Remember Me (10 page)

“It
wasn’t my intention to hurt you. I hoped to the last that I would be proved
wrong, but I could not sit back and do nothing. I had to be sure, for my own
peace of mind.”

“What
about mine?” Catlin wanted to shout, but she no longer had the strength left in
her to argue. Maria reached out to touch Catlin’s arm, but the girl recoiled.
The memory of her and Ben, their intimacy collided with the realisation of who and
what he was and the idea of physical contact with anyone made Catlin’s flesh
cold as ice. “I’ll leave the photo and, if you need someone to talk to, come
find me.”

Maria
left and Catlin gave into the cry of despair which had been threatening to
erupt from her lungs from the instant she had looked upon the photo. Who would
have thought a piece of celluloid could unleash so much devastation? Catlin
picked up the object which had stolen her future away, never wanting to see it
again but unable to stop staring at it. She hoped to find something that would
reveal Maria to be a liar at best and mad at worst, but there was nothing. It
was exactly what it appeared to be. It was Ben there, along with William, Maria
and the rest of their crew and she suddenly felt jealous. They had shared in
his life, his friendship and warmth. Maria had shared his love for a time, a
love so deep that he had killed himself rather than face life without her.
Catlin could not begin to compete with that. Ben had been unwilling to escort
her to one party, yet he gave his life up because Maria ended their
relationship.

Then
it dawned on her how stupid she was being. How could Ben have taken her out, he
didn’t exist! Other things began to make sense too – the way he could appear
out of no-where, that he turned up just when she was thinking about him, how he
was always in the same clothes and he would only go places with her where they
ran little chance of meeting anyone else. He had not been ashamed or
embarrassed to be seen out with her – he
couldn’t
be seen, not with her
or anyone else. But he
had
been spotted. People had seen them out
together. They were what brought Maria to her door. How was that possible? Sure
it was a coincidence, her going to kill herself on the very same night he had
done it. Had their identical thoughts, feelings and deeds (almost in Catlin’s
case) created some sort of bridge between then and now? Was it possible such
links could be forged, that acts committed in the present could connect with
those of the past? Had any of it been real or was she the one who was crazy?
She could not figure it out.

Catlin
had not realised until then that she had been pacing about the apartment,
trying to get her head around it all. She was angry, confused, hurt. She never
wanted to see Ben again yet all she wanted was for him to come to her, take her
in his arms and shield her from the living nightmare and the gathering demons
which had tracked her down at last.

Never
had the night been simultaneously loathed for its interminable length and
adored for its all-consuming shadow. Restless and finding it beyond her to
remain in once place for more than a few seconds, Catlin fretted from room to
room, up out onto the roof terrace, ignoring the chill air which permeated her
inappropriate dress, thanking the starless sky for hiding her shame and
stupidity from the world while wishing the day would come and bring with it, as
promised by the man himself, Ben. He held the solution to her woes and until he
was there with her, rest was as far from her reach as the moon. She willed him
to come to her, wished for it but to no avail. He had been there for her in the
past, had he finally deserted her, abandoned her like everyone else in her life
had done?

By
the time the sun was above the horizon she was well past the point of
exhaustion, could detect the tell-tale tickle of a cold starting at the back of
her throat and did not have the inclination to even bother changing out of the
damp clothing she wore. Her mind ached feverishly, but for the hours of
thinking and rethinking Catlin was more confused and uncertain of things than
she had been eight hours earlier.

The
tension in her shoulders eased as a familiar warmth spread out over her back.
She knew
he
was with her before his hands came to rest upon her
shoulders. Several times in the night she had vowed that if Ben had the nerve
to show his face in the apartment again she would send him packing, but it was
always followed up with a prayer for his return. Besides, was it possible to
banish a ghost from haunting what had been his own apartment, the place where
he died? At his touch any anger fuelled promises of sending him from her were
swallowed up by the far more potent desire for him to remain by her side until
her dying breath.

