by Anne McClane
Well, this is turning out to be a drag, Lacey thought.
Trevor returned to his carefree form when they reached the resort. “We have a gig in Santa Barbara next week. That’s close to here, isn’t it?”
“Closer than L.A., sure.”
“Think you can make it?” he asked.
“Sure,” Lacey said, trying to sound bright. “I’ll get the details from Jimmy. I’ll plan to come.”
They reached the parking lot, and Trevor stopped at a car with a Utah license plate.
“Do you need anything? Change of clothes or anything? I’m in a little cabin right across the way.”
“No, love. I’m good. I’ll see you soon?”
“Yep. I’ll make it happen.”
It sounded more convincing than Lacey felt.
She turned her back when he drove off, and found one of the benches at the edge of the parking lot. She made sure he was gone for good. She was stunned by the roller coaster moods she’d just experienced with Trevor. She felt profoundly lonely, and made herself feel worse by recognizing how alone she truly was.
Sure, she’d met a few Superfriends, but the only one who truly seemed to understand her potential—more than she did herself—was Eli. And he was not quite the balm for loneliness. And for as much as she enjoyed her time with Trevor, and wanted to be “in the moment” with him, he only seemed to remind her how she longed for something more permanent. Who knows, maybe he felt the same way. Maybe some corresponding part, in both of them, knew this wasn’t going to be permanent.
This sucks, she thought.
23
Lacey awoke the next morning, feeling surprisingly refreshed. If she ignored her feelings for Trevor (or rather, her confused feelings and the longing they inspired for something else), she had to admit, the break toward a “normal” interlude seemed just what she needed. Plus, it was Thursday, almost at the end of a really weird week.
She didn’t have to meet Kandace at the soundstage until Noon. And Eli had told her—again—that she wasn’t needed today. Feeling the morning wide open before her, and determined to not think about her love life, or Eli’s terseness, she started to imagine what her future career might be like. Dressed in a uniform, riding in an ambulance. Having to explain to her partner why she needed to strip in front of the injured person they were tending to . . .
That might be a minor issue.
Eli had said they could continue the lesson they’d started before the earthquake hit. But then he’d told her he hadn’t been the only one helping her when they rescued Rosie. That she had helped herself. How?
She sent Ambrose out onto the patio and opened the window near the bed. It looked out onto a wooded area. She peered out, wanting to be sure no one could see her. She stripped completely naked, still not understanding why the lesson required her to remove her clothes, like Eli had said. She couldn’t summon the healing feeling, the heat, because there wasn’t anyone nearby in need of healing.
If she wasn’t going to get so hot that she would ignite anything, why did she need to take her clothes off?
She heard it before she felt it. Announcing itself through a rustling in the trees, a breeze came through the window. The skin just below her throat tingled, then she felt a shiver radiate from that point all over her body.
Okay, I guess I wouldn’t have felt that so intensely with my clothes on . . .
The wind died, and Lacey felt her temperature return to normal. She closed her eyes, for what felt like an eternity, then opened them again when nothing else happened. She stopped herself from tapping her foot.
What next?
Maybe there’s some part of me that needs healing. Maybe that could increase my body temperature by a few degrees.
She thought about her messy emotions, her conflicted feelings, and concentrated on them. Nothing felt different in her body at all. So, maybe her emotional state wasn’t “broken,” or in need of healing.
You mean I’m supposed to feel like this??
Never mind, focus on the task on hand.
So, she really had no control over her ability. Eli had called her body a “conduit” for her power. But he had also hinted that she could control her body temperature—at least cool it down—so that she could counteract her power’s ill effects. Ill effects like her clothes catching on fire.
Where’s Eli when you need him?
She thought of ice, and snow. She looked out the window and tried to imagine the scene in winter. She tried to make her mind a blank.
It wasn’t cooperating. She wondered if she was the only person in the world who had ever done this. Then immediately realized that she wasn’t. She couldn’t be. Birdie had some similar power, though she didn’t know exactly what. She imagined Birdie trying to find some quiet place to be alone, with Fox’s father and myriad aunts and uncles as children, knocking at the door, nagging to know what she was doing. She couldn’t stop herself from smiling at the thought.
She thought again of “spooky action at a distance.” Was that what Birdie was to her, and she to Birdie? Affecting each other through time and distance, even though they never knew each other? Only connected through the “conduit” of the Becnels?
She felt a shiver just below her throat, same place as before. It turned sharp and hard, an ice dagger. It began to spread. She opened her eyes, fear growing, half expecting to see a sudden summer snowstorm in the scene outside her window. Nothing had changed, the sun was still shining.
Her teeth began to chatter.
“Well, sh-sh-sh-it!” She could barely get the word out. Okay, please, how do I stop this?
She resisted the urge to wrap herself in the blanket from the unmade bed. She closed her eyes again and took a deep breath. Her teeth stopped chattering, but her limbs still shivered. She imagined standing outside in the sun, dressed in a comfy sweater. Then, she thought of coming back from a run, on a pleasant fall day in New Orleans. Still warmer than a fall day in most other parts of the country.
