20
In 1990, Kerry had been five years old. At the time, Bridget was six years old. The two adorable pixies with the blonde and red hair charmed a lot of adults. During those days, their father was a traveling television sports reporter, and their mother was a full time mom. Rory was a two-year-old problem child restricted to a play pen as his older sisters played in the backyard and ran in and out of the garage of their home on Maple.
"Kerry, let's play cowboys and Indians."
"Okay." In those days Kerry with the pigtails idolized her big sister.
"I'll be the Indians…" Bridget pushed Kerry into the kiddy chair in the garage and found the leftover twine from the clothesline. "You'll be the cowboys before we scalp them…" Little Bridget with the unbrushed blonde hair tied the end of the twine to the chair then started running around her little sister to bind her to the seat. Giggling through her toothless grin, Kerry giggled and cooed. Her sister was playing with her! These were some of her best and favorite memories of her childhood. Surrounded by the boxes of the garage as Bridget raced around her chanting a nonsensical and stereotyped version of a Native American chant. Kerry just giggled. Running out of twine, the blonde older sister looked down at the little red-haired sister that ruined her being an only child.
"Time for all that red hair to go…"
"Okay…" Kerry didn't know what was going on was meant to ruin her nice looks. All she knew was that her sister was playing with her. That was the most important thing. Looking over the workbench in the garage, Bridget chanced on a pair of heavy iron sisters then became distracted by something else. Somewhere near the house, a police siren sounded. Bridget responded to it.
"Gotta go…" Bridget raced down the driveway in her yellow t-shirt and blue pants, turning at the hedge against the McGruder family next door, she vanished from the property as Kerry sat tied to the chair alone. Bound to her seat, left alone, she looked around for her sister.
"Bridget…" She asked out loud. "Bridget?" She started squirming under all the twine. "Bridget, come back…."
Kerry opened her eyes. She wasn't five years old; she was twenty-four. She was a grown woman and an assistant lawyer for one of Detroit's top corporate attorney firms. She hadn't dreamed she was a kid in a long time. That wasn't exactly how that incident had happened either. In the real world, Bridget had run and hid in the bushes after hearing her mother calling them. It was her mother who had untied her, and Bridget had a rash for two weeks after hiding in poison ivy. Kerry gasped and tried to recall where she was. She was in her fourteenth floor suite in the Hotel Tipton in Los Angeles. Despite a very few brief duties, she had come out here with Miss Flockhart to follow a lead on her sister. Someone knocked at her door.
"Room service."
"Thank you…." Bridget's voice accepted it.
Hearing that voice, Kerry jumped out of her bed and to her feet to look out of the bedroom. In the outer suite, Bridget was wearing a long hotel guest robe as she tipped the steward with a couple of dollars. He had wheeled a cart inside with two plates on it. Bridget wheeled it the rest of the way to the bedroom. Kerry stood stunned. She had found her sister. They were together… finally. Finally! A light feeling came to Kerry's heart, her head sort of trembled and the emotions rushed to her eyes as a million tears. She had found her sister!
"Kerry…" Bridget looked at her. "You've lost so much weight. Haven't you been eating?" She lifted the cover off a plate of lasagna, but Kerry wasn't interested in food. She was going through anger, delight, extreme joy and confusion. Too many things were colliding in her brain. Her eyes were full of tears. She could barely talk. All she could do was reach out and wrap her sister in her arms and hold her.
"Bridget…" Her voice was shaky, her heart full of emotion. "Oh, my God… it's really you!"
"It's really me." Bridget shed a tear as well.
"Was that… Was that…" Kerry struggled to find her thoughts. "What the heck was that?!" She backed away. "Why… Why did you act like that? Do you know what I've gone through to find you? Do you know how long I've been trying to find you? Why did you leave me?!" She stopped being upset to hug her again.
"Okay," Bridget's small grin turned to a large smile. "Which question do you want answered first?" An incredible happiness and joy filled her heart to finally have her sister back in her life.
"Well…" Kerry rolled her eyes. "Let's start with Howard and the guys…."
"Okay…" Bridget placed a slice of French bread on Kerry's plate of spaghetti and handed it to her. "Well, that's pretty basic, you see, I don't want the guys knowing who I am. I mean, if you had shown up by yourself like you were supposed to…"
"Like I was supposed to?" Kerry sat across from Bridget at the table by the window in her bedroom.
