by Chogan Swan
Bernard levered his long limbs out of the door and slung the bullpup on his back as he surveyed the surrounding wonders. Kaitlin grabbed her hat from the luggage area behind her and slid past him. Bernard took a belated step out of her way. Marian scrambled out of the door behind Kaitlin and stood looking at the water, crossing her legs in the half-curtsy Kaitlin had come to recognize as the need to pee.
A plump woman carrying a clipboard was halfway across the parking lot headed toward them. “Good evening,” she called to them as she came, striding in a way that said, I’m in charge.
Kaitlin buckled Promisekeeper in place and tied the bottom laces. When the woman was close enough to register Promisekeeper and the bullpup slung on Bernard’s back, she stopped in her tracks for a moment then came on more sedately. Kaitlin took off her hoodie and tossed it behind her over the armrest of the middle seat then put her hat on, tugging it in place. Calypso and Razor got out and slammed the car doors. The woman turned her head to frown at them. Razor ignored her, but she received a big grin from Calypso.
The woman made a beeline for Bernard who turned, still distracted by the tower and its surrounding field of mirrors.
“Good evening,” she repeated as she covered the final steps and came to a wide-legged power stance that, unfortunately, only showed how short her legs were.
“Good evening,” Kaitlin said, stepping up next to Bernard. “Is there somewhere the little girl can go to use a bathroom?”
“In a minute, dear,” said the woman, glancing at Kaitlin before turning back to Bernard. “I’m afraid open-carry of firearms isn’t permitted on-site, sir. I’ll have security come collect them and put those in the armory for you.”
Bernard turned to Kaitlin with a raised eyebrow, but she was already stepping in front of him, taking her own power stance, close enough to look down at the woman. “Marlee,” said Kaitlin, still looking the woman up and down. “Take Marian around behind the car so she can pee, would you?”
“Come on, Marian,” said Marlee in a quiet voice.
“Is Mommy going to shoot that lady?” Marian whispered.
“No, honey, I don’t think so.”
The expression on the woman’s face faltered as she registered the exchange.
Kaitlin waited until she could hear that Marian and Marlee had reached the cover of the car and were involved with taking care of business before continuing. “You seemed to have jumped past the introductions. My name is Kaitlin Sannhetsdottir. I’m the Texas territorial sheriff of Wet Gulch.” She tapped her badge with a finger. “No one will be disarming my deputy. The Nii Federation ambassador invited us here and gave us leave and power to perform our duty within the boundaries of all nations who are in alliance with the Nii Federation, including all the nations of the Native American Confederacy. This is Native American land, is it not?” She continued staring down at the woman.
The woman let out a huff of air. “Why you’re scarcely more than a child,” she said. “I will need to see some identification.”
Kaitlin shook her head. “No, you have it backwards. I need to see your authorization from the tribal council to act on their behalf. Though you are obviously no longer a child, I doubt you have a drop of Native American blood in your body.” She turned to Razor. “Am I wrong about that?”
Razor—who had come around to the near side of the SUV—shook his head, unsmiling.
Kaitlin turned back to the woman. “Now, madam, you have failed to identify yourself. You have been unaccommodating to a child in my care, rude to my deputy and me. If you don’t produce identification and documents somehow giving you authority to countermand treaty law, I will proceed to ignore you. I warn you that any attempts to violate international agreements will be met with appropriate force.”
She turned to the SUV and walked to the back hatch. Razor beat her there, opened the door and shouldered the gun case. “Let me get that for you, sheriff,” he said. “It’s nice to see one of our allies has finally shown up.” He turned to Marlee where she stood holding Marian’s hand—finished with business. “Will the sheriff and her party be staying at your place tonight, Marlee?”
Marlee nodded. She seemed to be fighting to keep a smile off her face. Calypso came up behind Razor and reached past him to grab Kaitlin’s luggage. “You can follow us, Sheriff, we know the way.”
Razor brushed by the woman who had failed to identify herself. “You don’t want to see the force she considers appropriate,” he said without expression as he passed.
