A walk between worlds

Jenny Jones

CHAPTER 5

Jenny Jones

            I reached the main building and walked in.  There was a receptionist area, but no one was on duty yet.  I walked down the first hallway and saw some people pushing carts.  They were getting ready to serve breakfast to the patients.  There was a main cafeteria as well, along with semi-private rooms with patients in them.  I have to admit, it was very cool to walk right past people.  I almost felt giddy.  Re-focusing, I needed to find Shawn’s records and also see where Jenny was.  I needed to keep her away from him somehow, without interfering in the choice of free will.  This place was enormous.  I have seen rehabs back home because of the criminal work we do, but they were nothing like this.  There was a yoga studio, massage room, mediation area, pool area, and library to name a few. 

            The therapist rooms and Dr.’s rooms were on the second floor.  I should be able to find the records room there.  I waked down the hallway finding the name on each office until I came upon the records department.  Bingo!!  The door was open and there was a light on.  No one was in the room yet.  I went over to the filling cabinets.  They were in order by year.  Pulling out the drawer labeled 1990, I found Shawn’s file.  Opening it, I read the reports from the Dr. Chang.  They weren’t very good.  Basically, in a nut shell if he didn’t turn things around…well you know the rest of the story.  He was listed for daily visits from a Therapist named Lily Ann Turner to work on the root causes of his issues.  His dietary plan and medications they wanted to try with him were listed as well.  Circled in red was the word intervention, band mates.  I read about this in one of the articles and if I am correct, they arrive the day after tomorrow.  They come to visit him to try and help.  There was a list of visitors that were allowed to see him, his band mates, producer, and mother and father.  Carefully, I printed my name in pen and wrote my name on the list.  I used my maiden name.  Leigh Naid Reese.  It should help limit some questions if any came up.

            I looked through the file for Jenny Jones and found she was admitted in January 9, 1990.  A known h****n addict and periods of mild psychosis.  s*x and drugs for her addictions.  There was a photo of her in the file.  Red hair, green eyes, 39 years old with a nice figure.  She was mildly attractive.  I felt a stab of jealously.  The word manipulates and narcissistic was listed.  Hmm...now I knew what I was dealing with at least.  Then my eyes moved to the private cabin she was in, it said Serenity Skye.  She was the one watching me this morning from the window.  That means she can see me.  Then a chill ran up my spine.  She had to be the entity.  Now it’s making sense.  She gave herself over to the entity with her addictions but she wasn’t enough, for some reason, it was set on getting Shawn as well.  I shut the file and thought; it was going to have to get through me first.

            I put the files back and looked at the time on the wall.  It was 8:00 am already; I had been gone for an hour.  I should get back and check on Shawn this morning.  I didn’t know how long I had here and I couldn’t dawdle around.

            I slipped back out the main building and walked across the court yard.  I had to go past Jenny’s cabin.  I kept a wary eye on her place but didn’t see any movement.  When I got to Shawn’s door, I heard someone talking, so I peered through the window.  There was a woman in the room with him and he was talking loudly.  She was trying to calm him down.  My guess is that it was his therapist Lilly checking on him.  I was able to slip in the door without either one noticing. 

            “Look I’m not crazy, there was a woman here last night, and her name was Leigh.  I talked to her, she gave me some kind of drink, she called it bitters or something and then I fell asleep.  I’m not bloody crazy Lil, don’t add to my problems.  If I was crazy, then where the hell did this necklace come from?   She put it around my neck.” 

            Lilly eyed him suspiciously.  “You said that she gave you ashwagandha?  That’s a natural calming agent among other things.  I haven’t heard someone use that in a long time.  Hmmm, that’s interesting.  Can I see the necklace?”

            He handed it to her and she studied it carefully, “This stone is an amethyst.  It is said to have many helpful uses, especially for those fighting addictions.  This stone looks old.  What did you say her name was?  Leigh?”

            “Yes, that what she said.  She was beautiful.  I think she said her name means, “Healer.”  Shawn looked at her.  “What the bloody hell is going on here?  I want to know where she is.”

