I don't own Inception
Kayla Walters was confused, very confused.
Or maybe frazzled was more the word. Meeting the three strangers was strange, and making her come apart at the seams. The guy had looked almost exactly as Uncle Arthur had when he had announced he had to go away on a business trip.
And then he had never come back.
She sighed, using the free hand that wasn't clutching the sketch pad to run a hand through her hair. She remembered the night he had to go away on business for five months. He had just said it casually at the dinner table, as if it wasn't anything big at all. She had stared at him, then had run to her room. She had been more hurt then she had said she was. He had promised he would be there for her, he had promised her that they would go to London together, maybe go to Los Angeles. She hadn't been to America in years, her first Mom had lived there, but Emma lived in Paris. But overall, he had promised to never leave for too long. Five months was too long.
It was probably a dumb thing to freak out, a business trip, but she had been really close to Uncle Arthur. He had acted differently around her, not the stick in the mud her mom, both of them, liked to call him. The British guy called him that too.
She slipped back into the circle. She tried to listen, but she really didn't care about whatever they were talking about. She went over to the stage that the ceremony would take place on and carefully sat down, taking out the sketch pad. She studied it for a few seconds. It wasn't actually hers, it was Ariadne's. She had seen Marissa's car and decided to go see if it was locked. Marissa had a habit of forgetting things like that.
It wasn't locked. And Ariadne's bag had been on the floor, and peeking out of it, was her sketch pad. And if anything could keep Kayla from going crazy, it was drawing. After finding a few pencils, she had locked Marissa's car for her then headed back in.
The bored girl decided to look through the sketches. The first ones were architecture or other objects. A library. A church. A picture of a freight train. A sketch of a city layout, then an elegant hotel. Then they moved into action scenes. This surprised her, she had never seen Ariadne draw anything like this. One was of a woman falling from the ledge of a hotel window. The next one seemed like a combination of two of her earlier ones, a city street with a freight train going straight down it, pushing cars out of its way, leaving deep groves in the road. Then a man floating in zero gravity, in a hotel. Weird, but what was weirder was that the man looked like the man she thought was Uncle Arthur earlier.
"Okay then," Kayla murmured, flipping through the rest until she found an empty sheet. Taking a pencil out of her jeans pocket, she straightened her legs, creating a table to place the pad while she drew. She poised the pencil above the clean sheet, not knowing what to draw. Finally, she placed it gently on the paper. Closing her eyes for a second to find the image she wanted, she moved the pencil across the page, watching her image come to life on the white page.
"Hey, what are you drawing?" Kayla looked up, startled at being jerked out of her little world. Ariadne looked at her amusedly. "Sorry, but I couldn't help but notice that looks exactly like my sketch pad." Kayla looked down.
"It is, Marissa's car was unlocked like always, so I went to lock it, and I found this," she waved the pad of paper in the air, "and I really wanted to draw, so…" Kayla trailed off, glancing at Ariadne.
"Yeah, I know it's mine, I saw you going through my sketches. Oh, it's fine," she reassured the guilty looking girl, "I just wanted to know how you got it. And what you're drawing." Ariadne looked at the new addition to her sketch book. "Why did you draw that?"
Kayla looked at her drawing. It was a girl, looking out an airport window, watching as a plane took off. The plane was turned away from her, halfway into the stormy sky. The girl was the only person in the shot; the lights were off, throwing some of her figure into the shadows.
"I don't really know," Kayla leaned against the side of the stage. "I just miss my Uncle." She knew Ariadne had heard about him from her mom.
"What was he like?" The older girl asked softly, sitting down next to her. Kayla smiled as she thought about him.
"He was medium tall, I guess you could say, with dark brown hair and eyes. He always preferred dress shirts and pants too jeans and a t-shirt. Mom always called him a stick in the mud for that, and cause of his attitude. He could be really stiff and professional sometimes, but he wasn't always like that. Especially around me, he was more, more open. He was probably the person I was closest to, even before Mom and Dad, just because…" Kayla hesitated, glancing at Ariadne. She had known her for a while now. She was the person who had first really gotten her into drawing. Mom had already known her when she had come into the picture.
