Unedited.
I was beat and I was tired. I was finally home. For the rest of my shift, I’d shoved the argument with Schylar out of my head but as I stood on my front steps, about to let myself into the house, I couldn’t help but pause. Why was it as I took a moment in front of my front door, that I suddenly felt foreboding? I peered through the glass and saw a couple lights still on. Nothing was really amiss about that but for some reason I felt…separated.
My eyes squeezed shut as my head got a little fuzzy and a snippet of conversation I didn’t really remember having drifted through my head.
“Listen to me first. Please?...I loved your father. I think you know that. I loved him as much if not more than you love Cecil, the brave boy that he is. But you have to understand, my darling girl, that I loved you too. I still do, you and your father both. I didn’t tell your father or you because the short time I had…I just wanted to be his wife and your mother. Being Elite…it’s like being two different people. I didn’t want to do that, split my life…
As quick as it came, it was gone and when I opened my eyes, I was still standing on my front porch. That was the second time today it had happened and I was seconds away from calling on the Lord of the Underworld to find out what the hell was going on when my phone chimed.
I dug it out of my bag and found a text from Cecil waiting on me.
See you soon.
One simple sentence, that was all it took to have me feeling a little better. Whatever was happening to me could wait for now. Right now I just needed to get my butt inside and say goodnight to my father so he could go to bed. He was slowly getting used to my schedule of ‘not sleeping’ like I used to and generally didn’t head upstairs to bed until I was home.
When I got in, I found him sitting at the kitchen table staring down at some paperwork. There was a half full glass of white wine sitting in front of him and golden oldies crooning from the sound system in the living room. I sighed before putting my stuff down, knowing full well what all this meant. My father had a rough day and there was a decision facing him, a hard one.
“Daddy.”
I thought I would’ve startled him but instead all he did was sigh, his shoulders lifting and falling rather hopelessly. “Hey, Tales. I didn’t hear you come in.”
Oh, Dad. The past couple of weeks were…I wouldn’t say our relationship was strained but it had definitely changed. Before I became Elite, he gave me more than enough room to breathe. I was a teenage girl and even though he was my father, he’d never been a teenage girl and therefore didn’t really know anything about what it took to be one. Since I could remember, he always made it clear that I could come to him with anything and he was there if I needed someone to talk to. I respected his rules, he respected my space.
But Theodore Abernathy wasn’t an idiot. He could read me just as well as he could read any putting green and since Florida, he knew as soon as he saw me the very next morning that there was something off about me. He knew there was something on my mind other than the usual boys, friends, and school stuff that I wasn’t talking to him about it. I made me think that he was feeling it all slip through his fingers too.
“I just got here.” I propped a hand on the back of his chair and glanced over his shoulder at what he was studying. “Is that about the garage?”
He nodded. “The Davidsons have officially put in their bid and the board wants me to take until the weekend to consider it.”
“You said you weren’t going to take it.”
“And I didn’t. But then Davidson propositioned the board. They liked the deal, even though it meant the building would be destroyed in the process. They said it was time to look to the future not the past or something to that affect. They’re asking me to strongly consider the proposal or they’ll take a vote.”
“You don’t think the vote will go in your favor?”
“Because the building has been up for sale for so long and costing us money in the process, no. They’ll vote to go with the Davidson proposal.”
I sat down in the seat to his left and covered his hand with mine. “I’m sorry, Dad. At least you tried. That’s what you always tell me.”
Truth was, my father always liked to win. If he didn’t, at least when it came to his golf game, he would study the tapes and my notes, talk to his swing and putting coaches, and then practice. A lot. Some of that dedication had carried over to the business world when he quote/unquote retired. He started a foundation to preserve old and historic buildings in the area and it quickly spread statewide. No one thought it would become a success but what those people didn’t know is Southerners like their history. Especially when it comes to the Civil War. When it comes to their culture and way of living, they liked to preserve the hell out of it. Like pickles, I would think. You put enough vinegar in there, those canned cucumbers would last a life time.
So the fact that my father was losing this building because someone wanted to bring in something new…it was eating him alive. But they had a point, I guess. Sometimes you just had to get rid of the past to make room for the future and what was best for the town.
“I know, Tales. I just wish they would keep something of the place.”
“And there’s been no other interest?”
He shook his head, sighing yet again. “None.” He looked up at me and gave me a brief smile. “But enough about me. How was your day?”
I snorted and sat back in my chair. “You’re going to love this. I was nominated for Homecoming Queen.”
The biggest grin I’d seen from him in days blossomed across his face. “Well that’s great, sweetheart! I’m so proud of you.”
