The Power of a Name
Chapter Three
"Uh…thanks," Mimi stammered as he helped her up. She stood there for a moment, lost in the depths of his eyes. Gradually, the rest of his face began to register—the sandy blonde hair, the arrogant smile, the solid line of his jaw.
"You should watch where you're going," the man said gruffly, the smile disappearing so fast Mimi wondered if she'd imagined it. But no, even a dreamer like her couldn't imagine something that gorgeous. "Here. Let me help you with this stuff." He knelt and started gathering her scattered papers.
"Thanks," said Mimi for the second time, cursing herself for sounding like such an idiot. Whatever happened to captivating her dream man with her ready wit? But suddenly, her tongue felt like lead in her mouth. She couldn't think of a single clever thing to say. She couldn't think, period. She just knelt beside him and started picking up her books, while darting quick glances at him when she was sure he wasn't watching.
She noticed the dying rose Kevin had given her just minutes before and hastily smashed it between two books, blushing. What if he saw it and thought she had a boyfriend? Of course, much to her disappointment, he barely seemed to take notice of her. She frowned. This wasn't how it was supposed to go at all. What had happened to the love at first sight? She was certainly experiencing it, but the feeling didn't seem to be mutual.
"Here you go," he said, standing up and extending the rest of her stuff to her.
Mimi could see he was about to walk away, and then what if she never saw him again? This called for drastic action. "Wait!" she cried, more forcefully than the occasion called for. She saw his eyes widen in surprise. Again cursing herself, Mimi blushed. Great. Now he'd think she was crazy. "I mean, thank you. And I'm sorry for bumping into you. But I don't remember seeing you before. I'm Mimi Lockhart, by the way. Are you new here?" She cringed inwardly at her babbling. Why, oh why, did she have to make an idiot of herself at every turn?
Her Mr. Right eyed her with a mixture of curiosity and amusement. He gave her a tolerant, patronizing smile. "Nice to meet you, Mimi Lockhart. Shouldn't you be in class?"
Mimi's whole face turned crimson. He sounded like a teacher. Oh no, he couldn't be! "Um, yes, sir," she said, with sudden deference. He didn't look old enough to be a teacher. Teachers just didn't look like that, damn it! Of course, he didn't carry himself the way most teenage boys did either. There was an assurance, an arrogance, a worldliness to his stance. This was no boy. This was a man.
He grinned sardonically at her respectful tone. "Then get there, Miss Lockhart," he ordered with false severity.
Mimi didn't bother staying to try to find out more about him. She had already embarrassed herself enough for one day. And she was seriously late for class. She had wasted too many minutes gawking at a guy who was totally beyond her reach. With a nervous smile, she moved past him, heading for class, though this time at a more sedate pace. Coming to her trigonometry class, she swore under her breath. They were in the middle of a pop quiz. Just her luck.
Her teacher looked up and saw her standing in the doorway. He did not look pleased. "Nice of you to join us, Miss Lockhart. Would you mind explaining to the class the reason for your tardiness?" Mimi could see Kevin shoot her an angrily satisfied glance.
She seemed to melt under being the center of attention. The whole class already looked ready to laugh, just for the sake of the interruption of the quiz. "Um, I'm sorry, Mr. Meade. I tripped…and fell," she finished lamely, trying her best to tune out the snickers of the other students.
Mr. Meade gave her a severe look. "I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt, Miriam, based on your good record in this class. Take your seat now. You'll have to make up the test after school."
Mimi slipped quietly into her seat, avoiding the stares of sympathetic friends and the laughing faces of the other students. This day just kept getting better and better. Well, unless that man truly was the one she'd been waiting her whole life for. In that case, this day might just be worth it.
~~*~~
Brady Black looked down at the view from his top-story office at Basic Black. The town of Salem lay before him in all its sleepy splendor. He had spent his whole life growing up in this town. It had given him everything and everyone he loved; and it had taken them away as well. His jaw clenched as he turned away from the view that held only misery for him now.
He wouldn't be here at all if it wasn't for that girl. She had gotten to him in a way no woman ever had before, and he couldn't walk away from that. He smiled wistfully, knowing where he had gotten this romantic, idealistic streak from. His sister. Belle had believed in love, even when it hurt, even when it failed her. Brady picked up one of the framed photos on his desk. Belle and Jason at their senior prom. They had been so happy then, so full of dreams, never knowing that in a few short months a routine check-up would change their lives forever.
