Escape (12 page)

There was a long pause on the other end of the line. “Is this Heather Gannis? I wanted to speak with Heather Gannis.”

Heather laughed quietly. He was joking. That was a good sign. She was getting pretty good at this whole cheering-up thing. “I told you I've changed, Ed. Please don't tell me you don't believe me yet.”

“No, I believe. Believe me, I believe.”

“Thank you.” She nodded graciously as if Ed were sitting across from her.

“And you're right.”

“I know I'm right. That part has never changed.”

“There's the Heather I know and love.”

“Ha ha,” she muttered. “But seriously, Ed. Just go to school. Hang out with the freaks.
I know
. Why don't you go to my benefit? That should be good for a laugh. How's that going, anyway?”

Ed breathed out a cross between a sigh and a chuckle. “Well, I wouldn't really call it a benefit. I think it's really more like a party. I'm not really sure what kind of benefit they could throw together if they're doing this thing tomorrow night.”

“It's tomorrow night? So soon?”

“Yeah, well, it was the only night Tatiana could get the place.”

“Tatiana is putting it together?”

“They all are, but Tatiana's is practically taking the whole sucker over.”

“Well, where's the party?”

“Some bar called Pravda.”

“
Pravda
? She booked Pravda for the whole night?”

Heather felt herself slipping back into her old persona, but she couldn't help but be impressed and maybe even a little jealous. She'd tried to book a few parties there, and they'd always seemed to diss her. What the hell was so special about Tatiana?

Will you listen to yourself, please? You're regressing
.

The more Heather thought about it, the more she realized just how
pathetically shallow
her life had been. The fact that something as trivial as who could book Pravda for the night had been something to steam over was just downright embarrassing.

“Yeah, I guess,” Ed said. “You sound just like the girls. They were going nuts about it. They started kissing all kinds of Tatiana ass, and I don't think they've really stopped since.”

Heather suddenly found herself flashing back to the day she had basically found herself in charge of the entire group. She hadn't exactly asked for all that power; it had just sort of been handed to her based surely on some combination of her remarkable character and her remarkable wardrobe, not necessarily in that order. And she could sense it immediately, with almost no information: They had set their sights on
Tatiana. With Heather gone, they needed a
new interim queen.
They were, after all, while being extremely stylish and sweet, born followers. That was what made things run so smoothly.

“I bet the coronation ceremony's not that far off,” Heather heard herself say. She hadn't even intended to say it out loud.

“What do you mean?” Ed asked.

“Oh, nothing,” she said. “But I just have this feeling that they might be looking for a. . . Never mind, let's talk more about you.”

“Come on,” Ed insisted. “What were you going to say?”

“No, it will sound egotistical, and I'm not like that anymore.”

“For old times' sake, then,” Ed joked.

Heather figured Ed would take it the right way. He'd known her for a very long time, even at her most shallow and egomaniacal, and they were still friends, after all. “Okay,” she agreed. “I was just going to say that it sounds to me like they're looking for a new. . . you know. . . queen. To replace me.”

There was a pause on the other end of the line. “Ed?”

“Oh, that doesn't sound egotistical. . . my queen.”

“Okay, shut up.” She laughed. “I'm just
saying
, Ed, when I, you know. . .
took over,
it only took them, like, two days to roll out the red carpet. I knew I was officially the new leader once there was a closet raid.”

“I'm sorry. . . ? A closet raid?”

“Yes, a closet raid, Ed.” Now he was making fun of her, thus forcing her to explain, no matter how ridiculous it might sound to a boy. “They all begged to come over to my house and raid my closet. As if I were hosting a Barney's warehouse sale out of my bedroom or something. You have to understand, Ed: When they want your clothes, it basically means they want to
be
you. That's just how it works.”

“Huh,” Ed grunted.

“What?”

“No, I was just remembering,” he said. “I was remembering that day all those girls agreed to dress up like Gaia to try and fake out that surveillance team waiting outside my building. Remember? When you all put on the blond wigs and the army pants and the tank tops? I guess Gaia had her own coronation and she never even knew it.”

Heather thought about it for a second. “Yeah,” she agreed finally. “I guess so.”

Silence on the phone again. “Now I'm depressed again.”

Heather let out a
long, frustrated sigh.
“Look, just go to my ridiculous fake benefit, Ed. Go and hang out and be normal, will you please? Your life is better than mine and Gaia's combined.”

“I'm sorry, you're right. You're right, Heather.”

“I know I'm right, Ed. I told you, I'm the blind soothsayer you've always dreamed of.”

“I know,” Ed replied. “But if you don't mind me saying. . . your last prediction about the date. . . it left a little to be desired.”

“Well, it was half right, wasn't it? Until she left. I'm new at it, Ed. Give me a little time.”

“I'll have to think about it,” Ed said. “But if tonight was what half a perfect date feels like, I'd almost rather have no date at all. . . .”

Almost
.

as if they had just stepped off the mother ship, ready to begin their deadly assault on earth

Semi-invisible Ghost

THERE WAS REALLY NO LOGIC TO IT.
Everything about this moment should have been painful and nauseating. Traveling toward the ruins of Loki's operation, on a futile search for information about her missing father. Alone in a car with Sam, questioning the underlying meaning of every word exchanged and every pregnant silence. But somehow, in spite of all the gloomy circumstances and stilted conversations, Gaia was still breathing better than she had in months.

It was the simple act of leaving the city. Crawling out from under the gray skies and enclosed spaces. Coasting over the world instead of standing under it. She could feel them all drifting away—all the skinheads and faux hippies in Washington Square Park, all the FOHs and their hopeless admirers pledging their allegiance to Abercrombie & Fitch, the Chanel mothers and Ralph Lauren fathers of East Seventy-second Street, the Perry Street town house turned crime scene. . . .

