The Ghostwriter's Words

Sara: Breaking the Silence

"Forever is a very long time," Sara whispered, breaking the silence several hours later. No one had spoken since she'd promised to learn how to pronounce Claire's name. Claire appeared lost in her thoughts, hypnotized by the ground passing miles beneath them. Steve seemed to be asleep and didn't stir. But Claire turned to Sara with an implicit question in her eyes.

Sara replied, "As I said, I've had sex with more men than I can count. I told you that. I didn't lie." She waited, watching for some reaction, while the question remained in Claire's eyes, maybe a different question, but she said nothing.

So, Sara added, "I like meeting and talking with new people. Don't you?"

Claire's eyebrows rose as if to say, So?

"That isn't a big deal. Right?"

Claire reminded Sara, "I'm not talking to you. I'm still really pissed and want to go home."

Since Claire claimed not to be speaking to her, Sara continued as though she hadn't. "It can be a big deal, but not necessarily. Sometimes it is just fun. It is just two people, sometimes more - why does that matter? Sometimes it is just people enjoying the company of other people."

Sara paused, waiting for validation she didn't receive. Claire was not, as she'd reiterated, speaking to her. So, Sara plodded on. "You're right. Sometimes it is more. Talking with another person can be as intimate or more than any form of physical intimacy. Sharing secrets, endearments, and promises."

Nothing.

"The point is: I've shared my soul with you, at least the greater part, and promise to share the rest - if you'll let me. That is an intimacy I promised myself I would never share with anyone other than Sammy. Then I broke that promise. I fell in love with you and opened my soul again. I didn't believe it was possible to be in love and share my soul with two people, not simultaneously. But it is. I'm still in love with Sammy, but I'm also in love with you, even if you are pissed, scared, and not talking to me."

Claire still wasn't talking to her.

"But I like having sex with other people too. It isn't a big deal. Not to me. I shared my body with Steve. We just had sex. We weren't intimate. I didn't share my soul. I didn't even come."

Claire still wasn't talking to her.

"I can't spend forever and never talk to another person. I can't spend forever and never share thoughts and ideas with another person. I can't spend forever and never have fun with another person. That's all sex is when it is only sex. I can't spend forever and have sex with only one person. But it isn't intimate. It is just sharing the pleasure of one another's company and body."

"And forever is a very long time," Claire finally said, with sarcasm, ending her silence. Regardless of the tone used to deliver them, Sara nodded and acknowledged the words as the truth.

"Why?" Claire asked a while later. Perhaps she was speaking with her after all.

They'd been racing the Sun and gradually falling behind. But, even if later in the day than Sara would have preferred, it was still Sammy's birthday, there were still several hours of daylight, and they were nearly home. "It just is," Sara told her, assuming they were still discussing 'forever.' "You'll understand. At least, I hope you will."

"No," Claire told her.

"I hope you won't say, No. I know you're still angry. But I hope you'll say, Yes."

"What are you talking about?" Claire asked, stretching, then realized she was standing and not falling to her death through the transparency beneath her feet. She immediately returned to the security of her seat, even though it was as transparent as the floors and walls.

"Forever," Sara told her, wasn't that obvious. "I hope you'll say, Yes, to forever. What are you talking about?"

"No. I don't care about forever," Claire clarified. "I don't understand why you won't let me go home. Why do I have to stay with you?"

"Oh," Sara said, pausing to reorient her thoughts. She summarized the day's earlier events again, which she hardly felt was necessary. Starting with those that Claire hadn't been present to witness, she listed: "Those women I saw beheaded. The one they shot in the back. That little toy microscope and those nasty 'Satan Cells,' which none of those women could have had-"

Claire cut her off, insisting, "What's that have to do with me? I don't have any 'Satan Cells.'"

Sara paused, afraid of the answer but needing to ask, "Is that a problem? Do you think people with 'Satan Cells' are evil and deserve to die? I hate that name, by the way, 'Satan Cells.' Do you hate Immortals?"

Claire shook her head. "No, people don't deserve to die because they believe they're immortal. They aren't; I don't think. So why does it matter what they believe? I don't understand 'Satan Cells,' but hurting or killing anyone isn't right because they believe something different."

"Good," Sara sighed, sitting back with a heavy exhalation of relief. She turned to Steve, who she assumed was awake enough to catch the latter part of the conversation, and asked, "I expect the same goes for you since you work for The Truth and could have abandoned me to those assholes at the airport?"

"No, no," Steve answered, "I have no issues with Immortals. I've been hoping to get some of those 'Satan Cells' for myself. Which is the entire point of working for The Truth?"

"Done," Sara told him matter-of-factly. "As soon as we get home. Remind me if I forget."

"Remind you of what?" Steve asked.

"Forever, if you want. I thought Immortality was what we were talking about?"

"Just like that?"

"Of course. You helped save my life."

Steve blinked several times, looking back at Sara in disbelief, and said, "Wow! I don't know what else to say. Wow!"