Radiantly in Love

Jane woke every morning with icy-hot rage coursing through her.

Like a newborn emerging from the womb, she felt the blood surge into her veins, the oxygen bite her skin, and her consciousness return—filling her mind with static, black and white blotting out her vision.

For these few moments when she came back into herself, she could only wait for what came next: the sweating, the sting of tears, the rippling of pain that singed every nerve ending, as fragments of her that had traveled across time and space stitched themselves back together inside her body.

For Jane did not dream when she slept, but traveled. Sucked into the fabric of the universe and spit back out into moments of time that had been, or could be.

Some would call her a time traveler, though the version most imagined was far kinder than her reality. She could not move through time to stop the Twin Towers from falling, the ice caps from melting, or women’s rights from dying. She could only bear witness, forced to see (against her will at times) small moments scattered across the universe. Her soul was a rope in an endless game of tug-of-war, one that she had yet to win.

Sometimes it was as simple as her soul being drawn to a mother who had forgotten the sound of her child’s laugh. Her grief seeping so deeply into the universe that it cut across space and time, tugging on Jane’s soul to remember for her.

Or, a butterfly whose wings demanded to be seen. A writer whose story yearned to be read.

She was not necessarily a time traveler, but a phantom. Sometimes peering over someone’s shoulder; other times, she would be inside their body—two souls intertwining as one.

Most nights she fought against sleep, clinging to wakefulness—to her life—with books, caffeine, even the occasional midnight batch of cookies. Jack liked to call her a vampire because of how she became alive and electric after dark.

His version sounded far more glamorous than the truth.

In reality, Jane was afraid. She was a coward, staving off the moment when the universe would seize her again. And when she finally gave in to sleep, she found herself wishing for her consciousness to know true rest.

This morning, she drew in a deep breath on instinct, her lungs straining until the stretch made her wince. And suddenly, the world was in color again. Streaks of soft light spilled through the bedroom window. She drew another deep breath. The cotton sheets pressed against her like tiny, warm embraces, and beside her—where her hand instinctually reached—was her husband.

She looked over at Jack, at how boyish he looked in his sleep, all the weight of the world stripped away, leaving only softened edges and rounded angles. His raven-black hair was a swirling mess, his legs tangled with hers.

Yes, Jane thought, glee blooming in her chest as it always did when she returned to her life. To him.

She rolled onto him, pressing slow, gentle kisses along his jaw. “Jack, wake up,” she whispered against his ear.

He moaned, his consciousness fighting sleep. Until a small smile blossomed across his face. The thing Jane loved most about her husband was that he always woke with a smile.

“Janey, my love, it’s so early.” He said, bright blue eyes peeking out between his squinted lids.

Jane kissed him again, laughing softly. “Precisely. The whole day is at our fingertips. Let’s go for a morning stroll—I’ll make the coffee.”

She launched herself off him in a hurry, giving him no chance to answer. Her bare legs carried her steady across the floor toward the kitchen.

Jack only hummed in reply, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

Jane couldn’t help but smile at the nip of stagnant cold air in their little one-bedroom apartment in Chicago. As the sun seeped in, the place seemed to come alive again, every nook and cranny filled with traces of them: canvases splashed with the art Jack and her had painted one night after too many glasses of wine, towers of vinyls stacked against the bookshelf, and photographs of their life—of moments and places in time that spoke to them—scattered everywhere.

A reminder that she was here. That they were here.

Jane often thought she could spend forever in this place, so long as Jack was beside her. She had wandered through thousands of moments across the world, yet here—in their apartment, stitched together with the pieces of their life—was where she most wanted to be.

Her fingers found the coffee pot by memory. As it heated, she reached for Jack’s chipped green mug—the bigger one she always stole. He’d bought it for himself on a business trip to New York, and though he had brought her back a mug too, this one was larger. Her love (and her need) for coffee ran deeper than his, which naturally required the bigger mug (despite his protests).

Jack stumbled out of their room, hair a mess, eyes still heavy but softening into a smile at the sight of his wife. He had pulled on a pair of khaki pants but kept his white sleep shirt on.

Jane’s gaze lingered on him, drinking him in. All tall, broad, and sturdy. She still couldn’t believe, even after eight years together, that she had managed to snag someone like him.

“Now, if you keep looking at me like that, Mrs. Vaughn, no morning walk shall be had.” He teased, voice low, swiping his hand through his messy hair.

“Perhaps that can be arranged after,” Jane quipped, smiling at him.

He came closer, mischief flickering in his eyes, and Jane burst into laughter as she darted away. Jack chased her around their little apartment, though the game was short-lived, as his arms engulfed her in a warm hug from behind.

Jane inhaled deeply as she savored the fresh smell of pine and sandalwood cologne that he wore. Truthfully, she wanted to be caught.

