Ah yes, you've read about things like this: falling in love.
And maybe you've got that white picket fence. And maybe you've got those kids, too.
Saturday night is date night - 6 p.m. at that little Italian bistro - and you hold hands.
Or... maybe you don't.
Maybe you sit there in silence, bored out of your mind and still not willing to walk away.
Because they work long hours.
Because you work long hours.
Because the trash didn't get taken out and an ex shows up out of the blue and a billion other things happen that make you second guess this whole matter.
Maybe you tempt yourself with the idea of running away.
Or, better yet - and more realistic - you sit alone at night, while they sleep (or while they are still at the office... or so you think, so you hope), and you imagine the life you could have had.
Ah yes, you've read about things like this: an adventuresome life.
Where peril is merely an instigator to action and no one gets hurt (but they sure as hell come close) and passion is a constant - a mysterious pair of lips against your own, desperate and dear, pulling you under like the tide.
Maybe that is what you think about, what you daydream about, what you wish would fall out of the sky and into your lap.
Maybe you want to trade in domesticity for something better... something bigger... something more like what you've read and less of what you know.
But if Spencer ever meets a person like this, she might just have to haul off and hit them.
/ / /
She was just your average girl, really. It was her last year of high-school and she didn't care much for the rules at this point - if she wanted to skip a class or two, she would. Her grades were good. Her parents were pleased. And her life - with college on the horizon, a major in art history - was truly ready to begin.
She laid on the beach, listening with one ear to the ocean and the waves rolling in... and, with the other ear, the tiny ear-bud of her MP3 player (which seemed to be perpetually looping The Church's 'Under the Milky Way'). She felt the sun bake her skin, turning her flesh golden and washing her blonde hair out even more. She could smell the coconut of her lotion and it caused her to sigh happily.
Her cell phone was off. Her flip-flop sat beside her, one on top of the other, as lazy as she was feeling.
A perfect day, that's how Spencer remembers it.
Of course, they say that a memory cannot be trusted, because you shape it in your own fashion - make it better than it was, re-tool it to fit what you want to see - and maybe that is true.
Maybe that is how Spencer wants to recall that day, the last day of her normal, everyday, silly little life.
A tiny slice of what could have been before all hell broke loose.
/ / /
Yes. Hell.
Hell being the ground barely shuddering, the kind of sensation you could have missed easily, and Spencer did miss it - eyes still shut and music still playing.
But then it got more pronounced and she fluttered her eyelids until they opened, blinking at the beautiful blue sky.
All was quiet again and she had almost convinced herself that she must have made it up.
However, when the far end of the beach rumbled to distorted life - like a bomb going off, but underground - Spencer bolted up from her towel.
She thought it was an earthquake. A huge fucking earthquake, the kind they make films about and that star Tom Cruise, that's what she thought.
And she tried to recall all those things they tell you to do, but - honestly - what could she do but stand there and let the world shake her to death?
Her gaze, though, was fixed on the sand as it billowed up and as the ground split and how the surface of the beach was cracking like being broken in half. She was frozen in muted terror, unable to look away and unable to run for her life. Spencer was going to die, right here and on this beach and on this perfect damn day.
Well, that's what would have happened had a girl named Ashley Davies not shown up.
The breath in Spencer's lungs was trapped, but strong arms wrapped about her waist and dislodged the air, which left Spencer's mouth in a scream... a scream that sounded a lot like 'what the fuck is going on?'.
And Spencer watched the shoreline grow more and more distant from her wide-eyed stare.
As if she were being catapulted into the atmosphere, a stone in a sling-shot.
"Don't let go of me, okay? Just don't let go."
That voice was the last thing Spencer heard before passing out.
/ / /
"Ashley, what are you thinking?"
"Uh, hello, saving someone. Isn't that the whole point?"
"You're supposed to set them down at a hospital or something. Not bring them home. She's not a stray dog."
"I know that, Kyla. God, lighten up."
"No, you don't get it. We've kept this all quiet for a long time and by bringing this girl here, you are jepardizing everything."
"Look, you saw what happened out there... Our 'quiet' is all over, Kyla. We've already been found."
"...Do you really think that was meant for you?"
"Yes. I mean, it was going to happen sooner or later, right? Dad always said so."
"I was just hoping that was senility speaking."
Spencer stays silent, keeps her eyes closed tight, and continues to listen to two girls talk from somewhere to her right.
And she tries to process what has just occurred. And she can't. Not at all.
"Okay. First things first, what are you going to do about her?"
"Oh. Well, I, um, I didn't think that far ahead..."
"Surprise, surprise."
"I could blindfold her I suppose..."
Spencer's heart-beat goes into overdrive at that point and she is panicking, not sure where she is or who she is with... or how she got here. Because she seems to remember someone grabbing her and then being up in the air - and that can't be real? Can it?
"Yea, that won't freak her out or anything."
"You got a better idea?"
"Sure. Don't have her here in the first place."
"That's really irrelevant now, Kyla. Not helping."
"Fine. Uh, we could chloroform her...?"
"...Excuse me?"
Spencer's eyes fly open then and she sits up, startling both the girls - who are only about thirty feet away, standing close to one another.
"Oh shit..." The one girl exclaims, dark gaze looking anxious. The other girl, who also looks a tad worried, doesn't say anything - she just keeps watching Spencer.
And Spencer blinks at the both of them, trying to find some way out of this situation.
