Demon Stories

Josephine: Forgetting the Stars, 1923, France

Josephine

Forgetting the Stars

1923, France

It happened suddenly down a side street in an open market square in Normandy on a breezy Autumn afternoon. 

"Josephine! Josephine!"

I hear my name ring out by a familiar voice, and my heart drops to my toes. Whipping around, there is the man calling out my name, running to me as if desperate. And I suppose he is. He is covered in dirt, his clothes filthy, hat with holes.

He catches up to me. "Josephine! By god, you don't look a drop over 20, just like when I knew you last, but...but how?!"

I stare at the man as if I don't know him, but I do know him. I do know him.

"Sir, you don't know me," I say as blankly as I can muster.

"But of course I know you, Josephine! You were with me every day in those old days! The 1880's, you remember? Paris? The piano? The club? How we used to play, on the rooftop! The stars!"

"Sir, you have mistaken me for someone else," I try again, edging away, giving the fake look like I think he is crazy.

"No, Josephine. Please. Please help me again. You'll help an old friend? Come with me to the bar, just like old times. Treat a friend to something to eat! Please, Josephine!" He drags a hand to my waist. His grubby hand makes marks on my coat, as he now grips the coarse material in his need. 

"My apologies, sir." I take both of his precious hands into my own. They are now old and rough, aged forty years, gnarled with arthritis, so unlike the young beautiful pianist hands I once knew. I stare him square in the face, unfamiliar lines creasing everything, his once youthful dimples now just a part of those old lines like they're not even there, his entire youth sucked out of him. I thrust his hands back at him forcefully, my heart stretching painfully at this.

"Josephine, what," he says, confused. His old man eyes are clouded, yet they look so torn. "Please, do you remember?"

I lean close to him now. He relaxes, smelling my familiar perfume. Tied in the moment are we, just like old times, just like the old lovers we used to be. Pianist and his singer love. 

Caressing his old, cold cheek, I whisper into his ear now, sadly.

"Run, Gerard, just run. You do not want to know me. I do not want to know you. To know me is to die. Just run away. In the other direction. Forget. Just forget."

His old blue eyes widen. Those beautiful blue eyes. 

And without another word, I walk away fast, making long hurried strides, and I cover my face with my gloved hand as I try to hide these betraying tears. The red gloves cover these red tears. These cursed demon tears. My cursed demon heart. 

All around us, as I walk away, there are hundreds of people just living their lives. Loving. Hating. Walking. Existing. It is my pain to bear to be different from them. It was his pain to bear to love me. But we must both forget. It took forty years to forget this much. And we have forgotten nothing. He will die. But I will never die. And I will never forget. I'll never forget the nights under the stars together, the piano we dragged up to the roof, singing cast out into the night drifting down to the streets below, his notes embracing me, and the song we cast together like a spell into those glittering stars like a heaven only we both knew. A precious memory. But just a memory. Just a memory.