Reincarnation

Or trying to remember what it is I forgot

Harry, do you believe in reincarnation? Jenny asked

The day had started without the consistent pain in my thigh. I had managed to sit up. Out the window, Squirt was doing his thing, traveling the snow-laden highway in the trees, then out on a narrow side road, which at any moment might snap beneath him. He leaped across to the snow-covered roof. I can hear him scattering around, first this way, then that, then back onto a single-track branch that barely managed to sustain the extra weight of snow, let alone him. At the wider end, another squirrel appears. Squirt is suddenly in a precarious situation. The two were staring at each other. It was a Little John, Robin Hood moment. Without taking my eyes off the developing situation outside the window, I ask, what was that?

Do you believe in reincarnation?

My leg is killing me, Jenny. Just leave the breakfast, I say, wincing as I try to move up the bed.

What about predestination?

Bloody hell, Jenny knows I’m faking pain. Pisses me off when I can’t tell a lie convincingly.

I don’t know, but I’m sure Squirt believes it right now.

See that out there? I said, pointing out the window to snow-covered branches. That’s squirt on this end. See it wavering and swaying with his weight? See, on the other end, on the thick end, that’s another squirrel, never seen him before, but right now Squirt must somehow turn around, risk falling, or face Little John for passage back home.

Jenny set my breakfast down on the bedclothes. Did you take more than your allotted dose of pain medication?

Do you mean did I have two baby aspirin?

Answer my question.

Which one?

Either one! Why are you so difficult?

Am I?

Yes.

Okay. The eggs are over easy, right? Yesterday I found snot in the white.

It was yours, then. I don’t cook eggs that way.

I turned my eyes back to the window. Both were gone. Dammit, Jenny, I missed what happened between Robin Hood (Squirt) and Little John.

Good, you’ll answer my question, and don’t ask me which one.

I haven’t given either any thought, I said.

Sure?

Of course, I’m sure, I said, a bit grumpily.

I have but can’t make up my mind when I heard you say something about it.

Yours is easy enough. You’ll want to come back as my wife, I said and cut open my poached egg. Perfect. (I had been sneezing and dealing with a runny nose lately…then the sudden thought of yesterday’s runny egg made me gag.)

I’m not sure what it is, but lately, Jenny has been full of philosophical questions and trying to understand the answers.

Look, anyone who stops by here at Medium to read something of mine doesn’t know whether to expect something funny, romantic, violent or just downright lousy poetry. But they know I loved Jenny the moment I saw her. (If you’re new to me, read older articles, you’ll get the idea.)

When we met, it was like I had walked into another life. Another life because one life was over. I never thought that past life would end. It did. Brutally, as it happens.

If I’d been doing anything else but shopping with my son in London, a Christmas holiday twenty-two years ago, I might have missed Jenny.

We stepped out on Regent Street, the Christmas lights blazing, the evening cold, dry. We had dinner and saw a show. Before we broke away for the night, she came close, put her slender arms around my neck, and we kissed for what seemed like an eternity. When we broke the kiss, she looked up at me with those eyes of hers, moist with tears, cocked her head in a motion that invited a comment, and I said, I feel like I’ve known you all my life, Jenny. Do you believe in reincarnation or predestination?

There was a sudden dawning as perfectly done egg yolk oozed down my chin.

Happy twenty-second anniversary of our first kiss, Jenny said, wiping away the yolk.