“And you’ll call every single day?” Her thoughts were suddenly a scrambled mess, and I didn’t know if she was doing it on purpose or more worked up than she was letting on.
“That might be a little tricky,” Daniel said. “Calls are easily traced, and the people who are tracking us definitely have the resources for those kinds of traces. We’ll have to be careful.”
He tapped impatiently on the table despite his appearance of calm. I think a part of him had been hoping Ellen would forbid me to go, would make me feel guilty enough to stay. He didn’t
understand how understanding Ellen could be. Or else he had underestimated Ellen’s ability to know when a person had to do something for reasons that didn’t always make sense.
Ellen let out a long sigh then her honey brown eyes narrowed with fierce emotion. She pointed a finger at Daniel. “You take care of her,” she demanded of him.
“Forever,” he replied.
Ellen gave my hand an extra squeeze and stood. She took a moment to compose her thoughts.
“When are you leaving?” she asked.
“Tomorrow. We’re going to drive,” Daniel said for me.
“You’re going to drive to New Orleans?” Alex asked.
“It’s the best way to stay off the radar. It would look a bit funny if I showed up with a bunch of Watchers in tow to get myself recruited by Marcus’s new pet down there. They will do their homework on me, and I have to look the part…desperate and alone.”
“You make it sound like they’re everywhere, and that they can hack into anything,” I scoffed.
“Yes,” he agreed.
“Oh.”
“We have a lot to do before tomorrow,” Ellen said as casually as she could manage. “Stories to tell the school, and packing, and whatever, so, I think we should get started.”
I knew she really just wanted to spend time with me before I left. I didn’t have to tell her that I didn’t have a clue how long this mission would take; that we could be gone for months, maybe longer. She knew. She always knew the things I didn’t say.
I changed into my clothes in one of the many rooms on the second floor. I heard Margaret and Jackson talking in low voices from the room Beatrice and Han gave them whenever they stayed.
Most of their conversation was out of my range of hearing, but the words which escaped the confines of the room were words of preparation and determination. At least, they weren’t
worried I would die a horrible death the moment I stepped out of King’s Cross. They were
focused on the mission, not the likely outcomes. I appreciated they were coming for that fact alone. Worry wouldn’t make this any easier.
I finished changing and went back downstairs. Ellen and Daniel were in deep conversation again, while Alex chatted with Beatrice. Alex avoided my gaze, her normally bubbly smile gone.
Beatrice was somber as well, her radiant face heavy with the weight of what we were all
preparing to do. I knew she was used to Daniel going on missions, but she never liked them; she could never stop the worry that accompanied each of his trips out of town.
As soon as she saw me, Ellen popped off the sofa, scrambling her thoughts. “Ready?” she asked me.
“Yep,” I said.
Daniel took my hand to talk privately. I’m going to follow in a moment, to keep an eye on things, but I think you should have this day with your mom. I’ll be close if anything happens.
Okay.
I released his hand reluctantly and followed Alex and Ellen down the hall, after a sad goodbye hug from Beatrice and Han. My feet dragged a bit as I savored the sights around me. The overly large fireplace, the exposed ceiling, the stone floors and lush carpets – they had become as much a home as my house. And now I was saying goodbye. The first of several, I was sure.
The drive home was silent. Alex wasn’t speaking to me, and Ellen was contemplating if she had made the right decision. I could understand Ellen’s thoughts of fear and confliction, but was having trouble understanding Alex’s huffy silence. I tried to listen in to her thoughts, but she wasn’t that easy.
When we got home, Alex didn’t waste any time getting to her Jeep, slamming her door, and
barreling off down the street with only the briefest of goodbyes to Ellen and an angry glare at me. Ellen and I watched her leave from our front yard.
“What was that about?” I asked, confused and a little hurt she would leave so abruptly.
Ellen sighed. “Sweetie…you’ve just decided to run off on an adventure, a scary adventure, but an adventure none-the-less. She’s hurt you’re doing it without her, especially since she is so invested in your life now.”
