“Ready?” he asked as Simon & Garfunkel gave way to ELO’s “Don’t Bring Me Down.”
“Go,” she replied.
Steve wasted no time. “Why do you keep asking me about Stockholm? Is it some kind of code?”
Kayla nodded and sighed heavily, because this first question was already a doozy; telling him this important code was a risk, and she didn’t want him pretending to be her primary Steve. “Yes. It’s the only thing we have to be 100% sure which of us we have. There’s only one answer to the question.”
“You gonna tell me what it is?”
A beat.
“No.”
Steve chomped on the back of his cheek and glared at her. “You said you’d tell me everything, and already you won’t answer me.”
“Sorry,” she said softly. But the answer is, yes, it’s a code. Next question?”
“Fine. So … what happens to me when the other me gets here? Where does my awareness go?”
Another toughie. Kayla had already explained how the imprinting works from the perspectives of their primary selves. What that means for their destination versions she hadn’t gone that far into yet. When she told him, Steve was completely shocked. He had a hard time believing that his rightful awareness that went with this body would just dissolve into the new one, but Kayla assured him it was true.
“So I’m not gonna remember any of this? Right now, this conversation? I’m not gonna remember it?” Kayla shook her head. “Why can’t it all just be one thing that merges if I’m the same person?”
“I don’t know.” They were silent for a long time. “Are you ok?”
Steve shrugged more of a no than a yes. “Will I feel that tug you said? How do you know when you’re about to be replaced?”
“You won’t feel a tug, no; as far as I know you’ll just freeze and go dormant. We’ve never been able to tell each other what it feels like to be imprinted and go away as a destination awareness, we’re never there when we arrive.” Kayla rubbed at her forehead. “That was an insane sentence.”
“I understood it.”
“It’s like the lights just go out. We freeze and become this kind of dead weight for a few seconds, and then the primary awareness arrives, and it’s all we can do to just breathe. It’s almost suffocating until we get that breath, and then the nausea. We’ve both thrown up a few times, but we try really hard to just wait it out. It always goes away eventually.”
“Just like I’m gonna go away eventually.” The immense pain Kayla felt coming off of him was oppressive. Crosby, Stills & Nash’s “Southern Cross” came on, which did nothing to lighten the moment.
“Ok, Question number three,” Steve forced himself to move on. “I don’t get this 12 seconds thing. If it takes 12 seconds, why isn’t the other me here yet? You’ve been here three weeks.”
“That’s part of what’s all messed up. The slipstream started breaking really quickly. Because we made huge changes. Some didn’t seem big, but they had big consequences. Like when you didn’t take that meeting with Harper and asked me to marry you after all. We—” Kayla stopped. She felt her daughter right around the bend, and she didn’t want to fall apart. “—got married. We had a life that wasn’t part of the original timeline. I was never raped. I never lost my hearing. Harper ended up killing other people that weren’t supposed to be dead. That branch we were living and the original timeline couldn’t be paired up. They were too off course. And that framework that holds all the timelines for our jumping – the slipstream – started breaking down. Stopped depositing us in the same spot at the same time.”
“So that’s what broke it? That jump?”
“Actually, ah, no. It started before that.”
“Question number four. What broke it?”
“We …” Kayla gathered her hair into a pony tail and secured it with the elastic that she wore around her wrist. “… we made love at a time we hadn’t the first time.”
Steve stared. “What?”
“You heard me.”
“When?”
Kayla hunched up her shoulders. “Cleveland. When you were hiding in my closet.”
Steve shook his head. “I was an asshole then. How did you – did I – WHAT DID I DO TO YOU?!”
“Nothing! Steve we were our primary selves, not destination. We weren’t out of sync yet, we jumped right into ourselves, and we … we wanted each other so badly before we jumped, and we just picked up where we’d left off before that!” Steve visibly relaxed. “Baby, not only did you not hurt me, you’ve never hurt me. Not even when I’ve been with a version of you that really was a serious jerk. You have never done anything less than take good care of me. I mean that.”
“Ok, but how do you know that’s really what caused it?”
Kayla lifted her foot onto her husband’s lap. “You rub, I’ll give you the freebie,” she smiled.
“Freebie, huh?” he leered back.
“Freebie bonus answers,” she laughed.
“Yeah, ok, deal.” Steve continued grinning at her as he started putting just the right kind of pressure in all the best places. “I like making you feel good, and I need something to do with my hands, anyway, so win-win, baby.” They were silent for a bit as Steve continued to rub. “This good?”
“Mm. This is great,” she smiled as “Southern Cross” faded into “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes.”
