Bitter Fruits by Sarah Daltry

us - and I get the feeling you’re going to need all night to tell me this story.”
     
     
     

 
    7.
     
    “So, as they say, how about you start at the beginning?” I ask after we have been walking for a while and civilization gives way to the woods. Alec seems convinced that finding Caleb is the first step to tracking down Henry and, having nothing else to go on, I agree.
    “In my case, that word has more weight than you understand,” he tells me.
    “How old are you?”
    “I don’t know. Time loses its meaning after so long. My parents were the first to walk this earth,” he offers.
    I put my hand in his and try to get warm. The chill in the air and the heaviness of the conversation aren’t helping. “Like Native Americans?”
    Alec stops. “Like native humans . They were the first, the pair that brought you into this world.”
    “What do you mean? You’re not saying...” I don’t finish my thought, because, well, my thought is ludicrous and insane. Alec, however, says it for me.
    “You know them as Adam and-”
    I laugh. It is a hysterical laugh, the laugh of someone who belongs in an institution. This is not happening, I tell myself, but the hysteria becomes a part of me. The sounds of my fading sanity echo through the trees and I sit on the cold, hard earth, picking up the dead leaves and blowing them into piles around me. “Eve? Your parents are Adam and Eve?” Even speaking the words leads to more laughter, because who says things like that? When did my life become this - a reality in which this is a reasonable question? It’s not even that I’m surprised; I feel like I knew this, but hearing it? That’s a different matter altogether.
    “They were. When I was like you.”
    “Mortal?” I look up to him and he nods, sinking to his knees and lifting my leaf piles to open the circle of them that I've created. I don’t know why I am making the circle; I know it’s not a ward from anything, but just as I can’t sleep without at least part of a blanket covering me, it holds a false security. The circle now extended, enclosing us both, Alec reaches for me and holds me against him. The secure feeling includes his embrace, because he is comfort for me. Together, inside my magical circle, nothing else is real and nothing else matters.
    “I hate how you look at me when I tell you these things. I want to go back to the party, when you thought I was just like you,” he says in my ear. I want the same thing, but I don’t want to break his heart admitting it. I know that we would still be here, that this is inevitable, but I do wish it were easier. I’ve accepted a great deal since meeting Alec, and as much as I believe that some force brought us together, I wouldn’t mind sometimes if he were just a guy.
    I breathe in and try not to freak out about what he’s saying. In his arms, it’s hard to believe that we are talking of curses and families that extend back to the Book of Genesis. He just feels like home. In the end, reality may be strange, but it is reality. I cannot fault Alec for telling me; I ’m the one who asked. Besides, he gave me the choice to leave; he gave me the choice several times both before and after we first made love. I chose this, I remind myself. I wonder about the things we do for love, but I know I wouldn’t change a thing.
    “I told you I wanted all of you. It wasn’t just physical,” I say. “I love you . If that means I have to face the fact that nothing I believed is true, so be it. You can’t choose love.”
    He kisses my forehead and smiles, the pain etched into his features. “No. You can’t. Nora, please, no matter what happens, remember that I know that as well as you. If, when this reaches its inevitable conclusion, you can’t look at me the same, I will remember that you believed everything you said tonight.”
    “Stop,” I tell him. “At the end, it will be you and me.” I tilt my head to the side and meet him in a kiss, passion wiping away the