A Place Worth Living

by B D Grant

  With Mom and I alone in the dining room she begins to say something. I have a second to decide if I should stay and listen to her lecture me about snapping at her or keep listening to the woman that gave me a concussion.

  “I’m going to see if they need any help with the dishes,” I say leaving her alone without a second thought.

  I’d rather listen to anyone else but her right now. If I can just stay close to Cassidy and Uncle Will I might find out more about this Seraphim world I’ve been kept from.

  Two days pass with me avoiding my mom and following Cassidy around like a shadow. Mom keeps asking about my hand and head but I just give short answers about not needing her help while I deal with the aching in my hand.

  I can tell Cassidy’s starting to warm up to me because she’s only yelled at me twice for stalking her. My uncle spends most of his time catching Mom up on what she’s missed and conference calls with the school. On the third day I’m woken up to the sight of my mom sitting next to me. She is staring at me.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask, wiping the drool from my cheek.

  “Nothing is wrong. We’ve made the decision on who will go meet Mitchell to check the town out.”

  If it was going to be anyone else but her she wouldn’t be sitting here looking at me like it’s the first time she’s seen my face.

  “Not you. Cassidy’s a much better choice for getting answers. Why can’t she go?”

  “She’s a Cache Taylor. I’m the best Itatis we have. She’s not equipped to question Mitchell and know if he’s telling the truth or not.”

  Her first sentence lost me. “What’s a Cache again?”

  “An invisible, the same as Mr. Thomas, he was the one that kept us safe for so long.”

  “And if this dude is lying about the whole thing just to get information, or you, what is there to stop him? You need someone with you. I can go. I could be your sniper. All you would have to do is say, ‘Great hair’, or scratch your nose and I will take him out.”

  She rubs her temple, “I had hoped you learned from the last time you tried to be my backup.”

  “I’ll do better this time I promise.” I see the bag by her feet next to the bed. “Are you leaving today?”

  “The sooner I get there the sooner I can come back.”

  “You don’t have to leave. Why don’t you just call him and ask all your questions over the phone?”

  “He’s in Dry Creek. Do you remember where Thomas told us he was going?”

  I think for a minute. “Dry Creek, but that should make you even more suspicious.”

  “I’m going to look for Thomas too. Will needs as many Cache as he can get for the academy if there are rogues going after kids again.”

  “So you just expect me to stay here and wait and see if you ever come back?”

  “No, you’re going with Will and Cassidy. They are leaving for the academy today and they offered to take you. You can be trained properly at Will’s school.”

  I’d be a transfer student at a school of mutants. I’ll pass. I get up and begin digging for an outfit from the pile of clothes on the floor, “I don’t need to go to school. I need to make sure you aren’t taken too. We can get Dad back.”

  She stops me from changing out of my pajamas and hugs me. “I love you so much.” She kisses both of my cheeks. “I’ll be at the academy with you so soon you won’t even realize I was gone.” She grabs her bag and heads for the door.

  “No! Don’t you dare leave me!”

  I yelled, cried, and begged for Mom to take me with her. When I watch her leave distraught and mad at me for acting like a child, I pick up a potted plant next to Clairabelle’s door and throw it against the wall. It shatters when it hits the bricks. Uncle Will makes me go inside, pack my bags, and apologize to Clairabelle for “defacing” the entrance to the spa. I hate myself by the time I make it through the back of the spa and up the flight of stairs to Clairabelle’s home above Spa New Orleans.

  I was too worn out from trying to talk Mom out of going that I told Clairabelle exactly what I did. I had no excuses, only remorse. She helped me pack which I took to mean she was ready for me to leave, but when she hugged me bye she cried.

  Cassidy pulls up in a blue sedan shortly after Clairabelle and I walk outside and pops open the trunk. I toss the big bags in the trunk and put my small duffle in the back seat as Uncle Will walks out. He’s got a trash bag, broom, and dustpan.

