Just Another Day at the Office

by Amber Lynn

Usually finding a recipe that sounded good didn't take all day. I'd just plug in the ingredients I had on hand and something would pop up. I spent an hour looking through recipes with the few ingredients I had left in the house from my two trips to the store. I couldn't believe how long it took.

  I made a note that I'd have to come up with a small list if we wanted to eat anything for dinner the next night. Nate had informed me our plane didn't leave until Saturday afternoon. He thought giving me a little more time to prepare for the plane ride was a good idea, but I was determined to get him to change his mind and drive home, so as far as I was concerned our departure time was up in the air.

  ?I finally decided to make some chicken puffs, which were just cream cheese, garlic, diced green onion and some shredded precooked chicken stuffed into biscuit dough. I thought I'd pair it with a cheesy rice corn mixture. That determined, it wouldn't take me more than an hour to prepare everything, so it didn't really help me waste time.

  On a whim, I started looking around at apartments in New York. I wanted to get an idea of what Nate would be showing me, and what kind of monthly rent payment we were looking at. My requirements were only that I had to like the neighborhood, the kitchen met my standards and it had at least two bedrooms. I knew we'd managed to share a bed without too many issues, but I'd still like to have my own room. When I was ready to get married, we could switch to sharing a room.

  I made notes on a few apartments that looked promising and called my search good after about ninety minutes. It was easy to get lost searching through all the possibilities. I was just about to see if there was anything on TV when my phone rang. Looking at the screen, I saw Rick's name, and my channel surfing was delayed.

  "Hey, Rick, you must be having a busy day," I said as I answered the phone.

  "Sorry, baby girl, I've been in an interrogation room all morning, so even though I would've loved to help with your boredom, I was tied up."

  "No worries, so far I've found enough to fill my day. Did you get your confession?"

  "Of course I did. It helps when you can pick up thoughts from the suspect and trip them up on their responses to questions."

  I imagined he wasn't sitting in the middle of the squad room during our conversation. I couldn't hear anything in the background that would help me figure out exactly where he was, and I didn't care enough to try to reach out and garner that information by other means.

  "You must be the department's best interrogator. I bet when everyone else gets stuck they call you in."

  "That they do, and I always get my confession. So what happened at the folks'? You get more of your memory back?" he asked.

  "Well, first off, on the way there I became officially engaged. Don't get your hopes up, though, because I only promised to marry him sometime in this lifetime."

  "Whenever the day may be, congratulations. I knew from the moment Nate told me he'd found you that eventually you guys would get married, for let's see, the millionth time. In this day and age, I'll let you guys fight amongst yourself over which side I get to stand up next to," he said, laughing quietly at his joke.

  "If you're on my side, you'll be in a dress, so be careful what you wish for. Anyway, let me get the box, so I can tell you about what my mom gave me."

  I walked into the bedroom to where I'd noticed Nate had put the box at some point.?I wasn't awake enough to know whether he had a look through the box. I was sure he already knew the contents, so there might have been a little reminiscing going on while I slept. I grabbed the box and returned to the living room.

  "So, did seeing whatever is in this box reveal the secrets in your mind?" Rick pushed for an answer.

  "Not quite, but the box came with a note. Here, let me read it to you," I said as I started to read him the letter.

  When I finished, Rick was quiet for a few moments before saying, "I can just imagine what Nate was thinking when you read him a letter from yourself. Especially, when you decided to leave a note to him personally."

  "Yeah, and I was nice enough to ask him if it was from an old girlfriend. Imagine my surprise when he told me the truth. He and my parents talked a little while about this so called upcoming war and they had no clue what it meant. Do you have any ideas?"

  "No, that doesn't make any sense. Who in their right mind would try to start a war against phoenixes? We've been around longer than anything else out there. That means we've had a lot of time on our hands and we didn't spend it learning to sew. Add to the fact we are a strong fighting force, that we also can't die, and you'd have to be insane to take us on," he ranted.

  "Nate seemed a little concerned that someone has figured out a weapon capable of killing us. We're based in fire, what if someone invented some kind of giant fire extinguisher that can douse our flame?" I asked.

  "It doesn't seem feasible, but I'll make a few calls and get some people looking into the possibility. On a lighter note, I noticed your letter made mention of me. How does it feel when you're told by yourself that you actually need me?"

  "I kind of had the feeling my former self was an idiot," I said jokingly. "I mean, what could she be thinking? You guys couldn't have been as close as you claim if she hadn't figured out she didn't need your protection."

  "I'll let you find out how close we were as your memories come back. I have a feeling you're going to be sticking your foot in your mouth. And, since your former self had the ability to see the future, I have a feeling you should heed any advice she may give you. So, what else was in the box?"

  I described each of the hodge podge items to him. I couldn't see any evident ties to help jog my memories.

  "Do you know what they are or what they might mean?"

  He was quiet for a second while he thought about it. "Not really. They're probably just mementos from your past lives that you thought might help along the way. I'd love to see the knife, though. You've always had an affinity for them; it'll be interesting to see which one you packed away."

  "Well, we'll be home in a couple days, so you can see it then."

  "Yeah, about you guys coming home, I have a present for you. I think you'll like it, but I'm not one hundred percent sure."

