Chapter 21:
Business trips. Velma had never been on one before. Signing up for this two-week conference had been very last-minute.
Originally, Velma fought long and hard against going. Sixteen people from the HTRT were supposed to sign up to share the team's research and inventions at some worldwide symposium-- the tricky part would be in not revealing where they learned certain pieces of information. Still, going was an honor, and at first finding a full list of people to sign up had been no problem. Then two people ducked out at the last minute, and somebody else needed to replace them. This was four days before the conference was supposed to start, and nobody could sign up now that they had other plans for the next two weeks.
Except Velma.
It was an escape. Her reason for initially declining when the sign-up sheet was first passed around was that it would be for two weeks. Two weeks was too long to be away from home... away from Shaggy...
Shaggy...
Velma reached into her totebag and pulled out a chart she should have been working on. Work. It was the one way she forget about how she had treated him... about how much both of them had been hurt. It used to be a burden when it interfered with her interaction with Shaggy; now it was her savior when she found her mind wandering back to him. It was easier to deal with problems on paper than to deal with problems in real life.
Which was why she was going on travel. She didn't like to think of it as "getting away," but the truth was she needed a break. A break from hurt and pain and confusion. A break from reality.
She checked the time on the airport clock. They would be loading in nearly half an hour.
"So... an eighteen-hour flight. You and me. I'll let you have the window seat."
Velma groaned inwardly. The rule had been that if an HTRT member attended the conference, so did her partner. That meant Judd MkKay.
Velma compared their tickets. First-class, seats 6A and 6B. The HTRT had of course paid for the tickets; it was nice that they had been given first-class. Still, at the thought of riding next to MkKay the entire time, Velma would have sooner ridden in the baggage compartment. The one that wasn't pressurized.
For a wild moment, she wondered if she could trade her ticket with somebody riding coach. Why not? MkKay was required to attend the conference with her; whoever said that meant they had to sit together on the plane?
But then again, she wouldn't put it past him to pull the same stunt and wind up sitting next to her anyway. Something really had a way of creeping her out about him...
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It had been an incredibly long flight, and Velma had not slept a wink the entire time.
She probably should have, come to think of it. But in order to fall asleep, she had to be relaxed. To be relaxed, she had to put her work away. After she put her work away, the distraction's effectiveness was removed... and her thoughts returned to--
Stop that, she told herself.
Unfortunately, about an hour before the plane landed, she ran out of things to do. This was something that until recently she had yearned for almost constantly-- to have no assignments, for there to be no work hanging over her head. But now it tortured her. She wished she had brought a newspaper or something.
She spent the rest of the flight, as well as the time waiting at the baggage claim, as well as the ride to the hotel, concentrating. Very seldom did anyone with a mind like Velma's ever concentrate on avoiding a thought, rather than pursuing one.
Do not think... do not think about him... do not think about...
Do not think about Shaggy.
Aaack. There it was again!
Velma unpacked very slowly after reaching the hotel room. She didn't have to leave for the conference for nearly another three hours. She wished she hadn't finished every scrap of work on the plane. Maybe she could turn on the TV for a while...
No, that didn't work. In a way that was painfully miraculous, every channel seemed to be showing one of Shaggy's favorite movies or TV shows.
Maybe she should grab something to eat.
That was even worse. It was very hard for Velma to eat much of anything lately. That was really disturbing, seeing as she was in her second trimester now. Anything she did choke down, it was only for the baby. And she had to distract herself while she was eating. Food of any kind reminded her of Shaggy.
She flopped down on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. Hotel room ceilings always seemed to have those odd swirling patterns that could serve as a Rorshach test if you watched them long enough. In the past, Velma would have said the swirls looked like elves or tigers or maps of Norway. Now she knew exactly what was on her mind, and the last thing she wanted was to see it. She rolled over and looked at the nightstand instead.
On it sat a phone.
For a surreal moment, Velma felt ecstatic. Somehow, she felt this strange sensation, as though it might be ringing, and she knew who it was, and she could just pick up the receiver and tell him how much she missed him already even though she had only been in Singapore for a few hours.
She shook herself. She was losing it. The phone certainly was not ringing. It certainly was not someone she knew, and she certainly could not tell him anything about how much she missed him. She broke his heart. She couldn't fix it, not after allowing it to sit like this for so long.
She lay there in agony. She had almost three hours to kill, and she couldn't last alone like this for another five minutes.
Maybe she could just call Daphne. Then again... checking her watch Velma realized that in their own time zone Daphne was probably sleeping. Maybe Velma could get some sleep of her own...
Setting the alarm clock next to her bed, Velma drifted off into a turbulent slumber.
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A few days later, Velma would have to go up to the podium.
Mr. Harolds had requested that she and MkKay present their research on some genetic modifications that would improve some rare wolf's chances of survival... or something like that. It was funny, really, how even though it was a project she had given herself fully to as of late, outside of the scientific world Velma could not have said what it was. It was her way of fleeing, of escaping reality, to become completely immersed in something that was really dull and uninteresting. The work became so automatic, so instinctive, that Velma became nearly robotic when she occupied herself with it. That felt good, not really having to think...
