Alone

I looked down at my wrist and the green veins transporting blood throughout my body. Sighing out loud at the tan line that marred my arm from the blue bracelet I so loving wore I looked back at the sea. So beautiful. So full of life. I could feel it. Its tug. The waves were a song and the moon was the writer. All of it calling to me almost as if it spoke my name. 

I rose to my knees to venture out into the beckoning aqua life from the sand, but before I could I heard a noise coming from my purse. 

Of course Mom, perfect timing.

I rolled my eyes and took my phone out of my purse and looked at the screen. 

I let it ring through then texted her I was fine and I was enjoying some alone time. For crying out loud, I thought, It’s almost as if she wasn’t aware I was a 25-year-old who works a full-time job and barely had time to sit down and relax. 

I set my phone back down in my purse and got up to answer the call to the pristine water. I shucked off my shirt and shorts till I was left in my navy bathing suit and tanned skin was bared to the sun. My feet sunk into the sand as I began my walk toward the crystal water. I groaned and pivoted on my heel when I heard my phone ring. Again.

Can’t I just have some peace and quiet!

Unzipping my purse again I pulled my phone out and looked at the Caller ID. There was none. 

Mom, you can’t just steal Uncle Andrew’s phone if I don’t answer your call.

The whole family knew something was weird with my Uncle but none of us ever had any interest in ever finding out what. He had once asked at a family gathering if I wanted to know and I had responded with, “Nope I'm good. Thanks though.” I hadn't wanted to feel obligated to share my own secret.

I answered the phone and became increasingly frustrated with my mother as she didn’t say anything on the other side of the line. 

“Hello? Mom? Mom, you can’t call me and then not answer me.”

As I was about to hang up the phone I heard a voice on the phone.

“We have your mother Alina. Now listen to exactly what I say. You’re going to pick up your shorts and shirt and put them back on. Quit pacing it’s annoying,”

I paused and turned my green eyes to scan the horizon over the sea then turned and scanned the dock.

“Quit looking for me and listen to what I say or your mother is going to be in a world of pain.”

I leaned down putting the phone on speaker as I stepped into my shorts and pulled on my shirt. I could hear my blood raging through my veins. From fear or adrenaline, I didn’t know.

“Good. Now pick up your phone and purse and walk to your car. The grey Subaru if I’m correct.”

I could feel it then. The sea behind me. I could feel the pull of the tides and the shifting and freeness of the water. It was power in my veins. I could feel it skitter along my bones begging to be free as the water was. 

Later. You are needed later. Stay cool and be ready.

I felt the power of the water shift and settle, waiting for the time I called on it. Good. Now looking at me all they could see was a scared adult following orders. I felt a wicked grin rising up and force it down willing my face into stone. They had no idea who they were dealing with.

Settling down into the car I await further instructions from my mom’s captors. I could play by their rules. 

“I’m here. Now, where am I going?”

I fiddled with my bracelet playing more into the scared role the expected me to play. I looked at the charm that I had found on the beach many years ago and had worn ever since. I flipped it over and remembered searching through every ancient library text and look at translations to figure out what the words meant.

το νερό είναι ισχυρό

το νερό είναι αφιλοφρών

το νερό είναι άθραυστο

The books I dug up in the limited time my mother allowed me to have at the library translated it to. "The water is strong, the water is ineffable, the water is unbreakable." Of course, being eleven at the time I didn’t really understand what it meant until my mom took our family back to the beach when I was 13 and I felt the water calling to me as I still did to this day. That day when I went into the water and could see my brown hair float clearly around me and could breathe and control the water around me, bending it to my will. I understood it then and the water understood me. 

“I’m here,” I said again, “where am I going to talk to you about the ransom?”

Was I being too casual? Would someone else be freaking out hysterically?

“Drive yourself over to Devin’s coffee shop. From what they tell me you already know where that is.”

“Yes. Am I to enter or sit and wait for you in my car?”

“Go on in. Order yourself a coffee and croissant if you like. I hear the chocolate ones are quite good,” with that the man ended the call.

Honestly, I would have laughed at the sheer nerve and arrogance in the gruff male voice if I hadn’t wanted to break the illusion of what they judged me as. For all I knew, there could be eyes on me at this very moment.

I drove down the road at a normal pace checking now and again at the car that had pulled out behind me at the last stoplight. No license plate in the front, dark-colored car, what looked to be thick glass. Definitely, a follow car. I looked in front of me as I drove and spotted another car similar to the one that was now a few cars behind me in traffic as I made my way towards the coffee shop. 