Giggling, she turned in his arms and rose onto her toes to press a quick kiss to his lips.

Pulling back with a grin, Jack pressed his forehead to her own, “Go get some pants on. I’ll grab our coats,” he whispered.

“Okay,” she said breathlessly, darting into their room, still in only her sleep shirt.

When she returned, Jack was waiting with her coat, holding it steady as she slipped her arms through the sleeves. She gathered their coffees, the warmth seeping into her palms. Jack shot her a look when she kept “his” mug for herself and passed him the blue one instead. Then together, they stepped out into the crisp, twinkling morning.

They walked the streets as the rest of the world slowly woke. For a few moments, Jane liked to imagine they were the only two people alive. That she was not a time traveler, and did not already know their neighbor would die in seven years in a car accident, or that his widow would adopt a dog, uninspiringly named Max, who never stopped jumping.

No. In these moments, she was simply Jane. She repeated it to herself like a prayer: I am Jane. I am here. I am alive.

And though she hated time travel most days, she had to admit it had given her this—an aching, fragile appreciation for the rare mornings and moments where she was only Jane, walking beside Jack.

The morning was blisteringly cold, yet it seemed to belong only to them. Frost turned the tree branches to glass, a cardinal trilled its song through the air, and a few restless dogs tugged their owners along in their first walk of the day.

Jane glanced at a man jogging closer to them. “Alright. Story time. What’s his deal?”

Jack studied the man who was in a full trench coat running down the street. “Clearly, he is in dire need of a bathroom.”

Jane burst out laughing, sending birds flying on a nearby branch. Jack looked at her with a gleam in his eye as he laughed with her.

Hand covering her mouth as the man in “dire need of a bathroom” passed them, she whispered, “I was going to say he forgot there was an early meeting, but you win that round.”

They giggled to themselves for a few beats, steam rising from their warm coffee cups. Until a middle-aged woman, head held high, in a white fur coat, red gloves, and a rather chic-looking red hat, walked past them. As she came closer, they realized that tucked in her coat was a rather plump poodle in her arms.

Jane leaned into Jack, “Now, she… she’s a tough one, but I’d wager that she needed a walk more than the dog. Perhaps, now stick with me on this, because she needed an alibi after murdering her husband this morning.”

“Goodness, my love,” Jack murmured, with a smile. “That’s awfully dark. You’re not projecting, are you?”

Jane scrunched her nose at Jack, “Never.” she replied, “You are stuck with me forever.”

“It is quiet a laborious task, but here I am doing it.” He teased.

Jane cleared her throat, nuzzling closer into his warmth. “What stories do you think people make up when they see us?”

Jack’s brows drew together in thought. “A tired couple trying to romanticize a Chicago winter while they freeze to death.”

Jane frowned. “Boring! Completely uninspiring.”

“Fair,” Jack said, kissing the back of her icy hand that was intertwined with his. “I wasted my best material on the running man.” He tilted his head toward her. “What do you think?”

Jane pursed her lips. “For others, you’re just a poor man doomed to follow his wife’s every command.”

Jack smirked. “Then they’d be wrong. I’m not a doomed man… it’s the best job I’ve ever had.”

Jane beamed at him and continued, “But selfishly, I hope they see us and think, They look exactly how they must feel.”

Jack’s mouth curved. “Lucky?”

Jane shook her head, “Radiantly in love.”

Jack slowed suddenly, the humor in his face softening. She had expected him to tease her, the way the two of them always seemed to do.

“What?” Jane asked, concerned.

Jack did not answer; instead, he let the words turn over in his mind. “Radiantly in love,” he echoed, quieter now, as though testing the truth of it. Then he smiled, not with playfulness but with admiration. “Yes. I like the thought that we shine so brightly we leave echoes behind.”

Jane leaned into him and gave him a kiss. And for the second time that day, she thought, Yes. Jack understands. He understood her and what she was trying to say. And for a woman who drifted through time without ever being understood or understanding why she was made this way, it was a rare and precious thing to be so deeply known in the ways that mattered most.

This would be a thought that would anchor her for years to come. Throughout time and space, as she was broken apart and remade again.

Jack brushed her face tenderly with his hand, and Jane thought she could live forever inside this moment.

Jane woke, not in fury, but with a smile.

She had traveled back in time, if only for a breath, and now returned to her present.

There was no pain, no sight left in her fading eyes. Still, she smiled—for she had been given one last gift: to live again, if only for a moment, a perfectly ordinary day with the love of her life, and to leave this world knowing she was understood in the ways that mattered most.

Her children and grandchildren whispered around her, but one voice, small and light, drifted through like a dandelion seed on the wind.

“Thank you for your radiant love,” it said.

Jane closed her eyes. Warmth spread through her as she released her final breath.

And at last, she knew what it meant to rest.