Chapter 5 – Slightly Burned
Sue was about to go check on the church preparations when she heard steps from the outside of her room. She sneaked out and saw that it was Ben, trying to get to his room as quiet as possible.
"And where are you going, may I ask?" The woman said out loud and had to laugh when her friend almost crashed the wall he bumped into, being scared to death.
"Never do that again, Susie!" He said in almost a whisper. It was a whisper for him.
"Ok, I'm sorry." She said, still laughing. "I just…anyway, how did it go?"
"Oh, thank you for the dinner. It was really amazing. Alicia loved it too. She asked to thank you as well." Ben said, walking into the room.
"Are you sure you're alright?" Sue asked from the doorway. "What did you do all night?"
"We talked." Ben answered and lay on the bed to get some rest.
Talked. Susan felt awful again. How could she ask him such an untactful question? Of course, they talked. They couldn't…no, Sue couldn't think about it anymore. She wanted to help Ben, she really did with all her heart, but her wadding, the most important day of her life, was going to be in three days and she wanted everything to be perfect.
"Hey, I'm here. Did you get any sleep?" Johnny asked his future brother-in-low.
"Hi. You're early. I still don't have the results." Johnny was about to say something when Reed went on. "I know you may think it's taking too much time and I'm too slow but if you want your son to be fine, you just have to let me do my job."
"Ok." Was all the Human Torch said.
Reed nodded and went back to work.
Flashback
"It's for you, Carmen." Eric called his wife from the living room of their huge mention.
"I'll take it in the bedroom!" She answered and took the phone. "Hello."
"Hey, Carm."
"Oh, hi, Johnny." The girl said with a hint of sadness in her voice but still smiled. "How are you?"
"I'm fine." He said. "You?"
"I'm good. Of course, you know what date today is or you wouldn't call." She said kindly.
"Yeah, I do." Young man on the other end of the line admitted. It was November, 12, James' birthday. How could he forget? "How is he? How was the birthday?"
"It was wonderful. He's first birthday." Carmen took a picture of a small baby in his crib from the nightstand and looked at it for a long moment.
"That's great. I just wanted to make sure everything's fine with him…and you." He trailed of.
"Well, we're fine. It was nice to hear from you, Johnny." Their talk was quiet and in some odd way comforting.
"You too. Well, gotta go. You know, parties, drinks, girls! Everything waiting for only me." Johnny tried to seem cheerful and it worked with Carmen, at least he thought so. "Well…bye. Take care."
"You too. Bye." She put the phone away.
Johnny did the same. He didn't plan to go anywhere. No parties, no clubs. He just wanted to stay home and have some sleep. Some dreamless sleep. Because he knew that if he dreams he'd dream of her and of their child.
End of Flashback
"Hey there." Carmen turned from her son to look at the door where Johnny was standing.
"Hey, you're back…" She said, recovering James with his favorite blanket. "I guess I fell asleep on the chair."
"Yeah." He nodded and came closer to look at the boy, he hasn't changed a poison from the previous night. "My friend is working on the tests."
"Good." Carmen brushed a strand of loose hair from James' face. "Wait a minuet, where did you sleep?"
"I went to the hotel."
"Don't be ridiculous! You and your friend will stay at my place." She exclaimed, her Spanish roots showing themselves.
"Are you sure? And Eric?" Johnny asked.
"I got divorced two years ago. Eric doesn't have a word in it now." Carman said, taking her son's hand.
It was darkening outside when Sue came back home. Reed and Johnny wasn't there, so she didn't need to order a dinner. She could just fix herself something on the kitchen. She was surprised not to find Ben at the Baxter Building, but Jimmy said he'd gone somewhere about three hours before.
The doorbell interrupted her plans for the peaceful evening. Sue checked the clock and went to get it.
"Well, well, well, Susan. Home alone again?" A calm sarcastic voice asked.
In front of Sue was standing the same young woman who'd come the day before. This time she was dressed in everything black and didn't take of the sun glasses although it was already dark. She looked gorgeous and dangerous. Everyone could see she knew that and used to her benefits.
"I believe it's not your business if I'm alone at my house or not." Sue answered. She didn't like this woman. She saw her the second time in her life, but already hated the stranger for two things: she was always calm and she had that arrogant smirk that reminded her of someone. The first second Sue saw this lady she knew – this woman is a bad news, at least for her and Reed.
"Oh, I believe it is." She said, smirking. "I need to speak with your fiancé."
She said the last part as if she was talking about dirt. Sue noticed it instantly.
"Who are you?" She asked furiously.
The stranger smirked again, showing some of her snow-white teeth:
"My name is Lydia." She finally said, putting her expensive sun glasses on the top of her head. "Lydia Rose Von Doom."
Everything went silent…
TBC
