The Fates (Book II)

9.8 - Big Bang

Let's check in with Trevor and Charliese in modern-day Greece :) ...

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Scene 8: Big Bang

A.D. 2015

"So, assuming just for argument's sake that somehow you're not insane and are actually primordial Chaos incarnate," Trevor posited, overstating his own skepticism, because a reasonable professor like him would never entertain such a notion, "on that assumption, here's my question."

From where she stood at the far end of the hotel room packing for their imminent departure to the isles, Charliese cast a brief glance at him over her shoulder, lips upturned in an affectionate smile. "Still pretending that you don't believe me, love? It may get tiresome prefacing everything you say to me with artificial incredulity..."

"Would you stop using your feminine charms and five-syllable words to seduce me into saying I believe you? You know I'm a sucker for your coy little smiles and superfluously elegant vocabulary."

"Oh, my dearest professorial fiancé, I'm extraordinarily apologetic if you erroneously thought me to be so deliberately manipulative..." Charliese enunciated each multisyllabic word as an excruciating tease.

He scowled, then pushed his spectacles back up the bridge of his nose, since they had inched down from the scrunching of his brows. "As I was saying," he continued, "assuming just for argument's sake that your overwhelmingly unbelievable claims are all true, then this is my question to you: what the motherfuck are you planning to do?"

His fiancée calmly carried on folding her clothes, placing them into her rollaway in tidy little rows. "So much for elegant vocabulary..."

"Of all the forms of language, expletives are by far the most expressive. There is elegance in such effective expression," Trevor asserted, overplaying the obnoxious tone common among many in his profession. "So cut the shit, please, and answer the question."

"That's very cute," she cooed. "But honestly, Trev, I have no clue what the motherfuck I plan to do. This present life is my first time on earth, and therefore my first incarnation as a human, as I've told you."

"Right. Unlike the Fates."

"Correct. Each of them has experienced millennia of mortal existence. Whereas in my case... let's just say I'm very new to this."

Trevor nodded. "Which is why, unlike them, you retain memory of your immortal identity. I mean — of your alleged immortal identity."

She flashed another of her coy, charming smiles at him. "Yes, that is certainly part of the reason. These memories remain with me partly because I am less distanced from my divine existence."

"Part of the reason?"

Charliese bit her lip for a moment while carefully folding her favorite grey dress. "The entire explanation is... complex."

"Honey, I'm a nerdy professor; I get off on explanatory complexity."

"I know, love. Maybe I'll indulge you in the full, long-winded, complicated story once you've openly acknowledged my identity."

"Oh, come on, that's a totally unfair level of bitchy..."

"Really? Just a few days ago, you claimed to have accepted me as basically the uterus of the universe — don't look so disgusted, Trevor, those were your own words—" she reproved in response to his petulant grimace, "—and I know that you meant it, which is why it's disingenuous of you to keep expressing doubt about it now."