A Difficult Kind – Chapter 14
Brenda walks out of her bedroom with a bag in her hand. She walks over to where Iris is sitting on the couch.
'Don't you think you should come with me to the theatre now? I'm not sure I want you to walk there alone, Iris,' Brenda says.
'I'll be fine, Brenda, really, it's only a few blocks,' she says.
'Well, at least let me call Paige to come and walk over with you?' Brenda asks with hopefulness.
Iris smiles and her and slowly nods her head.
Brenda calls her friend and asks her to come over and walk Iris over to the theatre.
'Sure, no problem, Brenda,' Paige says.
'Great, thank you so much,' Brenda says and hangs up the phone.
There is a knock at the door and Brenda walks quickly to answer it. She opens the door and sees the stage manager for the show standing in front of her apartment.
'Hi Dave, I'll be right out,' she says.
'Okay Iris, my escort is here,' Brenda says and kisses Iris on the forehead. 'I will see you in a little while.'
'Okay, dear,' Iris says with a smile.
Brenda walks out of the apartment with Dave at her side.
'Thanks for coming to get me, Dave. I know you must be really busy preparing for the show,' she says.
'Yeah, well, I needed a break anyway,' he says. 'Is there a particular reason you wanted someone to walk you down there?'
'Um, nothing specific,' she says, 'I guess I was kind of nervous, since I was stopped outside the theatre by some crazy fan yesterday. It just helps to have some company.'
Brenda looks at Dave to see whether or not he really believes her, but he just nods his head as they approach the theatre.
Brenda looks around for anyone looking suspicious, but doesn't recognize anything out of the ordinary. She thanks Dave again and almost runs into the theatre and back to her dressing room.
Iris stands in the bathroom putting the finishing touches on her makeup when she hears a knock at the door. She moves through the apartment quickly to open it.
Paige, Wyatt, and Brent are all standing on the other side when she opens the door.
'Hi, this is Wyatt and Brent,' Paige introduces them.
'It's very nice to meet you,' Iris says. 'Just let me grab my bag and I'll be ready to go,' she says.
She walks back to the bedroom and picks up her purse. She feels her heartbeat quicken as she bends down to pick it up. She stands up slowly and puts her hand to her chest.
Her heartbeat begins to slow back down and she moves to the living room to meet up with Brenda's friends.
'Shall we?' Paige says.
'Yes, let's go,' Iris says. They walk out of the apartment and down the street to the theatre.
'I thought Dylan would be coming with us?' Paige asks her.
'Oh, well,' Iris starts to say, 'he left earlier to take care of a few things and Brenda was worried that I wouldn't be able to find the theatre.'
Paige smiles at her as they walk.
'Have you seen many of Brenda's performances?' Iris asks them.
'Actually, I think we've seen them all since she's been here,' Wyatt says. 'She's very talented and every show she's been in has been wonderful.'
'This is my first time seeing her perform,' Iris tells them.
'Oh, well then, you are going to have the evening of a lifetime,' Brent says.
* * * * *
'Do you think we're ever going to find Dylan?' Steve asks the girls.
'Of course we will, or someone will. He can't be that far away,' Valerie says.
'Oh, please, by now he could be anywhere. He doesn't have anything tying him down to this place anymore and the only family he has around was in Hawaii and is now in London with Brenda,' Kelly says.
'Do you think that he might actually show up in London at some point?' Steve says.
'I've thought about that too. Does anyone even know if they were on speaking terms over the last few years? I mean, I've never heard him talk about her,' Donna says.
'Who knows? It's definitely a possibility that he would end up there, the question is why hasn't he already? What's taking him so long?' Kelly says.
'Maybe he has and she's been lying to us the whole time,' Steve suggests.
'Why would she do that? She doesn't know that we have ulterior motives here,' Kelly says.
'Yeah, but she was definitely surprised when Brandon called her and she was a little leery on the phone when I talked to her about coming back,' Donna says.
