Disclaimer: Not mine. I own nothing. Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy own everything.
PLEASE READ THIS DISCLAIMER BEFORE YOU READ THIS CHAPTER: I want to make the following absolutely clear before you read this chapter. While this chapter is rather tame; throughout this story, Maria will often act and speak in a manner which is blatantly racist, anti-Semitic and homophobic. Anybody who knows me knows that I am none of these. It is not my intention to seem like I think that prejudice is somehow "cool." It is, however, my intention to create a character that you, the reader, will hate. I want this character to offend you. I want her words to make your blood boil. The aim of this exercise is to create a character who has all the characteristics that I myself abhor (and hopefully, you do as well), and see if I can turn her into someone to be admired. If I do my job right, you will want to burn Maria in effigy by the end of the fifth chapter. If I do it righter, you will love her by the end of the story. From the outline I've made up, I can already tell that this is going to be a very difficult story to write (and not to put too fine a point on it, I'm not even sure I'm capable of doing it). Please don't make it more difficult by sending me a review which calls me a racist bigot, 'cause, frankly, it's not true.
Chapter 2:
Claudette laced her fingers and stretched her back. Ugh. Nothing like a four-hour drive to stiffen your body. Her three daughters asking "are we there yet?" every ten minutes wasn't helping much either. Another hour or so, and they'd be home. And in Québec, the speed limits were basically a suggestion. She might be able to shave a few minutes off of that time.
The tiny town of Norton, Vermont on highway 114 existed, basically, to be a border crossing. There was little more than a set of train tracks and a highway into Québec. The border crossing was a tiny brick building invariably manned by a little frenchman with a thick Québecois accent. She was, of course, somewhat biased where little frenchmen were concerned. Her marriage to one had dissolved less than a year after the birth of her third daughter. The father was some kind of deadbeat whom she'd never heard from since he'd vanished without a trace almost ten years ago. The twins, Geneviève and Élodie were born first, with Adèle following just over a year later. The youngest would be eleven in the spring. Not too bad for a woman just pushing 35.
Even after twelve years, the only way Claudette could think of the twins was by comparing them. Not because they were so similar, but because they were so different. They wore their hair differently, they dressed differently, they acted differently. Even looking at the two of them, it was difficult to tell that they were genetically identical. Geneviève's long brown hair hung loosely over her shoulders whereas Élodie had hers hacked short just below the ears. Geneviève was more of an academic where Élodie was the more physical of the two.
Geneviève could see.
Élodie had developed retinitis just under a year after she was born. The infant had been unable to vocalize her problem and it wasn't until she started running into objects around the house that Claudette had realized that the child's vision was failing. By then, it was too late. To this day, Élodie spoke of having seen a bright orange flickering light in front of her. Claudette could not be certain, but she felt that it was probably the single candle on her first birthday cake. Élodie had seen no candles since then.
Now twelve, Élodie hadn't let her ailment slow her down. A studio in Sherbrooke was offering a course in Karate, and Élodie had wanted to take it. Claudette had almost balked at that one, but after meeting with the Sensei, changed her mind. He'd promised to take good care of her, and had pointed out that eyesight was highly overrated in the martial arts anyway. Generally, he said, by the time you saw an attack coming, it was already too late. In fact, he had added, it would almost be an advantage. Other students needed to be taught to ignore their sight and focus on their other four senses. Élodie did it naturally. It seemed that he was right. If it hadn't been for the fact that she had watched her baby's eyesight slowly deteriorate, she would never have been able to guess it from the way she sparred with the other students. And, Claudette had to admit, if only to herself, that it took a great effort not to smirk when the other parents watched the little brown-haired girl who had just soundly kicked their child's butt in a sparring session pick up her white cane and tap out a path back to her mother. Élodie hated being referred to as "handicapped" or "impaired" or "challenged" or whatever the current politically-correct term was. The only thing with could predictably cause her to lose her temper was giving her some form of special treatment. She'd nearly punched a kind gentleman who'd offered to help her to her seat at a dinner party a while back. It was only because her twin sister had expected it and had stopped her that she didn't. She had, unsurprisingly, flat-out rejected the option of going to a special school for the blind. She'd taught herself to read and write Braille, and had learned to find her way around the little town of Lennoxville without sight. She now walked, unescorted, to the Provigo on Queen street for groceries as a matter of routine. To her, blindness wasn't a handicap; it was simply the only way of life she'd ever known.
