It had taken Pink by surprise. He had never really expected to ever see his face on the newspapers, and certainly not accompanied by the words "child molester on the run". But at least, they had found a rather nice picture of him -though where they had found it he didn't know, considering he had never liked having his picture taken. Someone at university probably.
There was no picture of Samara, but the article mentioned her too. Young girl. Long black hair. Pale. Lost her nails after a terrible sickness. Abducted by evil man who was completely mental and very dangerous.
Pink wished he could have protested.
Crazy he might have been, but dangerous, certainly not. Samara, on the other hand...
He didn't let her see the newspaper of course. She had not yet fully recovered of their encounter with Rachel Keller two days ago, and Pink didn't know how she would react to the news that they were now wanted.
Probably not well.
So he took her by the hand and without a word, they walked until they were out of the small town where they had spent the night. Then they walked some more, because Pink was now scared someone might see them. He took Samara to a small earth path between two fields of corn and when they were far away from the main road, he sat down and invited her to do the same. No one would find them here, it was safe, or so he hoped.
-Princess, I have bad news. It seems...
-They said you were a bad man, Samara said. In the newspaper. I saw it.
-You did?
-I'm a big girl you know. I can read, especially big letters like that. I'm not stupid. And there was a picture of you, but you look nicer in reality. And they said you were bad, but you're not. You're nice.
-Stupid but nice. Yep, that would be me.
-You're not always stupid, said Samara.
And that was probably the nicest thing anyone had ever told him. Pink, who until that point had been scared to death by that whole new situation, suddenly calmed down, feeling strangely happy.
After all, if Samara could remain calm, so could he.
-You understand that this is very bad, right? He asked.
-What, saying you're not stupid?
-Yeah, no, that was... cute, actually. No, I meant... what was in the paper. About me having kidnapped you and all. Means now, people will be after us. Police, people in the street... at any moment we could be recognized and then we're in big trouble. I don't know why this is happening, but...
-It's Rachel, Samara said.
And she still looked very calm, but suddenly, Pink realized that she really wasn't. Looking closely, he could see many emotions in her dark eyes. Fear. Anger. Hate. Sadness.
And, strangely, a hint of Guilt.
-I don't think the journalist could have done that by herself, Pink said in what he hoped to be a reassuring voice. And I don't think she'd ever want to have to fight you again.
-We never fought, the girl protested. I never fought.
-No, you sure didn't. But she did. And she's probably very much afraid of you now, and she won't want to have you... us as enemies. It can't be her, princess. It's got to be... that old crazy woman at the inn.
That's a lie, Pink thought.
-She did call me a pervert and a freak and all kind of niceties, remember? I bet you that as soon as she woke up, she went to the police and told them about us.
Not quite a lie this one, but you always needed some truth in your lies anyway.
-And they believed her because, well, maybe some of the people we met afterwards also decided we were kind of suspicious, and they also told the police, and that's how you end up with your face in the newspapers. Because these people, they all thought I might be dangerous, while your journalist knew that you were, and she is clever enough to stay away from us.
More lies, and at any other time, she'd never believe me because that's the most stupid lie I ever said. And that's something.
And Samara believed him, but only because she desperately wanted, no, needed to.
Parts of her still wanted to trust Rachel, just as she had trusted mommy till the very end, hoping until her very last breath that her mother would change her mind and take her back and they'd be happy again. Even now, even after everything that had happened, if Anna Morgan came back suddenly and told Samara she was sorry, the girl would love her again.
She had never stopped loving her.
Just as she had never stopped loving Rachel.
There had been too few people to ever care about her for her to start hating any of them. She was eight. She had been eight for years, decades. She needed to love someone, anyone, and if that meant loving people who had wanted to get rid of her several times, then so be it. She didn't really have the choice.
So she believed what Pink said. That Rachel had nothing to do with it. It didn't make the situation that much easier, really, but she felt better about it and that was something.
-So, what are we going to do? She asked after a few minutes. Are we going to tell people you're in fact real nice? If I tell them you're nice, it should be okay. I wouldn't like you if you were mean to me. It would be stupid. So I'll tell them, and...
-Won't work.
Samara glared at the young man. She didn't like to be interrupted, and even less so when it was to be told she was wrong. People who thought she was wrong, until now, had mostly included her father and the doctors -partly because nobody else would listen to her -and she hadn't liked them at all and she would always regret she had not gone after them because it was not fair they had survived while mommy and herself had died.