“Ok, no sleeping,” Steve said just before he yawned. “This is a long song, so we’re in it for the long haul, now.” Kayla chuckled. “How do we know that’s what did it?”
“’Cause that’s what Dr. Rolf says.”
“Yeah, he sounds real trustworthy.”
“Well, you’re not wrong. We don’t trust him. But he has no reason to make that up, and we agree that it makes sense based on everything else that’s happened before and since. There were little changes before that, and it just builds.”
“What do you mean?”
“Compounds. It all just doubles down on itself. One change creates a ripple that causes something that creates the next thing, and then we’re changing something else, and it just gets exponential.” Kayla lolled her head back. “Fifth question,” she prompted.
“Did you like me better with both of my eyes?” Steve’s vulnerable tone squeezed at Kayla’s heart. She lifted her head up quickly and met his leery eye with her own very solemn ones.
“You have never said a thing to me about your eyes in all these years.” Steve had stopped rubbing and just held on to her foot as they looked at each other. “Not since we’ve been really together have you ever doubted how I feel about how many eyes you have. I’m honestly shocked you would wonder.” Steve looked down. “Why are you suddenly worried about it, baby?”
Steve smiled at the endearment but continued looking down. “You got to spend all that time with me when I had a different face, I just wondered if it was better—different,” he quickly corrected himself, “for you.”
Now Kayla was only more flummoxed. “You just had two eyes with me. For a long time. Until you went to get the key with Marina. And you didn’t ask any of this before.”
Steve looked up. “It wasn’t the same. I couldn’t see out of that one. I could see you when we were together in 1979. I was a whole different person.”
“Oh baby.” Kayla swept her foot back under herself and pulled her husband to the center of the couch. “You listen to me, Steve Johnson. Your face is the most handsome one I’ve ever seen. One eye or two no matter how well they could see. Age 20 or age 50. I loved your face with both eyes just as much as the one I’m looking at right now.” Kayla held his face in her hands and kissed his patch. When she pulled back, the boyish smile on his face made her feel momentarily overwhelmed. “Ok?”
Steve nodded. “Ok,” he replied, his voice equally affected. He tucked a long strand of golden hair that didn’t make it into Kayla’s ponytail behind her ear and asked his next question. “Do you blame me for Marina?”
Kayla narrowed her eyes with real frustration, the fact that this tender moment was marred by her name not helping. “You have to stop beating yourself up about this.”
“Sweetness, your mouth says one thing, but your pen said another.” She tutted her tongue, stood up, and went to the window. Steve stood, too, but remained in place. “Looks like your pen is the more honest one from where I’m standing.”
“If I didn’t know better, I’d think you wanted me to blame you.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means why do you push?” she turned toward him. “Why do you have to keep talking about her? I know how you feel about her, so when I tell you she’s not a thing between us, why can’t you just let it go?!”
“Kayla, you and that other guy have been back to see her, but not me! I am sitting here with guilt knowing what she did to us.”
“She didn’t do it, you did!” Kayla laid incredulous eyes on her husband over what had just come out of her mouth. For his part, Steve was not shocked at all.
“Truth finally comes out.”
“Steve—”
“No. Don’t be sorry. I deserve it.”
“We … I have already been through this, but you haven’t. I can’t tell you how much I don’t want to keep talking about her. She was dead and buried even in my own head many years ago, but now that we’ve had to run into your crazy ex-girlfriends over and over again, she is upsetting all over again.”
“I have crazy ex-girlfriends. Great.”
Kayla ignored the snark. “I’m telling you the truth when I say that I don’t blame you for what she did. What I blame you for is not telling me the truth. You had a marriage you never told me about.”
“I was—”
“I know! I know why. It was a stupid reason.” Steve looked away from her. “But I understand what that reason was.”
“By the time—”
“—you really should have told me it was too late,” she finished his sentence, “and every day I didn’t know about her it made it worse and worse until you had to just hide her. Instead of cutting your losses and living through the fight we were definitely going to have if you’d told me even the day you found her in our living room, you felt like it was safer to just continue hiding all the evidence that she’d ever existed.” Steve stared, lost for a reply. “Right? Do I have that down, then?”
“Yeah,” he crossed his arms protectively, “pretty down, yeah.”
“So, yeah,” Kayla threw her arms up, “I blame you for that. The dishonesty. For not trusting me that when I said love, honor, and cherish that I meant forever no matter what. For not trusting me even long before that. It was because you were dishonest about something so important that all of it happened. Yes, I blame that on you.”
“Question … four …?”
