“So you’re saying that Kate was at your wedding and so was Mary here? Whoa, fella…” He paused as if he’d just remembered something. “You know what? She did try getting me to go to a wedding when we first started dating years ago. I hated weddings, and we were so new that I thought it might give off the wrong impression, so I lied and said I couldn’t because I had to work. I’ll be damned. This just keeps getting stranger and stranger.”
Now how did Vanessa play into all of this? “Vanessa, you say your husband died? Was he sick?” I asked, knowing this wasn’t going to be a pleasant conversation.
“Pretty much the same thing as your wife, Dean. He was my second husband. The kids weren’t his, but they loved him as if he were their father. Now they’re all gone.” She wiped away tears, and we all softened at the words.
“Every one of us was given our green alien rock thing by our significant loved one who’s now dead. Kate and my wife seem to have died the very same way, and I can only assume Mary’s husband shared a similar fate? I’m sorry to bring it up, but this feels really central to everything going on,” I said.
Mary took a deep breath. “I loved my husband a lot. He was a kind man, with a heart of gold, but he felt distant for the last couple years of his life. He got sick; some sort of lung infection where he would cough up blood, and within a few months, he had wasted away to nothing, and he died with me by his side. Being in the Air Force, I spent a lot of time away from home over the years and often wondered if he strayed from our marriage, or if he even loved me. As he lay in his hospital bed, he told me a crazy tale of people from another world, where a civil war ravaged part of their planet. Two sides came to peace eventually, but there was always a small amount of resentment still felt between them. They needed a new home, as theirs wasn’t going to last, and Earth was found to be suitable.
“One side claimed to have found a home for them that wouldn’t involve the genocide of a race, but the decision was already made. So a safety net was put into place: a device that could be used to bring the humans back once taken. It was said that the device has been here on Earth for hundreds of years, and that the rebels used a highly dangerous wormhole to make it here way ahead of the fleet we saw grace our atmosphere. Then we were selected to carry out the plan to save the world. It’s all been set up by the opposing faction from this planet. Though Bob didn’t say so outright, I now believe him to have been a member of that race. At the time, I thought he was delusional and insane. Now I know better.”
My stomach sank at the implications of her story. If Bob had been one of them, then surely Janine had too. But she was very human. I knew this for a fact. How could she have been anything but? The room swayed, and I reached my arms out to keep myself from falling down. I felt the soft cushion of the mattress and Ray’s hand lowering me down. “I know. If what Mary says is true, then we’re all in the same boat. Feeling deceived and hurt, but maybe it was the only way to save the people. We have to push past this and do what we need to do for the sake of the world. I just don’t quite understand how this is all going to work. We bring them back, then what? Get blasted to smithereens by them? Do we not expect some serious retaliation?”
“Is there anything to drink in this place? Mini-bar?” I asked.
Ray popped open a cupboard that unveiled a mini-fridge with single-serve alcohol bottles in it. “No ice here. What do you say to a glass of wine or a whiskey?”
Soon we had moved to the small table by the window and I was feeling slightly better about things, but that could have just been the effects of the cheap whiskey I’d downed. I was swirling a second one in a plastic glass and noticed Mary watching her red wine more than drinking it.
“It just doesn’t add up. Did any of you have kids? Bob and I tried for a couple years, but it never took. How about you guys?” Mary asked.
Ray shook his head, as did I.
“We can sit here all night and speculate, or we can figure it out moving forward. Now let’s stop worrying about the past and try to figure out the fastest way to get everyone back.” Her voice had progressively risen in pitch, and she emphasized the speech by taking my whiskey and shooting it back.
We settled in and started to form a plan for getting to Peru. We were four strangers and a dog sitting in a hotel room.
TEN
Carey and I walked away from the hotel, into a small field behind it. The morning sun was just about to rise, and the fall air felt cooler than it had in previous days. I was glad we were heading south; it would be warmer. I really was enjoying having a dog around. He reminded me of a regular life and was helping me stay grounded through all of this. He’d already had breakfast and now he was chasing a bird that had landed too close.
We headed back to the building, and Mary was leaning against the front lobby doorway, foot pressed against the brick wall. My heart skipped a beat seeing her there.
“Dean. How messed up is all of this? Can you imagine that we met six years ago and now here we are?” She let the comment stop, like she had more to say but didn’t want to say it.
I couldn’t help but look at her in a different light all of a sudden. I was no psychology major, but it was almost as if my last three years alone were bubbling up, and the sight of someone I’d met before, combined with the fact that we shared the same spousal story, was making me see her for all the woman she was.
I cleared my throat and hoped I wasn’t blushing too hard. I was in my thirties; did we still blush at that age? Feeling the flush in them, I guess I’d answered my own question. Thank goodness Carey interrupted my moment of shame, as he sauntered over to her, doing the patented cocker spaniel full-body tail wag. She crouched down and rubbed his ears while he kept wiggling.
“Bob wasn’t a dog person. Actually, I can’t even recall him ever interacting with one,” she said.
“Come to think of it, neither did Janine. I know she felt bad because I wanted one, but she said she was allergic. I looked into hypoallergenic ones, but she refused even then.”
Ray came and knocked on the door, waving us inside.
“Vanessa and Ray were making breakfast. Once we eat and get everything loaded, we’ll be on our way,” Mary said as I held the door open for her. She paused as we walked inside, her hand sitting lightly on my forearm. “Dean, do you think we can do this?”
“I honestly don’t know, but at least we have a plan for now. Too bad you didn’t have a jet to take us there with.” I laughed.
“I thought of that. Just heading down there myself and doing it. Vanessa was for it. But then we saw the ships, and I was too worried they would just shoot me down, and the whole mission would be screwed. Or at least my involvement in it. Plus, I would be dead,” Mary said solemnly. “I had no idea there was definitely anyone else coming. I just figured if Vanessa and I had been chosen that there must be more.”
“Were you in New York then? Was it your safety deposit box we found open?”
She fidgeted with the ring on her necklace. “That was me. I was close in Washington and took a boat there. Lots of those available where I was. It was only a matter of hours and I was there. I knew I would have to go there and had gone to that bank a couple times in the past two years. Bob gave me the letter to not open until the day they came. Of course I was angry at him for dying, and for telling me that insane story about aliens. I didn’t know what to think when I read it, telling me about a security box. Why wouldn’t I go and look at it? I stood there two years ago in that very bank and stared at that box for an hour. But for some reason, I didn’t open it.”