Last Call

When you wake up at three am and everyone else in the house is sound asleep do you drop back to sleep or do your thoughts and memories take over and keep slumber at bay?  If your memories take center stage, do those memories force you to revisit the "road not taken", or ask you to examine what might have been had you chosen the other woman, or man in your life?  What if that phantom relationship, that rejected future, was not only your nocturnal, sleepless companion, but also occupied your sleep-filled dreams and your waking hours at various indiscriminate times of the day?  That is what the Call was like, and has now become again for the last two years.

The Call was a euphemism for a telepathic vibe a former girlfriend and I had shared.  In essence, one of us could think of the other and the other would know it.  It was a convenient and comforting connection.  The Calls were received like memories, except they were not conjured.  It was like a full-sensory image of her was pushed into my mind's eye, complete with a trace of her favorite perfume...diva, I think.  When that relationship ended, it took the Calls with it.

The Calls returned with a vengeance about 18 years later.  Since January of 2006 I receive them fairly consistently and have become accustomed to their presence as a reminder of the woman I once knew.  For the past two years I have made efforts to understand the why and how of such an uncustomary form of communication with mixed results, but not without some very interesting episodes.

Megan and I were instantly attracted to each other and became extremely close in a very short time.  I am normally a circumspect suitor, but this relationship caught both of us like a house on fire.  I was just coming out of a previous engagement when we met and after that point, only the demands of my job kept us apart.  Over a period of ten months we had planned our lives and futures together with only the timing and the specifics to work out.

I recall we had some minor disputes inherent with any melding of individuals into a couple, but I did not think they were insurmountable.  It was around the seventh month when she thought my attention was waning which triggered my effort to gain her confidence; I proposed and she accepted.  She then thought I got complacent and she broke off our engagement, our relationship, and married another within six months.  Simply put, that was where the relationship died almost twenty years ago.

Being an inquisitive individual by nature and a professional sleuth as an attorney by training and trade, I determined to find out why and from where these Calls were coming.

I broached the topic of the Call with a client who is a psychiatrist.  His professional opinion was that emotions aside, there was nothing apparently wrong with me mentally, and I had no physical difficulties or behavioral patterns that were evidencing a negative effect from the Call.  He laughed and said I should seek the counsel of a psychic, after all, "this is kind of mystical and they deal with weird vibes all day long!"

I did not know of any psychics and the yellow pages with their Madame Ruby's, illustrated crystal balls, (amex, visa, mastercard accepted), really put me off.  It was days later that I remembered a client with a unique talent.  At our meeting years before I had handed her a pen for her signature and when she took it she looked at me and said, "Oh, you are married to Kathy with a "K"!"  I cannot explain why I had not thought of her earlier, but in retrospect it appears our meeting was fated.  I  made an appointment without indicating the reasons why.

My psychic, Cathy with a "C", started out our appointment with "Ah, I thought I remembered you!, You are married to Kathy with a "K"...uh, when was the last time you saw Megan?"  I was floored.  Her next words were equally jarring.  "You married the right girl; you were not meant for Megan."  While this was some relief it did not tell me why I had been receiving the Calls for the past several months.

After various other items of interest regarding my family that were amazingly on point, Cathy could come to no conclusions about why I might be receiving the Calls, but she did say that she would meditate on it to see if there was anything else she might be able to find.  She also suggested finding Megan and just calling her to say hello.  She thought that a telephone call would enable me to see the differences time has brought to our lives since I knew her and that alone might extinguish whatever was causing the connection.

Being nothing if not thorough, I made an appointment with another psychic of some repute to obtain a second opinion.  I cannot remember a time in my adult life when I have been more scared.  Diana's first words were "Megan is going to come back into your life and if you do not avoid her like the plague you will not be able to resist her and you will end up in a relationship with her.  The attraction between the two of you will dwarf the previous feelings you shared for each other.  She will be like crack to your addict.  You were born with something like magnets pointing to each other."

Diana went on to describe a past life and marriage with Megan that had been extremely intense and loving as had our brief relationship in this life.  She said that "these are supernatural forces which cannot be stopped...the energy between the two of you spans lifetimes and will work to put you two together."  Diana concluded with the comment that I had extremely strong karma to receive such a warning of Megan's eventual reappearance.

Needless to say, this revelation blew me away.  The life I had built, with wife, family and career, all were going to be in jeopardy from a past flame from whom I was receiving the mental equivalent of smoke signals?  This irresistible vixen was going to ignite an unquenchable fire in me that would cause me to forsake all I held dear?  You read about things like this happening and see it in movies, but I never considered myself a candidate.