He could still remember the look on Jason's face the day Belle told him the news. The heartbreak, the anguish, the denial, the anger, all mingled there to form the most complete image of a man destroyed Brady had ever seen. He thought sometimes that that look might have more to do with his inability to hate Jase than his own promise to Belle. He studied once again his baby sister's bright smile and laughing blue eyes. His little Tinkerbelle. There would never be anyone quite like her.
Deserted by the man she loved, dying of cancer; and still, she had kept her unquenchable spirit. And her love for Jason. Her last words to Brady had been to beg him to forgive Jase. And when he had promised, she simply let go and drifted away. She had been at peace all along. Sure in some unseen power Brady hadn't even begun to understand. It wasn't until a few days later when her will was read that Brady truly understood what unconditional love really meant.
And now, here he was, trying to show the same kind of love to a hardened prostitute who didn't want anything to do with him. Every reasonable instinct told him to just give up and go away. But something deeper than reason drove him. On some deep, unfathomable level, she had become part of him the first time he looked in her eyes. He loved her. And she needed him, whether she knew it or not.
Or maybe he was just deluding himself. Maybe she was right. Maybe all that time alone in the mountains had affected him more than he thought. He shook his head. No. He was never lonely in the mountains. It was only here in Salem that he got like this. Bittersweet memories and empty ghosts were all that remained of their once happy family. He studied the other photograph on his desk. A family photo taken in Brady's first year of college. Four smiling faces looked back at him. Dad, Marlena, him, and Belle.
Sure, they'd had their problems then. He and Marlena rarely got along, and it had caused stress for the whole family. If Brady could turn back time, he knew that was the one thing he would make right. Actually, he thought with dark bemusement, if he could turn back time, he'd stop his parents from leaving the funeral. Get them to take a cab, leave ten minutes sooner or later. Anything, so that they could avoid that drunk driver, that accident that had left him the only surviving member of a once happy family.
Brady sometimes found himself wondering what their last moments were like. Did they see the other car coming? Were they still too numb with grief over Belle to care? Did they suffer or was it instant and blissfully painless? Did their whole lives flash before their eyes? Had they thought of him and grieved for leaving him behind to face it all alone? He knew he'd never know the answers to those and a hundred other questions. He knew it was probably better that way. But still, he wondered. It was all he had left to dwell on.
And so, he went on alone. He took his rightful place as head of his father's company. But he left the day to day responsibilities of running Basic Black fall on others. He usually came in no more than once a week to get a general idea of what was going on. He honestly couldn't care less. This wasn't what was important to him anymore. He had found a peace, a comfort in the silence of the mountains; and he had thought never to leave them for this long.
But then, chance or fate had thrown him into the path of a woman with the eyes of an angel and the memories of a demon. He still knew so little about her. Hell, he didn't even know her real name. But he would learn. He would learn everything about her, no matter how unpleasant. No matter how long it took, no matter how long he had to wait, or what kind of hell they had to go through, Brady would wait for her to trust him, to love him, to come away with him. She was worth the wait.
~~*~~
"So I heard Kevin asked you to the dance," Susan commented, as she and Mimi sat down to lunch together. Only the faintest twinge of jealousy and resentment clouded her pleasant tones. Mimi Lockhart, Susan Adamson, and Kevin Lambert had all grown up on the same street. They had been best friends all their lives, and nothing would change that as far as Mimi was concerned. Not Kevin's crush on her, or Susan's unrequited love for him.
Mimi rolled her eyes. "I know gossip spreads like wildfire, but I didn't think a guy asking me out was a big item," she said, bemused irony tingeing her voice. "Is it all over school?" Secretly, she kind of wished it was. No one had ever cared enough to spread a rumor about her before.
Susan laughed, noting the excited gleam in her friend's eye. "Sorry, Meems. No. Kev told me last night he was going to ask you this morning. So how did he do it? Did you say yes?" She tried to make her words sound nonchalant, but her eyes took in every emotion that flickered across Mimi's face.
Mimi shook her head, sorrow and guilt reflected in her emerald eyes. "I just couldn't, Su. It just didn't feel right. And now Kev is furious with me. He said all these horrible things to me about how my dreams and ideals are nonsense, and I should just grow up and face reality."
