Designed to Love (11 page)

"But I was hoping you would train with me
today," Ronan says, taking the brush from my hands to finish
brushing the back of my hair.

"I'm not a Designer and I could never keep
up," I say with mild cynicism. Truth be told, I wouldn't mind doing
physical training with him and the others but I figured it would
only serve to emphasize their superior abilities, something I've
been prone to being sensitive about lately.

"Besides, it's supposed to snow all week and
today might be the last day to get some flying in for a while," I
say, watching him in the mirror. He pauses with the brush midway
down the back of my hair and his face takes on the characteristic
expression that I've come to recognize as a mental interruption
from one of the other Designers. "Who wants what?" I sigh when he
resumes brushing my hair.

"It was Alisha. They want me downstairs so
they can begin training."

"Duty calls," I say grabbing the brush from
his hand and hastily throwing my hair in a ponytail, trying hard
not to show my annoyance. I knew he had a job to do, but I was
beginning to resent the constant interruptions from Alisha. It
seems we have less privacy as a married couple than we did when we
were just dating, and although she didn't seem the type, I couldn't
help but wonder if she was jealous.

"You could come down and be my cheerleader,"
he says, already grinning at my anticipated response to such an
insulting offer. His hand flies up, automatically intersecting the
hairbrush pitched at him, while his eyes never leave my face. I am
about to scold him for being such a tease when he winces and
touches his forehead.

"Did she just yell at you?" I ask, already
knowing the answer. "I thought you had the ability to mentally
block her?"

"Most of the time I can, but sometimes she
slips through, mostly when she's annoyed or mad at me. It must have
something to do with the change in level of energy. Of course, this
is our little secret," he says winking at me.

He knows I get easily annoyed with Alisha's
demands, so he keeps the peace by just keeping his mouth shut. He's
become quite skilled at diverting my attention away from unpleasant
topics and when he smiles broadly, advancing slowly towards me, I
feel my heart flutter in my chest.

"Should I tell her we both have a case of
the flu and we need to stay in bed," he teases, kissing me
tenderly.

"It's tempting," I reply, pulling him even
closer.

"Mrs. Callahan?" he murmurs.

"Yes, Mr. Callahan?"

"How about I treat you to a fancy homemade
dinner tonight to make up for leaving you now?"

"Really? You mean I married a man that can
cook and he's just now revealing this hidden talent?" I say
pretending to be angry.

"If you want a man that can cook, then I
will become your own personal chef," he says softly. Slowly he
begins humming "Love Somebody" by Maroon 5 and my body
automatically matches his in rhythm when he begins twirling me in a
two-step around the room.

"Come on Cataryn, sing with me," he softly
coaxes.

" I really, really love somebody. I really
want to take her far away" he sings, substituting the lyrics with
his own, and in a voice that sounds almost as good as the lead
singer's. It makes me wonder if the talent is a result of DNA
manipulation or natural giftedness. When I don't readily join in,
he looks down at me with liquid gold eyes and a million dollar
smile.

"Please, for me. You know how I love it when
you sing for me. Just one chorus," he begs. Of course, I cave, and
accompany him through the rest of the song in perfect harmony. Like
everything else about us, our voices blend together flawlessly.

Our serenade is short-lived when his body
stiffens indicating Alisha is running out of patience. I know we
are risking a face-to-face encounter with her, so I reluctantly
nudge him away. "Better go."

"I know. I'll see you when you get home. I
love you. Be safe," he says kissing me goodbye as he hastily heads
down stairs.

"I love you too," I say knowing he can hear
me, even though he's already reached the bottom of the stairs.

***

I feel guilty when I see Marti, already at
the airport inspecting the airplane even though technically we
agreed on a nine a.m. meeting time and I am fifteen minutes early.
She likes to pre-inspect the airplane, even though I will repeat
the whole process under her supervision anyway.