“Oh…” I found Ellen’s eyes. “She’ll forgive me, right?”
Ellen’s eyes went to harass the ground. “I’m sure she will…eventually.” She sighed and shook her head. Then, not wanting to spend the day in sadness, she grabbed hold of my arm and pulled me close. “What outrageous story should I tell the neighbors to explain your disappearance?”
“Alien abduction,” I said.
“Nah, they’d believe that too easily…”
“I got a contract to Sumo wrestle in Japan,” I offered.
“How about you joined the circus?” she asked.
“Hm…I don’t think that would work. Everyone knows I have a fear of clowns.”
She laughed, and led me to the porch swing, offering more suggestions. We sat, talking over the stories we would feed the neighbors, the stories growing more ridiculous with the passing
moments. Rocking companionably, it wasn’t long before our conversation shifted to other
stories, stories from her childhood and the swing we were rocking on, and I knew I was facing another goodbye – a sendoff from her past and the house I had grown to love. It was almost as difficult as the knowledge that, after tomorrow, there was a possibility I would never see Ellen again. There was a possibility I wouldn’t come home alive.
When I woke up the next morning it was early. A slow dawn crept over the dewed grass of my back lawn. The window I had left open brought me scents of summer and the steady growth of the old forest. My head pounded, and my neck throbbed, from my injury, but I knew they
weren’t the reason for the bad feeling in my gut. I rolled over, feeling a presence next to me on the bed, and saw Daniel. He had a computer on his lap, which he was staring at intensely. When he felt my movement, he looked over and smiled. The smile wavered a bit when he saw my
expression. He shut the computer and put his hand on the side of my face in compassionate
understanding. “No one would think any less of you if you stayed.”
“I would. Did you stay all night?” I asked.
“Well…just the morning hours. I had to wait for Ellen to go to bed. She had to call Sam to come over, because she was, um...crying.”
“Oh.” I sat up and avoided looking at the duffle bag she had helped me pack, which was by the chimney in the center of my room. “What time are we leaving?”
“As soon as Jackson gets back with a proper vehicle.”
“What’s with the computer?” I asked.
“It’s a tracking program I designed. It pulls the police database of a city in with state and federal databases and creates a map of the unusual disappearances. It then narrows down the criteria to disappearances related with our kind. I use it to track down Watchers and Nightstalkers killing humans. I was updating it for New Orleans, so Jackson and Margaret could use it.”
“And me.”
“And you…” he said.
“So, it tracks down bad Watchers?” I asked.
“It tracks down deaths. You have to use your own common sense and skill to find the Watcher.
This just narrows it down,” he explained.
“That’s pretty cool.”
“It’s always worked in the past.” He sat the computer on the ground and rolled out of the bed. He walked around to my side of the bed and held his hands out to
help me up. “You should probably shower and get ready. Ellen is about to get up. I’ll go pretend to just arrive while you’re in the shower.”
“Okay,” I agreed.
He kissed me lightly and left. I took a moment, savoring the slight breeze in my room and the delicate light on the trees, then gathered my clothes and went to the bathroom to get ready for the day. Ellen was red-eyed, but in control, when I finally went downstairs. Sam held her hand and glared at me as I entered. He didn’t say anything, but his thoughts were in full lawyer, accusation mode. They pointed out every guilty emotion I was feeling. How could you leave her? How can you put her at risk? Why are you being so selfish in following Daniel? There are other people in this world beyond you…What of Alex? How could you leave her to what you have done to her?
His eyes told me he knew I could hear every single accusation. I sat at the table, accepting his blame, and found Daniel’s eyes. He was leaning against the counter, watching the scene with a curious expression on his face.
“Morning,” I said to the room. I catalogued the people around me. “Is Alex coming by before…”
“She didn’t say,” Sam said. “She locked herself away in her room and wouldn’t come out when I told her to.”