She could scream. Or try to out-run them. Or, if she had to, she could try and fight them off. Her brothers both take karate and taught her some moves, it might work. Right?
"Do something." One of them hisses and Spencer flashes her terrified stare back and forth between them.
And one of the girls steps forward slowly, smiling a bit.
"So, how are you feeling?" The girl asks and Spencer swallows hard, not sure if she should talk or not. The girl quirks her eyebrow and the smile grows a bit, turning a shade amused.
"What's wrong? Cat got your tongue?" The girls questions and Spencer keeps on staring, the tension spreading out in her body like wild-fire.
You should run now, the voice in her head says. You should run and knock that girl down, the voice says. You should take a chance and get the fuck out of here, the voice begs.
"Maybe she is in shock." The other girl supplies.
"Nah. I mean, that happened earlier."
"What? It can't happen more than once or something?"
"Nope."
"Liar."
"Am not."
"Are too."
"Am not."
"Are too."
Both girls roll their eyes and Spencer isn't sure what to think at all. Because they don't act like killers. Or kidnappers. Or whatever Spencer was imagining them to be.
They act like siblings. They sound like her brother, Glen, and herself. And some of the tension leaves Spencer's muscles, just a bit... just a little bit...
"I'm... not in shock." Spencer says softly and they both look at her. The girl closest to her grins then and spares a moment to stick her tongue out at the other girl.
"Right, as always." The girl says and the other girl just crosses her arms, looking faintly annoyed.
"I'm not in shock and... and I want to leave here. Now." Spencer states with more determination. Shaky determination, but determination nonetheless.
The girls look at each other as if having a conversation without speaking and the darker-haired girl stalks off in a huff suddenly.
And that leaves Spencer with just the one girl, the one closest, who is still smiling some and who is much closer than before. And Spencer scrambles up to her feet, backing away and turning her hands into fists.
"Whoa there, killer... I'm not going to hurt you."
"I don't know you, so how can I believe you?"
"Hey, I saved you, you know..."
"Saved me?"
"You would be like the dinosaurs if I hadn't carried you off."
"Be like the... wait a minute, what?"
"Oh, yea, I keep forgetting that you conked out during the flight."
"...Are you telling me that... that you and I... in the air? That was real?"
The girl holds out her hand and nods towards it, outstretched before Spencer's bewildered stare.
"C'mon and I'll show you."
/ / /
And, against all better judgment, Spencer reached out with equal parts trepidation and curiosity... and she took that hand in her own.
And, just like that, that other life - with college and art and all the things that could have happened - just faded away.
"Oh, I'm Ashley by the way. Ashley Davies."
The hand tugged gently and Spencer was pulled along to a what looked like a stone shaft, running high up above them, hollow and dark. And this girl named Ashley Davies faced her, bringing their bodies close. Uncomfortably close. Uncommonly close. So close that Spencer couldn't help but look into Ashley Davies steady gaze as those slightly familiar arms curled about her waist again.
Ashley's face tilted forward, lips warm against Spencer's ear.
And Spencer couldn't help but shiver just a bit... and she didn't even bother to ask why she shivered in the first place.
"Going up." Ashley whispered.
And then they were, up and up, and Spencer closed her eyes and she clung so tightly to Ashley's body. But the darkness rapidly receded and she could feel sunlight pushing against her eyelids - and Spencer heard Ashley shout out, jubilant and pleased... and Spencer forced herself to look, to see, to make sure she wasn't completely crazy.
And she wasn't. Far from it, in fact.
They were flying. In the air. With all of L.A. below them, beyond the smog and in the clouds, like birds. Or planes.
Spencer darted her gaze everywhere at once, hair whipping around her face, and - quite unexpectedly - she found her lips turning upward.
She found herself grinning like a kid on Christmas.
And, really, you would have reacted the same way... You know you would have. Because people aren't meant to fly and, yet, there you are - soaring along without wings.
There you are, breaking a known rule, and you aren't falling. You aren't crashing.
You are flying.
And, right at that moment, Spencer Carlin didn't mind her world changing.
She kind of liked it.
"Ready to land?"
"Uh, sure..."
"It would be really great if you could keep this quiet, you know..."
"Like anyone would believe me." Spencer muttered and Ashley smirked in response.
"True... you know, I told you my name, but I don't know yours..." Ashley said lightly as she tipped them back, placing Spencer above the girl and bringing them even further into contact. Spencer felt like she was blushing, which she never did. And she didn't want to know why she was doing so now.
And Spencer wasn't sure if she should say her name either. If she did, then she could be found by this girl. And she didn't even know what was going on - all that conversation she over-heard, none of it making sense... But she knew it would be stupid to get involved. Really stupid. Supremely idiotic.
Ashley suspended them there, in mid-air, hovering weightless and Spencer could feel all the places where they touched - hip bones and stomach, chests and thighs - it was terribly intimate.
And, somehow, the truth just came out.
"Spencer Carlin."
"Well, Spencer Carlin... it was my upmost pleasure to rescue you today."
And, with that comment, Ashley let them tumble out of the sky, faster and faster, but this time - this time, Spencer did not close her eyes.
But she didn't look around either.
She stared straight at Ashley and the girl started straight back, the strands of their hair almost tangling together - a metaphor before they had even taken the next step.
And Ashley grinned.
And Spencer did, too.
/ / /
TBC
Yea, I've got way too many stories going on [lol]. The perils of having an over-active fandom mind.