10
Of all the things Teddy Duncan liked to do, babysitting was not high on her list of priorities. She loved her baby sister, Charlie, but she preferred watching her on her own time, not when it conflicted with her social engagements. On this bright and sunny day, she took her sister to Cheesman Park to play with the other toddlers at the kiddie area of the park, but the only one who actually seemed to get anything out of it was her brother PJ who reverted back to his childhood in the slide, chutes and tunnels.
"That's so fun…" The big blonde goof giggled and chuckled as he romped with pre-schoolers.
"Yeah…" Teddy was holding Charlie in the path of the park with the baby stroller by her side. "But it is meant for kids under so tall." She placed her hand down to three feet tall.
"I was once that tall." PJ chuckled and looked over to the swings off the path. He looked to the top of the hill and back to his sister. "In fact, I'm taller now." He added. Teddy could only groan in unison with a sigh.
"You know," PJ continued. "If you still want to meet your date, I can take Charlie off your hands. I can take her home for you."
"No, you just want to exploit her." Teddy was tempted to take his offer but knew better. With her sister in the stroller, she started pushing her sister to the crest of the hill under the trees to head down to the entry of the park. "She's our sister. Not a magnet for you to attract dates."
"I have no idea why those girls thought I was her father!"
"You just went along with what they said." Teddy looked back at him.
"Hey," PJ grinned that goofy grin again. He liked it when the girls went gaga over him. "I'm just spreading the love."
"But you're not using Charlie to do it." Teddy reached out to take Charlie's stroller and reached to empty air. She looked again. In the path under the tree, the stroller was absent and rolling away down the path. Teddy's eyes widened in shock and her lips parted into a scream. PJ did a double take and looked again as Charlie rolled on down the steps, the uneven surface jostling her delicately. All the one-year old could see was sky and clouds and birds from her perspective. Giggling at the trees whizzing past her, she had no idea her older sister was chasing after her.
"Charlie!" Teddy jumped a trashcan and PJ cleared the stone steps up to the playground. Up ahead, a mom in the park with her kids dived to save Charlie but missed. The stroller continued rolling out of the park and out into Hammond Street where a Dodge Neon swerved to miss her and take out a mail box and newspaper box. Her brother and sister racing after her, Charlie and her stroller crossed Hammond and continued down Fifteenth Street.
"Hi, Bob…" The kid's mother, Amy Duncan, stopped on Lexington Road at the Fifteenth Street red light. "I just wanted to let you know I'm on the way home. What do you want for dinner?"
"Spaghetti."
"That's easy enough." Amy sat listening to the radio as she waited for the light to change. "How your day?"
"Termite job at the Old Fontana Place." The big burly pest man was in the crawlspace under the mansion. "God, this place is spooky. Always feel as if I'm going to find a dead body."
"Just clean up before you come home…." Amy sighed over her busy day at the hospital then noticed a stroller roll through the intersection in front of her. "That looks just like…"
Teddy and PJ raced by chasing the rolling stroller.
"Oh my GOD!"
At the bottom of the hill, a commuter bus turned on to Fifteenth Street. As Charlie and her stroller rolled down the center of the street between the cars and surprised looks of drivers, PJ and Teddy came racing after it. Teddy's chest was pounding. PJ was wheezing. Police officers in a parked patrol car scrambled to rescue the lost stroller, but they just barely missed it. The commuter bus was coming closer and closer. Wider than the cars, it left little room for the stroller to roll by unscathed. PJ 's leg gave out just past a tow truck and he went down tumbling a few feet from his momentum. Her lungs about to burst, Teddy collapsed just ten feet from her brother. Her left leg giving out, she put her hands out and fell face first into the asphalt. She heard the bus screeching to a stop. The smell of brake oil burning filled the air then the sound of a crash. Several passengers of the bus lurched forward from the sudden stop or landed in the aisle. Gritting her teeth in misery, Teddy feared the worse.