Gaia didn't exactly mind taking a little break from Natasha and Tatiana, either. Surrogate families were simply too complicated, and waiting for them to behave exactly as you wished was like waiting for the sun to set in Scandinavia. Even Ed. . . The truth was, Gaia felt so guilty for the way she'd treated Ed the last
few days that physically leaving the city was just about the only way she could feel any less tortured about it.

With a little time to breathe, she would come back from this fact-finding mission with a legitimate lead, a slightly improved attitude, and a much lower stress level. Then she could be something better resembling the Gaia Ed deserved instead of the
semi - invisible ghost
she'd turned into. With a few substantial facts under her belt, she'd be able to tell Ed about Sam and finally clear the air. That would be all she needed to get her and Ed back on track.

With Sam at the wheel, Gaia was free to drift off into the daze of her choice, and as she watched the crackled green blur of trees pass by her window, she found herself dreaming of being on the road like this with Ed. Of course, she and Ed wouldn't be heading out on some miserable mission.
They would just be heading
out
.
Sampling every single Friendly's and Bob's Big Boy, searching for the best deal on doughnuts and the perfect microwave burrito, trying out every indoor pool at every ultracheesy motel they passed, taking deeper breaths as the pollution grew thinner and thinner and watching as the people who gave them directions grew less and less obnoxious and cynical. And then at some point they'd get tired of driving. And they'd find the remotest street they could find and drop down their savings as a down payment on the first house that caught their eye. And presto facto. . . they would be home.

She lulled herself so deeply into her fantasy future that she actually turned toward the driver's side with an idiotic smile, expecting to see Ed. When she saw Sam's profile, awkward could not even begin to describe the sensation. But when Sam glimpsed her smile and smiled
back
. . .

Welcome to the land of the
über
-awkward.

“My God, was that a smile?” Sam asked, looking momentarily away from the road again. “I don't think I've seen you really smile once. Not since before I. . .”

His voice trailed off slowly as the steady bumps of the highway became the only sound inside the car. Gaia had to say something to fill the silence.

“I was just. . . ,” she began. Nope. Nothing. She knew enough to start a sentence, but she didn't have one single idea as to how to finish it. She certainly wouldn't be finishing it with the truth, that was for sure. So she had only answered his silence with more silence.
Nice going, Gaia.

“You know. . . I, uh. . .” Sam trailed off again.

Don't talk about us, Sam. Please don't talk about us.

Gaia suddenly realized that this mantra had basically been running through her head since the moment they'd fastened their seat belts. She was literally praying he wouldn't broach the subject of their relationship. Or Gaia's relationship with Ed.

Even if he'd asked to discuss this stuff two days ago, she probably could have handled it a little better. But
after last night she just wanted to sweep all the questions under the rug. Because until last night she really hadn't been aware that she
had
any questions. Gaia had been beyond elated to see Sam alive. It was
the first true miracle
she had ever encountered. It meant the world to her. It meant everything. She never wanted to let Sam Moon out of her sight for another second. She wanted to protect him and be close to him and just bask in his resurrection for as long as she possibly could. But their romantic relationship was over. Just like Sam said, it had been over before he'd even disappeared. Gaia was with Ed now. And as painful as it was, she'd finally explained that to Sam. Ed was all she wanted, if he would even have her after last night's debacle. She certainly had no questions about her love for Ed Fargo.

But after going through that altogether icky conversation with Sam—after setting all those romantic boundaries so clearly for him. . . Gaia'd had to go and walk through that door last night and have that
thing
. That
thing
she'd felt when she'd seen Tatiana sprawled out on the bed like a goddamn Victoria's Secret model.

The jealousy.
Gaia just hadn't expected the jealousy. It wasn't even that she really thought Tatiana was making some kind of play for Sam; it was just that Tatiana had somehow sparked this bizarre possessive instinct in Gaia—that was all.

“I, uh. . .” Sam was trying again to form his sentence as he squinted out the windshield.

Just leave it alone, Sam. Please. It will make things so much easier for both of us. . . .

“I can't quite remember if we came up the Sawmill Parkway. . . or the Taconic. . . .”

Right. Are we feeling sufficiently idiotic, Gaia
? She tried to hide the massive exhalation that poured from her lungs. Sam wasn't trying to start some deep emotional conversation. He was trying to find his way back to the compound. Just as he promised he'd do.

“It could have been either,” she replied. “You said you remember seeing signs for Great Barrington, right?”

“Right.”

“I can get us there,” she said, “but once we're onto the little unmapped roads, it's all you.”

Sam rolled down his window and rested his elbow on the door. “Gaia. . . about last night. . .”

Oh, no, no. They were supposed to be past this. She'd just suffered through that entire false alarm.
You've got to stop him, Gaia. Just stop him right now. . . .

“I am
starving
,” she groaned, loud and long enough to cut Sam off permanently. “I think we need to stop for something.” Of course, the last thing she wanted to do was stop, but it was all she could come up with on such short notice. “Are you hungry?”

“I could eat,” Sam said. “I mean, if you're sure you want to stop. Let me know when you see a place.”

“Okay.”

The car filled with awkward silence again. Until Sam opened his mouth.

“I just wanted to ask you about last—”

“
There,
” Gaia announced far too loudly, thrusting her finger out the window. “That place looks
perfect
.”

She was pointing at what looked like
the ultimate truck stop diner.
The kind of totally generic and anonymous place where she'd always dreamed of working as a waitress. The kind of place where everyone would be perfectly polite about the weather and the traffic, but no one would ever have to know a damn thing about Gaia except the name on her name tag. Which she would have changed to something like Mavis or Janette.