The meeting with Dillon and Mike moved to a conference room, as there wasn't enough room in Petra's office. Andrea came, as did their managers. Petra sat me at the end of the table with Andrea next to me. "If you start to get worked up, let Andrea calm you down," Petra said.
In the end, I wasn't the one who got worked up.
Mike and Dillon came in together, their managers right behind them. As soon as Dillon saw me, he said, "I suppose she wants to file some sort of complaint."
I watched Andrea tense up. I reached out and put a hand on her arm.
"You two are idiots," Petra said. "Sit down and shut up. This meeting is being recorded."
"You saw her," Mike said. "She was dressed like-"
"A slut," Dillon finished. "We didn't mean anything by it."
I had to physically restrain Andrea when she tried to get out of her chair. I turned her to face me and said, "Petra is on it, and nothing they say matters to me."
"She was even acting like a slut," Mike said. "Kissing everyone's neck."
No one said anything. I kept my hands on Andrea's arm. Petra looked at me, her lips tight. "Felicia, how big are you?"
"Five-two," I said. "And since coming to work here, I'm down to about one-fifteen. I feel great."
"How much wine did you intend to consume?"
"A sip from Karen, the glass I poured for myself, and part of your glass," I told her. "I was at my boss's party. I didn't want to get sloppy. Plus that costume, well, I didn't want my flirting to go too far. There's in character, and then there is being a slut. I nursed the one I poured for an hour and a half. I thought I was being restrained. It didn't occur to me that someone would fill it when I wasn't looking."
"Which of you asked her whether she was driving?" Petra asked. They didn't say anything. "Which of you was going to confess to her DUI when she got pulled over? Or wanted to call her parents to tell them she'd been killed while driving drunk? She's half your size. Half. Maybe you guys can get home safely on a bottle of wine, but she can't. And you would get DUIs if you got caught trying it. What would have happened to her?"
They were finally smart enough to shut up.
"Renea is livid. I am livid. Felicia over there is physically holding Andrea in her chair so she doesn't do something stupid." Petra paused.
"These are your termination papers. You are no longer employed by Renea Impressions. You will be paid through today. No severance pay. Certainly no references. If you apply for unemployment, we will state you were fired with cause, and if there is an investigation, we will play this tape where you confessed to drugging an employee if this company."
"We didn't drug her, we just gave her a little extra wine," said Mike.
"Thank you for confirming it on tape," Petra said. "Alcohol is a drug. You are fired. Security is waiting to escort you to your desks to collect any personal belongings you have. If you are ever seen on Renea Impressions property again, you will be arrested for trespassing. If you ever write anything about Renea Impressions or any of its employees, you better darned well be sure you can prove it. If you ever say anything about Renea Impresions or any of its employees, you better be sure you can prove it. I strongly encourage you to become familiar with libel and slander laws."
"You're all a bunch of fucking lesbo cunts," Mike said, standing up and storming out of the room.
Dillon was at least smart enough to keep his mouth shut as he left.
Their managers never said a word, but got up and quietly left the conference room, closing the door after themselves.
I looked over and Petra was shaking with rage. Andrea seemed to have calmed down, so I got out of my chair and walked to Petra. She was literally shaking.
"Hey," I said.
"I should have done it Renea's way," she said through gritted teeth.
"What was Renea's way?" I asked.
She turned to me and I watched her make up a lie on the spot. "Publicly," she said. I could tell she was lying.
"I guess you're up to four now," I said.
"Four?"
"Bad hires."
"Oh no, those aren't mine. Their managers hired them without consulting me. That won't be happening again."
"Thank you for looking out for me," I told her. "Want to hit the dojo early?"
"What an excellent idea!" she said. "Let me lock all this up in my office." She turned to Andrea. "Unless you need her?"
"Hell no," she said. "I'm coming with."
* * *
"I guess maybe she's not a pansy," I told Dream Petra that night. "Wow, was she mad."
Dream Petra looked away.
"Are you mad at me?"
She turned back and looked at me kindly then shook her head "no".
"Good," I said. "What are we doing tonight?"
She tossed a blanket around my shoulders and took me to her room. Then she began a tickle fight. She had to cheat to win.
* * *
Tuesday I cooked. Petra joined me. I had fun popping things into her mouth.
* * *
Tuesday night, Dream Petra had me run through more katas with the real swords. She made long, slow love to me afterwards, and we had time to cuddle before I woke up.
* * *
Wednesday night, we went for a walk. We'd been gone for a half hour, walking hand in hand, when suddenly Petra pulled me to a stop. She turned me to face her and stopped humming. "You. Wake up. NOW."
"Hey! Keep singing!" I said.
She went back to humming but pulled her sword and turned around. She hummed for a bit then said loudly, "Wake up NOW."
I pulled my own sword and put my back to hers.
"I don't know what's going on, but I'm not leaving you if there's danger."
That's when they walked out of the woods. Four men. They were large and ugly, and they immediately fanned out. Three of them stood trying to flank Petra. One faced off with me. They began talking, but I didn't understand the language.
All four of them pulled their swords.
"Back off, assholes!" I yelled. "Or The Wee Wench is going to kick your asses."
