Indigo Incite

by Jacinda Buchmann

  In an attempt to sound confident, he finally said, “I’ll have the French toast and bacon.”

  “All right, I’ll put your order right in. My name’s Sarah by the way. Is there anything else I can get for you while you wait? Would you like a refill on your drinks?”

  Eddie made immediate eye contact with Liliana. For the first time, he wished that he had the ability to read her thoughts and silently communicate. This was Sarah? Their Sarah, who they had come in search of? He had pictured meeting her for the first time, had imagined what their conversation would be like, but never had it crossed his mind that she would be so…so beautiful.

  “Sure, thanks,” Liliana said.

  Sarah turned to him. “Would you like another hot chocolate?”

  “Huh?—Oh…um…yeah…sure…thanks,” he managed to sputter.

  “I’ll be right back with that.” She smiled and then turned toward the kitchen.

  As soon as she was out of earshot, Liliana giggled. “Wow, you really like her, huh?”

  “Well...”

  “She’s married.”

  “She is?” He wondered if his disappointment was obvious.

  “Yeah. And she’s pregnant.”

  “How can you tell? She doesn’t look pregnant.”

  “I saw her aura. Pregnant women have a different type of aura. It’s like a golden glow. You know how they say that a woman seems to glow when she’s pregnant? Well, it’s because of her aura. There’s no doubt about it—Sarah’s pregnant. You’ve fallen for a married, pregnant woman,” she teased.

  “I haven’t fallen for her. I just think she’s…pretty.”

  Liliana snickered under her breath. “Oh, is that all? Well, we need to think of what we’re going to say before she comes back with our drinks. Do you have any ideas?”

  “I don’t know. If she’s married, there’s no way that her husband is going to let her go traipsing off with us, and if she’s pregnant, she’s not going to want to put her unborn baby in danger."

  “There is no ‘if.' She is married, and she is pregnant. But if she doesn’t come with us, she’ll be in danger, so maybe we can use a scare tactic to try to convince her.”

  “Scare her into coming with us? I don’t know. Maybe it’s better if she stays here, or maybe we can convince her to take a short vacation and hide out somewhere.”

  “Well, we need to at least talk to her, you know? Give her the choice and let her know that she could be in danger.”

  Eddie sighed. “Yeah, you’re right.”

  “Here she comes. Time to turn on the charm.”

  Just as Sarah approached their table, Eddie mumbled under his breath, “Read my thoughts.”

  “What?” Liliana whispered.

  Through a forced smile, he mumbled, “You heard me.”

  “Here you go.” Sarah placed new glasses on the table. “Is there anything else I can get for you?”

  “No thanks. This is fine.” Eddie indicated his hot cocoa. As she turned to leave, he called out, “Sarah?”

  She turned to him and smiled. “Yes?”

  “I know you’re busy, but do you think you could sit with us for a few minutes to talk?”

  I’m not sure what I’m going to say to her, Eddie thought to Liliana, but I know you can hear me, and you can hear what Sarah is thinking, too, so if I start to fumble, help me out. Okay?

  Liliana tapped her foot on his, under the table, and he knew that she understood.

  “That’s really kind of you to offer,” Sarah replied, “but I really am pretty busy. I need to get food out to the tables or the customers are going to get impatient.”

  “I understand,” Eddie said. “We were just hoping that we could chat with you before we have to leave this morning. Do you have a break soon?”

  Sarah looked puzzled at his earnest attempt to talk. “Um, no, sorry. Julie is the only other waitress besides me for the next hour.”

  He sensed that she was anxious to escape his pleas for conversation. Any ideas, Liliana? I can’t make her sit and talk with us, and she does have a point. She has a job to do. Maybe we should just wait until she gets off of work.

  Just as Sarah started to walk away, Liliana called out, “Sarah?”

  Their waitress turned, this time with a somewhat amused but annoyed expression on her face. “Yes?”

