”
“There are a lot of toys that have been around for years that are still being made today. I mean, I had Lincoln Logs when I was a kid and now my nephew—”
“No, Drew, that’s not what I’m getting at. This is about you remembering something that maybe didn’t happen to you—not in this lifetime, anyway.”
Not in this lifetime?
That’s a bizarre thing for her to say.
This lifetime . . .
As if there were some other lifetime to compare it to.
Something flits into the very edge of Drew’s consciousness, then back out again. He doesn’t chase after it. Maybe he’s afraid to.
“So you’re saying that maybe I never really played with that game after all?” he asks slowly.
“Not in this lifetime,” she repeats.
“Meaning . . .?”
“Meaning maybe you played the game in another lifetime. In a past life.”
Whoa.
Is she talking about . . . ?
Obviously, she is.
“Reincarnation,” he manages to say aloud, as the dangerous thought teases his mind again.
“Reincarnation. Yes.”
“I . . . I didn’t know you believed in that stuff.”
“No. You wouldn’t know, because I’ve always been careful never to bring it up to you.”
“Why not?”
She just looks at him. “I don’t even know how to say this.”
The thought that was dancing around the periphery of his brain is now demanding to be let in; he keeps it at bay.
“You know how my grandmother died young, and my grandfather never got over it?”
Drew nods.
“Well, I always liked to think that somehow, they got a second chance. That, you know, they were reborn as two different people who would find each other and fall in love all over again.”
He smiles faintly. “That’s pretty romantic.”
“Do you think it could happen?”
“Let’s put it this way . . . I guess stranger things could happen.”
“I’m really glad you said that, because . . .” She hesitates. “There’s just no easy way to say this.”
Then don’t say it, he wants to tell her.
Don’t say it, because I’m afraid to hear it.
Let’s just go back to living our ordinary, everyday life together.
This life.
“Drew, you know how you’re always saying you and I were meant to be together? Well, I think you’re right.”
“Of course I’m right.”
“No, I mean . . . I think you and I actually were together in another lifetime.”
There it is.
And he knew it. He knew it was coming.
The whole thing is crazy, and yet . . .
Logical.
The way he felt like he knew Clara when he met her. . . .
The way everything seemed to fall into place for them instantly, the way they both seemed to know they belonged together from the start. . . .
Back then, he told himself that must be how it was when you met the right person and truly fell in love for the first time.
But it might not have been the first time.
“Do you think I’m crazy or hormonal?”
“No,” he says quickly. “Not that at all.”
“But you get what I’m telling you?”
“That you think we were reborn to find each other, just like your grandparents?”
“Well . . . you were. See, it didn’t exactly happen the same way with us. I mean, you were someone else, in the past, and we were together, but—”
“When was this, exactly?” he cuts in as if that’s even a reasonable question, as if it even matters at all.
Because really, there’s nothing the least bit reasonable about what she’s trying to tell him. And yet, he’s buying it.
He’s buying it because for the first time, a lot of things are starting to make sense.
“Do you mean when did you and I first fall in love?” she asks, and he nods. “It was back in the 1940s.”
The 1940s.
World War Two, and galoshes, and big band music . . .
“Oh my God,” he whispers.
No wonder.
“You still don’t think I’m crazy?” Clara asks.
“What? No! No, I always thought that maybe I was crazy.”
“Why?”
“Because . . .” Does he dare tell her?
Looking into her eyes, he knows that he should. That he has to. That she’ll believe him, just as he believes her. That they’re in this together.
“Lately, I’ve had these flashes where I’d see something or hear something in my head, just like you do when you remember something from the past . . . only I knew that some of it had never happened to me, so I figured it was just my imagination or something. And apparently, some of the things I thought were actual memories never happened, either.”
He shakes his head, remembering the earlier conversation with his family. He remembered that old kitchen table and the linoleum floor and the Jack Straws game so vividly. How was it, he’d wondered at the time, that no one else did?
No one but Grandma, who had grown up in another era.
“I’ve done a lot of reading about reincarnation,” Clara tells him. “Sometimes, a person can have a flash of breakthrough memory that might really be a glimpse into their own past . . . as somebody else. Only they don’t realize they’re memories at all.”
“So you think I really had that aqua table with the chrome trim and that magnet game in my other lifetime?”
“I know you did.”
“How?”
“Because I saw them both. And the speckled aqua linoleum.”
“What? Where did you see them? How?”
“I was there.”
“In your past life?”
“No.” She clears her throat. “In yours.”
“But you just said you were there.”
“I was. But not in my past life. In this one.”
“You lost me. You just said we were reincarnated, and that—”
“No, Drew, I said you were reincarnated.”
“But . . .” Confused, he tries to piece together what she’s told him so far. He can’t. His head is spinning. “I thought you said we were together in the past, and that we fell in love when we were other people.”
“You were someone else. I was me.”
“You were you. . . .”
“Right.”
“You were Clara Becker, falling in love with some other guy in the 1940s, and—”
“I was actually Clara McCallum then,” she cuts in. “It was three years ago. Right before you and I met.”
“I thought you said it was the 1940s.”
“It was. I mean, for you. And I . . . okay, this is going to sound absolutely out there, and even if you believe all t
“Try me.”
“I time traveled.”
“What?” He gapes at her.
Oh, hell. Just when he thought they were onto something . . .
Maybe she is all hormonal. Crazy, even.
He loves her, anyway, but this is a little . . . out there.
She peers at his face and shakes her head. “You didn’t believe me last time I tried to explain it, either—not at first. And I know I sound insane—”
“No, you don’t.” He pauses. “The thing is . . . there wasn’t any ‘last time,’ Clara. You never said anything about time travel to me before. Trust me, if you had, I would have remembered, since remembering things—whether or not they happened—seems to be my forte,” he adds wryly.
“I didn’t say anything about it to you—not in this lifetime. But when I was back in 1941, and you were Jed, I tried to tell you, and you—”
The name jumps out at him; he flinches as if he’s been stung.
“Drew? What is it?”
He’s silent for a long moment.
Realizing . . .
Remembering.
Riding down a vintage Main Street USA in an old-fashioned car with an ah-ooh-gah horn, a couple of unfamiliar boys in the front seat, a female voice calling to him from the sidewalk, and he turns to look . . .
“Jed,” he says at last, aloud.
“Jed Landry,” Clara says softly. “That was your name.”
“That was my . . .” He struggles to wrap his head around the enormity of it.
“You were a soldier—”
“I was him. I was Jed. And that movie . . . the one you were making when we met . . .”
“That was based on his—your—life.”
He leans back against the couch cushions and tilts his head to the ceiling, eyes closed, trying to absorb the shock.
Beside him, Clara emits a sound that might be yawn, or perhaps a sigh of relief that it’s all out there at last.
She waits for a few moments before speaking.
“When Denton sent that invitation to the premiere, and you insisted on going, I was scared that it might . . . I don’t know, trigger something. Or maybe—maybe I wanted it to.”
“It did.” He opens his eyes and looks at her.
“What do you mean?”
“It was all so real. I tried to tell myself that’s what a good movie is supposed to do, you know? It’s supposed to put you in the moment, so that you can relate to the characters. But everything that was happening on the screen—it wasn’t like I felt like it was happening to me right then and there. I felt like it had already happened to me.”