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Sydney

Jarod was a nervous wreck while all of us were treated for minor smoke poisoning. Miss Parker, however, who had been exposed to the fire for far longer than any of us, had been wheeled into the ER immediatley.

I had never before seen Jarod, usually a gentle man, treat anyone as roughly as he did the attending doctor.

Finally, when the young man had lost his patience with us, Angelo and I sat in the waiting room of the hospital while Jarod was pacing nervously in front of us. The fact that the Centre had been brought down in front of our eyes in the literal sense, didn’t serve to cheer his dark mood.

“What the hell are they doing in there?” he exclaimed. “And why don’t they tell us anything? She might be dead for all we know!”

At these words he sank into a chair and dropped his head into his hands. His voice was much lower when he continued. “I’m scared for her, Sydney. I’m so scared for her…”

I patted his arm. Sharing his worries was the only thing I could do right now.

Finally, half an hour later, a doctor approached us, easily recognizeable as Miss Parker’s companions by the distinct smell of smoke that hung above us like a cloud and the dark streaks across our faces.

Jarod was on his feet before anyone could say anything. “How is she?”

“Please, Sir, I need you to calm down for this,” the physician said and Jarod drew a rattling breath that conveyed both impatience and dread.

“Please?” he then asked in a quiet, terrified voice.

The doctor seemed satisfied now. He looked very trustworthy, being a tall man with a shock of white hair that framed a kind face with sharply intelligent blue eyes.

“She has been exposed to the smoke for a long time and she has also lost quite some blood through her head injuries. Her vital functions did stop for a moment before the paramedics attended to her on the scene… she is unconscious now. Though it looks as if her baby was fine for now.”

He, too, saw the horrified look in Jarod’s eyes and reached out for the younger man, squeezing his arm slightly.

“I am sorry. We will have to see whether she will make it through the night.”

“May I stay with her?” Jarod asked, his voice almost pleading now and the doctor nodded towards the rest of us.

“You are the child’s father I presume?”

“Yes.”

“I can only allow one person in her room at a time. I would advice for the others to rest a little so you can take turns on her beside. It will be a long night.”

He went around to give our limp hands a firm shake, then left down the corridor. I followed Jarod until the edge of the door.

“I’ll stay, Jarod. Call me if you need me, okay?”

He nodded numbly and placed his shaking hand onto the doorknob. Giving me a last glance, he stepped through the door and into the hall.

Jarod

Miss Parker’s pale skin glowed even in the semi-darkness of the room. Her eyes were closed, her face unusually calm. Around it, her now auburn hair was spread across the pillow. I approached the bed and gently picked up one of her hands from her stomach as I took my seat on the chair next to the bed.

Unsure whether I was to talk to her or whether I could even trust my voice, I cleared my throat quietly.

Outside the moon was raising, vanishing and reappearing between the dark clouds of the night sky. The leafless branches of the trees stood against the white wall of the opposite building like arms desperately reaching out into the air. I did not hear anything except for the sound of the heart-monitors for which, despite its annoying tune, I was eternally grateful.

“He said we had to wait for you to make it through the night,” I told her, whispering for the simple reason of my voice being made husky by grief and the smoke that might be responsible for her death.

“I know you would hate me for giving you a cheesy speech about how much I love you and how it would shatter me to lose you,” I went on, a little more sure now. There was still no motion on her face, no flutter of the eyelids or tugging on the corner of her mouth.

I ran my other hand along the delicate curve of her stomach and drew a deep breath. We often imagine the horrors of losing someone we love. Sometimes we pause in our hectic schedule to look up and wonder, if only for a second, what it would be like to lose someone so very close to us.

It is only in these moments when we are waiting- for a diagnosis, a message, the dawn, when we realize just how much it hurts. It wretches your insides, has fear paralyze your limbs and it feels as if your heart is cut out.

There is nothing romantic about that kind of fear, and nothing anyone could do to soothe you. I had always been prepared to one day learn of Miss Parker’s death. Of her having committed suicide to escape the horrible life she was forced to lead, or for her to having crashed her car into a tree because she’d once again been drunk. I’d never imagined losing her like this, or being able to sit by her bedside, having to endure the waiting.

I had wondered what I would say, what I would feel but nothing had prepared me for this. I was beyond words.

