Nos Faux Ratu Ch. 08

"Losing family?" William replied, looking back to his biological mother.

"Yes, like losing family," Marcus finished. "Which is hard, under any circumstances."

"I'm sorry," the young man said, looking at Jenna. "I didn't know."

"Neither did I." Jenna ran her hand through her son's hair. It felt like such a normal motion, but she pulled her hand back. He wasn't her son, not in the way that mattered. Michelle Monroe was his mother. Only she had "ruffle the hair" privileges.

"It's okay," he told her, seeing the pain in his face. "And we still need to talk about you meeting the rest of my family."

"I thought we agreed --"

"No, you decided that meeting my parents wouldn't work, and I decided you're full of --"

"Language."

He gave her a dirty look. "You agree to come meet my parents, and THEN you can tell me to watch my language."

"I can't --"

"I think you can," William interrupted. "You're just afraid to. And I thought about what you said, about this changing the way they see me. I don't care. Any decision I make can change the way they see me, but it's not going to stop me from making them."

"I like him," Nessa said, sitting down next to Marcus and putting her head on his shoulder. It was impressive how natural they looked together. No wonder she turned him. "Jenna, you can't tell me you don't want to be part of his life. Why not do this?"

Jenna rehashed all her excuses in her head, and nothing seemed to sound as forceful as it had. "What would we tell them?" she asked at last.

"We'll figure that out," Nessa said, leaning in and kissing her child on the forehead.

Jenna sank into Caitlin's arms, letting her new lover's warmth calm chills that Jenna did not even known she had.

"And," Nessa added, "I have one last task for you as well."

Jenna looked slightly concerned. "What?"

"I'll tell you in a few days. For now, we need to rest up, and YOU need to get to know your family." Nessa looked around and, as if someone had sent a silent command, the rest of her children made their way over to sit down. For the first time in sixteen years, Jenna had a home.

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A month later . . .

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Jenna had thought the days she spent being terrified were over and behind her, but apparently not. In the preceding 30 days, things in New Atlanta had gotten back to normal, though what constituted "normal" in her mind had been irrevocably altered since that fateful night she had hurled a corporate spy out of a window. She, a member of a top-secret commando unit, had then discovered a world of "monsters," been drawn into that world, and had walked out the other side, a whole being for the first time in over fifteen years. After having her family murdered and her life ripped asunder as a child, she had a new family, and a new life.

As far as anyone could tell, it seemed that the government had bought the cover-up. Every human or Night Breed that had been involved in that final battle had been rounded up and given a choice, keep what had happened secret, or die. Strangely, no one had turned down Nessa's offer, especially after she started offering sex as part of the severance package. This seemed to annoy Marcus, which led to a fight between the two ancient vampires, which led to sex to between those same two vampires. Apparently, most things led to Nessa and Marcus having sex. But when the sun rose, Jenna was summoned back to Nessa's bed, as the proximity helped her adjust. In a show of trust, Caitlin was invited to sleep with them as well, though she had to remind Marcus (repeatedly) that she was completely gay, and that he needed to keep his hands to himself.

In the meantime, Jenna had spent time with all of Nessa's other children, particularly Shinmatsu. For some reason, Jenna just felt comfortable with the six-hundred pound man. After her upcoming vacation to the Bahamas with Caitlin, the two of them were going to be flying out to Japan to spend time with Shinmatsu and his wife. Both of them were now officially Nessa's employees, and the elder vampire had ordered them to take the first year of their employment off.

But first, there were two things that Jenna had to do that filled her with dread. The first had been meeting William's adopted parents. The cover story that Caitlin had concocted was to replace all parties of interest with crime syndicates and secret (but non-military) organizations. When William had introduced his parents to his Jenna, she had been so scared that she almost cried, which had elicited a motherly response from Michelle Moore. They had gone over everything, from Jenna giving up her son after surviving what the Messenger did, all the way up to absconding with William for his own safety. While Ron Moore had been angry about being kept out of the loop, he eventually thawed out when he discovered that there was no more danger, and that it had never been Jenna's intent to come between them and the child that they had raised. In the end, the Moores were good people, who did not fault Jenna for any of the decisions that she had made, and supported William in his desire to have his biological mother be a part of his life.

And William WAS part of her life. At the moment, an annoying part. He and Caitlin had both boarded a plane with Jenna to make sure that she fulfilled the task that Nessa had put before her. Jenna was still a slightly fractured psyche. She had made peace with her present, she had a future that she actually looked forward to, but she needed one last piece . . . to be connected to her past. There was only one person that had known Jenna back in the days before she had been left at the mercy of the Messenger when she was just fifteen, and Jenna had been ordered, quite literally, to mend that bridge between "what is" and "what was."

So she found herself standing on the sidewalk in front of a townhouse, no different in its appearance from every other house on the street, in the early hours of dusk. It was what was inside that was different. Inside was Tanya Smithson Caine, Jenna's best friend in high school. She was also the first girl that Jenna had ever had a crush on, and the first girl that Jenna had ever kissed.

