Prologue
Amanda Petes was riding in the family van with her husband John and their daughter Amy. They were bringing Amy from her father’s and were still a short distance from home. Amanda was talking with John about Amy’s schedule for the week when she felt her mind begin to wander. There was something about the car ahead of her which just seemed to bug her. No matter what was being said her eyes kept moving back to it. She couldn’t figure out what it was about the vehicle, it was a pretty non-descript 4-door passenger vehicle, but there was just something about it that just wouldn’t leave her alone. Amanda wanted to tell her husband to move up closer to the car but didn’t know how to ask him about it. As traffic eased their van moved over and she could now see a little more about the vehicle. It seemed to hold four people who looked to be a family with the two adults in the front seats with two young adults or school age kids in the back.
As she observed these facts, she also began to realize the thing that occupied her attention wasn’t simply the car, it was the young man on the far side, someone she could barely make out. In fact, she wasn’t even sure it was a young man; just that he/she seemed to be young. Amanda wondered what it was about the person that kept distracting her but…
“Are you even paying attention, Mom?” Amanda heard from the back seat.
“Huh, what?” she asked, taking her eyes from the car ahead of them to glance back at her daughter.
“She’s got a point,” John told her, “your mind is definitely drifting. What’s going on?”
“Oh, nothing, I was just thinking about the coming week,” she lied, trying hard to keep from glancing forward again, yet knowing it was only a matter of time before she would again.
“She keeps looking at that old car ahead of us,” Amy complained.
“Is that it Amanda? Is that what keeps distracting you? You do seem to keep staring off into that direction and losing your train of thought.”
She resisted the temptation to look and instead focused on her husband.
“No, everything is fine,” she insisted.
Amy eased up between the seats and glanced through the front windshield. “No, she’s watching that car. I can see her eyes from back here and she keeps looking over at it for some reason.”
“Is it someone you know or something?” her husband asked her.
“No, it’s... damn it, I don’t really know what it is. I just can’t keep my eyes off of it,” she confessed, still feeling the desire to glance up like the call of an old friend, or the desire to have an innocent little puff on a cigarette she’s been free from for the last five years. But, just like the cigarette, she knew that as soon as she gave in and took a look, she’d be sucked in and she’d have to quit it all over again, the temptation was just as strong.
“Hey, do I need to be worried about someone else?” John teased, fully confident in the strength of their relationship. When she didn’t respond he glanced over at her and saw a look of anxiety in her eyes.
“No, it’s nothing like that,” Amanda assured him. “I can’t really explain it, but there’s something about one of the people in the car that just pulls me like a moth to a flame.”
“Really, I can’t possibly see what,” Amy responded, glancing out the front window with her parents. She wasn’t very impressed with it. The car wasn’t worth much, the people inside didn’t seem to be very well dressed or particularly impressive. It was just some ordinary family driving somewhere, certainly no one she'd ever be concerned with, she thought dismissively.
“Do you want me to get closer so you can have a look?” John asked, which seemed particularly understanding of him since she couldn’t even tell him why she was interested.
“Could you? I don’t have any idea why it seems important but I just want to see whoever it is,” she tried to explain. So John maneuvered the car around and pulled even with the car on the right, giving Amanda a perfect view of the young girl and her mother but only a partial view of the young man in the back, but it was the closest they could manage. They were at least close enough that Amanda could finally identify the figure as a young man. The young girl turned, saw them all looking and awkwardly waved and Amanda felt her face flush in embarrassment. Amy waved while Amanda had no idea how to respond and John pulled away figuring the game was up.
“Well, does that help explain anything?” he asked.
“Nope, all I know is that he’s worth noting for some reason but I have no clue what reason that might be.” They had to exit soon thereafter so she never saw the car or its occupants again, but she remembered the car for a long, long time after that day.
Susan Baker was getting in later than she’d wanted to, she’d been pushing hard on the Interstate and just wanted to be done but she knew she still had a way to go. Still, she’d been driving for too long and knew she needed a break, so was pulling off the interstate to get some gas and simply walk around a bit to relax.
Susan was set to begin a new job in Texas soon and was relocating from Georgia. That was a long drive for her, made even longer by the van full of shit she had to carry. All her earthly possessions, as few as they were, were all packed in behind her. Still, she knew she’d appreciate having something from her past along with her in this new life so she couldn’t complain too much. It would have been easier if she hadn’t tried to do the trip all at once, but she didn’t have the extra funds to waste staying overnight if she could help it. But there were still a lot of hours of daylight, a fact which was helped by the early springtime afternoon; everything seemed brighter, greener and more full of life than it had for awhile. Even as far south as she lived, it was always nice when spring came and the trees all came into bloom. It always felt magical to her.
