"Yea, but we're not really that kind of family, are we?"
"No, I guess not. I'm sure you've got a lot of questions floating around in that head of yours. Really, if you wanted to ask me anything, anything at all, just ask."
"Even if it's about Mom?"
"Yes, even if it's about Mom." He broke the hug, heading back to his seat. Once there, he played with his empty bowl, rather than looking at her. She knew that it was nothing against her. Her mom had always been a sore subject between them, even before they found out that her death wasn't as cut and dry as a car accident.
"What was she doing in that hotel room?"
"Honey, I don't even know where that hotel room was. She was supposed to be in Boston at a conference, like I always told you. That might have been where the room was, but from what you told me about the video, I somehow doubt it. All I know is that she wasn’t there on business like I thought she was."
"Like we thought she was," Ellie corrected. She put the rest of her sandwich in her mouth, chewing it slowly to give her some extra time to think through everything. It was a hard part of growing up to realize that your parents don't actually know everything. With some things, they don't know anything at all. "I just wish..." she said, her mouth still half full, her tongue sticking to the roof of her mouth.
"I know," he said. "Did Agent Gorning ever get back to you with more information? He was going to look into her employment, wasn't he?"
"I actually haven't heard from him in a while," she said. The reminder of her girlfriend's father came as a surprise. After the new headmistress had started at the boarding school, and the fallout from it, things had settled down there. This caused it to fall off of the radar of Agent Gorning's agency. Despite his promises to search out for more information regarding her mother, she hadn't heard anything from him since then. That was well over a year ago. "I just sort of guess that there wasn't much to find."
"But he knew she was a spy, even before you found the video. How can he not even know who she was working for?"
"I don't think that was the problem. He knew who she was supposed to be working for, not who she was actually working for. I think that was the more important bit of information."
"I still don't believe that," he said. He picked up his bowl, dropping it into the sink behind him without leaving his chair. "Your mother was not someone who would betray us, betray her country."
"Maybe she didn't think that was what she was doing. Believe me, I've been batting these thoughts around for almost two years now. I don't want to believe anything bad about Mom either, though I barely remember her. I know it's probably harder for you."
"Your mother was a force to be reckoned with, believe me. She would have done anything to protect you. I don't know. Maybe someone had gotten to her, convinced her that the only way to keep you safe would be to work for them. That I could believe. Hell, I was working for a madwoman just on the threat that you'd been kidnapped."
"Yes, but I can take care of myself now. You know that, right? You're not going to fall for that sort of thing again."
"Of course, not. You're like your mom, a force to be reckoned with. If someone says they had kidnapped you, I'd laugh in their face."
"Well, maybe not laugh, but certainly take it with a grain of salt."
For some reason, she had a flash of the girls with the abyssal eyes, the ones that lived in her dorm, perhaps even on the same floor. She had been avoiding the floor get-togethers that had been held at inopportune times throughout the week. One of the many reasons for this was on the off chance that they would be there. That they'd corner her somehow and force her to join their strange cult. There was just something about them that made her think them capable of kidnapping her, even with her training in self-defense. She wasn't about to give them the opportunity to do anything against her.
"Speaking of which, how is that research going?" Ellie asked, trying to turn to a lighter subject.
"What research? That weird formula that the headmistress made me work on? That is something that could take my entire career to figure out. Even if I did figure it out, there's no reason to believe that it would allow us to travel to Hell, let alone get back from there if we did."
"So... no progress at all?" she teased.
"It is pretty slow going, I'll admit. Although, it's fun to play around with in my down time. I have a tablet in the bathroom just for such occasions."
"Ah, TMI," she said, flinching away from him. As she did so, the doorbell rang. Again, she was reminded of the girls with the abyssal eyes. Could they know her home address? Would they know to look for her there, if she wasn't in the dorms? Suddenly, there was a hollow pit in her stomach as she looked towards the front door, trying to see it through the intervening walls.
"I'll get it," Dave said, getting up from his stool again.
"No, I'll get it," Ellie said, hastily. "The last thing we need right now is for you to be kidnapped again. You have a very important class to teach Tuesday morning."
"You're just saying that because you're in that class." Despite his words, he sat back down, letting her get the door.
Ellie took a steadying breath as she headed through the house. She hoped that she still had a powerful enough scream, if she needed it to warn her father of the impending danger that these girls would cause. She promised herself, then and there, that, whoever... whatever these people were, they weren't going to get to her father if she had any say about it. As she came through the main hallway, she searched for something, anything, that could be used as a weapon. She had been trained in the use of all manner of weapons, both conventional and unconventional. All that she found, though, was the old coat rack. She knew that it would be too long, too unwieldy, to be anything but a detriment to her. Instead, she balled her fists, ready and waiting to throw the first punch.
When she was right by the door, the doorbell rang again. She jumped in place, her nerves already fried before she even knew what she was up against, how many there were of them, or if they were there for a fight. Her hand shook as she extended it to the doorknob. With a quick twist, she pulled the door towards her, using the movement to pivot towards the visitor, her fist already flying.
She redirected her fist, punching the wall, trying desperately to seem less like a crazy person, the moment that she recognized the girl on the other side of the door.