Velma finished combing her hair and put on the outfit that-- she hoped-- looked the most professional. This was her moment to shine! This was her chance to possibly get her foot in the door to become a widely-recognized scientist! She should be proud...
She felt sick at the sensation that she really didn't care.
When it was time to give her presentation, she and MkKay both rose and made their way to the front of the room. Velma began the presentation.
"In recent years, we have seen a decline in the Canis himalayaensis population which--"
The rest of the speech could have been a recording. Velma recited the words perfectly, but she didn't have the slightest clue what she was saying. The audience was clearly captivated, interested, but she didn't really know what part of her speech she was on. It was entirely automatic.
Unfortunately, that opened a space in her head in which her thoughts could wander. And three guesses as to where they could go.
"As sightings of these wolves became rarer and rarer--"
As sightings of Shaggy became rarer and rarer...
"Desperate measures had to be taken--"
Desperate reactions that never should have been given...
"Hopefully we will soon see an increase in--"
There is no hope that we will ever see any chance of...
She told herself to snap out of it. Focus. Ignore any other thoughts that might creep into her mind.
It didn't work. A few tears rolled down her cheeks. Right there in front of everybody. And the worst part of all was that they seemed to assume she was crying over the fate of the stupid species, which for all she cared right now could live or die or conquer the world and it wouldn't matter.
Afterward, everyone came up to Velma and MkKay and told them what an excellent project they had presented, and what potential this modification had and why the two were geniuses and everything else that didn't matter. Inwardly, Velma wanted to die.
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There was a knock on the door of Velma's hotel room. She got up off the bed and answered it.
It was MkKay.
He was of course the last person she wanted to see at the moment, but unfortunately there always was the very real chance that he had come for some work-related reason, possibly to discuss the day's presentation, etcetera. She really was obligated to open the door, like it or not.
"Hey, Velma!" he greeted her, as Velma stepped out into the hall. No way was she going to invite him into her room.
"Hello, MkKay," she told him, hoping he would catch the hint that she preferred surnames in the workplace. That never worked, unfortunately.
"I was thinking... we could go down to a bar or--"
"No thanks," she cut him off.
"Aw, why not?"
Because I would never go anywhere with you, Velma thought to herself. She gave the most obvious answer, though, and one which she hoped would remind him of their age difference. "I'm underage."
"The drinking age here is only eighteen. You could still go--"
"The answer is still no." Velma had known about the drinking age, but she was hoping MkKay wouldn't. "I'm seeing someone." She couldn't say whether that was true anymore, but it was an answer.
"The guy you broke up with?"
How on Earth did MkKay know about that? Velma shuddered, not wanting to know the truth. MkKay continued.
"Because I'm in love with you, Velma, in case you haven't noticed!"
Ick.
He stepped closer to her. She backed away, until her back was touching the wall. "You're all I think about, all I dream about..."
Velma wanted to barf just then. He was disgusting.
"That's flattering," she told him, "but--" She tried to slide away from him.
Her grabbed her arm. Hard. And he didn't let go.
Velma wasn't sure what he was doing, what she was doing, but she did know she yanked her arm back. She dashed into her room and slammed the door, locking it, just in the nick of time.
Heart racing, she peered out the peephole in the door. MkKay was still out there, pacing... not going away.
Velma felt trapped. Trapped and alone. Cornered by this creep. She didn't know how long he would stay out there-- possibly all night?-- but until he left she couldn't move.
She cried. She had come on this business trip for what purpose? To get away from Shaggy. Why? Shaggy loved her. Shaggy cared about her. He wasn't this strange stalker out in the hallway. What did MkKay want with a pregnant woman, anyhow? Velma willed the question out of her mind.
She thought instead of something else she had willed out of her mind... and found it relieving, rather than painful.
Shaggy was back home. Shaggy hadn't been the one to yell the last time they had ever spoken. Shaggy hadn't been the one who had been so cruel to somebody he loved. That was Velma.
She had been cruel to somebody she loved.
To somebody she loved!
She did love Shaggy... and only now did she know it for sure. Only now that she could maybe never find the courage to face him again, only now that she didn't even know whether she would ever be able to tell him how sorry she was, did she know how much she loved him. Now he was on the other side of the planet... maybe he had forgotten her by now. She had gone to get as far away from him as possible, and now she would have traded absolutely anything to be back in his arms, completely safe.
Instead she was in Singapore. One of the strictest societies in the developed world. Where crime rates and vandalism were lower than anywhere. Where everyone was supposed to feel safe.
Velma didn't feel safe at all. She looked out the peephole again and was relieved that MkKay had finally disappeared. Even so, she didn't dare venture out of her room again.
She lay on her bed, crying, praying for these two weeks to be over.