"I've had a premonition you were going to find me for the last three months." Bridget confessed. "You were going to find me in Detroit or here in Pasadena, but I never saw you in a premonition showing up with the guys."
"A premonition?" Kerry dabbed sauce on her bread then sipped her drink. "You saw me in a premonition." She grinned just loving this moment. "So, you're finally coming clear about all those…. Oh, what do we want to call them? Abilities?"
"Yes, I've got special abilities…" Bridget rolled her spaghetti in her fork before eating it. "I can fly, I'm bulletproof, I can lift a lot of heavy stuff, I can mentally move objects…" She stopped to smile proudly. "Kerry, I've seen more of the world than you can believe. I've been atop pyramids, the greatest mountains, seen incredible sights, visited so many cultures…"
Kerry sat stat looking at her with a mixture of shock and surprise with a dollop of disbelief. This was not how she pictured this talk. She pictured Bridget being more obtrusive with the truth, not quite so… honest…
"I wish I could have been there with you." Kerry confessed.
"You were." Bridget shined with a slight grin to her sister. Kerry could only glance down and look at the part in the robe Bridget was wearing and saw the big red Kryptonian "S" on her chest. It was not the same costume she had been seen wearing and photographed years ago in Detroit. It was possibly number hundred and thirty seven in a series of several that had been lost by fire, damaged by bullets and even torn off while flying too fast. Kerry looked at it then looked up to her sister's face.
"And all as one of the wealthiest women on the planet. Is that how you made all that money?" She asked. "By premonitions and psychic manipulating of the stock market?"
"Oh, you figured that out too, huh?" Bridget ate some more spaghetti. "Well, almost all of it goes into a special foundation for philanthropic and charitable institutes, but only a very small amount goes into my account for living purposes."
"How much money do you have?"
"You don't want me answering that." Bridget had more spaghetti with her garlic bread.
"How much?"
"You won't be able to handle it."
"How much?!"
"Forty five million, seven-hundred and thirty-four thousand…" She watched as Kerry started choking on a piece of garlic bread after nearly inhaling it in a gasp. Rising to pat her sister on the back, Bridget stopped her choking fit as Kerry dislodged the bread in her throat briefly to correctly swallow it.
"…A hundred and thirty-six dollars and sixty-seven cents…" Bridget answered with a slight pause. "But most of it is stocks, bonds, annuities and companies like Queen Scholarships and the Kent Foundation."
"Queen Scholarships paid for my college tuition!"
"And Rory's…" Bridget confessed nervously. "You're welcome…"
"Oh, my god!" Kerry was learning way too much way too fast. She rose to her feet out of nervous anxiety. "And what's the reasoning behind that?" Kerry pointed to Bridget's costume under the robe and beamed happily to have finally outed her sister. "What? It's easier to rip off an existing character than to create another one? Or do you own DC Comics as well?"
"I own stocks in Marvel, Disney, Microsoft and Time/Warner among others, but Kerry, " Bridget reacted a bit hesitant and embarrassed. "Getting to fly and have premonitions isn't the only thing that happened to me. My mind changed… my brain…" She struggled to explain it. "I'm thinking and rationalizing faster and more cognitively now. Do you recall how self-obsessed I used to be?" She stopped eating and turned from the table. "I started realizing… what I wanted to do. I wanted to make the world a better place. I wanted to help people. I wanted to do the things no else could do, and I realized… I could hide behind a comic book icon. No one ever recalls what I look like because all they do is remember the costume. All people ever see a character… no one ever sees me, and I prefer to keep it that way."
"How?" Kerry rose to stand with Bridget. "How did you even get like this? How did it happen?"
"I was afraid you ask that. That's a lot harder to explain." Bridget stood before the window near the chair with her cape draped over it. "Do you recall your Bible? Psalm Chapter 103, Verse 20…"
Kerry tried to remember.
"Bless the Lord and his Angels who excel in strength who carry His commandments and His voice into the world…" Kerry knew the verse. She thought about it and wondered why Bridget referred to that. She gasped, pretended to look away then looked back to Bridget. "Are you trying to tell me that you're a…"
"They're real." Bridget confessed. "Whether you call them gods or angels, they're real…. Real people who are so pure of heart and incapable of evil that they acquire their full potential to serve Him." She paused. "Most others like me either become doctors, lawyers, police officers, fire-fighters, rescue workers… but a few of us, very few, our drive to do some good makes us more powerful. I decided to become something much bigger, but not because of ego, because I could become a symbol for others. People believe in me. All the good I've done has touched others who have touched others and reached to others…."