            I was trying to focus but got stuck on the fact the he though I was beautiful.  I never really considered myself anything much more than ordinary and figured since Declan was always with other women, that there was something wrong with me. 

            If Lilly knew about the stone, and what they were used for, she may be a healer as well, which means, she may be able to see me.  I had to think on my feet.

            I put the opal back in my pocket, then opened the door and slammed it a bit, walking into the room.  Boldly I stepped in, “So you finally get out of bed?”

            Shawn jumped up, “See, there that’s her, I’m not nuts.” 

            Lilly looked me over, almost like she was looking through me.  It made me a bit unsettled.  “So, you are Leigh?  Who sent you here Leigh?” 

            “I assumed Shawn did, he asked me to come.  I was sent here by telegraph to come help him.  I arrived late last night.  I should be on his visitors list.  Is there a problem?”

            Lily looked down at my cuff bracelet and then at my ruby ring. “Shawn would you excuse me and Leigh for a minute.  I would like to speak with her, alone.”

            He looked at me and then walked outside on the deck to smoke a cigarette.

            “Who are you really Leigh?  And why are you here.”

            Sitting down I looked at her very carefully.  “I already told you who and why I am here.  I am a healer and I have taken a very long trip to be here to help him, until I am called back to where I came from.  Plain and simple.  If you are concerned with the ashwagandha powder I gave him I can prove it was all natural.” 

            “My grandmother was a healer, and she used ashwagandha and put it in warm milk when my mother or I got ill.  I have not heard someone use that in a long time.  The amethyst necklace you gave Shawn, I know its properties as well.  I am concerned about your intentions; however, I will let you stay but you need to understand this, all the healing crystals in the world won’t heal what’s wrong with his mind.”

            “I know that, that’s where you come in Lilly.  I will work on the physical part of his ailments; you get his mind.  Deal?”

            “For now, you have a deal.  You know I am going to verify that you are on the list, right?”

            “I would expect nothing less.  If your session is not done, I will take a walk, I need some fresh air to clear my mind.”

            I walked out onto the porch.  “I’m going for a walk; I will be back.  Finish your session with Lilly, we can play question and answer when I return.”

            I didn’t wait for a response and continued on my way, but I could feel his eyes boring a hole in my back.

            There was a path around the lake and a boat launch out into the water.  It was cold but crisp out.  A light snow covered the ground.  I didn’t mind the cold too much, never did, actually I quite enjoyed it.  I was never a fan of summer; it was my least favorite season.  I walked out onto the launch, sat down and crossed my legs.  Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath in and then out.  I needed to clear my mind a bit, this situation was draining my energy.  Again, taking a deep breath in and out again…then drifting away. 

            “Well how is it going?”  It was Diane, thank the heavens.  I told her what had happed so far, explaining that I decided to show myself to Lilly.

            “She would have seen you and then there would have been more questions. 

Have you discovered who the entity is attached to yet?” 

            “Yes, Jenny Jones, and she knows I am here.  She can see me as well.”

            “She would be able to, she is old magic.”

            “What do I do Diane, how do I fight her.”

            “You need to stay calm and look within yourself for strength.  She will be intimidated by you and will look for weaknesses.  Things like, jealously and hate will open yourself up for her to feed off of you as well.  I am more convinced than ever this thing is connected to you and Shawn in a past life.  You are doing fine, use your instincts, and mediate often, it will recharge you.  In the meantime, I’m going to do some research and see what I can find.”

            Diane said a prayer over me and the connection ended.  I continued to meditate and clear my mind and relax, when I heard footsteps behind me.  I looked around and standing behind me in a long fur coat and overdressed for 10:00 am in the morning was

Jenny.  I would recognize that face and flowing red hair anywhere.  I stood up and she just stared at me.

            Finally, she spoke first. “I know why you are here and you can’t have him.  He is mine; we will be together in life and death and there is nothing you can do about it.  I am what he craves and needs, I will feed his addictions because that is what he wants, not you.”  Just then her coat opened up and swirling black mist started to creep toward me.  I instinctively held up my hand with my ruby ring and yelled, “Get back!”  The mist halted.  In an angry voice she said, “Where did you get that ring?  It doesn’t belong to you!!”

