Linksshifter II

A Path Between The Waves - ~~~~

Sonali bent over a little, speaking a little slower. "Ma'am, an ye need a haun wi thon board, I'll gie it. Wur here for the community anaw." As long as this woman wasn't expecting full-on Doric, or go into Racist Nan mode because an Asian was speaking it, talking Scots would probably go smoother than trying to negotiate formal English.

The woman blinked again, like she wasn't expecting it, but didn't pitch a fit or ramble off into a Burns Night speech. "Oh – if ye wid, then, thanks kindly." She raised her hands to Sonali; not just the paper, but a heavy decades-old office stapler in the other hand, half unhinged. "I'd broat ma oan stapler for I wisnae wantin tae trouble yees, but daein it awa' the side's nae licht wirk."

Sonali took the paper off her and left the stapler. "Nae mind; we've pins here for folk to no huvtae brang their ain." And, she didn't add, because it was a lot more of a pain for the staff to pry random staples out of the corkboard when they cleaned it up every so often than it was to just move the pushpins to the side. Sonali spread out a hand to hold the woman's flyer up in front of a church supper from back in April and leaned across to gather a few pins from their corner.

"A fair time it wis," the woman was saying, "an nae body'd said owt tae me; didnae ken as folk pay mind namore, mair wid raise a haun an aid an owd wummin." She laid her stapler back into her trolley with a rattle and clunk. "But ye, ye've been raised right in ra owd ways, an e'en it's no yir ain folk it's namore than richt to dae richt by yir elders." Sonali very carefully did not say anything; you didn't need a traditional dutiful-girl-child upbringing to help out someone who was in trouble, and whatever feelings she might have about helping random Scots women in her work, they had nothing to do with her respect (or currently, lack thereof) for her own family.

"Aye, well," she said, pushing back from the flyer, "ony as came here, I'd help them the same, an –" and Sonali noticed, her hand coming down, what exactly was on this flyer. There was no mistaking it – this wasn't a trick of memory, her brain fitting a rain-melted photocopy into pareidolia. This was fair fresh off the printer, some of the lines smudging where her fingers came away, and she didn't need the name under the picture to put it to an existence. He didn't come around too often, only now and again with the rest of the twins' gang to play in the back lane, but it was Gavin, speccy Gavin in the flesh, all freckles and grin. Sonali stepped back without thinking, trying to steady herself. Gavin the liar, the Pokemon hunter who promised to find the ultra-rare by the end of summer break.

"Oh hen, I'm sorry," the woman was saying, a feeble hand stretched out. "I should hae told ye my darg anent ye began – dae ye ken the lad? Or owt ae anither? So sair trow this year anaw – nae in ones by twaes an threes." She shook her head slowly, exhausted, powerless.

"No – no, it's all right." Sonali took a deep breath and gathered herself. "You're right that I know the lad – your grandson, aye? He's well kent to me, I've a brother and sister his age, about; I'm just fair shocked I never heard it from them." She hadn't heard it from them because she was never home for supper by the time the twins were sent up to bed, maybe hadn't heard about it for other reasons.

The gran shook her head again. "They're like tae broke up if they ken, the lambs; this weekend twis he came nae hame. I wicht as Lucy's having a sair hard time – his mum, ma grandochter, anaw – wi her divorce the now, but surely ye'd bite doon oan it an call his da up in Potterstoun an naw lie hopin oan it, aye? The poor boy – I can only hope he's in a hame or summat somewheres that hasnae heard, for else I'm feart we'll see him nae mair again." She sighed deeply, and dug in her pocket for a tissue to dab at the corners of her eyes.

The trilobite under Sonali's shirt was as icy as if she was standing under the waterfall again, down in the selkie cave. This wasn't an accident – this wasn't a coincidence. There was something else here, something spreading in ways that weren't immediately visible, currents under the water. There was a meme being passed around the kids around here, kids with problems at home, kids who were already following their phones to find mythical beasts in all kinds of hidden and secret places, something like if you followed this particular trail, you could get away, and get beyond, somewhere that your home problems couldn't follow you. Nobody paid attention to kids, not really, and kids in situations like that, even less: it was almost too easy to hide a train of thought like that, just by not blabbing and making sure no one thought to look for it.

But it didn't come into being just by accident: someone had to start the rumors, someone had to give them a push and hustle them along. Who was Gavin's friend from Shetland, really? Who had told those little kids about the spawn circumstances? That Liam, what had he sent to who in the short time that he was back on land? What might the missing be sending back, still, from the depths of the sea? And who was getting those messages – everyone, or just the kids with problems, kids whose house was becoming less a home, more someplace that they had to get away from, now or never. Kids from homes... like hers, if she were six and eight and ten years younger. Like the twins. Like Gavin's buddies Anjali and Ajay. Was home still home for them, or was she making her problems into their problems – making her own situation into a situation they'd want to escape?

The fear and doubt and near flat panic must have been written all over Sonali's face, because the old woman had shuffled closer, trying to say something to comfort her, to try to understand. Sonali wasn't really listening – could barely even hear in this state – but took a deep breath and before she could object, clasped the old woman's hands in her own. "Naw, it's all right, gran, it'll be all right. I'm all right, an sure as I'm here right now, I promise you that your Gavin's still alive, an he'll come safe home. There's more in this than I can tell or you'd ever ken, but in this moment he's alive an safe an well – an I don't barely but half ken what I got to do, but there's no power in earth or hell that'd block me from bringing him, thon Liam, all of these missing back safe to land again." The woman was more confused than anything else, but seemed to be taking a little heart; Sonali's head was still reeling, and at the first chance, Gerry calling for her from the inside through the open door, she let go and turned, staggering back into the store, trying with all her might to hold it together, to get herself back on an even keel, because she was going to need to be, now like never.

She'd thought she had time; she'd thought that it wouldn't be the worst or impossible to let someone else follow the strands she had grasped and bound together. She was wrong. The amulet around her neck seemed to be pressing itself into Sonali's chest with a luminous chill, responding to her agitation: that thing was the key to all of this, one way or another, and if she didn't know how to start, it was well past time to start failing at it. Every day – every minute – she let this go and didn't start bringing it to its ends, the danger increased: if she waited and whiled, it would be her close that would have the police cars parked silent in front of it, and then it would be too late.