'When you talked to her she had been drinking, so it could have just been that,' Steve says.
'If I were her, I'd be kind of suspicious about this whole thing. I know that I haven't really talked to her since she's been there, have any of you?' Kelly asks and looks around the room.
'No, not really, she called me once about a year or so ago,' Donna says.
'I thought Brandon was calling her all of the time?' Steve asks.
'Steve, please, where have you been? They haven't been speaking to each other for like six or seven months until now,' Kelly says.
'Wait, what did I miss? Did I miss something?' Steve asks.
'Oh, my God, you are so dense,' Valerie says, leaning her head on her hand.
Donna and Kelly start to laugh at Steve.
'Come on, tell me what happened, what did I miss here?' he pleads.
'It happened right before Dylan was getting married. I guess Brandon thought that Brenda would be better off if she just stopped waiting for Dylan to come back to her. I think he always knew that Brenda had kept the door open for him, just in case, you know?' Kelly says.
'He was trying to figure out a way to break the news to her and let her know at the same time that she needed to suck it up and move on with her life. Dylan was getting married and that was the end of the story,' she continues.
'Yeah, so he came to us asking for ideas on how to go about letting Brenda know what was going on,' Valerie pipes in.
'We sat down with him for a long time trying to figure out what to do. We gave him several opinions on what we thought was the best way to break the news to her, but he rejected them all. At the end of the night, he just threw his hands up and said that he would figure out the best way to tell her on his own,' Kelly says.
'He didn't say another word about it and a little while after the wedding I asked him how he did it,' Valerie tells them.
Kelly puts her head down and starts to shake it as Valerie speaks.
'What? How did he do it?' Steve asks, looking from Valerie to Kelly.
'Well,' Kelly starts, 'he basically laid down the law. He was rude and condescending and an all-around jerk to her on the phone one day. Of course, she was mad and upset with him for treating her like dirt, but according to him it was all part of his plan.'
'After that phone call, he waited until the wedding was really close and then called her and left her a horribly insensitive and rude answering machine message. He basically told her in no uncertain terms to forget about all of us, since we've forgotten about her and with Dylan getting married to someone else, there was no reason for her to even be involved with anything going on back here,' Kelly says slowly.
'What? Why would he do that? We didn't forget about her. We asked about her all the time,' Steve says.
'Brandon, in his infinite wisdom, decided that she needed to be slapped in the face in order to move on and get over Dylan,' Valerie says.
'So, he decided to sacrifice himself and his relationship with her in order to achieve that goal. In all honesty, he really thought that it was in her best interest to just get over it quickly. He wanted her to go back to being the Brenda he remembered and the sister he loved,' Kelly says.
'I had no idea,' Steve says.
'Neither did we, until we asked him about how he did it and he cried the whole time he was telling us,' Valerie says.
'He needs to tell her the truth,' Donna says. 'That was a really bad way of handling that situation. He should have known better. I don't think Brenda will ever get over Dylan.'
'Well, we all know that, and he should have known that, but he was on a mission and nothing was going to stop him from trying to save her,' Kelly says.
'That's really sad,' Steve says. 'I mean, Brenda and I haven't always gotten along, but to have your brother, the one that you trust the most, hurt you like that must have been really painful for her to deal with on her own. I can't imagine how she dealt with Brandon treating her like that on top of the fact that Dylan was getting married. That must have made it like a thousand times worse.'
The gang looks around at each other with solemn faces.
'We should have called her sooner,' Valerie says. 'I feel really guilty about that now.'
Kelly nods her head and looks up at Valerie.
* * * * *
Iris sits in the audience with Brenda's friends watching her on perform. She is taken aback by what a brilliant actress Brenda really is and becomes a little sad that Dylan couldn't be there to see her.
At intermission, Iris goes outside the theatre to get some air and stands by the door talking with Brenda's friends.
She looks up suddenly at the sound of a motorcycle speeding by the front of the theatre and feels a jolt in her chest.
