Read Online Ghosts and Other Lovers by Lisa Tuttle - Free Book Online

see his face, as she could see the faces of all the others. And after the death, he was gone. Gone utterly, as if he had never been.
    No matter how she struggled, she could not see his face, nor where he went after the death. When at last, near morning, she slept, it was to dream about the man in black, standing in the crowded underground station, watching her, watching her father fall before her and die.
    The following week, Alida decided to alter her usual habit of visiting her parents on Saturday, and instead went to see some friends who were fixing up an old house in Stoke Newington.
    It was a warm, sunny day, and as she stepped off the bus at the request stop on Newington Church Street, Alida noticed how many people were out: clumps of drably dressed teenagers lounging against the buildings; women in brilliant saris flowing along like the personification of summer; geriatric couples moving at a snail's pace; young mothers trying to keep their children close at hand. The street rose and curved, and the pavements were narrow. As Alida dodged and moved along, she occasionally was forced off the curb into the road, which made her nervous, for the traffic moved swiftly, and the drivers, as they rounded the curve, did not slow down or seem aware of the need for special care.
    Ten yards ahead, by the tobacconist's shop before the bend in the road, a golden retriever was lying on the pavement, and a woman with a baby in a pushchair had paused to talk to two young men, creating a bottleneck which might be dangerous if some impatient pedestrian stepped off the curb into the road at the wrong moment. But it wasn't the awareness of possible danger which made Alida feel suddenly cold, made her clench her teeth and walk more quickly as she rubbed bare arms prickling with gooseflesh; it was the sight of the man in black waiting just beyond the woman, baby, men, and dog.
    She didn't for a moment believe she was mistaken, that he might have been some other man in an ordinary black suit, because it was by some sense other than sight that she recognized him. In fact, from this distance she could not even see his face which was somehow -- mysteriously, in the open air and bright sunlight -- in shadow.
    She began to walk even more quickly, almost running, in her determination to reach him before he could disappear -- determined to see his face and find him ordinary.
    Beside her, below her line of sight, someone else was moving: a child. And she heard a woman's voice, sharp but tired, calling behind her: "Gavin!"
    Alida realized that she was going to have to jog down into the street for a moment: either that or trip over the dog, or risk losing sight of her quarry as she pushed past the people in her way. The risk of the traffic seemed preferable.
    Something brushed past her hip: still thinking of the dog, she glanced down and saw a red-haired child, perhaps three years old, running past and giggling. From behind, sounding more despairing, the woman's voice again: " Gav -in!"
    The man in black stepped forward, now, like the child, actually standing in the street. His arms were outstretched, and he bent his knees, lowering himself, reaching for the child who, seemingly unaware, was running directly toward him.
    Alida was staring straight at the man in black now, and still she could not see his face. There was a glare of sunlight reflecting off the windows of an approaching car, and it dazzled her.
    Later, she went over and over it in her mind, trying to figure out why she had done what she did.
    She had known, on the instant of seeing the man in black stretching out his arms, that the child was doomed. Young Gavin was obviously about to die -- probably to be hit by a car rounding the bend.
    It would have been a normal response, not even heroic, to have grabbed the child, to have scooped him into her arms and pulled him back to safety and to the gratitude of his mother. It would have been the act of a moment, the obvious thing to do, to have