Memories in Time

Mary-Lynn Allard
April 13, 1999

Collinsport Maine, September 2001

Barnabas Collins got out of his car, and came toward the Old House. The windows were dark and empty, and although he had not seen the house in almost thirty years, he could feel the house was waiting for him. He tried the door, surprised yet not surprised to find it locked, and then unlocking it stepped across the threshold. No fire burned in the fireplace, but he could not feel the cold, and had long since left the pretense of warmth that any fireplace gave him. An affectation for when he once believed he could return to being human. His mind filled with memories of fires here, of people here, of love here. The curse that gave him strength and eternal life had taken his ability to forget away with his humanity, nothing ever forgotten. He pushed the memories away. Years of practice had brought with them the ability to not remember.

He felt Willie's presence before Willie had even entered the house. He saw him before he lit the candle, muttering under his breath. As the old man came in with a lit candle, he stopped, his fear reaching across the room. "Barnabas, is that you?" He lifted the candle to see more clearly as Barnabas turned toward him. "You…you look just the same." His motion jerky with nervousness, he turned to the candelabra to light it. "I should have realized…I'm sorry I didn't have a fire for you. I didn’t expect you so soon. The sun's only just set. In winter I keep the fires burning…"

Barnabas' face softened. "I know Willie. I've read your letters."

Willie turned to Barnabas, his face puzzled and sad. "I didn't know. You never answered them." Willie crossed the room and lit a candle on the mantle and bent down to put wood into the empty mouth of the fireplace. His actions got more relaxed as he got used to the now remembered prickle under his skin, that bond with Barnabas forged so long ago, and found that Barnabas wasn't as far changed as he feared he had.

But Barnabas had changed when he came to terms with his curse, and left Collinwood so long ago to seek answers to questions that Willie couldn't even imagine.

"I suppose you know then about Roger. He never got over Liz's death. That's when Carolyn and I moved into the Great House, so he wouldn’t be alone. David’s job took him to Texas and with the children on their own… but I guess I'm runnin' off at the mouth when you know all that…"

Barnabas lifted a magazine from the table with the latest band on the cover, and a headline boasting of the latest news. Willie chuckled. "I guess I didn't tell you that when the kids came to visit, we put them and the grandkids up here. Roger couldn't take the noise."

Willie stood and looked down at the fire that was burning now. "That should do it."

Barnabas seemed about to say something, when a glance around the room, took him to the mantle over the fireplace behind Willie. He crossed the room with a swift noiseless grace, and took the picture from where it sat in the dust. He thought that he had thrown that away. He looked at the feminine face smiling out from the frame of gold. He ran his finger down the shape of the face, across the sensitive mouth, as gently as if he was touching her flesh and not her image, remembering.

Quietly his voice filled the empty silence of the room. "Where did you find this?"

Willie came over to look at the picture with Barnabas. Not that he needed to see it to know what Barnabas was talking about. "I took it from the negative, and replaced the frame. I didn't think you really meant to get rid of them. It was the last picture on the roll, the last picture of Julia that you took…before…" Willie stopped.

Barnabas held the picture to him. All the memories, the pain of loss returned to him. "You don't know how many times I wish I had kept it."

Willie, looking out the window into the dark, spoke what had been on his mind since he had gotten the letter. "Why have you come back Barnabas?"

Barnabas keeping the picture dropped his arm. "About two weeks ago I got a letter from Eliot."

Willie turned startled. "But Eliot is dead. Died more than five years ago!"

Barnabas shrugged. "I can't explain it. Has anything ever been easy at Collinwood? I got the letter, and his journal, and that brought me back." He paused. "Willie, I must know, have you seen Julia?"

Willie's eyes grew wide. "Barnabas, you know Julia is dead. Dead these past 30 years from a heart attack!"

Barnabas looked through Willie, through time to see Julia. "Then her spirit doesn't walk here?"

Willie's forehead wrinkled as he shook his head. "No." He paused, looking guilty. "It's my fault that she died, if only I hadn't interfered."

Barnabas looked at Willie. There was no compassion in his face for Willie to hold on to, and he dropped his eyes. Barnabas still blames me after all these years. As though his thoughts had been spoken aloud, Barnabas answered him, "Only one person could have prevented this Willie. Any blame is mine."

Looking again at the picture, he placed it back on the mantle. He sat down at the desk and took a memo pad and ball-point pen from his pocket. He sat in the near dark and began to write.

"Here Barnabas, some light."

