Come What May

A.N. Ok, before you all start throwing stuff at me for taking so long with this update, let me assure you that the next one will not take as long. How do I know? Because school is done. And that's 7 hours of my day that I'll have free now to keep up with stuff like this. Also, the other story I was working on is finished now.

Christian had just fallen asleep when Satine came running into the room and turned on the light.

"Christian, wake up! We have a situation. Cassandra is gone!"

"Gone? How could she be gone?" Christian asked groggily.

"I don't know, but she is. She's not anywhere in the house."

Christian got up and walked down the hall to Cassandra's room. Sure enough, it was empty. He noticed the note on her desk.

"Well, you're right We do have quite a situation here."

"Christian, what are we going to do?"

"Ok, calm down. It's only been about two hours since we last saw her. She couldn't have gotten far. I'll call the police and get them looking for her. Then we should probably go to the hotel to let the others know that she's missing. Maybe they've seen her."

Satine nodded. Christian came and put his arm around her and kissed her forehead. "I'm sure she's fine. I ran away from home several times at her age" he said before going to place the calls.

Satine couldn't move. She just sat down on Cassandra's bed and put her head in her hands. She couldn't believe this was happening.

Meanwhile, Cassandra ran as fast as she could through the streets of the town. It had occurred to her after jumping out the window that Paris was across the ocean; therefore she would have to buy a ship ticket to get there. She had been to the shipyard several times in her life, and she knew that no one under 18 was allowed to buy tickets. But that wasn't enough to stop her from getting to Paris. She had a plan.

She reached the shipyard, and checked the departure schedule. To her delight, there was a ship leaving for Paris in a little more than 45 minutes. That was perfect timing for her.

She located the ship and found the area where the luggage was. Thankfully, the ship attendants were busy trying to inform a wealthy-looking woman that her dog would have to be in a proper pet carrier and brought on with the luggage, an argument that Cassandra could see was going to take awhile. She lifted up one of the lighter bags on top of the pile, and burrowed into the tall pile of suitcases and bags. She knew that the pile would remain intact as it was lifted onto the boat and brought to the luggage compartment, so she figured she was pretty safe.

She felt the pile being lifted up and smiled to herself. She was on her way.

"Yes, officer. Yes, of course. Thank you." Christian hung up the phone, and turned around to see Satine standing in the doorway of the living room. "The police said they'd try their best, and that there is a very slim chance that she would actually be able to get out of the country by herself. They have laws in place now that forbid children from buying travel tickets. And Cassandra would never stow away."

"Well, Christian, we thought she'd never run away either. Shouldn't we be doing something?" Satine asked.

Christian shook his head. "Our job is to stay here and wait for information. Also, the officer said that in most cases of runaways, the child comes home after a few hours, after they've had a chance to think and work out whatever was bothering them. If she does come home, we need to be here."

Satine nodded. She understood, but something told her that what had been bothering Cassandra was not going to be solved by a few hours of thinking. She looked at Christian; he was so optimistic about this whole situation. Somehow, though, Satine doubted the optimism.

"Christian, I'm so sorry. It's all my fault. I should have talked to her about my past sooner."

Christian slowly took Satine in his arms. "No, no. It's not your fault. It's not anyone's fault. Lots of kids run away from home. That boy down the street ran away last month; Cassandra harbored him in her room, remember? And we found him. Sooner or later someone is going to find her."

Satine nodded again, this time beginning to cry into Christian's shoulder. Christian gently rubbed her back.

"I promise, everything will be just fine."

A.N. Ok, now before you throw even more stuff at me, let me explain to you why this took so much longer than I planned. See, the day school ended, the Sims 2 showed up at my door. If you have it, you know how addicting it can be. I also had terrible writer's block with this chapter.