“Seven.”
“Seven,” he said softly. “Why do you forgive me?”
“Hmmp,” she chuffed. “Because you love me. You didn’t hide her so you could go be with her.”
“I would never be with her!” he protested.
“You hid her ‘cause you were afraid.”
He nodded uneasily. “I’m still afraid. That you’re gonna—”
“—find you out and divorce you, I know, you’ve said that a million times.”
“Can’t divorce me, we’re not married,” he smirked.
Kayla shot daggers at him. “Not helping.”
“Sorry.”
“I’m shocked you’d make that joke at all.”
“You’re right. I’m an idiot.”
“I mean it,” she didn’t correct him, “don’t say that again. We’ll figure it out, go to the courthouse, whatever. I don’t want any more weddings, but we’ll fix it. Even if we don’t make it to the courthouse, we’re married, we really are. So, that joke? Not funny.”
“Ok, sorry,” he whined again. “Sweetness, I just—”
“You have nothing to be afraid of,” she interrupted him again, wanting this line of questioning truly over. Aerosmith’s “Seasons of Whither” started playing, and Kayla was mildly aware that she didn’t think she’d heard this one before. “You did the wrong thing,” she continued. “The really wrong thing. But for reasons that only show how much you love me. The person who manipulated was Marina. The person who let you think she was dead for more than ten years was Marina. The person who forced you to jump through all those unnecessary hoops was Marina. The person who made you think I wouldn’t continue to love you was Marina. And the person who made me think maybe you wouldn’t continue to love me? That was also Marina. And I wasn’t completely innocent in all this, I made bad choices, too.”
“What are you talkin’ about, baby, you didn’t do anything wrong!”
“I let her get under my skin. And I kept my pregnancy from you for months.” Steve looked away. “I didn’t try hard enough to tell you when Jack found out.” When he looked back at her, his expression hardened. “I’m the one who married him in the first place, that was my choice. You led me to water, but I’m the one who drank.”
“How does marrying Jack have anything to do with Marina?”
Kayla chuffed out another humorless chuckle. “It doesn’t, I’m just saying, I’m not perfect.” Kayla went to him and held out his arms so she could walk into them. He immediately embraced her. “We are not fighting, this is not a fight, it’s just a really unpleasant topic. But ya know what, I’m glad you asked it.”
“Now I’m definitely doubting your sanity. Time travel, fine; being glad I asked about Marina, that’s grounds for the men in white coats, Sweetness.”
This time Kayla’s giggle had a smile, too, despite the irony he had no idea existed. “I am. You know why? Because I’ve heard the guilt in your voice for weeks. And even the other you still feels it, and I need to fix it. I have to fix it. You read that in my diary, too, right?”
“Yeah.” Kayla could hear his light smile as they held each other. “I did.”
“So let this be fixed now, Steve. Please. I forgive you, because I love you more than I will ever be able to say. You’re everything to me, and when you make mistakes, you do it for only the most noble and truly selfless reasons.”
“Not wanting to lose you isn’t selfless, it’s selfish.”
Kayla nodded into his chest. “Yeah, ok, true,” she smiled. “But I forgive you for that, too. And the whole thing taught us a hard lesson to trust our love in each other.”
“The crazy ex-girlfriend Marina sent you to jail, Sweetness, and you can talk about her, but you can’t talk about the crazy ex-girlfriend Ava.” They were still holding each other, as the next song came on, an obscure, mellow, bluesy tune Kayla was as equally unfamiliar with as the last one.
“That’s not a question,” Kayla said.
Rather than let her go, Steve held her a little tighter. “What did Ava do to you?”
Kayla stopped moving with Steve’s swaying steps. “I don’t want to tell you,” she said softly.
Steve’s reaction to this was to lay his palm on the back of Kayla’s pony tailed head and kiss her temple. “Tell me anyway, Sweetness,” he whispered into the side of her head. “Please, tell me anyway.”
Kayla couldn’t explain it, but telling him this very deeply intimate violation that happened to her – and in a different way to him, then ultimately to them – felt like a more serious betrayal than even sleeping with him would. And she decided that some things had to stay between only her and her rightful Steve. Things like the answer to the Stockholm question. And things like the very precious things that Ava stole from them. But this Steve deserved an answer. So, she gave him the best one she could.
“What she did was violate us. She hurt us. She knew who you were when you still had amnesia. She knew who I was and that we had a daughter that was growing up without you. She knew all of this, and she did everything she could to keep you from finding out. You were starting to remember us, you’d call for us in your sleep.”
“I did?” he asked with such hope in his voice.
