Author's Note: I'm super excited about this fanfic. I can feel it's going to be a good one. What do you guys think so far?
Chapter 2: Watson
"Mee-hai-eel." The syllables rolled carefully off Teresa's tongue as she counted them on her fingers. She looked up at the blonde and smiled. "Three."
"Hm?" He raised his brow again.
"Three!" Teresa repeated, holding up her fingers to show him. "Your name has three syllables just like mine."
"You're weird." Mihael commented, unsure of what to make this odd creature. An embarrassed blush replaced her gentle smile. She chewed on her bottom lip nervously and looked down at the ground. The distant sound of police sirens filled the awkward silence between them, and Teresa began to glance around nervously. "It's just the police." A small gasp escaped from her throat before she squeezed past Mihael in the alley way and crouched down next to a dumpster. "What are you doing?"
"Hiding." she whispered, motioning for him to get down as well.
"From the police?" She nodded, drawing her knees closer to her face and placing her hands atop them. "Why?"
"I ran away from school." she muttered shamefully.
"The elementary school four blocks from here?" Another nod. Mihael blinked in disbelief. How could she possibly think this was a good hiding spot when the place she had run away from was so close? "Well, the police will definitely find you here." he assessed, crossing his arms. The fragile thing began to quiver with tears again. "Especially if you keep crying!"
"I-I don't w-want t-to go back!" she whimpered, rubbing the sleeves of her yellow shirt across her wet face. Teresa looked up at Mihael with large, brown puppy dog eyes. "C-can you help me?"
"Fine." he agreed far quicker than she would have expected. He uncrossed his arms and placed his hands on his hips, leaning over the small girl. "But you have to stop crying!" She scrunched her face up in concentration, trying to swallow the surge of fear and anxiety that was overflowing from her. "Come on!" He grabbed her wrist and started to run. Teresa was surprised by how easily he pulled her up from her squatted position. At one point, both of her feet had left the ground, and she felt like she was flying. They ran through alleys, back streets, and parks until the sirens were left behind in their collective dust.
"Mi-Mihael!" Teresa wheezed between labored breaths. When the boy gave no response, she began jerking her wrist away from his grasp. He stopped suddenly, and she ran, face-first, straight into his back. Her legs buckled, and she collapsed onto the ground in a heap.
"What's wrong?" he asked, turning around to face her.
"I-I ca-can't—" She couldn't even finish her sentence, much less tell him how tired she was.
"O…." Mihael suddenly seemed to recognize the vast differences in their stamina and build. "You're tired?" She nodded, still unable to catch her breath. "Hm…we have to keep moving." The blonde glanced around and sighed. "Get on my back." he mumbled, crouching down in front of her. Without any hesitation, he felt Teresa's chest push against his back and her arms drape over his shoulders. He hooked his arms under her legs and stood, and Teresa couldn't help but to think he was strong for such a scrawny boy. Her brown eyes scanned the ground below her. She wasn't up as high as when her father used to carry her, but this felt the same: safe.
Teresa's eyes fluttered open when she felt her body being lowered onto something soft.
"O, you're up." Mihael noted, not bothering to cover her with the sheet in his hand.
"Where are we?" Her voice was a groggy mumble as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes. The brown orbs skimmed across the old, dusty room. The white paint was chipping off the walls, and the tempered glass doorway—the only entrance to the room—had faded lettering that Teresa could no longer make out. But it was bright. Sunlight still poured through the dirty skylight above them. Strands of ivy crept across the skylight glass, and the sun tossed their shadows onto the sparse furnishing: a desk, full of books and pens, a single full-sized mattress (on which Teresa sat), and a strange mechanical contraption in the corner that she did not understand—but had a small lamp plugged into it.
"Somewhere cops don't come." Mihael replied. She tilted her head in curiosity, wondering what kind of a place would be safe from the long arm of the law. He motioned her over to the glass entry, and she quickly joined him. Teresa peered out beyond the doors of their room and into the vast surrounding hallways. "It's an abandoned mall." She jumped when she noticed a man shuffle by the door.
"Who is he?"
"There are other people here, too. They're all like us."
"Like us?"
"Homeless." he explained.
"And the cops really don't come here?" she questioned, following him back to the mattress.