Geneviève was the exact opposite of her twin in every observable way. She much preferred stuffing her nose in a book to practicing katas in the living room. She tended to worry a little more about how she looked since she turned twelve and started noticing boys. The appearance of her first zit had been a near traumatic experience for her. Élodie, by contrast, had barely noticed. Perhaps one of the few fortunate side-effects to being unable to see was that you worried less about how you looked. Geneviève would read anything and everything she could get her hands on. If it had printed text, she would read it from cover to cover. She had demonstrated this most effectively when, at the age of four, she had memorized the text on a box of breakfast cereal in two languages. Claudette was fairly certain that she would exhaust the complete collection of Lennoxville's tiny library within the next couple of years. In spite of their vast differences, Geneviève was very close and fiercely protective of her older-by-twelve-minutes sister, although Élodie would be the first to inform her that she could take care of herself, thank you very much.
Of the three, Adèle was the hardest to pin down. She was very bright, but you'd never know it if you met her. There was an awful lot more going on behind those beautiful brown eyes than she let on. Her mind seemed locked on some distant, unreachable point. She seemed to look at the world as if none of it were real. As if it were some kind of a show put on for her benefit. Her eyes, while not vacant, had a sort of dreamy look to them. She would withdraw into that little world only she inhabited and the only thing you could do would be to wait until she decided to return from it. She didn't speak much, and when she did, it almost always consisted of short, cryptic statements that she was usually unwilling to elaborate upon. She did well in school, although nobody could seem to figure out how. She didn't seem to read or study at home. She just naturally seemed to get it.
The gas pump clicked indicating that the tank was full snapping Claudette out of her reverie. She sighed, realizing that she couldn't put off the next leg of the trip any longer.
She walked into the station and calmly paid the cashier. One hour from home. Hard to believe she missed the tiny town. Her parents, who had moved to Maine for their retirement, had seen her as something of a failure since her marriage had dissolved, leaving her with three kids to take care of.
She slid behind the wheel, twisting the ignition key and turning over the engine.
"Maman?"
That was Élodie's voice. For the first time that she could remember, the child's voice actually trembled.
She started to twist around in her seat to see what was wrong, when a hand clamped down on the back of her neck. The vice-like grip, impossibly strong, forced her to look straight forward.
"Don't turn around." The voice was hard, ragged. As though its owner had been pushed nearly to the breaking point.
"Je ne parle pas Anglais," she told the voice.
The voice hardened further, if that was possible, "every map and atlas in this van is printed in English. Try again."
"What do you want from me?" She tried to keep the fear from showing in her voice. It was impossible.
"Nothing that you're not going to do anyway. You're just going to cross the border, exactly as you planned. After that, once we're nicely out of sight of the border crossing you let me out and you'll never see me again."
"We just crossed the border. We're going to Maine."
The grip on her neck tightened, "Your gas tank was three-quarters full. You could have gone hundreds of miles before you refilled. You're refilling here because it's your last chance to get cheap gas before you cross the border." The voice lowered to a soft whisper, "that's two strikes. You don't want to find out what happens when I get to three."
"Why are you doing this?"
The voice carried on, as if Claudette hadn't spoken, "You're going to cross the border, just as you plan to, and if you do anything that even remotely suggests that I'm on board, I swear that the last thing you will ever hear will be each of your daughter's necks breaking."
"You wouldn't." Claudette stiffened at the threat to her daughters' lives.
"The state of Virginia tried to have me killed less than twenty-four hours ago. My best-case scenario if they get their hands on me is that they'll succeed this time." The grip loosened very slightly, "I don't want to hurt you or your three little frogs, but make no mistake, I have absolutely nothing to lose."
Claudette could feel the colour drain from her face, "okay, I'll do whatever you ask, just don't hurt them."
"That's more like it."
As abruptly as the grip clamped down on the back of her neck, it released, and Claudette turned around just to see the back of a young woman making her way to the back of the small minivan. She sat for a couple of seconds, trying to compose herself. She hadn't had a good look at the woman's face, but her voice had grim determination to it. She certainly seemed to believe her threat.
"Okay, girls, I need you all to stay quiet and be calm, okay?"
