In All of Infinity (5 page)

“Stop. Whatever it is you’re doing, just
stop,” he stated and watched as the white began returning to the
ball. He looked to Esme, realizing that she was far more beautiful
than Nadia no matter how bad her hair was, no matter if she wore
many clothes while her subjugator wore nothing. He turned back to
Nadia. “I need to speak with my wife first, and I need her to
respond.”

“Very well,” Nadia said and let the magic
balls disappear, then clapped her hands together over her head.

The scenery around him changed and he
realized he was standing on a beach, and everything about him was
illumed by moonlight. He recognized the beach, remembering it as
the first place he’d brought Esme when she stated she didn’t know
how to swim. He’d taught her. It was only last summer.

Emmanuel saw a woman clad in white at the
opposite end of the beach. She was coming towards him, her dress
floating along the breeze. He took a few steps towards her, feeling
his legs growing weary, and then he felt the need to run. She did
the same and they stopped only feet away.

“We don’t have much time,” Esme said, her
very voice filling him with desire. She seemed to sense this and
looked at the ground. “I cannot let you risk the life of our
daughter for me. I am already dead to everyone, except for you. She
hasn’t begun living yet. I need you to take her with you.”

“I’m not going to choose,” he said and felt
his heart break as he watched her bite her lip. “I love you both.
I’ll have you both.”

“You can’t. She won’t let you,” she said and
tried to smile. Emmanuel watched tears escape her eyes and stepped
closer to her, feeling the warmth of her face as he wiped them
away. Esme nuzzled up to his hand with her cheek, wanting him as
much as he wanted her. She realized she couldn’t and pulled away.
“I need you to say this: ‘I wish for the life of my daughter; in
return, I will surrender every memory I have of Esmeralda Navy.’
I…I know it’ll be hard to say…but I need you to say it.”

“I don’t understand what’s going on. I don’t
need to, as long as I have you,” he said as tears escaped his eyes.
He took a moment to regain his composure. “I need you to stay with
me.”

She sniffled. “I wish I could. If you don’t
choose our daughter, you will walk away with nothing, and become an
empty shell. She needs you, her father. If anything, I need you to
understand that.”

He nodded and took her hands in his, always
amazed by how delicate they were, and then looked sincerely into
her eyes. “No matter how alone and empty I become, I will seek you,
know you’re alive. I’ll see you in every ray of light, in every sky
of blue. I love you. That has to count for something in all of
infinity, doesn’t it?”

“It does,” she said and more tears slipped
down her face. “So does a bath.”

They surrendered to laughter and let tears
of happiness overcome their dour moods. He looked down at her and
she gazed up at him. They wanted to say something more than good
bye, but there was no time to say much else.

“I’ll find you again,” he assured her. “I
won’t rest until you’re by my side. I promised you that you would
never escape me, and no amount of magic will stop that from
happening. I am not a simple man, nor am I a man of magic, but I am
a man of science. I know more about infinity than you think,
dearest bride.”

Esme leaned against him, listened to his
heartbeat, wanting forever to remember the pace of his heart when
she was near. It was the same beat that equaled hers when he was
near. He kissed the top of her head, taking in the smell of jasmine
that would forever be her.

***

Emmanuel wished as Esme requested and he
suddenly awoke in the floor on his back. He felt as if he’d had a
wonderful dream, but he couldn’t remember what it was about. After
he stood, he heard a baby wailing nearby. He looked at the crib
beside the bed and blinked, seeming to recall a faint image in his
dream, but realized it wasn’t important. He smiled and realized his
sweet little girl must be in need of a diaper change.

He walked over and looked at her. She cooed
and stretched her arms up to him, so he lifted her up and realized
she was wet. He recalled how Mrs. Brevard considered him to be
excellent with children, even if he hadn’t been born into a large
family. ‘Usually,’ she would say, ‘those born into large families
are rather good with children.’ Since he was a single parent, she
commended him even more because of his devotion.

“All good now, Reverie?” he asked after he’d
changed her diaper. Although the name was an awkward one, he
remembered that Esme had circled the name in a birth name book. His
wife died shortly after giving birth to their daughter, begging him
to raise Reverie with as much love as he’d given her while she was
alive. He was planning to do just that.

Emmanuel held her to him, letting her head
rest on his shoulder. “We’ll be fine, Reverie. Just wait and see.
We’ll be just fine.”

She burped in response and he held her until
she fell to sleep, then he gently lay her down. As he looked at
her, he knew there was simply not a more beautiful baby in York
County. Many of the mothers claimed the same. He knew she would
become as beautiful as her mother, and he was more than willing to
make sure she did.

♥
Part Two: If Anything, a
Heart ♥

Isaac Partridge sat with his football
friends at what was designated the ‘popular’ table in the new
cafeteria, watching as the freshman high school students tried to
find themselves a place to sit. He couldn’t sympathize with them,
because he’d always been charismatic enough to fit in anywhere.
After all, he was the star quarterback. This group was another
story, so he and his friends sat at their table, laughing at them.
They even looked uneasy in their uniforms, with some pulling at
their collars while others scratched their arms.

They had already begun placing the freshmen
at tables, laughing at each decision made. When they saw a boy with
glasses, he was automatically categorized as a geek. When they saw
a boy with muscles, he became a jock. If his parents had seen him
doing this, they would berate him, even though he’d learned from
the best.

“Hey. Hey. Look at this one,” Teddy
“Blitzer” Bwitz said and slapped Isaac’s arm. He pointed wildly as
another line of freshmen began looking around for a place to sit.
He was gesturing to the girl at the head of the line, while his
mouth was still filled with food. “She doesn’t look like a geek or
the cheerleader type, but does she have a body or what? What do you
think, Isaac?”