Barnabas looked at Willie placing the unneeded light on the desk. For so long he had lived as a creature of the night, he had forgotten many of the ways of mortal man. It had been a long time since he had allowed himself to be touched by human compassion, and he for a moment he wondered why he had cast it away, and had stayed away so long. But then he already knew the answer to that, knew exactly what had kept him away from Collinwood. When he was away, he could think of Julia here at Collinwood, but now that he was here, just as before he left, he could feel the emptiness of Julia's absence, and feel the pain that he fought so hard to forget.

* * *

Willie took the list to begin his errands, wondering aloud how he was going to explain this to Carolyn, leaving Barnabas alone in the house once more. The walls of time had always been thin at Collinwood. Barnabas closed his eyes and listened through time. He could hear Sarah's voice begging for a story, his mother bidding him a tearful goodbye and safe journey. His father and Ben, Josette and Angelique all calling to him, but none was the voice he sought. The door to memories now opened could not be shut and the voice of Vicki joined, exclaiming over Josette's bedroom, Elizabeth in fear seeking refuge, Willie's youthful voice begging him again and again to realize his feelings for Julia. "She loves you, Barnabas. You love her." Then the voices of his memories stopped and the voice he sought, the one he had hidden away so deeply, echoed in the silence of his mind. "I love you, Barnabas Collins. Take it or leave it." How surprised Julia had been when he answered in the stillness after her outburst, "I will take it then."

Now the only voices he heard were hers. Years of conversation, her sharp tone covering the subtle accents of yearning ache she had felt for him. Each word from the past damning him. Barnabas crossed to the picture and took it up once more to look at it. She was so happy the day he took this with his first, his only roll of film, happier than any other day of their time together. So often he made life needlessly painful for her. That she was happy on her last day alive was of no comfort to him, for as the cause of that happiness, he had as surely been the cause of her death. "Barnabas Collins, do you love me?" The voices stopped, for he had never answered her question, the last question she had ever asked him, and with the silence a tear of blood rolled down his cheek.

* * *

When Willie returned, he found Barnabas standing over the box of Julia's belongings. Elizabeth had packed them after Julia's death. As far as Willie knew they had never been opened until this day. Barnabas' face showed no emotion as he took each item out and laid it aside looking for something, finally finding it, the medallion. Then putting the rest of the items back, he called to Willie. "You can come in. I won't bite you."

Willie had never known Barnabas to joke and despite the mild look on his face, was not certain that Barnabas was joking now. He came in and laid the items that he had scoured the town and the woods for on the table.

"Barnabas, I got everything you asked for. Can't you tell me what you're doing with it all?"

Barnabas looked at the clock; there was plenty of time. "Eliot wrote me before he died. Just before he died. The letter was taken with his personal effects and it wasn't until the museum was looking for his research that it was found and forwarded on to me, that and his journal. He thought he found a way for me to go back in time. He didn't think Julia was dead."

Willie thought of Julia's coffin being lowered into the grave, the thought of her having been alive making him claw at his collar to open it to better breathe. "Then she died later. She suffocated?"

Barnabas looked through Willie. "He found out something that made him believe that Julia was captured outside of time, that somehow something happened that should not have. If I could somehow get back to that moment or before and change that one event, she will not die. You remember. We tried everything, seances, cards, crystal ball, and Julia would not come to me. She couldn't come to me."

Willie remembered those awful days as Barnabas searched desperately for Julia.

And then the darkest day when Barnabas finally admitted to himself that he would never see her again. He destroyed the lab, and all the pictures of Julia that he had surrounded himself with, and then he was gone. It was almost a year before Willie heard from him again, and then it was through an attorney. "I remember Barnabas."

Barnabas looked out the window, his teeth more prominent in his mouth. His hunger must be satisfied. "Tomorrow is the anniversary of her death."

The night and the living blood called to Barnabas. "I must go, but I will be back before dawn. While you were gone I wrote out the directions of what you should do. Julia's life depends on you doing it exactly as it says."

Barnabas disappeared in a cloud of mist before Willie's amazed eyes, and was gone.

* * *

Willie was beginning to get nervous. Sunrise was coming too soon, and Barnabas had not returned. He stood at the foot of Julia's grave, having done everything on the list, hoping that he had followed the directions exactly, thinking them through over and over in his mind. Spending the night at the cemetery had never put him at his ease, and tonight as waited for Barnabas he was more nervous than ever. The sky was beginning to turn from the deep-purple black of night to the pale gray of almost morning when Barnabas came to stand with him. Willie gave him the medallion, and Barnabas watched the sky.

"Shouldn't you hurry, Barnabas. It's almost dawn."