            I straightened myself, “This ring has been in my family for decades, if you want it so bad, come and get.”

            She looked raging mad and then lunged for the ring but as soon as she touched it, it burnt her fingers and she screamed.  “You little b***h!  This isn’t over.”

            I stared right back and could feel my insides burn like fire.  The ring was glowing on my hand and I felt warmth throughout my body.  At that moment I swear I could have thrown a fireball in her face.  “Oh, its over.”  I pushed past her and started to walk away, when she hissed, “He will never be yours again Leigh.”  I could hear her laughing as I walked away.

CHAPTER 6

Intertwined

            As I walked closer to Shawn’s cabin I was shaking with anger.  I can not let her get to me.  I stared down at my hand, looking at my ruby ring.  For as long as I can remember this ring has been in my family.  Why does she think it belongs to her?  Even more unsettling was the power that surged through my body when she tried to take it from me.  Like red hot fire burning through my body.  I had so many questions, but I needed to bury that for now. 

            Round 2 was about to happen with Shawn and I really had no idea what I was going to say to him.  I prayed God would help guide me with the right words.

            I walked into the room from the cold and he was sitting there, relaxed legs crossed with his arm stretched across the top of couch.  He was dressed in jeans and a blue long sleeve button down shirt.  It matched his eyes.  “Have a seat, let’s talk, shall we.”

            I took off his coat and sat down.  “Thanks for the jacket, unfortunately, I packed light.”

            Silence between us I decided to go first, “So where would you like to start?”

            He looked at me, then asked, “Are you married?”  I laughed, “Seriously, all the questions in the world and you want to know if I am married?”  He smiled.  I replied,

“Yes and no.  Yes, I am but going through a divorce.  Next question.”

            “Interesting.  How old are you?”

            “Really?  You never ask a woman how old she is.  Next question”

            “Come on, how old are you 28 or 29”.

            I laughed, “Well right now, I’m 30.” 

            “Hmmm, older woman.”  He laughed.  I rolled my eyes.  I said, “How about I just tell you a bit more about me instead.  Let’s see, I am from a small coal town in Pennsylvania but grew up on a farm.  My family were farmers by trade, but my father is an over the road truck driver now, and my mother is a homemaker.  I have an older sister who is married with two children and a dog I love named Zeke.  There how is that for starters.”

            “Not bad.”  He sat there staring at me intently, “Last night, you said I sent for you, asked you to come.  Did we meet somewhere, when I was drinking and don’t remember you?  Part of me feels like we know each other, you look so familiar, and this necklace you put around me, I swear I have seen it before.”

            I took a deep breath, “Do you believe in past lives?  That your life is could be intertwined with someone else’s like a circle that is never broken?  

            His eyes lowered, sadness came across his face, “Sometimes, I feel lost.  Never really happy and never complete.  Like I’m this guy who plays a guitar in a band that is famous, and we are on top of the world, but I’m not happy.  Like I’m missing something or someone, and nothing I do fills that void.”

            “You do realize, you are not just some guy that plays with a guitar, right?  I mean, do you have any idea how truly gifted you are?  You are amazing and probably one of the most gifted guitarists of my time.  Why in the world would you want to piss that away on booze?”

            “I don’t know, pressure maybe; never feeling like I measure up.  What if I can’t come up with new music or a new sound.  What if I fail.  All I hear is my pop telling me my life style is wrong, I can’t do this forever.  He won’t even accept my offer to help him so he doesn’t have to work anymore.  I sent them money so he could retire, and he won’t, like what the bloody hell is he trying to prove?”

            “You need to stop living for someone else and start living for you.  That’s your dad’s issue not yours, but you are making it your problem.  As far as the band is concerned, they can all write music, that’s what makes your group so unique.  Their sound is ever changing.  There is no doubt that you are a huge part of the success, but you are more like a family unit that works together.  You need to believe in yourself and no one can give you that.  You need to find that on your own.”

