The ringing telephone jarred Callie awake. She rolled onto her back and blinked at the room. Memories of cheering crowds, a crystalline amphitheater, and a massive golden throne hung in her mind. She had stood before that throne . . . Elhanu had commended her . . . And then she’d been swimming in a light-filled river of pure joy. She hadn’t wanted to leave.
Daylight flooded around the miniblinds, casting horizontal lines across the rumpled bedclothes. An overgrown spider plant hung in front of it. From another room, a cockatiel called.
The phone rang again.
I’m home! She sat up, snatching the receiver on the third ring.
It was Lisa. “Callie, where were you last night?”
“Huh?”
“Are you hung over? You were supposed to come to my birthday party.”
“Birthday? What day is this?”
“Sunday, the twenty-fifth. Are you all right?”
She had been in the Arena almost thirteen months. Could the time have translated into exactly a year here or—?
“Which birthday, Lisa?”
“Which birthday? What’s the matter with you?”
“I’m sorry. I’m a little foggy. How old are you?”
“You’re trying to get me off track. What you did last night was low. At least you could’ve called.”
“How old are you, Lisa?” Desperation sharpened Callie’s voice, stopping the tide of her sister’s anger.
“You’re being very weird, Callie.”
“I need to know.”
“You’re scaring me. Maybe I should come over. You’re clearly disoriented.”
“Lisa. Please. How old are you?”
“I’m thirty-three. Did something happen last night?”
Thirty-three? Callie thought, reeling. Thirty-three. The same age she was last year. Except there was no last year. Thirteen months in the Arena had consumed less than a day in this world. Was that possible?
Unless it hadn’t happened.
Maybe she had hit her head, and it was all a dream—like in The Wizard of Oz. She closed her eyes and rubbed her temples, vaguely aware of Lisa blathering in her ear. No, it can’t have been a dream. It was too real, too involved.
“Lisa, I’m sorry I didn’t call,” she cut in, “but there wasn’t a phone.”
“Where were you?”
“I’ll be by later with your gift.”
“But you—”
Callie hung up and stood by the phone, shivering. It can’t have been a dream.
Yet here in this familiar room with the peeling plaster, the books cluttering the end table, the faded sheets, the root-bound plant—suddenly the adventure seemed impossibly fantastic. Carried away by aliens and forced to find her way home?
I have to find Meg.
The phone rang again. She jerked her hand away from it. That was either Lisa, trying again, or her mother.
It was a short bike ride to Meg’s. At first Callie thought her friend was not there, for the blinds were drawn and no one answered the bell. She was turning to leave when the thump of footfalls drew her back, and Meg opened the door, wearing her bathrobe. Her hair, grown out to her usual chin-length style, was tousled from sleep.
“Cal, what are you doing here so early?”
“It’s almost lunchtime, Meg,” Callie said, stepping inside.
“But we didn’t go to bed till dawn.” She shut the door behind them.
Callie sat on the couch. Light filtered through the cracks around the shade, illuminating the gloom. “What did we do last night?”
Meg dropped onto the beanbag chair across from her, frowning. “You don’t remember?”
“Do you?”
“We went out after the experiment. The lab techs threw a party.” Meg brushed her long top hair out of her eyes. “Alex was there, and . . . some others.” She laughed uneasily. “The punch must’ve been spiked. And I know I ate too many chili nachos because I’ve had the weirdest dreams.”
Nachos and spiked punch?
She’s remembering snatches of the celebration before we came back to Earth, Callie thought. Which was what they said would happen. “It makes it easier for most to re-enter their old lives,” Elhanu had told her. And Meg’s hair would have grown out in the rejuvenation tank.
Callie swallowed. “What about the experiment itself?”
“You don’t even remember that? The pegs in the boards? The ink blots? The virtual-reality stuff?”
“Virtual-reality stuff?”
“Yeah, there was this little car. And a white road . . .”
“What happened with Alex?”
Meg blushed. “To be honest, I can’t remember. And somehow I don’t even care. I hope I didn’t make a fool of myself. At least we got the fifty dollars out of it.”
