“I know, right!” laughed Miranda.
There was an awkward pause between the two of them after the short moment of laughter.
Lydia broke the silence.
“I think this might be good for you. You need to talk to someone and get this stuff with the nightmares figured out. There has to be something…this kind of stuff can make people go crazy.”
“That’s reassuring,” Miranda responded.
“I’m not saying I think you’ll go crazy or anything,” said Lydia. “I’m just saying that I care about you, and that I am really hoping that whatever is happening with you, you can maybe take a few steps back and see whatever you need to see to help you figure this out.”
Miranda sat stoically, and then looked up at Lydia. “Thank you, really. I think you are the only real friend that I have sometimes.”
“It might seem like we may be from two different planets,” Lydia said, “But I think we share a moon or two!”
“Does that even make any sense?” asked Miranda, smiling.
Lydia laughed. “I am gonna head back to bed. I’ve got a Modern Perspectives of Ancient Religious Practices test that I will probably bomb anyway, but I will at least give it a try. It’s early, so I will probably be gone before you get up, so give me one more hug before you go.”
Miranda got up and they gave each other their goodbye hug.
“You know,” Miranda said, “If you need to find another roommate, I understand. It’s going to be tight without my half of the rent.”
“Bullshit,” blurted Lydia. “This room will be waiting for you when you decide you are ready to come home. If I have to actually keep some of that cash mom and dad send my way, then that is what I will do. Just worry about yourself right now.”
Miranda felt a little warmth wash over her when Lydia called this her home. It made her feel like even though she had to leave for a while, there was still a place of her own to come back to.
“Thanks, Lyd,” Miranda said.
“Anytime, Miri,” Lydia said with a smile. “Night.”
“Hey,” Miranda interrupted as Lydia was about to close the door behind her. “Leave the door open, okay?”
“Sure,” said Lydia. “No problem. I‘ll leave mine open too.”
Miranda got back into bed and pulled her sheets over her once more. She didn’t think that she would get anymore sleep that night, but she had to try. She had a four hour drive ahead of her in the morning, and she hadn’t packed anything yet. Not that it was going to be hard to pack. Most of everything she had could be packed into a large trunk that she lived out of the first year and three apartments that she had when she first came to town. She liked to keep things light and simple. At least that was one simple part of her life. She couldn’t tell what she had more apprehension about at that point, just before she slipped back into sleep’s grasp. Was it the fear of the nightmare returning again in that same night? Or, was it simply the thought of going home? ‘Just try to sleep,’ she told herself. Tomorrow, like many other long days and longer nights, coffee would be her best friend once more.
Interstate 75 was relatively barren in the northbound lanes that Thursday morning. Miranda had some help from Michael, the neighbor who lived in the apartment below her and Lydia, with loading her large trunk into the cargo area of her 2009 Pontiac Vibe. The car was a gift from her parents last year after the junker ’89 Buick she had been driving for some time rolled its last miles before the engine seized beyond repair. At the time, her options were very limited. She did need a vehicle, and she thought that it would allow her parents the chance to feel like they were helping (which they really were of course), being that she was always so determined to go it all on her own.
She made a quick stop at Feast’n’Baristas, her favorite coffee shop just off campus, to get some of the best caffeinated fuel around before she headed up the road. Donatello, a six-foot-four-inch Jamaican barista, who Miranda had gotten to know quite well over the last several months, was working at the counter.
“ME-ran-dah! Looking beautiful as always this fine morning!” Donatello started, as he always did, with his own special brand of charm. He set one of the house latte mugs on the counter. “Double shot espresso café mocha, no whipped cream?”
“To go, today, Donny. I am going to be out of town for a while,” Miranda said with disappointment in her tone.
“Well, then this one is on me. No charge. You just make sure to not be gone too long. This place needs your smile!” Donatello said to her with his large, toothy grin.
Miranda smiled back. “You know that I don’t like to smile.”
“Oh, I know. But when you do, it makes the rest of us feel like anything is possible!” he said with a sarcastic, yet playfully friendly retort.
Miranda gave him a quick hug across the counter, took her café mocha and headed down the road.
In mid-October in Michigan, the weather can be almost anything. Miranda had driven through snow storms in a few rare occasions that time of year with her parents when she was younger, and more recently had been riding around in a t-shirt with the windows all the way down. Luckily, today was in between those two extremes, but leaning more towards the warmer side. The windows stayed up, but it was bright, sunny and dry, with few rogue clouds in the sky.
The coffee had been gone for an hour now, and she was dreading having to stop and get gas station coffee or machine mixed cappuccino. Miranda’s iPod was on top of her leather jacket in the passenger seat. She had been listening to the soundtrack to the Rocky Horror Picture Show, which she always had fun listening to, especially this time of year. She had actually gone to see both a live performance of the show as well as the movie during one of the interactive shadow cast shows with her friends Crystal and Ryan. Miranda didn’t get into dressing for those occasions, but those two almost always went as Magenta and Riff Raff. It was probably their favorite thing in the world to do.