            “You sound like Lilly,” he said laughing.  “Are you like a therapist too?”

            “No, but I am here to help heal you and would like to be your friend.  I don’t want anything from you Shawn.  I am not a groupie, I’m not looking to get it on with a rock star, I don’t want any money, and I’m not working for the local news paper for a story.   I’m just here for you, because you asked me to come.  And I came a long way to be with you, if only for a short time.”

            “There you said it again, that I asked you to come.  I feel like there is something you are not telling me.”  

            I sighed, “I guess the only way to tell you is to show you.” I got up and sat cross legged on the floor.  “Come sit down here with me.”  He got up and sat across from me on the floor.  I asked him to remove the necklace and give it to me, then placed it in my right hand.  Then I said, “Place your hands in mine.”  When he did, I felt a surge go through me to him.  He looked at me surprised, “Did you just feel that, or am I crazy.”  I said, “Yes I did too.  I need you to try and focus. Close your eyes and I want you to breathe in and then out slowly.  Focus your concentration on my voice and nothing else.  Breathe in and out.  I want you to remember Shawn, concentrate on my voice, remember the meadow and the mist, remember calling for me.  You said come back to me, do you remember?” 

            We sat there for a few minutes and then suddenly he pulled his hands away from mine and looked at me.  “I saw you, in the mist, I saw you, and we were together holding hands.  I leaned in to kiss you but I was pulled away from you and I was calling for you.  I saw it.”

            I lowered my gaze, “You have made choices and are still making choices that put your life in danger.  I was sent back because you have been given another chance, another chance to do things differently.  The only catch is, I can’t tell you what happens, and I can’t help make those decisions for you.  You need to do that on your own.”

            “What do you mean you were sent back.” 

I thought to myself, might as well get this out of the way, I mean go crazy or go home right?  “I am 30 years old.” 

            “Yes, we established that already,” I said, “I am 30 years old in 2001.  In 1990 I am 20 years old.  You are actually 10 years older than me in true time.”  There was a long pause.  “Are you some kind of witch?” 

I laughed and said, “I don’t think so, but I have been called worse.  Do you want to freak out yet and run screaming from the room?”

            He looked at me very serious, “No, I don’t. For some reason I know you are telling me the truth.” 

            “This leather cuff I am wearing has a stone from Stonehenge.  Long ago, the druids used it to walk between worlds.  That is what I am doing, it was really time travel.  I can’t take off the cuff or I won’t be able to go back home.  Eventually, I will need to.”

            I stood up, “I think that’s enough for you to absorb for now.  It’s noon and you really need to eat.”

            Just then there was a knock at the door.  Shawn got up and opened it and there was a cart with lunch on it and lots of food.  Shawn looked at me and said, “When you were out walking, I ordered lunch.  I wasn’t sure what you wanted to eat so I pretty much got everything.”

            “I hope you don’t expect me to eat all of that?”

            The attendant put the meals into the refrigerator and then handed Shawn a bottle of pills.  “Dr Chang will be coming by this afternoon to talk to you.  He would like you to start taking one of these everyday, starting with lunch.” 

            Shawn said, “I’m not taking these bloody pills.”  The attendant said, “You can discuss that with Dr. Chang.  He will be here around 3:30 p.m.  You two enjoy your lunch.”

            After the attendant left, I looked at Shawn.  “Can I see the bottle?” He handed it over to me.  I looked at it and it was labeled Prozac.  “I was on this once.  It actually helped me, but then I switched over to herbs as I started to get better.  I think you should consider it until they get to the root of your problem Shawn.  If you don’t like the way it makes you feel, you can always tell Dr. Chang.  However, I would not advise washing it down with vodka.”

            He rolled his eyes at me.  I took a salad from the refrigerator, and he took a sandwich and we sat down across from the each other at the table in dining room. 

            “Thanks for lunch, I was actually starving.”  He was very quiet, and just kept looking at me.  I finally broke the silence, “What’s wrong, was it took much information too fast?”

