Chapter 12: Home Away from Home

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       After a couple of hours, they came to a long drive. There was a gate, but it had started to rust and collapse in on itself over the years. Beside it was an intercom, which her mother had once used to screen guests, though Charlie doubted it could even be turned on anymore.

      Charlie directed Beatrice to fly the hoverboard up the driveway, roughly a mile or so.

       It didn't take long for them to come up on a house. It was a large, modern style house that had once been on the cutting edge of architectural style.

      Now it was crawling with ivy, and had paint and brick chipped away here and there. The lawn had grown up around it, almost encasing it in raggedy mess of leaves.

      Charlie swore she felt a cold chill run down her spine just looking up at it.

     "What is this place?" Beatrice asked.

     "It's my mom's old summer home." Charlie said, taking a step towards it.

      "Won't they know we're here? Surely there's alarms or something set up." Beatrice frowned.

       "No, no." Charlie shook her head. "My father doesn't maintain the property. They stopped paying for the alarm system years ago."

        Beatrice seemed a very wary of the whole thing, and eventually said.

        "I'm going to check just in case."

         Charlie waited with crossed arms as Beatrice inspected the building for any sort of alarms or location transmitters. It took her a good hour of scanning and re scanning before she seemed reassured enough to enter.

        As they approached the front door Charlie noticed the keypad used to unlock it. Although she still knew the code by heart (1017, her birthday), it didn't do her much good with the electricity shut off.

        "How are we gonna get the do—"
       Before the words were even out of her mouth, Beatrice sent a hefty kick towards the door. Then another.  And another.

       Mouth agape, Charlie watched as, in three more kicks, Beatrice had the door flying right off of the hinges. 

       "Jesus Christ." Charlie said. "I didn't know super strength was one of your powers."

        "It's not." Beatrice said wryly as she walked through the broken door frame.

      Charlie grimaced and quickly followed behind her. "Couldn't you just like, mind crumple it instead?"

         "I could." Beatrice said. "But I'm still tired from holding off those guys earlier. We could be in another fight in a day, or even an hour and I don't want to be over exhausted and unable to defend myself if it comes to that."

        "Oh yeah." Charlie said.

        She looked around, and took in the house. It was exactly the same as she remembered it, only much more dusty. The walls were still white, and the open concept living room was still perfectly decorated with the Art Deco furniture her mother had loved. It did, however, seem like the roof had started to leak in the years that the house had sat empty.

         There were still a few things left here and there, probably exactly as they had been the last time Charlie and her mom had stayed here. That day.

        She saw one of her mother's designer handbags on the table, covered with dust and slouching. There was an open tube of lipstick next to it.

       Charlie grimaced at these things, not wanting to get closer to them. They seemed like ghosts of the past that threatened to haunt her if she got too close.

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