Taker

by Patrick Wong

  “Oh, Amy.” Nicole’s mom hugged Amy as if she were her second daughter.

  Drake resumed the description of his plan. “My dad and I travel a lot, and I have hundreds of thousands of frequent flyer miles. I could buy the tickets through my dad’s Senate office. That even gives us some preferential treatment so we’re sure to get the next plane out of D.C.”

  Dr. Aaronson was starting to shut down from the shock of the recent events. “That’s really nice of you, Drake. Thank you for offering,” she said. She was using the words a mom might say, but she was obviously on autopilot and covered in worry and doubt.

  Nicole held her mom’s hands and looked into her eyes. “Mom, it’s going to be all right. Dad can fix this.”

  “I know. I have to let you go.” Dr. Aaronson’s eyes were glassy with tears waiting to fall.

  Nicole was breathless, shaken, and scared that her mom was letting her go. The doctor then began to busy herself to distract her mind from the enormity of what she had just suggested. She produced a bottle of pills.

  “You need to take these antibiotics for two weeks. They’re strong, so they’ll stop any infection. Your leg will hurt for a bit, but if you have any other problems, you get to the ER. Promise?”

  “Promise. I’ll be back soon,” Nicole reassured her mom.

  Trying to be strong, her mom nodded and stroked Nicole’s hair.

  Nicole stood up, put an arm around Amy’s shoulders, and then let her best friend take the weight.

  With a little wave goodbye, Nicole headed out the door with Amy and into the bright light. Ben shut the door with a gentle click, and the four friends continued down the front walkway.

  Amy grabbed Nicole a little tighter in a brief moment of uncertainty. “We’re doing the right thing, right? I mean, there are some bad people who seem to want to hurt you. This isn’t a game.”

  Nicole laughed. “Come on. It’s you and me, Awesome Amy and SuperNix. We’ll be fine.”

  “I know,” Amy continued, an air of doubt in her voice. “But what if they, you know, try to hurt you again?”

  Nicole stopped walking then and turned to look straight at Amy. Her expression had morphed from that of the usual Nicole into something different. “I’d like to see them try. I’m getting stronger each time I Balance. They’ll be sorry if they hurt any one of us.”

  Nicole, Amy, Ben and Drake fist-bumped on that last statement. The circumstances were officially life-or-death for Nicole, and she would do everything in her power to survive — even if self-preservation meant someone had to die a horrible death.

  From his car parked in the distance, Agent Bishop watched the four teens walk away from the house and Nicole take one last look back for her mom. But Dr. Aaronson wasn’t at the doorway to see her off. She had headed back inside the house to prepare for the night shift and get on with her everyday life. It would be all she could do to take her mind off the mortal danger her daughter was in.

  Want Rice with That?

  I had no choice.

  Really.

  No choice.

  I had to kill him.

  That’s all there is to it.

  It was me or him.

  Or was it him or I?

  He or I?

  Well, whatever.

  He’s dead.

  Simple as that.

  Nicole felt a touch on her shoulder and snapped out of her thoughts. The noise of the Dulles International Airport terminal cut through her haze of memories, and she found herself standing in the long line for the ladies’ room that hadn’t seemed to have moved in a while.

  A flustered blond girl frowned an apology at Nicole for jumping ahead of her in line, and she motioned to the seating area next to the line as if to convey her justification for cutting.

  “Need paper towels! Emergency! Excuse me!”

  Nicole noticed the girl was sending hand signals to her companion, who was stooped over his bag in the seating area. His head was bowed low, and he was emitting a muted moaning noise. Nicole figured he was about a year or two older than her. Perhaps even a freshman in college.

  “Everything OK?” Nicole offered. She didn’t know why she felt she could talk like this, given that she was supposed to be incognito. But there was just something about this guy that, mixed in with her boredom, spurred her on.

  He glanced up at her, and for a second Nicole thought the entire airport lounge had shifted 10 degrees to the left.

  His blue eyes were intense but yet somehow warm and clear, and she felt her eyes drawn to his jaw and neckline, the way his checkered shirt fell over his shoulders and his sleeves were rolled up over his arms.