The Time Warp started to play through the speakers, which was ironic because she had just seen a bright green sign on the side of the road with the words “NATIVE SPRINGS - 52” on it. She sometimes felt like heading back home meant traveling backwards in time to a place that somehow got left 15-20 years behind the rest of the world. The town had only gotten its first fast food restaurants in the last 12 years. That may have been a step towards a more modern feel, but to Miranda, it didn’t do anything to help its overall identity. Native Springs for years and years still carried a small town rustic appeal. The lakes surrounding it are very beautiful and draw every sort of sportsman, from fishermen to swimmers, boaters and skiers.
Outside of the town itself are miles and miles of state managed forests for hunters, hikers, and wildlife enthusiasts. But these days, even with the vast natural resources, the advent of fast food and the struggle to put sewers in the town as ways to both protect the watershed and promote economic growth had tainted, in Miranda’s eyes, the quaint, small town feel. Even though she felt she had to escape to a larger, more steel and concrete based environment in the world, she had a special place in her heart for the cozy comfort of the town she knew as a young child. Now, it was a place trapped between two distant worlds, as it was destined to be eventually, being right off the main interstate going straight through the middle of Michigan’s northern Lower Peninsula.
There was nothing overly exciting about the last several miles before her freeway exit. The colors of the trees farther south off the interstate were far more vivid and lustrous than they were around this area. Some golden browns and yellows, with a few occasional oranges and reds were all that was left to see, while many trees had already lost most of their leaves. This far north, there had already been a couple hard frost mornings, and usually on a day after an evening hard frost, you can sit quietly under the trees in your yard and watch a steady stream of leaves fall from the trees for hours. That was one of the things that Miranda would think about sometimes when things seemed to pile up too high on her plate in the big city. She would sometime
s just sit quietly in her room and close her eyes and try to imagine sitting in her family’s yard as the leaves slowly fell from above and landed around her and upon her. She could almost see herself running around in the backyard under the tall oak and maple trees, trying to catch the leaves as they fell.
She found herself daydreaming, and almost missing her exit ramp. Another unsettling feeling that brought her back to reality was the fact that she wasn’t returning to her childhood home. Her parents had closed on the sale of the home back in early June, and they moved five miles to the other side of town. The two story home they had for years was more room than they needed and getting very expensive to heat in the recent harsh winters, so they bought a few acres outside of town in a smaller subdivision and put a modular home on a full basement. Her dad said it would be cheaper to heat, and he could build a workshop and hobby room down in the basement over time, which Miranda quickly caught on to the idea that this was going to be a long work in progress.
Miranda’s return home proved to be a logistical problem as well. While her parents didn’t necessarily need as much space, and could easily accommodate the rare visit home from the prodigal daughter, they weren’t quite prepared for what possibly could be a longer term stay. The upstairs had three bedrooms; one occupied by Miranda’s parents, another by her 17-year-old brother Steven- who was not about to share a room with his older sister- and the third being used as both an office for her father and a craft room for her mother. The basement was one large, open room full of boxed things that, several months after being moved into the house, still needed to be gone through, put away or thrown away.
Miranda volunteered to take the basement without a second thought. All she needed was a little space; maybe throw up a few sheets as walls and a cot or mattress for a bed. It would be perfect for now, and even better, it would give her a little more of a space barrier between her and her family. She loved her family, but she had been in her own space for so long now that she needed a place of refuge, especially in this new and unfamiliar dwelling.
It didn’t take long to find the new house. In a small town like this, you are familiar with almost all of the layout of the land, and Miranda had had friends that used to live in the Sherwood Trail subdivision. It was about a one mile loop off the main highway that still had many undeveloped land parcels. She drove along until she saw the sign hanging in front of the blue modular home.
The sign read “Stratton” in large letters on top. In small letters below the larger name it read “Robert, Lorri, Miranda & Steven”.
The driveway was still only gravel. Miranda thought she remembered her father saying that a garage and paved driveway would come next year. That prompted her to think that the basement was going to be filled even more with miscellaneous junk than she originally anticipated. But it was okay. As long as she got her personal space, she was fine with it. She pulled into the drive, and already saw her mother’s silhouette through the larger front window looking out into the yard.
The front door opened, and Steven was the first out to greet his sister as she stepped out of the car. His brown hair was much lighter than hers, but longer now than the last time she had seen him back around Christmas when she came home for a short two day visit.
“Sissy!” Steven said with a silly tone in his voice. He had always called her ‘Sissy’ when they were younger.
“Oh, my bouncing, baby brother!” she said back, as she hugged him, and didn’t notice until that moment that her ‘little’ brother was now a few inches taller than she was. She wasn’t short at all, being five-foot-nine, but he had to be at least six-foot-one or even taller now. Her mother came to the door, and Miranda could see, even through her smile, the concern in her eyes.
Miranda walked up to her mother as Steven proceeded to grab the trunk out of the back of her car.
“Hey mom,” she said, trying to keep a smile on her face.
Her mother came down off the porch and put her arms around her daughter.
“I’ve missed you, baby girl,” Lorri Stratton said to her daughter. “I’m so glad you’re home.”