  “Don’t think you get out of cleaning your mess.” He sets it all down by the wall and goes back inside. I sweep the bits of the pot and dirt up thinking about how proud Mom would be with me doing something resembling a chore without complaining. They’re done loading the car and saying goodbye to Clairabelle when I dump the trash bag.

  “Sorry again about your plant.”

  “It’s okay but throwing a fit won’t get you very far and it doesn’t look good on a young lady.”

  “Acting like that won’t last long where we’re going,” Cassidy says getting in the drivers seat of the sedan.

  Miles comes running down the street to us, “Here.” He pushes a CD case at me. “What’s this?”

  “It’s my band. Well it was recorded with our old drummer. He wasn’t too bad but we’ve really grown without him.”

  Clairabelle blows her nose behind him, “They need to go, Miles.”

  “Cool, so, have a safe trip.” He takes a step back to join his mom.

  “Thanks. I uh, didn’t know you were getting me anything.”

  “Don’t trip, I have three boxes full of them in the back of my car.”

  Cassidy honks the horn.

  “See ya,” I say getting in the back seat. I watch them wave bye until a crowd of tourists block my view.

  Being stuck in a car with my uncle and Cassidy is as much fun as being stuck in a car with Mom after the kidnappings. I don’t have anything to listen to Miles’s band disk so I listen to my MP3 player until it’s dead. Cassidy has already made it clear that she won’t be making any stops until we get to the town we are staying the night in.

  I dig in my bag and find the wrapped birthday presents. They didn’t even get to see me open them. The presents sit on my lap as I dig around to see if…yup, I still have a gun in the bottom.

  “Hey are we going to have to fly or will we be driving the whole way there?”

  “Driving, getting to the hotel is the longest part,” Uncle Will says lowering his newspaper and looking over his shoulder. “You doing okay?”

  “Yup.”

  If we don’t have to go through security of some kind we’ll be fine. All though, if we did, I could just put it in Cassidy’s bag and watch the cops take her away. That would be good pay back for the knot she gave me on the back of my head that’s finally going away.

  I focus on the presents on my lap. I open the smallest book-shaped present. Cassidy and Uncle Will both look back at the sound of tearing paper.

  “Have y’all not seen a present before?” I grumble.

  My guess is confirmed when I turn over a small book. “The Happiness Inside.” By Janey L. Cox. It was a self-help book about being happy and finding an inner peace.

  “Were my parents high?” Oops, I said that out loud.

  Uncle Will says matter-of-factly, “That kind of lifestyle isn’t condoned among Seraphim whose life goal is to improve the world around them. Your parents are no different.”

  “They weren’t dealing with a teenage daughter when they lived in Aurora,” Cassidy says under her breath.

  I stick the other presents back in the bag. I flip through the pages seeing chapters about health, breathing techniques, and positive surroundings until I toss it back in the bag with everything else.

  At the hotel they tell me the great news that I’ll be sharing a room with Cassidy. I was dreading it, but she spent her time in the adjoining room my uncle was in. I could hear them on the phone with people from the school discussing the secret niece becoming a new student until I fall asleep. The next mor
ning breakfast is delivered to our room but Uncle Will doesn’t join us. Cassidy tells me he was getting some things before we left.

  He still isn’t back when we load our bags in the car.

  “Should we be worried?”

  Cassidy looks at her watch, “No, he still has ten minutes. Get in the car. I have to check us out of the room.”

  I climb in the backseat and look around the empty parking lot.

  What if something happened to him while he was out? I’m not sure what time Cassidy came to our room last night either. Goosebumps break out across my arms. She could have done something to him and I wouldn’t know. She’s already demonstrated that it wouldn’t be too hard to win a fight against me.

  I open my bag next to me and feel for my gun. I can’t find it so I dig around. When I find it in the bottom corner of my bag the car door opens, and Uncle Will leans in.

  He holds out a bag to me and I slowly reach out taking it from him. Looks like I don’t have to kill Cassidy today.

