Stories: All-New Tales - By Neil Gaiman & Al Sarrantonio Page 0,123

More often, they did not.

I reminded him that he had promised not to write about me anymore. He assured me he hadn’t meant to. It was just bits, here and there. He’d be more careful. And really, I ought to be flattered.

But then a week of my life disappeared. I loved that short story, and Imogen was an amazing character, the kind of woman I wished I was. That wasn’t the point.

The point was, he had stolen me from myself again. I was just gone, and I didn’t know where I went. And there were more things about myself that I had forgotten. Was green really my favorite color?

I flicked on the computer, started typing madly. Everything I could remember about myself. But when I looked over the file, there were gaps that I knew I had once remembered, and duplications of events.

Panting, I stripped off my clothing and stared at myself, hoping that my body was more real than my mind. But was that scar on my knee from falling off my bike when I was twelve, or from a too-sharp rock at the beach when I was seventeen. Was that really how I waved hello? Would I cry at a time like this?

Anyone would, I supposed.

I tried to rewrite myself. I scoured boxes of faded flower petals, crumpled ticket stubs, paged obsessively through old yearbooks. Called friend after friend to play do you remember.

When I remembered enough to ask. To know who my friends were.

It didn’t work. Whatever gift he had or curse that I was under that let him pull me into his stories, it was a magic too arcane for me to duplicate.

And still, the gaps in my life increased. New changes happened. I woke one morning to find my hair was white. Not like an old woman’s, but the platinum white of a rock star or some elven queen.

I didn’t dye it back.

There was a collection published of his short fiction. He appeared on Best Of lists, and was shortlisted for important literary prizes.

I forgot if I took milk in my coffee.

He called, asked to see me. Told me he still loved me, was haunted by memories of my skin, my voice, my scent. I missed, I thought, those things, too. So I told him yes.

It took him a moment to recognize me, he said, when I walked across the bar to meet him. Something was different. I told him I didn’t know what that might be.

He ordered for both of us. I let him. I was sure he knew what I liked.

There was a story, he explained. He thought maybe the best thing he would ever write. He could feel the electricity of it crackle across his skin, feel the words that he would write pound and echo in his brain.

He had an outline that I could look at, see what I thought. He slid a slim folder across the table.

I wondered aloud why, this time, he would ask permission. This one was longer. An epic. He wasn’t sure how long it would take him to write it. And after what had happened the last time, when I had…Well. He wanted to ask.

I appreciated the gesture.

I drummed my fingers across the top of the folder, but did not open it.

A waiter discreetly set a martini to the right of my plate. Funny. I had thought that it was Madeleine who drank martinis. But I sipped, and closed my eyes in pleasure at the sharpness of the alcohol.

I said yes.

To one more story, this masterpiece that I could see burning in his eyes. But I had a condition.

Anything, he said. Whatever I needed.

I wanted him to leave me in the story when he was finished.

He told me he had wondered if I might ask for that. I was surprised he hadn’t known. He nodded agreement, and that was settled.

We talked idly through dinner. Occasionally his eyes would unfocus, and I could see the lines of plot being woven together behind them.

I wondered what he would name me this time, almost asked, then realized it didn’t matter. Then realized I wasn’t even sure what my own name was anymore. Grace, maybe? I thought that sounded right. Grace.

He started scribbling on the cover of the folder while we were waiting for the check. I watched him write.

“Rafe fell in love with her voice first, tumbled into it when she introduced herself as…”

LET THE PAST BEGIN

Jonathan Carroll

EAMON REILLY WAS HANDSOME AND SLOPPY. He seemed to know everyone, even