"Aren't you the cutest little thing?" Her feet entrenched to receive the impact, Bridget left the imprint of one hand and her left shoulder in the front of the bus. Peering down to the cooing little angel in the stroller, she beamed and lit up before little Charlie. She had stopped the bus and saved another infant from a horrible fate. From the sidewalk, a few pedestrians stopped to attempt photos from their camera phones while others just ignored the sight and went about their business. Teddy's jaw dropped in surprise. Hastening to get out of the street, PJ jumped limping on one foot from curbside and cheered the mysterious blonde.
"You're… you're…" Teddy tried to form words.
"Welcome?" Bridget turned Charlie over to her big sister then did a pirouette up over the street, levitating over the bus and extended her arm to take flight again. The wind caught her and she started sailing away. He had finally met her. He had read all about her on the Internet and he finally met her. PJ could not be more overjoyed. Teddy meanwhile started wondering how she was going to spin this into her video library.
Back in Detroit, Kerry was at the family computer in the living room of the house. She was spending her day off working on her law school requirements and typing up her reports on law cases that had professor wanted her to research and analyze. Her grandfather was in his chair reading the newspaper, trying to ignore the sound of her typing, but as she typed, her cousin CJ had sidled up slowly close to her. He was clad in a blue shirt and tan khakis like a Chicago area shoe salesman. He was clean-shaven, but his mop of blonde hair hung low despite being cut around his ears. She never knew exactly what he was going to say. He had the ego of an artist of wisecracks, but he had the heart of someone who card a lot about his closest friends and family. He liked to think Kerry was his favorite cousin, but right now, he was distracting her.
"What?" She stopped typed and sharply acknowledged him with a high volume of annoyance in her voice.
"Kerry…. Care Bear…" He was grinning. He wanted something. Behind him, his Aunt Cate came up with laundry from the basement. "What's the family secret about Bridget?" He asked.
Cate stopped and turned around interested. Kerry looked to her and back to CJ. Her grandfather looked over the newspaper.
"You mean… besides the fact we don't know where she is." Kerry responded matter-of-factly.
"Heh-heh-heh…" CJ looked back to Cate. "So, the cover-up continues…" He looked back to Kerry. "Look, I can keep a secret. I'm a member of this family. Ain't I? Ain't I?"
"CJ…" Jim fussed with the paper as he folded it in half to set it aside. "Aren't you going to be late getting back to work?"
"Awww…" CJ postured a bit. "How much damage could those kids get into if I'm not back before the bell rings?" He thought about the history class he taught at Kerry's old high school.
"Enough to get you fired." Kerry knew those kids.
"Good point." He turned around to the door and took his car keys out with a moment to stop and make known his presence. "I will figure this out!" He opened the door to the porch as Paul came back home from the train station. With him in the Michigan State University jacket was Rory coming home for the weekend. His hair was uncombed, his jeans were dirty and his t-shirt was untucked, but he grinned ear-to-ear to see his mother again.
"It's the boy!" Paul brought his son home. Kerry saved her work on the computer quickly and jumped up to see her brother. It seemed she had a frozen image of him at seventeen constantly annoying her or busting Bridget five years ago for coming home late, but now, she was proud of the twenty-something year old basketball athlete. Paul was so proud of the boy and where he was going. Rory was now taller than her, and almost as tall as his mother. Rather than rising to the occasion, Jim wanted his turn than bother to get up on his cane to meet the boy.
"Home…" Rory was grinning as he hugged his mother and sister. "A clean bed, home cooking, free laundry…" He dropped his bag at his mother's feet and noticed his cousin. "CJ! How's my room?"
"Same…" CJ looked at Kerry then back to him. "What's the family secret about Bridget?" He asked.
"You mean besides the fact we don't know where she is." Rory answered.
"CJ…" Cate stepped closer. "Isn't there a classroom on fire with your name on it?"
"I will solve this!" He was backing out the door. "If it takes me a thousand years and a million lives…" He heard fire engines nearby and worried over his job. "Gotta go!" He hastened to his jeep as Cate swung the door behind him. Turning to her son, she waited for Paul to stop expressing his love for the boy… now a tall full-grown college man.
"Oh, no…no." Cate saw something she didn't like. "The beard, the stubble, the soul-patch… it's all got to go." She wanted the boy she had before he went to college.