Dream Petra snickered at that taunt but kept humming for me.
The katas Petra had been teaching me were designed to deal with multiple targets. I looked at the men facing us, envisioned what I was going to do, then told Petra, "Screw them."
I flapped at the sword of the one facing me. He parried and tried to riposte, but I slapped it away, which put him out of position. I used the rebound of my own sword to give me a backhand slap at the man on my right. He was paying attention to Petra, and I hit him pretty hard with the flat of the blade.
Petra flew into motion with the other two. I turned back to my first one, who was making a stab at me, I turned to the side, but didn't get out of the way fast enough and took a slice along my left arm.
"Damnit!" I said. "That hurt. Asshole." I went after him hard, and I don't think he was expecting that from a woman my size. I was significantly faster than he was, and I gave him a solid slice across his right shoulder. I didn't separate the arm, but he dropped his sword and fell to his knees
"Eww," I said, as I got splattered with blood.
I turned around. Petra had her hands full with two of them. One of hers was down, and the one I'd hit on the side of the head seemed slow. The other one took most of her attention.
"I'm on your left," I said, coming up behind her. I parried a poor thrust that was meant for her, then kicked the guy firmly in the balls. He fell to his knees, making a roundhouse kick that much easier.
"He's down," I told Petra.
The last one would have been able to beat me. His friends were poor, but he was good. He wasn't as good as Petra, however, and after taking a slice to his off arm, he turned tail and ran. Petra let him go.
She turned around to look at me, and that's when-
I woke up.
* * *
I was wrapped in my bed, staring at the wound in my arm as blood flowed from it. I just stared and stared as the wou
nd I'd gotten in my sleep oozed blood.
I finally clamped my hand over it and stumbled to the bathroom, where I discovered I was covered in blood, and I didn't think it was mine.
I stared at my reflection in the mirror, then grabbed a towel and thrust it over the wound in my arm.
I walked numbly to my front door, down the hall and climbed two flights of stairs, dripping blood as I went. I turned to Petra's door and began kicking it.
She didn't answer right away. I don't know how long I stood there kicking it. Kick. Pause, pause, pause. Kick, pause, pause pause.
Eventually it opened. I stood there staring at her.
"What the fuck." I said numbly. "Petra, am I covered in blood?"
She nodded.
"Why the fuck am I covered in blood off a guy I slashed with a sword in my dreams? And why am I dripping blood from this wound in my arm?"
She pulled me inside and to the bathroom. She tried to pull my arm off the towel.
"Let me see," she said.
"Fuck that! You tell me what the fuck is going on!"
"They weren't dreams," she said.
I stared at her. Nothing made sense.
"Siriena is real," she said.
"You are so full of shit," I told her. "You've been drugging me or something."
"No."
"I've been dreaming of you every night for two months," I told her.
"They weren't dreams," she said.
"I'm still dreaming. It's time to wake up, Felicia," I said. "Wakey wakey!"
"You're not dreaming," she said. "You're not going crazy. You're not seeing things that aren't there. It's all real. It's all been real. That wound in your arm is real, and you need to let me look at it."
"Fuck you," I told her. "You let me believe I was going crazy. You let me believe you didn't love me. You let me believe the only love I was worth was in my dreams. All of it was a bunch of lies."
I turned around and walked away from her. She ran around in front of me. "I need to fix your arm."
"I'm calling 9-1-1."
"You can't."
"Watch me."
"What are you going to tell them?"
I stared at her.
"There is no explanation to this that doesn't involve you getting locked up in a psych ward," she said. "And if you start babbling about your dreams, they'll never let you out."
I thought about it.
"Fuck!"
I turned around and stepped into the shower. "Please wash this blood off me."
She leaned past me and turned the water on. She adjusted it, then dropped her clothes in a pile outside the shower and stepped in with me. She closed the door and gently began washing me.
"Get me out of these bedclothes," I told her. "Rip them if you have to."
She stepped out of the shower, dripping water, and came back with a pair of scissors. She cut my pajamas off me and threw the remnants onto her bathroom floor. She tossed the scissors on the countertop and rejoined me in the shower. I let her wash my hair.
"Felicia."
"Shut up," I told her. "I haven't decided how angry I am."
She turned me roughly to face her. "You've been having intense sexual fantasies about me for two months," she said. "And it's not like you told me."
"You aren't really going to equate the two, are you?" I asked her. "They were dreams. Dreams! As far as I knew. And you knew that all along. Do not turn this back on me."
The water running over us, we glared at each other.
"Are you hurt?" I asked her quietly.
"No."
I looked down at my arm. It was dripping through the now sodden towel. "I need a doctor."
"Let me look."
I pulled my hand away and turned my eyes to the right. I felt her hands on my arm and she slowly peeled the towel off. Water started hitting it, and I hissed.
She reached past me and turned the water off, they played with my arm for a moment. I hissed again.
"It's a clean cut," she said. "Not that deep. Stitches would be good, but I'm going to use some spray disinfectant then bandage it up. Left on its own, you'd have an impressive scare, but I can heal it tonight."
"What do you mean, heal it tonight?"
