At seven in the morning on May twenty first I awoke to the pinks and purples of a new day peeking over the shops. The rusted red roofs of the buildings across the canal reflected into my window, illuminating my apartment. I put a portion of dog food in a bowl for my Great Pyrenees puppy Achilles. He stumbled out of the sitting area when he heard his food hit the plastic bowl. I went to change into something decent to wear, after all I was the only person working at the Suavis Macula.
My jeans swished together as I walked down the stairs to the small shop. The scent of coffee, sugar, and old books slowly became more noticeable as I descended. At eight fifteen on the weekdays the door would open and Mr. Marrs, the elderly gentleman from down the street, would hobble in and get the same thing every morning, three cups of black coffee with his own whiskey that he bought the night before. That was all he ever got, so in turn it became the Marr Special. By the time he left each morning the streets would be bustling with tourists and regulars I knew by name.
At eight I opened the door and started my oven and coffee maker careful to do everything right. I hadn’t seen Mr. Marrs in about a week, I thought he had fallen ill for a few days but he never came back, or sent the housekeeper to get him coffee like he had done before. A blonde girl in her mid twenties entered around eight thirty, her crystal blue eyes were bloodshot when she glanced at me.
“Give me the Marr Special to go.” She opened her wallet digging for cash, and pulled a few Euros out.
As she pushed it onto the counter and her change went everywhere, hands shaking like leaves in a harsh breeze. We locked eyes for a moment, she stared at me as if she knew me from somewhere.
“You look really familiar..” She mumbled attempting to figure out where she knew me from.
“Have you been to Venice before? I’ve lived here my entire life.” I grabbed a cup to pour her steaming Marr Special into.
“Never, I was only in town for my grandfather’s funeral.” She forced her wallet in her small purse. “And now I don’t have enough money to fly back to England.”
“What happened?” I asked getting a lid for her cup.
“My parents, they helped me pay for a ticket over and I figured they would help me home, but they didn’t, they shipped the rest of my stuff down here.”
“I’m sorry to hear about your loss ma’am, I’ll give you this cup on the house ok?”
“I don’t want your pity, let me pay.”
“No I insist, and if you need a little extra cash and time to get back on your feet you can work here if you’d like.”
“You’d do that for me?”
“I only want to help you ma’am.” I handed her the coffee.
“I really appreciate this a lot.” She smiled and turned away.
“Do you have a place to stay?” I asked.
“No, I’m currently looking for one.”
“I’ve got an extra room upstairs if you’d like to stay there.”
“That’d be wonderful! Thank you so much,” She grinned ear to ear.
“Hey, you like dogs right?” I asked as she opened the door.
“Yes. And by the way, my name is Elaine.”
“Tucker.” I called and waved as the door shut behind her.
At ten thirty that night we had finally got everything upstairs into my spare room. She had lots of boxes, mostly shipped ones from her parents house and a few suitcases. One box had only books and pictures in it, which she carefully laid out in the corner of the room. Her clothes were mostly sweaters and simple shirts that were currently wrinkled terribly.
“Tomorrow do you want to go shopping? We can repaint this entire room if you’d like.”
“I don’t want to make you spend your money on me, it wouldn’t be fair, we just met.”
“I insist Elaine, I’ll show you around as well, Venice is a truly beautiful place.”
“Thank you so much, you have no idea what this means to me.” She stared at me, I was basically a total stranger to her, I wanted to be polite and make her happy.
Around nine the next morning I was woken up to the sound of thudding, soon there was faster, quicker thudding. The squeak of a dog told me Elaine and Achilles had finally met. A thud against my door made me jump, Elaine had thrown his tennis ball hitting the door and Achilles soon followed trying to catch it.
“Oh my gosh are you okay baby?” came muffled through my door.
I opened my door and saw my white fluffy dog wrestling with my flat mate. She tossed the large puppy onto the couch and sat up, seeing me she stopped.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you, Achilles woke me up so I took him for a walk, I hope it was okay with you.”
“Yeah, thanks a lot Elaine.” I smiled as my puppy jumped up to greet me.
We left for the market ten minutes later, Achilles in tow. He walked calmly along beside us as we went from shop to shop, Elaine looking for things to decorate her room. Most of the shop owners allowed me to take Achilles inside, if they didn’t they soon caved in and let us come in anyways.
At five in the evening we got back home and Elaine went to work, putting up shelves, hanging pictures, organizing her closet, etc. I pulled a black leather journal off the shelf, I kept all seventeen of them there, and sat down to look through it. It pained me to look through these, all the people I loved, gone, but I want to remember everything about them.
Edith, the first girl I had ever loved in 1706. She died during childbirth in 1709, as did the baby. I never married anyone else that century, I waited for my heart to heal. It was hard, it was my first time ever losing someone close to me. I don’t remember my parents at all, they died when I was quite young.
In 1812, Eleanor Mae, a blonde, curly haired woman was the most headstrong person I had ever met. She went to college to become a nurse, it had been her passion ever since they had saved her father from and open gash on his chest. She told me once “The day women pursue the things men do they’ll be terrified, and I want to see that.” She went to school while I got a job to keep our small apartment in the slums. She finished school and went job searching, except there was one problem, she was a woman, and no one wanted to hire her. In grief she moved back to her parents and didn’t even ask me to go with her, she left in the middle of the night. To this day I don’t know where she went.
In 1940 I knew I had met the girl of my dreams, her name was Eva, Eva Martin. She had eyes greener than a tree frog, and hair blonde as hay. She was a assistant to a nurse at the field hospitals, giving them anything they yelled for in the heat of the battle to save the troops lives. She bandaged small wounds and threaded the needle for operations racing against time. A Nazi air raid took her away from me, the planes flew over before they had time to even think about leaving.
