JOAN'S FLASHFORWARD

Chapter 10 Joan's Journey

(AUTHOR'S NOTE: FLASHFORWARD is back on TV, but I've already come up with my own resolution of the story, and I'm not necessarily going to dovetail with what the future TV episodes reveal.)

"—and then I woke up," said the boy.

"Thank you for your story," said Joan.

"Thank YOU," said the boy. He looked around at the dozen-odd people in the group. They were meeting in one of the Baconia University classrooms, since classes had not yet resumed. "I've wanted to get that off my chest for a week, but, of course, there were embarrassing parts…"

Joan waved her hand dismissingly. "Don't worry. Remember, everybody has sworn not to reveal anything they hear in this room, without permission from the original speaker. However, that part you remember about going to the observatory to study a supernova may be important. Do you mind if I repeat that to a scientist friend?"

"Well –" The boy seemed hesitant but finally said, "As long as you don't use my name."

"I won't; I swear it. Now, does anybody else have anything to add? No? Then we'll meet again next Tuesday. Yes?" One girl was waving her hand.

"Madam Chairman," (the girl knew Joan's name, but attendants at Flash Anonymous avoided giving personal names). "It was a relief to tell my story, but now that I've done it, I don't think I need to keep coming. Do I have to?"

"Not at all; this is all strictly voluntary. The only mandatory thing is not to reveal somebody else's secret without their permission."

"I won't."

The meeting broke up, but Elizabeth Grotzmann walked up to the chairwoman. "Joan, this was such a marvelous idea! There are so many people who don't want to keep the 'flashes' to themselves, but also don't want to post them on mosaic dot com for everybody to see. Flash Anonymous is perfect for us. I've Emailed some friends back in Arcadia, and they're going to form their own Flash Anonymous club."

"Thanks, Elizabeth. But I hope you didn't give me too much credit. It was Ellie Himmel's idea."

Elizabeth Grotzmann frowned. "I've met her. Rather strange girl. Lots of good ideas for helping people after the flash, but she can't seem to ACT on them. You're always picking up the pieces behind her."

Joan shrugged. "Well, she's new here, and she's shy. I don't mind. I think of it is a fruitful division of labor -- Ellie the Idea Girl, then Work-it-out Girl, that's me. I really don't mind."

She left the building and started toward the flat that she shared with Adam. Once she thought she was out of earshot from any other student, she got out her cell phone and punched in her brother's number.

"This is Luke."

"Joan. Luke, I can't give the guy's name, but somebody told me that he was studying a supernova in his flashforward. Is that important?"

"A number of scientists have reported that, but it's good to have confirmation."

"Could the supernova have caused the flashforward?"

"Nobody's worked out a mechanism for it. But visible supernovae are rare, less than one per century. For one to happen just at the terminus ad quem is very suspicious."

"The what-crumb?"

"Sorry about the jargon. The scientists have invented some two theories, with some odd names attached. Terminus ab quo is Latin for departure point; it means the crucial cause happened a week ago, and kicked us 6 months into the future. Terminus ad quem means destination point; that theory is that the crucial event will be 6 months from now, and that we were pulled to there instead."

"I'm getting dizzy with all this pulling and kicking."

"Just focus on what you're doing, Joan; helping people deal with their flashes. I think that's the harder work of the two."

Joan was careful NOT to ask about Grace. She knew that Luke was trying his best to persuade Grace to come back from her job abroad, but she also knew that Grace was a very private girl, and would resent Joan getting involved. Let Luke do what he could; Joan knew he was the only one who could convince Grace to return.

When she got home, she found a message on her land-line answering machine.

"Joan, this is Lily. I don't want to say much on the phone, but you gotta come down here. Please. It's your parents; they've been arguing for a week, and we're at an impasse. Please come. CLICK"

Mom and Dad arguing? This was the first Joan had heard of it. Lily must have been trying to handle the conflict herself, but had just given up. Lily had training as a counselor, and had helped couples before. If she thought that she couldn't help her in-laws, then things really were a mess.

When Adam got back home from his projects, Joan explained Lily's plea for help.

"I'll come with you, Jane."

"No! Please don't."

"You think it's that private?"

"It's not that. I need you to stay up here and help out Ellie. This is an on-going crisis, Adam, and people need to do what's most needed for them to do."

Adam saw the point, and immediately helped Joan start packing.

