Colin’s phone is ringing.
He can hear the high pitched screech ringing in his ear, but when he tries to move his hand to reach for it, he realizes he can’t. His hands are handcuffed to a wall or something. Colin is still much too drowsy to open his eyes and look. What happened? Why is Harlem calling him? Harlem only calls for emergencies.
That’s when Colin remembers.
His eyes snap open, and he realizes he’s in total darkness. There’s nothing to see. Colin has to blink several times just to make sure his eyes are even open.
“What the hell,” he says, and his voice echoes.
Is he in a cave? Where the hell is he right now?
He remembers how he got here: the hotel room, Emmalee’s father, a group of men with a needle. But why? What the hell is going on? If Emmalee’s father was a threat, why wasn’t he in her file? Was he in her file? Colin can’t remember. It’s incredibly likely he glossed over her family history. It’s never the most interesting part. All recruits have some sort of family issues. Otherwise they wouldn’t be recruits.
“Oh, you’re not in hell yet,” Emmalee’s father says from across the room. “But don’t worry. You’ll get there.”
Colin blinks some more, trying in vain to see through the darkness. Where is Emmalee’s father? What does he want?
“Boo,” Emmalee’s father whispers in Colin’s ear.
Colin didn’t even hear his footsteps. This isn’t good. Colin’s never been in this situation before. Luckily, his phone has stopped ringing. He’s never not answered his phone either. Harlem will know what to do. Harlem will find him.
“Not much of a talker, huh?” Emmalee’s father asks, now a few feet away. “Not going to ask all the typical questions? Why am I here? What do I want? Really?” Colin doesn’t answer. “Hmm. I always thought my daughter’s taste in men was more predictable. She’s never gone for stability. I think she likes to have the upper-hand, you know? She likes to think she’s in control, the strong one. She didn’t get that feeling growing up, I’m afraid.”
Colin fights the urge to smile. Emmalee’s father thinks Colin is her boyfriend. He doesn’t know who Colin really is. Colin can use that to his advantage. This could work.
“Please,” Colin says, “let us go.”
“Ah,” Emmalee’s father says, “there it is. You must be one of the nice ones. Think just a little bit of begging with some pleasantries will do the trick? I’m afraid that won’t do, son. No, I have something much more fun planned for the two of you. I’ve been waiting a long time for this reunion. I expected someone like you would be here to join us, so don’t worry. You won’t miss out.”
Emmalee’s father puts a hand on Colin’s shoulder. Colin squeezes his eyes shut. He knows what’s coming even before he feels the needle press into the skin on his neck.
“Goodnight, now. I’ll see you for dinner,” Emmalee’s father says.
And then Colin is left in the dark again.
When you grow up with a psychopathic father, you learn a few things.
First, you learn not to cower or scream at the sight of brutality and/or murder. Besides, after watching your father kill your mother right in front of you at the age of three, you won’t be phased by violence as easily. Nothing can compare.
Secondly, you learn how to hide, keep secrets, and run from trouble. You know how not to get caught. You know how to free yourself from impending doom.
But mostly, you learn how to escape. You learn how to disappear into thin air, and never look back on the life you were raised in. You learn how to protect yourself from your biggest nightmare.
Until your biggest nightmare catches up with you.
Emmalee has been running from her father for fifteen years, knowing if he found her he would kill her. And now he finally found her.
She wakes up in a spacious bedroom on top of expensive bedding. The room is nice, has an adjacent bathroom, but is (most importantly) empty. Of course, as soon as she tries to open the door she realizes it’s locked.
It isn’t a bedroom. It’s her prison.
She knows better than to bang on the door. Nobody is there to help her, and if someone is there, it’s probably better they assume she’s still asleep. Surely, whatever punishment her father has planned for her will take into consideration how expertly she’s been able to escape from him.
But what about Colin? Did they take him too? Why isn’t he here with her? What have they done with him?
Not that Emmalee is particularly fond of Colin, but she can at least nearly guarantee that he’s more her ally than the man who raised her. If they were together right now, they’d probably be able to find a way out.