"Mom…"
"If you want me to do your laundry…"
"Cate," Paul played defense. "Let the boy keep the beard." He got the look from her and quickly gave in to turn back around. "You know, Rory, it does grow back."
"All right, I'll shave it…." Rory chuckled under breath. "Grandpa!" He noticed his mother's father looking annoyed.
"Took you long enough!" Jim lost his surly expression as Rory hugged him and turned round to another pat on the back from his father. Paul placed his arm contently around the boy.
"So…" He looked at the man. Last time he saw him, his father was in the recuperation stage after his heart surgery and his mother was seeing hallucinations of Bridget around the hospital and in town. Except for his big sister's absence, everything was back to normal. "Is CJ still five years behind the rest of us?"
"If you mean your sister flying around the world in a red cape and deflecting bullets off her chest…" Jim Eagan resettled himself a bit in the chair. "Yeah, that secret…"
Rory reacted surprised. He looked to Kerry first then his parents.
"Yeah, he knows…" Paul sat on the arm of the sofa next to Cate and in front of his prodigal son. "Damn hearing aid…."
"Worth every penny…." His father-in-law lifted himself on his cane to head for the downstairs bathroom.
"Yeah…" Cate was still smiling as she set the laundry basket off the sofa. "So, Rory… how's college? Who's this girl you've been talking about in your letters? How are your grades?"
"How is the basketball team going?" Paul wanted to know stuff important to him.
"We've won five out of eight." Rory starred unzipping his jacket. "I think I finally settled on a major." He tossed his jacket over one of the stools in the kitchen. "I'm going to go into drama. I want to act. I want to do movies." He grinned that boyish grin again. "In fact, I think I know someone in California who can probably get me in the business."
"Like who…" Standing near the computer, Kerry reacted curious.
"Bridget."
Everyone drew stunned and silent.
"Did he say Bridget?" Jim called through the door the first floor bathroom.
"Wait a minute…" Kerry came up to him. "What do you mean, Bridget can get you into acting?" Her eyes drew suspiciously. "Rory… what do you know about Bridget that we don't?"
"I ran into her in college." Rory confessed.
"What?" Cate and Paul both jumped to their feet. Rory was immediately grabbed by his mother desperate to know the truth. "You saw her? What was she doing? How does she look? Did she look well? How is she?"
"Is she still…." Paul sought the right words. "Kryptonian?"
"Oh yeah…" Rory rolled his eyes nervously. He turned to the refrigerator to get some juice and pour himself a drink. He had rehearsed how he was going to tell them, but even then, he wasn't sure how to say it. "She kind of tossed three guys around like rag dolls and dropped me into the reflective pool on campus from twenty feet above it…"
Cate's jaw dropped. Kerry turned around stunned and dropped into her grandfather's seat.
"Rory, could you speak a bit more clearly?" Cate's father called from the toilet. "It sounded like you said she crossed three rag dolls and hopped over the campus twenty times."
"Dad!" Cate tried to hush him.
"Wait a second…" Paul reacted confused. "Why would she do that?"
"I was hoping you wouldn't ask that." Rory poured some juice and replaced the juice back to the shelf. "But it seems there might have been drugs and alcohol involved…"
"Rory!" Paul reacted shocked. Kerry just turned away to avoid that talk.
"Rory Joseph Hennessey!" Cate was more upset. "You… you…" She was so angry she couldn't think. "You are not going back to that college!"
"Mom, I'm sorry." Rory reacted ashamed. "I've been drinking a lot of beer, yeah, but I never used any drugs. They were just offered to me, but I didn't use them." He paused embarrassed; his head held low. "Look, Bridget stopped me from a major- major- mistake."
"What does this mean to your scholarship?" Kerry stood arms crossed with her back to the family computer.
"I think I'm okay…" Rory confessed. "The fraternity is on probation, the coach ran us an extra mile, but I'm not getting expelled."
"And what's this thing about Bridget getting you into acting?" Cate now stood with her arms crossed.
"She was wearing a Los Angeles Lakers cap." Rory tried to move the attention off himself.
"She was wearing a what?" Grandpa was still in the bathroom.
"A Los Angeles Lakers cap!" Paul yelled the fresh news to his father-in-law.
