The Reluctant Alchemist

Prologue

Three things Morgan heard when she was a child:

you will write a book about religion; you will be a priest; you will save the world. It was not her parents who told her these things. It was her imaginary friends, the ones in her head who spoke to her all the time. They comforted her when she was sad. They played games with her like hide and seek and make the wind blow. They told her stories about other times that she had lived.

One story they often told her was about the girl who left her father’s house and followed a strange man with magical powers. The story was set long ago when there were no cars and people wore funny clothes. Her imaginary friends (that’s what her mother called them) didn’t just tell her stories; they showed her stories. Often, just as she was going to sleep or waking up, they would play what they called, one of their movies. She felt like she wasn’t just watching these stories, she was part of them, as if they were real.

In one of her favorites, she got to dress up like a knight and go charging about. Yet it always began the same way, as a young girl dreaming on a hill:

She looked out across the rolling hills past her sheep. The sun was on it’s final blaze before setting. Gazing toward the horizon she spied a dust tail rising on the road. Men on horses, moving fast. God told her this man would come.

He came to ask if the rumors and accounts were true. Did she really know things about people she had never met before? Did she predict the future? She sat leaning against the tree watching the dust tail resolve into horses with people on them. She saw their weapons glint in the setting sun. The armed men turned off the road and headed into the field to progress toward the hill on which she sat waiting.

She did not move. Her sheep, threatened by the noise and bluster of the large horses, protested the arrival of the men with startled bleats. Their bells clanked as they scattered in several directions, opening a path toward her. She took a deep breath and waited.

Five armoured men came to a halt at the foot of the hill. The lead horse, an enormous white one that must have been 12 hands high, tossed its head as his rider dismounted. Her scratchy shift and apron offered little protection against the armour and weapons of these men. But she was not scared. She knew God was on her side; she trusted the voices within. Voices within told her there was no threat here, all would be as it should. She stood dusting her hands off on her dress as the leader approached. She made no move toward him.

He removed his helmet as he trudged up the hill, armour crunching all the way. Long dark hair rested on his shoulders and piercing blue eyes caught hers as he came closer.

Are you Joan? he asked.

I am.

You are the maid who tells the future?

I don’t tell the future, God does.

God speaks to you?

Yes.

And why would God speak to you little maid?

Because I listen.

It got more exciting after that, but she loved the way it began and, in all honesty, she thought the man with the long dark hair and blue eyes was very handsome. There was something about him that made her breathless. He often appeared in various movies that her imaginary friends played for her. He would look different and wear other costumes, but she always knew him when she looked into his eyes. Her imaginary friends told her she would meet him again someday because… well, just because.

Morgan stopped listening to those voices in her head when she realized there were boys she wanted to kiss, when she got caught up in school, and then got married and started having children, realized her dream of helping others as a social worker and then abandoned this calling to follow her husband’s job to a handful of foreign lands.

She was no longer a child. She knew she was never going to write a book, much less one about religion; what did she know? There were no women priests in her church - that was not allowed. Saving the world? Obviously they had to be wrong about that too, so they must just be the childish imaginary friends her mother told her they were. She stopped listening to them and they went away. Or so she thought.

Day 1

London, UK 2011

Morgan stared into her closet and wished every single piece of clothing would burst into flames. Except for the jeans folded neatly on the floor. The jeans were the only piece of clothing that really fit her. All the fancy dresses, the designer shoes, the bags, they were all part of an elegant masquerade. And she was supposed to put on a costume and go out with the wives. She flicked through the dresses waiting on the cloth hangers like girls hoping for a chance to dance. Her hand settled on baby soft cloth. With relief she pulled the shapeless black dress out of the closet and tossed it onto the bed.

Is that what you’re wearing to Nobu tonight? Rachel leaned against the stiff pillows on Morgan’s overwrought bed and raised an eyebrow.

I’m going tonight because I miss Deborah… and because you’re coming. Ben won’t be there to judge me.

Morgan stepped back into the bright, white, marble bathroom. She leaned forward into the mirror as she raised her dark brows and applied mascara with quick, thoughtless, strokes. Her grey-blue eyes regarded her in the mirror. She tried to focus and not think too much. Her life had become a fog of have-to’s. She pulled her wavy blonde-highlighted hair in a sort of bun and clipped it with a comb as Rachel went on.

That’s true…where is he anyway?