Unfortunately, if Colin was taken with her, Emmalee is sure he must already be dead. Her father has no reason to keep him alive. No reason Emmalee would know of, at least.
She begins looking around the room for alternative methods of escape. There are no windows and no accessible air vents. The only door is locked. Not even the bathroom has a door on it.
What is she supposed to do?
She sits down on the plush, white carpet and sighs.
There’s nothing to do, but wait.
A poetic interpretation of a song by Twenty One Pilots.
Hope
the loss of it wraps around my throat, and I’m ready to give up.
It would be so easy,
so many ways to leave this world,
many more than 1,000.
And just one reason to stay:
You.
You buckled your heart to the backseat of my car,
so every time I drive away, I look in the rearview,
and I see you.
The night I felt like giving up, you knew,
you could feel it.
You saw the demons waiting on your porch,
waiting to deliver the news,
and you picked up the phone.
And just like that,
all my hope was restored.
You said stay with me
and wrapped your heart in a jar,
A jar to carry with me, so I will always know
you are the one who gives me hope.
You wave the torch of life above my head,
so I look up and understand
It will be okay.
I can live another day.
18
Growing up, I used to dream about my eighteenth birthday.
I imagined an exhilarating burst of freedom, and the ability to walk out of the door to my parents’ house and never look back. I thought turning 18 would make me an official adult, which would finally mean making my own decisions.
So, when the day finally came, I wanted to do something big.
There were many different factors involving my decision to drive to Dallas for my birthday. For one, it was where my best friend had moved the year before, and my birthday wouldn’t be complete without my best friend.
Then there was Neverland, my boyfriend at the time. Neverland and I were introduced by my best friend a few weeks before when we ran into her boyfriend, Jack-in-the-Box, at the mall. Jack-in-the-Box and Neverland were best friends as well, and naturally wherever Jack-in-the-Box went, Neverland went too. Mostly because Neverland was Jack-in-the-Box’s ride for the night, but that’s not the important part.
The important part was that while Jack-in-the-box and my best friend snuggled in a secluded space in a park we all ventured to, Neverland and I found a space of our own, and got to know each other. Three days later, we were an official couple, deluded into thinking it was love-at-first-sight and would last forever.
But the cynicism wouldn’t come until much later.
At the time, our happy bubble of new love was excited for my eighteenth birthday, and wanted to make the eight hour drive to Dallas to spend the weekend with my best friend. I would drive, Neverland would navigate from the passenger side, and Jack-in-the-Box would supply occasionally entertaining conversation from the backseat.
I’d never driven farther than Austin before, and never on my own. I had my phone GPS, an address, and a map which my grandmother gave us when we stopped in Austin (the halfway point) for a bowl of birthday stew. But I wasn’t nervous. Neverland sang to me the whole way up, replaying Bruno Mars’ Just the Way You Are several times. I was smiling so much, I’m surprised my cheeks didn’t fall off.
We made it to Dallas just before midnight. My best friend was still at work, so we went to pick her up. Jack-in-the-Box wrote his number on a scrap of paper and stuck it to the window of her work, pretending to be a creepy stranger. We saw her laugh and shake her head, and before long she had joined us.
It had been a cold winter, and snow still capped the roofs of many of the houses. I remember being mesmerized by the sight. I’d lived in Texas all my life, and very rarely ever experienced real snow.
My best friend was a master chef, so after a quick run to the local grocery store (Neverland bought a random gallon of milk because “It’s only a dollar here!”), she made us dinner. I don’t remember what it was. Pancakes? Or Grilled Cheese? Or perhaps TED Sandwiches (grilled cheese as buns with a bacon cheeseburger patty, and two bbq chicken strips)? Whatever we ate, I’m sure it was delicious.
After dinner, Neverland gave me my surprise birthday gift: he had written me a song. He used my best friend’s guitar to play it for me, and I cried tears of joy at the beauty of it. It still remains one of the best gifts I’ve ever received.
I’m sure we watched a movie or drove around recklessly or something. We were much too young and wild to go to bed at a decent hour. But I don’t remember the rest. I remember the song, and I remember falling asleep that night on the air mattress on the floor at the top of the staircase with Neverland, our bodies intertwined.
