Beyond Death Do Us Part

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The house was finally dark at 3:00 a.m. After hours of conversation, Celia had piled the couch with blankets and pillows and wished her guest goodnight. Now, she lay sleeping fitfully, murmuring as she slept. As dawn approached, the blackness of night giving way only slightly to heavy gray, she was jolted awake by sudden cries. Confused and frightened, she flew down the stairs and into the living room, to find Ben thrashing on the couch, moaning and crying out incoherently. It took her a few seconds to realize that he was in the midst of a nightmare. She exhaled a sigh of relief.

"Celie, Celie," he whimpered, making her start. She peered closely into his face, but he was clearly still asleep. Her heart fluttered slightly, and she noticed how beautiful he looked. "No," he muttered, and his voice suddenly rose to a scream. "No! Celie!" He sat bolt upright with a ragged gasp. The two stared at each other for a nonplussed moment, Ben getting his bearings.

"Oh, God, I'm really sorry," he exclaimed, embarrassed. "I'm so sorry for waking you. I should have told you that I often have nightmares." He blushed deeply. "I scream sometimes," he added in a small voice. "Did I scare you?"

"No...It's alright," Celia told him, eyeing him strangely. "You said this happens often?"

"Yeah, I've had these recurring night-terrors since I was a child. Not every night, but...often." He studied her still uncertain look. "What did I say?" he ventured. "Did I say something bad?"

"No. I—" She halted. "It's nothing. You just said my name, like you were calling to me."

"Really?" Ben furrowed his brows. "I've said things in my sleep plenty of times before, but folks have always told me that it didn't make any sense. I've never dreamed of someone I knew. It's always the same dream, after all."

"Would you... Would you like to talk about it?" Celia asked tentatively. "Like, what it's about? But you don't have to if you don't want to," she added quickly.

"No, it's okay. I've woken you up, I might as well explain the dream." Sitting up, Ben folded his legs underneath him and pulled the blankets close. Celia sat down beside him and gingerly pulled some of the covers around her shoulders—she wasn't wearing much.

"It always starts out happy," Ben began. "I'm driving in the car with someone, we're laughing. Everything's a blur, but then I look up. The dream slows down so everything's in slow motion. We're driving where there's a concrete divider in the middle of the road—it's four lanes. It's like some weird apparition: All of a sudden there's this eighteen-wheeler coming through the divider. I know what's going to happen, and there's nothing I can do. I slam on the brakes as the truck slides on the icy road. The thing slid so it was blocking the whole highway. My car skids on the ice too, and I can't brake well. I manage to turn the car a bit so that it's my side that hits the truck. There's all this color and flashing and noise. I don't want to die. I don't want to lose...something. There's this blinding pain, and I'm screaming, but it's not because of the pain. It's because I don't want to go, but I can't stop it. Then I wake up."

Finishing his account, Ben turned to Celia and was bewildered to find her in tears, her face blanched an unhealthy white.

"Celie!" he exclaimed, reaching out to her. "I'm sorry, what's wrong?" Celia tried to master he storm of sobbing. Confused, Ben drew her to his chest protectively. There was something about this mystery of a woman that made him want to hold her and fight off everything that caused her pain. At last she caught her breath.

"I just—I just don't understand," she choked. "That's exactly how my husband died." She dissolved into another fit of tears. "He died on Valentine's Day, twenty-one years ago." Something made Ben's blood run chill, his breath faltering. "I was in the car with him," she continued brokenly. "There was nothing we could have done: we were going too fast. I used to want to kill that truck driver, but it was really the bad roads, not him." Celia took a deep breath, shuddering. "You have no idea—I had to raise my daughter... I was going to kill myself tonight, right before you came. I miss him so much."

Ben gave a strange chuckle, causing her to look quickly into his face, surprised that he would laugh. When she saw his expression, her heart skipped a beat.

"Well, this is odd," he stated with a smile that was not really a smile at all. "I don't know what this means, but I was born on Valentine's Day, twenty-one years ago."

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Part III:

The two stared at one another. Celia's mind was a deluge of confused thoughts. She thought of his mannerisms and how they were just like Cam's. How Ben's way of speaking was so like him, and how she felt strangely attracted to him, as she had never felt to a man since Cameron's death. Even the funny way he liked his tea...

Mostly, she thought of Cameron, though. Her mind at last latched onto something he had once said to her. It was meant lightly, one of the romantic things lovers whisper in each other's ear. She could hear his voice so clearly: "I will love you to beyond death do us part. The ol' reaper's gonna meet his match if I ever leave you behind, 'cause I'm coming back!"

Ben was watching her with a strange look on his face. Celie had seemed so familiar. His first thought had been that she made him think of his nightmares, but that wasn't all. There was something much more than that: Memories that shouldn't be his tapping on the backdoor of his thoughts.

Celia wondered if she'd lost her mind. She'd never been a religious person, and wasn't even sure if she believed in an afterlife. And she'd certainly never given much thought to the notion of reincarnation—if that was indeed what her brain was trying to wrestle with. Perhaps it didn't matter what she believed, or what was true. All she knew was that there was more than coincidence at play here. Ben didn't look like her Cameron, but he acted like him in every respect. She focused her gaze on Ben once more, and shivered as she read a strange recognition in his eyes.

Ben couldn't tear his eyes away from hers. Faint memories swam foggily through his head; memories, or dreams, or something else, his didn't know which. It felt like his body was going off like a siren, telling him that he loved her. Every cell, every electrical current, every hormone, every particle of his being was screaming, responding as they would for a man looking into the eyes of the woman he loved.

Something—something outside of themselves, or deeper within than they could ever see—something caused them to move together, breath grazing lightly over one another's face. Something moved their lips together without conscious thought.

It was as though a blazing fire had been lit, engulfing them. With a primal hunger, they pressed their bodies together, pressing hot kisses over every inch of the other's face. He licked and sucked from her ear down the length of her neck like a man dying of thirst. She writhed in his arms, wrapping her legs around him, pulling his shirt over his head. Her hands mapped every contour of his chest, fingers making his passion burn hotter.

Breaking away, he practically ripped her short nightdress off, while she worked desperately to tear his boxers away. The desire that had lain dormant for so many years almost overwhelmed her with its scorching power. They fell onto the couch, hands rubbing, squeezing, massaging, and caressing every inch of bare skin.

Pushing him back, Celie straddled him, rubbing the soaked lips of her labia over his shaft. Moaning, she threw her head back, her fingers twisting at her nipples. Reaching down, he lifted her hips, urging her onto him. Her pussy poised over him for a moment, then he thrust upwards, ramming into her warmth with a strangled cry.

Celie rode him with a feral look in her eyes. Their bodies plunged together, meeting each time with a seismic jolt of pure passion. Shrieking together as one, they felt themselves melt into a unit, her throbbing inner walls meshed to his hard shaft, pulsing together in perfect time. They held themselves together, her hips gyrating slightly as she pushed into him, his pelvis lifted off the cushion as he pressed as deep within her as possible. For a few long, breathless moments, they hovered together, muscles rippling.

Howling with the force of it, they came. He could feel her fluids streaming down over his belly and between his legs, even as she felt him filling her with a torrent of his seed. Panting, they clutched at each other, dizzy and trembling.

As they lay together, almost blacking out, Celie felt a smile of true joy part her lips. Exhausted, she still managed to start laughing and crying at the same time. He kissed her tears, smiling back at her with understanding.

"Happy Valentine's Day."