by Kim Cormack
The waitress walked away holding the rat in her arms. It was as big as a cat. Grey murmured, “Just a house pet.” He stared at the waitress intensely for a second and her skirt fell off. She squealed and ran into the backroom without letting go of the rat.
Lexy grabbed Grey’s arm and yanked him to back down on the bench seat. “You’re a grown man. Was that really necessary?”
Grey gave Lexy an innocent look and said, “I’ll give her a good tip.”
Zach sparred, “Just the...?
Lexy scowled at Zach and stated, “I’ll kill you my damn self if you finish that bloody sentence.”
“That made my month. Hell, that made my year,” Frost whispered.
Lexy shot him a dirty look.
The waitress showed up with their meals and fully clothed. She handed Grey his meal first. He stared at his plate for a minute. Kayn suspected he wanted to walk away and refuse to eat it but nobody was going to follow him out of the restaurant. They were all too hungry. Kayn had thought before that moment that she’d already been privy to all of Grey’s phobias. Mental note: All mighty and powerful fire making warrior Grey was deathly afraid of rodents.
They finished at the diner and each of them took a minute or two to stretch their legs before climbing back into the RV. Kayn wandered towards the back room and sprawled out on a pillow on the floor. Zach and Melody were quick to fling themselves down beside her. The vehicle began to move and while lying on the floor it was ten times bumpier. They all giggled as their bodies shook with the rhythm of the uneven parking lot.
Melody let out a sheep like vibrato, “Ahahahaha.”
They all immaturely copied her, laughing until the motorhome was travelling on smooth pavement.
Zach grinned and said, “Should I say something or do you want to Mel?”
Kayn grimaced; they were going to give her crap for being in the bathroom alone with Frost. Kayn stared at Zach and prodded, “Well, spit it out?”
Zach whispered, “Go take a look in the mirror.”
Kayn humored him as she stood up and wandered into the bathroom. She closed the door behind her. What? She took in her reflection and cracked a smile. How does this always happen to her? She was covered in dust. It was stuck to her skin in clumps. There was even a lovely streak of it on her forehead and across her cheek. Awesome, this is just perfect. She’d put that lotion on and the parking lot had been full of dust. It didn’t take much to deduce how she’d come to exhibit her comical appearance. She cleaned herself off with a wash cloth and came out of the bathroom just as the motorhome went over a bump. She lost her footing and fell into Frost’s arms. She stepped away embarrassed.
He teased, “Stop hitting on me Brighton.”
She squirmed past him into the back room mumbling, “In your dreams.”
Frost chuckled, “No, in your dreams.” He shut the bathroom door behind him and Kayn tossed a pillow at the door in the hallway.
Melody got up and grabbed the pillow, threw it back at Kayn and ribbed, “Do you know what this is? It’s foreplay.”
Zach smacked Kayn in the face with his pillow and giggled, “Don’t do it man. Not that guy.”
Kayn rolled over on her side, glared at Zach and comically enquired, “Why not?”
Melody flung herself down on a pillow beside her and whispered, “I’m all for it. Stop pining and start living.” Zach sighed and added nothing else in response.
They drove for a few more hours before deciding to stop for the day. Kayn, Melody, Grey and Zach were sitting around the table playing Scrabble that afternoon. Frost strolled by wearing a plaid shirt. They kept playing. Kayn was the Scrabble champion. She may pass out first but she was the one who got all of the Scrabble glory. Frost gave her an idea for a word as he strutted by. She grinned.
Grey taunted, “Oh, watch out, Brighton’s got a good one.”
Zach glanced up, looked at Frost and teased, “Do you have a plaid shirt I can borrow?”
Frost was looking through the fridge. He winked and replied, “Not everyone can pull off this plaid shirt Zach.”
Zach said, “Let me rephrase the question for you. Why are you wearing that plaid shirt?”
“You mean you don’t like it?” Frost chuckled. He held up a beer towards Grey and when he nodded, Frost opened it and passed it to him. Frost added, “We’re in cowboy country. Women love this shirt.”
Kayn could appreciate the shirt. Frost tried to grab another one out of the fridge and it rolled onto the floor. He bent over to grab for it in front of Kayn.
