Category: Fiction Factor

Henry’s crush on Martha had been building for weeks, but he just couldn’t quite work up the courage to talk to her. He’d see her in the hallways and cafeteria almost every weekday, but instead of starting a conversation with her, the best he could do was give her a smile and half-hearted wave.

Henry’s best friend, Roderick, was getting tired of his buddy’s hesitation – especially since Martha was all Henry ever seemed to talk about these days.

“Go on, Henry … you can’t wait forever. Just go over there and strike up a conversation with her,” Roderick said while the two picked at their lunch. “She’s all by herself right now … ain’t like you’d be interrupting anything or anybody. I bet she’d love the company. I bet she’d love your company.”

Henry disagreed.

“I wouldn’t know what to say. Any time I get near her I get nervous. My hands get sweaty and my stomach gets all jumpy. I just freeze. And if I go over there and make a fool of myself, then I could never come back to the cafeteria ever again. I’d just have to starve, because if she saw me, she’d say to herself, ‘There’s that sweaty, jumpy idiot Henry.’ I need to wait until the time is just right. Of course, the time will probably never be right, so why don’t we just forget it and eat our lunch.”

Roderick huffed.

“We’re not gonna forget it, Henry. Right now is the right time … the time will never be righter than this. And I don’t know what you’re so worried about. I’ve seen the way she looks back at you when you smile at her. And when you wave at her, she waves back, don’t she? She ain’t flipped you the bird once. Ain’t thrown a single roll at you. Plus, there’s a million things to talk about … start with the weather and then go from there. Make fun of the food. Tell her how much you like her paintings in art class. Tell her she has pretty green eyes.”

“I’m not gonna talk to her about the dang weather,” Henry said. “What’s there to say? ‘Hey, Martha, it sure has been hot lately, ain’t it? Well … bye.’ And when we’re in art class I’m looking at her, not her paintings. And her eyes are blue, not green. They are blue, aren’t they? Shoot … now I’m not sure. Anyway, I get all tongue-tied just thinking about her. It’s easy for you … you’re a smooth talker. I’m not. I get too nervous.”

Roderick smiled.

“That’s funny. Roxy used to tell me that all the time, only she said I was a slick talker, not a smooth talker. Same thing, I reckon. And I ain’t gonna deny it, either. But that was the great thing about me and her … we’d start talking about anything and it’d go on for hours. And I bet that’s what’ll happen with you and Martha. Before you know it, you won’t have time to have lunch with me anymore because you’ll be all cozied-up to your new girlfriend.”

Henry shifted in his wheelchair.

“I like having lunch with you, Roderick,” Henry said. “You were the first person who was nice to me when I got moved to assisted living, and we’ve been friends ever since. Besides, I need you to push me.”

Roderick laughed.

“OK, then, you old fart. I’m about to push you over there where Martha is, and you best start talking. Like I keep saying … you can’t wait forever.”  

Ferdinand jumped effortlessly onto the bed and surveyed the situation, the tabby’s ginger and white tail gently sweeping back and forth as he eyed his humans. The long-haired one was rolled over on its ride side with sheets pulled up to cover everything but its face.

The short-haired one was on its back – covers twisted around its knees and mouth agape – emitting strange, rhythmic noises.

The cat walked over both people – gently – getting no response from the long-hair but prompting the short-hair to grunt, snort, and gracelessly shift.

Ferdinand crept toward the footboard and peered at the door leading out of the bedroom.

“It’s OK, Tinker … come on up.”

The small moggy, still a bit unsteady after just seven weeks walking the planet, wobbled forward.

“Too high,” he squeaked. “It too high.”

Ferdinand jumped down and nuzzled the kitten.

“That’s why you have claws, little dude,” said the older feline, who had lived in the same house with the humans for almost nine years. “You have to latch onto the side of the bed and climb up. That’s how I learned way back when the humans picked me up from the Giant Cage.”

Tinker stood on his hind legs and placed his front paws on the bed’s comforter.

“Now,” Ferdinand said, “just let your claws out. And then dig in. Once you do that, you just keep moving your paws up, up, up, and next thing you know, you’ll be on the bed. It’s as easy as that.”

Tinker was able to attach himself to the fabric but once hooked, he simply hung there, staring at Ferdinand.

“I scared.”

Ferdinand jumped back on the bed, his head directly above Tinker.

“Nothing to be scared of. Even if you fall, it won’t matter. Know why? Because you’re a cat. We jump, and sometimes we miss. When we miss, we fall. And when we fall, we get back up and jump again.”

Tinker put one paw in front of the other and slowly worked his way up the comforter – his fluffy, chocolate-colored tail curling with each movement. Finally, he hoisted himself on the top of the bed next to Ferdinand.

“It big,” said the kitten. “It big and soft.”

“It is,” Ferdinand said. “And they get on it every night. They talk, and then they nip each other on the face, and then they get quiet … like we get quiet throughout the day.”

“They rest?”

“They do. And we let them rest for a while because they need it.”

Tinker slowly walked between long-hair and short hair, taking quick sniffs. He then rolled up into a ball near their heads.

“Be ready, Tinker,” Ferdinand whispered. “If long-hair wakes up, it’ll grab you and bite you on the head. If short-hair wakes up, it’ll start rubbing you there. Not sure what it is about them, but they seem drawn to our heads. Watch this …”

Ferdinand made a quick jump and landed on short-hair’s chest, causing the human to open its eyes. He then tapped short hair on the face, causing it to mumble and start scratching Ferdinand’s chin. The scratching was brief as the human closed its eyes and fell back asleep.