Susan felt all of Kevin's wounded pride welling up inside her. How dare Mimi treat him like that! "He's right, Meems," she said stoutly. "Why can't you wake up and see what's right in front of your eyes? Kevin is a great guy, and he loves you! Why can't you see how lucky that makes you?"
Mimi looked at her with pity. She knew that Susan was speaking out of her own pain, her own bruised heart. "You don't understand, Su. You love Kevin. I don't. Not that way. And I can't pretend I do just to make him happy. I want to find the kind of love my parents have, a man I love with all of my heart and soul, someone I can spend the rest of my life with. I'm not interested in anything less."
Susan shook her head at her friend's delusional romanticism. "That's just not how it works, Mimi. There's no such thing as a perfect match. As much as I care for Kevin, there are things about him that drive me crazy. His crush on you being high on that list. Your parents do have a great relationship. The best I've ever seen. And I bet if you ask them they'll tell you it's because of all the work they put into it, not because of some instant magical connection."
"I'm not afraid to work on a relationship, Susan," Mimi defended herself vehemently. "I just want it to be the right relationship that I'm investing in. I mean, look around us." She gestured to include the crowd of high school students surrounding them. "Everywhere people are pouring themselves into relationships on any or no basis at all. And then, they're crushed when it doesn't work out. We see it everyday, Su. Now what's so wrong about waiting for a guy I'm sure about?"
"Because the guy you're looking for doesn't exist," Susan countered. "He's formed out of every fairy tale you've ever read, every sappy movie you've ever watched. Look, everyone has those fantasies when they're young, Meems. But once you've lived a little in the real world, you'll see that there is no man on earth who can live up to your expectations."
"I'm not so sure about that," Mimi said hesitantly. Her mind replayed every moment of her encounter with the handsome stranger this morning, every look on his face, every word that he spoke, and—most of all—every emotion he had made her feel.
Susan's eyes widened in shock. Was Mimi blushing? A slow smile spread across her face. "Mimi, are you holding out on me? Have you met someone?" A thrill of hope shot through her. If Mimi was seeing someone else, Kevin would have to give up and move on.
"No…I don't know. Maybe, yeah," Mimi stammered. She'd never felt so flustered before. Her heart seemed to be singing to her that this was the one. But he couldn't be. Not if he was a teacher.
"Well?" Susan prompted impatiently. "Details, please. When? Where? How? And, most importantly, who?"
"Um, this morning, the hall, I bumped into him, and I don't know." Mimi smiled laughingly at her friend. They weren't used to talking about stuff like this. Neither of them had ever had much of a social life.
"You don't know?" Susan squealed incredulously. "You bump into the guy you think might be your perfect match, the guy you've waited your whole life for, and you don't even bother to get his name? Miriam Lockhart, this might be the stupidest thing you've ever done!"
Mimi rolled her eyes at her friend's excitement. "What's it matter to you, Su? You don't believe in this stuff. Remember?" she teased.
"But you do," Susan argued, illogically to Mimi's way of thinking. "And if you believe this guy is your soulmate or whatever, how can you just let him get away without even figuring out who he is?"
"There wasn't time," Mimi responded. "Besides, if it's really meant to be, I'll see him again. And besides that, I…I think he might be a teacher." She avoided Susan's gaze after that last part, examining her sandwich like it was the most fascinating thing she'd ever seen.
"WHAT!?" Susan exclaimed. "You're joking, right? Tell me you're joking, Meems! Please, tell me you haven't fallen for some nasty middle-aged pervert, like one of those girls from the Lifetime movies." She shuddered for emphasis.
Mimi barely resisted the urge to knock her best friend upside the head. "No, Susan. They are not going to make a Lifetime movie out of my life. He's not nasty or middle-aged. I'm not even sure he's a teacher. He didn't seem old enough, but not young enough to be a student either. He was just…perfect."
Susan seemed to relax a little then. "Okay. Tell me the whole story, start to finish. And then we'll try and figure out who your mystery man really is." Needing no further prompting, Mimi poured out the entire brief encounter. "Not a teacher," Susan said firmly as soon as she finished.
"How can you be so sure?" Mimi challenged. "He could be new here."