  “Packing nightmare.” He grinned and then returned to his bag. “Aw, man!” he exclaimed, partly for Nicole’s awareness, as he lifted a soaking hand from his carry-on. After some more rummaging, he produced a half-filled — and squashed — water bottle.

  “Bad luck,” Nicole remarked, smiling, her heart still pounding in a way she hadn’t experienced before.

  “Yeah, but you know, that’s not the worst of it either,” he murmured, shaking his head. After a further dig in the bag, he slid out a damp tablet. From its thinness, Nicole could tell it was the latest model. Or had been.

  He slid open the tablet’s protective sleeve, releasing a new stream of water down onto his jeans. He glanced up at Nicole again with a wounded look, and she found herself covering her face and miming an expression of horror at him.

  “Great. Now everybody’s going to think I just peed on myself.”

  Then a sound emerged that Nicole hadn’t heard in a while: She giggled. After everything that had happened in the forest, the way her leg was pounding with pain — there was still a part of her that was enjoying this flirtation.

  “Well, thanks for your sympathy.”

  “No, I’m sorry,” she laughed. “It’s just … rice works?”

  “Rice?”

  “Sure. You want to get a big bowl of uncooked rice and submerge it in it. Dries it up.”

  “I want to get a big bowl of uncooked rice? Right.” The guy gestured to the airport lounge around him. “I’m not sure they sell that here next to the inflatable pillows and gummy bears.”

  They shared a laugh.

  “Well, your girlfriend may take a while getting paper towels in there. Apparently there are three toilets broken. Only one stall is working. She’s going to have to fight off several women to make it in there alive.”

  “Girlfriend? Yeah, no. Not my girlfriend.” He grinned. He unzipped the rest of his bag, lifted it upside down in the air, and released the latch, sending out a stream of water followed by a soggy battery charger that dropped to the floor with a thud.

  “You are taking it pretty well, considering,” Nicole said.

  “Well, hell. You know, someone once said you can tell a lot about a person by the way they handle three things: a rainy day, lost luggage and tangled wires.”

  “It was Maya Angelou. And it was tangled Christmas tree lights, to be precise.”

  “Oh, right. That works too. I’m Jason, by the way.” He held out his hand. As he got closer, Nicole caught the merest hint of his scent. It was some kind of cologne mixed with the warm fragrance of springtime rain and a morning breeze. She thought it smelled magnificent. The room shifted back five degrees the other way, and she felt her palms sweating up.

  “Nicole,” she beamed.

  “Where are you heading to, Nicole?”

  “Florida.”

  “Me too. If they let me on with my submersible luggage.”

  Nicole felt herself make a sly grin. He was even on the same flight.

  “You on your own?”

  Nicole shook her head and pointed in the vague direction of where she had last seen Amy, Ben and Drake. “With friends.”

  “Cool. I’m flying down to see my family.”

  “Great. They’ll be so happy to see you, I bet!” Nicole shocked herself with the supreme blandness of her response. But then Jason smiled at her,
and she let the intoxicating feeling spread over her.

  Jason laughed, tipping his head back, which sent ripples down his body. Nicole forgot all about being in a line or needing to pay a visit to the restroom — or even where the feds might be.

  Jason’s companion clearly hadn’t forgotten anything, however. She had emerged from the restroom some minutes before, and a furrowed expression crossed her face at the sight of the pair laughing together. She began waving a stack of paper towels.

  “Jason? Got them!”

  “Great!” Jason responded.

  “Great.” Nicole offered her best smile and motioned toward the line, which was now moving, and she returned to it. She tried to conceal her awkwardness as Jason and the girl reunited.

  “You saved its life. We are eternally thankful!” Jason said to his friend in a goofy alien voice as the pair stooped down to mop up the tablet and clothes.

  Jason’s non-girlfriend gave him a confused, you’re-a-pretty-weird-guy look.

  Nicole picked up on the pop culture reference. “Grateful,” she shouted back, half-giddy. This was out of character for her, but it felt good.

  With a wry smile, Jason glanced up.