“We did?”
“They gave it to us at the end.” She picked up an envelope lying on the end table. “I know you got one, too. I saw you put it in your purse.”
“Oh.” She’d have to check when she got home.
Meg’s eyes had focused on something in Callie’s lap and now widened. “Is that an engagement ring?”
Callie looked down at her hands. Her right hand was nervously turning the ring on the third finger of her left—a gold ring, inset with a glittering blood crystal. Her heart leapt. It had happened!
Meg frowned. “Is there something you want to tell me?”
“No. Uh . . .” Callie pulled the ring off her left hand and put it on her right. “I was trying to discourage this guy, so I told him I was engaged. Don’t you remember?”
Meg appeared unconvinced but accepted the story and moved on, wondering aloud what Jack would think if she called.
Callie tuned her out. Meg’s memories—what few were left—were being distorted by the need to make them fit her old reality. Beyond that her mind had been washed. Just as Pierce’s would be. The thought made Callie reel again. She stood in the middle of Meg’s sentence. “I have to go.”
Meg gaped at her, but Callie couldn’t explain. She just had to find him.
When she got home, the phone was ringing again. After it stopped, she picked up the receiver, dialed information, and got the numbers for six Andrewses in Durango. She called them all. One was a secretary. One had died. One invited her via answering machine to leave a message. One’s phone was disconnected. The other two did not answer.
She called local feed stores next, and hit pay dirt on the second try with a friendly and garrulous clerk. Of course she knew Andy Andrews, and wasn’t it awful about his son gone missing?
“The sheriff’s just called off the search yesterday,” the woman said, “and why not? After eight days of looking and no sign, what else could he do? Poor boy’s been gone over two weeks now, and is probably hurt besides. He’s a tough kid, but the odds are against him in this. I hear Andy and Helen are taking it hard.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Callie said, her voice trembling. “Their son . . . would be Pierce?”
“Of course.” The woman hesitated. “You don’t know them well, then?”
“Not the parents, no.”
Another silence. “Where’d you say you’re calling from?”
“Tucson.”
“Arizona?” Suspicion rang sharply in the woman’s voice now. Again she paused, apparently to marshal her thoughts. “Look, I don’t mean to be rude, miss, but do you know something about this situation that the Andrewses ought to hear?”
“I might. You wouldn’t happen to have their phone number, would you?”
The clerk was reluctant to give it over, but she did. Unfortunately it was one Callie had already called, and again, no one answered. Probably out searching, she realized—but she was bitterly disappointed nonetheless. Of course, if she kept calling, someone was bound to answer eventually. But then what would she say? The feed store clerk’s suspicion had made it clear how untenable her position was, and since she couldn’t really tell anyone where Pierce had been, and since he himself wouldn’t even remember her . . . well, hopefully she’d think of something. At least she had a number now.
But already the horrible suspicion that she wasn’t supposed to find him had begun to gnaw at her.
Again the phone rang. It was her mother.
Callie hung up half an hour later, surprised at how easily she’d taken control of the conversation. Mom hadn’t known what to make of her assertiveness, had hardly known what to say when Callie had refused to let her go on and on and deftly redirected the discussion. She had even managed to end the call in a relatively short time without being ugly.
She sat there a moment, feeling unexpectedly pleased.
Find yourself, the flyer had promised. Maybe she had. In more ways than one.
She surveyed her small living room with its bricks-and-boards bookshelf, and the drawing table littered with paint box, water jars, and brushes. Her books, sketches, and supply bins lay scattered across the floor where she’d left them Friday night. Her current project—a watercolor of desert wild flowers—stood taped to its board in a corner for viewing. It wasn’t done. She had left it in that awkward stage where it looked awful and hopeless.
Except that it didn’t anymore. In fact, she saw just what she needed to do.
At nine that evening, she set the finished painting, matted and framed, on the couch and surveyed it critically. Late afternoon shadows streaked across an adobe wall. The stems were a little awkward, but the values worked. And it was evocative, conjuring memories of her early-morning walks down the alley out back—
Her thought halted and excitement flushed her. Maybe there was a way to keep the fading memories alive, a way to hold on, if only in part.
