A Love Stronger Than Time

Chapter 9

End of Chapter 8:

He carefully sat down next to her, and she opened her eyes slowly, looking over at him.

"Hello," she said, her voice not betraying if she was still upset with him.

He could tell that she hadn't slept well either from the dark circles under her eyes that even her makeup couldn't hide.

"Tarja," he said softly, daring to touch her arm. "I'm really, really sorry."

"Tuomas," she sighed. "I don't want your apologies. I want you to tell me what's really going on."

He swallowed, putting his hand back in his lap. "What do you mean?"

She gave him an exasperated look. "I mean that ever since you came home from that walk, you haven't been acting like yourself. You act weird around me, you forgot we had rehearsal, you were talking to yourself, you forgot to wash your hands, and you acted REALLY weird when I told you about the dream I had. You can't deny this, Tuomas. Please just talk to me. You know you can tell me anything."

"Tarja, I- I just ... it won't help anything."

"Please," she said, her voice softening. "Tuo ... even if it really won't help, I want to know. I'm sorry for the way I acted toward you yesterday. At this point in time, we need each other more than ever. The world ... it- it's falling apart around us! If we don't have each other, then what more do we have to hold onto?"

He could hear the tears threatening to overtake her voice, and that broke him.

"It's my fault," he said.

"What?"

"The epidemic," he said quietly.

"Tuomas, don't be ridiculous! You know there's no possible way that could be true."

"But there is," he replied.

She opened her mouth to reply, but the grave look on his face stopped her.

"Just hear me out, okay?"

She nodded.

He took a deep breath. "First of all, I should probably tell you that ... that the reason I've been acting so strangely is that I'm not the person you married."

"Tuomas, are you sure you're feeling okay? Maybe we should take you to a doctor, if there are any available."

"Tarja, you asked me why I was acting so weird."

"RIght, I did, but you're actually expecting me to believe that you're not my husband? If you're not, you made a pretty good disguise."

He sighed. "You know the dream you had?"

"Yes."

"And how you said it felt real, like what you dreamed about had actually happened to you?"

"Yes."

"Well, it did happen."

She looked into his eyes, and he could tell a part of her wanted to believe him now.

He sighed. "I'm going to tell you the whole story. If you believe me, then we might ... we might have some sort of a chance at fixing this. If not, well, you'll probably think I'm insane and throw me out of the house, but I think you deserve to know the truth."

"The dream you had was of the original version of time," he continued. "The version of your life that was supposed to happen before I screwed everything up."