            “Yes and no.”  He smiled slightly.  “So why the divorce.  What happened?  Unless you don’t want to talk about it.”

            “No, its ok.  I fell in love with Declan, my soon to be ex-husband, when I was 20.  I was so enamored with him.  The fact he was interested in me, always surprised me.  We were married a year later.  I would stay with him for 10 years.  He cheated on me all the time.  I never stepped outside of our marriage, not even when we were separated.  I kept thinking he would change but he didn’t.  I went through a lot of mental abuse from him.  It almost killed me actually.  Hence my stint with antidepressants.  The final straw was when he took my bonus I worked for to go on a hunting trip out west and then shacked up with an ex-girlfriend, who was married.  Her husband was the one who got in touch with me and sent me their disgusting sexually explicit emails.  That was pretty much it.  I walked away with very little so he would give me a divorce.  I will make my own way and start my life over.  But the experience has left me a bit, broken so to speak.  I am working through it.  That’s the short version, the long version I just can’t get into.”

            He listened to every word I said, never taking his eyes off me.  “He must have been crazy.”  Then he looked down at his plate breaking eye contact with me.   

            I said blushing a bit, “Thank you.  It was a lesson learned, a hard one at that, but now I need to move forward.”  Changing the subject, “What about you?  You were engaged with Courtney for a long time.  What happened?  Unless you don’t want to talk about it.”

            He looked sad.  “I was 21 when we met.  She was an actress/model.  We fell in love quickly, but we were apart from each other a lot.  I was not always faithful, but neither was she.  She ran with people that were famous and I don’t always like the lime light.  I am actually more of a private person.  My drinking didn’t help either.  When we were together, we were always surrounded by booze and drugs.  I tried some of them, but alcohol was my anti-depressant.  I started to feel that she was using me as a way to get ahead with her career, which she denies.  We had a huge fight one night and I finally broke things off with her.  I miss her sometimes, but our relationship was not exactly a good one.  We fed each other’s egos.”

            “You still care about her; I can see it.  Maybe once you get yourself together, you can reach back out to her.”

            “No, sometimes its better to let sleeping dogs lie.  We would be better as friends, not lovers.”

            I looked up at the clock, it was going on 2:00 p.m.

           “You look tired, why don’t you go lie down for a bit.  Dr. Chang will be here at 3:30 to see you.   I will clean up here.”

                  He looked at me and said, “Will you come sit with me, I don’t like being alone right now.”

                  I was thoughtful for a moment, then said, “Yes, I will but you need sleep, no more talking for now.”  He smiled then walked back the hallway.  I took a deep breath.  complicated I thought.  There is no denying I have feelings for him.  I just want to wrap my arms around him and hold him.  I need to focus.   

                  After cleaning up in the kitchen, I walked into his room.  He was lying on top of the bed with a blanket.  I sat in the chair, and he rolled on his side and look at me.  He said, “Can I ask you a favor?”  I said, “Sure.”  Shawn hesitated and then not looking at me said, “Would you lay here next to me.  I understand if you don’t want to, I just have a need to be next to you.  I swear I will be a perfect gentleman.”  I hesitated, “I don’t think that’s a good idea.  I mean, I don’t want to complicate things.”  He looked at me and said, “If I wanted to have s*x with you Leigh, we would have already,” and then he laughed.

I looked at him agitated and said, “Don’t be so sure of yourself Mr. Walker.  I’m not that easy to get into bed.”

                  “Leigh, I just want to hold you till I fall asleep, please.”  I slipped off my boots and slipped into bed next to him under the blanket.  He rolled over and wrapped his arm around me.  I could fell a tingle go through me.  He said, “Well, I got you into bed, “and then laughed.  I said, “I would punch you but I know you are in pain.  Go to sleep.”

                  I few minutes later he said, “When I’m near you it makes it a little easier.  Thank you.” 

                  I wrapped my arm around him.  He laid his head on my chest and soon was breathing softly.  I knew he was asleep. I leaned in and kissed his forehead.  Yep, this was going to be very complicated.  Soon I fell asleep with him.