As the car pulled off the interstate and she was watching all the signage that showed where the various stops were she felt an odd pull. Somehow she knew there was something very important here at this insignificant stop that dwarfed her need to fill up or pee. There was something here that could clearly change her life, and not only that, she could feel a presence that was so important it was likely to affect a great many others as well. She had no idea how she could possibly know all of this, she just knew that it was true, even without any evidence to prove it to herself.
She’d always been good at reading people. Unlike her sister, who went after one sweet talking bad boy after another, Susan always managed to find the good, kind men who also proved themselves to be dedicated workers. She’d always told her sister she simply had to watch the person to know what they were really like but her sister just never got it. Susan herself wasn’t sure how she figured it out, she just would know by being near someone and watching them that they were either a good person or had an evil soul or, like most people, they were simply plagued by so much doubt and insecurity that they’d always waffle between the two extremes and never measure up to much. She frequently commented to her girlfriends that if she could only bottle what she seemed to be able to pick up so easily, she could easily retire on the proceeds.
This feeling she was now experiencing was much different however. In judging people she never knew what it was that was affecting her decision, now she could feel it and she felt it in such a way that there was absolutely no doubt about it being a purely physical presence, in as much as a feeling can ever be physical she had to remind herself.
As the van moved onto the main street she ignored the gas stations situated ahead of her and instead tried to figure out where this feeling might be directing her. She knew it was only a pure accident that she’d pulled into this stop, on this route and at this time. She couldn’t risk that all these odd influences would keep lining up for her. She, like everyone else, liked to believe that God managed to arrange things in our lives, except she had to admit that most of the time the good things that happened to you had much more to do with your role in life. Rich, white people, tended to favor other well educated white people. She had no illusions that she was any more favored by God than the poor black and Hispanic people around her, but she found herself in a position to be favored more than they ever did, and she also knew it wasn’t likely due to God's selections in the process either.
She found it strange but she knew just where to find the source of the feeling she was following. She wasn’t used to following her ‘feelings’, in the past she’d always told herself that her ability to judge people was due to her capacity to somehow read them and that’s what she’d always told others about it. Now she knew better, all she had was a vague feeling and it had a very real physical presence, one that she could locate and follow. She knew to take the next right and even as she did she knew the unknown thing she was following was located in a simple McDonald’s on the corner. She almost felt like she should simply drive over the embankment and over the curbs to get to it but she knew she’d never be able to do that, she’d have no way to explain what the hell had motivated her if she got caught, but she felt taking the time to make all the appropriate turns was simply taking way too much time.
How long does it take to make a pit stop in a McDonald’s? With luck, whoever or whatever it was she was following wouldn't be making quick break. If they had stopped for lunch they wouldn’t be likely to stop for more than 10 or 15 minutes. If they stopped for a cup of coffee it would be even less than that. She just knew this was such a small opportunity she had been blessed with, that she had to ensure she made the best of it.
Driving all the way around the simple restaurant, she found herself cursing whoever had designed the intersection. She had to move completely around the building, then ease past the various cars farther from the restaurant until she could approach the little fast food enclosure itself. As she did, she noticed there weren’t any spots immediately available and started looking for any nearby. She spotted one a row back that she quickly headed for.
She jerked the brake on, tore off her seatbelt and ripped the keys from the car as she jumped out at a run and headed into the McDonald's. It looked just like every other McDonald’s at every other highway off ramp across the country, how she’d ever found this one she had no idea but… No, she didn’t want to jinx herself by thinking negative thoughts. She’d been brought here by something, she’d have to trust in its benevolence.
She shoved her way through the door, having to avoid smashing into people. Somehow she knew whatever she was following wouldn’t be impressed by her harming or inconveniencing other people but that might have been her own guilt and morals working through her, and, since she had no idea what was calling, her she had no way of knowing what it’d be impressed by.
When she finally made her way into the building, she immediately began looking about, both trying to feel the mysterious presence as much as looking for whoever might be important in the crowd. Not that she expected some prince. She imagined the figure she assumed it would belong to would look as much like an eastern mystic in a white robe as it would a successful western business person. After looking about wildly she calmed down and again felt the essence, but this time she felt it moving away from her. She could again feel its presence and hurried through the restaurant looking for it. She could feel it outside at the far end of the restaurant and she knew she had a very limited window to try to catch whatever it was.