  “It’s a late birthday present,” he says.

  He gets in the passenger seat and Cassidy hops in the drivers seat. She looks over her shoulder at the bag in my hand and asks, “What you got there?”

  In the bag is a CD player. I take it out and show Cassidy. It’s so unexpected and sweet I’m almost speechless.

  “Thanks, Uncle Will.”

  “Don’t let her fool you,” he tells me. “She was the one that gave me the idea. I just hope the music isn’t as wild as Miles’s hair.”

  “I’ll let you know,” I laugh.

  Normally listening to a song of deep soulful jazz I would’ve called it lame, cut it off, and never picked it up again. Not today. This scary, weird, eye-opening week has sucked my good taste in music out of me.

  The list of songs on the back of the case shows that there are two parts to the disc, with five songs in each part. Part one: Business in the front. Part two: Party in the back. By the third song of deep crooning jazz I skip to number six interested to see what party in the back means to a bunch of jazzy hippies. I’m thinking they toss in an extra sax or trumpet to make it even jazzier.

  The song starts out slow and I lay my head back on the headrest. Then something unexpected happens. An electric guitar begins playing. It pumps up the tempo until it explodes into a crazy late eighties style rock. I flip back a couple of tracks to the jazz and listen a minute before switching it back to part two. I’m definitely a part two kind of girl.

  Nausea sets in two songs later. The ride in the back seat finally gets to me. I must be getting better at car rides because normally if I don’t take something for motion sickness it would strike in less than thirty minutes and I didn’t have to take anything yesterday.

  “I’m feeling a little sick back here. Can I move to front?”

  Cassidy looks at my uncle who is opening a bag.

  “You’ll be just fine. Your mom warned me before she left and gave me these.” He hands me two small pills. It’s what Mom gives me before any long road trips to prevent motion sickness.

  I take both of them but only stick one in my mouth. I know taking two will mean a long nap and I don’t want to be that out of it. I put the other pill in my pocket. I’m awake long enough to see us pass Fort Polk before I’m out.

  I wake some time later hearing my uncle telling Cassidy to slow down before we get to Florien. I feel the car pull to the side and we come to a stop. Cassidy gets out, telling him he might as well drive; she’ll be less inclined to kill him if he’s the the one behind the wheel. He obliges.

  I try to fight the drowsiness by looking out the window. We pass a Florien High School sign with an arrow directing you to turn left. We take a right onto another bumpy road. It seems to be the only kind of road they make in Louisiana. It gets quiet in the car once we’re on the road and I’m rocked back to sleep.

  “Taylor. Hey, you want something to drink?” Cassidy’s voice wakes me up.

  “Sure I’ll take a water,” I say, sitting up.

  We are stopped at a run-down convenience store.

  “Two waters, driver,” Cassidy commands.

  “I would’ve gotten her one. Why don’t you let her sleep?” Uncle Will asks.

  She opens the visor looking at herself in the tiny mirror, “That noise she was making was driving me crazy.”

  “She was breathing, Cass.” He gets out the car and goes inside.

  She looks at me using the mirror. “If you need the bathroom now’s the time to go.”

  “I’m good.”

  I straighten up looking around but there are only highway signs on the road and the numbers don’t mean a thing to me. I put my headphones on and pick up listening to Miles’s music where I left off.

  When I start over on part two I can tell we’re getting close just by how Uncle Will’s face looks calmer. We get on and off the highway, drive over some hills, and take a dirt driveway to what looks like would lead to an estate farm. My dad had told me years ago that a way to tell a true farmer from a hobby farmer is the size of their barn. As we drive passed cornfields on either side of the driveway, a welcoming, old, two-story house appears, complete with a barn in the back of the property. The barn is behind the house but it is twice the size of the house so it’s the first thing I notice.

  This is the home of a true farmer. The house seems to be on a hill that drops off passed the barn and I can’t see but there’s probably more corn behind it.