On cue, Morgan’s phone danced on the coverlet. She picked it up. "Hey… No… That’s fine… Remember

I have dinner with the bank girls tonight… I know…

Tomorrow? Ok…No, I‘ll take care of it…Yeah… Thanks…Bye." She put the phone down on the bed.

Apparently he’s with Marie. The charade continues, said Morgan.

He’s not going to give you grounds for divorce on a silver platter…

He already has.

So why are you still here?

Nobu was a restaurant that owed its success to the culture of celebrity. If most of the patrons were not star-struck by the galaxy of famous owners, the place would have ceased to exist long ago. A snooty host spent 5 minutes shifting papers around her podium and ignoring her patrons before she acknowledged Morgan and Rachel.

She then guided them through the narrowest of passages throbbing with the sounds created by the clink and clatter of glassware, utensils and plates, cushioned by the voices and laughter of diners. Rachel grasped her hand and pulled Morgan through the crowd as if afraid she might run away. They stopped at the table of familiar faces, Morgan felt like a fraud.

Morgan, I’m so glad you came… I hear it’s hard to get you out these days, standing, Deborah reached out to hug Morgan. Tears sprang to Morgan’s eyes as Deborah squeezed her.

I didn’t want to miss you while you were in town, said Morgan, grateful for the low lighting of the restaurant.

While Rachel moved in to greet Deborah, Morgan made the ritual round of the table greeting each of the other women. She felt as if there was a key she was missing to a lock she couldn’t find. They sat down and ordered drinks from a black clad waitress who seemed ready to bolt before they finished their requests.

Morgan appreciated that these women understood the relentless nature of the seemingly glamorous lives they all led. Like Morgan, several of them had lived in Asian countries and understood the dirge of endlessly reinventing yourself in places where you loathed going to the grocery store because you could not face trying to communicate in a language so far from the French or Spanish offered in your high school that it did not even share the same alphabet. They shoe-horned unhappy kids into new schools every two years. They tried to keep marriages together in places where the custom was for corporate men to be entertained by scantily clad women who catered to their every whim.

The ladies at this table in particular knew that the easy move to a place where your language is spoken could be more isolating and difficult because now you don’t even have the excuse of looking like you don’t belong. So they sat in comfortable commonality taking advantage of the fact that they could enjoy a nice meal and celebrate their friendship and commiserate with difficulties no one else understood. This made Morgan more miserable because she did not feel worthy and wondered why these ladies tolerated her. They could put on the show. They could take advantage of the perks offered by the privileged setting and make it look easy.

Oh shit, said Deborah, as the full champagne glass in her hand flipped pink liquid out into the middle of the table.

A man stood behind her and brushed her shoulders with a white napkin. I’m… so… sorry… it’s HIS fault, he said as he gestured to one of his companions across the table. Let us buy you a round of drinks… what’s that you had? Champagne?

Deborah protested but the group of loud businessmen sent a bottle anyway.

Not five minutes later Deborah was knocked forward again. Gosh these tables are so close together, sorry, I was just trying to get up. The sharp-featured man attempted a smile and then apologized again with two bottles of champagne.

More black clad servers interrupted spilled drinks and apologies bringing plates of blackened miso cod, bright pink tuna sashimi with eye-watering wasabi sauce, neon-green seaweed salad and warm salty miso soup.

Morgan struggled to keep up the game and stay in tune with the conversation at the table. In a fog, Morgan watched Deborah, Rachel and herself land at the table of the bumbling businessmen. The other three women ducked out early.

The man next to Morgan grabbed her hand and put it on his crotch. Jolted awake, Morgan thought, "Shit. Is that a hard on? I was just talking about sweating in a hot yoga class…oh my god." She snatched her hand away deciding it was time to go, and looked across the table to catch Rachel’s eye and give her a distress signal. She almost screamed, "Let’s get out of here now!" But Rachel’s brown head was bent forward in deep conversation with a swarthy man whose chest hair crested out of his open shirt creating a black bushy forest around his gold chain. She did not see Morgan.

Morgan beheld the man seated opposite her. A paralyzing pair of navy blue eyes bewitched and transfixed her. All the glitzy noise of the restaurant collapsed into that one moment; the clink of glassware and china ceased, the hum of hundreds of voices died, the laughter next to and behind her disappeared. For the first time she knew what time stopped meant because it did and all that existed was Morgan and a pair of navy blue eyes burning through her soul.

Then a clear voice came into her head, "Get up, say nothing, and wait for me downstairs."