Zach elbowed her, she was staring. Zach said, “I have my word. It’s peacock.” He looked at Kayn and asked, “What’s your word? I know you have one.”
Kayn turned her board around and they all laughed. The word was… Superficial.
Frost leaned across the table and playfully threatened, “I should put you over my knee and spank you.”
Kayn smiled sweetly at him and sparred, “I’d like to see you try.”
Frost teased, “Are you trying to flirt with me Froggy?”
She had an almost cool moment for a second there...
In the weeks that followed, a plastic rat mysteriously showed up everywhere, in Grey’s bed under his covers and in the shower of his hotel room. It appeared on his bunk in the RV and in the truck while he was driving. Eventually, Grey stopped squealing every time he saw it. He angrily launched it at Frost and Zach each time he came across it. The truth was it had never been Zach or Frost, it had been Kayn. She knew Frost suspected her but he couldn’t prove it. Lily had obviously been doing her job training her because she now had one hell of a poker face. Kayn had to use that poker face now. She used it every single time she looked at Frost.
The Secrets We Keep
Kayn stared out the window, deep in thought. The tires whirled monotonously down the highway on this day, the same as so many others. There was the random off key humming of songs that played privately in various headphones. This was as familiar a sound as her clan member’s voices. Then snickers as someone belted out a chorus into the almost silent air space. Kayn heard the clicking of the signal light, the vehicle turned abruptly. The tires crackled into a driveway. She guessed they’d arrived at one of a possible thousand convenience stores along the seemingly endless highway. A gas station perhaps, as she heard the ding sound from the pump.
Almost before the RV had come to a complete stop Lily had hopped up from the passenger seat up front. She began to fumble with the lock on the front door. It could be a tiny bit claustrophobic with the hours upon hours that they all spent together in close confines. There were only so many games of Fish, Twenty-one and Monopoly that one could play. They took turns driving but there were two vehicles. That meant that four people were forced to stay awake at any given time. They slept in shifts. If they were lucky, they had the opportunity to stop somewhere for the night and then they could all just go to sleep and have some semblance of normalcy.
Zach followed Lily out of the door and asked, “Does anybody need anything from the store?”
“We could use some more orange juice and maybe some cereal?” Lexy answered.
Zach replied, “I’ll take a look. If they don't have anything good, we’ll stop at a real grocery store later.”
Sometimes Kayn couldn't help but smile at how normal some of the conversations were, amidst the messed-up ones. She shifted the curtains to one side to see where they were. This time she honestly couldn't tell… It was quite nondescript scenery. Usually there were mountains or nothing but flat for as far as her eye could see. Kayn did enjoy people watching. There honestly wasn’t much else to do between jobs. Lily and Grey could be a downright comical combination. Grey had been her Mr. Right Now, not her Mr. Forever. They passed each other in the parking lot, bags in hand. It had been a long time but they still wouldn’t even utter a simple good morning to each other. This was an excellent example of why seriously dating a clan member was a bad idea. It was still done though of course, because they were together all of the
time and hormones happen. Only when the clan’s Oracle stepped in and said, ‘No way’ was it actually forbidden. Maybe Frost had been warned to stay away from her? He had worn his feelings on his sleeve during their conversation in the bathroom and she could tell it was an extremely difficult thing for him to do. She sensed that someone who had their heart broken repeatedly over give-or-take a thousand years would want to guard it diligently. The two of them had this weird passive aggressive relationship going on. He continued flirting with her as per usual but didn’t push it. He also hadn’t been with anyone else since he found out she’d been dreaming of him. She had been left alone with her thoughts and she had plenty of them rolling on her squeaky, empty hamster wheel.
Kayn glanced across the room and saw Melody sitting there staring at her laptop. Melody was pretty quiet most of the time. She seemed to be deep in thought and always Google searching her home town. She would spend hours looking at her old property. She would read the online newspaper from her home town almost every day but never share anything about it. They all had their strange little rituals. The past was the past and they managed to leave it there for the most part. She watched Melody smile as she was reading whatever graced the laptop’s screen. Lexy was sprawled out on her bunk, mesmerized by her own laptop.