"I've learned many things while I was away, contacts of Eliot's. Julia and I were wrong not to have trusted him. I'm not the only one of my kind. I've learned some tricks, some which have kept me alive. My best chance to do this is when the sun begins to rise, and I think I can stay alive long enough to do what I must do. Only one chance."

As the pink began to touch the sky, Barnabas stood at the foot of the grave and waited. The sun started to rise. Barnabas could feel the pain blocking out all thought of everything but Julia as the sun began to boil in his blood, and then the pain grew too great and he screamed as he died.

* * *

Collinsport Maine, 1971

Barnbas Collins stood in the foyer of the Great House of Collinwood. His great coat with its cape was buttoned against the chill that woke him at dawn this morning and only he seemed to feel on this mild autumn day, and he carried his cane with ease as though it was part of him rather than part of his dress. He sensed Julia at the top of the stairs, even though he no longer had the keen senses of a vampire, which at one time made him able to sense the heartbeat and scent of warm blood. He always seemed to know when she was nearby. Although it first dismayed him when he became a human again, the familiar feeling gave him comfort in the end, and drew him to her. Something he was grateful for.

He looked up. Julia was dressed in the blue suit he so much liked. The subtle sway of the short skirt as she came down the stairs, the pale color so suited to her auburn hair and hazel eyes, always caused him to appreciate the femininity in this usually so professional woman. No one was near to see the two exchange a sparkling glance, or share a smile, or to see the way Barnabas' fingers accidentally brushed the soft skin of Julia's neck as he helped her into her coat.

They weren't going far today, a small restaurant near the edge of town for lunch, and then a walk on the beach before winter would come with its chill winds. Julia had encouraged Barnabas to see more of the world, now that he was not bound to the night, but Barnabas had little desire to leave Collinsport, the Old House, and most of all Julia. As they got in the car, Julia saw a camera sitting on the seat between them. She lifted it up and examined it. "New?"

"Roger helped me pick it out. I thought it was time that I added to the family album."

Julia smiled. "Did you want me to take your picture?"

Barnabas looked startled, then laughed. "I'm already in the album. Remember? But you are right. It's time for Barnabas Collins, the cousin from England, to be added. That other Barnabas is for the other time."

He took his right hand from the steering wheel and laid it over her hand on the seat, the flat black stone of his ring catching the light. "No I want to take a picture of you."

"But I'm not a Collins." Julia wished she had bitten back the words, not because she was afraid that he would guess her feelings. Those days were gone a long time ago, and Barnabas knew she loved him. No she didn't want to spoil this day if he should tell her that he decided that he could not love her and wanted to stay her best friend. Quickly Julia changed the subject. "Have you practiced with it?"

Julia raised the camera to her eye and looked through the viewfinder, and aiming at him, took his picture as he drove.

* * *

Julia sat on a rock, watching the dark coming across the waters of the ocean to her. She shivered at the thought of impending darkness. What a strange mood she was in. Waiting for something to happen. The day had been so happy she hoped it would never end. Barnabas called to her and she turned smiling, only to be caught in the flash of the camera. "Don't you have enough of those?" She frowned as she said it, but neither believed the serious tone was meant. She enjoyed too much Barnabas' desire to photograph her.

Barnabas put out his hand. "It's getting late. Willie will have supper for us at home."

Home. Yes the Old House was home to her, wherever Barnabas lived was home to her. Julia took his hand and they walked hand-in-hand to the car.

* * *

After supper instead of sitting in the drawing room, they sat in the small sitting room, a cozy room, once Naomi's favorite. The fire burned in the fireplace. "Poor Willie."

Barnabas his arm about Julia and contemplating stealing a kiss raised his eyebrows. "Poor Willie?"

Julia smiled and laid her head on Barnabas shoulder. "I was just thinking how much of his day must go to tending the fireplaces."

Barnabas put a finger under her chin, drawing her face up so his lips could meet hers. "When we are married, are you going to change the whole house? Central heat, electricity, telephones?"

Julia tasted Barnabas mouth then pulled back staring into his eyes. Barnabas had never spoken of marriage, rarely of love. "What are you saying Barnabas?"

"I'm saying that I want to marry you. Will you marry me Julia?"

Julia's arms went around Barnabas' neck as she kissed him hard.

* * *

The hours of the night went by with speed, not that Barnabas and Julia were aware of it, for there was no clock in the room to tell them the hour. Kisses grew warm and touching was sweet as they talked about the future and the past, of plans made and things hoped for. Then time seemed to stop as they looked at each other, and wanted more than to kiss and to touch and to plan for the day when they would be one. "Stay with me tonight? Lie with me?"

"Yes."