"Oh my God, is that guy talking to me again?" thought Morgan. She broke the gaze lock and looked at crotch-man to see if he had whispered this proposition in her ear, but his back was to her as he now engaged himself in conversation with Deborah’s ample breasts.

She looked up and across the table. Blue eyes still stared at her, an eyebrow arched in question.

The voice came back into her head, "Did you not hear me? Get up. Say nothing. Meet me downstairs." Other than the smirk that worked its way across his face, his lips did not move.

Morgan stared back at him feeling like shattered glass. "Am I crazy? Am I drunk? Or did this guy really just talk to me in my head? What is that called… telepathy?" These thoughts whirred as she stared back at the man.

He cocked his head, smiled and then nodded. Feathers of steel grey hair framed the mischievous blue eyes. He leaned forward as he held her gaze, the voice more insistent now, "Get up. Say nothing. Meet me downstairs." And then, a moment later, Please.

Morgan rose from the table, shouldered her bag, said nothing to Mr. I-wish-you-would-feel-my-hard-on or her friends and went downstairs to the front door. Just as she thought, Ok, I imagined that the man with the blue eyes was beside her.

He took her by the arm and led her outside.

I think we need to go somewhere else. Let’s grab a taxi. A taxi pulled up to the door with a wave from the doorman. Her companion opened the door and held it for her. She ducked in and sat down. He followed.

To the driver he said, Do you know where the All Bar One is near Leicester Square? The driver answered with a nod.

Looking Morgan over with a wolfish smile he said, God I can’t believe we just fucking did that. We just left. Have you ever done anything like that?

No, never… came out from somewhere south of her nose as she swam underwater and time again slowed down. "This is not something I ever imagined myself doing," thought Morgan.

We just left. Wow. I’m really glad to be away from those assholes. Jesus. He laughed and looked straight at her, I don’t even know your name.

My name is Morgan. Morgan Gardiner.

Jeff, nice to meet you, this came out with a sideways grin that was nearly a leer.

Jeff…. what?

Oh, let’s not worry about that right now. You know I watched you the whole time. You’re amazing and gorgeous. You have the most wonderful eyes, I noticed you the moment you walked in the room.

Morgan answered with the silence in her head. Then she realized he was still speaking.

Looking at her left hand he said, Based on the rings I presume you are married.

Uhhhh…it’s complicated.

Complicated how?

Her chest rose with a deep inhale.Let’s just say that my husband has a roving eye and has for a long time.

And you…?

I go to church and make him look good.

That elicited a laugh.I’m sure that’s true…What does he do for a living? I bet whatever it is, he wears suits. I hate suits, don’t even own one.

He’s a lawyer. You aren’t married?

Divorced.

Hmmmm… London unfurled outside the window, black taxis with their round eyes, reverent architecture laced with lights and neon.

Marriage isn’t what it’s cracked up to be, is it? asked Jeff.

A laugh was surprised out of her; she smiled at her black furry flats and shook her head, No, it’s not what I thought it would be.

So do you regularly end up in the beds of men you’ve just met?

I’m a 45 year old former social worker with two kids and a basset hound puppy, what do you think? And right now, we’re in a taxi.

It was his turn to laugh. No, you really don’t seem like the type. What would the ladies back at Nobu think?

I just hope they didn’t notice. I wouldn’t want to explain it.

We left separately… I don’t think you’ve anything to worry about.

How did we come to leave at the same time? She questioned schizophrenic style hallucinations of cosmic connections in dark pseudo-Japanese restaurants.

He looked straight at her. His fierce blue eyes captured hers for a brief second, Because I asked you to.

But you didn’t…

They stopped. The door opened as she inhaled the question she was afraid to ask. Once out of the taxi, whinnying flatterers bobbed and weaved all around him drawn like iron shavings to a magnet. The bouncers at the door, the mini-cab drivers on the street all chorused with, Oh Mr. Jeff, it’s been so long, where have you been? The ritual male dance of clutched forearms, slapped shoulders and shaken hands took place. She swam in a fish bowl and observed the exchange. "Who the hell is he?" she thought.

They stepped across the threshold into a bar that throbbed with people at least ten years younger than them. A crowd bounced in the center of a makeshift dance floor. A DJ occupied the space at the end of the bar behind a mound of equipment and blinking lights, his headphones askew so that one ear remained exposed.

Jeff slid an arm around her waist. What do you want?

Water, please.

You sure?

I don’t need anything else to drink. She wanted her head to clear a bit.

Okay. He turned and leaned over the dark bar toward the beefy bartender. She watched the kids on the dance floor