Now You See Me

Forty: To Be In Possession

It felt like forever had been and gone before I was able to breathe evenly again. When I became aware of the room around me, and what I had just done, I groaned.

"I don't know why I panicked," I murmured, and dropped my head to stare at the carpet. A tear ran down my face and dangled on the tip of my nose before falling. "I don't know why I panicked. Nothing happened. I just..."

I turned to look at the office door, half-expecting Chris to come stalking through it to demand what was wrong with me, but with a flash of shame I realised he wouldn't do that anymore, and that I'd probably scared him just as much as he'd scared me.

"I thought I saw something," I blurted, even though Leia hadn't said anything. I felt like I had to justify it somehow. "When Chris looked at me. But he didn't do anything; he just got out the bath. I don't know why I ran away."

"You don't have to know, Damien." Instead of standing up, Leia settled herself on the floor next to me, with her back against her desk, one knee up with her arm propped on it. "Sometimes instinct tells you what your rational mind never will, so you probably didn't panic for nothing. I'm hoping Lorien can shed some light later with that handy dandy radar of his." She turned her head and smiled at me. "For now, he doesn't seem to be doing any harm. We'll keep an eye on him."

Her eyes slipped over my head, and I looked back and jumped when I found Feila standing in the doorway. The fae had changed into a long, navy blue robe that tied at the waist and exposed her long arms, and for a moment I paused, weirdly transfixed by her. She had that effect on people, I seemed to remember, when not shrouded in exhaustion, bitter sea winds and an enormous grey cagoule which looked like it had been borrowed from David.

"Chris seems to be in some state of distress," she said, and though there was no hint of blame in the statement, it still made me feel incredibly guilty. "He has no memory of what happened before Damien ran out. He doesn't even remember him coming in."

"What a great sign," Leia said with a groan, levering herself up from the floor and stretching, face pulled into a grimace. "Ugh, I'm getting old. My back is killing me."

"No, mein Liebling, that is simply because you sleep in ridiculous positions," Feila corrected her gently, drifting as if without legs towards the desk, "If you stopped doing that, and stopped acting like a mule in the snow over replacing our mattress, your pain would be greatly reduced."

"Ack, who's the one with the medical training here?" Leia grumbled, collapsing in her chair in front of the computer.

"The only one who won't follow their own advice," Feila retorted, and then smiled down at me, offering a hand to help me up. As our skin made contact, a strange kind of buzzing warmth spread up my arm and out to the rest of my body, relieving the lingering dizziness from the panic attack as she guided me to a chair.

"He doesn't want to see me, does he?" I asked.

"I don't know," she replied. "I believe he's going to have a nap now, though, so you don't need to worry about that."

"I don't know why I panicked," I repeated, as if it would help. "I honestly don't."

A short silence prevailed after my useless statement. I knew what Leia wanted me to talk about now I was here – probably her strange way of 'taking my mind off things' – but I wanted her to ask because I had no idea where to start. I'd barely processed the events for myself, let alone gathered together a coherent account of them. Add to the mix my strange dream – or memory, whichever it was – and I didn't know where to put any of the pieces. Marilyn was the biggest anomaly of all in this; perhaps it would be easier if she just disappeared.