Maybe, once that whole newspaper problem was over, she would ask Pink to take her to the doctors to get a proper revenge and then she'd never kill anyone ever again, promise, and the two of them could live happily ever after and it would be sweet.
But first, she asked Pink why she couldn't go tell other people that he was really not a bad man, just a little strange at times.
-There are many reason, he answered. For example, because they won't listen. See, if you tell them you're the girl I'm supposed to have kidnapped, they'll take you to a hospital...
She gasped, terrified.
-To make sure you're okay, that I didn't hurt you, Pink added quickly. It would be... the right kind of hospital. The ones where they actually help people get better. But even there, if you tell them I'm a good guy, they won't listen to you. They will think I lied to you, that I threatened you to do horrible stuff if you said I was bad.
-That's stupid.
-No, it's not. That's what usually really happens to children who are taken from their family. That's what bad people do to children they kidnap, they lie and threaten and pretend to be their friends to confuse them. Everybody would assume that's what happened to you and, really, I can't blame them. It's... you know. Good. That people worry, I mean. They should worry, because, well, what that newspaper said, it could be the truth.
-But you didn't kidnap me!
-Yeah, but only you and me know that. And by the time they start wondering if you're not telling the truth, weeks will have passed, and they will have discovered that, strictly speaking, you don't exist. 'cause, you know, you're dead and all that. If you tell them your real name, they'll think you're lying, because not many girls are called Samara Morgan, and the only one I've ever heard of has been dead for years, since, you know, that's you. Of course, you could give them a fake name, but they will soon realize that in reality, no eight years old girl of your description disappeared lately.
-So they will know you were really nice!
-No. They'll just think I kidnapped you years ago. They'll think I tortured you, because look at your hands, most people have nails. Most girls sleep at night. Most girls might not burn the doctors' minds if they ask too many questions.
But you are not most girls, and you are not normal, and they might think you're crazy and send you to a wrong hospital.
Pink didn't have to say the words, Samara still heard them.
And she had never hated her weirdness more than she did now. If she had been normal, she could have told the people that Pink was nice, and everyone would have left them alone and it would have been very nice.
But of course, if she had been normal, she would have stayed with her first mommy and she would be a grown up by now and none of the bad things in her life would have happened.
She really wished she had been normal.
-So what can we do? She asked miserably. What's going to happen?
-If people find us, it's end of the story for us, Pink said. You're going to an orphanage or something like that. I'm going to jail for the rest of my life. End of story.
-But what can we do?
Pink smiled, and he did so with such a endearing spark mischief in his eyes that Samara felt herself smiling too, as if he were contagious.
-Well, princess, it's fairly easy, the young man said. What we can do is this: we don't get caught, obviously. Now, I know what you're going to say, this is not a proper plan. But I've got an idea, and you're gonna love it.
And that was a lie, really, because Samara didn't love the idea at all.
For one thing, it involved her becoming blond and wearing the silliest, ugliest pink and blue dress ever. She had tolerated Pink calling her a princess because it was kind of sweet now that she was used to it and it made her feel she was important to him and she liked that, but the dress was too much and made her look like a cupcake.
-God, you look completely dumb, Pink laughed.
Samara, for a split second, thought she ought to have killed him right there and then. He deserved it, and she hated people laughing at her and not taking her seriously. But then again, Pink wasn't looking very clever either, and he certainly knew it. He was wearing the ugliest shirt ever, blue with big, ugly red flowers, and he also had those shorts that were showing his skinny, white, hairy legs, and he had dyed his hair blond too, and Samara decided she couldn't kill him now. He was looking too stupid, and it would not be fair on him that after having been so nice to her, he'd have to be forever remembered by the people who would discover his corpse as "that one dead guy with no fashion sense".
And, well, they were both stupid looking now, and had the same bright, yellow hair, so people might assume more easily that they were siblings. At least, that was what Pink was aiming at.
Turned out he had bought days ago stuff for a complete make over of the two of them.
He had always known there would be problems, Samara suddenly understood. He had always known people would be suspicious. He had always know being with her would get him into lots of troubles, just as he had always known she could kill him at any moment.
And yet he hadn't cared. Better, he had stayed, and said he would always stay.
She would never tell him, because in her experience telling things was always a bad move, but she decided that day that having an Uncle was maybe even nicer than having a Mommy.
Quiet week-end, and I'm in a writing mood, so here you go. Once again, I can't promise anything about the next chapter, but at least I've started it, so that's something.
