Chapter 2: Too Much Confusion, or 'How To Deal When Your Life's Insane'
AN: My lovelies, I've just returned from seeing my favorite band live! Flogging Molly played at the Dublin Irish Festival, and I managed to find a way to go! WooHOO!!! Front and center, baby… Plus, I got hugs and photos with them after the concert! Ok, ok, on to what you're actually interested in. (FM will be featured throughout this chapter… sorry…)
I want to believe in myself once again,
So I dream of a man whose hopes never end…
But as darkness falls, I return to my bed-
Don't ask me more questions, don't fuck with my head!
Black Friday Rule, by Flogging Molly
Reid splashed his face again, the cold water a harsh wake-up to his nerves. He looked up into the small mirror on the wall of the unisex gas station bathroom, seeing the circles under his eyes and the manic set of his features. He raked his hair back, dropping his hands to let it fall back in the exact same wave of blond. Suddenly, that hair annoyed him. It mocked him, going back like that. No matter what he did, it always looked the same: thick white-blond, a smooth, straight brush across his forehead.
Turning away from the mirror, Reid stalked out of the restroom and made his way towards the door. A girl heading for the check-out counter halted abruptly just before Reid slammed into her, and he caught himself just before tripping over his own feet. Murmuring a hasty apology, he whipped around her and was out the door. If he had looked back, he would have seen the way she stared after him, her wide eyes locked on his retreating back.
As he started his car and pulled onto the highway, the girl was pulling out a cell phone. She dialed quickly, her hair sheeting across her face as she ducked into a corner of the gas station.
"You aren't going to believe this," she said hurriedly.
Meanwhile, Reid was shuffling through the CDs he'd left in the glove compartment of the car the last time he'd 'borrowed' it, pulling one out blindly and sliding it into the player.
Would it make
you happy if
Everyone around you smiled?
Then you wouldn't have
to hide
The world'd be yours
And you'd be mine.
I'd be your
Prometheus stealing
From a nuclear sky.
I'd be your insecure
hero
And you would be mine.
Kirk McLeod's voice filled his ears, and Reid reached out to switch the track. The song made him think of Kat; her shattered expression, her cold bravery.
Instantly, the fast, frantic fiddling of Bridget Regan wiped away the image in his mind and replaced it with a frenzy of punk and dancing feet. As the gravely voice of Dave King split the air, the fear and uncertainty seemed to crack and fall away for the moment.
I'll wait for you till I turn blue,
There's nothin' more a man could do!
Don't get your bollocks in a twist;
Settle down, don't take a fit.
Ya drank with demons straight from Hell-
They almost nearly won, as well.
Ya wiped the floor with victory,
Then puked until ya fell asleep!
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Too many sad days,
Too many Tuesday mornings.
I thought of you today;
I wished it was yesterday morning.
I thought of you today,
And I dreamt you were dressed in mourning.
Kat was packing, her backpack open on her bed. Scythian was blasting in the background, hiding the sound of Caleb's fervent arguments and Kat's equally fervent rejoinders.
"Damn it, Caleb, I'm going after him!"
"You can't go after him! You don't know where he's going, what he's doing. You have no idea what's going through his head! You're already in enough trouble, Kat, you don't need any more!" He reached into her bag and pulled out the crumpled shirt she'd just thrust in, tossing it back to her. Kat snarled at him and put it back, along with a pair of jeans and a bra.
"You can't want him to go off alone!"
"Of course I don't! There's nothing we-"
"You can't leave; you're their chief suspect now that Reid's gone. The police will be looking for him, and-"
"No, they won't," Caleb interrupted. Kat paused mid-rant, confused.
"What?"
"They won't be after Reid," he repeated a bit sheepishly. Kat peered at him.
"What did you do," she asked finally.