I brought these revelations back to Cathy who, to my chagrin, didn't entirely rule out Diana's findings.  She said that she didn't see these things, but that did not mean it couldn't happen as there is an extremely powerful energy between both of us.  "However, when was the last time you were swept up in emotional circumstances beyond your control?  Never?  I thought so.  Even the original realtionship was in your control."  "Not quite," I replied, "she had broken it off."  "We'll see," retorted Cathy, "that's not what I'm getting."

Meanwhile, my efforts at locating Megan's married name and address were going nowhere.  I asked my secretary to find it after providing her with a brief synopsis of my situation.  In less than ten minutes she located Megan's married name, address and telephone number (which I later found out was unlisted) in the city where she was raised.  I still felt reticent about contacting a woman I hadn't seen in nearly two decades, even if it was only to say "hello".  I certainly felt I had a reason in that it might make the Calls recede from my mind, but what other can of worms might it open?  I decided to delay any telephone call until I felt better about it.

As time passed the Calls remained constant.  They resulted in many detailed memories of situations and conversations that I had long ago forgotten.  Then, while sitting at my desk, I got a Call.  I asked my wonder-secretary to check the divorce records in the city where Megan lived.  Her divorce was finalized in January of 2006...when my Calls had returned.

Now this brought up another set of questions...she broke up with me, got married, got divorced after about 18 years, then thinks about me enough to cause the cosmic telegraph to light a pathway back to my mind?

I took this information to Cathy who again suggested I call.  "Just say "I was thinking of you and I just thought I'd call and see how you were...", and see what happens.  After all, what could it hurt?  She could hang up on you.  If an old flame called me out of the blue I would enjoy hearing his voice and how his kids are doing or whatever.  You'd only be asking out of curiosity, you're not trying to start anything,  Also, that simple conversation should enable you to see the obvious differences in the people you have become and may well bring about the end of the Calls and whatever lingering questions are causing them."  She then said "If you do call her, do it on...(she turned her gaze to the ceiling) Friday at 12:15...she'll be there then."

After mulling over the idea of calling Megan, Friday came around and I determined to call.  At 11:45 I got no answer. At 12:00 I got no answer.  At 12:15 I got a "Hello?" in a familiar sing-song voice that I hadn't heard in years.  I almost choked.  Cathy's credibility, already spot-on, just increased one-thousand-fold.

After some surprisingly abrupt comments and uncomfortable fits and starts the conversation briefly ran past some basic high points in our lives and quickly ended.  As I hung up the telephone I was dismayed and not a little uncomfortable at the attitude and chill I received from her during the conversation.  I got the impression that not only was my brief call very unwelcome, but that I had recently committed some personal affront for which I had yet to apologize.  I wrote down my impressions at the time and went back to my day with a strange feeling in the pit of my stomach.

The next Monday, Cathy called and asked if I had had an intense dream or if I had actually called.  I said I had called her and asked what she had seen.  She proceeded to describe the entire conversation nearly verbatim.  Her dream had been my telephone call.  She had been shocked at Megan's tone and borderline hostility.  She said some of it could be explained by there being another person in the room with her when she answered, but the enmity had been palpable and she would have to meditate on it to see what might have been the cause of such a cold reception.  "After all," she said, "I have greeted sworn enemies in a nicer tone than she used.  That was indicative of something, but I'll have to let you know."

After several days Cathy called and instead of describing the situation for me she asked me questions.  "What did you do to end the relationship?"  I replied that Megan ended it with a telephone call.  She claimed it was the same way she ended a previous relationship wherein the new guy just swept her off her feet.  She apologized, ended our engagement and said we were finished as a couple.

Cathy then asked me if I tried to change her mind.  To talk her out of it or to convince her otherwise?  "Well, no," I said, "She sounded extremely definite and convinced me she had made up her mind."

"OK.  Would you have followed through with you proposal and married her?" she asked.  "I think so, I was taken by surprise when she called me." I said. "I thought we were working out the timing...but she pulled the plug and I was naturally hurt...then I heard she was going to be married and I fell apart."

"Didn't you have someone else, Kathy, that you were still engaged to?"  "No," I replied, "We had broken up.  But Megan did find a birthday card from Kathy that she thought was proof of my continued involvement with Kathy.  Kathy had given me my ring back several months prior to this point.  In fact I didn't speak to Kathy again until about four or five months after Megan left."

