Love, Death, and Chocolate

"Sweetie? You haven't touched your dessert."

Leilani sat back, her latest bout of laughter fading quickly. "Maybe I don't want tonight to end. I’m having such a good time."

The pale blond lady pursed her lips. "You know that it has to at some point, don’t you Leilani?"

“I prefer Leila, please. And honestly out of the two of us, how am I the enigma? ‘Helena’ is a pretty name and all, but it’s the only thing I know about you. You say you work in 'acquisitions,’ whatever that means, I don't know where you're from or who your people are. All I know is you're funny, you're cute, I've had a damn fine afternoon with you, and you're trying to get into my pants."

Helena reclined back in her chair and shrugged, her pretty face instantly masked with disapproval. "Why do you need to know anything else? There's a mutual attraction here.Why not just leave it there?" Her expression flickered slightly, and Leilani thought she saw something on the right half of her face. Something that raised the hair on the back of her neck, but was gone in an instant.

Then that tantalizing smile was back and Helena was pushing the small plate forward again.

A decadent slice of chocolate cake, as fancy as the expensive and crowded restaurant they sat in, on a tiny dish; just for her. Leilani felt like the rest of the restaurant was desaturated by comparison. Almost as if all the colors in the place were being used up by this single delicacy.

"Finish up so we can go." The voice came out colder than before, harsher and almost cruel. Nothing at all like the sweet and charismatic woman Leilani was dating. Helena smiled and the world wavered around them until Leilani found it difficult to look away from that perfect face. “How about a compromise? One bite, and we can see if there isn’t something else you’d like to eat?”

Leilani’s eyes widened and she felt herself blush. “How forward of you!”

“I didn’t hear a no,” Helena flirted.

“No, no you did not. But I don’t normally take my date home with me on the first date.”

“First time for everything, Leila,” Helena purred. Her delicate hand reached out to brush Leilani’s forearm, sending thrills through the younger girl’s skin.

It became very difficult for Leilani to think of a good reason to say no anymore. She was sure there had been a reason. So sure. But now… now she could think of nothing but the woman sitting across from her. So beautiful in such a unique way. So neatly befitting Leilani’s exact type. So… so perfect.

Why say no?

Leilani gulped down the rest of her wine, throwing caution to the wind, and stood up. “Alright then, to hell with dessert. I’ll pay the tab and we can continue this conversation back at my place.”

She turned away from the table and found the restaurant abandoned. No waiters. No guests. Just empty tables and broken chairs. The only lighting came from a few lonely candles sitting atop a handful of those empty tables. And peering through the quivering darkness were emerald eyes leering at her hungrily.

A terror she could not explain gripped her, like something deep within her that she could scarcely remember was telling her it knew what those things were and she should be very afraid.

Leilani yelped and fell backward… into her wife’s arms.

Helena pushed back the white veil and kissed her deeply. It was everything Leilani could have ever dreamed of. It was perfect.

The crowded restaurant grew quiet, every guest turning to look at her at once. Disapproval. Disdain. Annoyance. Impatience. Hunger!

“Are you alright ma’am?” The waiter asked as he helped her up into a seated position. “Sorry, you sort of came out of nowhere as I was bringing the tray around. You and your wife were about to have lunch?”

Leilani glanced around the restaurant, trying to ignore the differences.

The patterns on the tablecloths were wrong. The guests were all different. The music was not even the same genre. She gripped the waiter’s arm and paused in horror as she caught sight of her gnarled hand.

When had she had grown so old?

“I… I must have had too much wine, silly me,” Leilani lied easily. Her voice sounded just as withered and frail as her hand. The young man helped her to her feet and sat her back down across from Helena.

Leilani’s breath caught when she spotted her wife. Helena’s hair may have gone fully white but her face looked practically untouched by whatever time had passed. A lifetime of memories lay between them, yet her face showed nary a wrinkle.

“How is it after all this time, you are still the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen?”

Helena’s pained smile held both the anticipation of grief, and also a bittersweet, vain sort of pride.

“Ah, dearest. You always say the sweetest things when you’re well into your drinks. If only you’d behave like this when you were sober,” She turned to the waiter and thanked him for ‘handling’ her. “Honestly you’d think she’d lay off before noon but the woman just can’t help herself. You must forgive her.”

The poor boy ran off looking mortified.

“You do not have to say things like that. I could have just been an old lady who slipped. Not…”

“A crazy drunk? Sure. You could have been. But look at you, Leilani. Go ahead, look,” Helena pointed across the restaurant at a mirror facing them. “Tell me what you see.”

Leilani mumbled under her breath about preferring ‘Leila’ and turned to view her reflection. An old woman stared back at her, sat across from a Helena so youthful and vibrant that someone could have mistaken her for Leilani’s daughter. Which was unfair. Helena was older.

Leilani gathered her confidence. “I see my beautiful wife. And I see myself, an old queen far from through with her life.”

Helena winced. “Oh please don’t call me that in public. You look old enough to be my mother.”

Leilani looked away, feeling a shame that did not belong to her start to creep in. Her eyes narrowed. This was wrong.

