Jeff Baker: Make Me Immortal With a Kiss

This is a heart-warming fantasy (if slightly poignant) wish-fulfillment story from Jeff that’s inspired by the Christopher Marlowe play ‘Faust’, with the bonus of a cute dog! Don’t forget to check out Jeff’s other books and stories here…

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Pic credit: Aleksandra Chornobab on Pexels.com

            “Hi, Honey!”

            Hank Jones, looking about forty years old, opened their front door and glared back at the door which obediently shut and locked.

            “Don’t ‘Hi Honey me, dammit!’” Kenny said. “I finally realized what you did! How dare you do something like that without telling me!”

            “Did?” Hank said. “Did what?” He was genuinely confused. He let the bag of groceries float over to the table but he didn’t scan Kenny’s thoughts because he usually didn’t need to and from his agitation, he would find out soon enough.

            “Those extra years,” Kenny said angrily. “You didn’t think I’d realize where they came from.”

            “Oooookay,” Hank said under his breath. He knew Kenny was going to guess this part sooner or later. But he’d hoped for later, maybe a hundred years later.

            “You told me I was sick, that I might not have much time left,” Kenny sputtered. “And then you told me you could, what did you call it? ‘Use the powers of the Lahadnedjj to field-share some of your metabolism to blend some of our physical essence together magically’ so I’d be healthy and we’d both be able to live another eight-hundred years or so together?”

            “Honey, I was going to explain all the rest of that to you,” Hank said. “Just after the blending we were both a little pooped-out for a couple of days. Hey, my powers are only just coming back to regular strength.”

            “So you didn’t tell me the whole thing, did you?” Kenny snapped.

            “We didn’t have a lot of time,” Hank said.

            Kenny Briscoe had accepted that their relationship was like something out of an old sitcom; with the twist of the incognito space alien falling for the Earthman. But he hadn’t expected anything like this.

            “You’ve got what, sixteen-hundred good years left? And you cut them in half and gave half to me? Shortened your life by about a thousand years?” Kenny was trembling and looked like he was ready to cry.

            “That Underlord of the Lahadnedjj title they bestowed on me on Vothnian wasn’t just a degree I earned, it comes with some perks,” Hank said, looking tired. “Magical perks. A lot of them are things I have already, the extended lifespan bit adds up to about two-thousand years which, as a Vothnian, I already had.”

            “Yeah, had,” Kenny said bitterly. “I took that from you.”

            “You didn’t take anything…” Hank started to say. He was damn close to yelling at Kenny and he’d never done that. “Look, that’s why I was able to do that. Share it with you. It’s one of the fringe benefits I mentioned.”

            Hank sighed and walked over and put his hands on Kenny’s shoulders. “I’d been scanning you. You were sicker than the doctors thought you were. I’d been planning this, prepping for this for a couple of days.”

            “So, why didn’t you just, you know, zap! I’m healthy?” Kenny asked.

            “I can’t do stuff just like that. It’s more complicated.” Hank said. “Besides, you had to agree to it. That’s part of the magical part of it. We both had to agree.”

            “And you cut your life off for me,” Kenny said.

            “My life without you wouldn’t be worth living,” Hank said. “If we only got more ten years together I’d consider it perfect even if it all came to an end when the ten years were over. This way we get, you know, a little more.”

            “A lot more,” Kenny said, kissing Hank on the nose.

            “Yeah,” Hank said kissing Kenny in the more conventional place. “I’d lived over three hundred and sixty years without knowing you, I wasn’t going to lose you and go through that again. This way, well, our lives will pretty well wear out at about the same time hundreds of years from now.”

            “That’s a lot of weekends,” Kenny said. Hank smiled. Kenny’s sense of humor was back. A good sign. They kissed again.

            “Hey, did anybody ask about, you know…” Kenny glanced down and ran a finger down Hank’s bare arm. Before he’d effected the change, Hank had looked like a tall, dark-haired pale dude. Now, he was moderately tanned like some of Kenny’s relatives who were biracial.

            “Not really,” Hank said grinning. “If they do I’ll just say I tan kind of funny because I’m Lahadnedjj on my Mom’s side.”

            Kenny stared at him.

            “Well, it’s true!” Hank said with a laugh. “Anyway they’d think it’s some Arabic/Slavic country or something.”

            “Yeah, and how to explain that I lost about a hundred-and-fifty pounds?” Kenny said laughing.

            “You lost weight during the pandemic,” Hank said kissing him again. Kenny looked good in Hank’s sweatpants which fit him now that he weighed about two-hundred.

            Kenny rubbed the unkempt frizz of hair on his head. “Couldn’t make this grow into a big ‘fro, could you?”

            At their feet there was a whimper for attention.

            “Awww! Bopper!” Kenny said, rubbing the mottled grey and black dog’s ears. “You want some attention too, huh?”

            “He always wants attention!” Hank laughed. “Let’s get him a doggie biscuit and sit the three of us down on the couch, turn on the TV and veg out.”

            “Yeah, we could use that,” Kenny said. “Hey, how long is eight hundred years anyway? Twenty-eighth, no Twenty-ninth Century?”

            “Imagine all those wrong years we’re going to write on checks in all those Januarys,” Hank said.

            They laughed again and Bopper barked happily.