“That doesn’t sound like her,” I said, hurt beyond words.
“Sometimes, people act in ways we don’t like,” Sam said pointedly.
“Sometimes,” I agreed.
“Jackson is here,” Daniel said softly. “I’ll get your bag…”
He was really giving me time to say goodbye. I was upset I wouldn’t get to see Alex, but I couldn’t change her choice; I couldn’t change the fact that I was leaving. I had already made up my mind. Ellen’s brown eyes were a doe’s caught in headlights as she looked at me. She didn’t know what to do now that the time had actually arrived. Her thoughts were panicked that we were really saying goodbye; she kept circling around the idea that it had always been me and her.
I stood and pulled her into my arms. Her hug was tight and said more than her thoughts.
She finally held me at arm’s length and smiled, setting aside her panic so that it wouldn’t be last thing I remembered her by. “I’m going to learn how to cook while you’re gone,” she declared.
“Poor Sam,” I laughed.
Sam actually smiled. He reached out and gave me a one armed hug, not forgiving me, but not wanting to part on bad terms. “Be careful, and call when you can,” he commanded.
“I will,” I promised.
They followed me to the door. Daniel was waiting with Jackson and Margaret on my lawn, the three looking like surreal lawn ornaments as they talked. Beyond them was a minivan. It was old, with duct tape holding the rear window in place, and had a sticker that said, “I hate bumper stickers”. I took that to be an ominous sign. So did Ellen.
“I feel better about this already,” Ellen muttered to Sam.
My grin at her words was crooked, but I didn’t let the scary looking van deter me. I waved uncertainly then turned to the van. The first step inside the van was the worst. It smelled of cigarettes and stale sweat as if someone had purposefully rubbed their sweaty body over the seats until they smelled as bad as humanly possible. I started coughing at the smell, but I didn’t back out. I crawled in the back and pretended to look comfortable around my coughing. Jackson and Margaret got in the front with Margaret at the wheel.
Daniel wrinkled his nose at the smell and joined me in the back, not pretending he was happy with the smell. “Could you have picked a smellier piece of crap?” he asked Jackson.
“I didn’t have to sign a title,” Jackson said. “Or pull on my contacts for an identity, which keeps us off the radar.”
“You should have leaned on someone,” Daniel said.
“Yeah, like someone with an air freshener,” I added.
I turned in my seat and watched as Ellen and Sam faded out of view, Margaret driving slow
down the narrow road of my dead-end street. Ellen waved once then turned and put her face in Sam’s shoulder to hide her tears from me. He held her tight, his eyes distant. I settled down into the seat, my arms crossed against the emotions in my chest, and tried not to think of the
goodbyes. It had felt so simple…so easy. How was it that easy? I watched the flickering trees pass us in a blur of dark morning, and listened to the song Margaret had turned up to prevent Jackson and Daniel from bickering about the van. Jackson pulled out the morning paper and, after a cursory glance at the headlines, turned to the Sudoku. He started filling out numbers as if we weren’t all headed toward the unknown in a minivan.
Daniel reached across the space and nudged my knee. “You okay?”
“Yeah...”
His face was skeptical, but he accepted my confirmation without argument. “Have you ever been to New Orleans?” he asked quietly.
“Ellen and I stayed there for a week once, but she felt weird there, didn’t like it. We moved to Baton Rouge instead. That lasted for about six months….what?”
He was staring at me thoughtfully. “Ellen always seems to know what places to avoid and when to move…” he said.
I shrugged. “It’s called being flighty.”
“Flighty has probably saved your life.”
“Maybe. Why?”
He turned toward me in the van, his long legs searching for a place to stretch out. “New Orleans has always been one of our cities. The fallen ones tend to congregate there for whatever reason, and that inevitably means more of us. Los Angeles is another big one – in America, at least.”
“Oh. I wonder why.”
“Because there are more people there,” Daniel said as if it were obvious. “Fallen ones have always been drawn to humanity.”