Catlin
reached for his hand, fighting the overwhelming fear that her fingers would
contact nothing but empty air but they came to rest on flesh,
his
flesh.
She fell backwards into him, crying as she had not done since her childhood,
since that night in Scotland. She had not thought on those demons in months.
Ben had driven them away but one by one they saw her vulnerability and were
creeping back to claim her.

“I
am so sorry,” he began, holding her into him as the sobs wracked her frame.
“I’d hoped it would not come to this, but despite telling myself we’d get away
with it, I think I knew from the start this day would inevitably come.” Catlin
wanted to shout at him, scream and ask why if he had known their days together
were to be short, he had allowed their relationship to develop, but she could
not reprimand him for a crime she was equally guilty of. Had she not also
sensed the approaching storm clouds? Picked up on the signs that the end was
coming? Like Ben, she had not cared and had plunged headlong over the side of
the precipice, not giving a damn about the consequences. The ride down might
have been one of a lifetime but that did not mean its abrupt ending was without
pain.

 “It’s
not your fault,” Catlin managed to cough as she tried to get her lungs to take
in some air. “It’s mine. I should never have fooled myself into believing this
could be real. Things like this don’t happen, not to girls like me.”

“Hey,
don’t you dare talk like that,” Ben scolded, coming around to kneel in front of
her. He took her by the arms and shook her slightly to gain her attention. “No
girl deserves to be happy more than you do, and what we had, no
have
, is
as real as anything I might have once shared with Maria. More so.”

Catlin
calmed herself a little at Maria’s name as the jealous part of her womanhood
was stung by the mention of her rival.

“There
it is,” Ben said wiping the tears from her face, “that stubborn glare of determination.
Yes, I knew it was her at your door tonight. It was as if an old wound had been
ripped open with a blunt blade as she neared us and there was only one person
who could have caused me to feel as angry as I did then. It was better for us
all that I left. Had I not done so, I might have found the temptation to go
poltergeist on her impossible to ignore.” It went against the grain of her
emotions, but Catlin laughed. “That smile,” Ben murmured, “a man would die
happy after being on the receiving end of a smile like that.”

“Does
that include you?” Catlin had not intended the remark to sound as accusing as
it did, but Ben was immune to the taunt.

“No,
not me. It brought me back to life.” The tears began to gather in Catlin’s eyes
again and there was a pain in her chest, as if someone was puncturing her heart
with a red hot blade and having driven it in as far as they could was twisting
it.

Ben
wrapped her in his arms, holding her until the convulsion subsided, wishing he
could do something to ease her suffering while knowing he could only make it
worse. He did not trust himself to be that strong. His own heart was aching as
much as hers. God! Why had he ignored that voice at the back of his mind which
had repeatedly told him to stay away from her? It was only ever going to end
badly. But he was not capable of such restraint. It was selfish, but after
thirty five years of looking in on the lives of mortals and being unable to
help, partake or be involved in them, how could he have kept away from the one
person who was, by some incredible power, able to see, speak and touch him?
With Catlin he had been given a chance of a life he had thought to be out of
his reach. In many ways he had not saved her that night – she had been the one
to rescue him.

The
pills and the drink; the deed had been a mistake and he discovered that as soon
as it was done. It had been an overreaction to an intolerable situation, but
one that could have been altered, but it was too late to do anything about his
choices by the time he realised that. The things that were wrong with his life
could have all been changed. He could have given Maria the opportunity to see
she was wrong, walked away from his job. None of it had been set in stone. 

“That
was why when I saw you were on the verge of making the same mistake I had and
for the same trivial reasons, I wished more than I ever had before that I had
not thrown away the ability to assist those around me. I was needed by someone
but could not help. I’d watched you in the same way I watched the previous
occupants of my old home, and was struck by the number of traits in you that I could
recognise in myself. Then you began to tread the same path I had followed and I
wanted to protect you from its pitfalls and that which lay at the end of it.
And, somehow, t
his
happened. You could see me, hear me and feel me. It
was as if I was being given a shot at getting back the life I had discarded so
carelessly. I don’t pretend to understand how it happened let alone why. Maybe
I was being offered a chance of redemption or it was to show you that there
were reasons to live. It might be a bit of both, but either way, whether for
good or ill, it happened and I would not swap a single second of our days
together for an entire lifetime with anyone else.”