"I'm not really sure why, Ari, it's just, he understood me. I was quiet, reserved, and he just, got it. And then the jerk left, supposedly for five months on business, and then he never came back. After the first year, we all started losing hope, but after the second year, it was gone. All gone." Kayla sat up for a minute, only to lean against Ariadne.
"It's a good picture, you got the shadows right. And it's very realistic." Ariadne decided to leave that topic. Kayla looked at the sketch critically.
"You think? I don't really think it's that good." Kayla frowned at it. Ariadne took the sketch pad and pencil and flipped to a new page. Kayla looked at her quizzically. She watched as the woman carefully drew a duck.
"A duck?" Kayla asked incredulously. Kayla took back both items and drew the duck with a floppy hat. Handing it back, they continued the game until they had a duck with a floppy hat shopping for scarves in Miami, with surfer ducks in the background.
"As interesting as that was, I need to go get into those weird robe things you have to wear for graduation." Ariadne stood up and stretched. Kayla held out her sketch book, but Ariadne shook her head.
"I can get it later, you keep it. Draw in it while the ceremony goes on." Kayla smiled her thanks at Ariadne. She watched as she got up and went to the backstage area. She flipped back to her previous sketch, then glanced at the clock. She still had thirty minutes. She erased part of the scene, adding in a taller woman with her arm around the girl. Standing up, she realized, most people had taken their seats.
Getting up, she scanned the room, looking for her father. She locked eyes with the British guy, Eames? Odd name. He winked at her, then turned to the man she had crashed into. He glanced at her too, but then turned back to his conversation. She stood on her toes, not able to find her Dad. Realizing he was right behind the group she had met earlier, she hurried over, slipping into the aisle seat next to her dad. She leaned forward, putting her elbows on her knees. She listened idly to the man John was talking too, but at some point switched to the people in front of her.
"When will Yusuf get here? I know he was going to cut it close, but it starts in ten minutes." The British man grumbled, leaning back in his chair. Cobb shrugged. Kayla realized they had to be their last names, who would name their kids Cobb and Eames?
"He's Yusuf, he'll be here, don't worry about it." The blond haired man reasoned. Kayla leaned back when she realized that the Arthur guy was on the other side of Cobb. She wondered who Yusuf was.
"He'll be here Eames, just relax." Arthur said. Eames was about to say something back, but seemed to restrain himself when Cobb shot him a look.
"You look stressed Arthur," Cobb looked worried. "Why?"
"I wasn't expecting them to be here!" Arthur groaned. "I would never have agreed to come if I'd known." Kayla sat up, paying more attention now. She knew it was wrong to eavesdrop, but he seemed exactly like her uncle…
"Based on the girl's reaction, I doubt they know you're here. After the ceremony, you can leave and they won't be in any danger." Eames replied lazily. Kayla studied him for a second.
"But what if Kayla did notice that it actually was me? What if she goes and tells Emma I'm here, or someone who looks exactly like me, or…" he was interrupted by the arrival of a man. He had a black beard and didn't look very active.
"What's going on?" he asked, sitting in the only chair left and raising an eyebrow. Eames sighed dramatically.
"Arthur here is freaking out because he saw his niece who is supposed to think he's dead so that her and her family aren't hurt." He said. He swiveled in his seat to look at Arthur. "Honestly, if she didn't realize it was you when she crashed into us earlier, she won't recognize you now." Kayla didn't hear the rest of the conversation. She felt like someone had just dumped a bucket of ice water over her head, she wanted to get up and scream, but she also felt paralyzed. She turned to look at the man to her left, not caring if any of them turned around and saw here.
He shouldn't have known her mother's name.
That man had to be her Uncle Arthur.