"They'd have made an announcement about it," Susan responded sensibly, amazed at how dense Meems could be sometimes, especially when she got lost in one of her fantasies. "He could be a substitute, but I doubt it. Sounds more like someone's older brother or boyfriend dropping them off." She was a lot less impressed by the mystery guy than Mimi obviously was. Maybe it was one of those had to be there moments.
"Before second period?" Mimi questioned doubtfully. She didn't want Susan's supposition to be true—particularly the boyfriend part. If he didn't work here, she truly might not see him again. And that idea gave way to panicked thoughts about growing old and dying alone, still waiting for her soulmate to reappear.
"I don't know, Meems. But I hope you find him again, if only to see how delusional your fantasies are," Susan responded, her frustration with Mimi growing. Why couldn't she just grow up and become a rational adult as everyone else had?
"I think you're wrong," Mimi maintained, still unshaken in her beliefs. "And at any rate, it's a risk I'm willing to take."
~~*~~
She didn't want to be thinking of him. Thinking of him was giving her a headache and keeping her awake when she needed to be resting for tonight. She groaned and pushed aside the covers, going to the bathroom to grab a wet cloth and an aspirin for her head. It was pounding. People like him did that to her. People who made her start thinking about her life instead of resigning herself to the inevitable.
"I was doing fine," she muttered, splashing cold water on her face and neck. She felt warm to the touch, and she wondered fleetingly if she might have caught something. She hoped whatever it was, was deadly. With her luck, there probably wasn't even a chance. She had tried to kill herself too many times to count, and every time she had come through just fine. The Phoenix had made sure of it. He seemed to delight in letting her think she had finally found her release in death and then bringing her back from the brink. One more way to show that he held all the power in her life. Even power over life and death.
She trudged back to her bed and lay down, covering her eyes with the wet cloth. It was impossible to believe even now that the Phoenix wasn't going to be there behind her shoulder every time she turned around. She didn't sleep. She couldn't. Her dreams were plagued with nightmares where his face leered out at her and his cold laugh met her at every turn. "You're mine, Sapphire. You tried to escape. But you know better, don't you? I'll always be there. No matter where you go." And she would try to run through her dream; but sure enough, everywhere she turned, there he was.
No. Life was just one form of hell before death. And then after death, who knew? Perhaps a hell a thousand times greater with another Phoenix waiting for her with every step. Or perhaps a nothingness. She would simply cease to exist. That didn't bother her. She had stopped living a long time ago. She wasn't fool enough to believe in heaven. If God existed, he had turned his back on her a long time ago.
She couldn't think about it anymore. If she did, she'd go mad. She had to just shut down her brain and her emotions and live purely on instinct. And she'd been doing a damn good job of it until that idiot man had made her his rescue mission. And now, she couldn't seem to shake these clawing fears and doubt. She needed an escape, if only a temporary one.
Sitting up and removing the cloth, she pulled out her Discman and popped in a CD. Music was her refuge. It was the only thing besides her name that even the Phoenix had been unable to take from her. That Discman was the first thing she bough when she escaped. And as far as she was concerned, it was all she needed to survive. The music she chose to listen to brought back memories of a happier time in her life. At least, she hoped it had been real. Maybe it hadn't. Maybe it had all been just a wonderful dream, and her life had only begun on the day she met the Phoenix.
She tuned on the CD and leaned back, immediately relaxing as the sounds of Carmen filled her ears. This was her addiction, the only drug she craved. While the other girls spent all their money trying to feed their alcohol, cocaine, and heroin addictions, she saved hers up, hording for the day she would finally be able to bid goodbye to this kind of life forever. Her only exception to this frugal policy was the weekly CD she bought herself. Opera was her passion. She had the full libretti of a dozen different ones memorized.
She was swept away by from her problems by the crashing crescendos of Bizet filling her ears. Which is why it came as such an unpleasant shock when someone's shadow fell across her bed, interrupting her fleeting solace. She yanked off the headphones and glared fiercely up at Nicole for daring to intrude on her privacy. "What the hell are you doing here?" she demanded forcefully.
Nicole backed away from the heat of the other woman's rage. "Relax, Sapphire," she responded, her hands raised in surrender. "If you want me to go, I'll go. I just know how much trouble you have sleeping and thought you might like some company. Sorry. It won't happen again." There was a wounded look on the older woman's face.
