Lost In Rewind (Audio Fools #3) (36 page)

The driver brings me back to the harbor in a flash. My mind hasn’t stopped racing in a hundred different directions since I ran out of her father’s vineyard. I run toward the place where all the little boats are docked, but they’re all empty. I look around for anyone who could bring me back to the yacht, but there’s no one in sight; it must be lunchtime. I get impatient and decide to row myself back to the ship and have someone bring the boat back later. I can see the Bruel yacht docked prominently in the distance—how hard could this be?

I jump in an empty moored vessel, and after untying the rope, begin to row like a lunatic, like a possessed animal, like a man who just stole a boat. I need to get back and find Kali, I mean, Sarah.

The strong sun reflecting off the white limestone Calanques lining the port is literally burning my skin. I stop rowing to catch my breath and let go of the oars to unbutton my shirt, contemplating whether I should jump into the calm Mediterranean Sea to cool off. I sit still in my stolen boat and allow my reality to filter through the manic haze around me.
How can all this be happening?
I lie down, breathing in and out slowly to prevent the inevitable panic assault, and that’s when I realize just how emotionally and physically tired I am. And then it dawns on me that I need to tell Sara Knight that we are halfway around the world looking for another Sarah.

“Y
ou mean to tell me she’s bloody alive?” Will questions again for the third time as if he can’t believe that the girl we’ve been searching for could actually be alive. Since getting word from Will’s father last night, they were all under the impression that Kali passed away and were trying to figure out gentle ways to tell me she was dead.

I look around the table at everyone’s faces, and they mirror my own baffled state of mind. I have just finished recapping my fucked-up life to the six people I’ve known for a very long time; the same group of people who know my life and the choices I’ve made. They’ve seen the struggles I’ve lived through and the heartaches I’ve caused and survived. However, I direct my speech mostly to one person—Sara, who quietly listens to me tell the same story she already heard before about a gypsy fortuneteller changing my life. But now she is no longer the girl with the biblical name at the center of my world that will save me, and I desperately want to know what’s going on inside her complicated mind.

Without any announcements, Will, Eddie, Michelle, Louis, and Emily all get up and leave the table simultaneously. It’s just Sara and me, the last two people left in the world staring one another down.

“Say something,” I beg her.

The wind has picked up since we set sail for Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer, blowing Sara’s light hair toward her face, shielding her eyes from me.

“Jeffery, I hope you don’t think we were a mistake?” she states in a small voice laced in worry and fear.

“No! Never! I wouldn’t change a thing, even knowing what I know now, I would still do it all the same. You are one of the best decisions I have ever made, and Jacob and Juliet are all the evidence I’ll ever need to know we were meant to be in each other’s lives. I have to believe that Joella deliberately intercepted my life, which greatly affected your life, and that’s what brought you to Will and me here.”

She looks out toward the distance at the glistening water surrounding us.

“Jeffery, that’s not why I’m upset; I know all of that. I don’t doubt our purpose or regret the choices that have gotten us to this point in our lives. I just don’t want you to move JJ away from me. I may not be your salvation, but they’re mine,” she begs with tears streaming down her cheeks.

I gasp at her words and her fears. I get up and walk over to her and kneel at her feet. I make her a promise right here and now. “I will never move away. I will never take your kids away from you. I will never hurt you or them, ever again. I’ve done enough hurting to last me two lifetimes. You will always be a part of my heart and my soul. I will make sure you are always loved and that you have the most excellent life; the kind I promised you, but could never give you because it wasn’t me you were created for.”

She wraps her arms around my neck, sobbing loudly into my shoulder. We stay huddled together like two lost children as the universe reveals itself with yet another piece of the puzzle.

“I can’t believe that your Kali is actually your Sarah. Wait here,” she announces and runs inside, leaving me on deck alone.

She returns with a pen in hand a few minutes later. She takes hold of my left hand and turns it to inspect my open palm. She finds with her fingers the faded place where I had her named tattooed under my wedding band fifteen years ago and writes S A R A H over it with her pen.

“I’ll always be your first Sara, but I hope that she’ll be your last. Our kids will have both of us guarding them and you from now on, just like their mother promised them.”

I nod and smile at her heartening comment.

Sarah LeBlanc has no idea how many people she’s about to inherit, but I bet Joella Gitanos knew.

“
Alone
” by Heart

I
’ve lived in Cassis for most of my life, and I never knew that one of the reasons my maman and my papa chose to live here was because of its proximity to Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer. I sit in the place my parents visited over twenty-five years ago after they got married to ask the black Madonna—Sarah la Kali—for guidance and protection. My papa told me a few weeks ago that my maman vowed to name her first daughter after her beloved saint as a token of her love and devotion. I now realize that all the women in my life, in their own way, are connected to this patron saint of the Gitan people, which I am proud to be a descendent of.

