This week’s prompt was a take home one with up to 1000 words allowed. One of our members requested that we do it. It too was from the Ladies at Reedsy.

“I Will See You in A Hundred Years….”

“I will see you in a hundred years, for I am old and not like other people. I was mainstream once, back when my age was less than the number of countries in the world today. That was so long ago I can barely remember the time of it. But even then I was off center. I tell you now, the times on this planet are changing. The speed is faster, the edge is sharper. If you can’t keep up, you perish by the blade. You, my young friend, are leaving today on a fantastic, historic venture and I envy you the thrills to come, the new things you will see and learn. I rather wish I could be surprised once again, I miss that. The sameness sometimes becomes tiring. But you will go, and I will stay, at least for now. Hold on to your humanness, you will transcend as I have if you meet this challenge. But don’t hold too tightly to the known, reach out for the stars, they will be there to guide you and give you a pull in the direction you aspire to go. Bon Voyage, and Godspeed.”

I stood outside a doorway and listened to the one sided conversation, thinking at first someone in the office must have left a radio on, because the voice was deep and lulling. A very good reading voice. But I realized quickly that what I heard was a man in the inner office speaking. I should have made my presence known then, or else moved on, but I was too caught up in the story to abandon my spot. I was hidden from view behind a large fake tree, not concerned about being discovered. Rather, I was more concerned that my view didn’t afford me a clear look at the person who was speaking. I moved slowly away from my concealment in order to get a better look. As I stepped toward the voice, a small mouse chose that moment to scuttle across the carpet directly under my feet. I screamed and jumped, landing against a large fish aquarium, startling an eel who had been gazing at me from his watery home. He backed up under a shelf of rocks, his beady eyes accusing me. I straightened up and came face to face with the man who I assumed was the source of the voice I had been listening to. He didn’t look at all like someone well over two hundred years old. He was good looking in a very classic way, his age not much over thirty, I guessed. I would be thirty-one next week, and I didn’t think he looked any older than I. He smiled at me, then reached out to help me steady myself. I hadn’t realized until he put his hands on my arms that I was swaying side to side.

“Hello, I’m Chad,” he said.
“I’m Joyce, sorry to disturb you,” I squeaked out, my voice much higher than normal. What was wrong with me? Was it the conversation I had overheard? Or the electric pulses that went through my body when he touched me?
“Nice to meet you Joyce. May I ask, why are you lurking in the tree outside my office? Not that I’m complaining, mind you. Just curious. Would you like to come inside and sit down for a minute? You seem very pale, do you feel faint?”
I was, in truth, feeling quite faint, and also breathless, but for some reason, I didn’t want him to know that. I backed away, shaking my head.
“Uh, no thanks. I’m fine. I’m going to go back to my desk and grab my stuff. It is quitting time, and I should go home now.” I realized as I spoke that I really didn’t want to leave him. I felt like our paths had crossed for a reason, and I didn’t want to take my eyes off him ever again. On the other hand, the things I had heard him say were spooky. I may have fallen in love with him at first sight, but I wasn’t in the habit of dating ancient men outside my species.
“I hope you aren’t put off by what you may have overheard while hanging around in the tree.”
“Well, it wasn’t the most normal thing I’ve heard while eavesdropping,” I said, willing myself to break the hold he seemed to have on me.
“Let me explain, I was reading a short story submission aloud. It’s science fiction, not my strong suit, and it helps to hear it spoken. I’m trying to decide whether to give the author a spot in our magazine.” Chad looked into my eyes, and I believed him. How could I have been dumb enough to think what I overheard was anything other than science fiction?
“Thanks for explaining that to me,” I said.
Chad frowned, putting a hand to his middle. His stomach made a loud grumbling sound, echoing in the room. He looked embarrassed.
“Joyce, I apologize. I haven’t eaten since this morning. I was out of town for a while and consequently I have been trying to catch up on my work. How about coming out to dinner with me? We can go to the restaurant downstairs. They serve a duck a l’orange that is out of this world.”
“Well, that certainly seems appropriate. I would love to go to dinner with you,” I said to him, daydreaming about how beautiful our babies would be.

by Karen Hydock

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1000 Years of Loving Sophia

He lifted his hand to knock on the door, he hesitated. What would she say? Would she welcome him? Would she turn him away without listening to his story? He straightened the knot on his tie and tightened his hold on the pink roses.
He had been on this same doorstep 100 years ago. It had been the grandest house in the neighborhood. The Victorian mansion of James White was the railroad baron’s showplace.