“I’ve missed you too,” she told her mother, feeling a little guilty. It was true that even though she had missed her mother, she didn’t think that this was going to feel like her idea of home.
“Steven can give you the tour of the house. I would, but I want to get dinner finished before your father gets home from work. We’ve got something set up for you in the basement. Your brother can help you take your trunk downstairs.”
Lorri retreated back into her kitchen, and Steven led Miranda to the stairs descending into the basement.
Miranda could smell sawdust as she followed Steven down the stairs. She could feel her anxiety jump up a few notches as she stepped downward into the unknown.
“It sucks you have to stay down here. Dad installed a de-humidifier just the other day,” said Steven. “Not that it was all that bad to begin with, but he didn’t want to take any chances with dampness or mold or anything.”
Mold. Great.
She soon saw what the sawdust was all about, and against her will, a little smile did come to her lips.
In the far corner of the basement, there was a room. It was a room with real walls; not curtains or old sheets.
Steven caught a glimpse of her momentary grin. “Dad had me down here the last three days working on this with him. He said he didn’t want you to feel any less at home than the rest of us. It’s only temporary, until he finishes the basement, but…”
“But it’s yours for as long as you need it to be.” The voice from behind startled Steven, but Miranda only felt warmth in the sound of her father’s voice. They had not heard him come down the stairs, but even the tough girl in Miranda had a soft spot for the sight and sound of her father. Her mother had always been the nurturing parent, the one who would mostly take care of feeding them, getting them ready for school, and making sure they did their homework. But as she got older, it was her father that was the encouraging one. It was him that first told her she could do anything in this world; she just had to believe in herself. It was also her father that told her that if she felt she needed to go far away from this place, then that is exactly what she should do, much to the chagrin of her mother.
Miranda walked over to her dad and gave him a big, long hug. “Thank you Dad. It’s perfect.”
“Did you check it out inside yet?” her father asked.
“She didn’t get that far yet,” said Steven. His grin widened.
“Well, it’s not much,” Robert said. “But I think you of all people will make it work for you.”
Miranda stepped into the room that she would be staying in for an undetermined duration. Although there was no door on it yet, there was a thick curtain over the door opening, which was fine considering that she had expected the walls to be made of similar material. Inside the room was a twin bed to the left, with an end table next to the bed and a large, old antique lamp lit up on top of the end table. There was also a small desk and chair, and a short dresser that she could use for both storage and place her trunk upon if she chose to. It was only then that she noticed the walls of this little makeshift room had been wallpapered with all of the posters that she had left up in her room from the old house. Nine Inch Nails, Soul Asylum…much of it she didn’t listen to so often anymore, but it didn’t matter. This really was starting to feel like a home away from home.
Robert broke the silence. “We’re gonna let you get settled in. Come up for dinner whenever you are ready. Your mom has lasagna waiting for you. Welcome home, Miranda.”
Sleep never seemed to come easy for Miranda anymore, and the mornings always came far too soon. She felt that she hadn’t slept any better, or any worse, than she slept in her bed back at her apartment with Lydia. Steven had left for school, and her father was up far before anyone else had awakened to head to his auto body shop, but Miranda had not noticed either one leave. It wasn’t until her mother called down the stairs to le
t her know that she had some errands to run that Miranda, in a half daze, realized she was alone in the house.
In only her black tank top and underwear, Miranda climbed up the stairs in search of morning nourishment. The cupboards were full of sugary cereals only; she had hoped, although knew it would most likely be in vain, for shredded wheat or maybe some oatmeal. She opted for a bagel with cream cheese. The coffee pot was still on, and even though it wasn’t the deliciousness of the coffee from the café back home, she did appreciate the fresh ground blends her mother would find at the local grocery store.
All that was left to do this morning was ponder and shower. Shower was easy, and badly needed, but the pondering came with a little more thought and complication. All her parents really knew about her coming home was that she was starting to fall behind in some of her school responsibilities. She didn’t tell them about the nightmares. She remembered telling them about the first dream when she was a little girl, but only in passing, as it didn’t seem like such a big deal at the time. They didn’t come with the newfound intensity that they brought with them now. A realization came to her that she really didn’t have much of a plan at all in what she was going to do when she got here. All she knew for sure was she felt that something inside was telling her she needed to come home. And now, all she could do was to take it one step at a time. Maybe she would look up some old friends and see if they were still in town?
Right. That didn’t seem likely at all, she thought. It wasn’t like she even really wanted to be here, and seeking "old friends" to her somehow seemed like adding insult to injury. Return home with your tail tucked between your legs in defeat, and then parade yourself around in front of everyone you snubbed your nose at just a few short years before. No, Miranda decided to stick with the original plan, as loose as it may be; one step at a time.
The shower felt good, but like her sleep, was unexpectedly cut short. She heard a banging at the front door, and thought perhaps it was her mother with an arm full of groceries waiting for her to hurry up and open the door for her. She quickly dried her hair and wrapped a towel around herself as the banging came again.
In the Shadows of Fate Page 2