Silently, I leaned forward and rested my head next to hers.

Don’t die on me, Parker, I thought and inhaled her scent that was barely detectable through the smoky air.

Sydney

The night dragged on, the minutes only passing slowly. I was so high on caffeine, that I had started pacing the corridor. Unable to endure imagining the impact her death would have on all of us, I finally sank onto a bench and buried my head in my hands. Don’t die, Mischa.

Broots

I woke to my own laboured breathing. Unable to catch the bad dream I’d had, I stared into the darkness of my hospital room. Sydney had called earlier, causing in me a feeling of wild triumph as the grim monster that had eaten my future away had been defeated. But then he’d broken the news of Miss Parker’s condition. I checked my watch on the nightstand. Three o’clock. The morning light was still far away. I felt the sharp pain in my shoulder and inhaled deeply. It was nothing compared to the pain I would feel if Miss Parker actually died. Please don’t.

Miss Parker

There was a maze I was trying to navigate through. I knew perfectly well that I was dreaming, but still the need to get to the destination I was heading to was more pressing than anything. But still something seemed to hold me back.

Voices. A chorus of voices, calling me by the various names I had been called by over the years. Mischa, Michelle, Miss Parker… Parker.

My family name.

Oh god how I hated my family name. How I hated anything that was associated to the Centre. I imagined the hot wind and the Greek sun on my skin. I had been happy there as a young girl at boarding-school. Why couldn’t I go back and start anew? Why hadn’t my mother survived and found a way to take me away and keep me safe?

I had hoped so badly that alcohol and cigarettes would eventually kill me, or that Lyle would do it, or anyone. Just so I didn’t have to take it into my own hands. Curious, how despite all the bitterness and the pain a small part of me had still believed in the knight in the shining armour that would one day take me away. At first, I had imagined it to be Jarod. Later I had believed I could start a new life with Thomas in Oregon. The truth was, that I’d never stood a chance with either of them.

My life was just so incredibly twisted, so filled with pain, that a premature death seemed to be the inevitable end to it.

“Angel! I wonder where the Parker spirit has gone.”

I turn around to gaze into the eyes of my father. Only that they are different from how I remember them. Has he ever shown the tiniest trace of emotion in his lifetime? I wonder. I don’t answer him, just stare at his face, try to read what he is feeling.

“You still have a life, stupid girl,” he scolds, every bit the disapproving father he has always been.

“God, how I hate you!” I suddenly burst out. “How dare you assume that you know anything about me?”

“I am your father,” he replies and I laugh out.

“So you’re telling me to go back and live this life? I assume I am on the verge of death! Why don’t they send me my mother?”

He looks at me and slightly shakes his head.

“There is only one lesson to be told,” he says. “Life is pain, but it is still there to be lived.” He reaches out for me. “Take my hand, Angel.”

I feel fury rise inside me. “Oh thank you, Daddy. You alone have given me enough pain for several lifetimes!”

He bends his head as if in regret. It just doesn’t suit him.

“I know,” he finally admitts. “So if there is one thing that I can do for you it is to send you back.”

I approach him and try to grip his throat. “And if I don’t want to go back? I am sick of it all. I am so sick of it all…”

Tears are threatening to fall and as they spill across my cheeks, I give a sob of frustration.

“I didn't have a life. But you do.”
”No, you have taken that life from me.”
”Dammit! You are a fighter,” he scolds again.

“I don’t want to be anymore…” I turn away, having firmly decided that I will walk on that path.

“You told Sydney that your mother had been weak when you still thought she had shot herself in that elevator.”
I freeze, my shoulders sag and I turn around slowly.

“Are you omnicient just because your dead?” I ask.

“Too many people are depending on you now,” he tells me. “You can’t just leave them.”

I give a jolt of sarcastic laughter. “And here I was believing you to be a misanthrope.”

He crosses his arms in front of his chest. “I am. But you are not.”

“You tried your best to make me into one.”
”But I never succeeded.”

“Don’t die on me, Parker.”

“Don’t die, Mischa.”

”Please don’t.“

He is holding his hand out to me now. “Please, Angel. I was never able to love you when I was alive, but I am now.”

I want to see a Daddy I can love in this man. I really want to believe that he finally sees me for what I am, that he has stopped detesting me. I just can’t. Not even here. Not even now.

