No Plan ━━ Spencer Reid

[ 004 ] Elephant's Memory

[ September 12, 2007 ]

Just before Daisy left her mother's house, Freida asked her one more question. Daisy hadn't answered the first one, but the second was far easier. Mostly because it didn't involve her.

As Daisy slung her purse over her shoulder and adjusted Spencer's cardigan—which she'd completely forgotten she was wearing—Freida opened the front door and stared at the driveway.

She sighed and turned to Daisy. "Did Haley. . ." Freida pressed her lips together. "Well, I called Aaron yesterday and he wouldn't talk about her, so I assumed. . . I don't know." She shrugged.

"She and Jack left," Daisy replied quietly, suddenly feeling like she was betraying Aaron's trust. "I went over to. . . ask him something and she was gone. I thought she'd come back." She shook her head. "I haven't checked on him since."

"Do me a favor," Freida whispered, taking both of Daisy's hands in hers. "Check up on him. He trusts you more than he trusts me or Sean."

"But—"

"He won't talk to me," Freida reasoned. "Not since we fought on Christmas." The look in her eyes was pleading, so much so that it slipped a pin into Daisy's heart and forced her to say yes.

How could she say no, anyhow? Aaron was her brother. And it was like Freida said: he trusted her the most.

[ September 17, 2007 ]

It was the last period of the morning before lunch, and Daisy was so nauseous she could barely speak. It took everything in her to not to vomit all over the floor of the classroom whenever a whiff of food drifted down the hall.

Still, despite how horrible she felt, teaching came naturally. Daisy's students brought out something in her that couldn't be worn down by an uptick in morning sickness or the need to sleep in late.

"Now," Daisy said, swallowing a bout of nausea and wiping the swat off her forehead, "I'm holding a paper with a word—our Word of the Day—and I'm going to describe it to you so you guys can tell me what it means! How does that sound?"

"Good!" chorused the children, and Daisy smiled.

"Okay, everyone. This word . . ." she glanced at the paper, ". . . means one hundred years. What's the word we use when we talk about a hundred years? Remember, it starts with the soft C sound—yes, Gracie?"

"Century!" Gracie said proudly, and Daisy reached over to give her a high five.

"Yup, great job!"

Just behind the students, on the wall, was the clock, and Daisy's smile faded just slightly when she noticed that the class was over. "Alright, it looks like our time is up for the morning—but it's time for lunch and recess now!" she exclaimed, and was met with a chorus of cheers. "Let's all go to our cubbies and get our lunch boxes!"