She pulled her sketchpad from the cabinet and began blocking in the planes of a man’s face. Miraculously, the image took shape before her, and her heart began to pound. Seeing his face made her exquisitely aware of how much he’d meant to her. She would go to Durango herself.
On Monday she quit her job to make the trip, withdrawing her meager savings and going into debt with Lisa. But in Durango, she learned Pierce had been found the day she’d first called, walking out of the woods with no memory of what had befallen him. His parents had immediately taken him to be evaluated at a hospital in Denver and hadn’t been home since. She followed them there, but nothing worked out as she hoped. Neither hospitals nor doctors were willing to give out information to non-family members, and she didn’t want to lie for fear of alienating her quarry once she finally caught up with them. They were sure to be just as suspicious and put off as the people she’d questioned in Durango, and, having no reasonable explanation for her interest to offer them, she knew lying would only make things worse.
In the end it didn’t matter. With both funds and options depleted, she was finally forced to face the fact that she wasn’t going to find him. Not without help, anyway. “Trust Elhanu,” he’d said. It seemed she had no other recourse.
Back in Tucson, she decided that rather than find a new job she would take the plunge as a full-time artist. Her mother had a fit, but Callie ignored her doomsaying and set to work gathering a body of paintings and approaching galleries. Within a month she had representation for her traditional watercolors.
Summer turned to fall. Her career took off. Three months after that fateful weekend, her work was selling briskly. In October, the fantasy paintings of her memories found a market. She won two national awards that winter, received a commission for a book cover the following spring, and had collectors in New York, Denver, and L.A., buying her work by the next summer. She bought a car and moved into a house on the eastside with horse property. She even bought a piano and began taking lessons. She knew she would never be a professional pianist—as Pierce might have been—but she practiced diligently, and it fed her soul.
Everyone marveled at the way everything suddenly came together for her, but Callie knew it for Elhanu’s promised reward.
Her desperate need for Pierce waned. It helped that she had never known him in this life. She had only the ring and the painting in her bedroom to remind her. It was an oil of him standing on that hillside above Rimlight. She supposed she ought to take it down—and forget—but somehow she never got around to it.
Meg had also experienced the reward of prosperity. Shortly after the weekend in June she married Jack. He had made her deliriously happy. And before long, pregnant, as well.
The next June Lisa threw another party—a black-tie affair at the Westin La Paloma. Jack was out of town, so Callie dragged Meg along for moral support. Parties didn’t intimidate her as they once had, but she still disliked them, and once again, Lisa had some guy for her to meet. His name was Alan, and Tom had met him on the plane.
“You’ll like this one, Callie,” Lisa had assured her. “And remember, it’s black tie, so gussy up a little.”
Reluctantly Callie obeyed. At least now she had something to gussy up in—a white chiffon dress she’d bought for the reception in New York. Hitting just above the knee, it had a Grecian style neckline and a figure-flattering drape. She put her hair up in a soft chignon, threw on a string of pearls, and even condescended to wear a pair of low heels. That was as gussy as she would go, however. If Lisa didn’t like it, too bad.
“And we’re not staying long,” she told Meg as they drove across town. “We’ll just eat and run.”
“Just like old times, huh?” Meg asked with a smile. Her baby was due in a little over a month, and she was showing substantially. “Have you ever considered that this might be to your benefit? You might meet a client or potential client—”
“Of course I thought of that. Why else do you think I’m going willingly?”
“You might even like this Alan character.”
“He’s a stockbroker, Meg.”
It was dusk as they parked and entered the resort. Heading for the Canyon Four Ballroom, they passed a dimpled blond youth manning the sign-up table for a seminar on Life Management, and Callie did a double take. The crowd around the table made it hard to see him, and she finally decided she didn’t know him. But he was young enough, and handsome enough—he could have been Aggillon.
She couldn’t see an ad for a seminar now without wondering—were they recruiting again? “Life Management” would certainly fit the bill. And the young preppies bent over the table wouldn’t be there if they weren’t searching for something. Maybe this time they’d find it.
