Chapter
13
A Serialized Story of the
Not So Distant Future
June 14, 2005
Part Thirty Two
Sam left the building and realized that he was starving. He almost forgot Dawn and pressed the doorbell for the apartment above the store. It buzzed instantly and Sam made his way up a flight of old stairs. The hallway had a musty smelll to it, as if the air doesn't move through here often enough. Many of the stairs were slightly sunken, as if they were tired from all the use they've seen over the years.
The apartment door opened at the top of the stairs and Dawn was waiting for him. "Thanks for coming up." Dawn said. "This is my home away from home."
The apartment was more of a work space, with card tables and folding chairs set up everywhere. There were banners and signs, and dozens of bumper stickers and buttons around. It looked like Dawn's vest had exploded, filling the room with colored slogans, Sam thought.
"That strike was pretty scary huh?" She said. "The group I was organizing here took off, they were afraid it would happen to them."
"Yeah, I can understand their worry." Sam said. "Do you want to get some lunch, I'm starving."
"Sure, let me just tell Dad." She picked up the phone and pressed a button. "Rachel, tell Dad that I'm going to lunch with Sam, I'll probably head home after that."
"I feel like a kid sometimes, but Dad's got good reason to keep tabs on me."
"How old are you anyway, if you don't mind me asking?" Sam said.
"I'll tell you if you tell me." She smiled.
"Thirty." Sam said.
"No shit? No offense I mean, but I thought you were at least forty."
"I know, it's not a big deal." Sam said. "The worst thing was when some salesgirl thought that I was married to my mother."
Dawn laughed, "I'm sorry Sam, but that is pretty funny."
"I know, it is, but it can be depressing too. I feel like I've aged 50 years during that coma. But hey, you still haven't told me your age."
"Twenty six." She said, "people tell me I have a young face. It's even worse when I let my hair down."
"So you don't always have it like that." Sam asked.
"I change it a lot, I'll probably pick a new color next week. Sometimes I shave it off completely. How about you, ever think of dying your hair bright pink?"
"I can't say that I have, although a couple of people have advised me to dye it brown."
Dawn gave that idea a rasberry. "If you're going to dye it, pick something lively at least."
"Yeah, to be honest I don't think I could stand the maintenance of it. So where's a good place to eat around here?" Sam saked.
"Actually, there's only one place that will serve me, and it's a Vegatarian restaurant." Dawn said.
"Oh, are you a vegetarian?"
"No, but they're the only place that doesn't discriminate around here, they make good burritos and vegie lasanga."
"Cool." Sam said.
They walked around the corner and Sam found it hard to keep up with Dawn's pace. He was embarrassed and struggled to look casual as he walked faster. The restaurant was aptly named "From Avacado to Zuchinni" and actually had animated vegetables on the sign.
The man behind the counter gave Dawn a big hello as she came in, Dawn returned the greeting and introduced Sam to Marcus, the owner. Dawn ordered a three bean burrito, and Sam followed suit. The burritos were huge, and covered in an orangy sauce like Sam had never tasted before.
"Wow, these are great, what's in that sauce?" Sam asked.
"Marcus won't say," Dawn answered, "I know there's tomatoes, peppers and squash, but he's got some secret stuff in there as well."
"I just realized, this is the first burrito I've had in over a decade." Sam said.
"Wow, well you picked a good one. So how long have you been awake now?"
"It's been a couple of weeks, an amazing couple of weeks really."
Another pair of customers entered the restaurant, they were either well dressed business men or Federal agents. Sam glanced at them and felt a little uneasy. Dawn caught his gaze and glanced over her shoulder.
"One for each of us I guess," she said with a shrug.
"I have to admit, it puts a damper on our conversation." Sam said.
"Yeah, try not to let it bug you. A few years ago, me and my friends would deliberately make up stuff for them, but it got us pulled in for questioning a few times so we had to stop. These days, we can actually be charged with 'interfering with a Federal investigation' for doing that."
"How the hell have all these laws gotten passed?" Sam asked.
"People don't pay attention, a lot of them still don't. My Dad has pointed out that historically, there have been many worse regimes than the one we're in right now, that have lasted for generations."
"He told me that he felt things were changing, that people were waking up."
"Yeah, I think he's right. There have been a lot of protests, particularly in the so called Red Belt. A lot of good ol' boys are dying due to environmental destruction. They're killing their support base and they don't really care."
"What can we really do though, if the elections are fixed?"
"I know, my Dad loves to quote Stalin: 'It's not who votes that matters, it's who count the votes,' or something like that."
They finished their lunch and left the restaurant, the two suits followed almost right behind them.
"Subtle." Sam said in a loud voice, which made Dawn smirk.
"Wanna have a little fun?" Dawn asked.
"Sure."
"Double back on the count of three, 1, 2, 3!"
They both whirled around and walked quickly through the milling crowds on the sidewalk, passing right by the annoyed looking agents.
"In here." Dawn pulled Sam into a pet store.
"There's a back exit here, we'll take it and enter the bar in the basement of the office building across the street." They cruised through the pet store, and out the back entrance onto the street.
"By now they're calling for backup." Dawn said, they'll have someone new on us in a minute."
They entered the revolving door of the office building, and got a stern look from the building security guard. They headed straight downstairs to the bar and entered, Sam's eyes had difficulty adjusting to the dim lights.
There were a couple of patrons at the bar, Dawn glided by with Sam in tow, they went past the bathrooms to a storeroom in the back. From there they followed a back exit which led into a maintenance corridor for the building.