"Teddy won't find you." Adèle spoke to the stranger as she pushed past into the back of the minivan.
"Not now, Adèle." Claudette shook her head. The one time she really needed her youngest daughter to shut up, and she was being the most vocal of them. "There's a blanket in the back there," she called to the form which had just disappeared behind the bench seat in the back of the minivan, "put that over you and don't move."
"Don't worry," the voice was spookily calm, "this will all be over in a moment."
That's what I'm afraid of, Claudette didn't voice the thought aloud.
********
The border was, unsurprisingly, manned by a portly little Frenchman.
"Bonjour, madame, je m'appelle Théodore, il faut que je vous demande quelques questions."
"Could you speak English, please?" Claudette asked politely, forcing her voice to be even. She spoke fluent French, but she didn't want her new passenger to think she was trying to hide something or signal the guard in some way.
"Certainly, madame." The man nodded, "my name h'is T'eodore. H'I 'ave some question to h'ask you." She never fully understood why those with thick Quebecois accents had the tendency to put the letter 'h' just about everywhere except where they were supposed to be.
"Of course."
"You h'are all Canadien?"
"Yes." Claudette handed him four individual passports.
"'ow long were you in h'America?" He asked as he looked over the passports.
"Four days."
"Pleasure trip?"
She nodded, "visiting relatives in Maine."
"Did you buy anyt'ing?"
Claudette shook her head, "food, a couple of tanks of gas. That's it."
"'ave you seen anyt'ing strange on the road?"
"Strange?"
"A convict h'escape from h'a prison in Virginia. We t'ink she may be 'eading for the boarder."
"I heard about it on the radio. Do they think she's headed this way?"
The man shook his head, "Probably not. T'ere are much closer boarder crossings t'an t'is one." He shrugged, "still, I 'ave to h'ask." He handed the passports back to her.
"Of course."
"Where are you 'eaded today?"
"Lennoxville," She replied.
"Ah, h'I live in Nort' 'atley. We're practically neighbors."
She smiled. North Hatley was a nice little town on lake Massawippi. Beautiful little town about a twenty-minute drive out of Lennoxville.
"T'ank you, madame. 'Ave a nice trip." He waved to the small brick building and the arm which blocked her way lifted. He waved her along.
Claudette tried not to drive away too fast.
When they were out of sight, she pulled over to the side of the road. And turned around, "you can come out now, Maria, was it?"
"I didn't say, but that's me." She could see the young woman clearly now. She was filthy. Her hair was knotted and grimy, her clothes hung off of her in tatters. She had the look of someone who had pushed her body far beyond its limits.
She slowly made her way to the side sliding door and started to open it.
"Wait." Claudette told her.
"What?"
"Sit down for a second." She nodded to the empty passenger side front seat.
"You escaped from a maximum security prison."
The woman nodded silently, as she sat down. As her eyes looked over her, Claudette couldn't help but feel that she was being analyzed as a predator would study its prey.
"Death row."
Maria nodded again.
"What did you do?"
Maria shook her head, "Jeffrey Dahmer kills fifteen people and gets life in prison. I beat one spic to death with a baseball bat and I get death. That strike you as fair?"
Claudette bristled at the racial epithet, but held her composure.
"How did you break out?"
"You got me. They'd just started the machine when I somehow turned into Bruce Lee and beat three guards senseless."
"And how'd you get here?"
"Whoever said that getting there was half the fun never tied themselves to the bottom of a freight train."
Claudette was silent for a moment, "you weren't bluffing, were you?" She said, "you would have killed us all if I'd told the guard about you."
"I'm dead if I ever go back to Virginia anyway. Four dead frogs aren't going to make me any deader."
"Where will you go from here?" Anybody who could move that fast, who was that strong…
"I don't know. Wherever I can go."
"If I may…" Opportunities like this didn't come around very often.
"Look, don't push it, lady. You don't want to know me any better than you already do."
"Maybe I do."
"Fuck this, I'm out of here." She turned towards the door.
"There's a little town about an hour up the road called Lennoxville. I live there, and it's the last place anybody would think to look for you." She nodded up the road.
Maria's hand froze on the door handle. "So what?"
"Come with me," Claudette wrinkled her nose, "take a shower. I don't have a lot of space, but the couch is probably more comfortable than your prison bunk." She smiled, "I have a modest proposal for you."