#itsdarkoutside86

It was just after dawn when he heard it, the wintry sun just beginning to creep in through the part in the heavy curtains.  The snow had been coming down for three days straight, so the faint trace of sunlight was a welcome break.  However the reprieve was lost to Tod as he scrambled out of his cozy bed to clamber to his feet, his brain wide awake once the sound of the bedroom door softly closing had reached him.

So she had been serious when she said she was leaving.

He berated himself for taking it so lightly the night before.

Tod dashed manically around the room, throwing as much warm wear he could before hastily shoving his feet into his brand new snow boots, pulling his heavy jacket on as he left the room in a hurry and practically flew down the stairs.  As he wrenched the front door open the thought of Carmen clobbering him later for making so much noise entered his mind and he grinned sheepishly, but he slammed the door behind him regardless and dashed after the retreating figure ahead of him.

“Hey, Lotte!”

“Go back to sleep Tod.  I told you last night that I was leaving, this shouldn’t be that big of a shock to you.”

“Why though?  Why the rush?  Why is it you have to constantly be on the move?” he finally caught up to her and grabbed on to her arm, turning her around so that she had no choice but to face him.  “Just talk to me.”

She avoided his eyes, choosing to look across the snow-covered landscape instead as she hitched the strap of her bag up higher on her shoulder.  “There’s nothing to talk about, Tod.  I’ve wasted enough time as it is.”

“So that’s all we are to you, then?  A waste of time?”

“That’s not-“

“Violet.”  He stopped her from trying to pull away, taking her face in both of his hands firmly.  His blue eyes studied the furrow in her brow carefully, noting the distressed look in her distant eyes.   She had a habit of doing this; something he had caught on to pretty quickly.  When she finally started to relax and let herself become closer to the others, she would clam up and shut them out.  She would throw that cold and distant mask on again, pretend like nothing phased her and she didn’t have a care in the world, until it was ripped off of her again.  It was next to impossible for her to ever wear it for long, because she couldn’t fool herself anymore.  She cared too much.

The sensation of Tod’s thumbs stroking her cheeks softly caused her to close her eyes for a moment, her breath escaping her in a puff of white as she sighed lightly.  “I can’t.  I’ve been still for far too long.  I need to go.”

“Why?  Why do you constantly have to be on the move?”

“My kid is out there somewhere.”

Tod’s jaw dropped and he just stared at her, dumbfounded.  “You…..you’re a mom?”

Lotte snorted and turned away from him, a humorless laugh leaving her.  “Is it so hard to believe that I could be a mother?  Gee thanks, you’re such a charmer, ass.”

Tod regained his composure and dashed in front of her, blocking her path.  “Nonono, that’s not what I meant at all, I’m sorry.  It’s just….you’ve never mentioned that fact before.  You don’t even talk about, uuuuuh…?”

“Her.  Faith.”

Tod smiled and discreetly inched closer to the woman in front of him, reaching out to rub her arms when he saw her shiver slightly.  He was very aware of the fact that his body was becoming number by the second, the shin deep snow helping that fact along rather well.  “That’s a beautiful name.  How old is she?”

Lotte swallowed deeply and looked down, feeling the corners of her eyes starting to prickle with hot tears.  “She turned fourteen a couple weeks ago.  I was hoping to have already had her by then, but…”

“Why wasn’t she with you?”

“Heh.” She shook her head and pulled herself out of Tod’s arms, her demeanor hard once again.  She brushed past him, still shaking her head.  “I don’t have time to get into this.  It’s a long story.”

“Then dumb it down for me.  That’s at least one thing you’re good at.” he shot back at her, cocky grin on his face as he watched her stop dead in her tracks.

Lotte narrowed her eyes and smirked, keeping her back to him.  She mulled things over for a moment, deciding to take up the challenge, no matter how vulnerable it would make her feel later.  “Her ‘father’ had her taken away from me the day she was born.  Long story short, I fell in with the wrong group when I was a teenager, after my folks died.  I dropped out of school; my grades were great and everything, I just had no desire to go anymore.  Met this guy when I was eighteen.  He was nice enough.  Cute.  Pretty charming.  We got wasted and wound up sleeping together.”