I did love other people, many others in fact, but those women stick out more than anyone else to me. They opened my eyes to new ideas and new experiences. They were all ahead of their time, they were out of place in their generation. Then Miss Elaine came along, she‘s smart, quirky, funny, and by far the prettiest girl I have ever met. She was currently in her room yelling classic rock songs to the top of her lungs, and I didn’t care. 
Achilles looked at me, slowly her walked to her door and turned his head to the side as if to say “What the heck is happening?” I smiled and put the journal back on the shelf and walked to the kitchen to grab water.  Elaine walked out of her room still yelling and dancing around.
“Oh sorry,” She ran back to her room to turn the music off, “I didn’t realize you were home, it was so quiet I thought you left.”
“No harm Elaine, the neighbors might complain though.”
“Oh gosh, I’m so sorry!”
“Elaine, it’s ok, I promise, me and Achilles could use a little noise around here sometimes.”
She smiled and walked to the fridge to grab a juice bottle she had got when we were shopping today. It was orange and smelled of mangoes as she walked by.
“Hey, question.” She yelled from her room.
“Yes, Elaine.”
“Is there a reason there's like forty seven of the same black leather journal in this closet? I totally understand if you can only write in the one, not a problem with me.”
“Just my preference.” I called my voice shaking.
“Okay cool, I’m gonna put them in your closet.” She called.
A minute later she walked out carrying my box of black journals. I heard a thud as she dropped the cardboard box to the ground. The soft sound of her feet crossing my wooden floor in fluffy socks brought me comfort. She had only lived in my apartment for a few days, but I felt as if I could spend the rest of my time with her.
On June eighteenth the next year we became an official couple, we worked in Suavis Macula Monday through Friday and laid around on Saturdays, doing whatever we wanted. Life was good, Achilles was growing and had to have more attention all the time, forcing us to sometimes sleep with a enormous marshmallow between us. We didn’t mind, it became a comfort.
Elaine’s parents never came to visit, they never even called her and see if she was okay. She never seemed bothered, it seemed she had everything she could ever want. Her and Achilles became the best of friends, he often followed her around more than me.
Months later I heard Elaine coughing from the bathroom where she was changing into something nice to wear to work. She paused momentarily and continued a second later.
“Elaine? Do I need to get medicine?” I called walking towards the door.
“No, no. I’ll be fine!” She yelled as more coughing ensued.
I grabbed a small measuring cup and filled it up with water, I pulled the fleecy blankets out of the small closet and made a pile of them on the couch for her. The microwave beeped, I walked over and took out her cider water, since she had a strong dislike for tea. I set a plain bagel, cider, and the TV remote on the table. Walking down the steps to the shop I heard floundering footsteps attempting to follow me downstairs.
“Elaine, stay up there you’re sick.” The footsteps stopped and stumbled back to the couch.
They day went smoothly, I didn’t worry too much about Elaine since I was doubtless that she did anything today. At six that evening I made my way slowly up the stairs to see no Elaine, only Achilles loafed on the couch, not turning to see me as I looked for her throughout the apartment. I heard a crash coming from her room, clothes and bags came flying out along with furious screams.
“Elaine?” I mumbled cautiously approaching her door.
“What is wrong with you?” She screamed throwing a shoe at me.
I stared at her, she didn’t know my secret, I never told anyone. The only thing she could have done was went through the box of leather journals. Predestined lovers names were scribbled on the front pages of every journal, something I had no control over.
“Why are there so many women, whose names all start with E for some reason, in your stupid comfort journals?” She screamed and continued to throw things.
“Elaine, honey, please listen to me okay?” I begged the raging woman.
“No you listen here,” Tears streamed down her face, “I love you, and if you want to cheat on me, or whatever the hell this is, with all these other women, then be that way. I’m leaving.” Her trembling finger pointed into my chest.
“Elaine.” I grabbed her arm as she stormed by me. “You need to understand something, okay? My fate is predetermined, I can’t change the names in the journals.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” She attempted to wrench away from me.
“I’m immortal, Elaine. The curse comes with the price, I have everything picked and chosen for me. I can’t change anything, even if I wanted to.”
“So you’re saying everything that you do, like meeting me was already planned out since the day you were born?”
“No.” I released her arm and slowly backed away just incase things started flying again. “You broke the system, you weren’t predestined.”
“So you really do love me don’t you?” The almost inaudible whisper came out of her small chapped lips as she fell to the ground.
“Elaine Winston,” I placed my hands on the side of her face, “you are my pride and joy, my everything, my world, my angel, the absolute love of my life. You weren’t set in stone, no one told me I was going to fall this deep in love with you. I am the world's most grateful man that you walked into my shop on May twenty first. I love you more than anything in this world Elaine.” I gently brushed the salty tears off her face.
I looked into her eyes, they held the world. The bright blues were offset by the rainforest green that directly surrounded her pupil. Gold flecks dotted one eye, giving them a completely separate appearance that one has to witness in person. I pulled her closer to me and pressed our lips gently together, she was in shock at first, after she adjusted kissed back with just as much emotion.
I connected more with her in that moment than I ever had with anyone in my entire life. She pulled away and hugged me tight enough that I struggled to breathe. It was in this moment I knew the curse was broken, I had a lighter more happy sense about life and myself.
Elaine had saved me, she showed me all the mortal things that were so enjoyable, half of them I had never known about. She showed me the world, everywhere we went I loved dearly. Our small apartment was soon filled with pictures of me and her in every beautiful exotic place we went to. I loved her, until cruel old age took me away from her and the three children I held so dear to my heart.