Smart. Two cars so they can switch out. 

Even if I had identified two cars following me I still had no idea who I was meeting or what I was walking into. I knew my mother’s captor was male and had a cadre of ‘friends’ that helped him out. The mafia? A gang? 

I puzzled over this as I pulled into the parking lot of Devin’s Coffee Shop & Bakery. I watched the car that had been following a slight distance behind pull in behind me and do a loop around the lot and then pull out. I almost waved at them as they circled around before leaving but I figured that would paint more as a threat than I wanted them to think me as. 

I took the keys out of the ignition grabbed my purse and phone then stepped down out of the car. I walked up the sidewalk as I saw the following car that had been in front of while driving pull into the coffee shop. I kept my expression blank and disinterested as I turned walking into the shop. I smiled at the man behind the counter and ordered a small black coffee and a chocolate croissant. Maybe that would help put this man on more uneven footing. I paid and moved to the waiting line that had formed as I assumed it always did at 5:00 P.M when people get off work in the evening and college kids come to get coffee before studying as I had. 

I sat in an empty corner booth after I heard my order number called and waited for my mother’s captor to grace me with his presence. He was taking a disgustingly long time. I took a long sip of my coffee then took a bite out of the croissant. Whoever this man was his ‘friends’ had great taste in baked goods. I debated taking out my phone and playing a game, but I decided that it would set the wrong precedent and they could use it against me. For someone with incredible abilities with water, I was not going to add more fuel to their fire.

I had almost finished my croissant and drained my coffee when the man I assumed had been on the other side of the phone showed his face. He smoothly sat down in the seat across from me. Tall, muscled, mid-2``0's, lean face, hazel eyes, vibrant sleeve tattoo snaking down his arm, honestly what I had expected. 

“Pity you didn’t stop by the bakery, your sources were correct they are delicious.”

The man blinked, the only surprise he would let show, then smirked. 

“I’m sure she will be glad to hear it.”

I figured I might as well go ahead and ask since he seemed perfectly content to sit in silence.

“Why do you have my mother?”

He leaned over and grabbed what was left my chocolate croissant and threw it in his mouth. Once he was done chewing he said,

“Because she asked me to.”

My heart stopped. That was not the answer I had wanted and this man knew that. I could feel my power run its cooling caress over my bones rising up to protect me from the threat of this man and his words. 

Not yet, I told it. Not yet.

“Why would my mother ask you to kidnap her,” I asked my voice as cold as ice.

“She said there was something strange about you. Like her brother. Like me. She also said you weren’t very forthcoming with information regarding your… gifts.”

The man wiggled his fingers in emphasis. Had she betrayed me? She was the only one I had trusted to know and now she had sold me out to these. . . people.

“What does she want?”

“She wants you to help her. Your mother"

"With what, exactly," I asked tone sharpening.

"I can only assume you were blissfully unaware of all of this Alina. Your mother runs a secret organization of people like us. People who were born different. Those who could feel things of power calling to them to use and to wield. She has since before you were born when she realized her brother and others like him could help the vast majority secretly.”

The man continued on, “Your mother needs your help. She wants you to learn how to wield your gift and use it to help others.”

“Let me get this straight. . . ,” 

“Darryl.”

“Let me get this straight Darryl. My mother wants me to basically join a band of superheroes to learn and disband crime, which she has been doing behind my back for my entire life.”

“Yes.”

I rubbed my temple and felt anger rise up in me at my mother lying to me all these years. She had known how to help me and had left me to figure it out on my own. She had left me alone.

“I know this is a lot to take in Alina, but your mother needs you, we need you. Don’t let your anger towards her stop you from making the right choice just to spite her.”

I closed my eyes and rubbed my temples again. How he had read the emotion on my face I didn’t know, but I did know as much as I hated to admit it, Darryl was right. I opened my eyes to find him waiting on my answer his eyes intently searching my face.

“Alright. I’ll join your band of superheroes. But the pay better be good. Also, we’ll need better cars to follow people in. I spotted you all a mile away. Both of them."

Maybe with these people who were like me, I would no longer be alone.

Darryl cracked a smile and said, “That can be arranged.”

“Welcome to the team, Alina. Me and you are going to have so much fun.”

And if those weren’t the most welcoming words I had ever heard.