Ben
looked at Catlin intently, his eyes wide open in an effort to take in as much
detail of her face as possible.

“But,
I cannot come to you anymore.” Catlin’s heart was skewered anew by the knife
and knowing the cut was coming did not deaden the hurt of the wound. “I hoped
that we would be able to keep our secret from the world and in doing so secure
our future, but if people are asking questions it won’t take long for someone
other than Maria to put the pieces together and whatever conclusions they draw,
they would bring nothing but additional trouble to your door, and I won’t be
the cause of ruining your life.”

“But
you are my life,” Catlin said. “It’s worth nothing without you.” There was a desperation
in her words which frightened Ben and he remembered the night of their first
encounter on the roof.

“You
listen to me Catlin Manners, stop thinking like that. I don’t want you doing
anything stupid and coming after me, do you hear me?” Catlin shook, unable and
unwilling to consider a world in which Ben played no part. “Promise me,” he
demanded fiercely. She nodded, wishing for once he had not been able to read
her like a book and seen the plan which had entered her mind.

“I
promise.”

He
eased his grip on her having gained her vow to do as he wanted.

“Good.
I do not want you on my side of things a second earlier than you’re meant to
be. The greater pain will be mine if I thought that rather than giving you a
reason to live I had taken it away from you. You’ve got a life to live, so do
precisely that – live.”

“But
it won’t be a life I want, not without you in it.”

“Of
course I’ll be in it. Not being able to see me doesn’t mean I’m going to leave
you. I will never leave you Cate. Think of me and I will be with you always.” A
saying Catlin had heard years before came to mind. ‘Keep someone in your heart
and they will live forever.’ Ben was in her heart, he owned it completely and
she thought on his words, which he had uttered to her while believing her to be
asleep, with a new determination. “‘Remember me.’” She would remember. She
would never forget and through her Ben, wherever he was, would live on.

“When
will you leave?” She forced the bitter tasting words out of her mouth.

“Tonight.
I will go tonight, so we will have one last day together.”

That
day was the one which carried Catlin through the heartache and anguish of those
which followed in its wake. They went out into the hills, sat by under the sun
by the banks of the river and spoke of their time together, hoping to find a
way to make the pain of their parting seem less cruel but as evening fell and
the clock marked the passing of the hours as it moved towards the birth of a
new day, Catlin and Ben found they could not deceive time any longer. Catlin
did not want to sleep. She tricked her brain into thinking that if she kept Ben
in sight he would not leave her side and she could steal one more day of bliss
from the years of misery stacked up ahead of her. He had been there from the
start, watching over her. She had not realised it then, but it was his presence
she had sensed in the sanctuary of her apartment, him she had been speaking to
not the four walls, a guardian angel, looking on unseen but always there beside
her. It had been comforting before but now she had shared her life with Ben the
thought of their having to go back to that way of existence left her cold. She
didn’t want an invisible protector from another realm, she wanted Ben, the man
she loved more than anything else in the whole world, there with her.

“You’re
tired,” Ben said, running his fingers through her hair. “Time for bed I think.”
Catlin felt the icy talons of death upon them and she instinctively held onto
Ben.

“Will
you stay with me until I am asleep?” She had to swallow a choking lump of grief
hard in order to get the words out.

“Of
course I will.”

They
lay down on the bed facing each other, Catlin holding Ben’s hand as if her very
life depended on it.

“It’s
okay my love,” he soothed, everything will be all right. I promise. Just close
your eyes and rest.” Catlin had no intention of closing her eyes. She did not
want to so much as blink less Ben should disappear from her while doing so, but
the lure of the soft pillow, cool and comforting under her head, which pulsed
from the events of the past twenty four hours, was too strong and finally, with
her mind full of the image of Ben’s dark eyes, mesmerising eyes and smile which
went right through you, she fell asleep.