Just as she managed to near the door she isolated the car it currently resided in, it was backing up, already clear of its former parking spot. Again, she could isolate just where it was coming from and realized what she was feeling was coming from the person sitting in the back seat on the far side. She pushed through the doors and exited, running into the street just in time to see it pulling out of the exit, the exit now conveniently placed, unlike the entrance she'd needed access to earlier.
She was crushed, knowing there was no way she could possibly catch it, no way to reach her car in enough time to possibly catch it, even if there was some way to know where it might be headed. What the fates or God or something else had put in her hands they’d just ripped out again. She knew there was no way she could have hurried any more or skipped any corners, short of driving over that embankment like she’d wanted to, but she also knew she’d always regret that she couldn’t have been just a little faster. She only hoped that she’d be granted yet another opportunity like this to learn what it was that she’d just missed.
Amber Blossom’s head jerked up in surprise. Here she was, with a wealthy, well kept, attractive client who’d shown her many favors in the past, but now her attention was yanked from her like a toy train yanked by its pull string from a toddler by a spiteful uncle. One second she was completely focused on doing her job well and on pleasing her client, the next she couldn’t even think of him.
Something had happened, something significant. She had no idea what it might be, but she could feel a presence nearby; an important presence which called out to her and demanded her attention. Without knowing what it was, she immediately realized it was important and powerful. In her professional duties she’d been around many, many important, rich and influential people but she’d never felt herself in the presence of anything as powerful as the feelings coming to her now. Whoever or whatever it was she knew it demanded her presence now!
She pulled herself up and unceremoniously climbed off of her client’s reclining form, searching about quickly for her scattered clothing, no longer concerned with her performance or her appearance, something which normally she focused on most of the time.
“What the hell? What’s going on, what do you think you’re doing?” called the man lying on the bed full of annoyed impatience.
“It’s something important Tony,” Amber told him, knowing there was no way he was going to take it well but also knowing that what she had to do now was also more important than whatever impressive tip he might leave her with. Sure, she might be able to buy a nice something with what he gave her, but she could also tell that what she felt would be able to influence her life in some personal, significant and life altering way.
“I’m sorry, I’ll make it up to you but I’ve REALLY got to go now. There’s no charge for this evening and the next one is on me but I just can’t stay right now,” she tried to reassure him as she hurried into her few clothes and grabbed her purse. She ran for the door and was closing it before any of his curses even reached her.
She tried to consider herself and what she was doing once she’d reached the hallway. She knew she had to hurry, if for nothing else she was sure Tony wouldn't come looking for her in the hallway and if she wanted a chance to get away she couldn’t be caught in an unpleasant scene in a hotel hallway right now. However, the more important consideration was how she could locate and find this presence she felt nearby.
Amber Blossom, or the simpler Allison Livermore that only her few friends and family knew her by, was no stranger to feeling things about people. She spent a long time refining her ability to read feelings from people. It had helped her win over reluctant professors at her college, it had served her well when she finally took to hooking to pay for said university and it was what finally allowed her to go into business for herself dating and sleeping with only the most influential people in New Orleans, her home for the last seven years. Somehow she was always able to feel their needs, their wants and also their basic characters. It helped her avoid the demanding pimps that would break her to their own will while it directed her towards those who could help her and reward her in her personal ambitions.
She’d never been afraid of hard work; she’d worked hard trying to earn her parent’s love, although it never came easily. She slaved away at college but soon found she could accomplish more by reacting to the unseen feelings she had about the professors than she ever could by doing the difficult and tedious work they’d assign. In fact, she put her all into each and every client she had, working to touch all their nerves and serve all their needs, even the one’s they themselves never knew they had. That was what had allowed her to succeed so well. It paid her way through university, it paid for that nice townhouse nearby, it paid to keep her girlfriend happy and it paid for her ungrateful parents.
Yet this was different, in each of those she’d get these vague feelings about someone that she’d only slowly learned to trust over time. Now, as she ran down the hall heading for the elevators, she could feel a very distinct and physical presence out on the street, many floors below that she just knew she had to find and meet somehow, and that it’d make more of an influence on her life than all the cheap dates, self important professors or rich playboys and senators that she counted as clients now.