"Hi," Alex said, standing there in all her amazingness.
Chapter Nine
Close Encounters of an Alex Kind
Ellie's anxiety melted the moment she saw Alex. Despite the intervening years, despite the fact that Alex broke her heart when she broke up with her, despite the fact that Ellie had a girlfriend that she loved, Alex still had that effect on her. She was her first love, something that one doesn't get over easily.
"Ellie?" Alex asked. She was still standing there on the front porch, looking over at her. Alex had been one of the few other girls in their year to be as short as Ellie was. It made sense for them to be friends, though it became so much more. "Are you alright?" she asked.
Ellie realized that she still hadn't said anything, that she was still standing there, overwhelmed by Alex's appearance on her doorstep. She held up a finger as she gradually got a grip on herself, on the wave of emotions playing through her. Alex was alone, with no one behind her on the street, no one hiding around the corner waiting to jump them. Her eyes looked like their normal, amazing emerald green that always took her breath away. Nothing was wrong with this picture...
Except she still felt like something was up, something was wrong, something was just about to happen. She just wasn't sure what it was.
"Um, hi," Ellie said, hesitantly. "It's..."
"It's been a while," Alex said. "I'm... Well, I kind of feel like that's partly my fault."
It was entirely her fault. She broke Ellie's heart into a million pieces, on that day by the lake. They were supposed to be together; they were perfect together. But that wasn't enough for Alex. No, she wanted t
o be normal.
"I mean, I didn't know what happened to you," she continued, ignorant of the internal struggle that was going on in Ellie's head. "You just sort of disappeared two years ago. I heard your dad sent you to boarding school or something. But, well, I still didn't reach out. I'm sorry. I'm sorry about a lot of things, I--"
"Alex, what are you doing here?" Ellie asked, once she finally managed to get a hold of the storm that raged inside of her.
"Oh, well, I, uh... I figured we could catch up. I don't know. Maybe this was a mistake." She took a step away from her, turning back towards the street. Back away from Ellie
"No," Ellie said, quickly. She even reached out, about to take her by the shoulder. But she paused, her hands still in midair, not sure if she should. "No, I'm sorry. Let's... Can I start over? Hi, Alex. It's... nice to see you. How have you been?"
Alex turned back to her, smiling sheepishly. "I'm sorry to just drop by like this. I should have called."
"It's fine. Why don't you come in?" Ellie stepped aside, letting Alex come through the door. She noticed her father's face peeking around the doorway from the kitchen at the end of the hall and she waved him away, sending silent signals to him to mind his own business. She knew what she was doing. More importantly, she wasn't about to forget the fact that she had a very real girlfriend, one that actually wanted to be with her.
Alex knew her house almost as well as Ellie did. She barely brushed by Ellie, her skin sending electricity through Ellie as it grazed across her bare arm. Goosebumps formed, despite Ellie's better judgement. Alex headed through to the living room, and Ellie thanked God that she hadn't tried to go upstairs to her room. She settled down on the couch, looking over at Ellie with that smile that always got to her.
Ellie shook herself, stealing her nerves against Alex's wiles. She closed the door, slowly walking through to the living room. When she approached the couch, Alex patted a spot next to her, inviting her to sit way too close to her from Ellie's liking. Instead, she opted for the recliner next to the couch. It was old, and no longer comfortable, but it was far enough away from Alex that neither would be tempted to do anything.
This was the first time they had been alone together since the lake, since the breakup. They hadn't seen each other after that outside of school. It had only been a month later that Ellie had gone to boarding school, that her world had been turned completely upside down. As Alex sat there, Ellie got a flash of them both together, sitting in the back of Alex’s father’s truck, staring out across the ocean, right before she tore her heart out.
"So," Ellie prompted.
"So," Alex said. "I, uh, I saw you at school."
"School?"
"U of C? I saw you around campus. I waved, but... well, I guess you didn't see me."
"Oh, uh, no. I guess I didn't. I didn't even know you were going to U of C. I thought you wanted to go somewhere back east."
"I did. It... well, it wasn't... Mom didn't like the thought of me going so far away."
"Ah, yes. How is Dorothy?" Ellie shuddered at the thought of the woman. Dorothy was a super religious person, one of the many people that Alex didn't want to disappoint by admitting that she was gay.
"She's good. She's not too thrilled with me these days, though."
"Not thrilled with you? Why on earth would she not love her perfect, precious little girl?"
"Because I told her I was gay," Alex said. Ellie's face fell. That was the last thing she would have expected Alex to have said, ever. "Yea. I know. I just... I couldn't take it anymore. She was actually planning my wedding to Jared, of all things. I mean, we barely went out, like twice."
"Yea, I remember," Ellie said. That part had hurt almost as much as the breakup had. She had started seeing Jared, the quarterback, practically the next day. Ellie had always thought that they were seeing each other behind her back. That what she and Alex had had wasn't what she thought they had. It had almost been poetic when Mare had broken up with her steady boyfriend for Ellie, a mirror image of what had happened with Alex. "When... When did this happen? When did you tell her?" She almost wished that Alex had told her the week that she had left, that maybe, just maybe, she had done it for her.
