Fantasia

November 5th happened to fall on a Friday that year and Freya felt the familiar tightness in her stomach as she sat on the Southeastern trail hurtling her towards the ancient harbour town of Rye. She had stopped listening to music on her Iphone out of fear that it would light up again with another text message from her,

“See you in two hours” the last one had read. That was over an hour ago.

Freya exhaled deeply and sat up straighter in her seat, the glaring lights of the train carriage harsh yet oddly comforting. She appreciated the familiarity of public transport. Even when you were amongst strangers, it felt like you were being cradled by a parental civilization where the CCTV would prevent the worst crimes, the stewards would stop any unpleasantness and the speeding train would surely deposit you to your destination.

There was assurance on the train. It was what she would find in the ghostly cobbled streets of Rye that made her shiver. She looked up and out of what patches she could see through the foggy window, so cold to the touch of her hot forehead. There was a full, heavy moon above her, following the train.

“Of course it’s a full moon,” Freya muttered. Her reflection in the glass was not as youthful as the last time she’d taken this same train to Rye, but then it had also been more naive. Freya thought back to her younger self, so optimistic for the future and so in love, ready to throw everything in her life away for a swashbuckling Northern girl. She’d worn bright red lipstick then and curled her hair before brushing it out. This time her makeup was more natural, and her hair was too long to hold curls so it just fell wildly around her like a red fox’s tail.

The train conductor chimed over the speaker, the next stop was Rye. Freya instinctively took a few deep breaths. Her hands were sweating which annoyed her. “There is nothing to be nervous about,” she thought to herself angrily, “She is the one who should be nervous. She’s lucky I’ve turned up at all.” Freya stood and gathered her things.

Before a couple of weeks ago, Freya hadn’t spoken to Julia in two whole years, their longest record yet. This time she really thought she’d never hear from her again. And good riddance.

As Freya walked up the familiar streets of Rye towards their old place, Jeake’s House, she was flooded with memories and associations of all the past bonfire nights here. She’d never been to Rye with anyone else, she’d kept that promise. She always wondered vaguely if Julia had stayed as true to that pact...but Freya couldn’t bring herself to ask. There was only so much betrayal and disappointment you could really take. And she wouldn’t have believed Julia’s answer anyway.

Yet through it all, they kept finding their way back to each other. They kept returning year after year, or every other year to this same sleepy town which had always maintained the most beautiful parts of their love, the romanticism and the magic. Here in these streets their love felt truer than anything else, at least to Freya, and everything else dulled.

Of course a part of Freya, the academic side, the side that had gained her fucking PhD, told her that this was insanity. The girl dumped you after you left your wife for her. Her brain repeated this same truth in weak moments. You were suicidal. It said louder. You had to return to America. You lost friends. All of these things were undeniably true. Freya hesitated around the corner from Mermaid Street which she knew was the beginning of the short climb up to Jeake's. She leaned against a wall trying to think rationally. What do you really want, Freya asked herself. Not for the first time today. Why are you really here? To find out if you’re still in love with her? To find out if she’s sorry. But maybe the real answer was that it was just habit.

She knew Julia would be in the hotel room there. The same one they always booked at Jeake’s house, the old Radcliffe Hall room. She imagined her there, bored, impatient, probably, waiting on her. Easily confident that Freya would return.

I just need a sign. Freya said, unsure if it was aloud or to herself. The night was too cold and her shoes were too uncomfortable for her to be idly hovering around Rye trying to make up her mind.

Sighing, she turned the corner and began walking up the cobbled street. She looked up towards Jeake’s House and towards the windows that she knew were the ones to the room they had booked. The lights were on. Freya’s stomach flipped. A simultaneous feeling of ecstasy and dread was on her like a cold hand in the night.

Something moved in the window as she looked at it and Freya hesitated, eyes wide. Was Julia at the window looking for her? But then it moved again and it swooped down lowly below the window in a long “u” before it twisted and maneuvered back up towards the Mermaid Inn where it perched and turned its head, now its face blazing through the darkness. It was a barn owl. Face as white as the moon above. It stood on the sign of the Mermaid Inn watching Freya who was still motionless below.

It didn’t help that Freya had an irrational fear of birds. But this one, despite its proximity, was mesmerizing. Freya stared at the bird which seemed to hold all the secrets and majesty of the night, and it stared back at her. It’s black eyes trying to communicate telepathically to her.

But then the door to Jeake’s House’s reception opened and a friendly voice said, “Hello there, can I help with your bags?” Freya turned her head to see the old man that kept Jeake’s House. He looked exactly the same as the last time she’d seen him, Gerald, she thought his name was. Or Giles. He probably didn’t remember her.

The low lighting and warmth instantly transported her into a different world to the crisp mystery of night with the snow-faced barn owl.