With that thought she pulled up short, having gained the elevator and pushed the button to carry her away before her latest client came out demanding some accountability. What would this thing she felt calling her think of her, dressed for a client encounter, disheveled and probably still reeking of sex and alcohol. True, she didn’t do more than take a sip of well watered drinks and she never let herself get very carried away during these encounters, as they left her unable to anticipate what her clients required of her, that is the emotional things they needed and not the raw sex they all demanded. They called her for sex but they always came back for what she could do for those holes in their souls. But whether the smells were her own or someone else’s wouldn’t matter, whoever it was that she felt nearby certainly wouldn’t be impressed to encounter a wanton whore, no matter how high class.
Shit, she swore to herself, she couldn’t possibly show up in front of someone like this in her present state. Damn, she’d have to run home and hope she could change and get back before they left. About all she could hope was that they were staying here at the hotel and not just stopping nearby for a brief visit, otherwise she’d miss her opportunity completely. If only she had some idea of whom or what she could feel was now outside on the other side of the hotel’s lobby. The elevator doors had finally opened and she quickly headed out.
Just as she had intuitively known that this thing she felt would be able to affect her life, she suddenly realized she knew that it was a person. She’d been picking up on the wants and needs of people for long enough to realize that what she was feeling could only come from a person of some sort. She also somehow knew that, although she felt it was powerful and strong, that it might not present itself as such. She’d been used to powerful men in the past and the power they wielded was usually other people’s that they claimed as their own. Somehow this one felt different. She surmised he wasn’t so much powerful in what he did or what he might do as he was a source of a great deal of power and that the sensations she felt were her picking up on the outpouring of that source of psychic power.
She considered leaving a message of some sort at the desk but what could she possibly tell them? She had no idea who she was looking for or what they might look like and thus had no idea of how to describe them. Henry behind the desk might be understanding, an understanding bolstered by the constant tips and bribes she fed him, but even he wouldn’t be able to figure out what to do about this. No, she could physically feel his presence, only she would be able to find whoever this was. She just had to be damn fast about it. She had to rush home, shower, change and hurry back in order to find this mysterious person before they left. She was certainly no stranger to knocking on strange doors and talking her way past security guards so she wasn’t worried about wherever she might find them, no, she was worried that she simply wouldn’t be able to find him. If that happened she knew she’d always blame her present occupation because, despite everything it offered her, it would have impeded her reaching someone who could really affect her life is some way unimaginable.
These thoughts and many more, each more dread filled, flipped through her mind as she ran off to a nearby cab that would carry her off, away from her ultimate destination. She could only hope it’d be here when she returned.
Donna noticed the young man almost as soon as he wandered onto the street where she and her friends were hanging out. They were all down enjoying spring break and were all having a great time, but for some strange reason, Donna felt her attention drawn to the young man. He certainly wasn’t her type at all. He was way too young, he wasn’t built, he wasn’t athletic at all, he didn’t have that strong, he-man persona she usually went for, heck, he wasn’t even all that attractive. Still, she couldn’t seem to take her eyes off of him for some strange reason. When Donna pointed him out to her friends they scoffed at her.
“Him? You’ve got to be kidding me,” they all responded.
She thought about the attraction then and acknowledged that it was odd. Although she felt like he must be famous or recognizable or something, that was definitely not the case. Famous people are surrounded by people, even when they’re dressed like normal folk. They’re all doing fabulous things in terrific places. This young man was clearly just a kid out visiting with his family, yet she still couldn’t tear her eyes away from him.
He seemed to walk like someone who had no idea how interesting he was. He carried himself slouched over, as if he didn’t expect anyone to notice him. She wished he’d just stand up straight so she could get a good look at him. There was also a girl that just kept hanging around him all the time too. Donna quickly discounted her, she must be a sister or something, they looked enough alike to assume that much, but she kept getting in the way of her ability to look at him directly.
It didn’t take long until her friends were pulling her arm, trying to get her to follow them along on their own adventures. As much as she didn’t want to, as much as she really just wanted to stay and watch this unique young man, she really had no reason to, no justification for her fascination, so she let herself be drawn aside. However, she managed one good, long, look back. Although she promised she’d remember him for some time, she also knew that she’d soon transform him in her dreams into a hunkier, more universally attractive figure. At the very least, she’d try to imbibe her usual litany of movie stars and football players with whatever he had that made him so unique. In either case she’d be featuring either him or a stand in for him in her dreams for a good while.
In minutes he was gone again, probably never to be seen again. Yet, Donna knew some form of him would stay with her for a long while.
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