  “The truth is,” Liliana said, “we came here to surprise you. See, my friend, Eddie, here, heard that your husband, Danny, was sent overseas with the military. He wanted to check on you, to make sure that you’re doing all right. He influenced me to come along for the ride.” At the word 'influenced,' Liliana kicked Eddie hard on the shin, so that there would be no mistaking her meaning. The night before, they had shared stories of their various powers, and Eddie had told her that he could mentally influence the actions and decisions of others. This was Liliana’s way of telling him that he should use his influential charms, now to convince Sarah to talk with them.

  Keep her talking for a minute, Eddie thought to Liliana.

  "So, you know how guys are,” Liliana continued. “They watch each other’s back, especially during times like this, when they’re sent away and have to leave their pregnant wives home alone. Eddie wanted to make sure that you’re doing all right.”

  Liliana was obviously using Sarah’s private thoughts to learn about her husband and personal life. As she continued to spin her story, he concentrated on the beautiful waitress and sent positive thoughts and energy her way.

  When he felt that he had complete concentration on Sarah’s energy, Eddie interjected into the conversation. “So it would really mean a lot if you could sit with us for a few minutes. I know that Danny would be happy to know that I came to see you.” He smiled at Sarah. It wasn’t difficult to send warm thoughts her way; just looking at her made him smile. He didn’t care if she was married or not; he could still appreciate her beauty.

  “So you know Danny?”

  “Well…” He didn’t want to lie to her. Liliana had stretched the truth a bit and had perhaps implied that they knew her husband, but she hadn’t come out and said so. If they were going to get Sarah to believe their story, it would be best if they stuck to the truth as much as possible. So far, everything Liliana had said was completely true; Danny would be happy to know that they had checked on his wife. “Why don’t you get yourself a cup of hot chocolate and join us for a few minutes. We can tell you all about it,” he said.

  “Well, it’s very kind of you to come see me. Maybe later this afternoon, when I get off of work—”

  Eddie tried to sound disappointed. “I’m afraid we won’t be here this afternoon. We have to head home.” He feared that his efforts to influence her had failed, and he conjured up a new wave of positive energy to send her way. His efforts seemed to work, because in a moment, her hesitant expression disappeared. Her face seemed to lighten, and her eyes twinkled in reaction to his smile.

  “All right,” she said, “I guess it won’t hurt to sit for a few minutes, since you did come all this way to see me. Let me just talk to Chelsea, our hostess, and see if she can cover for me for a little bit. I’ll be right back.”

  Eddie watched Sarah walk to the podium by the front door. She spoke to the hostess and then both girls disappeared into the recesses of the kitchen.

  Once Sarah was completely out of sight and earshot, he turned to Liliana with a smile. “You were brilliant. Thank you.”

  She grinned in return. “You weren’t too bad, yourself.” She stared at the fire for a minute and then asked, “Did you do the same thing on me? Charm me into coming with you?”

  Eddie shook his head. “No, not at all. But, then again, it wasn’t necessary. You could hear our thoughts, so you knew we were telling the truth.”

  “That’s true…and I trusted you from the beginning because I read your aura. Good, that makes me feel better. At least I know that I’m here on my own free will.”

  Eddie laughed. “Yeah, well, I’m not that good. I can have a
strong influence over someone, but I can’t make people do anything they don’t want to do. Sarah wanted to sit and talk with us. She just had another voice in her head telling her that she should work, instead. I just helped to quiet that other voice, for a while, so that she could concentrate on what she really wanted.”

  “And what she wants is to sit down and talk with us?”

  “Absolutely, otherwise she never would have agreed to it. Believe me, when I was a kid, I tried to convince my parents to let me stay up past my bedtime and not make me eat my vegetables. It never worked because they truly wanted me to eat my veggies, and they couldn’t wait for me to go to bed so that they could have some alone time.”

  Liliana laughed. “That’s funny. Still, I’ll bet you were able to use your gift to your advantage once in a while.”

  “Sure, like the time I wanted to go to Disneyland over spring break. My mother kept insisting that she couldn’t take the time off of work, but that time I won out and talked her into taking us. Deep down she really wanted to go. It just took a little extra power of persuasion on my part.”

