A Way Home

Chapter 3 – Home Away from Home

"It's a long way from Miami to LA/ It's a long way from yesterday to where I am today/ It's a long way from my thoughts to what I'll say/ It's a long way from paradise to where I am today/…over and over/ over, take me over/ I've been poison, I've been rain/ I've been fooled again/ I've seen ashes shine like chrome/ Someday I'll see home."

- Home, Switchfoot

-

I buttoned up the last button and stared at myself in the mirror. It felt so strange to be wearing jeans and a T-shirt again. It also felt strange to be wearing a bra again. I felt like I was in another reality. It was so strange. And yet, it was familiar.

It was as though I had been taken from the past at birth, brought into the future, and it was my destiny to return to the past, where I felt the most at home. I still knew the future, and could cope in it, but I was at home in the past.

It was too weird.

I turned when someone knocked on the door. AM2 was standing in the doorway, his face red from anger.

"Where is she?" He demanded.

"Who?" I asked, turning back to the mirror.

"AM4," he replied, his breath coming in short bursts.

"Actually," I said, "her name is Joey. That's the first thing," I turned to him, " the second thing, is that you're not looking for her, are you?" I smiled knowingly. "You're looking for my daughter." I paused. "You won't find her here. She's gone home." I smiled again.

AM2's face turned even more red, and he looked like a zit about to pop. "Why?" Was all he managed to get out before he screamed in rage.

I turned back to the mirror and watched him through the glass. I pretended not to care, though.

"Because I wasn't in any shape to time travel," I replied after he had calmed down a bit, "And because I certainly wasn't going to let you steal her away from me." I turned back to him to see his shocked expression. "Did you really think that I was going to let you take my daughter – the only daughter that I have seen for the past week and a half – into the next century? You and I both know that I don't trust you in the slightest," I said. "And, as if I would actually condone you stealing away into the nineteenth century with my youngest child. Not on your life."

"You don't understand," AM2 shook his head, his teeth clenched in anger.

"You're right," I said, "I don't understand how someone like you, who has had people persecute you because of what you look like, could be so cruel to me, when I was the one who offered to help you." I folded my arms over my chest.

"There was something I needed to do there," AM2 said. "Now you've ruined it."

"You were going to take Erik and bring him here, leaving our two daughters all by themselves, weren't you?" I demanded, taking a step forward. My mother bear instinct was kicking in.

AM2 took a step back and held up his hands. "Calm down," he said, trying to calm me. It was in vain.

"And why should I?" I demanded. "You never gave me any reason to trust you when I met you. In fact" – I held up a finger for emphasis – "as I recall, you even grabbed my hand and nearly ripped it off. So, no, I am not going to calm down. I am going to do the exact opposite, because that is what you deserve."

All my anger at the people who had persecuted me, Erik, and Charity in the past boiled up and over, and I swung my hardest punch at AM2. He ducked, and then ran from the hotel room like hell itself was chasing him.

"Yeah, you better run!" I called out the door. "And don't you dare let me catch you trying to kidnap either of my children again, you hear me!" I shook my fist outside the door, in the hall.

A couple of doors had opened, and a few people were peeking out to see what was the matter. I gave them a death glare, and they closed their doors again.

There was no way I was ever going to let anyone take my children away from me.

-

I sat on the plane and stared out at the clouds. I hadn't been on a plane in so long. Well, technically, I had been on a plane only about eight months earlier. But that wasn't important. What was important was that I was going to see my mother again.

I had been informed by AM2 and David that my father had been killed in a hunting accident a few months after my parents had had my funeral. They had figured I was dead. I guess they thought there was no way I could ever return. Lucky for me the belt had worked perfectly after it was completely dry.

My mother had been devastated by the fact that she had lost both her husband, and her daughter within the span of three months. I needed to see her again, if only to comfort her. So, I was returning to Canada.

-

I stepped off the plane, and into a limo.

"Ooh," I said. "Fancy."

AM2 rolled his eyes, thinking that I wasn't watching.

"What?" I asked as David grinned at me. He had informed me that, if and when I returned to the eighteenth century, I either had to take him with me, or let Joey have the belt so that she could return.

David shook his head. "Nevermind." At least he had learned to not be so uptight.

I sat in the limo and stared out the window, dreaming of Erik; remembering when Charity was born.

"I love you," he said, and smiled at me.

We kissed. I loved him so much. I told him so.

Erik smiled at the sleeping baby that I held in my arms. I held her out to him.

He shook his head. "I would hurt her," he said.

"You will be a wonderful father," I told him, "and all the non-deformed men will be jealous." I smiled at him as I teased him.

He smiled back, and cautiously took Charity from my arms. I showed him again how to hold her, because he had forgotten since Lynaea was no longer a baby.

"She's so tiny," he whispered to me, careful not to wake her.

"She looks just like her father," I whispered back, and I kissed him again.

"We're here," AM2 said, jolting me out of my memory.

I stepped out of the limousine and onto the wet sidewalk. It had rained a little, and the grass was coated in a thin layer of water droplets. The flowers in the flower bed were standing up straight, and appeared almost springy. The tiger lilies were almost in bloom. My mother loved tiger lilies. Her rose, though, looked like it was dieing. The lilac bush was flowering, and in full bloom. Some of the buds even looked like they had already died. It was early summer, and, depending on the weather, the lilac bush often bloomed early.

So many memories

I remembered forming the flower box for my mother's tiger lilies with my father. We had put the cement stones for the tiny base there ourselves. When I had entered the house, my whole face had been red from exertion.

Picking flowers from the lilac bush.

So many wonderful memories.

I walked up to the front door.

Opening the porch door, I stepped inside. The porch was humid; it was always humid when it rained. The white lawn chairs stood in their special places, the grime from previous years gardening speckling the plastic surface. There was a small table sitting beside the door, waiting for someone to clean it. It, too, was filthy. It had a lid, so that when you lifted it, there was a small space for someone to put something inside it. It had previously belonged to my mother's grandmother. She had used it to store a record player. Then she gave it to my mother, who had used it for the same purpose. The record player had come with it, and had worked perfectly. Eventually, though, my mom had ripped the crap out of the bottom of it and used it for extra baby supplies when I was a baby.

I lifted the lid and saw that the gardening gloves my mother kept there were still there. It had previously been used in our foyer on the second floor of our house, gathering dust. Then my mother had moved it downstairs and into the porch. Now it held old newspapers and her gardening gloves.

I heard the door creak open, and I turned around. My mother stood in the doorway. She looked older, and more worn out, but she was still my mother.

"Mom," I began, but no more words came out. My mouth closed, and I couldn't speak because of the lump gathering in my throat. I was too caught up in emotion.

"Rebecca?" She breathed my name carefully, as though if she said it out loud, someone would run in and take me away again.

"It's me, mom," I managed to get out before a tear escaped and trickled down my cheek.

"I thought you were dead," she said, still in a whisper. She took two small steps forward. She was still wearing her moccasin slippers that she had bought originally for me, but that I had never used.

Then, she wrapped her arms around me, and I breathed in the scent of her perfume; that comforting tea rose scent that my father had gone to great lengths to buy for her. She was wearing her red bathrobe, and it added to the comforting effect, so that I burst into uncontrollable tears.

I was home, but I was still missing my home. It felt strange, and yet comforting. I didn't know what I was going to do. How could I still be with my mother, and with Erik, Charity, and Dominique?

A/N: There you go! You asked for it, I posted it! Review, please, and let me know what you think!