“Yeah,” Kayla nodded, “you were remembering us, and she did the same thing Marina did. Manipulated you, and she got her father and that whole family to keep you close. Keep you from discovering us. She took something from me.” Kayla’s tears came on fast, and she let them, because holding them back would have been even more stressful than just allowing them. “She took my future from me. Our future together. The – babies we would have had together – that now we’ll never have. Sixteen years, Steve. She didn’t take all of them, but if she’d really loved you, she would have told you who you were and set you free. We could have had eight more years. Had … the children … we were supposed to.”
“Jesus, Kayla,” his voice broke. Then he held her away from him by her shoulders, and she could see the pain in his eye through the tears coming from hers.
“That’s what she did.” Not a thing she said was a lie.
“How do we make sure she never comes near us?”
“Here? She doesn’t know who you are yet,” she replied as Steve wiped her tears away with his thumbs. “That’s why you can’t work for the police. Or investigate Jencon. Or help Nick Corelli. So you don’t get in the way of that bomb and get taken by Lawrence and then sold to Stefano and finally end up with the Vitalis. So, I guess the way you keep her away from us is start your job at the Emergency Center on Monday, and we’ll be good.”
“God, it all just compounds. Just like you said.” Kayla nodded. “Ok, wait, that’s a huge change, though. The timeline.”
Kayla held up her hands. “Save that one for tomorrow, it’s a whole set of just its own questions, I won’t make it through the night on that one.”
“Ok, I’m putting it on the calendar for tomorrow, then.”
Kayla had stopped crying and took a deep, cleansing breath. “Ok, two more.”
“Question Nine,’ he said. “We got any of your crazy ex-boyfriends to deal with?”
“Ah, nope.”
“I’m the only one with crazies?”
“Yeah, you’re the only one with … any.” Even as she spoke, Kayla realized she was just about to make the same mistake she’d already made with this information and remembered with burning hot clarity the anger when Steve had found out about her omitting her relationship with Shane from her narrative.
“You have no exes. Come on, baby, don’t blow smoke.”
I would have understood. “Would you have?” she said softly to herself out loud.
“Would I have what?”
Kayla snapped out of her inner monologue. ‘I … I had … one.”
“One? Just one boyfriend? In 16 years?” Kayla nodded. “Why did you just say you didn’t, then?”
Kayla turned to the shelf behind her and ran reverential fingers over their wedding photo.
“You know what? We’ve both done a lot of things wrong in our marriage. In our whole lives. Because that’s what human beings do. We make mistakes. Dr. Rolf took a lot from us, but he also gave us something no one else has ever gotten to do. A do-over. We get the chance to fix the mistakes. All of the mistakes. Go back and do them over the right way. Those fixes have been … amazing, Steve. Sometimes just beautiful. Only we usually pay for it later on. Terrible side effects in our jumps, crazy heightened emotions. Dreams …” Kayla trailed off and ran through what she was about to do in her head.
“What are you trying to tell me, Sweetness?”
“I made a terrible mistake a long time ago, then I was so ashamed that I lied to you about it.” She didn’t see when Steve’s hackles went up at this.
“When was that?” Steve asked, clearly trying to control his anxious tone.
“When you came back. After your memory returned and we got back together. I’m going to fix this mistake now. The slipstream is going to hate it. You might hate it, too, I honestly am not sure. But I’m going to fix it now. Because I trust you.” She took a deep breath and fixed her very determined eyes on him. “Ok?”
Steve hadn’t moved from the dining room doorway. His eye was troubled with the anticipation of something he knew in his gut he wasn’t going to want to hear. But he’d made a promise here that he knew about. And somewhere in the cosmos, a future version of him he had no recollection of had made the same promise. “I’m listening,” he said.
“I had one serious relationship. Then in LA I dated someone a couple times, literally, it was maybe three dates, and it was a great big nothing. The other one though … wasn’t nothing.”
Steve chewed on the back of his cheek and crossed his arms as he leaned against the dining room entryway. “Ok,” he said with real effort to keep the agitation out of his voice. “So, when was that? How many years after I died?”
“About three m-months.”
Kayla saw very clearly when Steve’s apprehension turned to a jealousy so acute, she could feel it like another character in the room. “Three months? I—wasn’t I still in that warehouse?!”
“Yes, but no one knew that. I—was in terrible pain. I wasn’t coping well at all, and I kind of wanted to die.”
“Don’t say that, Kayla.”
“So I should lie then?” Steve looked down. When he lifted his eye back up to hers, he shook his head. “It was too soon, I wasn’t ready.” Then very quietly she added the really hard part. “And you know him.”
