Page 31 of Never Quite Gone

A faint blush colored his cheeks. “I should probably go,” he said, but he made no move to stand. “I have... things.”

“Of course.” I kept my tone light. “Busy doctor things, I'm sure. But if you ever want company for your Saturday museum visits...” I let the offer hang between us, unfinished but clear.

He stood slowly, gathering his coffee cup. “I'll think about it.”

“That's all I ask.” I watched him take a few steps toward the exit before adding, “Oh, and Eli?”

He turned back, eyebrows raised in question.

“Giovanni makes excellent peppermint tea too. Just in case the coffee's keeping you up at night.”

Understanding flickered across his face – he hadn't told anyone about his recent insomnia. But instead of pulling away, he just shook his head with a small smile. “Good to know,” he said softly, and then he was gone.

Movement caught my eye – Eli hadn't left after all. He stood before an ancient Greek vase, pretending to study its intricate patterns while his gaze kept drifting back to our bench. The struggle played across his face clear as gallery lights on marble, logic wrestling with something deeper and less easily explained.

“The dreams started recently, didn't they?” I kept my voice soft as museum shadows. “The ones that don't quite feel like dreams.”

His slight flinch rippled through the quiet air between us. Around us, carved heroes and gods watched our dance with ancient eyes, morning light turning every surface to liquid gold.

“Everyone has strange dreams,” he said, but uncertainty threaded through his voice like cracks in marble.

“Not like these,” I said. “Not dreams that feel more real than waking. Not memories that live in your bones.”

His fingers found his wedding ring, twisting it like an anchor to reality. Each movement precise, controlled, fighting against something he couldn't quite name. “You sound very sure about my dreams.”

“I recognize the signs.” I shifted over without making it obvious, creating space without demand. “The way you look at certain things like you're seeing double – what's there now, and what used to be. The way your hands remember movements you've never learned.”

His fingers went still on the ring. “You're very observant, Mr. Roths...Alex.”

“And observation is only part of it. Recognition is something else entirely.”

A wave of chatter crashed through the adjacent gallery, voices bouncing off ancient stone. We let the silence stretch between us until the noise faded. Eli had settled onto the bench again, maintaining a careful few inches of space that felt electric with possibility.

“Who are you?” His question hit the marble walls and multiplied, echoing off centuries of art. “Really?”

The morning light caught his profile, turning him into another masterpiece among the collection. “Someone who knows you. Someone who's known you before.”

He stood abruptly, but not with the panic I'd feared. “That's impossible.”

“Impossible is an interesting word.” I kept my voice gentle as the sunlight filtering through high windows. “Especially for a doctor. How many 'impossible' things have you seen in your ER? How many times has science had to expand to explain what seemed unexplainable?”

His pacing carried the grace of someone who had walked these halls before, even if he didn't know it. “You're talking in riddles.”

“Would you believe straight answers?” The dust motes danced between us like stars. “If I told you why you're drawn to this place, why certain things feel familiar when they shouldn't?”

“Try me.” His voice carried equal parts challenge and fear.

“Your hands shake sometimes. Not during surgery – never then. But afterward, when you're alone. When the dreams are strongest.” The truth of it showed in his slight tremor. “You recognize places you've never visited, remember skills you've never learned. And sometimes, in the spaces between sleeping and waking, you hear voices speaking languages you shouldn't understand.”

The color drained from his face. “That's— How do you know these things?”

“Because I know you.” I let my careful control slip just enough. “Not just the Chief of Emergency Medicine, not just the brilliant surgeon. I know the healer who's lived many lives, who's carried that calling through centuries.”

He took a step back, his doctor's rationality visibly warring with deeper knowledge. “You're talking about reincarnation. Past lives. That's?—“

“Impossible?” The word hung between us like incense smoke. “Like the way you knew exactly how to modify those architectural plans without training? Like how you can read ancient Greek without studying it?”

His eyes widened. “I never told anyone about?—“

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