Kerry stood stunned. It was way too much to realize and to accept. Her sister was some sort of angel, a potential demigod? A person so pure of heart that it enabled her to have godlike powers?
"I'm not the only one like this." Bridget turned back around. "There's a guy in London who runs around as Batman and a guy who's Spiderman in Tokyo, but they can't fly like I can."
"What about the underwear thing?" Kerry asked the one thing everyone was curious about. Bridget briefly chuckled.
"I did that once to make a point…" Bridget pulled her robe closed up over her costume. "I never expected to do it so often, but… everyone now just expects it."
"Bridget…" Kerry forgot about eating her dinner and realized what she wanted was the truth. "The one thing I want to know more than anything else is why? I could have kept your secret. Why did you run away? Why did you disappear from me?"
"Because history repeats itself." Bridget answered. "Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. You give people a source of power, and they will abuse it. The one thing I learned from talking with spirits is don't share your secrets. Joan of Arc was burned at the stake for revealing prophecies. Nostradamus was exploited by nobility." She looked embarrassed. "I wanted to tell you so much, but I was warned not to tell. I was warned what could happen if you found out; I was required to make it difficult for you to discover the truth, but I left home because…" She looked lovingly at her sister. "It was time for me to go. It was becoming impossible for me to do this while living at home." She placed her hand to her chest. "This is a full-time job. I have constant visions of the worst things that could happen. I have smaller visions when I pass through the lives of others, and in the cracks, I have to create an identity to live in society. I am always there not because I'm convenient, but because I can't turn off visions of probable events, and what's worse. The future is always changing. A bus crash can no longer occur, but a flood will take its place. I never know when I can take a break."
"Are you coming home with me?" Kerry asked. "I mean… will you lose your powers now that I know?"
"No…" Bridget looked out the window. "I haven't even told you the worst part. Do you recall dad's heart problem?"
"The one you predicted."
"I gave up my life with him that he'd survive." Bridget shed a tear. "He was supposed to die that night so I would leave home."
"No, that can't be true."
"The future changes a lot, but destiny finds a way to lead all paths in one direction." Bridget answered. "The second I go home, we could lose dad…"
"No…." Kerry felt the tears returning.
"Bridget Hennessey no longer exists…" Bridget turned to her sister. "I'm Penny Parker now… That's why you were able to find me. I stopped being Bridget the second I left home."
Kerry postured and paced back and forth a bit. She had learned everything and a bit more. It was all too much to absorb right now. This was the truth. Her sister didn't leave home because she wanted to; she left because she had to! She wasn't the old Bridget. These powers, her pure of heart had made her superior to her both physically and mentally. Bridget had finally become the person Kerry wanted her to be, and she wasn't able to live in her life.
"I miss you so much." Kerry's eyes filled with tears, and sister and sister embraced each other. Bridget delicately held her beloved sister close to her heart.
"You can't tell anyone you found me." The blonde one whispered.
"I can tell mom, right?"
"You can't tell anyone!"
"Why not?" Kerry pushed away from Bridget and looked at her.
"Kerry, there's one more ability I forgot to tell you about." Bridget nervously dropped her head and then lifted it again slowly before her sister. "Do you recall when I saved Kyle's life, and he showed up at the house and confronted me?"
"Yeah…" Kerry looked to her sister. "How did you get him to forget all…" Her eyes made contact with Bridget's big blue eyes, and she felt suddenly light-headed. She tried blinking to shake off the dizziness, but it was no use. She felt tired and sleepy then suddenly stumbled forward into Bridget's arms. Her older sister pulled her close and became remorseful. Her heart was breaking all over again.
"I'm sorry." She whispered. "I hope you understand I'm doing this for you." She held Kerry close to her heart and whispered in her ear. "Everything has been a dream. We never met, and you dreamed you found me." Tears started falling down her face. "I was never here." She started wavering in the difficult memory she was placing in her sister's mind. "I love you, Kerry…" She started bawling over the hard task she had to do. "And I'm so sorry…" Her heart broke and her lips quaked with the hard decision she had to make right now.
"Have a good life, Kerry…" Her heart broke and the emotion exploded from her heart with a million tears pouring from her eyes.