"Good morning, Cat," she says cheerfully,
after looking around. I am certain her good spirits are partly due
to the fact that Ronan didn't accompany me to today's lesson. It's
not as if she has anything personal against him, she just made it
clear, that she thinks he creates too much of a distraction. I
refrained from asking if it was me or her he was distracting.

"How do you feel today?" she asks looking at
me peculiarly. "Great," I say shrugging my shoulders as I run my
hand over the wing of the plane.

"Good, because today you're going to do a
short solo flight into Montana," she says matter-of-factly, and my
heart just about jumps out of my chest.

"Really? You think I'm ready?" I ask
breathlessly. Last week I had performed two solo flights within the
flight pattern of the airport, all within her view and she said
afterwards that I executed everything perfectly.

"Yes, I think you're more than ready," she
says laughing. "Grab your flight bag and let's go inside to go over
your flight plan."

The small airport that caters to general
aviation pilots has a café where Marti and I typically sit to go
over our flight plan. Today, there are only a few other patrons
sitting in the restaurant, and we easily find a seat next to the
window facing the runway. It takes us only twenty minutes to come
up with a flight plan that includes a stop in Great Falls, Montana,
then back. It's less than two hours there and two hours back.
Perfect, I'll be back in time for Ronan's
dinner,
I think to myself, already picturing the look on
Ronan's face, when I surprise him with my achievement.

As Marti quizzes me on emergency procedures,
I glance around the small airport at the sea of faces and wonder
which ones have been assigned by my husband to follow me around.
Ronan finally admitted to arranging undercover secret service
protection, something he knew would irritate the hell out of me. He
was taking this whole conspiracy thing of Bernie's way to serious.
Even Alisha and the others expressed as much. I decide that I will
talk to him about it again tonight even though I didn't think it
would do much good. I want to be able to surprise him with the news
of my solo flight, and I resent that fact that some agent would be
giving him a report before I had the chance. I lower my voice when
discussing my flight plan with Marti and when she gets up to use
the restroom I mention to our waitress that I'll be practicing
touch-n-goes for the morning.
Humph, let's see
how the little hound dogs are going to trail me in an
airplane,
I think smugly.

RONAN

Claire, Burke, and Brandon are already in
the water when I arrive downstairs and Claire is squealing with
delight as they take turns launching her off their shoulders, ten
feet in the air, while she performs twists and summersaults. It's
her favorite water game and she can almost always talk them in to
playing along. All of us have cetacean DNA, but Claire has the most
and it shows. Swimming is as natural to her as running and she
propels like a torpedo under water, holding her breath for close to
ten minutes at a time. As soon as I arrive, she begs me to join
them and Jason has to remind her that the pool is for training
purposes today, not recreation. Michael and Jason agreed to act as
coaches and the teams have already been predetermined. Jason will
work with Alisha, Claire. and me, while Michael takes the other
three.

Naturally, our group starts with water
training first, because Claire insists. We all agree with Cat, that
a six year old shouldn't have the kind of power that she does, but
nonetheless, she is rarely ever denied. Jason begins by having us
swim laps, using different strokes. It's simple enough, and for the
first hour, the three of us silently glide through the water
building speed and flexibility as we go. Once we are sufficiently
warmed up, we work together to connect various sized hollow tubes
which are then lowered into the water and anchored to the bottom of
the pool. It's one giant underwater maze with one way in and one
way out, and for this exercise, we are the rats that are expected
to make it through. Alisha says "Piece of cake," and Jason warns
her that it is easy to get disoriented while underwater, holding
your breath. Claire begs to go first and pouts when she is firmly
refused this time. The only built-in safety mechanism for this
exercise is the use of each other, and underwater sound devices
that simulate an audible dolphin noise that all of us are capable
of hearing. I volunteer to go first and Jason sets the timer for
seven minutes, the maximum amount of time that I have been able to
hold my breath.