  “Nice,” Liliana said and then glanced up. “Here she comes.”

  He followed her gaze. Sarah was headed their way with breakfast plates in hand.

  She set the plates on the table and took a seat. “So, where are you from?”

  “I’m sorry, we didn’t introduce ourselves. My name’s Eddie, and this is Liliana.”

  “Hi.” Liliana smiled sweetly and then occupied herself with breakfast. Eddie had his sweet-talking charm up and running and she was ready to let him do the talking.

  “It’s nice to meet you,” Sarah replied. “Where do you know Danny from? Were you in the military together?”

  “Um…not exactly.” Eddie glanced at Liliana and took a deep breath as he gathered courage to explain why they had come. He continued to focus positive energy her way. “The truth is, we don’t actually know Danny.” When he saw that she was about to ask questions, he quickly interjected, “But we do know that he is away from home right now and you’re alone. We did come here to make sure that you’re okay.”

  Obviously confused, Sarah tilted her head sideways and raised her eyebrows. “We’ve never met, right?”

  “Right.”

  “And you don’t know my husband?”

  “Uh…no.”

  “So…?”

  “All right, this is going to sound a little odd, but please just hear us out before you say anything. Okay?” When he noticed her confusion start to turn to frustration, he sent her another wave of warm energy. Soon, the frustration seemed to dissipate, and he sensed a juncture of peace settle upon her.

  She nodded. “Go ahead.”

  “I have a friend. His name’s Tyler. We only met just a few days ago…”

  As he spoke, he glanced at Liliana, who would listen to Sarah’s thoughts and be ready to warn him if he needed to boost up the positive energy.

  “So that’s why we’re here,” he concluded after he had explained the entire story. “I know it sounds crazy. It has to because that’s what I thought when Toby first contacted me. But it’s all real—every last bit of it. For whatever reason that we can’t begin to understand, there really are people after us, and they are ready to take us when they find us. Even if you don’t care about finding Toby, think about yourself and your baby. If you come with us, we can watch your back and track these people down, before they track us down.”

  “I don’t know what to say,” Sarah said.

  “Sarah,” Liliana began, “I know you must be confused, and you’re probably hesitant to run off with a bunch of people you just met, but you can’t stay here. I’ve never done anything crazy like this in my life. My parents would be furious if they knew that I wasn’t in school, but I took the risk because this is serious. There are people after us, and if I had stayed home, they would have come after me and found me, just like they’re going to come after you.”

  Sarah sat in silence. She picked up a discarded straw wrapper and began to tie it in knots. Eddie and Liliana turned their attention to their breakfast, as they waited for her to say something.

  Finally, she looked up. “I understand that you’re in quite the predicament. I get that, but…” She paused as if to search for the right words. “I’m not the girl you’re looking for.”

  They sat in momentary silence, trying to absorb this new bit of information. Was it possible that they had tracked down the wrong person? Toby had specifically told Tyler that Sarah worked at this restaurant, unless…

  “Is there another Sarah who works here?” Eddie asked.

  She shook her head. “Um, no, sorry.”

  “You are Sarah Hughes, right?”

  “I am.”

  She smiled politely, but Eddie sensed that it no longer mattered how much charm and energy he threw her way; this conversation was just about over as far as she was concerned.

  “My name is Sarah Hughes, but it’s a common name.” She shook her head again. “Obviously you’re looking for someone else. I’m sorry that I can’t help you.”

  Eddie glanced at Liliana. Is she lying? he asked, silently.

  Liliana shrugged.

  How can you not know? I thought you could always detect a lie.

  Not for the first time, he wished that he could hear Liliana’s thoughts. It was like a one-way conversation; he could silently ask her questions, but she couldn’t respond.

  Help me out, he silently pleaded. I don’t know what else to say. She has to be the right Sarah Hughes. How could there be a mistake?

  “Sarah,” Liliana began, “I know that this sounds strange and scary, but if you don’t let us help you, the kidnappers will eventually show up looking for you.”

  “Well, if they do, I’ll just explain to them, like I told you, that they have the wrong person. Sarah Hughes is a very common name.”