“What?” Meg asked, noting the direction of her gaze. “You interested in that seminar?”
Callie laughed. “No. My life’s doing just fine, thanks.”
The hall and balcony outside the ballroom had been roped off, and a young hostess stood at the opening to take their invitations. As they stepped into the company of the glitterati—Lisa’s parties always included state senators, city council members, bigwig business types, and local celebrities—a waiter passed with an empty hors d’oeuvre tray. The name on his badge brought Callie up short: Angelo. Before she could get a good look at him, though, he had disappeared into the crowd.
Meg was eyeing her again. “What is it now?”
Callie shook her head. “An attack of déjà vu. Come on. Let’s find Lisa, and get Alan out of the way.”
She had to admit the meetings with Lisa’s prospects had not been so bad lately. Maybe it was because of her increased self-confidence, or maybe she had previously perceived negativity where there had been none. At least Alan was supposed to be interested in art.
The ballroom was decorated with potted palms and white twinkle lights. White-linened tables ringed a wooden dance floor, and a band played in the far corner. To the left, servers were restocking the buffet table. Callie spotted her sister talking to a group of gowned and tuxedoed movers and shakers near the gift table. Tom stood between her and a slender man in a tan, western-cut suit with wavy brown hair and eyes so brilliantly blue Callie could see their color from across the room. Her knees went weak, and her breath left as if the wind had been knocked out of her. She managed to duck around a knot of people, then sagged against the wall.
Meg was immediately at her side. “What’s the matter? Are you sick?”
“I’m fine.” She drew a deep breath. It was just coincidence, she thought. It wasn’t him. It was just someone who looked like him. She drew herself together and stepped out for another glance.
It wasn’t coincidence. And it wasn’t hallucination. It was him. He looked up and met her eyes from across the room, but there was no sign of recognition. Just the brief glance, and then he was speaking to one of Lisa’s friends.
She was shaking violently, aware of Meg frowning at her, but there was no way she could walk up to that group and speak to anyone normally. Abruptly she turned and headed out of the room.
Meg waddled after her. “Callie, where are you going?”
The restroom was clogged with women attending to their makeup and fixing their hair. Callie collapsed into a chair in the outer salon and stared at the wall. He didn’t know her. He didn’t know her at all. But what was he doing in Tucson? At her sister’s birthday party?
Meg pulled up a chair. “All right, what gives?”
Callie looked at her. How could she ever explain?
“Did you forget to eat again today?” her friend asked with narrowed eyes.
“No.”
Meg raised a skeptical brow. “What did you have for lunch?”
“I had a . . . I don’t remember.”
Meg stood and hauled her to her feet. “Come on. Let’s get you some food.”
Halfway to the buffet Lisa pounced, hugging Callie, admiring her dress and hair, then urging her to “Come say hello to Alan.”
“Oh, Lisa . . .” How could she even be civil to Alan when Pierce was in the room, maybe even standing beside him? She wouldn’t be able to think, much less talk.
“I think you’ll like this one.”
“A stockbroker Tom met on an airplane?”
“He’s not just a stockbroker. He’s a pianist and a student, and he used to be a cowboy. He’s also quite good-looking.”
Callie felt the blood drain from her face. Cowboy? No, that made no sense. Why would he call himself Alan?
Lisa’s smile turned to a frown. “Are you all right?”
“She’s only about to pass out from low blood sugar,” Meg said.
Lisa’s frown deepened. “Did you forget to eat again?”
“I’ll get something at the buffet,” Callie said, “then I’ll come over, okay?”
The frown was disapproving but uncertain. “Okay, but don’t wait too long. You’ve got competition, you know. He’s rich as well as handsome.”
Rich? Pierce hadn’t been rich. His father’s ranch had been in trouble. But then, his financial situation had likely changed as dramatically as her own this last year . . .
Could it really be him? The pieces were falling into place, and suddenly she was panic-stricken. What if she did the wrong thing, said the wrong thing? What if she turned him off?