“It sweet,” Tinker said, looking up at big brother.

“It is,” Ferdinand said with a purr. “It likes to bite our heads and rub our heads, and it also gives us food and cleans our bathroom and lets us stay inside where the water monsters from the sky can’t hurt us. Short-hair and long hair have been very good pets for as long as I’ve had them.”

Tinker rolled over on his back.

“Ferdinand,” he asked, “they stay with us forever?”

Ferdinand stretched and yawned.

“Forever and ever. They’d be helpless without us.”

The minute Pace Patton saw Diedre Grace’s America Pass, he knew it was a forgery. A very good one, but a forgery nonetheless.

“Lemme see here … says you are Citizen Grace, number 59834, Atlantic Territory. Where are you headed?” he asked, pretending to carefully examine her ID.

“Looking for work, sir,” she said, adjusting her faded green backpack. “It’s mostly dried up here in Norfolk, so I figured I’d head further north. Saw you pull over and was hoping I could ride with you a ways.”

Patton’s jeep had official government markings on it, and an America Pass was required for any passenger.

“Sure thing. I’m headed up the coast, so if you see a place you want to stop, let me know and I’ll drop you off. Just call me Pace, by the way. No need for formalities.”

“Copy that. Call me Diedre.”

After several miles on the road, the rider/driver dynamic between Diedre and Pace began to evolve into something else entirely.

First there were the obligatory, “Where you from?” exchanges, followed by vague niceties about their personal histories. The more they talked, the more Pace believed he was riding with a kindred spirit.

Feeling confident that he knew what the sturdy-built hitchhiker was up to, Pace decided to test her.

“Can I ask you a question?”

“Sure,” Diedre replied.

“Why are you really traveling to the north?”

Diedre was puzzled … she thought the question had been asked and answered during earlier “car talk.”

“Like I said, just looking for work. Only so much I can do on what’s left of the port in Norfolk, so I’m moving on.”

Pace wasn’t buying it.

“You just sound like a woman on a mission,” he said. “And if you are on a mission, just what is it? Most people going this direction want to find out about the Philadelphia Freedoms, and as you know, the government frowns on that particular pursuit, especially after the Uprising of ’29.”

Named after the old World Team Tennis Team from the 1970s that inspired an Elton John song, the Philadelphia Freedoms were allegedly a group of revolutionaries headquartered in Pennsylvania. Rumored to be plotting to infiltrate and ultimately overtake the Imperial America regime, state media contended that the entire movement was weak and disorganized, and had already been quelled.

Diedre was taken aback: Pace was on to her, and that meant the situation could get volatile at any moment.

“My mission is to make money so I can eat. That’s the mission of a lot of people these days,” she said, slowly moving her hand to the right pocket where her mini stun gun was hidden.

Pace pretended not to notice.

“It’s just little things you’ve mentioned here and there make me think you have bigger plans. Then again, maybe you’re just running away from something. Is your home situation bad? Are you trying to get a divorce and the guy’s standing in the way? Are you in trouble with the law? Have you broken the Patriot Code? I just want to understand.”

Early on Diedre had to catch herself because she felt at ease talking to Pace. Now, however, she was on the defensive. He had spent the drive buttering her up, and was probably taking her to the nearest work camp. He was, after all, driving a government-issued vehicle.

She tried to remain calm, but made sure her hand was firmly on her weapon.

“Never married, no family to speak of, no debts owed, no ties to the Mob, not on any government watch list – unless you know something I don’t,” Diedre said, avoiding eye contact with Pace. “Like I said, I just need a job. Plus, I’ve never been up north before and now seems like the perfect time to visit, especially with the Border War still hot. How about you? Are you just out looking for bounty money?”

Pace toyed with the idea of immediately telling Diedre the truth, but thought better of it. He wondered how long it’d be before she tried to turn the tables on him.

“Just making the rounds … like a good American.”

The elephant in the room – or in the car – was the fact that a thousand dollar bounty was available for anyone who rounded up a suspected revolutionary and turned them in at a Patriot Code checkpoint.

With her fake America Pass – and her assumption that Pace was an official of Imperial America – Diedre was either trying to hijack his vehicle or take him hostage in hopes of gaining information.

So Pace eased off the road, came to a stop, and turned off the engine.

“Before you zap me with your stun gun – yes, I know you have a stun gun – you should probably know this isn’t my vehicle and I don’t work for the government,” Pace said. “Well, I’m in the government, but I’m working against it. They just don’t realize it yet. There are a whole lot more of us than you might think.”

He then raised the sleeve on his left arm to reveal a tattoo of Elton John banging on a piano.

Diedre smiled.

“Subtle,” she said.

Pace nodded.

“I hoped you’d notice. Now … what do I need to know to know that we’re working together?

“Release date of the song was February 28, 1975,” Diedre said. “It was written by Elton John and Bernie Taupin for Billie Jean King. Now your turn.”

“B-side was I Saw Here Standing There,” Pace replied. “It was a live performance with John Lennon.”

The pair breathed a sigh of relief and shook hands.

“By the way, Pace is an alias. But I imagine you already knew that. My real name’s Fess Douglass. And you?

“Tubman … Henrietta Tubman.”

Douglass cranked up the engine and steered back onto the road.

Philadelphia was still a couple of hours away.

Freedoms? Well, those would likely take a bit longer to get back.