Chapter 4: 24 Going on 94

"You WHAT? You went on a date with the creepy--albeit good looking--guy that was in here yesterday?"

Gloria was astonished. Never in all the years that she had known Nattie had she ever seen her do something so careless. She didn't like it. Not one bit.

She spun to face Deb. "Did YOU know about this?"

"Yes mother, I did." She rolled her eyes. "What's the prob? Nattie's about due for a bit of fun."

"Fun yes. But not with a complete stranger! Nattie-" she turned to look at her friend. "This isn't like you."

"I know it s not. I'm reinventing myself. Look Gloria, I'm fine. We went out, had a nice dinner and came home. He kissed me goodnight and left. That's it."

"Then he stood her up for breakfast." Deb put in. "So I don't plan on Mr. Blue Eyes to be popping in any time soon."

"I dunno. I just got a weird feeling about him yesterday." Gloria said. "Remember the last time I got that feeling?"

"Oh for crying out loud, Gloria! He's not an alien." Deb said. She loved Gloria, but she was slightly odd. "McDuff wasn't either. He was just a scumbag."

"Yeah. But still, my feeling ended up saving you from that scumbag, remember. At least let me talk to my friends. Maybe they'll know something about him." she said to Nattie.

Nattie saw Deb hold up the Star-Trek 'live long and prosper' fingers, but managed to suppress her giggle. Barely.

"Uh-huh. And how would they go about doing that?" Deb asked.

"I happen to have quite a few friends who are hackers. They can do a quick background check."

"I don't know about that. It seems kinda intrusive. I mean, guys, it was just one date. Like Deb said, he'll probably not show up again."

"Uh, I wouldn't be so sure about that. Mr. Blue Eyes, 8 o'clock." Gloria nodded toward the door.

Jack Ferriman stood pacing outside her diner. He seemed to be in an intense battle with himself on whether or not he wanted to go in. Finally, he stood up, straightened his white t-shirt, and walked inside. He shoved his hands into the pockets of his loose cargo khakis and meandered over to the counter.

"Well, speak of the devil and he appears." Deb said as he approached. She looked at Nattie, who had gone pale but for the flush in her cheeks.

He stopped and looked from cocky Deb, to suspicious Gloria, to hopeful Natalia. It was the spark in her eyes that had him turning on his heel and walking back out the door. They watched as he walked past the window, very upset, and screamed a very inappropriate four letter word. As he stalked off, lightning split the cloudless sky.

"Gloria, ask your friends if they can find out anything."

"I'm on it."

"Hey, Nat…" Deb trailed off as she watched her friend watch this … guy … leave. A kind of light had come into Natalia's eyes. One that Deb had never seen in them before. She was falling in love with this complete and total stranger, and she probably didn't even know it.

Well how about that, Deb thought. She shook her head and hopped off the counter to go see about table #4.

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Nattie was unlocking her front door that night just as her phone started ringing. As she rushed inside, she stepped on Lorien's tail, causing the cat to bite her on the ankle.

"OW! STUPIDASS CAT! MOVE!" she shouted as she kicked at the furball. "Hello?"

"Nattie? Gloria just called me. She called for an emergency meeting at her house. She sounded really freaked out."

"She always sounds freaked out."

"Yeah. Well even more so than usual."

Nattie sighed. She was REALLY hoping she could just come home, get in the shower, and go to bed. She pressed her fingertips to her forehead, attempting to hold off the headache that threatened.

"Fine. I'll be there in a few minutes. Gimme time to change clothes, alright?"

"Check. See ya in a few." Deb said, and hung up.

Nattie made a quick change from her jeans and blue button down top to her black cotton pj bottoms and a shirt that was about 4 sizes too big.

Once she was comfortable, she fed the hell-beast that was her cat, made a dash out the door, and drove to Gloria's apartment.

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"Ok, what's the big deal? I had high hopes of a long cool shower." Nattie said as she walked in to Gloria's apartment.

She looked at Gloria, who was pale and wide-eyed. She looked at Deb, who looked much the same but for the cigarette that was shaking in her right hand.

"What? What's the matter?" Nattie asked, worried.

"I think you need to sit for this. Jesus. I wish I had." Deb said as she took a shaky drag from her cigarette.

"I talked to my hacker friends, and they couldn't find anything on Jack Ferriman."

"Well, good. That means he's not a criminal, right?" Nattie asked.

Gloria shook her head. "No Nattie. I mean they didn't find ANYTHING on Jack Ferriman. Like, at all." She blew at the short fringe of dark bangs that covered her forehead. "I went to my forum-"

"The paranormal activists forum?" Nattie snorted. "Gloria, you don't actually believe in-"

"Listen! I went to my forum and crosschecked with some of the people there. I checked name, descriptions, stuff like that. Then this one guy sent me these." She held up two papers.

"So? What are they?"

"This is a picture taken in 1967 of the Natslion Bridge. It was a bridge in New York that collapsed later, killing over 140 people. Someone had weakened the support structure. Investigators never found out whom. This," she indicated the other picture, "is a picture taken on the day that the Morro Castle sailed from New York Harbor in 1934. The ship caught fire and everyone burned to death."

"I get it. Well, not exactly... Can I see those now?"

Gloria passed the pictures over to her and bit her lip. Nattie took the pictures and studied them.

What does this have to do with finding out whether or not Ferriman was a whack job? That's all she wanted to know before--

What the hell?

She peered closer to the black and white photographs. Her mouth fell open and all blood drained from her face. She looked at Gloria, then at Deb.

"What the…? How?"

"I'm not sure, but if those photos are legit, and I've never had reason to doubt my contacts," she said looking at Deb, "then Ferriman is somewhere close to 94 years old. And he's been around the same place and time of at least two accidents resulting in the death of over 275 people."

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