The River and The Highway part 2

I got back to the house about fifteen minutes after finding the strange rose on my windshield. To say the very least I was more than a little bit up set; I believed that one of the local townies was trying to set me up with some one. It never occurred to me that there might be more to all of this than that.

It never occurred to me that any thing else might be going on until the moment I pulled up into my drive way and found Alyssa there leaning against a very familiar white lancia. She glared at me for a few seconds as I stepped out of the truck.

"Does your mom know that you're here?"

She grinned, "You kidding? I wanna live to make it to my next birthday."

I looked at the car and let out a huge sigh.

"So why did you come here?"

"Well first off, I want to know why you aren't returning my calls. Second you have a heard of people back in Oregon that are scared to death that something happened to you. Finally...."

I held up my hand to stop her, "Don't even go there. Please?"

"Why are you having such a hard time with this?"
"That's a stupid question." I turned away from her and picked up one bag of groceries.

"Actually," This came from the car, "It's not that much of a dumb question mam."

I glared at the white autobot, "Did you just call me mam?"

I could tell he was flushing as he told me, "I'm sorry, I thought that's what humans called women they respected."

I stood there and looked at Wheeljack for a few seconds then shook my head and went into the house with my groceries. Alyssa of course followed me bound and determined to get something out of me on this new taboo of mine.

"I asked you a question." She told me leaning against the door jam.

"And I asked you to please not go there okay?" I was in the process of carrying the cereal that I suddenly now had no appetite for into the pantry. I was expecting her to come in there and harp on it some more. Instead she took a completely different tact.

"I thought you went after that because you were hungry?" She pointed at the box of corn flakes.

"I was, I'm not any more." I meant to set the thing on the shelf but my hands were shaking so hard that it missed and proceeded to hit the floor instead. I bent down to pick it up for some reason something as simple as dropping a box on the floor suddenly made me want to cry. She noticed this and came over to me.

"Angel, Listen to me okay? All of your life you've been living for everyone around you. To try and make their lives easier, your parents, your sister, your friends, and now this."

I looked up at her a little angry at those words, "And how do you propose I not do things like that? If I don't look after my folks who's going to? If I don't keep my sibling out of trouble who will? Explain that to me."

True to form she backed off a little bit and looked at me.

"I know it's hard, I have my own issues with my folks. As I'm sure you know, but sometimes you can't always take the easiest path."

"Do you think that what I've done has been easy?" I snapped.

"No, not really," She put her hand on mine, "But you have a right to be happy to, not just spend your life making sure the rest of the world is happy."

I managed to peel my self up off the floor but couldn't seem to work up the will to walk out of that pantry.

"How do you propose that the two of us can ever be together? I can hear my mom now," I took a deep breath and went into my mimicking tone, "Angel how could you think about being with some one like that! He's not even human!" I let out the remains of the breath and looked at her.

"You of all people should know that sometimes it's just simpler to let them have their way. I mean think about it! She flipped for me saying a Japanese guy was cute, how do you think she's gonna react to this?"

She shook her head, "Is that the real reason Angel? Or are you just scared that you don't have the right to have some one you love?"

"Maybe I am..." I trailed off, "Honestly I don't know, but if you think taking the path that causes the least pain is easy you got another thing coming."

"I don't know any more, all I know is that there is a man out there who loves you more than anything on this or any other planet in the universe." She walked over to me and put her arm around me, carefully because I was still sore, "and from what I saw and from what I heard you did, you love him to."

I pulled away from her, and walked back into the kitchen, "you think I should go back to him don't you?"

"I don't think any thing like that at all. What I do think that you should do something that I can tell you have never done Angel Kincaid, I think you should listen to your heart for once in your life."

"Listen to my heart?" I turned back to face her.

"Exactly, what dose it tell you that you want?"

I shook my head at her, "That's what I came to this place to try and figure out Alyssa."

"Then I suggest you start doing it," She then proceeded to shove me down in the nearest chair, "I also suggest that you start doing what the doctor said you should do."

"Oh slag now don't you start in on me too...!"

"OH I have no intention of starting in on you," she grinned and pointed to the door, "HE however, plans on making you follow doctor's orders if he has to hot glue you to the bed posts."

That was when I looked up and saw and unbelievably pissed Ratchet and a smirking Wheeljack, some how shrunk down to human sized and standing in my door way. Wheeljack looked me over then turned to Ratchet and stuck out is hand in his direction.

"Toldja... Pay up!"

The medic growled and proceeded to produce what I suppose they used as currency and then turned on me. The explosion hit with the force of the Hiroshima bomb.

"DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW WORRIED I'VE BEEN ABOUT YOU!!?"
All I could do was to sit there at my table and gape.

"NONE OF MY PAITENTS HAVE EVER EVER PULLED A STUNT LIKE THIS BEFORE! I SHOULD CONFINE YOU TO QUARTERS FOR THE REST OF YOU'RE..."

I held up my hand and he stopped and glared at me.

"And just who said I'm your patient?" I asked, trying to get some of my old snark back.

"WHO the slag's patient do you THINK you are!? I'm the one that's been taking care of you from the moment you showed up at the ark and I plan on continuing to take care of you until I bloody well say your recovered, NOT YOU, not those hacks at that miserable excuse for a human hospital, ME!"

He then proceeded to lower him self down to my eye level, narrow his eyes to a pair of sapphire slits and tell me in a very quiet sounding voice, "DO I make my self perfectly clear young lady?"

"Yessir." I think I nearly swallowed my tongue at that point.

The medic nodded and then stood up grabbed me around the waist and tossed me over one shoulder, then demanded to know the following.

"Where's your bed room?"

I let out a big sigh and pointed at the back of the house as I was getting hauled away I looked down at Alyssa and tried my best to save what lil dignity I had left.

"By the way, I'm a lil lonely here, why don't you guys stay here with me?"

She grinned from ear to ear, "Why we'd love to Angel."

"Yah I kind of thought that..." I frowned my way into the bed room and got dumped on the bed.

The rest of the day consisted of me having Wheeljack and Alyssa set up in the living room with my game cube and copy of PIKMIN 2 while I was stranded in bed with iron fist Ratchet on guard out side my door. How he expected me to sleep like that I have no idea but some how I did manage to doze off before it got night.

To day had left me with a whole lot to think about and an overzealous doctor bot as a bodyguard. I didn't expect much else to go on but something else did happen. Though at that point I was beginning to believe it was a dream.

I had managed to slip by ratchet and was going to get something to drink. I took a look out the front window and saw him again. By him I mean the blond guy that I had seen the day before, once again standing there in the rain and just looking at me. I stared for a good five minutes this time, then looked away to make sure my body guard hadn't caught me yet. When I looked back he was gone, need less to say my life was becoming more and stranger by the moment. Though I saw this man it never entered my mind who it may be and it never occurred to me that the look on his face was something more that just idle curiosity.