The buffet was only lightly attended. She strolled alongside it, but nothing seemed appealing. Her stomach was too knotted to even think about eating. Someone came up beside her as she stared at the offerings.
“The taquitos are pretty good.” His voice thrummed through her like a clarion call.
“Are they?” She made herself look up at him. Mercy! When had he gotten so handsome?
He cocked a brow, still not showing the slightest hint of recognition.
“Are you all right?”
“I’m fine, thank you.” She tore her eyes away and put a piece of parsley on her plate.
“Maybe you should sit down or something.”
“No, I just need to eat. I get caught up in my work and forget to.” What was she going to do with this parsley?
He was regarding her curiously. “You’re Lisa’s sister, aren’t you? The artist.”
“Yes.” With trembling fingers she picked up the tongs and fumbled two taquitos onto her plate.
“I’m a big fan of your work.”
She gaped at him.
He grinned and she nearly died. “The Henley Gallery’s practically next door to my office in Denver.”
“That’s my fantasy work.”
“Yes. Your traditional work is excellent, too. I saw some over at Tom and Lisa’s. But the fantasy pieces are so evocative I could swear I’m standing right there. Are they based on any particular place?”
She stared at him intently, knowing she was being weird, unable to help herself. Was he remembering something? “I . . . uh . . . well, not on any specific earthly place, no.” She added a cheese enchilada to her taquitos. Hurry! Small talk—anything. “So, uh, how do you know my sister?”
“Actually, I know your brother-in-law. We’ve worked together over the Net. He suggested I vacation in Tucson, but it was pure coincidence we ended up on the same plane.”
Callie’s nape hairs stood upright. “I assume you’re in stocks, too, then?”
He nodded.
“You’re not Alan, are you?”
He smiled his wonderful smile. “Lisa told you about me?”
“A little.” She hesitated, wondering how to ask this without it sounding strange. “She said you were a cowboy before you were a stockbroker.”
“I grew up on a ranch. We sold out last year. I’d been researching investments and decided to risk some of the proceeds. It’s worked out well enough for my folks to buy a smaller place outside Denver.”
“And you live with them?”
“I have a place in the city, though I have to admit, I prefer country living.”
“With computers and teleconferences, I’d think you could.”
“Yes, but I’m also going to school—finishing up my degree.”
“In business?”
“History. With a minor in language.”
She shook her head, marveling. Always some new facet to surprise her.
“I never planned to be a broker forever, and I’ve done well enough that it seems I won’t have to.”
“So what language are you studying?”
“Greek.”
Now she was dumbfounded. “Greek? Whatever would you—”
Before she could finish, Lisa swooped down upon them. “I see you’ve met. Great! Did Alan tell you he’s a fan of your work?”
“Actually, he did.”
Lisa beamed at them as if she expected them to fall into each other’s arms on the spot. They stared back, and her smile broadened. “I’ll leave you two to get acquainted.”
After she left, Pierce said, “Do I detect a bit of matchmaking here?”
Callie blushed hotly. “She’s always doing this. I’m sorry.”
“Well, I’m not.” He smiled. “Though she must not be very successful if she’s always doing it.”
“Hope springs eternal.”
“Ah.”
When they reached the end of the food line, Callie remembered Meg, still trailing behind, listening intently. When she introduced them, Meg smiled and bobbed her head and immediately made her exit. “I see your mom over there,” she said. “It’s been ages since we’ve visited.”
Grinning slyly, she waddled off. Callie rolled her eyes and followed Pierce to a table on the fringes.
“I wouldn’t have pegged you for an Alan,” she said, picking up a taquito.
“No? What would you have pegged me for?”
“Something unusual.”
“Like Poindexter or Cuthbert?” She laughed.
“Not that unusual.”
“Well, Alan’s my middle name. I’ve been Pierce most of my life.”
“Why the change?”
“There’s a firm in Denver called Lane, Simpson, Andrews, and Pierce. I wanted to avoid the confusion when I put my own shingle out. And Alan Andrews has a kind of ring.”