"Not yet." Mihael said, flopping down onto the makeshift bed and placing his hands behind his bed. "This retail park wasn't making any money and got abandoned a year ago. The police stopped coming around after all the stuff got moved out. It's pretty out of the way, and we're all careful about not being seen coming in or leaving, so the police don't come to look." His stomach growled loudly, and he gave her an embarrassed look.
"Are you hungry?" Teresa prodded, moving closing to him.
"Y-yea." he admitted. "I was trying to get some food when you ran into me."
"I have food!" she suddenly remembered. She reached over for her bag and began digging through it for the small lunch box tucked inside. Teresa popped open the lid and held it out for the boy to take.
"Aren't you hungry?" he asked, hesitating to take the sandwich and small bunch of grapes. She shook her head confidently.
"I already ate today. Really, take it."
"O-okay…." His reluctance lasted only a moment longer before he practically inhaled the food. Teresa scraped at the bottom of her bag, looking for something else to offer the boy.
"I also have this." She held out a handful of chocolates.
"Woah, why do you have so many?" he asked, gratefully taking them.
"Melissa and Brian said it would help me make friends." she explained. She brought her knees to her chest and rested her chin on them as she watched him unwrap the sweet.
"Who are Melissa and Brian?"
"My adopted parents."
"Adoptive." Mihael corrected.
"My adoptive parents." she repeated after him.
"And you ran away from them?" Another small nod. "They can't be so bad if they pack your lunches." he reasoned with a mouth full of chocolate.
"They're really nice." Teresa said with glossed eyes that seemed to stare past him. "Brian always reads me stories before bed, and Melissa hugs me when I cry." Despite the positive words, Teresa's face remained vacant of any emotion other than sadness.
"So? Why'd you run away?"
"They took me away from my dad." It was then that Mihael noticed the other item in Teresa's hand: a military nametape. He had seen it on the jackets of a few of the homeless veterans that lived in the abandoned mall. She clung to this thing like it was her lifeline. "I used to live with him."
"Where?"
"I don't remember…but we were homeless, too."
"So, where is he now?"
"I don't know." Teresa ran her thumbs over the embroidered letters on the nametape. "I ran away to look for him." Her voice shook and tears began edging their way out of the corners of her eyes again.
"Well, you'll never survive out here if you cry all the time." he chastised.
"But I'm sad." Teresa defended her behavior through a series of hiccups and tried to cover her weepy eyes with her forearm. He frowned at her quivering lips around clenched teeth.
"Then get mad!" he demanded.
"B-but—"
"If you always cry about the things that make you sad, that's all you'll ever do. But if you get mad, you'll want to change them, and then you can survive." It was a way of looking at anger and sorrow that Teresa was not familiar with.
"M-Mihael?"
"Hm?"
"Will you teach me how to survive on my own?" There was a small pause as she chewed on her bottom lip. "So, I can find my dad."
"Sure." Another pause.
"Will you help me find my dad, too?"
"If I can." the boy agreed. "Where did you used to live?"
"I don't remember." she confessed meekly.
"Well, what does he look like?"
"Like me." Mihael eyed the black-haired, brown-eyed, tan-skinned girl and furrowed his brow again.
"A lot of people look like you in California." She shrugged in response to his observation. "What about his name?" She offered him the nametape and he took it from her hands. "Fuller. That's a last name. What about his first name?"
"I-I don't remember." He could tell she was trying hard not to cry again. He tapped his chin in thought.
"This is an Army nametape." he finally said. "That's helpful." Teresa's eyes lit up and she suddenly smiled. "Not that helpful." he quickly managed her expectations. "But it might be enough to give us a start."
"A start?"
"To our case." he replied, standing up and heading to his desk full of books. He picked one up and held it out for her to take.
"The Add-ven-tah—"
"Adventures." Mihael helped Teresa read the title.
"Adventures of Sherlock Hole-mms." she finished.
"Holmes—like the homes you live in, no l."
"Holmes. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes." She ran her fingers over the mysterious looking figure on the cover of the book. "What is it?"
"It's a book about a famous detective who solves cases with just a little bit of evidence—like one nametape." Mihael explained with a smile, holding up the beginning of his first case. "And every good detective needs a sidekick." It was the first time since their meeting that Teresa had seen such unadulterated happiness on this boy's face. "Let's go, Watson." He took her by the wrist again, but this time more gently, and led her through the tempered glass doors, out of their little domain.