“Like right now? I know who he is right now?” Kayla nodded. “Tell me. No,” he looked away, “I don’t want to know.” Then as his anger started ratcheting up, Steve suddenly calmed. “I’m sorry, baby. I’m begging you to tell me things, you tell me, and then I act like a dick.” Kayla released her anxiety with a laugh. “I am, I’m a serious dick. I’m sorry.”
“Thank you.” Kayla exhaled heavily. “Should I tell you or consider the question answered?”
Steve went to her and rubbed his hands up and down her arms, because the pull to be touching each other in good times, bad times, easy times, and hard ones was a tenet of their relationship. “Tell me.”
I would have understood.
“I …”
I would have understood.
“Just say it.
Kayla swallowed hard and dropped her eyes. Steve tipped her chin back up. “I’m not going anywhere. Just say it,” he repeated.
I’m not making this mistake again, she thought to herself. She looked back up into her husband’s eye and trusted that when he said he would have understood that he meant it. “It was Shane.” Her tone was soft, but it was clear and resolute.
Steve stared, but then he smiled waiting for a punchline somewhere. When she didn’t provide one, he dropped his smile and set his jaw while Kayla let the verity of the moment settle. When Steve replied, Kayla could see him working hard to maintain control.
“Shane? Donovan?” Kayla nodded warily. “Shane is gonna be—was your … you were with him? Kayla nodded again. “What does that mean exactly?”
She didn’t lower her gaze as she bravely confirmed what he was asking to a Steve that was going to be devastated by this first-time knowledge. “It means exactly what you think it means.”
Steve’s eye flared, and the jealousy that was endemic to Steve Johnson’s nature began its uphill trajectory toward anger. “How is that possible, Kayla?” he spat.
“It’s possible when two people who are close, hurting, and not coping are so lonely that they make bad choices. To prevent the world from swallowing them up.”
Steve softened just slightly. “But—Kimberly?” he said incredulously.
Kayla shook her head. “They’re going to be divorced by then.”
“That’s less than a year from now?”
Kayla nodded solemnly. “And you were dead,” she reminded him. She rested her hand on his crossed arms. He didn’t pull away from her, but he didn’t open for her, either. She stroked his forearm. “So, you are mad.” It was more of a confirmation than a question, and the emphasis in the sentence went over his head.
“That you had boyfriend?” he said tightly, “No. Sixteen years is a long time, I wouldn’t have wanted you to be lonely.” A warmth began to spread within her. “It’s just,” Steve continued to anxiously not know where to put his hands, “Shane?!” his incredulity continued. “You moved on real quick.” The warmth cooled quickly.
“Kim had rejected him, you were dead, we were so lonely I don’t have words!” The sudden vehemence of Kayla’s defense hit Steve in the face like a cold slap. “Me and Stephanie were being threatened by Lawrence, and we couldn’t go home!”
“What?!”
“So, we lived at Shane’s where it was safe, and things just happened!”
“Wait, you lived there?! When?!”
“Right away,” she replied with absolute honesty, “the day of your funeral.”
Now Steve flared hot, and the jealous green was joined by angry red. “What the hell, Kayla!”
“What the hell is that Shane and the ISA protected me and your daughter. That’s what the hell. Literally from the day you died. We couldn’t go home and never did again.” Steve gaped at her. “Shane gave me a place to be safe. Our relationship didn’t actually change to something—romantic—” Kayla felt it when Steve cringed “until much later; it was platonic until then.”
Kayla could see the vision of she and Shane having sex infiltrating Steve’s thoughts right before her eyes.
“Why couldn’t you go home?” It sounded exactly like all the other times Steve lashed out in some kind of negative emotion.
“Because I had a tape proving that Lawrence had killed you, he wanted it, and tried to hurt us to get it.”
“Great, another damn lunatic wanting a tape or a disk or some kind of bullshit we get the short end on.” Kayla shrugged a nod, because that was just about right. Steve finally turned from her and crossed to the other side of the room.
Kayla tutted her tongue. “Believe me, as upset as you are right now, I feel worse.” Steve glared at her in response. But you don’t know what I went through! The other you knows. Because you saw what it was like for me! But I don’t have a way to tell you that you would understand! You want to be mad at me, fine, I get it. But you.were.dead.Steve. As far as I knew, my soulmate was gone forever. The person I really hurt in all this was my sister. In ways that never truly, completely healed. But let me tell you,” she added with a humorless sound, “she hurt me first. She didn’t try to hurt me, but she did, she wouldn’t stop, and the betrayal was unbelievable. And I was a shattered, goddamn mess!” She saw those words affect her husband and quickly went on. “But Shane and me broke up, and in the end all these years later, when we got you back, I ended up with just one ex-boyfriend, he never came back to hurt me or you or anyone else, in fact, he bent over backwards for you, no one went to prison because of him, and no one had their father killed because of him, so don’t you fucking sit there and judge me, Steve!”