With my papa’s blessing, I have decided that I must join this pilgrimage for my soul that somehow got lost between here and there. This grand festival to honor Saint Sarah only takes place once a year, and I’m fortunate to be here on this magical, warm day in May.

I have spent over four hours standing in this crypt below the church of Saint Michael with the statue of Saint Sarah watching over me. I have told her about everything and everyone that lives inside my heart, both dead and alive, and I hope she will hear and answer my prayers like only she can.

The sense of loneliness that wouldn’t let me stay in Rhode Island has greatly diminished since I came back to my place of birth. I now get to carry the matriarch of my family with me everywhere I go, tucked inside my heart, never again allowing myself to feel alone. I kiss the locket dangling around my neck with the solace of knowing the women I’ve lost will always guide me. I have transported and hidden all of Joella’s journals just as she left them—unopened, un-violated—except one. The saint I was named after, the same glorious daughter of God that I now sit at her feet, graced the leather covers of the one journal that was meant for me to find and read. My grand-mère has been writing my book since before I was born, moving all the pieces necessary to help the stars align. I have vowed to my papa to never read beyond the point I am at right now or how my life will one day end, but I have read enough to know that I am in the right place and on the right path.

As hard as I’ve tried, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about him once from our one night together over a half a year ago. I don’t feel bitter for having met and touched him, and with the new direction my heart has swung, I accept my destiny and his contribution to it. He will forever be etched in my past, and I will forever be grateful to my grand-mère for bringing a mysterious stranger named Jeffery Rossi into my life, even if for one night.

I smile as I realize that he will never understand what I now know, and perhaps that, too, is for the best. My chest aches as I recite Joella’s words to him in my mind. She wrote in her journal that Godfrey will come carrying the key to my future, and he did. I think back to how clear and simple my grand-mère’s words to him were. She was describing me in her prophecy—I am the girl with the biblical name, it was my hands that create the music she spoke of, but Jeff has no idea. He believes Joella made a mistake, but she never made a mistake, and he will never have the privilege of knowing.

In a positive mindset, I recognize the role I was meant to play in his life, in his moment of weakness, and I’m indebted for the role he played in mine. I try to not think or imagine him outside our short, fated interaction, because it’s senseless and still painful. I’m certain he went back to that young girl he always loved—Eddie’s little sister, now that his wife has passed away and fate no longer stands in their way. I’m sure they found each other—as lovers always do. I don’t wish him mal, and I truthfully hope they finally have a happy life together. I will do my best to have a beautiful life as well.

I enfold my arms around my own waist for a much-needed hug.
All will be fine,
I promise myself. I have grown up in the past six months, more than I had in six years. My existence now has priorities that are not based on juvenile impulses and curiosity. I ceased wishing for silly, unimportant things, such as for him to call, text, or come find me. I now only have one wish to be the strong person I need for myself, and never require more than what God gave me in order to feel whole.

I have brought my beloved violin that once belonged to my maman—and before that, to Joella and her mère—and I’ve been joining in accompaniment of the divine melody emanating from dozens of guitars played by other gypsies that have come to honor this female deity almost all day. The hymns that fill this crypt have completely restored my aching soul, making me postulate that maybe I’ve been here hundreds of times before, and perhaps, in a way, my soul has.

I inhale the scent of burning candles that light the prominent shrine, causing a sense of suspended euphoric reality; an enchanting environment. I would never be able to recap or explain to another person this feeling unless they came and stood next to me and witnessed her spirit for themselves.

I stand on the long line to re-enter the underground shrine after taking a quick break to give my fingers and legs a rest.

“This is amazing.”

I hear someone speak English and look up immediately. The Provençal festival of St. Sarah has been known to bring thousands of tourists to this little seaside town, and I’m not at all surprised that a few Americans have found their way to the crypt. Two women stand in line directly in front of me, and it’s obvious they can’t contain their delight at the visual feast taking place a few feet away from them.

I try to continue my peaceful meditation and absorb all the positive energy dancing around me, but I can’t help but listen in on their conversation, excited at being able to understand them.

“Is it weird that we’re here?” The blonder woman asks the taller girl.

“They don’t know we’re Jewish. You look like a shiksa anyway.”

They both snort out an infectious kind of laugh that I can’t help but smile and silently join in on. By their comfort and ease, they seem as if they’ve known each other for years, perhaps they’re even sisters. As an only child growing up on a secluded vineyard without a mama and fearing the sea, I didn’t have many friends besides my musical instruments. I unintentionally become extremely envious when I see female friendships that someone like me can only dream about.