Kaitlin waited for Marlee and Marian to pass, then strode after them. Bernard fell in beside her. She glanced at him from the side of her eyes. “I don’t know about you, Bernard, but I’m getting tired of people trying to take away our guns.”
“I’d noticed that,” he said. There was a chuckle buried in his voice somewhere though no one else would have heard it except Bernice.
Chapter 37 — Birthday Belated
When Marlee opened the door to the apartment she shared with Brian, Calypso followed her in with the bags and the box of food she’d brought to Puerto Peñasco. “Anyone still hungry?” she called.
“Me, me,” chirped Marian.
“Meme? Who’s this Meme, child?” Calypso said, putting her hands on her hips. “Nobody around here with that name. Did she come in the luggage?”
“Don’t tease, Caly,” Razor said. “Dish it out. She’s been surviving on airline food.” He put the gun case by the door.
Bernard stepped inside and looked around. “Looks like a tiny house designer had a field day with this place. This is truly a work of art.”
“My dad will be pleased you think so,” Marlee said.
“You say there’s food left?” Kaitlin said, coming in and shutting the door behind her. She looked around. Bernard was right, the use of space inside was...efficient, but also a lot more spacious than living with three unwashed men in an SUV. Kaitlin smiled to herself.
Marlee held plates out for people to take. Bernard was the only one to decline. Instead, he settled into the recliner, put his head back and closed his eyes. As everyone else ate, chatting and joking, Bernard began to snore quietly.
Marlee stopped in the middle of asking Marian a question. “Um. Should we go into the other room?”
Kaitlin shook her head. “You would not believe what this man can sleep through.”
“Sounds like a story there,” Calypso prodded.
So Kaitlin had to recount the event that led to them losing the trailer to the bandits and Daniels driving through a barricade on two wheels during the wild pursuit.
“Now that’s a story,” Calypso gasped between snorts of laughter.
“So say we all,” Marlee agreed with a grin.
“How did you get away from the guys chasing you after that?” Razor said.
Kaitlin paused, losing her smile. “I shot the guy who was driving their truck through the back door of our SUV with a penetrating core .458 SOCOM round from that bullpup over behind the chair where Bernard is sleeping,” she said.
After an uncomfortable moment of quiet, Kaitlin rubbed her hands on her face. “Bernard slept through that too, but the gun had a silencer and it was a subsonic round. The story’s better without that part though, isn’t it?”
“Funnier,” said Razor. “Not better.”
Kaitlin turned to regard him for a moment, but couldn’t read anything else from his face.
“You did what you had to, Kaitlin,” Marlee said and put her hand on Kaitlin’s arm.
Kaitlin turned to look at Marlee’s face, basking in the acceptance and love she’d always found there.
“I’ve had to do that kind of thing a lot, Marlee.”
“We’ll talk.” Marlee leaned over and pulled her close.
It was good to have her big sister back.
Calypso stood, from where she’d been sitting on the floor next to Razor, and nudged him with her toe. “The food’s all gone now, and we’d best be letting these tired folk get some rest.” She turne
d to Kaitlin. “Breakfast is better if you get there early. Shall we come get you about seven?”
Kaitlin nodded. “We’ll be up.... I will be anyway.”
“Me too,” Marian said as she finished her sandwich roll-up. “What are we having?”
Calypso laughed.
Kaitlin rubbed Marian’s head. “I guess you and I will need to work out more now that we’ve returned to a target-rich environment for food.” She tapped her watch. “It’s your bedtime, my girl. If you ask nicely, Marlee might read you a story first while I find the bathroom and get cleaned up so I don’t make the bed smell like a locker room.”
Marlee smiled. “I know just the one, Marian. It’s called Goodnight Me.”
“You saved it?!” It was a children’s story Kaitlin had written to read to herself two years ago as part of her self-designed inner child parenting. Brian had to argue for days to get her to publish it, and even longer to convince her to charge for it. In the end, she’d only agreed to the smallest allowable price tag.