As he looks the home over he sees it’s lost its luster. The brass door knocker which had been one of the unmistakable fittings of the wealthy was gone all that remained were scars of the screws which had attached it to the door. The house was in need of a fresh paint job. The porch which wrapped around the front and right side of the house sagged, and some of its posts were broken. Some of the window panes in the fourth story tower were broken.

He had loved Sophia for 1000 years, and as his life evolved and re-evolved, he sought her out. In 89AD they had first met. Domitian was the emperor of Rome, and Anthony was a member of the Senate. Domitian had curtailed the Senate’s power, and there was talk of assassination. Sophia was a servant girl in Domitian’s palace, and Anthony sought her out hoping to get her assistance. She would serve the wine with the deadly hemlock in it to Domitian. Sophia agreed to help them with their plan for she despised the emperor and the advances he made on her. She put the water hemlock in the goblet with his favorite wine. She sat in on the table at his place, but Titus having emptied his cup picked it up while Domitian was looking away and drained it. The next morning Titus was found barely breathing and soon died. Domitian’s physician recognized it as poisoning with hemlock.

We had to flee as one of the other slaves reported seeing Sophia putting something in Domitian’s drink. During their planning, Anthony had fallen in love with the beautiful and gentle Sophia. We were captured brought back to Rome and executed by being thrown into the Colosseum with hungry lions. Sophia died in my arms as a lion pounced on my back and bit into my neck.

In 189 they had again been united. Only sixteen when they met. Children of local farmers they encountered each other at harvest time. Madly in love, they were about to marry when a plague struck their small village, and both succumbed to the illness. It was now thought the dread disease was smallpox.

In 889 one of the most tumultuous of their lives. They resided in Strathclyde. They had a small home on the River Clyde. The kingdom was under constant invasion up and down the coast and along the river, Clyde by the Vikings. The Norse men raped, killed and pillages the area. During one of the invasions, Sophia and their daughter Deidra were kidnapped and never again did Anthony see them. He died by his own hand two years later.
In the most recent life in 1889, they had lived the happiest of all their unitings. Sophia’s father James was the wealthiest man in Harmony. At the time Harmony was a small village built along the new railroad. Anthony worked for James as his assistant and was respected for his diligence. He remembered how he had come to call for Sophia in the most elegant carriage the livery stable had pulled by two matched black horses. He would take her to the Easter Pageant practice. She came out in a white lawn dress it fell from her natural waist to her ankles, and she wore a matching bonnet. For the pageant, she was dressed in coarse brown cotton. She portrayed Mary Magdalene on her knees before the crucified Christ. That night he made the decision he would ask her to marry him. He requested her father’s blessing that very night, and it was given. On Easter Sunday after the pageant, he proposed to her. Before the summer was over, they were wed. They lived happily in Harmony fifty years raising five children. They survived into their late seventies seeing the next generations of their grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Now it was 1989 and the car sitting at the curb was his new Buick Riviera. It glittered in the sun. Its tire fixed. He could have been on his way in the morning, but he had stayed the night, and while having a beer with his dinner he heard a laugh. He recognized it. It was her Sophia, but before he could catch a glimpse of her, she had left. His waitress was an amiable sort and flirted throughout his meal.
“The woman I just heard laughing, who is she?”
Marta batted her lashes, “Oh, that’s Sophia Wills.”
She seemed to have no regrets in telling him who she was or where she lived. “She’s lives in the old run down house on James Street.”
He paid for his dinner leaving Marta a sizable trip, but that was all he left. I’ll go by in the morning. He had thought. I can’t wait to see her again.

Now he was at the door, and it all had come pouring back. He rapped on the door. He heard voices. It sounded like a child crying, “Mummy, Mummy.”
The door opened. It was her. “Sophia,” he groaned.
She looked at him with those turquoise blue eyes. He saw fear in them.
“Sir, do I know you?”
“It had been 100 years perhaps she did not remember their love. That they were soul mates and would always be. He looked down at her swollen stomach.
“Oh, excuse me I thought someone I knew lived here.”
“Someone named Sophia? That is my name, and I have lived in this house all my life. But I assure you, sir, I don’t know you.”
“Pardon my disturbing you, it must be in another town much like this one I know a Sophia. I will take my leave. Good day.” He turned and walked down the cracked and uneven sidewalk to his car. He tossed the roses in a trash bin set by the curb.

“Goodbye Sophia,” he said as he drove away. “I will see you in 100 years. For my heart is old and I am not like other people.”

Christine Howard