Her legs and arms stopped shivering. She opened her eyes and still saw goose bumps on her arms. But she was no longer uncomfortable.
She looked around the room and could hear Ambrose pacing outside on the porch. He was ready to come back in. She threw on some clothes and opened the door for him. She was lost in her thoughts.
Okay, so I definitely brought my body temperature down. But how?
“Was I thinking cold thoughts, Bro, was that it?”
The dog looked up at her as if to say, “How am I supposed to know?”
So, I was thinking of cold things, and then I thought of Birdie. About how we’re connected.
I stopped thinking of my own issues for a fraction of a second.
“Is that it? I just have to detach a bit? And stop focusing on my problems?”
Could it be that easy?
She made an intention to ask Eli that very thing, and got ready to head to the soundstage.
The coffee mug, Diet Dr. Pepper, and wobbly straw was there, but no Kandace. Horatio was a sight for sore eyes at the gate, but he was the only thing that was familiar. The studio had been cleared. The table Lacey had used as a desk had been cleared. All that was left was cavernous, echoing space. Lacey peeked around the corner where Kandace’s office had been. That, at least, looked the same.
It was eerie, and it was sad. Lacey had been frustrated and bored working here before, but it was still preferable to the profound sense of loss permeating the place now. Lacey felt Kevin’s absence as acutely as at the funeral. She stepped inside the doorway to Kandace’s office, found a folding chair, and sat.
Why did Kandace need her to come in? She had closed all the books when the production went on hiatus. Her throat felt tight and she wanted to get back to the Mineral Springs.
“When did you get here?” she heard a voice say.
Lacey whipped
her head around. Kandace strolled into her office, more at ease than Lacey had ever seen her.
Lacey stood. “Just a few minutes ago. I couldn’t find you, so I just came here.”
Kandace plopped down behind her desk. “Go ahead, pull up the chair, we have time,” she said.
Lacey looked at the chair again and pulled it closer. But not too close.
“What are we going to be doing today?” Lacey asked.
“Oh, I need your help with some files,” Kandace answered. “But it can wait for a bit.
“Did you ever go to that restaurant?” Kandace asked. “The one you were looking up that one time?”
Lacey struggled to figure out what the hell Kandace was talking about. And her radical change in demeanor. She was so relaxed—and well, normal. It was not a bad thing.
“Um, you mean Taverna?”
“Yes, that’s the one.”
Lacey thought of her dinner with Trevor, her first night with him. “Yes. It feels like a while ago now, with everything that’s happened, but, yes.”
“I wound up going back,” Kandace said. “But not with Roger. It was a lot better.”
“Oh,” Lacey said. “That’s . . . good.”
“I met someone,” Kandace said, her words falling on top of Lacey’s. “Roger doesn’t know yet.”
“Oh, yeah? That sounds intriguing,” Lacey said.
Kandace proceeded to offer details about someone who sounded surprisingly authentic. Black hair, green eyes, she wasn’t really crazy about the way he dressed, he was a little too sloppy. They had gone together to Taverna, explaining her aforementioned reference. But they had also gone hiking, and Kandace named the trail. Turtle Rock, in Morro Bay. Either she was getting better at delusions, or this person was actually real.
“Wow,” Lacey said. “You did all that in one weekend?”
“Oh, Lord, yes, it was a whirlwind. But he’s been gone this week, traveling for work. He’s supposed to be back next week.”
“Oh,” Lacey said. She had an insight, but didn’t want to burst Kandace’s bubble. Something about a whirlwind weekend, and then “disappearing” over the week. And the sloppy way the man dressed.
“He lives here, in San Luis Obispo?”
“Yes, that’s how he knew the trail at Morro Bay, and what to order at Taverna.”
Lacey thought of Fox, and wondered how many women like Kandace he had suckered. She shuddered, but for the first time ever, felt sympathy for the poor women who hadn’t known he was married.
“So. Are you going to tell Roger?” Lacey asked. She reasoned an imaginary boyfriend was better than a possibly married one.
“Not yet,” Kandace said. “I’m not sure where this is going to go. And plus, I haven’t really heard from new guy.”
That confirmed Lacey’s suspicion. “I think that’s smart,” she said. “You don’t want to throw away a good, long-term thing just yet. I mean, you have a lot invested in your relationship with Roger, don’t you?”
Lacey tried not to reflect on the absurdity of her statement.
“Yes, that’s a good point,” Kandace replied. “Thanks for listening.”
That sounded sincere, Lacey realized with shock. Maybe there was more to Kandace beyond “work-boss mode.”
“So, there is a bit of work to do,” Kandace continued. “Would you mind helping out with some filing?”
I suppose it’s all part of my ill-defined job, Lacey thought. “Sure.”
Lacey and Kandace spent two hours together shuffling through boxes of paper, mostly Movie Marvel reports that never needed to be printed in the first place. Many were several years old, covering productions Lacey had never heard of. She kept encountering a report heading titled “Ripe Transgression,” which made her giggle. But after the thousandth page with that heading, Lacey wept silently over all the sacrificed trees.
Lacey grabbed a cushion from storage and sat cross-legged on it while she sorted. Kandace brought in a chair and craned forward from the waist toward the boxes on the ground.