  “There’s no chance anyone would think this was a school,” I say.

  Cassidy rolls down her window, “The Southern Academy is not a run down farm house.”

  I push the back of her seat with my knee. We pass the house driving for the barn. It has rusted trailers and random equipment outside of it littering the sides with tall grass that’s grown up around a lot of the junk. Most of it looks like it hasn’t been touched in a long time.

  We stop in front of the barn and Uncle Will gets out to open the barn doors. Cassidy moves to the drivers seat.

  “So do we get inside the barn and it transports us to an alternate dimension?”

  She closes the door with unnecessary force then puts the car in drive. “You should just close your eyes until we get there. I would hate for this to not live up to your expectations.”

  “I was kidding.”

  Uncle Will motions for her to drive in. A man on a 4-wheeler pulls up beside him.

  “Stay here,” Cassidy says, getting out.

  The man on the 4-wheeler watches Cassidy walk up suspiciously. They start talking and the man keeps looking at me. He has a purple scar coming out of his side burn stopping half way down his neck. They seem to come to an agreement. Uncle Will and Cassidy climb back in the car and we drive through the barn.

  “What was that about?” I ask after they’ve closed their doors.

  As we pull away the man with the scar closes the doors behind us. “Newcomers have to go through the farm house first before being allowed into The Southern Academy. Cass and I need to get back so we don’t have time for them to question you.” Them? “I already know you’re my niece so you just got out of having to deal with our first line of defense.” “That’s good because he looked like a nightmare.”

  Cassidy makes a small, muffled noise. Uncle Will looks at her a moment with no apparent amusement on his face then continues driving in.

  We stop at the end of the barn and Cassidy gets out this time.

  “He’s actually one of the easier ones to deal with at the house,” Uncle Will tells me.

  I watch Cassidy walk to the back wall of the barn wondering what she’s looking for because all that’s there is the barn wall. There are tools and farm equipment hanging on nails on the wall on either side but she doesn’t go to any of them. She reaches behind a post that looks like it’s part of the wall and pushes.

  Doors hidden in the weave of the wooden architecture suddenly open. With Cassidy in the car we drive out the back of the barn. I look behind us and I don’t see any
one else in the barn so the doors must close automatically. I face forward to see we’re driving down a steep hill. From the front of the barn the sharp drop is unnoticeable but we level out soon. The flat fields and cows are gone now. Trees, underbrush, and tire ruts are the only things surroundings us.

  Finally, a ninety-degree turn brings us to the academy. I don’t have to ask this time.

  5

  T. Southern Academy

  I plop my backpack on the chair beside the secretary’s desk and say in a noticeably forced calm tone, “But I’m his niece. I need to see him."

  The woman behind the desk lowers her chin and levels her gaze on me. “You could be the President of the United States and I still wouldn't let you in to see him right now."

  This woman is impossible. I’m standing in front of Uncle Will's secretary's desk having a staring contest. She doesn’t falter in her resolve. I break eye contact first, admitting defeat silently.

  I take a seat in the chair directly across from her desk thinking eventually my uncle will come out of his office and I’ll get to talk to him. I pick at the scab on my hand as I practice what I’ll say to him in my head. Hey, sooo do you expect me to not ever talk to my mom or what? or Sup, nice to see you again. I was beginning to forget what you looked like. Since you’re here, can you get my mom on the phone so I can make sure she’s, you know, alive?

  Thirty minutes later my lunch is over and I'm forced to leave so that I won’t be tardy for class.

  I return that evening hoping she’s gone, but like a bad pimple, she’s there for anyone and everyone to see that she’s unmoving.

  "He's in a meeting,” she says before I make it to her desk.

  I am prepared for this. In my sweet voice I ask, “May I leave him a note, please?"

  She holds her hand out in total disinterest and I give her my prewritten note that I've already folded and stapled shut. She eyes the stapled paper and tosses it on a small stack of letters on the corner of her desk.