The Pact

"I don't understand," he said in exasperation.  "What is...THIS?  This connection between us that just leaves me feeling empty and full of longing, but I feel like I can't live without it?  I don't even know if I can understand...or how to explain..."

She looked at him deeply, her eyes steady yet searching, like a beacon looking out to sea.  "I think I know," she said at last.  She paused again before launching into her story.  "It's because...when we were younger...seven, maybe eight, I had this tree house.  We spent almost every day there together.  Just us.  And we'd stay there for hours.  I can't remember how many times Mom had to drive you home because it was after dark."  She went on.  "One day, we made a pact.  We swore that we would never forget it, cross our hearts, hope to die..."

"Fifty needles in my eye if I lie?" he finished.

"Yes," she continued, her face still blank, her eyes still searching, like she was reading a page from an ancient text.  "And then, I left.  I moved away and the tree house rotted from its abandonment.  And now, almost twenty years later, we met again as strangers.  We had forgotten, but not completely.  Something still remained.

"That is the tension you sense," she explained.  "We are remembering that we have forgotten.  And while we cannot fully remember, we can't fully forget."  She had finished speaking, but her eyes still held his.

He drew back from her, as if trying to escape the knife that had already sunk into him.  All of what she had said was a lie, of course.  There had been no tree house, no pact. They had never met until only a few years before.  All of it had been random chance.

Still, he knew that every word she spoke was true.