Exousia (Karass Chronicles Book 4)

by Beca Lewis

  “Don’t expect me to be doting like that, Sam,” Mira said.

  Sam reached over and squeezed her hand, “Thank you. I want you to become more and more your own woman, Mira, and I am grateful that you have chosen me to be in your life as you do that.”

  “Oh for heaven’s sake,” Mandy said, arriving at the table with a plate full of goodies. “Stop mooning around and start eating.” Then she winked at Mira, who winked back. They understood each other. Mandy was just as in love with Mira’s twin brother, Tom as Mira was with Sam, and they both knew it. In fact, the two of them had discussed a joint wedding. It wasn’t official for either couple, but everyone knew it was coming.

  At Valerie’s table, Harold said something that caused the group to gasp and then laugh, and when Mandy glanced up, Harold motioned her over.

  “Could you settle something for us, Mandy?” Harold asked and grabbed her hand. “Which of us is the most handsome?”

  Mandy looked at the other man at the table, and then at Valerie trying to decide if it was a joke or not. Valerie’s expression told her it was serious, but Mandy lightened it up by laughing and asking how could she ever choose. But since Harold was the more regular customer, she would pick him. It seemed to work. Valerie relaxed and gave Mandy a weak smile, and Harold asked for the check.

  After they left, as Mandy wiped off their table, she found a piece of paper with her name on it. Unfolding it, she found a five dollar bill and the words, ‘thank you.’ Wondering who wrote it and what that was all about, she stuck them both in her pocket.

  The morning continued to be busy, and Mandy didn’t think of it again until that night when she found the note while getting ready for bed. Tom was traveling, so she was alone. She took the paper out and puzzled over the writing. Who wrote it? What were they thanking her for? Mandy thought she would ask Valerie about it later and stuck it in the book she was reading so she wouldn’t forget.

  Mandy wondered how well she knew anyone in the village. Like Sam, she knew that what you see, is not usually what you get. She had been around too long, in too many ugly places to have forgotten that bitter lesson.

  Her days as an escort for men for money were long gone, but her memories, though faded into the background, had taught her not to trust looks or charm. She also knew how hard it could be to discover the true essence of someone. Yes, she would have to talk to Valerie. How did she and Harold meet? What was that look on Valerie’s face, anyway?

  Mandy drifted off to sleep, hugging Tom’s pillow instead of Tom, and wondering if something was going on that she needed to know about. She would talk to the women’s group about it at their first meeting.

  Nine

  Grace looked around the room one last time. It looked different now. For almost a year it had been the room that she and Eric sat in every morning and talked, or read books together, sometimes stopping to read a passage to each other. She had decorated it with Eric in mind. It had been Mandy’s apartment, but when she and Eric married they knocked down walls and built this room. A long room filled with light. If you wanted to, you could stand at the windows that looked out over the town square and watch everything that was going on in downtown Doveland.

  On summer nights when the band played their concerts on the green, Eric and Grace would fling open the windows and listen while snuggling on the couch together. We never had a winter together in this room, Grace thought. Only married a few months and then he was gone.

  Grace knew that Eric was sick when they married. But she had hoped against hope that he would be cured and they could live out the rest of their lives together. At least more than a few months. Instead, she had a ghost for a husband.

  Well, it’s better than never seeing him again, she thought. She saw him. Through Sarah. Or Hannah. But still, she saw him. Every once in a while.

  He looked well and happy and, if she told the truth to herself, that kind of made her mad. She knew she shouldn’t be angry. But still, sometimes the feeling was so intense it hurt.

  Eric looked better. She looked worse. At least she felt that she did. Eric told her he looked better because as a dimension traveler they could wear bodies like coats. Clean them up, look good. Didn’t she remember that we are not our bodies?

  Of course, she did. It’s just that right at that moment her body missed Eric’s, and hers was old and getting older, and she hated every minute of it. Every minute. It wasn’t like her to be so discouraged. She used to call herself a busy-body old lady, which was the truth. She still was a busy-body old lady, but now she was a sad and discouraged one.

  Sarah said that what they were going to do would help. Grace was so discouraged she didn’t see how it could. The only reason Grace agreed was because if Sarah wanted it, Grace was going to do it. Sarah had sacrificed for her, and she could never repay her, even if she only had a ghost for a husband. So did Sarah.

  So with Mandy’s help, she changed the room. If they were going to be meeting here, it had to turn into something that didn’t remind her of what she had lost, but inspired her to begin again. Today was the first day of their meeting. None of them knew what would come of it, but Sarah said it was necessary to start somewhere.

  They would start small. It would be Grace, Sarah, Mandy, Ava, and Mira.

  Grace heard footsteps on the stairs coming up to her apartment. Downstairs was her beloved bookstore and coffee house. The stairs to her apartment were through a door in the back of the store. Only her friends had a key that opened the door to the stairs. At the top of the stairs was a landing and then the door to her apartment. It was perfect. Just what she had always dreamed of having. Really, Grace thought. I am blessed. I need to get over myself.

