51. Why We’re Talking

Jocelyn sits waiting in the chair, surrounded by a hundred other chairs. She’s alone, still wearing the black formal dress, still made up like a movie star.

She looks over at me and smiles.

I feel naked and silly. But I can’t hide or run or do anything else. Plus, all I want to do is go over and see her.

I find myself moving closer to her. There’s no sound in here other than the sound of my feet against the shiny, clean floor that reflects the sun from the glass windows around us.

I stop before getting to her.

She’s no longer just beautiful.

I can’t think of a word or a phrase.…

“Hi, Chris.”

Her voice doesn’t sound like an echo or a distant muffle. It sounds real and warm and whispers in my ear. “Sit, please.”

I rest in the bowl-like chair that faces her.

Jocelyn sits with one leg crossed over the other, looking so refined and elegant. She’s older in this—this vision or dream or whatever it is—but she’s also the same. The eyes that look at me are the same ones that looked at me in that classroom and that hallway and that love we shared such a short and such a long time ago.

“We don’t have much time,” she says.

“Time—what is this? Am I really here? Are you?”

“How are you, Chris?”

I don’t worry about what I’m saying, not here, not looking into those eyes.

“Terrified,” I say. “Lost. And like totally just—sad.”

She nods.

I want to kiss her and grow old with her.

“The next few months are important for you. You need to know this.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t—that I wasn’t able to help you,” I say.

“Don’t apologize for something you didn’t do. That’s not why you’re here.”

“What is this place? Is this real?”

“Yes. What you see and what you feel are real. Very real. This is not a dream.”

“I’m sorry, Jocelyn.”

“Chris. A hundred sorrys won’t get me back.”

“What will?”

She smiles.

I remember everything about her and how short-lived everything was and how she kept warning me—how the whole world warned me—but how I just refused to understand.

“How could you understand, Chris?”

She can read my thoughts? In dreams, or nightmares, or visions, or whatever this is, I guess anything is possible.

“Can I run away with you?”

She shakes her head.

I hear something shaking above us and see a plane taking off.

“You need to listen carefully.”

“Jocelyn, help me to get out of Solitary.”

“That’s precisely why I’m here, Chris. Why we’re talking.”

“What do you mean?”

The adult Jocelyn doesn’t smile or give me any sense of security or hope in her expression.

“There are those you can still help. There is still time.”

“Time for what?” I ask.

“You have to stay in Solitary. You cannot leave.”