The Shimmer Project

Moonlight

Caleb

Ten years. Ten years since I'd been back in San Franciso. Time had really flown by.

I hoisted my backpack higher on my shoulders. Getting back here had been more difficult than I had anticipated. Having finished college a year early, my father hadn't been too keen to send me to the other side of the country to go to medical school, he did however cave when I agreed to live with my Aunt Victoria and her daughter Pamela for the first semester until I had a job and could pay for my own place.

I mostly planned to put my head down and spend the summer studying before classes got started to get a head start, so I also managed to convince my father to let me move to San Francisco a whole two months before I actually needed to. I think he knew I needed to get out of Detroit, too many memories of Mom.

It didn't take me long to find Victoria's apartment building. It was easily one of the newest buildings in the city. It looked very modern with its swinging glass doors and doorman decked in dark green and gold.

Aunt Victoria was a very high class and well-paid surgeon. She had been top of all her classes all through high school and college. My grandparents used to brag about her to my Mom, who had been a sculptor. I knew I could learn a lot from her.

I parked my Jeep around the block and slipped out. It was a nice part of town, not too far from the beach, yet downtown enough that people looked sophisticated. Down the street, I saw the painted cable car rolling down the hill covered in tourists. San Francisco was a busy, cheerful city, exactly like I remembered it.

Girls walked by me, I saw them eyeing me up, giggling, biting their lips. I was used to girls trying to get my attention. I ignored them.

I slipped into Victoria's building and was welcomed in by the doorman. He pointed out the elevator and told me they lived on the eighth floor.

The elevator pinged and the doors slid open. I stepped out onto the landing and rang the doorbell. The door banged open almost immediately and a girl stood in the doorway.

"Mom!" she hollered. "I've found him!" she grabbed my hand and pulled me inside slamming the door behind me.

"I hope you're Pamela, or I've just been kidnapped," I murmured down at her. She grinned up at me.

She looked just like Mom had, her skin was light brown tanned and she had large green eyes. Her dark brown hair was cut in a straight line at the base of her chin with long bangs that fell just above her eyes. I hadn't seen her in ten years, she was two years old the last time I saw her.

"Of course, it's me silly," she giggled. "Caleb! I'm so glad to see you!" she exclaimed, my memory suddenly came back reminding me she was clingy. Even as a two-year-old.

"Hey, nice to see you too Pam."

"Caleb I'm so glad you decided to move in with Mom and me!"

"It's just temporary," I mumbled.

"But I'm so happy. Mom's making your favourite dinner! Roast chicken! Remember you used to love her chicken!" she shrieked.

I nodded slowly.

"Yeah, I remember. But how do you?"

"Mom told me all about you. She said you were great! Plus I'm so happy to have a big cousin living with me! She said you were tough too! So boys won't beat me up in the playground."

"Do they hurt you?" I asked raising one brow.

"No," she grinned.

She didn't look like the sort of girl who let herself be pushed around at school anyway.