“When I found out I was pregnant, everything changed.  I decided to get my shit together, and stop being stupid.  I quit smoking and drinking; I haven’t done either one for almost fifteen years now.  I found new friends that had a positive impact on my life.  I got my GED and a pretty swell job as a secretary for a high-end attorney in Miami.  Started saving up, planning ahead for my baby, yanno?  Tried to be the daughter my folks would have been proud of.  Six months in I decided to tell the guy, too.  It was the right thing to do, and I wasn’t expecting anything from him at all.  He just had a right to know.”

Tod kept his eyes glued to her back, chancing a few steps forward.  “How did he take it?”

She chewed on her bottom lip absentmindedly, her aquamarine eyes glued to the ice-covered trees ahead of her.  “Really well, actually.  He told me that I could stay with him, and that he’d take care of me the best he could, if I wanted it.  I didn’t need any help, but I figured that maybe if we spent more time together maybe something would spark.  I could see myself loving him, and I wanted him to be part of his daughter’s life, too.” She snorted and shook her head, her brow furrowing.  “Should have known it was too good to be true.  I held her for maybe an hour after I delivered, then that bastard shot me up with something and told the doc I had a drug problem.  I was declared an unfit mother, he was granted full custody, I got sent to jail for two years, and I barely got to see her.  Monitored visits every second weekend of the month at first.  When I got out six months early for good behavior and the promise to go to rehab I got her for a couple hours every weekend.  When she turned ten the court granted me partial custody, and I could have her for three months out of the year.  Thirteen, and I got her half of the year.  I’ve been fighting for her for the entirety of her life, and when she told the judge she wanted to live with me, they denied it.”

“Why though?  Why did he….”

“He’s a neurosurgeon that practiced in Miami.  Turns out, he was also married and a multimillionaire in the state of Washington.  Everything was kept hush hush, for his poor reputation.  Fed his wife some bullshit lie about saving Faith from a broken home.  That’s why I had no chance in anything, plus there was no witness.  Aside from the nurse that was with me.  She tried to testify on my behalf, but it was thrown out.  He got everything that I’d saved up for Faith, and then some.  I guess he figured he would bite me in the ass before I tried to do the same thing.  Not that I was going to.”

“There was a witness but it was thrown out?  Why the fuck for?”

“She was nervous.  He’d threatened her if she said anything, and she did it anyway.”

“Is she….?”

“Yeah, at least the last I had heard she was.  Now though….”

Tod threw caution to the wind and wrapped his arms around her, bringing her back snuggly against his front, pleased when she didn’t pull away.  “Where is she now?”

Lotte sighed and leaned in to him, dimly aware of the fact snow was starting to seep into her boots.  “Seattle.  Or at least, that’s where I hope she is.”

He stared at the back of her head in disbelief, not even about to figure out the miles this woman had traveled.  “And you lived in Florida?!”

“I was waiting on the plane from Miami to Florida the day the world went to shit.”  She sighed and pulled out of Tod’s embrace, again.  “Which is why I have to keep moving.  There’s no telling who she’s with, where she’s at, if she’s….” she swallowed again and shook her head, turning around to face Tod.  “And if he’s still alive, he won’t be once I get to him.  I can promise you that.”

“I am not letting you go Lotte.  Not like this, if the cold doesn’t do you in the wind will.  Come back and talk to Carmen and Griff about it.”

She brushed his hand off and backed away, frowning.  “Don’t make this any harder than it has to be, Tod.  If you care about me, at all, you’ll let me go.”

“And if you care for me at all,” Tod countered, grabbing on to her arm once more, his eyes boring into hers.  “Or the others, you will come back to the house with me right now.”

Lotte shook her head, eyes once again glassy with unshed tears.  “That’s not fair.  You know I do.”

“And you’re being fair?” he said angrily, once again taking her face in his hands.  “You don’t have to do this alone, Violet.  You have been long enough.  Let us help you.  Let me help you.”

“And risking putting the kids in danger?”