"You are not going to just stand there all night," William said, standing at her side. He almost wanted to smile, seeing his mother acting so nervous. He knew that she could kill a man in a matter of seconds, but she had all the social confidence of a teenager. With his parent's permission, he had been able to accompany Jenna on this trip, partially to spend more time with her, at Nessa's insistence, to make sure that she damn well went through with it.

"We will actually ring the doorbell for you," Caitlin added, standing on the other side. "C'mon honey, it'll be fine."

Jenna gave a slight smile to her girlfriend. Caitlin, formerly known as the High Priestess, had been a rock for Jenna in the last month, patient to a fault, yet passionate. Every day, the two women had exchanged intimacies, and had gone on dates like normal people did. The fact that they were both trained assassins and soldiers just meant that being mugged was less likely.

"What if she's mad at me? What if she doesn't even remember me?"

"Jenna," William started, finally cracking a smile, "you're kind of unforgettable. I doubt it was much different when you were a teenager."

Caitlin took her hand. "You're the most beautiful girl that I've ever seen. I think William's right, that there's no way she could have forgotten you. You even said she tried to visit you --"

"I couldn't face her," Jenna said.

Caitlin kissed her cheek. "You can now."

Jenna steeled herself, then took each step up to the door as if she were walking the last mile at prison. Her finger trembled as it reached forward and touched the buzzer.

Seconds later, a man answered the door. He was handsome enough, with a slightly receding hairline but kind eyes. Somewhere in the background was the sound of a woman's voice, talking to a child while preparing dinner. "Yes?" the man said, "May I help you?"

Jenna's words froze in her mouth. "I . . . I --" She looked over at Caitlin who just smiled patiently. Jenna turned back to the man, whose name she knew was Steve. "I was looking for Tanya."

The man glanced toward the open door from where all the noise was coming from. "Honey, there are some people here to see you."

"Well, who are they?" shouted a voice that was so achingly familiar to Jenna that her heart almost beat at the sound of it.

The man glanced at Jenna. "Sorry, I didn't catch your name."

"Jenna," she replied. "Jenna Owens."

The man turned around again. "It's a Jenna Owens?! Were you --" He stopped, as the noises in the kitchen stopped with alarming speed. Footsteps were heard approaching the kitchen door.

The woman who appeared in that door was a few pounds heavier than the last time Jenna had spoken with her, but she wore it well. With pride even. She had always had an athlete's build and swagger, to the point where she had been a little butch, but Jenna hadn't cared in the least. She had married Steven right out of college, and the kids had come along shortly. One of them, a five-year old boy, was peeking out from around his mother's leg. But Tanya's eyes were fixed on Jenna's like she was seeing a ghost. And to a certain extent, she was.

"I . . . I thought you were dead," Tanya whispered. She stepped forward and raised a hand, wanting to see if Jenna was real, but afraid that she was just imagining this.

Jenna felt her eyes begin to well up, and quickly dabbed them with a dark cloth so that Tanya would not see the blood. "I wanted to be," she whispered. "I didn't want . . . Tanya, I'm so sorry," she said, trying to keep herself composed as all the memories crashed into her at once. She had been talking with Tanya on the computer the day her family was taken. This was was the only person left who remembered her the way she was before. Jenna herself had tried so hard to forget that young girl. "I just couldn't see you after . . . after --"

Tanya lunged forward and wrapped her arms around her long-lost friend. She was crying. She remembered Jenna Owens. She knew what the girl had been, and she had known what she had lost. She had sat at the Owens's dining room table. She had watched movies with her best friend on their couch. She remembered. "I tried to visit you," she said, gasping for breath as she held the beautiful woman close, afraid that she'd vanish again.

"I wasn't ready to see you. I couldn't. I was dead inside, and I didn't want you to see me like that," Jenna managed, choking on a pain that had been dormant for so long.

Tanya finally noticed that Jenna wasn't alone. "Who --" she sniffed.

Jenna looked behind. "Jenna, this is my girlfriend, Caitlin," she said, indicating the buxom brunette, who just smiled in response. "And this is William." She looked Tanya. "My son."

Tanya's eyes opened wide. "Your . . . son? But he's --"

"Almost sixteen."

The other woman's eyes opened wider. "That means --"

"Yeah. He knows," she said, looking lovingly at her boy. Then her eyes were drawn back to Tanya. "Tanya, I know I have no right to ask, since I just disappeared on you, but . . . but I've been broken. I'm trying to fix myself, but I can't to it without you."

Tanya looked at her friend, then to Caitlin and then to William. "God," she said, "you look so much like her." She glanced at her very confused-looking husband. "Steven, I think I'll need you to handle dinner tonight. I think Jenna and I have a lot of catching up to do."

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The End . . .