Nicole Walker was a hardened veteran of this job at almost thirty. She had never planned on coming to this of course. It had all started with a porn movie her father had forced her to make when she was sixteen. She had become a wealthy businessman's mistress before her eighteenth birthday. But her own self-loathing and her growing drug habit had caused him to get rid of her before she became a liability. And so she found herself forced to rely on the oldest profession to support her drug habit.
Strangely, Nicole had been the only girl who had been able to form any slight friendship with her. Perhaps because she was more thick-skinned than the others. Nicole was able to deal with her rages and cold silences when everyone else just gave up. Or perhaps it was because she had formed a small soft spot for Nicole. Everyone needed a friend, after all.
She sucked in a breath, feeling a sudden and very rare pang of guilt. "Wait, Nicole. I'm sorry. What did you want?" She knew better than to believe that crap about coming just to keep her company. Nobody just talked in this building. Well, except for Brady Black, apparently. She pushed him out of her thoughts and focused on Nicole. She probably needed money for a hit.
Nicole flopped onto the bed, her eyes clear and lucid for once, her worldly face breaking into a rare smile. "I talked with Barb after I got off work. She mentioned your last client. So what was he like? What did he really want?" Unlike her, Nicole was still able to find some amusement in the cruel twists of fate that had brought them to this. Nicole believed in making the most of the hand life dealt you. Of course, Nicole also got stoned almost every day of the week.
She shrugged, getting up and moving to her vanity, intentionally avoiding Nicole's probing stare. "He wanted to talk," she replied in a tone that left no room for further questions. Falling back to her old habit when situations got unpleasant, she picked up her hairbrush and started brushing her thick, dark hair out in long, unhurried strokes.
Nicole studied her, knowing the smart thing to do would be to shut up and leave now. But she was curious. She'd never been able to pry anything out of her younger, yet strangely more experienced, friend. This at least was a reaction of some sort. "So what kind of talk? Did he want to jack-off while you talked sex or something? Was he a total perv?"
The hairbrush hit the vanity table with a loud thump. Her sapphire eyes shot fire at Nicole's reflection. Even if she allowed Nicole certain liberties, there were lines she should know better than to cross. And talking about men, any man, was one of them. "No. He wanted to talk to me."
Nicole's eyes widened in surprise. "Do you know him or something?" She had a sudden sympathetic look on her face. "Is he who you're running from?" she asked softly.
She whirled around, stark terror revealed in her eyes for only a moment before she hid it again behind her mask of indifference. "No. I'd never met him before this morning," she answered coolly. "And as for the rest of it, leave it alone, Nicole." There was a warning in her tone that even Nicole couldn't ignore.
Nicole shrugged. "Okay. So this guy, what's he like? Why would he pay so much just to talk to you?" She frowned. They all got twisted requests on an almost nightly basis, especially Sapphire. But a man coming just to talk? That was truly unusual. And terrifying.
She turned back to her mirror, annoyed with Nicole's insistence on dwelling on the man she was trying so hard to forget. "I don't know," she said testily. "I didn't take time to figure it out."
"Well, what did he want to talk to you about?" Nicole pressed on.
"I don't know. I didn't pay attention," she lied, wishing with all her heart that she had kicked Nicole out from the beginning.
"Yeah, right," Nicole countered, not buying it for a second. She was surprised at the way her friend was behaving. Sapphire was known as the only one of them who had never had a weak spot. She had never allowed any of the men she slept with have any effect on her. But Nicole could see easily that this one was different. This one had gotten to her. "So was he handsome? Did he tell you his name?"
"If you're so interested in him, have Barb send him to you if he comes again," she snapped. "But I'm not stupid enough to fall prey to the fantasy that there's an escape from this, Nicole. If you want to, go ahead. Just do it somewhere else. I have a headache, and I need my rest."
"Fine," Nicole relented, sighing as she got up. "You win, Sapphire. I give up. But I know you're lying to me. This one got to you, didn't he? Ah, honey, it happens to us all." She smiled with bitter amusement. "The trick is to enjoy it while it lasts, while still preparing yourself for it to end."
"No," she returned viciously. "The trick is to realize that love is crap, that men are bastards who only want to use you, and that life is nothing but one hellish experience after another. That's the only safety, Nicole."
Nicole paused by the door, looking back and shaking her head. "Whoever it was that made you like this must have been something else. You know, Sapphire, we all have scars. Some of us just hide them better than others." She gave up when she got no response, slipping out and shutting the door behind her.