Freya climbed the old creaky stairs, how many hundreds of years old she didn’t know. She remembered briefly her and Julia sneaking up them higher than their room and testing doors to see if any rooms were open that weren’t theirs. Then she was outside the Radcliffe Hall Room, she knocked. Her knuckles heavy.

The door opened unceremoniously and there was Julia. Blonde, tall, thin, glamorous, as always. Her familiar perfume wafting over Freya’s senses. Then that half smile, uncertain, those glittering blue eyes watching her.

“Hello Freya,” she said.

They started kissing. And it was almost the same as before. Julia’s one jagged tooth still caught her lips which were a bit too full to miss it. Freya still felt how perfect their bodies were together. Still felt the intensity of the desire. But there a restraint in her heart which thought of all the other women Julia had chosen over her. All the other women who had been here, maybe not literally in Rye, but in some other ancient town, kissing this same woman whom she’d always loved so fiercely unconditionally. But now, the stakes were higher and Julia’s kissing seemed rougher, more insistent. Or maybe it had always been this way?

They were undressing each other on the bed, the same one they’d been naked together on many times before. Freya mechanically lifted up Julia’s silky shirt, obviously something she’d chosen special for tonight. But there, on her rib cage, were thick inky lines, the outline of an owl. And underneath the owl italics that said "My leaping flame, my owl-eyed October".

Freya paused in her movements. Her feeling of confusion was replaced with a sadness, this quote had nothing to do with her. The mysterious wells of this woman who had lived so many love stories was evident again. Julia took her hand and sat up beside her, already trying to explain.

“Freya, I knew you’d want to know about this, let me explain,” but it didn’t matter what she said, because the pain of the unknown was closing in around her life a fog. She looked towards the window of the bedroom, the same one moments before she’d been looking up at and seen the owl.

The owl. A shiver ran down Freya’s spine. Had it been a warning? She got up and walked over to the window, abandoning Julia on the bed. But it wasn’t out there anymore. It was gone. An illusion. She turned around and faced Julia who’s beautiful features were contorted in a worried and guilty way, she looked almost scared of Freya. Why? Freya wondered. She decided again, as she had many times to cross the barrier of communication between her and Julia.

“Julia, tonight when I was walking up here there was an owl on the window outside. Now that I see you have a tattoo of one I feel like it was trying to tell me something, but I don’t know what.” Freya said, sitting down in the chair by the window, facing Julia who was still sitting on the bed.

Julia frowned. “Oh,” she said flatly. And then laughed loudly, “ohhh Freya, you were always so melodramatic, I remember now why I fell in love with you.”

“I thought you said you were never in love with me, and that was the problem,” Freya retorted harshly, not resisting the temptation to throw some daggers.

“That was because then you were still a girl, but now you’re a woman, and I am mature enough to see that.” Julia said looking at her seductively.

Freya stared at Julia. It was those sort of remarks that always haunted her in all the absent hours that inevitably followed their passionate but short lived trysts. They were just so cringe and patronising.

The owl outline on Julia’s ribs was still staring back at Freya, communicating something. Everything seemed to have greater significance. But maybe it was just this place, this room. She felt insane.

Freya sighed and buried her head in her hands. She knew she didn’t have the willpower to just leave. She knew she would do nothing. She would stay and be heartbroken again. And again. For evermore. And maybe one day she’d be a tattooed symbol on this same woman’s body too.

She heard Julia get up from the bed and approach her. At that moment an enormous, thundering boom exploded behind them through the window. They both jumped up. Fireworks. The whole of Mermaid Street lit up under the glorious blue, pink, and yellow colours of the displays. Both women gasped and dropped down to their knees at the window, looking out. Julia draped her long thin arm around Freya protectively. Freya leaned into it.

The celebrations had begun and the momentary friction was forgotten. They glanced at each other. Each surprised to find the same face they’d thought so much about in absence. Julia smiled. And Freya leaned in and kissed her as another firework went off.

“What did you do last year on Bonfire night?” Julia asked vampy like in her lilting northern accent when she pulled back from the kiss.

“Well, it’s not a holiday in America, is it?” Freya answered trying to keep the bitterness out of her voice. Julia looked down. She was so damn beautiful, Freya thought. That was her problem.

“Oh yeah...I guess it just seems very American to celebrate the near-burning down of Parliament, and burning a man alive on a bonfire pile”

“I think that traditional torture is more you Brit’s style,” Freya said with a smile. There was a long beat.

“The owl tattoo is about you, you git.” Julia said finally.

“I don’t believe that,” Freya said. Feeling the weight of the heaviness of it all on her heart. There was no significance in October for them.

“I’m not asking you to believe it. I’m telling you what it means.”

“Well, I still don’t know what it means.”

“It means, I love you.”

The lit bonfire torches were being carried over the hill. Freya wondered if the owl, somewhere out there in the dark, was scared of the flames.