  With a soft knock on her door, the four women stepped into the apartment.

  “Oh Grace, this is lovely,” Mira said, standing in the doorway of the newly decorated space.

  “Mandy did it,” Grace answered. “She’s a wonder.”

  Mandy blushed and said, “Thank you. I can’t tell you how much I love doing this. It makes me happy inside and out.”

  After hanging their coats in the closet outside the room, the four of them stood together looking at the two couches facing each other with a beautiful coffee table between them, placed perfectly for talking.

  “Let’s begin,” Sarah said.

  *******

  Hank kept his word and picked up Hannah on Monday after school to go meet Emily. All day in school Hanna could barely stay still. She was used to people asking her to stop fidgeting, but today was worse than ever. Her teacher finally gave up and ignored her.

  Hannah suspected that her teacher had the same problem and understood that something important was happening that day. Hannah’s suspicions were confirmed when during recess the teacher came over to Hannah and asked why she was so excited.

  When Hannah told her she was going to meet the dance teacher after school and start taking lessons, her teacher hugged her and said she understood completely. She loved to dance too. In fact, she was part of the adult students who took the class Emily taught in the town hall. Hannah thought that Ava and Evan might like those lessons, and promised to tell them about it.

  In addition, her teacher wanted Hannah to show her what she was learning and asked her to be sure to invite her to the performances. Hannah had never considered that there would be performances. It both terrified and excited her, and the rest of the school day was a blur.

  Hank said that Emily—Hannah was supposed to call her Miss Emily—taught the children’s classes in the house that she was renting. He cautioned her not to get her hopes up. Maybe it wasn’t what she wanted to do. But the moment Hannah walked in the door and saw everyone in their dance clothes, and the mirror, and the wood floor, and the barre on the wall, she knew she had found her place. It was like coming home.

  Miss Emily was busy teaching a cla
ss of little children, younger than Hannah. Hannah thought they were adorable. They struggled with getting their feet in the right place but looked as if they were enjoying every minute of it. When they all sat down on the floor to do some stretches, Hannah did the same in the back of the room. It hurt, and it felt good.

  After class, Hannah talked to Miss Emily for a while. Emily explained to Hannah that since she was starting a little later than many of her students, she would need to be diligent about practicing and paying attention. Hank waited patiently for the two of them, happy that Hannah was finding something that was moving her past what had happened last summer.

  After they were finished talking and getting to know each other, Emily gave Hank a schedule for the classes that she thought Hannah might like. Hank thought that Ava and Evan would figure out a way for Hannah to take all of them if it made her that happy.

  While Hank and Emily talked about when he would start construction out at her site, Hannah walked around the room touching everything.

  Emily watched, recognizing the signs. Hannah was going to be an exciting student to teach. It was one more indication that moving to Doveland was the right choice for her to have made.

  At first, the move was to find the answers to a family mystery. After a year of living in Doveland, she was no closer to the solution. Maybe she never would be. Now it didn’t matter as much. Instead, she had the land where she could build her dream. Doveland was becoming the perfect place to live and teach. Answers or no answers.

  Ten

  Craig closed the door to the office, made sure it was locked, zipped his coat up, and started walking to his breakfast meeting at the Diner with Dr. Joe.

  They had been meeting now early on Tuesday for over six months. It had started when he had first approached Joe about buying his practice. Their initial meetings had been filled with the tentative “test each other out” kind of conversations. Craig thought that Joe would bring folders and folders of information to their meetings to show him what kind of practice he had run for fifty years. But he never did.

  Instead, he answered every question from memory. Of course, Joe had his accountant prepare all the numbers that they needed to agree on a price for the practice, but everything else appeared to be tucked away within his memory banks.

  During those first meetings, Craig and Joe had discovered many common interests. The one that delighted Craig the most was that they both liked the idea of trying out alternative healing practices. Craig had spent too many hours as an emergency room physician to discount how important it was to take care of the body before something broke down and it became an emergency.

  At first, they only touched on the surface of the different practices, but after many months of weekly meetings, they had started to get more in depth.

  Craig was amazed at the amount of information that Joe knew. Without looking at notes, he could cite multiple incidences that proved or disproved the ideas and theories that they’d discuss.

  Their discussions had prompted Craig to do even more research into other means of healing. One modality that he was exploring was the idea that it was always the mind that did the healing. It was what the patient believed happened, or would happen, that impacted the healing more than any medicine they could use.

  However, every time he brought up the research, Joe would change the subject. Craig wondered if it was because he didn’t believe in it, or that he thought Craig was not well enough versed in the knowledge of the practice. So he let it drop, and continued the research on his own. Craig decided he would give the discussion a try again in another month or so. Besides, he could always talk that particular idea over with his friends. They loved the subject!

  Tuesday morning breakfasts were not always conversations about patients and healing. After months of being together, they had become more than an old doctor selling his practice to a younger doctor. They had become friends.

