(Part 3) Laying Roots

I wake in the morning to the smell of coffee. Back only aches when I think about it or I move too fast. I take the antibiotics with toast.

"I been thinkin bout your situation," Cliff says. "Listen, I could get you a job down the corner grocers, while you try figurin things out."

I stare at the eggs on my plate. I feel stuffed after just half a piece of toast. "I owe you too much already. I'll be on my way soon anyway."

"But where will you go?" His face is completely open, his expression boyish. He's around my age I guess -- no wrinkles yet but no zits either.

"Don't you have work to do? A life to get back to? I don't know two things about you, but you let me stay here, paid bills... that's too much."

"Well, that makes two of us who don't know each other," he says. I purse my lips. "That's not fair--I don't even know me. Least you have that."

He sighs. "I work down at my uncle's farm. Parents passed away. You're the most interesting thing that's been by in years, if I'm honest."

I stand up, push the eggs away. My stomach didn't like the pills. "I wouldn't mind being a little less interesting right now. Excuse me."

Fresh air cools my head, but not my intestines. I grimace at the sunlight. It's chased away all the magic of this yard at night, made it dull.

I take a quick shower, then put the overalls and his shirt back on. I really need to get some clothes, but I can't ask Cliff for anything more.

I'll need to get a job, I realize; at least for a little while until I figure things out. If I ever figure things out.

I think about a future in this little piece of nowhere. Staying here for the rest of my life, growing old, having kids, never knowing my past.

Hell, maybe I even have kids. I lift the shirt a little to peek at my stomach. No stretch marks, no C-section scars... Unlikely. I hope.

The front foor bangs; bad hinges. Cliff shuffles his feet on the porch. "I gotta run into town... You wanna come with?"

Why not? I climb in his side because the handle of my door is rusted shut. The road in is bumpy, jolting me across the ripped plaid seatcovers.

"You're not from around here, I can tell you that," he says over the country wail of the radio. "How can you tell?" I ask. He laughs.

"Your accent, for one. For two, your teeth are actually straight, and your hands, gosh..." I fold my hands in my lap. "What about them?"

"I've never seen hands so white and smooth, sweetheart. Nails uncracked, no calluses... No way you're from this town. You were monied, I'll bet."

"I hope so," I whisper into my lap. "Then maybe I stand a chance of paying you back, for all this..."

He slid something across the seat, a small black drawstring bag. "Almost forgot... This was in the back pocket of the pants you threw out."

I pull the strings and dump the contents into my palm. A silver Capital One card, a few cents (including Euros) and a key with the Lexus logo.

"Think this was mine?" I roll the key between my fingers. He shrugs. I drop everything back into the bag. "At least I can use the card."

Town is little more than a grocery store and a row of fifteen storefronts. He heads for the food, leaving me to search for clothes on my own.

The first store only carries menswear. In the second store, I find a pair of jeans and a few old T-shirts in the sale bin. Shoes are harder.

I must have tried on half the products in the store before I find a pair of faded leather boots that fit. Apparently I'm a size six.

I hand the woman the credit card and try to look casual. I have no idea if this is my card, what the pin number is, how high the balance...

She smiles and passes it back over the counter and a receipt begins to print, so it must have gone through. I ask if I can change in the back.

Ten minutes later I'm dressed in women's clothes again, and shoes that fit, pacing through the grocery store looking for my cowboy.

I find him in the meat aisle. "How much steak d'you think you'd eat?" he asks, eying the cuts behind the counter with an expert stare.

"For all I know, I'm a vegetarian," I say. "How do I look?" I twirl for him. He laughs. "Out-of-place." He points the server to two T-bone steaks.

He drops the groceries in the truck. "Let's walk, just up and down the block," he says. "Maybe something will jar your memory."

Halfway up the street, I glance at the dark windows of a department store, and pause. My reflection stands out in the tinted glass.

I'm not short, but not tall either. Maybe 5'6", though I look scrawny next to Cliff's 6'2" bulk. My hair is a mess; dark circles line my eyes.

Cliff stares at me too. "What?" I ask, but he's silent. I start walking again. He runs to catch up. "Sorry," he says. "For a second I thought..."

"Thought what?" I ask. But I don't get to find out. A black car speeds down the street, aimed straight for us. Cliff dives in front of me.

The car swerves at the last second, but something flies out the window at us. At me. It lands at my feet. The car floors it out of town.

Cliff reaches for the package, but I grab his hand. "Bomb" is the first thought exploding in my brain.

When a few seconds pass and nothing has blown up, I break a branch from a streetside tree, and poke the brown paper wrapping the package.

Several passersby have stopped, and Cliff is telling them something, but I'm intent on the paper. It's scotch-taped, but I break that open.

Inside is a plaque, the words on it scratched into oblivion. But a symbol remains; one I recognize. Circles around a flame, same as on my back.

I want to look at the tattoo again in the window's reflection, but there are too many people now. I grab Cliff's hand. "Let's go." He nods.

That's what I notice the writing, printed in short block letters around the inside of the wrapping paper.

'Don't bother running,' it reads. 'Leave Mr. Bass out of this, or you'll make it worse for yourself.' Cliff watches me, his eyes concerned.

I stuff the paper into my pocket. The last thing I want to do is drag him further into this, anyway. Whatever this is...