Mordred walked to the side door with Lindsey behind her catching up. She turned to find him still finishing the small rolled joint from the van ride home and she asked having noticed a man sitting outside near the tree,
"Did you see that guy out there?"
Lindsey looked around and stuck his head around the corner of the house and moved his untidy bangs out of the way, his hair nearly touching his shoulders.
"Shit." He said panicking now and holding the joint in his fingertips carefully, "Shit! Help me get rid of this."
"Who is that? What's your de-"
"That's the feds, Mora, shit. I got stuff inside! Here, make this disappear or something."
She loved his face when he was guilty and she rolled her eyes at that last comment. Lindsey was a hard worker who certainly didn't always live the life of what society called a hippie. After having returned physically and mentally scarred by the trauma of Vietnam, Lindsey found a new life in science. He was academically brilliant and partnered with Dr. David Ferrét, who fathered his best friend, they were a pair not to be trifled with or separated. David took in Lindsey as his own after returning home with the folded flag for his son, Michael, who fought by his side overseas. Michael and Lindsey had been friends since before they could tie their shoes.
It didn't take long after their introduction for Mordred to know that Lindsey is a complicated case. He was home and safe from war, but his mind was often still in the tall grasses of the jungle. Mordred understood his diagnosis of severe post-traumatic stress disorder would be a delicate fix for her father. Illnesses of the mind weren't intended for their work. But Mordred couldn't deny him.
David sat up each night with Lindsey's fits. Screaming in his sleep, crying for others that have long left him. Especially Michael. The guilt of not saving his best friend and someone's only son. David would take him in his arms to keep him from hurting himself and talk him quietly out of the jungle.
Mordred took the joint in her hands and dubbed the end into the gravel, snuffing away the ashes. She lifted one of the stepping stones leading to the side door and placed the butt underneath, pressing the stone back down with her foot.
"There." She said stomping down.
Lindsey still kept watch and he said over his shoulder,
"I bet I know why they're here."
"Why?" Mordred asked.
"Dr. Collier. They wanna scope us out after finding the tablets in his room."
Mordred scoffed and she said keeping her eyes on the stranger smoking on the front lawn, "I don't even know how Tim got those, man. He knew he could've asked me for anything and I would've made something just for him. He'd never just walk off with a whole bottle."
Mordred kept her eyes focused forward. She saw the badge on the man's hip as he sat and she patted Lindsey's back to encourage him inside. If she was going to be questioned anyhow, she didn't want to prolong it a second.
"Just go inside, Mickey. I'll deal with this." She often used his nickname to sweeten her demands. This one being a play on Lindsey's lady name: McClaine. Mordred moved forward and Lindsey gently stopped her, holding onto her wrist.
"I don't think that's a good idea. Let them come to us. It's too shady."
"It's not shady to introduce myself."
"You know that pop wants to handle this shit with Collier. He doesn't want you being involved-"
"Lindsey, Thomas can hardly handle grits that are too hot. He's 81 years old, he won't handle anything that I'm not able to do myself. Get me?"
Lindsey sighed letting her go and she turned to give him a gift for Amethyst when he got inside. She also handed him a hair elastic to tie up his messy ringlets around his face before David could say something about how unprofessional he looked. She turned back to the front and pulled out her pack of Newports from her skirt as she walked. She tried to make her steps silent as possible, wanting her approach to be undetected.
She kept her eyes fixated on his face and she saw how young he was. His aura felt gentle and warm. Someone she could agree with. But she knew she couldn't shake his hand. It would be impolite and uncouth but she didn't want to see the remembrances of someone who's trained to kill, no matter how soft they seemed. She came behind the empty seat beside him and asked softly, ripping him from a daydream it seemed.
"Is anyone sitting here?"
He stood up away from the bench and she heard in her ears how fast his heartbeat. All the hurried glances in his eyes and how he was stumbling around every thought just to say anything,
"Oh, no. Go ahead." He said as he took the cigarette from his lips. They sat back down together. She crossed her ankles on the ground and she could feel his eyes watching her. His eyes bounced from the road then back to her, he hoped he wouldn't lose his train of thought when she spoke to him. She placed a cigarette into her mouth and took the lighter from inside her pack. She struck the hammer once, then twice, then cupped her hand around the flame closer. Liam reached into his pocket to help with his own lighter and offered it across the gap,
"Try mine."
She cringed and gave up on her own. He opened the lighter as she leaned close with the cigarette bouncing on her lips. She inhaled to bring the smoke into her lungs, puffing the fumes away from her mouth and he snapped it closed.
"Can I see?" He asked motioning for her broken lighter. Usually, the cheap gas station brands are a quick fix if one knew the parts as he did. Mordred took a drag as she carefully handed it over. She was actively holding it away from her fingertips to not touch him. He sat his ankle in his lap beginning to deconstruct it, piece by piece. He unclasped the chrome guard across the front and noticed the moisture underneath the flint wheel.
Mordred could only look at the focus he had. They hadn't shared ten words but he was willing to do something so tedious for a stranger. A stranger with a fifty-cent lighter that was probably left outside exponentially in the past year.
"Is there any hope, doc?" She joked through a puff of smoke and he returned a snicker,
"Your flint is just wet."
He took his lighter again and steadied hers sideways as he ignited his own just inches below, letting the flame warm up the flint in her lighter. She watched with a smile that grew to notice his art-like hazel eyes and she said intrigued,
"That's smart. I've never thought of that."