"Not much. Nothing that can't be fixed. It's not even permanent. It's the best I could do. The last thing we need is a bunch of cops going after-"
"I don't even want to know," Kat decided. "I don't know how the hell you managed it, but if it's not permanent, that's all the more proof that I need to find him! You can't leave, or you would have already. Tyler's still in the hospital, and the others are too hurt to do anything. I'm the only one who can get out. I'm the only one they have nothing on. It has to be me; you know it does." She accentuated her point by stuffing a sweatshirt into the backpack and zipping it up ferociously.
"You don't know where he's going," Caleb tried again, futilely. He watched as Kat swung the backpack over her shoulders, slipping a folding knife and a lighter into her pants pocket.
"I am the wolf," Kat replied softly, and there was a wildness to her that some deep-seated, instinctive part of Caleb recognized and celebrated. "I'll find him."
He left then, pausing in the window frame to give her a nod.
"Call me as soon as…"
"I will."
When she was alone, Kat picked up a piece of paper and pen from her desk.
Dad-
I know I promised I'd explain, and I didn't. I know you don't understand any of this, and I'm sorry for that. I wish there was more time. You told me once that there was only one thing worth everything, and that was love. I've always listened to you, you know… and now, I'm doing what you brought me up to believe is right. I'm risking everything, and I hope that, even if you don't know the details, you'll realize that I'm risking it for something you taught me. I love you forever.
I know you don't want to hear this, but there's a chance… Well, more than that. I might not be coming home. I don't know what's going to happen where I'm going, but I just want to come to terms with the fact that I might never see you again. If that happens, I want you to know that you are the best dad I can imagine. If I'm brave, it's because you taught me courage. If I'm smart, it's because you helped me learn. God, you must be shocked reading this… I'm never so sappy. Don't worry, I didn't have a lobotomy while I was away. It's still your Furball talking. Hell, I must be worrying you even more by acting so out of character. Shit. This is not coming out like I wanted it to.
I'd better end it here, before I get lost in whatever point I was vaguely trying to make.
I know you wanted a new start when we moved to Ipswich, and I ruined that by getting caught up this mess, but I can't honestly say I would trade it. Remember when we had that argument about destiny? You thought it might exist, I thought it was a load of- Anyway, I've been thinking. Maybe you were right. Maybe there's such a thing as fate. Maybe my destiny has always been to do this, and maybe yours was to raise me to be able to do it. Or maybe I'm just a wild card, like I always thought.
Your daughter,
Kitty Teague
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Danny Teague finished reading the letter his seventeen-year-old daughter had written, and placed it neatly back on her desk. He felt a strong sense of deja-vu, remembering the sucking vacuum of despair he'd felt when Kat went missing. Nothing made sense. He'd lost her, his baby, and then she'd come back to him, and now she was gone again. It almost felt like a dream, a strange nightmare reminiscent of the crazy hallucinations he'd experienced during his teenaged years, experimenting with LSD.
I might not be coming home.
The confusion, the pain… it swirled inside him and drained away, leaving a hollow kind of loss.
You told me once that there was only one thing worth everything, and that was love.
There was some secret in her writing, in the words she used. It was fierce, and proud, and stirred something long-forgotten in her father. The sense of loss was struggling with something, something very new or very, very old.
Maybe my destiny has always been to do this, and maybe yours was to raise me to be able to do it.
That word.
Destiny.
Danny's breath was coming harder, his nostrils flaring. He recalled Kat's pale face, her fiery eyes, and the feral flare she'd worn like a cloak upon her mysterious return. He didn't know what he was thinking, but his gut told him it was dangerous, and secret, and ancient.
"Good luck," he whispered to his child's empty room, seeing not the bland walls or furniture but instead the open window and haunting moon. "Wherever you're going."
Then, he placed a call to the Ipswich PD, calmly informing the irate officer in charge of the case regarding the house on Knight Street that he'd had his daughter flown to California to stay with her mother in order to deal with her symptoms of PTSD, and that if they wanted to talk to her again, they could damn well send her an email.
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Songs:
1. You Would Be Mine, by Seven Nations
2. Salty Dog, by Flogging Molly
3. Tuesday Morning, by Scythian (I saw them live as well, so I thought I'd include them…They are quite awesome.)
