Page 12 of Past Lives
She turns to me, hair clinging to her cheeks, and for a moment I catch something behind her eyes—a flicker, like a trapped moth. My chest tightens, and though I want to touch her hand, I flex my own and rest it on my thigh, focusing on the worn wood beneath my palm.
Suddenly, she leans her head on my shoulder, almost shyly, as if asking permission for something neither of us could name.
“You want to go to the top?” I say, voice steadier than I feel.
She nods, and we begin the climb.
The spiral stairs are tight; outside vanishes after a few turns. Only our breathing and the struts’ groans remain. Halfway up, I stop to catch my breath. Maya is steady, her hand brushing the rail as if tracing runes.
At the landing, the door sticks, but Maya shoves it open. We blink at the sudden light; the storm has passed. Below, the coastline unfolds, alive with spray and salt.
“God,” she says, “look at all of it.”
I try, but mostly I’m looking at her: the way her hair whips across her face, the flush in her cheeks, the way her body seems more at ease the closer she gets to the edge. The room smells not of oil or metal, but of ozone and far-off flowers. It occurs to me that she belongs here, somehow, with her pale profile and sea-witch laugh, and that I am simply a trespasser granted a single afternoon’s amnesty.
She circles the walkway, pausing at the leeward side to peer across the water. I join her. The sun, low and weak, lays a scattered path of gold over the waves. We stand shoulder to shoulder, both of us holding our breaths.
“You know Moira used to walk up here every night,” she says, finally. “They say she could see all the way to England with the right telescope. But she never left. Even when the light was automated. She just stayed.”
“Some people can’t leave where they hurt the most.”
She nods, then shudders, as if shedding a coat of memory. “So…what do you think? Soulful enough for your brand?”
I want to tell her I don’t give a damn about the brand. That if it were up to me, I’d ditch my phone in the sea and stay here, just to see what it feels like to exist without an agenda. But I don’t say it, because it would sound like a line. Instead, I say: “I think it’s the kind of place you dream about, but when you wake up, you think it’s too much, even for dreams.”
She laughs, less sea-witch than girl again. I want to remember the way her throat moves as she swallows the air. “Very poetic,” she says, but there’s a catch in it, and I sense an invitation, or maybe just a dare.
For a while, we don’t talk. The wind claws at us through the gaps in the glass, but Maya stands still, eyes fixed on the endless sky and water. She puts her hand up, palm outward, as if asking the sea for something it cannot give.
I try my selfie. I hold the phone high and frame us both against the blue sky. Maya leans on me just enough to make it look real. For a moment, I let myself believe it could be. My arm is around her shoulder, her cheek pressed cold against mine, the photo capturing not the lighthouse or the bay, but the almost, the sense of something that feels like arrival.
She looks at the photo and makes a face. “You look somber,” she says.
“I always look somber.”
She cocks her head. “What would it take to make you look otherwise?”
You, I want to say. You, you, you, you. But my mouth fills with the ghosts of other moments, other women I failed to keep, and hunger turns to ache.
Instead, I nudge her towards the camera. “Smile for the brand,” I say.
She grins, but just as the shutter goes, her expression changes. She looks open, less prepared, all her shields down. For a second, I see something I don’t have a word for. Not happiness, exactly, but the possibility of it.
Chapter 8
Maya
The train backto Edinburgh is delayed and crammed. I stand wedged between a smeared window and a woman who smells of warm cumin and synthetic raincoat, trying to decipher the illegible in patterns of raindrops blurring the view. The woodland dissolves, then the drenched fields, then the city, and still I cannot shake the acute sense of exile that clings to my ribs since we left the lighthouse.
Heath is somewhere up the carriage, probably scowling at his phone as messages multiply. I try not to think about the lingering heat of his hand or his softened voice. I replay the story of Moira Blythe like worrying at a loose tooth: girl becomes woman, becomes ghost, waits for love, death, or tide. I search my own skin for something permanent.
When we get to Waverley Station, we find a small Italian restaurant near the Royal Mile. Heath orders wine, though neither of us really wants it. The pasta between us feels like a silent negotiation. His fork scrapes the plate when he laughs, and I notice him watching my mouth as I talk. Outside, the wet stone of Edinburgh shines under the streetlights as he walks me back, his shoulder sometimes touching mine. At my hotel,we stand awkwardly, not moving closer or apart, until he finally says goodnight, his eyes hinting at more.
My room is small and beige, with a painting of a stag in a snowstorm and a carpet worn thin. I take off my coat, unwrap my scarf that still smells like seawater, and fall onto the bed. It feels like sinking into a shallow grave. I lie there, arms and legs spread, waiting to feel like myself again.
I want a bath, but don’t have the energy to run one. I want dinner, but I can’t even think about eating. I want someone—a hand, a voice, someone there. But I’ve always been best at wanting things I know I can’t have.
Instead, I text my mother to let her know I’m still alive and still abroad. She calls me her wandering star, as if that’s comforting. She asks if I’ve eaten, if I’ve written anything, and if there’s anyone special yet. My mother knows better, but hoping for grandchildren is a family sport.