Joan hadn't anticipated a long journey by car, so after crossing the Maryland border she stopped at a gas station to fill up her tank again. There was actually a human attendant there to work the pumps. As she drove off, the attendant called out:

"I suggest you detour by Leslie St., Joan!"

The mention of her name by a stranger who had never heard it was still the usual signal. She was now in traffic and could not backtrack immediately, but she took the first U-turn she could find and drove back to the station. The attendant was nowhere in sight.

"Where are you?" she called out. "You can't just hide, after all this!"

"May I help you, ma'am?" said a middle-aged man in a service-station uniform, walking up. Probably he thought she was crazy. Joan tried to control her emotions and look calm.

"I need to talk to the guy who filled my tank a few minutes ago."

"We don't have employees working the pumps right now. All my people are busy doing repairs. Flash and Crash cases." Presumably he was referring to cars that ran into obstructions when their drivers blacked out.

"But—" Joan realized that it was useless to argue with the manager, who was presumably honest. There were no real employees working the pumps. God had taken the role to talk to Joan, and probably made his activities invisible to everybody else. "Thank you, sir."

"Damn, damn, damn," muttered Joan after she was back in the privacy of her car. It was probably not kosher to curse a divine activity, but that was how she felt right now. She had heard nothing from God since the day of the Flash, and desperately wanted an explanation of what happened. Yet he popped up just to give her another incomprehensible mission. She could never call God; He thought he could always call her. She was getting exasperated.

All the same, by sheer force of habit, she took a detour by Leslie St., in a rundown section of Arcadia.

CRACK!

Joan was a policeman's daughter and could recognize a gunshot when she heard it. And any doubts she had were settled when she saw a guy rush out of a shop with a gun. He hopped in a car and drove off as fast as he could.

Joan was tempted to follow, but she remembered a stern lecture from her father, which had occurred after she and her friend Veronica Mars try to tail a suspicious character by car. A gun-wielding criminal who feared capture for a serious crime was a dangerous man, Dad had said. An ordinary citizen should not try to play the hero, but should leave it to the professionals who were trained in such things. Instead Joan carefully stared at the car's license: CBS 666. Then she got out her cell and called 911.

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When she got to the house, Lily was alone with her kid, and looking antsy.

"OK, I'm here. What is the problem?"

Lily told the story of the confrontation between Will and Helen in her presence. "Helen faithfully hid your involvement in the whole thing, Joan. The problem was, Will could TELL that she was hiding something. I mean, he's had years of experience questioning people."

"But this is Mom! He's not going to regard her the same way he'd regard a criminal suspect walking through the door."

"Normally, no. But Will is under tremendous strain. The Flash may be the greatest crime in history, and every law enforcement official in the world has been ordered to find out all he can. Yet Helen is, in his view, clearly hiding something, protecting somebody. He's not suspecting you. But when a wife conceals something crucial from her husband, well, sometimes he suspects, well – cherchez l'homme -- look for a guy."

"Certainly he can't suspect that Mom is – is –"

"I don't know, Joan. What I do is that the atmosphere is poisonous here, and I felt that I simply had to call you."

"All right. I'll try to intervene."

"Thank God. Now, Henry has asked me for a date – and frankly, I don't want to be around when the fireworks start. Can you babysit Terry until somebody else gets here?"

"Right. Go ahead, this isn't your problem here."

"Thank you."

Lily went out, and Joan looked down on Terry. When Lily was pregnant a few years ago, she had had an oddly prophetic dream, and Joan had wondered whether Terry was destined to have a special relationship with God, temporarily expressed through her mother. Would Terry have a better understanding of the divine purpose than Joan did, or would she too be kept in the dark, being granted knowledge only when there was a need to know?

Joan heard the front door open again. She wondered how long she had been standing here, thinking the same thoughts over and over.

"Joan!"

"Hi, Dad." She rushed to hug her father, but even in the couple of seconds it took to reach him, she could see how careworn he was.

"I'm glad to see you're all right, Joan. There was a shooting on Leslie St., and they told me you had phoned in the car's license number."

"That's right."

"But what were you doing on Leslie Street? It wasn't on your route here from college."

Joan took a deep breath. The next sentence would be one of the most crucial statements of her life.

"God told me to be there, Dad."

"God?!"

"Yes. I know it's going to take time to explain this, Dad, but I've been going on missions for God for years!"

TO BE CONTINUED