Marlee smiled. “Of course, I keep it on my phone and read it every night.” She pulled her phone from her pocket. “While we are doing that, you can either shower at the pools about 100 meters east of here next to the public pool, or go right through there.” Marlee pointed to a door, just visible, tucked around a corner from the living area.
“I know this may sound strange to you, but I don’t think I can bathe outside without an armed guard watching, and I’m not going to wake up Bernard just for that.”
Kaitlin picked up her bag, went to the door and looked inside. “This is what the Brits call a water closet, right?” She laughed. “It’s fine. I’m just missing my swimming hole back in Wet Gulch.”
“The swimming here is amazing. I’ll take you tomorrow. Maybe we can find someone who’ll set up a guard post for you to feel at home. In the meantime, there’s plenty of hot water. We just recycle it and, this month, we have more heat than we can use.”
Kaitlin squeezed her bag and her body into the bathroom and, after some fussing around, managed to get under the steaming water spray. A vent fan came on automatically, doing a good job of clearing the air, and Kaitlin let the heat of the needle spray push away the soreness of the bruises and scrapes of her fight with Daniels.
Yeah, but you should see the other guy.
She smiled, but hoped Daniels was recovering, not that she was above hoping it took him a while.
When her fingers started wrinkling, she turned the water off and just let it drip from her body for a minute while she breathed in and out, considering tonight and tomorrow before towelling her hair then brushing her teeth with the toothbrush from the hotel.
Before leaving the water closet, she wrapped herself in the sarong Jordan had given her.
Marlee was finishing the bedtime story.
Kaitlin paused and watched them, grateful for Marlee’s help.
What do mommies do when they don’t have anyone to help them?
She had to stop for a minute as she imagined what her mother—long estranged from her own dysfunctional family—had felt when she’d heard her husband was dying of cancer. Kaitlin remembered waiting on the vinyl couch in the hospital, wondering why it was taking so long for her mother to come back from talking to the doctors.
Dear God, I never gave her enough credit.
Then she snarled at Fear and kicked it back into its cage.
“Goodnight, me,” Kaitlin whispered along with Marlee as she read the words to the story. “I’ll see you in the morning. I’ll be here all night if you need anyone to talk to. We’ll figure it out together.”
“That was a good story,” Marian said, looking up as Kaitlin walked into the room. “... even if the pictures are really little on the phone.”
“I just remember them bigger when I tell it to myself at night,” Marlee said, tacking on a chuckle at the end.
Marian nodded. “I could do that... or maybe I’ll draw my own pictures.”
“That’s a good idea,” Kaitlin said, holding out her arms. “Where are the two of us sleeping, Marlee?”
“You guys get the double bed in Dad’s room, but before that, I have something for you. I bought them for your birthday before we went to Richmond, and I’ve been holding them for you ever since.”
Kaitlin laughed. “Do you know I completely forgot my own birthday this year? It was a week after it passed before I even thought about it.”
“Well, I remembered for you. Here,” she said, handing Kaitlin a package wrapped in sturdy brown paper... somewhat scuffed.
“Open it,” Marian said.
“Yeah, open it,” Marlee echoed.
“Hang on. It’s not every day a girl turns twenty-one.”
“Twenty-one?” Marlee raised an eyebrow.
“That’s what my passport says.” Kaitlin grinned.
“Oh! Good thinking.”
“When they asked, I didn’t even have to think about it,” Kaitlin said, putting her finger to her lips. “I did stay in school long enough to learn how to subtract five from my birth year.”
“Open.” Marlee pointed at the package, speaking in the voice of imperial command.
Kaitlin pulled the tape off the side of the package and opened the end. A small, cylinder dropped into her hand. “Sweet! A tactical pen.” She flipped it across her fingers then gripped it in defensive mode.
“You aren’t done yet. Keep going.”
Kaitlin winked at Marian. “It makes her crazy to wait for anything,” she stage whispered.
“I want to see too. Open it.”
Kaitlin pulled off the rest of the wrapping paper and lifted the journal and opened it to a note.
