Anything familiar does not belong to me. I am just using them for my own amusement.
SPOV
Mine and Rangers six month anniversary is coming up in a couple of weeks. No, we aren't married, but we are living together and working on our someday. The last six months have been crazy, frustrating and wonderful. That is why I am currently beating my head against the wall at the mall. Ranger is always surprising me with little, and not so little, gifts. I want to surprise him for our anniversary, but really, what does one buy Batman?
As I stand here looking in another store window that is giving me exactly zero ideas, I catch a flash of black out of the corner of my eye. He wouldn't, would he? Surely there is a very good explanation why I am ninety percent sure I just saw a Merry Man at the mall. I have my trackers, I have my panic button. If he is having me shadowed, that means they are also giving him reports, very detailed reports, that will tell him I am planning on surprising him with something (hell, I don't even know what that something is going to be yet).
OK, Plum, before you go off the deep end, figure out if you have a shadow. I walk into a book store, one with lots of rows where one certainly couldn't watch someone from outside the store. I casually stroll through the aisles before abruptly stopping between two aisles, forcing my shadow to come look for me. Yep, it is Binkie. I catch him out of the corner of my eye, but pretend to not see him. I feel sorry for what I am about to do to him, but I deserve a little privacy and Carlos aka Ranger needs to learn that.
I leave the bookstore and go to a small clothing boutique. A friend of mine from high school works there and I am about to enlist her help. After picking out about 10 outfits, I walk up to Maggie.
"Hey Maggie, I am going to buy these, but I need a little help." I say as I slip her my credit card.
"Sure thing, what do you need?" She asks.
"Is there a back door I can leave out of, that can't be seen from the main mall area?" I ask hopefully.
"Sure, there is back door near the dressing room that does back to the corridor where security is and the employee entrance to the mall."
"Great, I am going to go into the dressing room and put these in the bags I already have. Here are the tags. Once you have me wrung up, I'd like to leave through that back door if it is ok with you."
She raises an eye brow at me. Seriously, can everyone do that but me?
Ï am trying to buy Ranger a surprise but I have a shadow." I explain. Everyone knows Ranger.
She smiles and nods. "Got it."
I go into a dressing room and start ditching all of my trackers. I even take the one out of my cell phone. Thanks to Hector for letting me watch him change them out, I now know how to remove them. When Maggie comes to give me my credit card and receipt, I hand her my trackers and a handwritten note, instructing her to give them to Binkie when he comes looking for me. I figure I have about 10 minutes.
I slip out of the mall and bypass my car. I go to the bus stop and board the first bus that pulls up.