“I think certain cities have magic,” I replied, shaking my head at his logic. I’d been through enough of them to know. “Savannah had magic. There was just something there that went
beyond the people and the buildings. It was in the air, in the smells, in the way the night talked to you. New York is the same way.”
“So, you’re saying that a place isn’t just made up of the people and buildings, or important simply because of the value we give them?”
“I think that our conception of places, the conceived value we put to things, affects how we view a place, but I think places can be beautiful or important regardless of how any one person feels about them,” I said. “It’s sort of egocentric to say this place or that place is beautiful because people are there….what about all of nature? What about our lake? Does it stop having value when we leave?”
“But the idea of value is an idea that only people can put into effect. Value, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. If no one beholds it, how can it retain value?” Daniel said.
“You’re arguing that a place is limited by value, because of language or thought, right? That if no one is there to value it, it has no value?” I asked.
“Doesn’t it take a person to think a flower sweet smelling or a forest pretty?” Daniel countered.
“That’s assuming that people are the only ones that can appreciate life,” I said.
“I just think that life is limited by thought,” Daniel said.
“I think, therefore I am?”
“Something like that,” he agreed.
“How about I am, therefore I think?” I said.
“That doesn’t make any sense,” he scoffed.
“Life usually doesn’t. I think that there are places on this earth, places you and I will probably never see, that have wonderful value – value beyond our imaging. Just because we can’t put words to it yet, or ever, doesn’t mean it’s less,” I said.
“You’re…you have whimsy!” he said in surprise.
I laughed at his surprise. “It’s realistic to be a dreamer. Your parents probably know that. Isn’t there a quote…dreamers make the best scientists…”
“I think you just made that up.” He closed the distance between us and his eyes danced wit
h mine playfully. “But I concede to your point. Perhaps, things have meaning beyond the words we give them.”
“If this what it’s going to be like being around you two, I think I’d rather stay,” Jackson said. He filled in another number, his tongue perched thoughtfully in the corner of his mouth. Margaret gave a small grunt of agreement.
“We’re just having a discussion,” Daniel said.
“You’re going to have to explain to them what that is. I don’t think they know,” I said.
“How about we discuss what the plan is,” Jackson said. He put the paper down and turned
around in his seat.
“There’s not much of a plan. I have to contact Serenity when I get down there, and she’ll set me up with an acquaintance of hers, who is a recruiter for Marcus. I pretend to be a powerful, new Watcher with a penchant for killing. As far as you guys go…well, I can only do so many things.”
“What’s the best way to handle protecting people while we’re down there?” Jackson asked,
ignoring the implication that we were all in Daniel’s way. “We’re bound to attract notice if their Seekers start turning up dead. And I think any kind of unusual happenings would be bad for you.”
“Seekers die all the time. They’ll just figure that they crossed the wrong people. The trick is to not get seen or leave no witnesses…and to not get carried away.” Daniel tapped Jackson’s seat with his foot. “Did you hear me?”
“No witnesses…got it.”
“Once you’re in, if you can get in, will you be able to contact us?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” Daniel replied. “We’ll see when I get down there. I’ll have to get a feel for this new leader first. Gaining his trust won’t be easy.”
“Trust never is,” I agreed.
The trip was tedious. Not the way I imagined a grand adventure to start. The progressive,
monotonous symphony of wheels on pavement lent a throbbing to my already throbbing head.
After a while, I lost where my headache ended and the sound began. It became engrained in my very being. While the sound was a promise of an unknown future, the conflicting emotions
raging inside were almost as bad as the circular click of rubber on asphalt. Leaving had never felt this scary. I had always kept one foot ready to hit the road, in case Ellen changed her mind about our latest town – King’s Cross wasn’t even the longest I had ever lived somewhere – but leaving had never been harder. I thought it was because I had never really had a home before. I knew I had to be crazy to give that up – crazy enough to go to New Orleans in a stinking minivan with three people who could kill as easily as I buttered bread.
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