“Yeah, well. You know me.”
“Who else was nominated? Is the competition steep?”
I shrugged and glanced down at the pattern the wood made in the table top. “Don’t really know. I was too busy worrying about things with Schylar to pay any attention.”
“Schylar?” That fatherly concern instantly flooded his voice. “What’s going on with Schylar?”
Hoping he could help me out, I said, “That’s the thing. I don’t know. Since school started we’re not spending as much time together which is normal. But he broke up with Brittany and it’s like he’s become this whole different person.”
“Different how?”
“He’s insecure and clingy. If I don’t react the way he wants me to, he freaks out on me…” I threw my hands up in frustration. “If I didn’t know any better I would think I was his girlfriend…”
My father grabbed one of my flailing hands and held it down against the table. The expression on his face was loving and enduring and had me rolling my eyes.
“Don’t be so hard on him. Teenage boys can act just like teenage girls, you know. They need just as much attention if not more.”
“I just…” I shook my head “…with everything that’s going on, I really don’t need him acting squirrely on top of it. Being Elite isn’t as easy as Dr. Wilson made it sound and I just…” I gapped at my father “…I don’t know what to do.”
“Tales…” he sighed and squeezed my hand “…you know what?”
“What? Please, Dad, tell me how to fix things with him because I don’t know how. I’ve tried to apologize and I’ve tried to smooth things over but…” He got up from the table and offered me his other hand. “What are you doing?”
“We’re going to dance.”
“Dance?”
He nodded. “That’s how I always did it with your mother when she would get all panicky like you are now. Come on,” he waved with his freehand for me to stand up, “it’ll make us both feel better.”
As I stood up, one of the only Elvis Presley songs that I could stand came on. I eyed my father suspiciously who just grinned and shrugged like he didn’t know it was going to happen. And there was no way for him to. I was the only person in the house, the whole world really, who could predict the future. Gods excluded. They were supposed to be omniscient but sometimes I wondered if it was true or not.
He backed away from the table a couple of steps so we wouldn’t bump into it and started to sway back and forth.
“You know I used to sing this to you when you wouldn’t go to sleep when you were a baby?”
I smiled and rested my chin on his shoulder. “I know.”
“You were a good baby, don’t get me wrong, but you never liked to sleep. It was like you were afraid you would miss something. Then you got used to one of us rocking you to sleep so we had to break you of that. Your mother had the hardest time letting you cry it out. She hated it when you would cry but it was what the doctor told us to do. You had to get used to not being held so much.”
“Is that when you started singing to me?”
He nodded. “We would stand at the doorway when it got to be too much and whatever came to mind, we would sing it. At first you would scream through it and eventually tire yourself out but the more often we would do it, the faster you would stop and fall asleep. We figured out which songs you liked and which you didn’t. You hated nursery rhymes and songs like that.”
“So naturally you thought of Elvis Presley.”
He chuckled. “It was better than The Beatles. Your mother loved them, you and I hated them.”
We fell into silence after that until he started humming a few bars to the song. When it ended, I felt a little bereft and without me having to ask, my father replayed it and set it to repeat.
“Are you awake?”
One eye popped open and a fuzzy image of the wall across from me came into view. This one just happened to have my book shelf lined up against it and I got a brief glimpse at titles I haven’t read in years before rolling over to look at the doorway.
Andrzej stood leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest. Obviously he was a little annoyed that I’d in fact been sleeping. Well, what the Elite passed off as sleeping. To the human world, it wasn’t actually considered sleep just a state of unconsciousness where there was no detectable brain activity. Take it from someone who just recently turned Elite, there was plenty of brain activity. Humans just couldn’t detect it.
“Come in before you wake up my dad,” I whispered at him.
The full extent of his irritation showed as he entered the room herm-uffing and closed the door. “We have things to do. I can’t believe you’re actually in bed.”
“I was tired.” And my voice indeed showed that. “Believe it or not but I don’t get as much sleep as you think I do.”
Without asking, he came around to the side of the bed that I wasn’t laying on and plopped himself down, his head turned up at the ceiling. It gave me the chance to study the side of his face. His skin was smooth. No blemish in sight. His sideburns were a little shaggier than usual and it made me wonder if I should buy him an electric razor for Christmas. He still wore the black eyeliner under his eyes which only showed off just how long his eyelashes were.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
I suppressed a smile. “I was just looking at your girly lashes. That’s all.”
His eyes rolled. “They are not girly.”
“Well they’re not exactly boy-like either. Those things stretch on for miles.”