She breathed a sigh of relief as Nicole left. She should have known better than to let Nicole even a little into her life. She was usually smarter than that. She would just have to work that much harder to shut her out now. And the truth was, she didn't have the energy. She was tired. Tired of life, tired of living like this, tired of looking in the mirror and seeing only the filth that ran so deep she could never get it off. It was in her blood. And there was no way out. No way out at all.
~~*~~
Mimi tapped her pencil restlessly on the desk, looking idly around the empty classroom. She checked her watch again. Where the hell was Mr. Meade? She hoped her mom had been able to pick up Connor, or he'd have an awful long wait. She was almost ready to leave and just take the incomplete on the assignment when she heard footsteps echoing squeakily on the tile floor. Finally.
He sure was taking his sweet time about getting here though. She could hear him stopping at every classroom, checking for God knew what. Uneven desk alignment, perhaps. She muttered something under her breath about anal retentive perfectionists and began tapping her foot impatiently. Didn't he realize that she had a life, too? Finally, the footsteps stopped in front of her classroom door. The knob twisted slowly, and then…
"You!" Mimi exclaimed breathlessly, as she once again was confronted by the only man to ever make her heart do cartwheels.
He stood in the doorway, watching her with the same bemused expression he had this morning, like she was something entirely new to him. "Miss…Lockhart, wasn't it?" Mimi nodded, too tongue-tied to speak. "What are you still doing here? School let out half-an-hour ago."
Mimi flushed, once again feeling like an inferior dolt. "I'm supposed to make up a test. But I guess Mr. Meade forgot or something." She frowned suddenly, wondering why she was telling him all this. "Who are you anyway? Why are you here?"
He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, suddenly looking much more boyish and—to Mimi's mind at least—more adorable. "I'm the new security guard," he said, with a failed attempt at gruffness. "And no students are allowed in school after hours unless accompanied by a teacher or in a school-sponsored club or activity." He sounded bored, like he was repeating a catechism he'd been forced to learn.
Mimi tried to keep her emotions from showing. School security guard? Not exactly her ideal profession for her dream man, but at least it meant she'd have plenty of opportunities to see him around. Hell, if it meant a chance to see him again, she'd become a juvenile delinquent. "Like I said, I was waiting for my teacher. But since he's not here, I guess I should just go," she said, standing and grabbing her backpack.
"Hold on a sec," he ordered her, still blocking the doorway with his muscular frame. "They're having an emergency staff meeting downstairs. I'm sure that's where Mr. Meade is. If you want to wait for him, you can."
"But I thought you said students weren't allowed." She took in his hunter green shirt—unable to keep herself from noticing how it accentuated his gorgeous eyes—and khaki pants. She frowned, suddenly doubting his story. "If you're a security guard, why aren't you wearing a uniform?"
His mouth tipped sardonically. "It hasn't arrived yet. But if you think I'm here to prey on unsuspecting high school girls…I guess you'll have to wait and see." He made his voice deeper and darker, but there was a teasing light to his eyes. He raised his eyebrows, challenging her. "What do you think? Do you trust me?"
Mimi knew her answer immediately. She knew nothing about him, not even his name; but her heart told her that this was a man she could trust with her life. "I trust you," she replied firmly, her emerald eyes meeting his unwaveringly.
He frowned, actually seeming to see her for the first time. She felt him look at her and into her instead of through her. His look warmed her to the tips of her toes. She fought back the urge to blush and simply stood there, directly meeting his stare. Finally, he shook his head, laughing self-deprecatingly. She was just some silly, high school girl. Why had he felt that momentary connection to her? "Okay, then," he said, purely for the sake of breaking the charged silence.
Mimi smiled shyly, sitting back down. "Oh!" she exclaimed suddenly. "By the way, what's your—"
"Sorry, I'm late, Miss Lockhart," said Mr. Meade briskly, entering the room as the man stepped aside for him. "Perhaps now you'll know how it feels and won't keep the class waiting so long." He dropped a sheet of paper on her desk, and Mimi looked up at him in flustered confusion. "You have forty-five minutes to complete it. Starting now." He sank behind his desk, checked his watch, and pulled out papers to grade.
Eventually, Mimi shook herself out of her disorientation and turned back to the doorway. He was gone. Her Mr. Right had disappeared again, and she still didn't know his name.