  “It’s ‘grateful.’ The aliens from Toy Story, right?” she added.

  “You are so right, Nicole.”

  Jason turned to his non-girlfriend. “See? Somebody gets my movie quotes.”

  He then looked back at Nicole and grinned. “Who doesn’t love Pixar movies?”

  As she moved on up the line and away from Jason, Nicole found herself wishing that wouldn’t be the last time she would see him.

  Game Over

  “He’s staring at you. He’s thinking, ‘Who is that beautiful girl? She looks so dangerous. So mysterious. She looks as if she could crush me with her mind.’”

  “Cut it out, Amy. He is not looking.” Nicole playfully tugged her best friend’s top. It was a fruitless attempt to get her to turn back around and sit in her seat. Nicole gave one last try, ending up with a handful of spandex. “Sit back!”

  “He’s cute,” Amy teased.

  “Hey!” Drake halfway looked up from his paperback and offered a pretend wounded look.

  Amy buried her head into Drake. “I’m just saying — he’s cute enough for Nicole.”

  “Uh, thanks? I think? Besides, he’s sitting next to that girl,” Nicole protested.

  “So? You’re sitting next to a boy.” Amy motioned toward Ben, who was seated on the other side of Nicole and now struggling to suppress his annoyance.

  Drake smirked and returned to his book.

  “And that girl could be anyone. Look around — it’s like a regular school bus on here.” Amy gestured around at the mix of high school students. Some of them sported colorful jerseys, and many of them were wearing matching shirts. “Hey, Ben, reckon the school band has a geek section?”

  Ben pretended not to hear.

  Surveying the cabin, Nicole had to agree with Amy. The Columbus Day weekend had drawn a ton of students out together — some likely for a weekend break, others on what appeared to be a band trip. Colorful banners and pom-poms took up most of the luggage space, and every now and then, passengers were subjected to loud practice chants and cheers. On the plus side, this would make blending in even easier for Nicole and company, as the average age in the cabin appeared to be about 17 years old.

  Above them rang the distinctive ting of the PA system.

  “This is the captain speaking. Once again, I want to welcome you on board Flight 91 to Orlando, Florida. Our estimated flight time is one hour and 51 minutes. As soon as we reach a comfortable cruising altitude, I’ll turn off the seatbelt sign. Until then, please remain in your seats with your seatbelts securely fastened …”

  Nicole double-checked the belt in her lap and let the pilot’s routine spiel swim over her. She closed her eyes.

  Relax, Nicole.

  How come every time she told herself to relax, the other stuff crept in?

  One thing that did make her forget her recent brush with danger was Jason. Even from a distance, she could just detect his distinctive scent. Nicole eased her gaze between the gaps of the headrest to sneak a peek back at the fair-haired guy with the checkered shirt. He was scrolling through his rejuvenated tablet, and she liked how he swept his hand, the way one might move through long grass. A flight attendant leaned across and, by the looks of it, asked him to put the device in airplane mode. He didn’t hesitate to do as she asked. Nicole noted with a little smile that his charms didn’t go unnoticed by the flight attendant either.

  There was definitely something about him. Amy might reduce it to “cute,” and such an assessment was undeniably helped by the strands of hair falling across his eyes. But ever since they had crossed paths back in the terminal, Nicole had also had an inescapable warm, comforting feeling.

  “You can’t keep your eyes off of him,” Amy observed.

  “He’s not looking now,” Nicole asserted.

  But at that precise moment, he did.

  With a deft motion, Jason raised his eyes and caught Nicole’s. Blue eyes — icy, some might say, but with a sparkle that also made them warm. Nicole felt the sudden burst of butterfly wings flutter through her. And for a moment they were both locked there, connected across the aisles of seats, as though invisible hands were lifting them high above the other passengers.

  It was the best feeling Nicole had felt in weeks. She was too shy to hold Jason’s gaze for long, however, and soon had to look away. And then, like someone flipped a switch, the gravity of her Balancing acts hit Nicole like a weight on her stomach. She felt guilty about feeling so good again.

