by E G McNally
Hardly keeping a cool façade plastered to her face, Taylor followed the stewardess down the corridor that connected the plane to the terminal, and out to where her grandparents were, with exception to airport protocol, waiting.
“Taylor!” chirped a small, elderly woman. “My dear sweet child!” she exclaimed, running up to Taylor, embracing her tightly like a long lost friend.
“Well you look just like your mother,” A tall, old man commented, overshadowing the smaller woman.
Uncomfortably wedged between the new stranger’s arms, she pulled away from the old woman, and brushed herself out. Pushing back the long strands of hair, tossed in her face, and straightening out her shirt, Taylor, uneasily watched the two of them as the stewardess interjected.
“I’m assuming you must be Pat and Mia Donalow.” She said.
Pat responded, “Yes Ma’am, I believe you’ve got some paperwork for us.”
The stewardess signed something in the file, and then handed it over to him. “You won’t mind if I see some identification, just for security purposes please?”
“No problem. I can appreciate that. It’s not like you’d want to hand her off to the wrong people.” Pat said, nodding in agreement before pulling out his driver’s license and showing the stewardess.
“Thank you, I believe that’s everything then. You folks have a nice evening,” she paused, directing her attention to Taylor, “good luck with your new home Taylor.” She said, and then gave a brief wave, before turning around and walking back towards the terminal.
Taylor silently stood, watching her grandparents for a moment. What kind of people are you, she thought, creating character profiles from their stature. Tall, confident and handsome in an old man way - not what I expected, she thought, looking up and down her grandpa. And you, petite, amiable, nonthreatening, with quaint old lady curls – not what I expected either, she thought, glancing over her grandma. Where are the guns, and attitudes, and hatefulness that my parents used to talk about? Reflecting back on the old stories, she realized neither of them lived up to the horrifying monsters that Taylor had depicted from her parent’s stories over the years, and now maybe she did have a chance to start over.
“Oh honey, I know this is all new to you. And I know we must seem like total strangers, but you don’t have to figure us out tonight. You’ve got lots of time to get to know us and we’ve got lots of time to get to know you.” Mia lovingly explained, slipping over to Taylor and pulling her back into a big hug. “And the important thing is that we’ll love you no matter what.”
Taylor became tense and very uncomfortable again, the words echoing in her mind. We’ll love you no matter what . . . Yeah right, she thought, brushing away the warm feeling that threatened to tear down her wall of safety, built up behind her tough-girl façade. “Okay, okay . . . can we just get going already? I’m really tired and I’m sure you’ve got thousands of questions you want to pelt me with.” She said, readjusting her backpack over her shoulders.
“Oh yes, sorry dear . . . let’s just be on our way then.” Mia commented, leading the way out to the car.
“We’ve got a good hour and a half until we’re home, please let us know if you want anything to eat or if you’d just like to sleep. We understand how exhausted you must be.” Mia exchanged a look of agreement with Pat.
“Anything at all,” he said, holding the door for Taylor as she jumped into the back seat, before jumping into the driver’s side himself and starting up the car.
“I am kind of hungry. I haven’t really eaten for a while.” She commented. “A burger or anything like that would be fine, if you don’t mind.”
“Of course, dear, there’s a stop up the road a little way, we’ll grab a bite there. We won’t bother you for anything else tonight. We know you must be exhausted.” Mia said, before zoning off while they drove up to a burger joint.
“A cheeseburger is fine,” Taylor relayed to Pat, as he ordered it through the window, paid for it, and drove off. She chomped down on the sandwich, enjoying every last ketchup smothered bite, “Thanks,” she muttered, keeping a fresh and polite tone with her grandparents.
This time it was Pat that responded. “Not a problem, like we said anything you need.”
Taylor began to feel uncomfortable with all the nice gestures and the sympathetic attitude. “Okay, just so that we’re clear here - you guys don’t have to keep pretending like you care about me. I know how to take care of myself and I’ve been doing it a long time. I’m not trying to be rude or anything. I just know how this works, and the sooner you stop pretending to care, the less likely I’ll get hurt, okay.” She came out and said it, what she’d always meant to say to other foster parents. It was important to her that they are honest and upfront, she was tired of being moved from one home to another and tired of all the emotional games they play. The worst thing that could happen now is that they would decide they didn’t want her and send her back, but being sent back now would be better than being sent back later, when she might actually like them.
“Darling, darling, darling . . .” Mia sighed, and then turned to Pat. “How I wish they’d notified us about her years ago.” She leaned over the side of the chair, gazing at Taylor, and empathetically whispered to her. “My, how the system has messed with you, you can’t trust anyone, can you?”
A lump formed in Taylor’s throat, she wanted to cry. She wanted to tell Grandma about all the awful things that had happened to her in foster care. She wanted to tell her how lonely she felt and how nobody cared to listen. And mostly she wanted to share with her how horrible it’d felt the day she’d lost her mother. She wanted to tell her all those things, but her mind wouldn’t let her unleash the flood of emotion that would inevitably leave her feeling vulnerable and lost. So instead she huffed at her grandma, turned away, facing the window, and muttered, “What would you know,” while gazing out the window.