Barnabas stood and held out his hand and they stood together. He blew out all the candles but one, taking it to light their way, stopping as the moved through the house on their way to his bed to send the house into its quiet night. Julia smiled thinking that this nightly routine would soon be hers. Each night they would turn out lights and climb the stairs, and lie together the whole night long. Was it too late, or would there be children? Please, let there be children.

* * *

Barnabas opened his eyes. He could tell by the color of the sky, and past experience, that dawn was near. Julia slept in his arms, her breathing slow and steady. He gathered her closer absentmindedly caressing her, and she nuzzled against him in her sleep, content, and peaceful after a long sleepless night. He thought about last night, after their passion had been spent and they rested quietly. Julia had asked him if he loved her. He pretended to be asleep, wondering why he hadn't just confessed to her that he loved her more than words could tell. He thought that his lovemaking had revealed his love to her, but he should have known that she needed the words. Before they loved again, he would make sure she knew without a doubt. The room had grown cold, and Barnabas hoped that Willie would not be early to make the fire. Perhaps the new way of heating had one good point, uninterrupted privacy.

The door opened with a bang, startling Julia awake. As Barnabas went to admonish Willie, he sat up astonished, for it was not Willie at the door, but Angelique. She wore the dress that Barnabas had last seen her in, blood stained its front. She looked at the lovers and shook her head. Barnabas felt a wave of fear. Angelique spoke as if speaking were now alien to her. "Why Barnabas. Why didn't you stay faithful to me?" She looked with great sorrow, and Barnabas relaxed. She did not mean them harm. "I'm sorry Barnabas. I'm sorry…"

Barnabas bent with the pain. This time there had been no bat to bite him, but the result was the same, only more intense. He had reverted fully, completely, Julia held him in horror as his skin grew cold and dry in her embrace. "Barnabas! The dawn!" Julia had not needed to tell him, he could feel the pain of the dawn in his skin and in his bones. "Go Barnabas. Hurry."

"No, Julia. I won't leave this time."

"Barnabas. What do you mean this time? You've never left me before, but you must now. You must go."

"No. I don't know how I know, but if I go, we will never again be together." Barnabas pulled himself out of bed and stumbled to the curtains so less light could get through. Even though the sun was nearly up, he was still alive, but the light rays were burning him from the inside out. "Angelique. You are dead."

"No, Barnabas. You love me. You must always love me."

"Angelique. Love changes. I love Julia."

Julia had gotten out of bed, slipping on Barnabas' shirt to cover herself. At Barnabas' admission, she went to his side.

Angelique looked at her puzzled. "Who are you?" She held out her arms to Barnabas. "All who love you die."

Barnabas feared for Julia, and again, more firmly spoke. "Angelique. You are dead. Look across your mother is waiting for you. Go to her."

Julia joined with Barnabas in telling Angelique that she didn't need to stay anymore. "Your life is over Angelique. Go to your rest."

Angelique disappeared and Barnabas sat on the bed, sweating. As he wiped the sweat from his upper lip he laughed. "I'm sweating Julia!"

"I'm sure that's a normal reaction." The frown between her eyes showing she couldn't understand his reaction to his fear.

"Normal for a man. I’m not a vampire." Barnabas ran to the window and opened the curtain. The sun shone on his bare skin and Julia shivering from the cold and reaction to the ghost got into bed and called to Barnabas to join her.

Barnabas built up the fire, and locked the door, not that he was afraid Angelique would return, but because it was nearly time for Willie to tend to the fire. As they snuggled down under the covers, they wondered how it all could have happened. "I'll have to ask Eliot, but can ghostly witches cast curses?"

Julia shrugged her shoulders, and rested her head on Barnabas' chest listening to the pounding of Barnabas' heart. "The mind is powerful. That's how many curses work, the belief is what gives power to the curse. I don’t know…I don’t know."

* * *

Collinsport Maine, 2001

Barnabas Collins got out of his car, and came toward the Old House. The windows were brightly lit, and the door was ajar. He pushed it open to be met with warmth and light and music. Julia came into the foyer from the drawing room, her red hair streaked with white framing her face with its beaming smile. To Barnabas she didn't look any older than the photograph of her that used to stand on his desk at work, and now that he was retired hung in his study. The last picture from the very first roll of film that he had ever taken. "The children are already here. Where have you been?"

Barnabas pulled Julia to him and reached into his pocket for the little gift he had brought her. "Had something special to get. Do you remember what day this is?"

Julia blushed and hushed Barnabas. "I know what day it is, our anniversary. I have your gift upstairs."

They shared a kiss, then turned and stood with their arms around each other as they looked at the drawing room and the two generations of Collins laughing together. Then with another kiss, they joined their family.