“They’re in enough danger as it is.  We all are babe, that’s life.  We will figure something out, and I know both Carmen and Griff will jump all over this.”

“Tod-“

He cut her off by claiming her lips with his own, the pads of his thumbs brushing away the tears that had managed to spill onto her cheeks.  After a moment he broke away from her lips to rest his forehead against hers, a small grin on his face as he felt her fingers run through the short strands of hair on the nape of his neck.  “I am not letting you go, and you’re not doing this alone.  Got it?”

“Alright.”

“Good.  Now, we can do this one of three ways;” he said with a grin, taking his hand in hers and planting a kiss to the back of it.  “One, you willingly come back to the house with me.  Two, I sling your ass over my shoulder and I carry you back. Or three, we wait out here and freeze until Carmen comes to yell at me for making so much noise running after you.  Your choice.”

Lotte laughed and shook her head, following Tod as he tugged on her hand.  “If you think for one second that I would let you sling me over your shoulder, you’ve got another thing comin’.”

“Don’t think I wouldn’t do it.  If I hadn’t gotten you talked down in the next five minutes I was gonna do it regardless.”

“Uh-huh.  You just didn’t want Carmen to come chew your ass out in the cold.”

“Damn straight.  Hey, yanno, I never realized you were that much olde-ooooooooow…..”

“If you value your fingers I would really think on if it’s really all that wise to finish that sentence or not.”

“If you don’t stop all that squirming up there, I’m going to just toss you up in the air and hope for the best.”  Tod grunted as he came to a halt, Griff perched on top of his shoulders.  They were in an outdoors store, something akin to a Bass Pro, but not as grand.  Nor as big, luckily for them.  He sighed and came to a halt, his eyes glued to the middles shelves in front of him.  “Remind me again why we’re doing this?  This store has been picked clean.”

“Becaaaaaaaause, Mr. Grumpy, no one ever thinks to look on top of the shelves.  In the store, you’ve gotta get a manager or lackey to get one of those fancy poles with a hook, or a ladder, or SOMETHING; people focus on the easiest target, the bottom and middle shelves, and forget that there’s more on the very top!”

“And why didn’t WE get a ladder?”

“This was quicker.  Plus I’m not that heavy.”

“That’s what you think.” Tod muttered under his breath, grinning to himself as Griff gasped in mock hurt, squirming even more for effect.  He took a few steps forward, almost nose-to-nose with the shelves and tapped Griff on the leg when he felt he was grounded.  He winced a little as Griff carefully stood up on his shoulders, pulling herself up onto the top shelf, Tod boosting her.  “What are you after anyway?” he asked after he regained his breath.

“Tents!  Haven’t you ever been camping, city boy?”

Tod scoffed and crossed his arms across his chest, scanning the aisle for any unwelcome visitors.  “What do we need tents for?  There are perfectly good buildings and whatnot to crash in.”

Griff snorted as she found what she was looking for, shoving them off of the top of the shelves.  “It’s going to be summer.  We’re in Texas.  There is no air conditioning anymore.  You’re telling me you’d rather sweat your ass off inside a nasty, stagnant building, than sleep outside where there will be more relief from the heat?”

Tod rolled his eyes and shouldered the tents, not willing to admit that there was some logic behind her question.  “Alright, alright, fine; you win this time.  Now hurry up and jump down here so we can get the hell out of here.”

Griff snorted and peered down at him.  “You really haven’t been camping before, have you?  We need more than just that!  Quick, go get a shopping cart and I’ll I dunno….jump from shelf to shelf.  Or something.  Chop chop!  We are far from done, sir!  Hopefully Carmen and Vi have managed to find us all summer clothing.”

“Sure thing Tarzan.”  Tod groaned as he plodded out of the aisle in search of a cart.  “I hate shopping.  I hate shopping with women.  WHY, of all the people I could get stuck with during the zombie fucking apocalypse, did it have to be a bunch of CHICKS?”

“You know you love us!”

Tod muttered curses to himself under his breath, glad that Griff couldn’t see the shit-eating grin on his face just then.