"Well," said Cathy,"let me tell you Megan's side of the story and why you were treated that way on the telephone. Megan was convinced you were still engaged to or seeing Kathy.  That was one ghost she was fighting.  Next, apparently your smallest disappointments in or criticisms of her, real or imagined, were taken extremely hard by Megan, as if she wasn't measuring up.  She never felt secure with you...she couldn't read you and despite what you would say to the contrary she felt she was always trying to please you and not being successful."

"Megan is an extremely attractive, feminine, intelligent woman who can easily charm, especially men, to get what she wants.  Although her charm attracted you, it didn't get you to marry her which is what she wanted and expected.  In fact, she thought you were going to propose on several different occasions and you didn't even notice her disappointment.  When you did propose she thought you were just doing it because you knew she wanted you to.  This was a defeat of a sort she had never dealt with before.  It changed her life and she married someone ill-suited to her very quickly after you left her life."

Cathy continued, "Now, when Megan told you that she had found someone else, someone she met the weekend before and he supplanted you after ten months and a marriage proposal...and you believed it and didn't try to convince her otherwise.  In her eyes she got nothing more than a "See you later" from you with that conversation."

"Your Calls started at the time she got divorced.  That kind of disruption causes one to reevaluate what they want and don't want, like and don't like from their past and hopefully make the right choices in the future.  Often an evaluation of what worked in other relationships can provide some guidance.  Her Call may have been initiated by this kind of soul-searching during that trying time, and I saw her mention you in a deep discussion with a friend named Robin, while Megan and Robin sat on a dock.  Something about "Touch would have known what to do...".  But you receiving the Call is more a statement about your sensitivity than her attempt to draw you into her life, which she wouldn't have the confidence to do.  The Calls continued as you gave them attention and they may also have awakened your interest in that period of your life in which you were single, had minimal responsibility and the constant attention of a beautiful young woman.  As we always want what we don't have...contrast that time in your life to the responsible, married, successful, domesticated, family-man, attorney you have become.  Sound appealing?"

"When she got your telephone call she was completely shocked.  She had just recently reviewed the memories of your relationship and relived the pain she received from your rejection.  And then you called out of the blue!  How had you known you had been in her thoughts?  Who could have told you?  Why were you calling when these memories were fresh in her mind?  Your feeling that she was angry with you was altogether accurate...you stung her all those years ago and she reacted to that old and now renewed offense.  Her pride was hurt and your rejection resulted in her marriage which ended in divorce.  Despite the decisions she has made she holds you responsible for her disappointments, and it certainly came through in the telephone call."

"Her exaggerated claims as to how happy she is are false; she is struggling to find her contentment.  Also, after you confirmed your wife is the former girlfriend, which was like another poke in the eye to her already injured pride, she couldn't get off the telephone fast enough, hanging up before she had completed "Good-bye."  To her, you were someone whose standards she could not meet despite her best efforts and it hurts her to think what might have been."

"I do not see her attempting to contact you as "my competition" (Diana) so dramatically stated!  Megan got in her last snub on the telephone and she has way too much pride to want to engage in any discussion with you that might allow you to confirm your (her imagined) supposed criticism of her."

"The Calls, I think, were caused by the strong energy between you and the way in which your relationship ended...neither one of you knew what really happened.  You being the more sensitive found her twenty years later through her emotional trials, and that awakened your ability to hear her whenever she was there.  The energy remains between you but it is not meant for this life, as astrologically the two of you are indeed "star-crossed lovers".  I will be very surprised if your Calls persist after this analysis and experience.  The only questions that remain cannot be answered without a long discussion between you, but at least now you know what happened.  Let go of the past, Touch, and make room for your future...it will need all the attention you can give it."

Since then, roughly three months ago, my Calls have subsided to occasional reminders.  I no longer wake up from dreams of Megan to memories of Megan.  Somewhere in the great ether that binds us all a switch was flipped, a peace was made, a question was answered and an equilibrium was restored.

Now, in my quiet Call-less moments, when I go there, I realize the enormous gulf between our understandings of the same relationship years ago.  I am saddened to know that I couldn't make clear to her the depth of my feelings for her because in the end I see that she really had no idea.  I do, however, have an occasional recurring dream that provides me an opportunity to thank Megan for being a part of my life and allows me to apologize for any pain that I have caused.  Although I would love to tell her in person, I will not intrude on her privacy to do it.  I loved her and continue to love the woman I knew and wish her nothing but happiness.  And while my last call to her ended much as the relationship did twenty years ago, I cannot shake the notion that I will get her Calls in the future.     

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