That really got Steve’s attention, and he got very humble very, very quickly. “Ok, hold the phone,” he said.
“No! No, you promised me you’d understand!”
“I—I do—”
“BullSHIT, Steve!”
The voice coming out of her was that foreign one that he was still getting to know from 20 years in the future, not the one that belonged here. “What do you mean, whose father? You don’t mean your pop.”
“Maybe this was a mistake, too, because you’re still mad.” Kayla muttered equally to herself as to the version of Steve that wasn’t there as she swayed in anger. “You’re gonna be upset all over again.”
“Ok,” he went to her, “your turn to calm down,” he said. She tried to evade the vulnerability she felt in this intimate proximity, but Steve held her there by her shoulders. “Just calm down.” He shot her an irritated look, but his grip on her was gentle. “You can’t expect me to be Mr. Happy listening to this, Kayla.” Steve’s tone was shockingly rational. “I don’t get what you’re fixing with this, and when you start talking to that other guy like I’m not right here I get real fuckin’ confused.”
“I—I’m sorry.” Kayla was genuinely contrite here. “That’s not fair to you, I’m sorry.”
Steve nodded. “That’s ok. I’m not mad at you.” She stuck out her chin and narrowed her eyes. “Really? You’re gonna give me that face? You can’t lay that bombshell on me and think I’m not gonna lose my damn mind a little. Now, you and me are gonna sit here,” he ushered her back to the couch, “and you’re gonna explain all of this to me.” Steve sat with his back against the left side of the couch and pulled Kayla down to sit opposite him. He held her hand and squeezed. “Then ya know what’s gonna happen?” Kayla shook her head. “Then I’m gonna understand. I am pretty sure I’m not gonna like it.” Kayla blew out a breath. “But I’m gonna understand it as best I can. Now you start at the beginning and explain to me how you and me are together right now, but in less than a year you’re with—someone else.”
Kayla rested her elbows on her thighs and held her head in her hands. “God, there’s just … there’s so much, I didn’t realize how hard this was going to be.”
“How about you start with what you’re fixing by telling me.” Then he sat up straighter. “Wait, you’re still in prison in the real timeline, right? Is—Jesus, is this about—the first time through, did I drive you to him because of Mar—”
“NO!” Kayla shot up off the couch like a live wire. “Steve, I can’t hear her name anymore. I mean it, the source of all our problems in our lifetime is not always her. Sometimes it was, yes, but it’s over now, and if you ask me one more time if she this, that, the other, in, down, around, or through, I swear I’m going to scream.”
Steve seemed to accept once and for all that his surprise ex-wife was not an element here and didn’t speak of her again. “Ok. Now wouldja sit back down here? Please?” She did as he asked, taking the same spot as she’d just had. “Ok,” he repeated. “Then tell me what you’re fixing.”
Kayla exhaled heavily. “Being with Shane was my first mistake. Lying to you about it was my second. That’s what I’m fixing.” Steve had so many things he wanted to say, but he kept quiet, allowing her to get this all out to him. “When we got back together after you got your memory back, I didn’t tell you about Shane. I told you I’d tried moving on but that it didn’t work, which was true. But my relationship with him was significant.” Kayla saw her husband very clearly start to grind his teeth. “And I just—never told you about it. You found out, because we jumped to that time, and it all came out. You’ve never been so upset with me in your life. We jumped right in the middle of this awful fight about it, and I wasn’t completely sure you weren’t going to … leave me.”
“I’d never leave you,” he said tightly.
Kayla smiled sadly. “You weren’t happy that it happened, but that I hadn’t told you in all that time that we were back together. More than three years … you were so upset,” she said weepily. “You were so mad. Because I’d kept it from you. And you carried it with you into the jumps after that.”
“Does he know?”
“What, right now?”
“Yeah.” He was so jealous he wasn’t thinking straight.
“No, Steve, none of this has happened yet!” she snapped.
“Right. Ok, right.”
“We broke up before I left Salem for LA, and were never a thing again. By the time we start jumping in 2009 he’s back together with Kim.”
“Then why didn’t you just tell me?”