"That doesn't mean she's living in LA, you idiot." Kerry scoffed. "She probably got it in San Francisco."
"That's right…" Paul was still getting over the fact his favorite child was drinking and close to drugs. "She probably got it in…." He stopped and did a double take. Cate and Paul now turned round in unison to face their red-haired daughter.
"Where'd San Francisco come from, Care Bear?"
"San Francisco?" Kerry now found herself on the spot. She looked into their confused faces staring at her. Now Rory and the two of them were looking at her suspiciously with their arms folded.
"Did I forget to tell you about that?"
Almost three hundred miles south of San Francisco on the west coast and north of Los Angeles, Leonard Hofstader was leading the way onward to another weekly ritual at the local Comics World affiliate. He purchased a lot of his comic books and superhero memorabilia from the location. Along the way, he and the guys were usually involved in a spirited debate about the perimeters and trivial details of the comic book universe.
"Dude, I'm telling you." Raj spoke up. "The Hulk could definitely beat Superman up."
"Au contraire…" Sheldon brought up the rear of their party down the stairs from the apartment. "The Hulk only has superhuman strength, but Superman has strength, speed and super-hearing. He'd hear the Hulk coming from miles away and stay away from him. Plus, he has his heat vision. He could use that to slow down the Hulk."
"Yeah, but what about the madder Hulk gets, the stronger he gets." Leonard rarely took Sheldon's side in these debates. "Eventually, he's going to be able to inflict some major damage to even Superman."
"Not likely…" Sheldon continued. "Superman has a healing factor."
"Not as good as Wolverine's." Raj pointed out.
"You know what I'd like to see…" Howard grinned a bit. "Wonder Woman and the She-Hulk getting in a cat fight… ripping each other's clothes off…" At that moment, a very attractive blue-eyed brunette entered the lobby of the building. She was wearing a form-fitting white sweater with a dark violet skirt down to her ankles. Her eyes were pure azure, but upon hearing Howard mention, "ripping each other's clothes off," she stopped, paused and realized it was a conversation she wanted no part of. Leonard was automatically attracted to her shapely figure, and as Raj became mute in her presence, Howard was trying to picture her without the sweater and skirt. Somehow, the brunette beauty sensed their attraction and turned back to the mailboxes.
"Excuse me…" She had scanned the mailboxes. "Does Billie Daniels still live in the building?"
"Allow me to introduce myself…" Howard pushed his way to meet her. "Howard Wolowitz… the future man of your dreams, and your name, my azure-eyed goddess?" He tried to kiss her hand.
"Engaged…" Prue Halliwell took her hand back from him. "I'm looking for a friend of mine who is supposed to live here. She's blonde, tall, athletic build…"
"There's no one named Billie in the building…" Leonard spoke up. "But there is a girl with that description. Her name's Penny and she lives in 402."
"Thanks…" Prue slipped by them and headed up the stairs. As she passed Sheldon, the tall physicist barely acknowledged her and looked back to Howard. He thought for a minute and stepped down off the staircase to the main floor.
"Did you think you was actually going to get anywhere with her?" He asked Howard.
"It was worth a shot."
"I thought she was hot." Raj broke his silence.
"Yeah…" Leonard pushed the way out of the building to head to the comics shop. "I don't what it was… but she had this sort of… I don't know, magical thing about her."
On the fourth floor, Prue walked past the guy's apartment and noticed Apartment 402 at the bottom of the stairs to the fifth floor. Stepping up to it, she lightly rapped at the door. It had been a few years since she had last seen Bridget as Billie. She knew all about her past and powers and had even helped her get used to expanding her mystical senses. In return, Bridget had even saved her life and that of her sisters a few times from forces beyond understanding. To this day, she was still amazed at her power, and her younger sister Paige was even at times jealous of them, but even with all they did know about Bridget and her abilities, there was still a lot they did not understand about them.