I am confident that I have adequately
memorized the layout from the surface, and enter the tube with a
false sense of assurance that I will make it out the other end with
plenty of time to spare. But Jason is right, the minute I enter the
tunnel, and am surrounded by pitch blackness, I have to fight the
urge not to panic. The first few turns are right where I expect
them to be, but after that, I take several wrong turns and end up
repeatedly swimming into the side of the tube. Instead of eliciting
help from Claire and Alisha right away, I attempt to use my remote
viewing gift to gain perspective from above and am stunned to find
that I am unable to leave the confines of my own body. Even my
mental connection to Claire and Alisha is garbled and
unreliable.

Jason thumps four times on the top of the
tube, letting me know that I have three minutes left and that's
when the panic really starts to set in. I pound my fist on the side
of the tube, signaling that I am in trouble and immediately, hear
the low whine of the whistle that sounds eerily haunting, now that
I am in the middle of the tubes.
How could
four minutes have passed already?
I think as I try hard
to detect the direction of the whistle. My lungs start to burn and
I pound on the side now more persistently, each time eliciting an
equal response from the whistle blower. It's like a game of Marco
Polo—I pound, they whistle. It's effective in getting me turned
around in the right direction, and I swim hard through the pitch
blackness, using my right arm to guide me along the tube. But one
wrong turn and the whistle begins to fade again. My heart begins to
beat wildly and my lungs feel like they are on fire. The one minute
warning given by Jason isn't really necessary. I am fully aware
that I am only seconds away from drowning in the hollow watery
grave, and in a last desperate attempt, I slam my fist hard enough
into the plastic tube that it cracks, letting just enough light in
that I see Claire's hand reach for me just before everything goes
black.

***

"Come on Ronan, breathe!" I hear Alisha
hiss, the stress in her voice obvious. The person pushing on my
chest isn't going easy and without warning I vomit all over the
swim deck and the person leaning over me, which happens to be
Alisha. My chest feels like it's on fire and it isn't until Claire
places her hands on me, that it subsides enough for me to be able
to take a full deep breath. Alisha and Jason continue to work over
me, even after I tell them I'm okay. It takes me a good forty-five
minutes to feel well enough to get back in the water.

"You were this close to drowning," Alisha
says holding up two fingers with a thread like space between them.
"You're not going back in," she says determinedly, shaking her head
back and forth and blocking my entrance to the pool.

"Alisha, I appreciate the concern, but I'm
fine. Now let's get back to work," I say, fixed on succeeding with
the training. I am more disturbed by failing the exercise, than I
am at the near drowning episode.

"Nope, I'm not going to lose a little
brother today, because you are being pigheaded," she says
stubbornly. "And besides, even Claire could have ended up dead down
there."

"Could not," Claire interrupts, making a
face behind Alisha's back. She isn't happy about being reprimanded
for diving in after me and thinks Alisha is being unfair to both of
us.

"Ah, see Dr. Ali, you really do love me," I
say quickly planting a kiss on her cheek, then immediately dodging
out of her reach as she takes a swing at me. "Did you hear that
everyone? She considers me like a little brother," I say mockingly,
coming up behind her and wrapping my arms around her, pinning her
arms to her sides before she has a chance to swing again. She
struggles just enough that the two of us lose our balance and end
up in the water, much to the delight of Claire who jumps in after
us.

***

Claire is the only Designer to make it
through the underwater maze on the first attempt. The rest of us,
including Brandon, Burke, and Liz, each make three to four attempts
before successfully making it through the tubes and we use most of
our air supply in doing so. To date, it's one of the most
challenging drills we have ever faced. Underwater, we lose our
ability to mentally connect, remote travel and even our ability to
use Claire for a telekinetic energy source. Claire however, swims
through the obstacle course like a dolphin, making it to the exit
in less than a minute. She insists we have the ability to do the
same, but fear blocks our natural cetacean instincts. None of us
really want to own up to the fear factor thing, so we quickly
dismiss discussing the issue any further and congregate upstairs
for a much needed lunch break.