The remainder of the ride was quiet, both Grandparents listened to music on the radio up front, and Taylor glared out the back window, recalling fragments of her strange dream, trying to lighten her mood, and distract her mind.
That was such a strange dream. It felt like I was really there, and that man in the uniform, he seemed familiar, like maybe I’ve seen him somewhere else, she thought. Maybe I’m so stressed out from everything that’s happened the last week that my normal life is spilling into my sleep. It’s not like I normally remember my dreams.
I wonder if I could dream about being a gargoyle again, she thought, while staring into the shadowy trees. A dark figure soared quickly through the treetops vanishing as suddenly as it appeared. Yikes, Taylor thought, peering into the darkness, finding nothing. It must be time for me to get some sleep. Now I’m seeing things.
No sooner did Taylor close her eyes to relax, did she find the car pulling into the driveway, and her grandpa making the announcement that they were home. Taylor peered out the window, barely making out the two story shape of the house and the glinting surface of the moonlit river behind. It was dark and cold, as she stepped out into the driveway, and yet a warm feeling emanated deep inside as the words “we’re home” sank in.
Chapter V: At the Tracks
The next morning Taylor awoke to the irresistible smell of bacon wafting into her room from the downstairs. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d woken up to such a great smell, and so she pulled on some pajama pants and hurried downstairs into the kitchen.
“Good morning darling, how was your night?” Her grandma pleasantly greeted her with a plateful of scrambled eggs, strips of bacon, and fresh from the oven biscuits.
“Oh, everything smells so good,” Taylor said, smiling, and then she quickly corrected herself, before snatching a plate and disappearing into the dining room. “I mean . . . eggs are good.”
Grandma brought in a few glasses of orange juice and a pitcher situating herself across the table from Taylor.
“So, how was your flight, yesterday?”
“Long and .
. .”
“Did you sleep well?” Grandpa chimed in, joining them at the table.
“I guess, but . . .”
“Do you like your room? I painted it myself.” Grandma interrupted before Taylor added anything.
“How’re the eggs?” Grandpa asked.
“Oh my God, I don’t know, you’re asking me too many questions. I can’t even breathe.” Taylor tersely replied.
“Oh sorry honey, we must have gotten a little excited.” Grandma said. “You just tell us whatever’s on your mind.” She added.
Taylor gobbled down the eggs and began on the bacon before she said anything, leaving both her grandparents waiting in anticipation for something to come out of her mouth. “The flight wasn’t too bad, but that was probably because I slept the whole time. I did have a really strange dream though, actually I sort of had the same dream again last night, and it was really weird.” Taylor didn’t continue realizing that she would have to describe it now; maybe if she changed the subject then she wouldn’t have to say anything. “The room is nice, but do you mind if I add some personal touches to it, you know, make it my own?”
“Oh sure thing honey, just don’t do anything outrageous, like taking out a wall or adding a greenhouse.” Grandma smirked.
“Funny, but I was just thinking about drawing some pictures on the walls and putting up some posters, nothing to permanent.” She smiled, successfully changing the subject.
“So how about that strange dream you’ve been having, wanna tell us about it?” Grandpa asked.
Taylor frowned.
“Yeah, you know Pat here used to be a psychologist back in the day, maybe he can help you figure out the deeper hidden message within the dream. They say that dreams are just the subconscious speaking out in abstract ways.” Grandma said.
Oh great, now I get to play someone’s guinea pig, she thought. “It’s actually really stupid now that I think about it anyway?” She said, doubting they seriously wanted to her a dream about gargoyles and men dressed in military uniforms. They probably thought she was just having dreams about boys and school.
“Come on, give you’re old grandpa something to think about.” He said.
“Okay, but I’m telling you it’s out there.
“That’s fine, I like a good challenge.” He replied.
“Well, it began with me in a house. Much like this one come to think of it.” Taylor said looking around at the room, and finding it strange that it was really similar to the dream, if not the same.
“Then some men dressed up in military uniforms came to the house. They were looking for something, but I don’t know what. They scared me so I snuck onto the roof, hiding so that they couldn’t find me.” She continued.
“After they left the house, I began flying, and then I flew into a snow storm in the mountains and found a mansion. I heard some men talking about something. It sounded like something about a stone, and saving a girl, and activating it, but then I –um, just woke up.” She cut the story short, too embarrassed to say anything about the bit where she was a gargoyle, or about the fact that she had found a large diamond recently and it was probably still inside her stomach.
“Interesting,” said Grandpa, keeping a straight considerate look.
“Wow that really does sound strange.” Grandma smirked, throwing a wink at Grandpa.
Grandpa sat for a while eating the remainder of his breakfast while Taylor sat wondering about the harsh thoughts crossing Grandpa’s mind. Maybe he thinks I’m crazy. Or maybe he’s not even thinking about it, maybe it was so stupid that he doesn’t even care, and regrets that he asked about it in the first place.
“Right, well that’s pretty cut and dry.” Grandpa finally interrupted the silence.
“I’m not crazy, I swear.” Taylor quickly defended herself.