"A couple of months ago," Alex said, with a shrug. "It's one of the reasons why she didn't want me going out east. I mean, I had a scholarship to NYU. NYU, can you believe it? And she threatened to cut me off if I went. She thought that I'd only get gayer if I went to New York."
"Well, who cares what she thinks?" Ellie asked, and not for the first time. She suddenly felt like they were back in high school, whispering about the same old secrets, the ones that Ellie wanted to scream from the top of a building. Ellie had come out to her father when she was twelve, even before she had met Alex. Alex always said that she wished she could be that brave. To Ellie, though, being with Alex had always felt like a step backwards, back into the closet. No matter how accepting the world got, there were always those people that will never understand.
"Oh, Elle, don't start. It's not like it was in high school. She's coming around to the idea. I just have to give her time. I can't... I can't lose my mom."
"I know," Ellie said. She turned away from Alex, hiding the tears that started to form in her eyes. The wound was always fresh lately, ever since she found out the truth about her mom. It still tore at her, not knowing everything, the mystery that refused to be solved. When she looked back to Alex, a look of surprise greeted her. She had always been so blasé about her mother's death, taking it as a simple fact of life. Showing that level of empathy about the loss must have shocked Alex. Ellie just shrugged, not wanting to talk about it.
"Anyway," Alex said, letting the comment stand. "I just... I wanted to let you know, I guess. I don't know. I don't think..."
"We're not getting back together, Alex," Ellie said. She meant it more as a joke than anything else, but Alex flinched away from the words like they were a knife to her heart. Ellie knew that feeling all too well. "Sorry. I'm... I'm seeing someone."
"That Becky girl?" she asked, venom sinking into her words.
"Becky?" Ellie asked, surprised. "No. She's just my roommate."
"Oh," she said. She sounded surprised, pleasantly surprised. "I just... I mean, weren't we going to be roommates? Wasn't that the plan?"
"Alex," Ellie whined. "Yes, that was the plan. You know what happened with that, though. Don't... Don't make this harder than it is."
"There's a reason why this is hard," Alex said.
"Alex, seriously. We're not getting back together. Like I said, I'm seeing someone. She's amazing. She just doesn't go to U of C, so we can't be roommates."
"Oh. You know, we could be roommates... I mean, if you'd like. I'm not all that fond of my roommate."
Ellie sat there for a moment, pondering that thought. She really did want to get rid of Becky for a roommate, but that was a dangerous thing to want. What would Mare think if she was suddenly living with her old girlfriend? What would Alex think? Would she think that was enough, that just being her roommate would mean they were getting back together? That it was even a possibility? It wasn't, not then, not ever. Ellie wasn't about to open herself up to that sort of thing again. Whether or not Alex was out, she knew that she would find some way to hurt her again, to reject her again. Besides, she was with Mare. She loved Mare. There was no reason to ever risk that, not for some old love, not even for her first love.
"I... I don't think that's a good idea."
"What about... I mean, before we were... together, we were friends, right?"
"The best of friends," Ellie admitted. She thought this line of conversation was safer.
"Can... Can we go back to that? To being friends?"
"Sure. I'd like that. It's just... I don't want to blur the lines there again, alright?"
"Sure," Alex said, smiling despite her words. "We'll be friends, though, right?"
"Absolutely. According to my father, I need friends." She looked towards the door that led to the kitchen,
knowing he was bound to have been listening in to their entire conversation. However, her thoughts weren't on her father, or even on Alex. They were lost in trying to figure out how to explain this to Mare. Her girlfriend had never been the possessive type, but she wasn't entirely sure that she would be alright with this.
"Well, your father is a smart man," Alex said. She seemed oblivious of the internal struggle that continued in Ellie. Instead, she was smiling broadly, almost gloating that she had gotten back in her good graces. Perhaps she was thinking that she was that much closer to getting her back. Ellie hoped that she wouldn't need to burst that bubble. That Alex would come to her senses before she tried to take it too far.
"Yea, but I try not to admit that too often. His ego is bad enough as it is." Stifled laughter came from the door to the kitchen. "We should probably do something sometime this week."
"Well, were you going to go to that LGBT group meeting this afternoon? We could go to that together."
"A group?" Ellie asked, annoyed, and completely surprised, that her first suggestion involved other people. "You know about me and joining things."
"Oh, I know. But, no, it's cool. I went to it over the summer, after I came out to Mom. It really helped with things. I know you're Ms. Pride and all, but you might still find it rather cool."
"I wouldn't exactly call myself Ms. Pride. I've never even been to Pride. Just because I came out before you doesn't mean that I'm any more experienced in the whole thing. I'm just being true to myself, and myself wouldn't be caught dead at one of those groups."
"Oh, please? For me? We can do something else after, or whatever. I just don't want to let you get away again." She laughed it off, but Ellie had a sinking feeling just how true those words were. Still, she resisted. Not because of her intolerance for groups larger than five. It was more because of the fact that the meeting was going to undoubtedly be on campus. There was a whole mess of weird, scary people between her and campus.
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