"Billie?" Prue knocked again. Looking behind her and to the stairs, the blue-eyed beauty showed a power of her own. She pointed at the doorknob as it unlocked and swung open partially. Stepping forward, she let herself in and looked around the small apartment. A few dishes were left out on the counter to the kitchen, some clothes were left over the sofa and the front window to the street was slightly ajar. A stack of tabloid magazines were on the floor by the sofa, and a dirty bowl with a spoon in it rested on the futon behind the sofa. Glancing around, Prue saw a photo of Bridget and Sabrina from their trip to Australia over the television cabinet. Next to it was a picture of Kerry from Detroit and then another with Prue, Bridget and Phoebe taken at a fund-raiser back at Golden Gate Park. The place was disorganized and a little bit of a mess. She picked up the bowl, two cups and a random spoon off the floor and headed to the kitchen sink to place them in water.
"Several years later and she still doesn't do housework…." Prue reverted to habit and tried to clean up a little. At least there was dishwashing liquid, it meant she was trying. A few more dirty dishes in the sink, Prue tied her long dark locks of hair behind her and picked up a halter top off the floor. When she stood up, she felt a rush of wind through the apartment. The window parted fully and Bridget stood there before her in full Kryptonian presence, her blonde hair cascading down over her cape, a large red "S" emblazoned to her chest above her bosom and a short red skirt to match her red boots. It was maybe the twentieth or twenty-fifth version of the same outfit. Back in San Francisco, Bridget had the poofed sleeves and low neckline with the insignia over her heart like the Eighties version of the DC Comics character, but now she was back to the form-fitting leotard and large "S" over her chest.
"You didn't just come here to clean up after me, did you?" Bridget asked her.
"No…" Prue looked her over in that silly costume. "Piper still wants her Beatles Sgt. Pepper CD back."
"It's on the shelf…." Bridget glided over removing her cape, draping it over the sofa and then hugging Prue fondly like a sister. "Oooo, it's so good to see you again. How are Piper and Leo?"
"Fine…" Prue smiled a bit. "Did you get the new pictures of the baby?"
"I did…" Bridget recalled the e-mail and moved the newspaper to coax Prue to sit by her on the sofa. "So, what's the honor of this visit? Don't want to be rude but I did have premonitions of a possible suicide in Seattle and a bus crash in Toronto I have to get to…"
"Bridget…" Prue took a deep breath and leaned back into the sofa sideways before the young demigoddess. "I got an e-mail from your sister in Detroit."
Bridget was slow to respond. She turned slowly, placed both her feet to the floor and sighed with a deep breath.
"I figured as much…" She responded tiredly. "Her research to track me down is getting better. I just ran into Rory last week at his college." She looked back to Prue. "I had a dream he lost his scholarship, and I had to prevent it. I can only guess what he's telling my parents."
"Why don't you just go home?"
"I can't…" Garbed in just her blouse and skirt, Bridget rose to head into her kitchen. "Haven't you heard? Bridget Hennessey no longer exists. I gave up my identity so that my father would survive his surgery." She stopped to pour herself some juice. "That's the promise I made…"
"Yeah, I've encountered my own fair share of gods and angels…" Prue sighed a bit and stood back up. "But your sister is going to find out where you are."
"She's going to bust Penny…." Bridget pointed out. "Not Bridget, who no longer exists…." She sipped her juice. "Look, if Kerry finds me, she finds me…. I trust her. I know she can keep my secret."
"So you're not going to do anything about it."
"I had a lot of fun deceiving her and hiding my identity from her back home, but I can't help her bust me." She paused for a moment. "She has to do it herself."
"You're not going to do anything?"
"I could move to live in London next…" Bridget thought about it. "I kind of like doing that English accent." She did it again then reverted back to her normal voice. "But I'd feel bad about leaving Leonard…" She looked figuratively back to the guy's apartment. "I've kind of become fond of him."
"The guy with the glasses from across the hall?"
"That's him…" Bridget finished her juice. "He's got potential…"
"What about your secret?"
"I'll cross that bridge when I get to it." Bridget answered taking her cape back and pulling it back over her shoulders to reattach to her costume.
"I'd be careful doing that…" Prue picked up a few articles of clothing to toss together in a pile in the chair. "Remember David? If we hadn't erased his memories…" She turned briefly to adjust a lamp, but when she looked again, she was talking to an empty apartment.
"I hate it when she does that."