'Iris, are you alright?' Paige asks her as she sees Iris quickly put a hand up to her chest.
'Oh, yes, I'm fine. It's probably just a little indigestion or something,' she says and goes back into the theatre.
Iris sits through the second act of the play nervously playing with the strap on her purse. The play ends to thunderous applause which seems to get impossibly louder when Brenda takes her bow.
Brenda stands up and smiles as the cast bows together and then makes their off of the stage as the house lights come up.
Brenda walks back to the dressing room and changes her clothes. She washes her face and takes all of the stage makeup off as quickly as she can. She doesn't want to leave Iris out in the auditorium for too long by herself.
'Congratulations, Brenda, fantastic job out there tonight,' Dave comes by and tells her.
'Thanks, Dave,' she says with a smile and grabs her bag.
Brenda wades her way through the crowd of people that have gathered outside of the dressing room door. She immediately looks for her friends and Iris, but doesn't see them. She continues down the hallway slowly, weaving in and out of the crowd.
She gets to the stage and looks out in the audience to see if Iris was waiting for her. She doesn't see her anywhere inside the building and starts to get a nervous feeling in the bottom of her stomach. She walks up the aisle to the front of the theatre and searches the people standing in the lobby.
She walks out the front doors to the theatre and hears Paige yelling her name.
'Brenda!' Paige yells with urgency.
Brenda turns slowly in the direction of Paige's voice. She sees Paige, Brent, and Wyatt running toward her out of the corner of her eye. She suddenly feels her heart sink when she does not see Iris with them.
'You were so great in this play. This is the best one yet,' Paige says and hugs her.
'Where is Iris?' Brenda says firmly.
'She said she needed to go to the ladies room, so we told her that we'd meet her out here,' Paige tells her.
Brenda nods her head and looks around at her friends. 'I'll be right back, okay?'
She makes her way back inside and almost runs to the bathroom. She opens the door and yells Iris' name.
'Are you in here?' she says louder.
She hears the main door open behind her and sees a tall man standing in the doorway.
'This is the ladies room, the men's room is next door,' Brenda tells him.
'I didn't come in here to use the bathroom, Ms. Walsh,' the man says as the door closes behind him.
* * * * *
'Brandon has been gone for a long time, anyone know when he's going to be back?' Donna asks.
'Why don't we call him and see where he is,' Steve says and picks up the phone. He dials Brandon's number and waits.
'He's not answering,' Steve tells them. As Steve puts the phone down the gang hears the front door open.
'We're in the kitchen Brandon,' Kelly yells.
Valerie turns her body and looks toward the foyer. She gasps loudly as a large hand shoves a cloth over her mouth. She breathes in and everything goes black.
'Down on the ground, all of you, right now!' they hear one of the men yell.
Steve, Donna, and Kelly slowly lay down on the ground. The men surround them and start to tie their hands behind their backs.
One of the guys pulls Steve's head up by his hair and yells 'Where's the Walsh guy?'
Steve doesn't answer and yelps when his head is pulled back farther.
'Where is he? Is he upstairs?' he yells.
Steve tries to shake his head. 'He's not here. He didn't say where he was going,' he says quickly.
'Yeah, somehow I doubt that. Well, it doesn't matter anyway,' he says. He looks up at the other guys and nods.
One by one they are brought to their feet and guided out of the back door. One of the men picks up Valerie's body and carries her out the door. They are all led to a black van and thrown inside.
* * * * *
Brenda slowly backs away from the man standing in front of her.
'I'm not going to hurt you. My name is John Granger, I work for the FBI,' he says slowly. He puts his hand into his pocket and shows her his badge.
One of the stall doors opens slowly and Brenda turns her head to see Iris holding on to the latch.
She looks pale and her eyes have sunken into her head a little bit. She puts her hand out to Brenda, who runs to her and grabs her arm.
'Oh my God, Iris, are you alright? What happened?' Brenda asks her.
John walks over to where they are standing.