“Just like your legs. Imagine that.” He turned to face me. “Can we go now?”
“Are you in that much of a hurry? I swear. I think you enjoy this training a little too much.”
“You’re the only challenge I have so of course I like it. Everyone else is either not up to snuff or too scared of me to even get close enough to hit me.”
“Like you would let anyone hit you anyways.”
“I let you hit me.” He rolled to completely face me, his hand tucked up under his face. “You can even hit on me if you’d like.”
“Ha! I think you do enough of that for the two of us.”
I sat up and rolled the blanket down, fully intending on getting out of bed and preparing to leave but I suddenly didn’t want to anymore. Dragging ass would definitely be a good way to describe it as I couldn’t shake the grogginess of just waking up.
That usually just meant one thing.
Unlike my other visions, this was one I couldn’t ignore. It never lasted long, was mostly just snippets, flashes of things that wouldn’t be considered important to anyone. I covered my eyes with one hand as another room flickered into transparent view.
Wherever they were, it was day time. The sunlight was streaked across the ceiling as a triangle, obviously coming from a doorway or window. There was nothing specific and wouldn’t be unless the person turned their head to look around. But I was starting to think they could feel these moments like I did when both of our worlds blurred into one, overlapping like very thin paper.
And just as I was blocking their view of my world, they were shielding me from seeing where they were. At first, there were details telling me where they were: buildings, people, him, the way both of them were dressed. But these past few times it was shots of the ceiling or a wall.
These flashes only lasted a few seconds, were blips in time, but they still bothered me. I didn’t like being connected to them or the only way the gods could track them.
“Where this time?” Andrzej asked when it was over.
“Don’t know.” I drew my hand down and gave him a rather tight smile. “But it’s sunny.”
“Half of the world is sunny right now. Did you get anything else?”
“No. Just a fun shot of the ceiling.”
“Maybe it goes with the part of the room you saw yesterday.”
“Or maybe the Fates are just being irritating and showing me that I need to take a vacation.”
He thought about it for a moment, really thought about it, but in the end, shook his head. “Nah. That’s not it.” He hopped up from the bed and patted me on the head like I was a pet. “Can’t take a vacation in the middle of saving the world.”
“Says you. The planet isn’t in immediate danger. Besides, haven’t you heard? The world is supposed to end in December not October.”
“In the wise words of Sheldon Cooper, it’s all hokum.”
I stared at him for a second before busting out laughing. Apparently I was being too loud for him so he pounced on me, covering my mouth in the process so the sound was dialed down a little. I couldn’t help myself. It was just something I never thought I would hear come out of his mouth. Hell, I didn’t even know he knew how to operate a TV let alone how to put batteries in a clicker. So it was ok, in my book, to think him quoting The Big Bang Theory was funny.
“Let me know when you’ve calmed down. Luckily enough your hyena laugh didn’t wake your father. Just made him roll over.”
That had a whole new round of laughter breaking through. Andrzej just thunked his head into the pillow next to mine and possibly almost suffocated while waiting for me to calm down.
“Ok, I’m done.”
It was muffled but thanks to his werewolf super hearing, he understood what I said. His hand came off my mouth and I took in a deep breath, letting the remaining trembles of laughter die off.
“That was nice.” He turned his head to look at me the same time I looked at him, frowning at his statement. “Hearing you laugh, I mean. You don’t do it as much as you used to.”
“If I didn’t know you hated me most days, I would think you liked me based off that statement.”
He just rolled his eyes. “I don’t hate you. You’re tolerable most days. And other days it’s actually nice being around you.”
“Didn’t have much human interaction before I came along, huh? Other than, you know, working your way through the girls at the Schola.”
“Eh…you make it sound worse than it is.”
“I talked to Caroline. She told me all about it. In fact, she compared you to a rutting deer.”
“That’s…disturbing. Have you ever seen a rutting deer?”
“My uncle took me hunting once.” Andrzej grimaced. “My dad was out of town and my uncle thought it would be fun. He taught me how to shoot a gun the summer before so he assumed it would be ok. Gave me a refresher course before we went out. So we were nestled in the deer stand when this doe came out of the bushes. My uncle told me I couldn’t shoot it because it was a girl deer. Apparently he has standards when it comes to hunting and only shoots the boy deer. Anyways, not even five minutes later, this buck comes out of the bushes right where the girl deer did and wasted no time before…”
“Ooooh kaaay. I can see where this is going.” He scrambled off the bed and started tossing clothes at me. “You’ve proved your point and now it’s time to train.”
~ * ~
Music Selection: Love Me Tender by Elvis Presley