She was not some old hag who deserved to be mistreated by a wife who should love her. This was not how she deserved to go out!

“Darling? Have you forgotten your meds?” Helena asked sweetly. Leilani glanced up in shock, seeing her beautiful, raven-haired wife rustling through her purse to find a small prescription bottle. She quickly passed it across the breakfast table.

This was not the cruel grey-haired Helena, nor the pushy young Helena. This one was somewhere in between. A beautiful woman with patience and kindness in her voice, not seduction or steel. “You remember what Doctor Mitchell said. You miss one and you’ll start seeing things again.”

Leilani looked at the bottle and tried to ignore all the differences around her. The restaurant was all wrong, again. She reached for the bottle but saw a bright green flash the moment she touched it. Those ravenous emerald eyes peering at her through the dark.

The bottle fell into her half-eaten breakfast and spilled everywhere. Sweet Helena’s face morphed into one of disdain, disappointment, hunger, and annoyance. Her dark hair greyed in seconds. The restaurant warped along with her.

“Look what you’ve done, you’ve spoiled lunch!” She pointed down at the spilled glass of wine soaking their meals. “Ugh, I’m so tired of taking you anywhere. Waiter! Bring me the check!”

“I-I’m sorry,” Leilani whispered, her eyes welling up as she looked around at all the curious faces peering at her. Her hands were wringing themselves in her lap and she blinked away tears of embarrassment. “I… I’m not sure what’s going on, Helena. I’m confused!”

The hissed-out confession drew Helena up short. She looked at Leilani with a flicker of something that may have once been pity but had long since curdled to apathy. “Aren’t you always?”

Leilani felt as if she had been slapped. Her expression must have reflected that because even this Helena, the cruel one, looked away guiltily.

“I’m sorry if I’ve burdened you. Nothing about this feels right, Helena. I feel… adrift. Like I’m young and old and somewhere in between all at the same time. I feel scared. I feel lost. I feel alone. And you’re mad at me for something I don’t even remember!”

Helena’s tongue worked its way across her bottom lip as she exhaled a hot blast of frustration. “I know, Leila. I know. Just. This isn’t easy for me either you know, trapped on the outside. I’m just trying to help you,” She lied.

Leilani did not know how she knew, but she knew. It was all a lie.

A familiar voice interrupted her reverie, and she was no longer sitting across from the grey-haired woman of her nightmares.

“Darling? You haven’t touched your dessert,” Sweet Helena said, nudging Leilani under the table. “It’s your favorite. Triple chocolate with chocolate chips and chocolate drizzle.” She giggled, and Leilani prepared herself for her wife’s favorite joke. “A chocolate overdose. Just like me!”

Leilani smiled despite her tumultuously whirling mind. Her instincts were screaming that something was wrong but how could anything be wrong with such a beautiful woman seated across from her, smiling and laughing and enjoying her company? Somehow that smile let her forget whatever it was that had been bothering her a second ago.

“You never get tired of that joke do you?”

“Never!” Helena laughed.

Leilani, her jaw aching from smiling for so long, picked up her fork and reached for a bite, pausing to make one more quip. “You know what else you and this cake have in common?”

Helena broke away from staring intently at the forkful of cake to affix Leilani with those gorgeous green eyes. Those ravenous, sweet-as-honey, impatient, and cold green eyes. “What’s that?”

“I like the way it melts in my mouth, too.” Leilani flirted, winking as she brought the fork towards her lips.

NO!

Leilani let the fork clatter to the table, standing back so quickly that the chair clattered away behind her. She was back in the first restaurant. Helena was just a tinder match. Not her beloved fiancee. Not her cruel wife. Just a first date.

“What the fuck is going on?” Leilani demanded.

Helena rose from her chair with a sickly sweet smile and the crowded restaurant vanished. Replaced by that abandoned nightmare from before. Dozens of emerald eyes watched her from all around. But only Helena moved.

“Leilani, please. Sit down and enjoy this pleasant fiction with me. It is so rare that we get to entertain living guests. Come. Sit. Eat. Stay,” She offered seductively.

“What are you? What’s in that cake?”

One half of Helena’s face wavered: revealing first an old woman, then half of a bare skull, then back to beautiful young Helena. “The cake is a cure, Leilani.”

“A cure for what, exactly? I’m not sick!”

“Oh but you are, dearest. Sick in the way that all mortals are. You all wither and die in the blink of my eye. I don’t wish that for you. Come and eat cake with me, and all your troubles will disappear like a bad memory.”

Leilani looked around, searching for an exit and finding none. “Was any of it real? Was Helena ever real?”

Helena tilted her head curiously. She smiled that perfect smile that made everything else fade away, and Leilani blinked.

The crowded restaurant returned, and Leilani glanced around dreamily at all the happy faces enjoying their dinners.

“Leila, you’ve hardly touched your dessert.”

Leilani smiled. She liked the way her name sounded in Helena’s voice. She took a bite to appease the beautiful lady and hummed with delight as the chocolate hit her taste buds.