Different

Chapter 21 -Finale

Hormone therapy can be inconvenient. Matthew tried brewing potions that were improvements of what I had concocted. They tasted awful and had to drink them like smoothies, quite unbearable. I preferred the medical way. My body continued to change gradually, and I was loving the changes. I still had insecurities, though. I did talk to a few transgender folks in the state and learn that being transgender wasn't as bad as I thought. I just had to find my niche.

I tried reaching out to my family. I sent a letter apologizing to my father after what happened between the two of us at a tavern. They hadn't responded. I wasn't expecting them to.

Bishaw fired me due to my absences. But I had a different job after that. Veronica's manor became state property because she had no living relatives. None of the Rothschilds in Oregon knew her. It was safe to say that in at least the last century of her life, she lived alone. Matt and I tried to learn about her ancestry, the furthest back we could trace was old records in Minnesota in the seventeeth century.

A private company bought her property and turned it into a state attraction. Students and scholars came every month not really to make educational reports but to take pictures, selfies especially. What's beneath the manor was the main attraction, though.

Aphrodite looked as she always did, motionless, eyes gazing into the unknown, while another figure crouched before her, both knees sitting on a table, one hand resting on the concrete, the other hand holding its stomach, head stooped in somewhat submission before a deity.

Photos of the peculiar duo had been on the internet, spreading across the state and even throughout the country, attracting curious tourists who had been coming in to see the spectacle. Rebecca Veronica Rothschild became immortal. But not in the sense that she understood.

The spectators took lots of photos. One of them stood out, a tall guy who wore a jacket. He had caught me staring at him before we exchanged smiles. I walked towards him.

"Can I help you with anything?"

"Hayley Davis, I'm Dane Walker."

"How did you know my name?"

"I think I saw it somewhere." He's soft-spoken and charming.

"Dane Walker," I said squinting, "as in Mr. Siler's assistant?"

He nodded.

"You look different in your email photo."

"Is that a compliment?"

I was flustered. His blue eyes swept me away. He spoke before I could utter a word.

"I came here to formally invite you to a dinner with Mr. Siler--"

"Just him?"

"--and us."

He beamed at me. "He wants to talk about this famous museum."

I creased my forehead but smiled. "Why did it take him over a year to see me?"

"He's a busy guy."

The chatters died out. When I looked around, I was surprised. "Where's everyone?" The crowd was gone.

"Looks like they've left." Why he couldn't stop smiling and being charming was beyond me. "Anyway, I saw some of the books in the library upstairs. I know someone who might find them useful."

"Really?" I made a facial expression that was half smiling and half scowling.

"Yeah, he's like a witch who never learned how to be one."

I sighed and shrugged. "I wish I could help, but I'm just a keeper of this old place."

"Anyway, I got to be going." He reached out his hand to shake mine. "Nice to finally meet you."

"Come by anytime you wish," I replied. I was in the midst of wondering why the room suddenly went empty when my phone rang. I was about to answer it, but I missed the call.

"Who was that guy?" Matt was walking down the stairs.

"He's the assistant of this place's owner."

"Why was he smiling?" Matt's frown was either amusing or hilarious.

"Smiling?" I grinned.

"I saw him smiling."

"I don't know." I shrugged. "Why didn't you ask him?"

We both fell silent as we stared at Veronica. We couldn't read each other's minds, but I knew we were both thinking of the same thing, the same memories of a recent past.

"You know what those bounty hunting warlocks said still bothers me," I said as I stared blankly at the cowering figure on the table. "They said I was their end." I looked at Matthew. "It doesn't make sense to me."

"They weren't talking about you. They were talking about a prediction about a person they thought was you. It was she" -- he pointed at the Veronica -- "all along. She was the end of them. She massacred them. And she bore the other soul, her child."

"Yours as well." I sniggered.

But he fell into a melancholic disinterest. "It wasn't my child. It was her doing. It was hers alone."

I heaved a sigh. "Anyway, Jackie called."

"Are you joining them?"

"They're celebrating their baby's first month this weekend."

"Are they Chinese?"

"I think her husband is half Chinese."

"Can I come with you?"

"You're not invited unfortunately. Don't worry about me. I don't think anyone else is going to abduct me. Besides, we can always track each other now." I pulled the familiar amulet from my turtleneck and brandished it before him.

He rubbed his over his shirt, the outlines of the bronze pentagram becoming noticeable as his fingertips passed over it. "Dinner tonight?"

"Date a girl already!"

"Exactly." He grabbed my hand and dragged me upstairs. No, he didn't really drag me. Whatever.

END