My eighteenth birthday was everything I could have hoped it would be. There was laughter, love, great food, amazing fun, the perfect gift, and even snow.
But most importantly, the day I turned 18, I was free.
They’re surrounded.
Colin is used to finding himself in complicated and dangerous situations, but he usually has the upper-hand. For one, he typically puts himself in those situations, knowing how to get out of them. For another, he’s never had a complicated and difficult recruit to look after while in the dangerous situation.
The odds aren’t in Colin’s favor this time.
He immediately presses the panic button he always keeps with him during missions. Harlem will send someone as soon as he receives the alert, and he’ll just have to hope it isn’t Lydia. Suddenly, it doesn’t seem so insane that Lydia could be a part of this mess in the first place.
Colin and Emmalee are both pinned by the strong, dark figures who burst into the room when another one walks calmly in. It’s too dark for Colin to make out any distinguishable features other than the figure is obviously male, and walks with an assured posture straight toward Emmalee.
“Emma, darling,” the man says with a thick British accent, grazing Emmalee’s face with his fingertips.
Colin notices that she flinches like she’s been burned at his touch, and does her best not to look at him. Who is he? How does he know her? How could Harlem not warn him about this? He tries to detach himself from the people keeping him pinned, and fails. He won’t be getting out of here on his own.
“And you, Colin Timothy Brice, or Agent Brice if you prefer. Yes, I know exactly who you are. I don’t suppose you have any grand ideas of rescue, and I wouldn’t suggest you start,” the man says, turning to Colin.
“Who the hell are you?” Colin asks. “And what do you want?”
The man laughs slightly, but nothing about this situation is particularly funny. Where’s Lydia? Colin couldn’t get rid of her earlier, and now when he actually needs her help, she’s nowhere to be found? What is going on?
The man walks back over to Emmalee.
“Well, I’m Emmalee’s father. Or didn’t she tell you?” he says. “Take them to the car. We must leave quickly now.”
And then, Colin feels a needle prick the skin on his neck, and everything goes black.
Emmalee doesn’t sleep.
She can’t. Not with the threat of danger looming over her. She doesn’t think Colin knows why she’s been running for so long. Surely, if he knew, they wouldn’t be staying at this same hotel for another night. Surely, they’d be long gone by now.
Like she would be if she wasn’t stuck here. The last thing she needed was an agency tracking her down to kill her. Colin had found her too many times for her to think she could elude him for long.
She made her choice. Now she had to deal with it.
Emmalee turns over on the bed, and sighs.
“Go to sleep,” Colin mumbles from the bed across from her.
“Where’s Lydia?” Emmalee asks.
Lydia still hasn’t returned from wherever she ran off to.
“Who cares?” Colin says.
Emmalee sits up and stares at the silhouette of Colin’s form sprawled out on the bed. He didn’t even bother to get under the covers. She wonders how long it took him to fall asleep. She hasn’t been paying attention. She’s been more focused on the sounds coming from the broken window, and the occasional footsteps outside the hotel door.
“I do.”
Colin snorts, but the sound is muffled by the pillow his face is pressed into.
“I’m serious,” Emmalee says. “Where is she?”
Before Colin can respond, the window shatters behind her, and the door busts open in front of her. Emmalee barely has time to scream before one dark-suited silhouette after another come storming into the room. Colin snaps himself awake in an instant, but it’s too late.
Her safety is officially over.
A fictional interpretation of a song by Avril Lavigne
This is how love works:
We fall in love right at the moment we finally decide we’re independent. We’d rather be alone, but suddenly that’s not an option anymore. Someone comes along and reminds us how beautiful love can feel when we’re falling into it.
That’s what happened with us. We tried to make it on our own, and just when we both thought love could never work, we found each other.
And then we fell in love.
***
Falling in love is simple.
The rose colored glasses make loving each other easy. All the little annoyances are endearing, cute, adorable. Nothing is or ever could be more perfect than our love.
But at some point, we stop falling and we hit the ground, and with it, reality. We realize our love is far from perfect, and become annoyed by the little things.