  Craig and Joe discussed everything from politics to their favorite restaurants. They had both traveled the world, so those restaurants were often found in other countries. Craig discovered that Joe loved Spain as much as he did, and they talked about taking a trip there together one day.

  This morning, they both arrived at the Diner at the same time, which made them both laugh at how in tune they had become with each other.

  As they entered the Diner, Pete’s new cook, Alex, greeted them. Right behind Alex was Johnny who had stopped in on his way to school. Craig was getting used to everyone knowing Dr. Joe. Joe had been the town’s doctor for so long there was practically no one that he didn’t know by name. If they were born in Doveland, Dr. Joe delivered them. If they lived in Doveland, he had taken care of them at one time or another.

  Johnny wanted to ask Dr. Joe if he was coming over to dinner on Wednesday. He heard his mom and dad talking about getting a group together, and his name had been mentioned.

  Craig thought that he saw a flicker of annoyance in Joe’s eyes, but it passed by so quickly Craig decided that he probably imagined it. Besides, he had heard that Harold was what Ava called a conversation stealer, and Joe’s reluctance to be part of that, was probably what he had sensed. Craig thought that if anyone should be talking all the time, it should be Joe sharing what he knew. Joe was an actual authority, a walking library of information.

  However, Craig knew that Joe didn’t like to show that side of himself much, preferring to remain the quiet, unassuming, but very effective doctor. Craig admired him for it.

  After a few cups of coffee and Alex’s famous omelet, Joe excused himself saying he had work to do, leaving Craig at the table nursing what he promised himself would be his last cup of coffee for the day. He wondered what he was going to do with himself the rest of the day.

  Craig was seeing a few patients a day, even while Mandy was putting the last touches on his redesigned office space. Getting the practice going had been slow. Dr. Joe’s patients were getting used to him. He didn’t mind. It gave him time to learn about each patient and the town. The only drawback was sometimes he just felt bored.

  Today there were no patients at all, so boredom and restlessness threatened to set in. All of which must have shown on his face, because it wasn’t long before Pete appeared across the table from him and asked him what was wrong.

  “I don’t know. Maybe it’s pre-spring fever. One day its winter, the next its spring.”

  “That’s the end of March for you,” Pete said. “Maybe we should do something new and exciting.”

  “And what would that be, Pete?” Craig laughed.

  “Well, Barbara and I were thinking about going to New York City for a few days and taking in some Broadway shows. We’ll get tickets when we get there. Wing it. We don’t even have to drive. We can ride the Megabus into the city together. Have ourselves a little outing.

  “Alex can take care of the Diner. Grace and Mandy will check in on him and Johnny. If you can reschedule a few patients, we could take off tomorrow.”

  Craig looked at Pete and wondered how he could have gotten along without him before. Until moving to Doveland, he had friends, but he didn’t have friends like this. No other agendas but the one of friendship and kindness.

  “Let me make a few calls, Pete. I’m in.”

  Alex beamed with pride when Pete told him that he was in charge. Yes, Alex said, he would have Grace check everything to make sure it was running smoothly. Yes, he would call in every evening to let Pete know how it was going and get any questions that he had answered.

  Plans were made to pick up the Megabus in State College. It would take them directly into the city. Barbara booked them rooms in a hotel near Times Square. They would pick up tickets to plays once they got there. Winging it was what Pete said. Craig needed a brain break.

  Craig hoped that it would be that easy. Something was bothering him, and he hoped getting over it wa
s as simple as getting away.

  Eleven

  The library was just right, Emily thought. It was not too big, and not too small. It was Goldilocks size, just perfect. Old, but not dusty. Large windows let in light and air. But there was privacy and warmth to be found back in the book stacks where she sat at a small square table looking through old newspapers on microfiche.

  She had traveled to the Allegheny department of records instead of the closest one in Concourse because she had already tried that library, too. She went looking for the past newspapers and records of the area in the 1970s, but there was very little to see in Doveland. Almost all the papers and microfiche records of the area before 1990 had been stored in a basement in the town hall, and during one extremely stormy season it had flooded and destroyed everything.

  Since arriving in Doveland, Emily had tried to be inconspicuous about her interest in the past. She didn’t want everyone to wonder why she was so curious about the 1970s because she didn’t want anyone to know that there was an alternative reason for her coming to Doveland other than the story she told.

  Most of the story was true. Emily’s mother, Mary, had grown up in Louisiana. Her mother’s sister, Jean, was ten years older. It was Emily’s mother who told the story about Jean. In 1968, when she turned twenty-one, and Mary was only eleven, Jean had decided to travel the United States on her own.

  Jean had been working what she considered a stuffy job as a secretary in a lawyer’s office. It didn’t take long for Jean to realize that office work wasn’t for her. The lawyer’s office was stinky and small, and no new ideas were allowed. She couldn’t stand it. Jean told her family that while she was young, she wanted to explore the ideas that were being discussed among the young people of the day. How could she do that in that little town that never changed? She couldn’t. Jean said she had to go.