“Well. Have you noticed how well you’re taking it right now?” Steve failed at keeping the arrogant look off his face in response to the snide remark. “But more than that,” she sighed, “I was just plain ashamed.”
Steve crossed his arms and looked down. “I was making terrible choices, because of what was at that time the worst pain in my entire life. It’s still painful to talk about, even though I got you back.”
That was when Kayla really began laying it all out. Like she had the second time through under Mike’s exploded lab so many years ago, Kayla started at the beginning and explained it all. Steve had deep reactions to her trauma and could barely contain himself when he learned that Kimberly was sleeping with his would-be killer. She tried to be very linear combining the original timeline with the second one after his escape from his sale to Stefano Dimera, and she was impressed when Steve seemed to understand it all with few clarifying questions.
“So that’s why,” Kayla finished. “That’s how. Because I was sleeping with my sister’s husband.”
“Jesus,” he muttered.
“And I was keeping him from his baby daughter so that he’d love mine. That was the worst thing I’ve ever done. But when I finally told you everything, you said you still loved me.”
“Of course, I still love you. Did you really think I wouldn’t?”
Kayla shrugged. “Things were compli—”
“Complicated, right? They were complicated? You’ve said that six ways till Sunday, Sweetness. I get it, everything was real complicated. I won’t say Marina’s name again if you don’t say how complicated it all was again. Because what the hell does that matter? How many times we gotta make vows to each other before you believe that nothing will make me stop loving you?”
Kayla smiled. “You’d be surprised just how many times we’ve made vows to each other.”
“Yeah, well maybe we’re doin’ it wrong, ‘cause even all these years later it doesn’t seem to be sinkin’ in.” Steve caressed the back of his hand down Kayla’s cheek. She took it in her own and brought it to her lips. “Come here,” he said. Kayla kissed her husband, and despite his words, she felt insecurity in his kiss. She broke from his lips and searched his eye for what he was thinking. It was so deep green even in the dimness of the room. “You don’t .. think about him … right?” he finally asked softly.
Kayla knew this was his jealousy talking, and she knew that he just didn’t have the lived-in wisdom to process this like her Steve did. “No. No. Not right now, and not back then the first time.”
“Did he love you? Does he love you right now?”
Kayla nodded. “He did love me. Not like he loves Kim. And right now he still loves Kim. Truthfully, he’s always going to love Kim. But right now, no, he’s not thinking about me like that. None of that happens for a while yet.”
Then Steve quietly asked the last question he would about his wife’s relationship with their brother-in-law.
“Did you love him?”
She couldn’t do much about Steve’s jealousy. And she couldn’t will his consciousness that already had all this knowledge into him. But hell if she was going to let any version of her husband feel insecure about where her affections lie. “I told him that I did. I told myself that I did.” She held Steve’s stiff hand to her heart. “But the truth is that I didn’t. Not like that. Not like I love you. I am bonded to you for life, Steve. You’re the only man I’ve ever been this kind of in love with. The real kind. The devoted kind. The kind that knits itself to your very soul so that it’s there no matter where you are. It’s why when you were gone and I thought you were dead that I was in pieces. Because part of what had become who I am was gone.” Kayla smiled sadly when her husband’s eye watered. “Steven Earl Johnson, there wasn’t a day that went by when I was with him that I didn’t wish he was you. And there never will be. Because you’re the only man for me. You’ve told me you would die for me. Steve, I would die a thousand deaths for you. For our family. Right now, back then, and in in 20 years. You—are everything to me.”
“Sweetness,” his voice broke. “I love you so goddamn much, baby.” Steve pulled Kayla into his tight embrace and kissed her passionately. He held her close to him, and Kayla could feel him both giving her reassurance while also searching for his own. She felt his need to make love to her in his touch. His fingers were so warm as they caressed her face, her back, her arms, and back again. And Kayla wanted nothing more right now than to feel that same warmth inside her, show him how deeply she loved him. Steve immediately reacted to what he felt in her body. She wanted him, and she loved him. But, once again, it was Steve who pulled out of the kiss first.
Kayla felt high and a little crazy with the mix of emotions coursing through her when her husband stood and went to the stereo. He ejected the cassette, flipped it over, then re-inserted it into the tape deck and pressed play. Then he went back to her and held out his hand. “Dance with me, Sweetness.”
Kayla smiled warmly as she stood up. “I love dancing with you,” she said.
“I know,” he nodded warmly. “I like feeling you close to me.”
“I know,” she said right back.