  Eddie felt like there was nothing else he could possibly say, but he took one last grasp at hope. “What if the kidnappers find you and they don’t take ‘no’ for an answer? What if they insist that you are the Sarah Hughes they’re looking for and they decide to take you anyways? Would you at least think about going away for a little while? Maybe you could take a trip to see family?”

  “I have nowhere to go. In fact, I am on a trip, visiting family. My home is in Fort Lewis. I came here to live with my aunt, when my husband was deployed, so that I wouldn’t be alone. I have no other family, and I’m five months pregnant.

  “Don’t worry,” she continued. “If they show up, I’m sure they’ll be able to see that I’m not the person they’re looking for, because when it comes down to it, the facts are very simple…I don’t have any special gifts. I can’t read minds, or tell the future, or make objects float through the air. I’m just plain old Sarah Hughes. There’s nothing special about me.”

  That’s where you’re mistaken, Eddie thought to himself. He wasn’t psychic, he couldn’t read auras or hear thoughts, but he was certain that there was something very special about Sarah Hughes, even if she had no powers as she claimed. He felt drawn to her and wanted to protect her, but he felt that there was nothing else that he could say or do.

  “Okay,” Eddie finally said, with reluctance.

  “Okay?” Liliana asked, in quiet bewilderment.

  What else can I say to her? he asked, silently.

  From the corner of his eye, he saw Liliana shrug and shake her head.

  “Look,” Eddie said, “I apologize for taking up your time with this crazy story, and I hope that we haven’t upset you too much. Hopefully we can find the Sarah Hughes we’re looking for. I wish you the best of luck with the baby and hope for the safe return of your husband.”

  “Thank you,” Sarah said with a sincere smile. She stood, and Eddie and Liliana rose as well. “It was nice meeting you, even under these strange circumstances. I wish you the best of luck finding your friend’s brother. If you like, I can package you up some muffins and juice to take back to the room,
for him.”

  “Thank you,” Eddie said. “That would be nice.”

  “I’ll be right back with your check and the muffins.”

  “Now what?” Liliana asked after Sarah was gone. “Where do we go from here?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t know. I hear what she’s saying, but I just don’t buy it. You can’t tell if she’s lying?”

  “No, it’s weird. Usually, when someone is lying, their auras are, well…different. Her aura changed a little, but not like she was lying. She seemed more confused than anything else. I believe her when she says she doesn’t have any powers. I certainly didn’t hear her think otherwise. But there was something strange. When I tried to listen to her thoughts, I heard—”

  She was interrupted by Sarah’s return, to the table. “Here ya go.” She handed them the check, a to-go cup with juice, and a white paper bag. “I packed a few extra muffins for the road, since it sounds like you might be gone for a while. My treat.”

  “Thank you,” Liliana said, as she accepted the bag.

  “Do you have a piece of paper I could write on?” Eddie asked.

  “Um…sure. Here.” Sarah handed him a pen and the tablet she used for writing orders.

  “I’m writing down my cell phone number and address,” he told her. “If something comes up after we leave, if anyone comes around and scares you, or you just want to talk to us for any reason, please give me a call. We’re flying out to Salt Lake as soon as we leave here to go meet a girl named Grace. She’s the last person on the list. After that we plan to head back to Arizona to figure out the next step. That’s where we’ll be.” He tore the paper off of the tablet, folded it in half, and handed it to her. “So, please, keep this somewhere safe, and call me if you change your mind.”

  She accepted the folded paper and placed it in the pocket of her jeans. “Thank you. I appreciate your concern, really I do. Good luck with everything.”

  *****

  “What, no breakfast burrito?” Tyler asked, when Liliana handed him the cup of juice and bag of muffins.

  “You were lucky to get that,” Eddie said.

  “Uh oh. What happened?”

  “She’s not coming,” Liliana said as she plopped down on the edge of the bed.

  “What do you mean, she’s not coming?”

  Eddie sat in the armchair and sighed. “Sarah claims there’s nothing special about her and she’s not the person we’re looking for.”