About an hour and a half in, Kandace switched gears completely. She leaned back in her chair, arched her back, and exhaled loudly. Following her lead, Lacey unfolded her legs, clasped her hands in front of her and stretched them over her head.
“You know, I heard something recently about Kevin, and I really don’t know what to think about it,” Kandace said.
Lacey tried to play off her surprise and Kandace’s mention of the subject. “Who’d you hear it from?” Lacey asked.
“That doesn’t really matter,” Kandace said.
Lacey tilted her head to the side and waited for more, not surprised that Kandace wouldn’t reveal her source.
“Someone was just saying, what if it wasn’t just an accident? What if he had been run off the road?”
Kandace looked at Lacey as if she knew the answer. She had certainly thought of foul play, but she wasn’t sure where Kandace was headed with this conversation.
Lacey shook her head, and pushed herself back on her cushion. “Wow,” she said. “That would be awful.”
Kandace seemed convinced this was the answer. “If he was run off the road, who would’ve been behind it? Or could it all have been just a freak accident?”
“Well, let’s think about it,” Lacey said. “Allison would be the one witness, if that was the case. Has she said anything publicly about the accident?”
Kandace stood up from her chair. She paced the small room littered with boxes. The setting, and Kandace’s affected manner, made Lacey feel like she was in a bad television show. The X-Files, where the files were a bunch of lame accounting reports. Thinking of her setting, a soundstage for bad TV movies, she realized how ironic that seemed.
“Allison has said she doesn’t remember anything about the accident,” Kandace said, turning to Lacey with a dramatic pause.
“She was hurt pretty badly,” Lacey said from the floor. “Maybe she has some short-term amnesia about the accident.” Lacey tried to give Allison the benefit of the doubt, but something bothered her. She remembered having a great first impression of Allison, but then feeling like she’d cast a spell upon her. There was too much that seemed hidden about her. Suspicion unfurled.
“Do you know if anyone is trying to jog her memory?” Lacey asked.
“I think so,” Kandace said, her back to Lacey now. “I mean, someone has to be, right? That’s a pretty big piece.” Kandace turned back around, chewing on a straw. “Yeah, they would have to be. I heard a rumor—I don’t know how true it is—that Allison might sue Kevin’s estate. But if that’s the case, they would want her version of events, right?”
Discussing the accident with Kandace, out in the open, triggered something right in the center of Lacey’s brain, a little spark that she could make no sense of. A stronger, more patent distrust of Allison welled up, and Lacey felt immediately guilty for it. The poor woman had almost died, and also been witness to Kevin’s last breath. But there was something about her that put Lacey on edge.
“Did you see or talk to Allison at all, at the funeral?” Lacey asked.
“No,” Kandace answered. “I mean, I saw her to tell her how sorry I was, but that was it. She seemed like she was in a lot of pain.”
“I saw her, but didn’t have the chance to say anything,” Lacey said. “Heck, I barely even saw you. There were a lot of people there.”
“Did you see Wonder Woman there?” Kandace asked, eyes suddenly wide.
Lacey smiled. It was funny that Kandace used the character’s name, and not the person who played her. Kandace actually looked star-struck, an open-mouthed smile and stars in her eyes. “Yes. She’s hard to miss.”
“I actually had the opportunity to say something to her, but I couldn’t,” Kandace said. “I couldn’t think of anything that sounded appropriate for the setting.”
&nb
sp; Lacey wondered if that was the first time Kandace had ever successfully censored herself.
“Yeah, what do you say when you meet someone at a funeral? It’s all supposed to be about the connection to the person who’s now gone.”
Lacey caught Kandace’s reaction, then each cast their eyes away. Lacey felt guilty about their cavalier conversation. She endeavored to get back to the task at hand.
“So anyway,” Lacey said. “I’ve gone through all these boxes.”
Lacey swept her arm to the stack of ten boxes at her back. “They’re all ready for the shredder.”
They tied up the remaining loose ends, and Lacey left the studio just a few minutes later. She said goodbye to Horatio at the gate, thinking it would be the last time she’d see him. She thought about it, and realized he was the only person she’d interacted with at the facility who actually worked there full-time. Everyone else was itinerant, just like her. Moving with the production.
She wondered how Horatio felt about that.
24
Lacey was done with the Central Coast and all its wild beauty. Her skin was dry, her eyes were bloodshot, her limbs were tired. She thought of summoning some healing energy to use on herself, but felt too tired to attempt it. And, if she was honest with herself, some part of her wanted to feel done, dry and wrung-out.
How does that make any sense?
It had been three days since she’d seen Eli. And Christine had taken a few days off to help Rosie. Lacey had spent most of those days alone. During which, she’d figured out that Eli asking her to come up to the Mineral Spring must have been a pretense. The production status was still in limbo, and she’d done nothing to assist with scouting. So if the idea was that she’d come up here so that Eli could help her understand the “how” of her healing ability, how come he’d gone missing in action?
And the smell of the sulfur springs was beginning to feel less earthy, and more noxious. Just plain noxious.