“No darling, you’re not crazy. I just mean that all the things in your dream symbolize fairly obvious rolls in your life that could easily be bothering your subconscious.” He replied with a chuckle.
“So what do you think?” She cautiously asked.
“Well first, I think the men in the military uniforms symbolize authority, and because you recently had some problems with the police I could only ascertain that your subconscious is still bothered by the incident. When you hid on the roof in your dream it could just mean that you’re hiding from yourself, and not confronting the way you feel about the whole debacle.
“Secondly, imagining oneself flying is a rather common occurrence in dreams, especially in adolescent females, but in your case it could just represent the trip that you took to fly out here on the airplane. That seems a fairly simple inference.
“And lastly, along the same lines, the mansion in the cold mountains that you found, could easily be a subconscious view of how you see our house and the trip it took to get here. The cold could symbolize an emotionally distant association you have with us, and the long trip into the mountains to find the mansion could represent the emotional toil you must have traveled through to arrive here at your new home.” Grandpa finished, with a smug look on his, satisfied that he’d gotten it all right.
“Wow, I never really thought about it that way, but I guess it makes sense. Thank you.” She said, dissatisfied with the analysis. She felt like there was more to it than that. A chill ran down her back as her entire body acknowledged the genuineness of her dream, the bitter cold nipping at her face and hands and the amazing feeling of flexing those beautiful black wings. Something about it seemed real, but she couldn’t tell anyone that, not even Grandpa.
As she sat at the table thinking about the analysis that Grandpa had given her, she heard the disturbing headline of a local news channel drifting in from the living room, where Grandpa had retreated.
“Four more children vanished from an elementary school early yesterday morning, this time in Concord, New Hampshire, bringing the national total to forty-seven in the last three weeks. The FBI is investigating each case, but further information has not been released to the press. So please keep a close eye on your children and make sure all arrangements to and from school are explicit. Next, we’ll be speaking with John Yodel, who is on the scene in Hong Kong, where a new terrorist group is claiming responsibility for the attack on the Shanghai World Financial Center . . .”
“There you are, honey.” Grandma said, causing Taylor to jump.
“Yikes Grandma, did you hear the news? It sounds like the world is having a total meltdown. I missed a lot the last few weeks.” Taylor replied.
“Now, don’t go minding the news, there’s always something terrible going on now-a-days. You just worry about, Taylor, and everything will be just fine.” She reassured her, sending a cross look at Grandpa in the living room. “Now come on, I’ll show you around the house and then afterwards, the yard. I’m sure you didn’t get to see anything when we drove in last night.” Grandma said.
“Oh cool, I’d like to see what’s around here. I couldn’t tell for sure, but it looked like there was a river out back.” She replied, pushing the newscast into the back of her mind.
“Yes there is one; it runs out to the sea you know. The tides change the direction of flow in the river so you have to keep a close eye on it, especially if you’re going to boat or anything daring like that.” Grandma said.
She followed her grandmother around the house discovering the different rooms, an office, two bathrooms, three guest rooms, one of which had been converted into her room and the main living room where Grandpa was finishing up the news. Then Grandma stepped out into the back yard with Taylor right behind.
“It’s beautiful,” she gasped, gazing at the magnificent oak cascading shade over a vast portion of the back yard. And like a post card picture, an old rope swing hung below one of the larger branches, with the picturesque winding river looming behind.
“That’s not all,” Grandma walked down a rickety staircase and stopped at the little dock floating on the river’s edge. “I used to fish with my dad on this dock wh
en I was just a little girl, of course back then the river was so polluted you couldn’t eat any of the fish that came from it, but it was still fun.”
“You’ve lived here that long?” Taylor asked.
Grandma chuckled at the comment, and raised her eyebrow at Taylor.
“I didn’t mean that you’re really old or anything. I just meant that I’ve never known anyone to live in one place for so long. I mean look at me; I’ve never lived in one home for more than a year. That’s all I mean.” Taylor quickly defended her comment.
“Oh don’t worry, it just doesn’t seem like that long ago to me, I suppose.” She said, and then an idea struck her. “You know, I’ve got all my old fishing gear in the shed if you’d like me to show you how. And, I’m sure grandpa would love to join us, the old guru. What he wouldn’t do for an excuse to fish.” She chuckled some more, cautiously leaning over the edge of the dock, and then tossed some water into Taylor’s face.
“Hey cut it out, that’s cold,” Taylor snapped, secretly enjoying the sense of familiarity and closeness she was sharing with Grandma.
Taylor peered across the river, soaking in the beauty of the old town. She could make out a boat park, a large bridge, some classic Victorian houses, and a curious old railroad track.
“Enjoy it, while you can, this river will be solid ice in a few weeks, and the days will be so cold you won’t want to leave the house.” Her grandma said.
That gave Taylor an idea.
“Can I go explore in town later today, maybe?” She sounded pleading, hoping that she wasn’t pushing her boundaries.
“Of course, actually we should all go together. Considering you’ll need to be starting school no later than next week, and all you seem to own is a backpack with a few measly items, we should probably get you some school clothes and supplies.” Grandma replied.