Liam shrugged and shook his head nonchalantly, "Just something I learned in college."
He clasped his lighter closed to set down beside him and tried her own again. He hit the hammer once. Then twice. Then three times to finally see a spark again. She nodded impressed and took it back from his palm as he handed it over.
"Well, well." She hummed in a sing-song tone, "to whom do I owe the gratitude?"
She watched in horror as the hazel eyes she couldn't look away from now looked down as he outstretched his hand for a handshake along with an introduction,
"Liam Amare. I'm actually here from the Bureau."
She felt her nerves tie into knots having to decline and she played it off with some humor to stifle the awkwardness,
"Sorry boss, I don't shake on the first date."
He winced his hand backward, hoping he didn't make her feel uncomfortable. It was something new to be denied a handshake but he was willing to pick up.
"Nothing against you" She said quickly as she noticed he seemed offended, "Just a bit of a germaphobe. It's very nice to meet anyone who will fix my busted shit. I'm Mordred. Erwood. My friends call me Mora."
He was taken aback by the strangeness in her name and debated for a moment on where he'd heard it in the past. Somewhere in literature. She fought back another grin watching him open that mental filing cabinet upstairs and he spoke.
"Mordred as in...one of the knights from King Arthur?"
"Very good." She said, lighting up at his knowledge. Only a few people knew the relevance of her name but she still watched Liam's face scour in confusion as to why a woman could be named Mordred.
"The meaning behind it is just..a long story. You'll have to ask my father along that stroke."
Liam looked at his watch after hearing that comment and he stood up realizing how long he'd been out here. Mordred looked to the horizon seeing the oncoming rain storm getting closer and she asks looking towards the Pontiac convertible in the driveway,
"That yours?"
"No." Liam said as he gathered himself to move back towards the front door, "It's Tanner's, he's inside with Thomas..sorry, your father."
"I'd ask him for the keys to park it in the barn on the other side of the property. The interior will be ruined." She said still looking at the sky and he moved a little faster as he too saw the gray clouds coming,
"I'll be right back."
Mordred stayed behind and she turned as she saw Tobias' blue pickup parked in the side yard. She dubbed out their cigarettes into the stone and she wondered if he had any tarp left inside the cab from the roof repairs they did last month. She thought with just a little extra left over, they could save the convertible from damage in the rain. She looked behind the seat after opening the door and then, the floorboard, no sign of what she needed until something fell into the seat before she closed the door. A little scrap of paper, like the corner of a magazine, ripped away. She held it in her hands to make sense of the writing across the top in ink. Her eyes widened and she looked around for Tobias who rode halfway across the backfield.
She turned her eyes back to the number on the paper with a flirtatious message before it. She quickly stuffed the note into her bra before hearing Liam come back outside. She raced back to the front yard when suddenly a large crash of thunder met them with a downpour of warm rain. Liam found her in the yard and hid a smile seeing her hair already becoming wet and she said,
"It's just across the backyard! You can still make it!"
She pointed out behind her and Liam hopped inside, actually hurling himself over the driver's door to land down in the seat. The rain got heavier as he started the ignition and Mordred knew the shortcut beside the gravel road back along the fence line. She opened the passenger door, hurriedly sat down beside him and he threw it in gear to accelerate.
She wrung out her hair and watched as he swung his now dripping bangs away from his eyes as he drove and she began laughing under her breath at the madness this first impression had become. She looked over still fighting back laughter and he smiled as he too fought back a laugh remembering how he just fixed her soggy flint lighter only minutes before this.
"Maybe this is a sign to buy a new damn lighter. It's hopeless."
They both erupted in laughter as the car rushingly approached the barn. He came to a slow stop as she jumped from the cab to open the barn doors, she stood aside as he rolled in, shifting gears to bring it into park. He shut off the engine and she stood there watching the rain. "It should stop in just a few minutes. The sky isn't that dark." She said with her face still turned to the sky and she felt him coming up close behind her but not anticipating his next move. She was startled at first feeling his denim jacket become hung over her shoulders like a cloak and he said,
"I know you said you're a germaphobe but I don't want you to be cold."
She held her arms in surprise and didn't much appreciate her face becoming pink from flattery.
"No, no." She protested, "This is summer rain, Liam. I don't get cold anyways." She didn't have the biology to be cold. She didn't need to sleep when tired or eat when hungry. Anatomically human but biologically not so. She shimmied it away from her body and he refused, holding a hand up to stop her. She was again met with those animated hazel eyes that pleaded along with his words,
"If I'm cold, I know you are."
If only what he knew was one fiber of the fine grain of all she couldn't tell him. She accepted his offer and hung the jacket back over her. Reluctantly she felt the silence grow between them and she stroked her arms inside his jacket noticing how nervous she was. It could've been many things. Tim, their dear constituent, was dead. The note in Tobias's truck. She couldn't lay a finger on exactly what. But around this man, she felt calm.
"Well." He began to break the silence, "I guess since we're stuck just for a minute or two. Can I ask you a few questions? Well, I hope I don't come off too forward with anything."
Her mind raced with what he could mean by that and she listened for the thoughts she could hear in his mind and her nervousness came to a new height as he asked,
"I saw this photograph inside your house and I was just wondering-"
It was exactly what she needed to avoid. The humans putting the pieces together.