The girl had auburn hair that seemed red
when the light shone on it (as it was now) and a pair of expressive
deep blue eyes. Her figure was curvy, especially for a fourteen
year old, but she didn’t seem to realize how beautiful she truly
was. She turned to Isaac and they locked eyes, making the rest of
the world disappear. He had never been infatuated with someone
younger than he was, especially not a fourteen year old. When he
was eight, he had a crush on his babysitter, who was sixteen with
large breasts and a low IQ. He had a feeling this girl, whoever she
was, wasn’t stupid.

Isaac found someone’s hands cover his eyes
and heard a shrill New Yorker accent ask, “Guess who?” He could
tell that voice from a million voices, and the perfume, which she’d
used so much of that it was offensive, was the same. Penelope
Conway was the head cheerleader and always reapplied, reapplied,
reapplied, until it came to graduating and going to college. He
wondered how many times she’d put on her makeup, brushed her hair,
and wet her neck and wrists with perfume. “Come on, now, honey,
you’ve got to know who this is. I’ll give you a hint: I have a
crush on you.”

He smirked. Although some thought he was
popular only because of his football skills, there was also another
reason: he could get any girl to fall in love with him. He merely
had to capture them in the hall, whisper a compliment their way,
and they would be yearning for him uncontrollably. His teachers
even thought he was charming, and that was saying plenty. There
were many teachers at York County High who hated all of their
students. He had always easily gotten himself out of detention. The
only person he’d ever regretted saying anything good about was
Penelope, because she wouldn’t stop bothering him.

“Let me guess: Danielle Brevard?” he asked
and heard her giggle. She was pressed so close to him that he could
feel her breasts shake when she laughed. “No? Ok. If you’re not
Danielle then perhaps you’re her twin, Demi?”

He knew she was jealous of the twins,
especially since they were popular without being cheerleaders.
There weren’t many girls who weren’t popular without a bad
reputation, but the twins were as decent as they came. They helped
out at the church with their parents when they weren’t delving into
their studies. He had gotten in trouble once and his parents had
signed him up for helping with feeding the needy. The twins had
loved him ever since.

“Come on, keep trying,” she said and laughed
again. “I know you know who I am, honey. I’ll give you another
hint: my last name rhymes with ‘day’.”

“Oh… is that you Penelope?” he asked and
laughed.

She removed her hands and sat down beside
him, smiling. Her mascara had been reapplied several times and he
could hardly see her eyes behind it. There were times in the past
when he had asked her why she wore so much, but that was before
he’d met her mom. Penelope would be beautiful without the gunk, but
she didn’t think that she would be. Her lips, large and pouty, were
covered with several layers of her favorite cherry red lipstick,
and her cheeks were a bright red. She wore her hair in a high
ponytail, and it swayed behind her as she looked from him to her
food to the other football players.

Isaac began searching for
the auburn haired beauty he’d seen earlier, looking through the
many crowds that seemed to be developing the way he’d predicted.
York County High, since its inception in 1930, being created with
the intention of finally breaking away from York County
Elementary/Middle School, was a typical school no matter what the
papers said. There was once an advertisement that said ‘York County
High: a school unlike any other,’ which had actually been the first
announcement seen by the public. It had been pulled from the papers
only a week later, and replaced with ‘York County High: Feel
connected to education.’ They didn’t
feel
much of anything, these
freshmen, except lost.

He saw her seated at the opposite end of the
room, alone. She looked like a wild animal, afraid of everything
and everyone. When she decided at last to escape into a book
(rather than face high school society), he couldn’t stop the smile
from forming on his face because of how disconnected she was. He
was just the guy to fix her problem.

“I’ll catch you guys later,” he said and
stood. He wasn’t the tallest member of the team, standing a mere
5’9, nor was he powerfully built. His father often claimed that the
Partridge men were ‘late bloomers.’ Isaac still had something to be
proud about: although the others were well built and towered above
him at 6’, he was the smartest by far. He was the leader.

“See you,” said Kyle Crum, the wide
receiver. He was focused on his food now, which he hadn’t eaten any
of since he’d been busy labeling the new students. He was a smart
kid, Isaac knew, but spent more than half of his time being a
goofball.

“Where are you going?” Penelope asked and
looked up at him, biting into her sandwich and staining the food
with lipstick.

“I’m sure the guys can take care of you,” he
said and started walking away.

Isaac looked at his group, realizing there
were hardly any of them who spoke when they were at lunch. He’d
always been the one to start them talking, even when they said that
they didn’t want to. He further knew that Blitzer had a thing for
Penelope, but he was too ‘manly’ to reveal his emotions. When Isaac
had stated his real feelings for Penelope, Blitzer had smiled and
slapped the quarterback’s arm with delight. He realized, of course,
that he was running out of time because they were a year away from
graduating. He didn’t have long to reveal how he felt.

Isaac strolled over to the table furthest
from civilization, placed his food on the table with a bang, and
smiled when she jumped.

“Did I scare you?” he asked and sat down.
She refused to lower the book, actually raised it higher so he
couldn’t see her face. He read the title aloud, realizing it was a
library book about animals and not a textbook that had been
assigned by her teachers. “Are you interested in animals?” She
refused to speak and kept the book in front of her face. “I have a
Rottweiler. His name’s Gable. I named him after Clark Gable. Do you
watch movies?”

“Mmm,” she said in response.

“Oh. I see. You’re a fan of Tarzan,” he said
and laughed at his own joke. “I don’t think Tarzan would need to
read about animals, though, because he was always around them. What
do you think?”

She moved the book away from her face with a
flick of her wrist and held it with pinky and thumb on opposite
pages. He smiled at her, but stopped when she didn’t return it. He
could tell by her expression that she wanted him to get lost. He
wondered if he was right assuming she was detached, because she
seemed to be the loner type. They were connected about being
disconnected.