'I presume you're Dylan's mother?' he asks her. Iris nods her head as Brenda helps her over to the sink.
She splashes some water on her face and looks into the mirror.
'Brenda, something terrible has happened. All of a sudden I started to feel nauseas and felt this enormous pressure in my chest,' Iris says slowly.
'Ladies, this is not a safe place for you to be. There are several people milling around watching your every move. We need to leave this building quickly, quietly, and without being seen,' John says.
'My friends are waiting outside for me,' Brenda says.
'Tell them you have to take care of Iris or something, but get rid of them,' John says.
Brenda nods and leaves the bathroom. She runs out front to where her friends are waiting.
'Sorry guys, Iris is not feeling well and she's been throwing up. I have to take care of her, so you guys go on ahead to the pub and I'll meet up with you later, okay?' Brenda says quickly.
'Oh, is she alright? She started to get antsy toward the end of the play,' Paige says.
'It's probably a stomach bug or something, I'm sure she'll be fine once I get her back to my apartment. I'll see you guys later, okay?' Brenda says.
They all nod at her and start walking across the street to the pub. Brenda turns around to head back inside when someone grabs her arm. She jerks her head around quickly and comes face to face with Beau.
'Brenda, how was the show? Sorry I missed it,' he says.
She pulls her arm out of his hand and stares at him.
'Beau, I don't have time to talk right now. Everyone just went across the street, why don't you join them?' she says and goes back into the theatre.
She enters the bathroom to find Iris with her head in her hands leaning against the counter.
'Okay, they're gone,' she says to John.
'Follow me,' he says and starts to walk out of the bathroom.
'Come on, Iris, let me steady you. We have to get out of here,' she says. Brenda puts her arm around Iris and guides her out of the bathroom.
They follow John to the back of the theatre and exit the building into the alleyway. He takes them around the block and down a few more alleyways until they finally reach Brenda's apartment.
They go inside quickly and lock the door.
'Don't turn on any lights that aren't on already,' John says. He quickly walks through the apartment to make sure there is no one hiding out.
Brenda sits Iris on the couch and gets her a glass of water.
'Brenda, something is not right. It's not supposed to be this way. Whatever is happening shouldn't be happening. We did something wrong, maybe we missed a clue,' Iris starts to say quickly.
'Iris, it's okay. First we need to figure out why you're feeling like this. I'm here, you're here, the FBI is here, so we're okay for now,' she says.
'It's not about us,' Iris says clearly. She stares at the floor for a while and then looks up slowly at Brenda.
'If it's not us, it's your brother or,' Iris stops as she sees John come back into the room.
'The house is clear. I'm sorry to have cornered you in the bathroom, but the situation at the theatre did not look good. I usually don't come in contact with my targets unless absolutely necessary,' he tells Brenda.
'You and Iris are definitely being followed. I'm not sure who is who yet, but there seems to be a big interest in where you go and who you are with,' he continues.
He pulls out a phone and dials a number.
'Yes, I've made contact. It was unavoidable. Minimum three. Negative. Yes, sir,' John says into the phone and hangs it up.
'We have to move,' he says. 'Pack a very small bag with essentials only. You have 10 minutes,' he says and stands in the middle of the living room.
Brenda looks at him and back to Iris.
'What do you need that you don't have in your purse already?' Brenda asks her.
'My cards, Brenda, they are on the table. I also have a small bag on the nightstand next to the bed that I need,' she says.
Brenda walks around the apartment collecting Iris' things. She goes into her bedroom and grabs her phone charger, her emergency money, and her passport.
She walks back out to the living room and hands Iris her bag and the cards.
Brenda puts her things in her shoulder bag and goes to the bookshelf to grab the Byron poetry book. She shoves it in the bag and looks back at John.
'Okay,' she tells him.
'Good, let's go. My car is parked down the street,' he says.
Brenda helps Iris up and looks around as they leave her apartment.
'I can't believe this is happening,' she says.