"From here we have our choice of four exits." Dawn said, "I never asked you what your plans were for the rest of the day?"
"I don't have any really." Sam said.
"You want to hang out at my house?"
"Sure."
"Cool, come this way." Dawn led them out a service exit which was only about 20 feet from a subway entrance. "I think we lost 'em."
They went down to the subway platform, and though they didn't have and Homeland Security officers following them, they ran into a group of high school students instead.
"Check out this freak!" One boy said. They were as all American crew-cut as you can get. There were four of them in the group and they were wearing Varsity Jackets.
"I'd swear we walked into the 1950's" Sam said softly to Dawn.
"Hey Baby, is all you're hair pink?" This followed a string of guffaws from his friends.
Dawn shot them a finger as they walked on, Sam glared at them momentarily, silently cursing his physical condition. The boys all made "ooo" noises and one of them said: "Sal man, you can't just take that!"
"Hey Bitch!" Sal called out. He looked about sixteen and was bursting with testosterone and wounded pride.
"WHAT!" Dawn wheeled about with a fire that would stop most men in their tracks.
"Don't think I won't slap you in front of your Daddy, bitch!" Sal said closing the distance between them. Sal's buddies were right behind him, trying to look equally menacing.
An older woman got up from the bench and tried to intercept the boys.
"Don't you boys have to be somewhere?"
Sam realized that it was Rose, and was glad for her intercession, the boys just breezed by her though as if she wasn't there.
"Sam, get clear." Dawn said.
"I'm not going anywhere." Sam said.
Sal and Dawn stood almost eye to eye. He hocked up some spit and launched it at her, Dawn sidestepped it and one of the other boys tried to push Dawn towards the tracks. Dawn was ready though and used the boy's arm as a lever to support herself and kicking him in the balls.
Sam moved in towards Sal, but one of the other boys grabbed his arm and said: "Easy Pops, we don't want to hurt you."
Sam struggled against the younger man's grip, but there wasn't much he could do. Dawn was now going head to head with Sal. She obviously knew kickboxing or Tai Kwan Do judging by the way she moved.
Sal swung at Dawn, but she blocked his blows easily, and delivered a hard shot to the side of his head. She also kept his buddy at bay by swinging a wild kick in his direction.
Sam realized that the kid holding him had relaxed his grip a bit, Sam pulled himself down hard and slammed the kid into the side of a trash can. He headbutted the kid in the jaw and felt him go limp.
Dawn had retreated a bit trying to fend off both attackers. Sam didn't say a word he snuck up behind the nearest one and kicked him behind the knee, causing him to fall on his rear. Dawn took advantage of the moment to launch a quick attack on Sal, taking a glancing blow in the process but knocking Sal off of his feet and pushing him on top of his buddy.
"Come on Sam, we better go." Dawn grabbed his arm and they began running up the steps to the street above. Sam followed, adrenaline racing through him, they reached the street and slowed to a quick walk.
"Damn! We need another safe place, we'll try to get back to my father's."
They hurried down a couple of narrow streets and turned a corner, Sam realized that they were back on the block of her father's office. She unlocked the upstairs apartment door and they hurried inside. They got upstairs, and she locked the door behind them. She picked up the phone and called Rachel.
"Rachel, it's me. Sam and I were attacked by some high school kids in the subway, keep an eye out for cops, we're going to stay up here... Yes, I'm fine, Sam is too, we're just a little winded."
Dawn hung up the phone and said to Sam: "Are you ok?"
"Yeah, actually I'm still feeling kind of hyper, is this a typical day for you?"
She blushed and Sam felt instantly bad for asking it.
"I'm only kidding Dawn really. I guess it was my turn to put my foot in my mouth."
"It's alright, to be honest stuff like that does happen once in a while."
"You're one hell of a fighter."
"Thanks, you did pretty well yourself."
"I'm nothing like I should be... like I used to be."
"Hey, don't sweat it." Dawn said, "you'll get better. Your body was able to move pretty well when it needed to."
"I guess so." Sam said, looking down towards the floor.
Dawn walked over to him and squeezed his shoulder, "I'm sorry for dragging you into this Sam, really."
Sam looked up into her blue eyes. "Don't worry about it, it's the most fun I've had in ages."
He didn't know if he moved towards her first or she towards him, but suddenly they were kissing. Their passion, combined with the excitement of their flight was electric. Time seemed to stop for that brief moment, but was then interrupted by the phone ringing.
They broke their embrace, smiling at each other, Dawn picked up the phone. "Hello. Yeah Dad, I'm fine, really. Sam is too. Some high school kids. Ok, we'll take a car." She hung up the phone.
"Dad's getting us a limo to go home in. It's the only service that doesn't cater to the Hosers. It should be here in about 15 minutes."
"Cool." Sam said, uncertain what to say about the kiss. He touched her forearm lightly, feeling suddenly awkward.
"Um," Dawn said, blushing again. She took his hand in hers and held it. "This is going to sound really weird, but I don't have a lot of experience with this kind of thing. Everyone always expects me to be this wild girl but..."
"Well, it's been ten years for me." Sam said. "but I'm still getting over the death of my girlfriend... it's kind of complicated. I really like you though, I really admire your courage. Let's just take things slowly, ok?"
"Yeah, that'd be great really." Dawn said. "I like you too." She leaned into him and they kissed softly. They stayed that way until they heard the distant beeping of the limo horn an eternity later.
posted by John at 11:53 PM | link |
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