Steve pulled her tightly against him as the first guitar lick of Three Dog Night’s “Shambala” filled the room. It was a deeply rich sound that immediately enveloped them in its inherently nurturing melody. Steve held her hand against his heart as they swayed, and Kayla relished the feel of his chest against her cheek.
Wash away my troubles.
Wash away my pain.
With the rain in Shambala.
“I’m glad you told me,” Steve said.
“Really?”
“Yeah, baby.”
Wash away my sorrow.
Wash away my shame.
With the rain in Shambala.
“So, you’re not upset?”
“You told me the truth, so I’m gonna tell you the truth. I’m upset.” Kayla stopped moving, but Steve wouldn’t let her, he needed them to be in this cocoon of safety their dancing gave them. “Sweetness, I know you want me to be fine with it. But I’m not really fine with it.” Kayla stiffened, but Steve held her tighter. I know I should be glad someone loved you. And I am, I really wouldn’t want you to be lonely. I mean that, Sweetness, and I’m sad that you spent all that time alone. But I’m a jealous man. And this is gonna be hard for me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No.” Steve held her out at arms length. “Don’t be sorry. Didn’t I promise you I’d understand?” She nodded. “I keep my promises, and I do. I don’t like it, and I feel like I gotta cut Donovan’s balls off. But I told you to explain it to me and I’d understand it. Now I do. So don’t be sorry, baby. But I don’t like it, and I’m jealous. Because you’re my wife.”
“I am your wife.” She held her husband’s face in her hands and stroked his cheeks with her thumbs. “Forever, only your wife.” Steve held the backs of her hands in his palms and smiled warmly. “Please don’t cut his balls off.” Now Steve chuckled.
“No promises.”
Kayla grinned and leaned back into his arms and continued to dance to the music.
Everyone is helpful, everyone is kind.
On the road to Shambala.
Kayla closed her eyes and felt Steve’s heart beat in almost perfect tempo with the song they danced to. The low, gritty notes surrounding them had a gruffness that was balanced with the smooth vocals singing of a journey of absolution. Kayla realized that it perfectly mirrored how they were both feeling right now, and she wondered if Time did it on purpose.
“Sweetness?” Steve said softly. “You’re my wife, but I’m not your husband.”
“That’s not true.”
“If what you’re telling me is true, and you’re not really losing your mind, then I’m not. Not according to that Rolf guy. To him I’m just some sort of vessel. A place to put the other consciousness. And that means I’m not gonna last. I’m gonna go away.”
“Don’t—think—like that,” Kayla barely whispered.
“But, Kayla, I’m conscious, too. When that guy gets here, he’s gonna kick me out, and he doesn’t even belong here.”
“Remember the jump I told you about in Chicago?”
“When I was runnin’ gems? You didn’t say much.”
“I was with that other you for three days.”
“I’ll bet that was real fun.”
“You were wonderful.”
“There’s no way I was wonderful. If I wasn’t comin’ on to you I had to be mean as a hell.”
Kayla gestured her buy-in on both points, to which Steve smirked. “But also wonderful. You took care of me, and you were already showing me that you cared about me. I was there when you went away. And I was really sad that I’d never be seeing you again.” Kayla began crying. “When you leave this body, I’m going to feel the same way. You’ll never be able to tell me where you’ve gone or if you stay—aware—but I want you to know how much I love you. You’re real. I love the you that’s not here yet. But I love,” she crossed her arms over her chest tightly with feeling, “this you, too. You are him; he is you. I am your wife, and I love you.”
“Kayla,” Steve’s voice broke. “I don’t wanna go.” Kayla wiped her palms across her face. “But I get one more question, right?”
“I think you blew through your last question a hundred questions ago,” she continued to cry.
“Last one. Until I do … go … and the other guy gets here …” Steve’s eye finally ran over with the unshed tears he’d been holding back as he danced with her. “… even if it’s not the same … do you think maybe I can be enough?”
How does your light shine?
On the road to Shambala?
“Oh, Steve.”
Tell me!
How does your light shine?
On the road to Shambala?
Kayla nodded though her tears as the song ended with the love and acceptance its conclusion also spelled for both of them. “You’re enough. If you get here tomorrow or you never get here at all, I love you, you are my husband, and you are enough.”
Kayla let her husband hold her, and they both cried. She was terrified that her Steve was still missing after three weeks. She was equally terrified that this one would disappear before they woke back up in the morning. She didn’t even know what the rules really were anymore – or if there ever were any to begin with. All she knew for sure was that every Steve loved her. And she loved every one of him, too. They kissed each other’s tears away and held each other. Because it was all they could do.
Chapter 165 coming soon >