Happy Birthday, Kaitlin. Your words are important. Don’t stop writing... ever!
“It’s stone paper, very tough as well as water and fire resistant,” Marlee said.
Kaitlin nodded, a lump in her throat.
“You have to write a story for me,” Marian said.
“I will,” Kaitlin said. “And I already did... lots of them. I just didn’t know they were for you at the time.” She turned to Marlee. “Were any of them saved?”
“All of them,” Marlee said. “Electronic copies as well as the print books. We have a complete set here and another in an archived vault. Dad and I both think your stories are important, Kaitlin.”
Kaitlin smiled. “Now that’s a nice present too. Happy birthday to me.”
Marlee grinned. “And besides that, my artwork is on a bunch of them.”
Chapter 38 — I’m a deputy
Marian touched Kaitlin’s hair, running her fingers through the heavy, red-gold waves. “I’m sorry I didn’t get you anything for your birthday, Mommy. Would you like to have the airplane from our flying trip?”
Kaitlin bent over her, smoothing the sheets. “Thank you, Maid Marian, but you keep that. You were my birthday present all by yourself, and it’s okay if you call me mommy, but I know you haven’t forgotten you have a first mommy and a daddy too. I’m going to do everything I can to find them for you. I know they must miss you very much, and I’m sure you miss them too.”
For a long time, Marian didn’t say anything, but Kaitlin felt teardrops falling on her legs like gentle rain. She spotted a clean handkerchief folded on the ledge above the bed, took it by a corner and opened it for Marian.
Marian wiped her face and nose then looked up at Kaitlin. “Lots of people died. I saw so many dead... bodies after he took me. He killed people too. He said without him, I would be dead. I don’t think Daddy and Mommy... before you... could be alive. They weren’t like you. I don’t think they would know how to stay alive.”
Kaitlin pressed her lips together. “Maybe they learned. People can change. I’ve seen people learn how to survive faster than you would think. We won’t know unless we try to find them, and we need to know.”
Marian nodded, sniffed and blew her nose. “Can you sing the song to me?”
“Sure, love.”
Marian set
tled back into her pillow, and Kaitlin slid in next to her.
After singing the song twice, Kaitlin listened to Marian’s quiet breathing and stared at the familiar landscape of Marlee’s artwork plastered everywhere Brian could find a spot. After a time, she closed her eyes. As she drifted to sleep, she smiled as Marlee began singing to her from the other room.
If you needed me, I would come to you. I would swim the seas for to ease your pain.
∆ ∆ ∆
Kaitlin treasured the mornings when she could turn her active mind down and ‘dial in’ on her strength-focused yoga workout. The sun was still below the horizon, but it coloured the eastern sky with strands of red that reminded her of drawings Marian had made depicting Kaitlin’s hair. Kaitlin’s handstand push-up sets without using a wall had finally hit double digits, and she’d managed three sets before going back to her leg workout.
She was on the concrete walkway in front of Marian’s door and could hear people starting to stir in the building. Nobody had come outside yet, other than her. Instead of carrying Promisekeeper during her yoga time, she’d strapped on the shoulder holster Bernard carried for the Glock 40 and brought that pistol out instead. It was just easier to exercise with.
Winding down, she worked through balance poses and finished by repeating the breathing discipline she’d started with—centering.
Truth.
She meditated on her focus word and then stood.
If not for this, you would have been in a mental institution at ten.
“Yes,” she replied, because answering seemed the polite thing to do.
She pushed through the door—a grin still on her face—and locked it behind her. She replaced Bernard’s pistol and went to the kitchen to look for Marlee’s French press. An induction powered teapot boiled water (already hot from the tap) in a few seconds. Soon the smell of coffee brewing drifted to her nose. She stripped and threw her workout shorts and sports bra on the shower floor then stepped in after them, rinsing herself for a few seconds, she turned the water off, wrung out her things and wrapped the towel around her waist. She left her shorts and top hanging on hooks inside the shower to dry. The day would be dry and hot—as usual—she suspected, so any water evaporating indoors would be a welcome savings on cooling.