  "I have a simple way for you to know. Tell me what it is and I can make sure it's the right gift for me."

  "Nope. It's a surprise and kind of a house warming gift for when you get your new place," he replied.

  "Please, just a little hint," I pleaded and broadcast to him that I was sticking out my lower lip.

  "You'll get nothing, but you only have to wait a couple days, so it won't kill you. You better tuck that lip in, or a bird will come along and poop on it."

  "Not funny. Are you sure I won't die from waiting? You know I'm not very patient. I may just have to take a trip in your mind and find out," I taunted. Whether someone could block me out hadn't been discussed, but I imagined warning him wasn't the best move.

  "That wouldn't be very nice. You should only use your abilities for good, Avery. Just diving into people's minds because you want to know something, like what presents they've gotten for you, is not what they should be used for," he scolded. It seemed I'd been getting reprimanded a lot.

  "I wasn't going to; I just wanted to tease you. I did dive into the mind of a couple of my suspects today. One was way too boring; the other was actually a little interesting, at least so much as it sounded like he was plotting world domination.

  "I'm going to talk it over with Nate as soon as he gets home. We could solve this one before I run screaming from the town. Although, tomorrow I'm evidently spending the day with a couple of the girls, looking at wedding dresses online. That might make me have Nate get me out of here sooner, even if that means staying at a motel tomorrow night."

  "Darn. I was hoping I'd get to help you pick out the dress. I mean, I have been to each of your weddings, so I'm qualified to tell you what you've already worn. And just because I love you so, I'll let you know that you have gone with the naked look a couple times already, so I doubt you'd want t
o do that again. All the fashion mags would bring up how it's so primitive."

  "Oh no you didn't. Why would you say something like that, even if it's true? Now, I have to think about the fact that you've seen me naked. Ack! It's bad enough my latest memory yesterday had me getting way too up close and personal with Nate slash Zarek."

  "Tell me it wasn't a time when you slipped my guard duty. You did that a lot in those days, even though there was a threat against you," he said as if he was still frustrated by my past antics.

  "You would probably be right, a missing escort was mentioned. See, I don't know what my most recent past self was thinking saying I had a protector for a reason. I've always been trying to get away from you."

  "Yeah, well, the way I see it is if she pointed out you needed protection for a reason, maybe that time is finally coming. Believe me, I'm prepared to lock you in a room if I think that will keep you safe. I have the shackles picked out and everything. They're purple, by the way, just because I know you'd like them a little bit more than plain metal ones."

  "I'm pretty sure it doesn't matter what color the shackles are, you're going to have a huge fight on your hand if you ever try to put them on me," I said, looking over at the clock. "Hey, sweetie, this has been fun, but I better start supper, so Nate can eat when he gets home. You know how grumpy he can be when he's hungry."

  "Okay, I'll see you soon. Try to be good until then."

  "I'll try, but I'm not making any promises." It felt like we ended too many of our conversations with me vowing to stay out of trouble.

  I hurried to the kitchen and pieced together supper. I was glad I decided on something that I could rush through. Taking my time, I could've made it comfortably within an hour. In hurry up mode, I shaved fifteen minutes off the time.

  After walking in and using his "honey, I'm home" line again, we relaxed for a few minutes on the sectional before dinner.

  "Did you find anything interesting today?" I asked. I didn't get a feeling he was brimming with good news to share.

  "No, nothing new. I may not even go in tomorrow. I don't think we're going to find anything within the tank. Even scanning through thoughts hasn't given me something I feel is concrete enough to focus in on a person."

  "I did a little surfing in Hank's and Eric's heads today. Hank was pretty boring, but Eric had some interesting thoughts about being excited to leave this town in the near future and some new shell he'd been working on. The question would be whether he's selling secrets to fund his little side project," I relayed, filling him in the little bit of investigation I'd gotten done.

  "Hmm. He wasn't around the office much today, and I hadn't heard any thoughts like that the previous times I listened in. Of course, I do try to stay out of his mind. It wanders to a certain butterfly tattoo more than I like.

  "I guess maybe I'll go in tomorrow and see if I can dig anything up on him. If not, when we turn the case over, he'll be the number one suspect. Anything else fun happen today? It doesn't look like you were bored enough to try to peel the paint from the walls."

  "I was saving that for tomorrow. I talked to Rick for a little while and learned he has shackles picked out for me, but he reassured me that they're for my own good. Other than that and the fact he's interested in seeing what knife was in the box, the conversation didn't reveal anything new."

  "Okay, let's eat supper then and maybe watch a movie before we head to bed," Nate suggested as he stood up and helped me find my feet.

  We ate quickly and ended up watching?a pair of cartoon movies. We both wanted a laugh and nothing makes you laugh like a panda not knowing his goose father isn't his biological father. After the movies, we called it a night. I fell asleep hoping Nate was able to turn up something on Eric, so our mission could end successfully.

  Nate didn't have a lot of blemishes on his track record, and I didn't want our first case to be a failure. I kept complaining about wanting to leave and everyone driving me insane, but if I thought we had a chance of tying things up, I'd stay a little longer.?

  CHAPTER 26

  If you're smart, you run the other way when he tries to put a ring on it