Atlantis by Lisa Graves

turned again at the edge of the cove, racking my brain for more proof of my theory. When I resumed my pacing, he spoke.
    “ I know,” he said in a soft, apologetic purr and looked straight at me.
    Elliott caught me off guard. I hadn’t expected my hallucination to agree with me. “What do you mean you know? And what about this ring?!” I was at my wits end. I was crying now. I was ashamed of having worked myself into tears. I turned my face away from him trying to hide the water running down my cheeks.
    “ Please sit down Miele,” he said patting the grass beside him, “and I promise to explain.”
    I slowly folded myself onto the grass at his side, continuing to look away. “That’s the second time you called me that. Miele .” The word sounded foreign on my tongue. “What does it mean?” I said as I looked at him, curious yet cautious at the same time.
    He was moving abnormally slow. Perhaps in an effort to calm me down. Elliott gently took my left hand in his and stroked my middle finger as he looked at the ring.
    “ Where should I begin...?” He said to himself as he let his gaze get lost in the ocean of color.
    I followed his eyes to the stone on my hand and temporarily lost myself in its brilliance. As the colors absorbed my thoughts, a strange realization came to me. I never did try and get the ring off with soap and water that day with Charlotte. I had completely forgotten to even try. It had been such an urgent need at the time, but somehow in the wake of everything, it had become a part of me. As though it was always mine. His voice pulled me back to the meadow and the moonless night.
    “ You and I met in 1719 in Napoli. Naples.” His eyes looked worried at how I would take in his story. I must have looked too calm and collected because he stopped and said, “Why are you taking this so well? You freaked out on me a second ago for saying good evening.”
    “ Elliott. You’re not real. You are just my imagination running wild. All signs point to the fact that I must be dreaming.” A fabulous dream. “Charlotte’s with me on this. I don’t like it, but I have to face the fact that you are a wonderful hallucination.”
    Elliott looked quite amused at my conclusion. How was he taking this so well? I was certain my mind would fight me on this.
    “ Lilly, how can I convince you I’m real?”
    “ Why is my head trying to screw with me?” I said aloud and looked directly at him. “No one has seen you but me. I’m fairly certain no one can see you but me. Unfortunately, for me, you are not real.”
    To my surprise Elliott laughed. It was a happy, light-hearted sound, it could even be considered a giggle, and it tugged on my thoughts as though part of some distant memory, until I remembered I was mad.
    “ This is no laughing matter Elliott!”
    “ Actually, it is.” He giggled again.
    Even his laugh was like honey. The wind caught up and the same strange, but oddly familiar floral scent circled around us in the air. I breathed it in deeply, trying to clear my head. Why did he have such an effect on me?
    “ Okay, if you are real then why hasn’t anyone else seen you? Hmm?” How dare my mind toy with me when I’m trying to come to terms with reality!
    “ Because...”
    “ ...you are not real.” I finished his sentence for him, stressing each word.
    “ You weren’t usually this sassy. I think your current friends are a bad influence on you.”
    “ Excuse me?” Sarcasm was dripping from my lips. “Mr., I’m real Lil, but only you can see me. What are you, some kind of ghost?”
    “ It might be easier for you to think of me that way.”
    I paused, wary. I hadn’t seen this coming. It took me a moment of looking at Elliott, trying to see through him before I could talk.
    “ But I can touch you.”
    “ Yes.”
    I was frustrated and fuming. It took all my energy to try and stay calm as I argued with the male model my mind had conjured up.
    “ I don’t get it. What do you mean it would