“Pierce suits you better, though.”
“That’s what my mother says.”
Callie flushed and concentrated on her taquito. If her heart beat any faster, it would go into ventricular fibrillation. And she was coming on way too strong.
Gradually, though, she relaxed. He was still easy to talk to, even if he didn’t remember her. Artful questioning confirmed what she had learned last summer—how he had wandered out of the mountains after two weeks of allegedly being lost, remembering nothing. Since his horse had returned earlier, it was assumed he’d fallen and hit his head. His parents had taken him to a round of specialists in Denver and had been forced to sell the ranch to pay the bills, but nothing had helped. He still couldn’t remember.
After dinner Lisa opened her gifts, then cut the cake. Pierce volunteered to get some for both of them, and as soon as he walked off, Meg collapsed into his chair, clasping her hands on the table and leaning toward Callie. “He looks just like the guy in that picture in your bedroom! The one you made up. Did you notice?”
Did I notice? Callie looked from Pierce to Meg and fought to keep a straight face. “You think so?”
“The likeness is uncanny.”
“You’re exaggerating.” Her eyes returned to Pierce, lean and fit in the tan suit. “This guy’s much better looking.”
Meg gaped at her. “You’re taken with him!”
“Maybe.”
“We’ve known each other too long for ‘maybe.’ And if I’m any judge, he’s not exactly bored.”
“You think so?”
Meg rolled her eyes. “Are jalapeños hot? Oh, he’s coming back. I gotta say hello to Tom.” She stood. “And you didn’t believe in love at first sight.”
As Pierce settled at her side, a white-haired waiter reached over her shoulder to fill her coffee cup. She glanced up as he turned away, and a jolt went up her spine. But he disappeared behind a knot of people without turning, and she decided she must have imagined the likeness.
Before long the band started up, and of course, Pierce asked her to dance, and of course, she said yes, even knowing Lisa would gloat for months. Stepping into his arms was just like the first time—she was nervous, jittery, aware of all those little sparks from his touch. They danced two fast numbers and a slow one, and by then she was hopelessly in love with him all over again.
“You know,” he murmured alongside her ear, “this is going to sound weird, but I keep wondering—have we met before?”
She drew back to look at him. “Why do you ask?”
A crease furrowed his brow. “Because I have the strangest feeling I already know you.”
She could not keep the shock from her face, and he grimaced. “Coming on a little strong, am I? Sorry.”
“It’s not that,” she assured him. “You just surprised me.”
He gazed blindly at the crowd behind her. “The blank spot from last summer haunts me. I keep trying to remember, and sometimes something will trigger the feeling that, if I can just turn this corner in my mind, it will all come back.” He paused, dropped his eyes to her face. “You’re sure you weren’t in Colorado last June?”
“Positive. Are you sure you were?”
He gave her a funny look, and she trained her gaze over his shoulder again, wondering why she had asked that. Now he’d think she was making fun of him. But to try to explain—
And then she saw the white-haired waiter again, the one who had poured her coffee, the one who looked startlingly like Elhanu. He stood near the table, watching them, and as her gaze met his, he smiled, his dark eyes twinkling.
He understood too much to lose it all. The words sounded in her mind as clearly as if he had spoken in her ear.
You mean eventually he’ll remember me? Callie asked silently.
You and all the rest of it. Quite rapidly now, I expect. Let him find it on his own, though. Rushing things will only distress you both unnecessarily.
But I thought the rejuvenation process removed—
Normally, it does. However, his mind was just so saturated with understanding that much of it is still there. Finding you will finally allow him to access it. He paused. But don’t concern yourself overly with the past, Callie. The future is what matters.
He gave her a small nod, then set down his coffeepot and pushed through the swinging door to the kitchen beyond.
She wanted to run after him but knew she wouldn’t find him. Not there anyway.
“You know, that’s the weirdest thing about it,” Pierce said softly in her ear. “For the longest time I’ve felt I wasn’t in Colorado. That I was somewhere else, and that I was there for longer than two weeks. But that doesn’t make sense, does it? Because where else could I have been?”