"I can't pull you over when you're awake," she said. "Only when you're asleep. I'll heal it in Siriena tonight."
"Like hell you will," I said. "I'm not going."
She didn't say anything, but she stepped out of the shower and collected a first aid kit from under the sink. She came back and messed with my wound. I looked away and hissed with the pain a few times, but didn't say anything else. Finally she wrapped it up.
"I'll heal it properly tonight," she said.
I looked around the bathroom, spotted a towel, and began drying myself. It was awkward with one arm. She took over and dried me. "Go near the erogenous areas and I swear I'll kick your ass."
She finished drying me then herself. I looked up at her. "Are you going to kiss me or not?"
She looked away.
"Oh fuck you too," I said. I grabbed the towel to wrap around myself and began storming to the front door.
"Wait! Wait! Wait!" she said, running in front of me and holding her hands out. "There's a reason."
"Get the fuck out of my way."
"I want to so badly it hurts," she said.
"Fuck you."
"If I do, I can't bring you to Siriena again."
I stopped trying to get past her and stared at her.
"I made that mistake with Karen."
"So Karen knows all about Siriena. Is she laughing at me, too?"
Petra sighed. "No one is laughing at you, Felicia. And no, Karen doesn't know. Karen has worked for me for three years. I was pulling her to Siriena the way I have been with you. But we were at an event, and we both had too much wine, and she asked me to kiss her. So I did. And then after that, I couldn't pull her over anymore. A couple of days later she came into my office and apologized, said she'd had too much wine, and it had been a nice kiss. She accepted all the blame and asked me not to fire her."
"So, we have a dream lovers life, but can never touch here?" I asked her.
"No," she said. "Once you learn to travel without my help, I won't have to hum and sing for you, and we can do whatever we want in either world."
I stared at her for a minute. "Who knows?"
"Renea. Andrea. Kelly. Me. That's it at work." She paused. "It doesn't work with just anyone."
I shook my head. "Is this the exotic travel you've been promising me?"
"You have to admit, it doesn't get more exotic."
I stared at her, then stepped around her and slammed the door as I left. She didn't try to chase me.
Revenge
I got back to my own apartment. There was a trail of blood on the floor. I didn't care. I found something to wear, then sat numbly on the couch, staring at nothing. I couldn't decide whether I should scream or cry. I did a little of both.
Dervish jumped up in my lap and settled in. I scratched his ears.
After a while, there was a knock at the door. I ignored it. Then the door opened and Petra let herself in.
I turned around her and stared at her. "Oh, of course you have a key to my apartment." I turned back and looked out the window. "Don't worry, I'll be out as soon as I can find somewhere new."
She walked over and sat down. "Please don't go. Please don't decide anything while you're angry."
I started to cry again. "Nothing was real. No one was honest. You got a job for your fucking girlfriend and wouldn't even keep her for yourself, but foisted her off on someone else."
She came over to hug me.
"Don't touch me!"
She backed away. "It wasn't like that."
"Karen is exceedingly good at her job," she said. "And you would hate human resources. However, you're brilliant as Andrea's assistant, and we're grooming you for any job in the company you want."
I stared out the window for a while before asking, "What do
you want now?"
"For you to forgive me."
"After that?"
"Be with me. Let me teach you how to travel between both worlds. Then we can be together."
"Is that all this is about? Finding a girlfriend?"
"No, but as soon as I met you, I've wanted you." She paused. "And you seemed to feel the same way."
"I'm mad at you right now. I don't know if I'm going to stop being mad."
"I know."
"Go away. I'm taking a sick day. Please tell my boss I have a sword wound in the arm and might be out for a day or two."
She got up then paused. "Felicia, I'm sorry. If I could have found a different way to tell you all this, I would have."
"This is like the eyedropper, isn't it? I'm supposed to forgive you for being cruel, because your motivations were pure."
"Yes."
I turned away again. "I'm not feeling forgiving right now. Go away."
"I'll check on you tonight."
"The door will be barred."
"I need to check your arm," she said.
"I'll do it myself. I'm not an invalid. Unlike when you use your magic on me."
She pursed her lips but didn't say anything else right away. She began walking to the door. "Felicia, I'm sorry," she said before closing the door behind her.
Fuck.
* * *
I stared out the window for a couple of hours. I didn't find any answers. I got up and found something to eat.
I wandered into the bathroom and discovered I'd let my hair dry without brushing it. Great. Bad hair week. Pulling it into a pony tail with one hand wasn't easy, and using two hands hurt.
I decided I was perfectly fine if my hair scared people.
I grabbed my coat and headed for the train station across the street.
* * *
I arrived twenty minutes into dojo time. Petra stopped and stared at me. I went to the practice sword rack and pulled down a sword. I pointed it at her one handed and said, "You and I have unfinished business."
Petra turned to Andrea. I didn't hear what she said, but Andrea said, "Early day! Everyone out."
Karen was staring at me. I ignored her. Andrea said something to her and got her and everyone else to leave. She locked the door and placed her back against it.
"I'm going to kick your ass," I told Petra. "And you're next," I said to Andrea.
Pulled to the Dark (The Siriena Series) Page 13