Chasing Aurora

Four days. We’ve been searching this grid for four days and have gotten nothing. Getting back to my hotel room, I slammed the door behind me. My hands shook as I sat on the edge of the bed. We’d accomplished nothing. Even with the grid pattern, there were so many side streets it was impossible to get anything done. I have fifteen days until the summer solstice and Aurora dies. At this rate, I’m not going to be able to do it. I could feel the tears of frustration burning their way down my cheeks as I stared at the wall feeling this abyss of self-doubt start to consume me.

I don’t know how long I was sat there before the door opened and I hastily wiped away the tears. I pushed myself to my feet to face my intruder, but when I saw Robby, I sat back down on the bed, “How the fuck did you get in here?”

“I swiped your extra key, duh.” He shrugged pulling up the chair, “I’m here to disrupt your little pity party. Don’t even try to deny it, I can see your eyes are red.”

“Fine. I’m feeling like shit. We’ve gotten nowhere, and I feel useless.” I sighed flopping back on the bed. A little overdramatic, maybe, but it is how I’m feeling.

“Look, the witches are meeting up at midnight, which is five am here. They’re going to get us a location and we’re going to be in the car waiting for them. I talked to the front desk and told them we’re checking out then. We’ll figure out somewhere to sleep close by wherever Aurora is while we do surveillance. The fairies have already agreed to sleep on shifts and watch the place while you keep up your strength so we can get your girl.”

I pushed myself up to look at Robby. Here I was wallowing in self-pity and he’s actually fixing the problem, “Robby, thank you so much.”

“Don’t mention it. Look, I also figured they’ll be looking for you, so I picked up a little disguise.” He tossed me the bag he was holding. I looked inside and pulled out a long blonde wig. I held it up to him with my eyebrow raised. “What? The goal is for you not to look like you. I also got you some makeup and some big sunglasses.”

I dumped the rest of the contents of the bag out to be treated with some pink lipstick and some god-awful sunglasses, “You know, I really hate you sometimes.”

“I try. Now, I’m heading down to the gym. Do you want to join me?”

“Yeah, give me a second to change and I’ll be right down.”

He left my room, and I moved my disguise to the desk. I got dressed in my workout gear and picked up my phone. I was just about to leave when it buzzed in my hand. I looked down to see a message from my dad. Hey Pip, hope you’re taking care of yourself. Mom says hi. We hope you can come home soon. We miss you.

I smiled as I typed out a message. Just heading down to the gym before we head to bed. Early morning tomorrow. Hopefully we’ll have a location to go on but I’ll keep you updated. I miss you guys too.

I shoved my phone in my pocket and headed down to the gym. Robby was already there stretching. It was a pretty nice setup they had. Not as nice as the one we had back home, but it would do. Working out with Robby and texting with my parents gave me a sense of normalcy I desperately craved. It kept me out of my head. It had been a problem for me when I was young. Always going to the worse possible outcome. I had gotten myself out of it for the most part, but this whole thing was throwing me back into these old habits.

After a good workout, we both went back to our rooms. I showered before I got into bed and set my alarm. I laid there staring at the ceiling, trying to fall asleep, but for some reason sleep wasn’t coming easily. So I let my mind wander and it went where it always did, Aurora.

-----

We must have been about 17 at the time. Our dreams had taken us to this park overlooking the city. We weren’t looking at the view. We were laying on the soft grass, her head resting on my chest as she wrapped her arms around my waist. We were completely quiet, just enjoying being in each other’s company when she sighed.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

She turned her head so she could look at me. She was chewing on her lip like she usually did when there was a lot on her mind. I knew she’d been fighting with her aunts a lot at the time, but she hadn’t told me why. I wanted to help her, but she didn’t talk about her life a lot. At least, she didn’t until that night. “I got into a big argument with my aunts, worse than usual. They want me in this bubble that I don’t want to be in. They want me to go to university, get some tech or engineering degree, meet some guy, get married and have lots of his babies, but I literally cannot think of anything worse. They keep saying that’s what my parents would have wanted, but it’s like what I want doesn’t matter!”

I remember how hearing about her meeting a guy hurt like a knife to the heart. She had been open to me that she was attracted to guys and girls. She had more difficulty coming to terms with her sexuality than I did, which I didn’t blame her for at all. I still wanted to hold onto the illusion that my dream girl was only attracted to me and me alone. Definitely did not want her marrying a man and having his babies. I pushed it aside for now because I needed to help her as best as I could, “So what do you want?”

She sat up and looked over the city below us. The sun was stuck in permanent sunset and cast beautiful colours across her face. She looked so beautiful and profoundly sad, “I want to go to university, maybe get an education degree or I could be a therapist. I want to marry you, have some babies and live a nice life in the countryside.”

I couldn’t help the smile on my face when she said she wanted to marry me. Even though I thought it wasn’t a possibility, it was a nice dream. “And just how many kids are we going to have in your dream?”

“Hmm, I think two would be cool.” She reached over and took my hand. “So what do you want in the future?”

“About the same, but I always wanted some dogs. I’m going to get a degree in business, probably minor in computer programming, then I’ll take over my dad’s business.” I shrugged as I looked down at our hands slowly playing with her fingers, “But you’re the only person I ever see myself marrying. I don’t think I’ll ever meet anyone else like you.” As soon as I said the words, it felt like I had sealed my fate. At the time, I thought that fate was a lifetime alone, pining over the one woman I could never have. Now I knew different. I knew that fate was driving the two of us together.

I just had to fight a little bit harder.