  She hadn’t meant to kill that agent. Well, she had. But not cold-bloodedly. It wasn’t premeditated or anything. But what if she really did plan to do something? What would happen then?

  Nicole spread her gaze across the gray and red seats of the airplane cabin and considered how artificial this situation was — hundreds of passengers cooped up into what amounted to a tin can. Like her, the majority of them were calmly sitting back as the plane glided through the air. How could an airplane floor feel so solid and yet be speeding through the air? The illusion of control.

  Momentarily, Nicole was back in that dark place. In the rotted, gnarled woods again, trying to make her way home. How to follow the light? How to lift her feet and try to push through the immense stabbing pain in her wounded leg so that she could make it home? Each step felt like an eternity.

  No. She couldn’t visit this place now. Now was not the time. But the facts were inescapable. Ever since the four friends had boarded the plane, their conversations had been awash with speculation — first, with identifying the air marshal, and then with choosing which of their fellow passengers was an undercover fed. They had to face the facts: The feds had to be here, somewhere, even if they were disguised as a teacher or a chaperone.

  How far could she go with her Balancing abilities before the feds would take her? Nicole knew they would think twice about taking her so as not to risk losing another agent the way Agent Carter had died.

  The ting of the airplane PA system sounded again.

  “This is the captain speaking. We’ve reached our cruising altitude and are expecting a smooth flight. I’m going to turn off the seatbelt sign.”

  Minutes later, a flight attendant visited the four friends’ row to offer snacks and beverages.

  “Oh, look — Veggie Crisps. Hey, Ben! They have your favorite, Veggie Crisps!” Nicole exclaimed.

  Ben gave a pained expression

  “Oh, I forgot. Still have that cold sore?”

  “Yeah,” Ben responded casually, trying to downplay any imperfection about himself. “It’s nothing. I get them when I get stressed or worried. I was worried about you in the woods. I just don’t know what I would’ve done … well, you’re a Balancer. I know you can take care of yourself.”

  Amy reached over and grabbed a bag of nuts and shoved it in Nicole’s hands.

&nb
sp; Nicole offered a sympathetic smile to Ben.

  “It doesn’t look that bad.”

  The flight attendant continued on toward the next aisle, but she didn’t get very far before she had to excuse herself around somebody.

  It was Jason.

  “So, I know this is going to sound weird, but — you totally had me at hi.”

  The moment Ben saw Nicole look up and smile at the fair-haired boy in the checkered shirt, his heart sank.

  “Hello,” Nicole said. “‘You had me at hello.’ From Jerry McGuire. That’s my mom’s favorite movie. Jason, you complete me.”

  “Wait a second,” Jason laughed. “That’s Tom Cruise’s line. I’m the guy, so that’s supposed to be my line.”

  “Well, I had to play Tom because you already picked Renee Zellweger.”

  They laughed and stared at each other for what seemed to Ben like forever.

  Game over.

  Cold Sores as Weapons

  Nicole and Jason continued to talk as though they’d been dating forever, but Ben was too deep in his own thoughts to process what they were saying. He knew he was the guy who never had anything witty to say until hours later. And he’d never been able to get the type of joy from Nicole that he saw in her eyes when she looked at Jason. What was even more frustrating for Ben was that the more Jason said stupid things, the cuter Nicole seemed to find him. That made no sense at all.

  Deep down, Ben had known what getting up to go to the bathroom would mean. But he had to get away. Ben excused himself and walked toward the bathrooms, but nobody noticed.

  There was a line from the plane’s bathroom to the aisle, and all the while standing in it, Ben had felt torn — half glad not to be playing fifth wheel to Nicole and the guy who’d introduced himself as Jason, the other half of him annoyed by Jason muscling in.

  As he made his way back along the aisles, Ben felt a new twinge of annoyance: Jason wasn’t standing in the aisle; he was making himself comfortable in Ben’s seat. That was bad enough, but would he move if asked? Ben had studiously avoided this kind of scenario at school, chiefly by scarfing his lunch quickly, or by taking a corner table in the cafeteria with less-threatening people wherever possible.