Meeting in the Nexus

St. Louis, Missouri, 1882 A.D. A beatific walking park, a finely dressed young woman sat at a bench watching as the tall, dark man approached her. He wore black from head to toe with a large hat pulled down low over his eyes. His yellow eyes. They would seem alarming to anyone else but she had the same yellow eyes, the same pale skin, frail frame and shockingly sharp cheekbones. The man tipped the brim of his hat to her in greeting and sat beside her.

“There are rules, you know,” she responded to his presence in a high pitched, soft, breathy voice. “You are breaking so many.”

The tall man removed his hat revealing a blaze of pale blonde hair on his head. He looked out at the visitors in the park, the usual folk that wander the sidewalks to see and be seen. No matter the splendor of their dress they didn’t come close to the vivid colors of the surroundings.

Each of them belonged to one place. The park belonged to many and the overlapping realities strengthened the representation. His kind referred to this joining point of realities, the nexus. It was the only way he could speak to her. “I have reasons,” he replied. His voice, though that of a grown man, held the same wispy, high qualities of hers.

She smiled at his answer. “So I gather. I notice you didn’t say that they were your reasons.”

The man turned and regarded her for the first time, taking in her complete visage. He became oddly amused. “So this is what I would look like as a woman. A very petite woman,” he remarked with good humor. “Why are you so tiny?”

The tiny woman, barely past the five foot mark standing in boots, pressed her lips together grimly. “Speak for yourself, you’re practically a giant,” she replied. “So you want to perform a transfer.”

He returned his attention to the park in general as he explained. He seemed slightly uncomfortable with the prospect of asking the alternate aspect of himself a favor. “The poor man was confused. I don’t think he was meant to do what he did.”

She appeared momentarily surprised. Her tall doppelganger might be alluding to a conflict neither of them even wanted to acknowledge. “You suspect he may have been influenced?” she asked, her voice becoming more hushed.

“His current state of mind has made him vulnerable,” he replied.

She frowned. She could tell he was being evasive. Time to cut him to the quick. “Or maybe you’re too soft hearted,” she accused. “We aren’t supposed to play God. We’re supposed to play.”

“We are essentially the same,” he replied without falter. “You can be no less touched by his predicament than I.”

She considered this but did not want to admit to the same weakness he had. “We can be as different as night and day, man and woman, tall and short.” She gestured to them both as she said this.

He bowed his head in acquiescence. “Point taken,” he said. “But our feelings, our minds.”

“Are the same,” she agreed with a reluctant sigh. He knew from the beginning what she was going to say. No point in delaying the inevitable. “I will assist in the exchange. I’ve already made plans.”

“I know,” he answered and to his credit, he quelled whatever triumphant smile he could have worn on his face. He handed her a package the size of a loaf of bread, wrapped neatly in brown paper. “Take this. It will help in the exchange.”

She looked curiously at the bundle and could not keep herself from opening it like a child with a present. When she saw the contents, she became confused. “Fabric,” she said with a muted note of disappointment, but her fingers lingered over the feel of the contents. She continued to touch it, stroke it, evaluate it value. “It’s very fine fabric but what am I supposed to do with it?”

The tall man stood gracefully from the bench and replaced his hat upon his head. “Make it into a travelling cloak,” he replied. He turned his down to her, meeting her eyes. Yellow to yellow. “It’s cotton.”

The tiny woman looked back at him with disbelief, shock. Her hands could not stop feeling the fabric. Its touch had become hypnotic. “That’s impossible,” she said in a whisper. “It feels and looks like silk.”

He smiled at her slip of perfection’s mask. “It’s from a little mill in Nebraska.”

She looked down at her gift, contemplating what this meant. He had given her the perfect weapon to ensnare her target. “She won’t be able to resist,” she whispered. Then she looked back up at him, having to strain to match the distance. She realized then that their meeting wasn’t about asking for assistance or permission or even to organize the transition of souls from one time stream to another. They both already knew everything they had to know to follow the plan. He only wanted to meet her to give her the package. “You knew. You knew who my target was.”

“We are the same,” he repeated. “Our hearts beat as one.” He turned away from her then to look at the people of their respective realities, those in their charge. “If you orchestrate this right, it could be a happy ending all around.”

She followed his gaze. She knew everything that was going to happen. “Someone will still die,” she said softly.

As he walked away from her and the nexus began to separate, he reassured her, “But for the right reasons.”