Still I need to voice what I have always felt, regardless of the circumstances of my miserable life.

“I love you, Daddy.”

“And I love you, Angel.”

He holds my gaze for a moment and for the first time I see honesty in his eyes. For the first time I am sure that he is not lying to me.
And I finally take his hand.

Centre Surveillance System

The little girl is sitting at a table on a chair that seems far too large for her. It is only with difficulty that she can place her hands onto the table. Her gaze, however, is clear and sharp as she looks at the man opposite her.

His bulging eyes and intimidating posture do not seem to startle her.

“Why are you not afraid of me, Miss Parker?” he asks.

“Why don’t you call me Michelle, Mister Raines?” she asks in a friendly voice.

“Now, Michelle, you haven’t answered my question, have you?”

The girl shrugs as if he had been asking about her favourite color.

“I can feel that you will not hurt me.”
Mister Raines looks intrigued now and leans forward across the table.

“Has your mother told you how to read people?” he asks, something very closely resembling greed seeping into his voice by accident.

“Noone can tell you how to read people,” she says wisely. “You either can or you cannot.”

“Has your mother told you that?”

She nods eagerly. “And Uncle Sydney.”

Raines leans back again, folding his arms across his chest.

“Have they taught you how to use that skill?”

She wavers for the first time. “I am not to tell,” she finally admitts.

“So they have.”

“Why are you angry at them?”

Raines looks slightly taken aback. “So you are that good.”

He suddenly jumps up and leans far across the table grabbing little Miss Parker’s shoulder.

“I want you to concentrate on your mother now, Michelle. What do you see?”

She shakes her head. “I don’t…”

“Concentrate.” His voice has risen and his grip has become harder. Miss Parker winces.

“You’re hurting me, Sir.”

He losens the grip. “I won’t if you simply tell me what you see.”
She closes her eyes, concentrates, then shrieks.

“No!”

“Do you see your mother?”

She struggles, tries to get up.

“Mommy! No!”

A predatory grin has spread over Raines’ face. “What do you see, Michelle? What do you see?”

“Mommy!” she shouts again, tears spilling over her face.

“MICHELLE- what do you see?”

She lurches backwards, her chair crashing against the wall.

“NO!” She blinks, sways for a second, then races for the door.

Mister Raines remains at the table, knowing what she will find when she will approach the elevator: The body of her dead mother.

He listens to her cries that echo through the corridors and shakes his head. It is only a single word that he mutters under his breath: “Extraordinary.”

A sweeper is trying to hold Miss Parker back as she makes for her mother’s body, tears smeared across her face.

“Michelle!” he calls and she suddenly goes rigid. She turns around to him and there is a sudden hardness in her eyes. “Never call me that again. It’s Miss Parker.”
And so it remains.

Jarod

A soft sigh startles me awake instantly. The sky has turned a lighter shade of blue, the moon is already growing paler, but my attention is focused on the woman in front of me. Miss Parker’s eyes are open, staring intently at me.

My heart leaps and I squeeze her hand that I have been holding in mine all night.

“Parker…” I whisper, my voice still heavy with sleep, but she doesn’t answer, just stares at me with that clear focused gaze that scares me a bit.

“Are you okay?” I whisper.

“Who are you?” she asks, her voice only a faint whisper and an icy hand seems to grip my heart. Then she breaks into a tiny grin.

“I love you, Jarod.”

My heart skips a beat and I press her knuckles to my lips.

“Never do that to me again!”
”Are the others okay?” she asks me, clearly exhausted by the sole effort of keeping her eyes open.

“They are, Parker, they are.”

“Somehow I can’t believe it will ever be over even with Raines, my father and Lyle dead… there’s still the Triumvirate.”

I shake my head.

“The Pretender project was all they were interested in and with the authorities now swarming the place, I’m sure they have given up the Centre branch in Blue Cove for good.”

We sit in silence for a moment. What do they say? The past is just the future with the lights on

We have been stuck in the past for such a long time that I am sure we are both determined to concentrate on the future now. But there is one last thing…

“What happened to you-run-I-chase?” I ask, only half joking.

She gives me a tired but sincere smile and I have to lean forward to be able to make out what she is telling me: “Say it very quickly, five times after another. Sounds funny!”










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