The door opened, startling them. It was Grey. He smiled, quite obviously exhausted. He tossed a bag full of Ketchup chips at Melody. That was sweet. Melody looked up from the computer and smiled at him. Grey walked past them without even speaking and collapsed on his bunk. Kayn found that she was always disappointed whenever Grey opted out of speaking. He had the best accent in the world. He sounded Australian. That had been her first guess but every once in a while, he sounded Scottish. There was sure to be a good story behind that. She never got tired of the sound of his voice.
Lexy sat up, sighed and made her way to the driver’s seat. It was her turn to drive the motorhome.
Frost walked in, locking the door behind him. He made eye contact with Kayn as he handed her the bag with the juice in it. No cereal, but an enormous jug of orange juice. She held onto it for a second. What the hell Frost? He could have walked one foot and put it in the fridge by himself. She decided not to say anything, because she’d not yet learned how to drive. He climbed up onto his bunk, stretched out and smiled at her mischievously, before laying his head down on his pillow and shutting his eyes. Kayn made her way up to the cupboard and grabbed a couple glasses. She poured both Lexy and herself a glass of orange juice, put the jug back into the fridge and steadied herself as the motorhome began to pull out. The tires crackled through the gravel before whirling down the highway again. Kayn sat beside Lexy and without words she handed her a glass of orange juice.
Lexy took a big drink before placing it in the holder and saying, “Thanks hun.”
This was the usual deal. Kayn didn't drive but that didn't mean that she wasn't expected to keep the person driving comfortable and entertained. Kayn told Lexy jokes from her cell phone. She spent a lot of time with Lexy but she was still a mystery to her. Lexy was beautiful and as tough as nails in a fight. In day to day life, the clan’s infamous Dragon was a fire cracker of comedy, not violence. Lexy always had a weird joke or a hilarious story about something she’d seen online. A story about someone she had met in a store or randomly on the street. There was never a moment of guy drama where Lexy was concerned. Perhaps she was just smart enough to know that it wasn’t the brightest idea in the world to get into a relationship with someone you could never break up with. Literally ever, as Grey and Lily had found out. Well Grey and almost everyone else. There had been Lily, Arrianna and Melody, if their brief half-an-hour-long fling even counted.
Kayn glanced at Lexy. They had gone into Testing together. She knew Grey was Lexy’s Handler but wasn’t sure what that meant. Every once in a while, she caught Lexy staring at him. Kayn was pretty sure their relationship was more than friendship. She’d been tempted to ask on various occasions but always decided against it. She opted out of the drama and watched the scenery whirl by for a few more minutes. Kayn felt eyes on her and turned to see Lexy smiling at her. Damn inner dialogue.
They heard the honking of a horn. Zach was waving at them from the truck directly in front of them. What a goofball. Zach wasn't the classically hot guy but he had this strange mixture of likability and goofiness that made you want to be near him. He overzealously waved again. Lexy shook her head, coolly unrolled the driver’s side window and gave him the finger. Zach had a long hard road to forgiveness, especially with her. Forgiveness was quite obviously not Lexy’s strong suit. The crimson-haired warrior was always plotting a warped revenge scenario in her mind, this always made Kayn smile. It is always advantageous to have something to look forward to in life, even if that something is a wicked deplorable act of self-satisfying revenge.
They went over a bump in the road. Lexy’s glass of orange juice just about spilled but was saved by Kayn’s sharp reflexes. Her act of orange juice heroism was followed by a smile from Lexy. Kayn was surprised that she’d caught it. Her reflexes were usually more like a drunken circus clown than a stealthy feline. She recalled Frost’s taunts about her having the reflexes of a blindly hammered moose. She felt like that a lot. He had been an asshole but he wasn’t wrong. She giggled out loud at her own thoughts.
Lexy gave her a strange look and chuckled, “I’m glad you find your own thoughts amusing. I am afraid to ask what you’re laughing about. With you, it could be anything.”
Kayn stretched in her seat as she replied, “I was imagining myself as a blindly hammered moose.”
Lexy made a valiant attempt to stifle her smile for a second. It escaped as she teased, “My point exactly.”