Our love takes a turn from blissfully simple to punishingly difficult.
***
It’s not easy anymore.
I nag too much, and you give me too many reasons to nag. You’ve stopped listening, stopped being eager to please. I’ve stopped being patient, and my expectations are too high.
Before you, I would check out at this point. Once it became too difficult, I would find a way to escape. I’d take the first exit out of the relationship.
But not with you.
You are worth the fight.
***
We deserve better than this.
We deserve bliss. So please, don’t be afraid to tell me to just shut up whenever I get too tough on you. Kiss me instead. It’s going to take the both of us to win this battle. Love is only easy when we’re falling, but we’ve got two feet on the ground now, and it’s time to start walking through this journey of life together.
Hand-in-hand, when push comes to shove, it’s going to take the both of us.
So let’s go.
“What’s the deal with the recruit?” Colin asks.
He hears Harlem grunt on the other line. He was probably sleeping, but Colin hardly has time to care. Somebody tried to break in and possibly steal his recruit. It’s possible the intentions were harmless, or even that Lydia created this mess just to make things more difficult for him. But there’s definitely something or someone after Emmalee that Colin needs to know about.
“Colin, it’s three o’clock in the morning. Go to bed,” Harlem says. “Or better yet, why don’t you finish your job?”
“That’s the problem, Harlem. How can I be expected to do my job when I don’t have all the information?”
“What more could you possibly need? You have enough to recruit, and that’s your job. Or have you forgotten already? I thought you said you wouldn’t have a problem with this girl. Do I need to assign you to another case because I can do that?”
“No, I’m fine.”
“Then why are you calling me?”
“Because the mission was compromised. Somebody tried to break into the hotel room, and our shining recruit’s first instinct was to hide in the cupboard! I don’t think she’s been changing identities for the thrill. I think she’s been running from something, and I need to know what.”
“If I tell you I’ll look into it, can I go back to bed?”
“Thank you, Harlem. You won’t be disappointed.”
“I sure hope not.”
Harlem hangs up and Colin returns to the room with Emmalee. She already cleaned up the glass on the floor, and attempted to cover the hole with a sheet of foil. She jumps slightly when Colin enters the room, though, as if she’s still terrified it might be whatever took away her choice, and forced her to run. That’s what she said, wasn’t it? She didn’t have a choice. Running and hiding in someone else’s life was her only option in life.
But who or what is forcing her to run?
It’s time for Colin to find out.
A fictional interpretation of a song by Miley Cyrus
Her hands in the air above her head, red dress hugging tightly to her curves, his leather jacket around her shoulders, she thinks:
We can’t stop. We won’t stop. This night will last forever.
***
Three hours earlier and she was sitting on the beach in front of the flickering flame of a fire. Her best friend is laughing across from her. It’s the first time she’s laughed all night.
Her boyfriend broke up with her earlier that day in the parking lot of the sundae shop they went to after school.
Somebody passes around a bottle of something much stronger than they’re all used to, and they all take a long, heavy sip. She coughs, and the boy next to her puts his arm around her, his leather jacket rubbing against the bare skin on her shoulder. She leans into him. It’s been a long time since someone held her. She knows what he wants, though.
But she has the power to decide whether she gives it or not.
***
Now on a dance floor crowded with people, he’s nowhere in sight.
She’s dancing with her best friend, and neither one of them can remember the last time they had a coherent thought. But somehow they made it here. How long have they been here? How long will they stay?
Does it matter?
***
One mission:
His house. The ex-boyfriend of her best friend has a girl over, she knows it. They must stop whatever is going to happen, must get to him before he ruins everything.
Should they be driving?
Probably not. But they’re past the point of perception and rationality.
His leather jacket has disappeared from her shoulders, though she can’t remember taking it off. The only thing on her mind is her best friend shouting in her ear turn here, turn here.
But there isn’t a turn.
There’s only a red light, and a car stopped that neither of them were coherent enough to see.
They come to a slamming halt, and disappear into the blackness.
***
We can’t stop.
We won’t stop.
This night will last forever.
But not in the way she thought.