Page 84 of I Dreamt That You Loved Me

New Year’sDAY 1997

“What’s a tropical fruit with sweet, white flesh and a thin, rough skin?”

I looked up from my book. Gabriel had his pen poised, ready to fill in the answer in theNew York Timescrossword puzzle.

“Gabriel,” I said, then laughed at my own dumb joke.

He snorted. “Six letters, ends in an E. Third letter is a C.”

I counted it out on my fingers. “Lychee.”

Gabriel nodded and wrote it in. “I should’ve gotten that one.” He lifted my feet out of his lap and stood up from the sofa. “I got you something.” He wandered off to the kitchen, taking the newspaper with him.

“Hang on,” I called after him. “Let me see that puzzle.” I was doing it earlier and didn’t remember seeing that clue.

He returned a few minutes later without the crossword puzzle and set a brown paper bag in my lap. I peeked into the bag and counted seven lychees.

“Why seven?” I asked when he sat next to me and draped his arm across the back of my cushion.

“One for every year since I first saw you. They turned our diner into a fucking Starbucks,” he said, shaking his head like he couldn’t believe they’d do that to us.

It had been a Starbucks for over a year, but Gabriel still wasn’t over it. For him, that diner was a sacred place. It marked the beginning of our story when he first saw me from the window, and he didn’t want a coffee chain ruining the sanctity of his memories.

“Aren’t you going to eat your lychees?” he asked a little while later when I’d gone back to reading.

I closed my book and set it down. “Aren’t you going to feed them to me?” I transferred the bag to his lap.

He picked it up and dumped it back in mine. “I just want to watch you.” I gave him a look. “It’s our first fruit of the month for the new year. Lychees bring good luck and abundance in life.”

“Then we should both eat them.”

“I bought thirteen, so I already had mine.”

“Why thirteen and not twelve?” I asked, peeling the spiky skin off the lychee.

“Because of this.” He touched the ankh, an Egyptian hieroglyphic that looked like a teardrop above the letter T that hung from a leather cord around his neck. It symbolized eternal life. I gave it to him for his 27thbirthday and made him promise to wear it every day.

Call me superstitious but two weeks before Gabriel turned twenty-seven, I had a bad dream. It was so vivid that I woke up sweating and disoriented and shook him awake to make sure he was still alive and well.

In the dream, Gabriel was on stage playing his guitar, but he couldn’t remember the lyrics to any of the songs. I was backstage when he stumbled off and walked right past me, like he didn’t even see me standing there. The dream ended with him driving a car off a cliff.

After that, I became paranoid that Gabriel would become a member of the 27 Club so last year, I put my own career on hold and joined him on tour.

Annika told me I was being ridiculous, but I didn’t care how crazy it sounded. We had a crazy kind of love and we were both really protective of each other. I needed to be there to ensure that he reached his 28thbirthday, which thankfully, he did.

“The ancient Egyptians believed that life was a spiritual journey that unfolded in stages. Twelve in life and the thirteenth was the most transformative when you ascend into the eternal afterlife. Thirteen’s a lucky number,” he said incisively.

“You are a wonder, Gabriel Francis.”

“Now eat your lychees.” His smile was so sexy, so decadent that I rewarded him by moaning my way through the bag of fruit, licking my fingers and doing my best porn star impersonation.

His body shook with silent laughter as I searched the bag for the seventh lychee amid the cast-off peels and stones.

He was cackling now. I shot him a look. “What is so funny?”

Gabriel shook his head. “Only you.”

“Only me what?”