The long miles of highway whirled at a stomach churning pace in her peripheral vision. She had to look straight ahead but something would always draw her attention to the blur. Wasn’t that a perfect observation on life? This was the calm before the storm. This time was about learning to embrace what she was destined to become. It was about training in the in-between followed by long monotonous days of driving, sleeping and overthinking everything. There was far too much time to think. Her thoughts kept traveling back to the night Frost had appeared all cocky and shirtless in her room. He’d changed her life the night he’d branded her Ankh. He was the one that had given her a free ticket to this warped, yet magnificent rollercoaster ride. She told herself once again that everyone was attracted to Frost. It didn’t mean anything. Kevin was another story. She couldn’t shake the feeling that their love was now a mirage. A mirage only she could see. She knew he wasn’t waiting for her. Waiting for him was beginning to feel like she was standing on the highway waiting to get smoked by a car. She could make a choice and get out of the way. Logic told her that she had to stop romanticizing something that had no hope of becoming anything. She would see him again and it wouldn’t matter. She wasn’t some kind of naive dumbass. She was tired of feeling like she was slowly withering away in her memories of him, while he was safe and happy with absolutely no recollection of what they’d lost. Now that she was beginning to accept Kevin’s absence as an irreversible fact of life, it stung a little less whenever he crossed her mind.
She’d been staring out the window for what felt like forever, deep in thought. The sun had disappeared from the sky and the heavens had surrendered to the dusk. Kayn went to lie down on her bunk for a while. Frost would have to get up with Grey. It was their turn to drive. Frost didn't look like he was awake. She climbed onto her bunk directly across the tiny hallway from him. She watched him sleeping for a couple of minutes knowing she was trying to move on by entertaining the idea of him. Were her feelings for him confusion over receiving her sister’s memories? How was she supposed to know?
Frost opened one eye and groggily whispered, “A penny for your thoughts?”
She smiled, for if he had actually given her a penny for every time she heard him say that phrase to someone she would have twenty bucks by now. Kayn snuggl
ed under the blanket while just continuing to look into his eyes. He tossed something on her bed. It was one of those fake rings from a bubble gum machine. She rolled over, grabbed it and held the ring up in front of her face so she could take a good look at it. Kayn smiled at him and said, “Cute. Where did you get this?”
He winked at her and replied, “In the gas station earlier. I also got a chocolate bar.”
“You didn’t get me one?” She teased.
Frost responded, “I’m having a hard time figuring out what you want.”
So am I. She bit her lip and whispered, “Sweet dreams.” She turned around to face the other direction while still staring at the little plastic ring with the fake topaz colored stone. She had no idea what he was trying to do but he’d made her day with a plastic ring. She laid there waiting for him to say something back. She heard him quietly laughing.
He leaned over her bunk and whispered in her ear, “It’s my turn to drive with Grey. Sweet dreams to you.” He tucked a loose strand of her hair behind her ear and softly kissed her cheek. Her heart flip flopped inside her chest. Kayn didn't move a muscle until he’d opened and closed the door behind him. Then she grinned, hiding her smile with one of her hands. She wanted to squeal but knew someone would hear her.
A noise came from the bunk above the one Frost had just left empty. Lexy’s voice whispered, “I’m going on record right now. That’s an exceptionally bad idea.”
Kayn was still smiling as she whispered back, “I know.” She rolled over and stared at the ring. It was the color of her birth stone. He had loved her sister. He would have paid attention to the little things. Her little things were the same as Chloe’s. That had to be convenient. She had some of Chloe’s memories and knew she was feeling her emotions. She was just lonely. Why did Frost have to be this hot? She stared at the ring. What if the ring had been given to her in an attempt to trigger one of Chloe’s memories? The ring came randomly out of a machine. He probably stuck a quarter in the machine on a whim. She was reading far too much into everything. She held it to her lips. Full grown adult men don’t give girls bubble gum machine rings. It was just a cute gesture. She fell asleep and drifted into one of her sister’s memories. Chloe was making Frost hold a buttercup to his chin to see if he liked butter and he was humoring her. He was seducing her with his eyes. He trailed one of his fingers seductively down the length of her arm, slowly along the soft skin on her upper thigh. She shivered.
