Stargazing: Changing Our Stars

Chapter Eleven

“Paige! Run!” I screamed as an orange glow grew in front of me.

The warmth of the fire grew and grew as I frantically looked over to Paige as she began struggling to break free of the hold she was placed in – the henchmen held his hand over her mouth and forced her to look towards the blaze. Nathan walked off as his gang continued to hold us back.

The henchmen that held Paige back slowly began moving backwards. It seemed he had the brains of the lot: fire reaches the gas tank, boom. That’s when she did it. She bit onto his hand with enough force that could take a finger clean off as if it were a carrot. He bellowed in pain as he let go. Paige quickly broke away and attempted running towards me. Why? I began questioning. It would be better if she’d simply save herself.

“Allow it. “ Nathan said staring at us from a safe distance. The gang backed off but the fire had still been reaching dangerous heats. The rubber of the tires were left in a molten black pile of sludge and the paint began to bubble and bulge up. I knew how much danger I had been in, yet, I couldn’t move. It had been between pain and fear but I had been completely paralyzed.

“No! Let me go!” Paige screamed in utter desperation. At first I thought it been the gang but then I saw them running off in my peripheral vision. I felt someone tug onto me and dragging me backwards, away from the raging inferno.

Everything had still been blurred. My head felt like it had been filled with cotton. My mouth numb with the taste of copper and a dull pain pierced through my gut. I heard a wailing noise as blur flashes of red and blue danced before my eyes.

After that, just darkness.


I came too a while after. I was sitting at the back of the ambulance with a dull pain through my gut, more bearable then before, and a few scratches. Other then that, I seemed fine. Paige stared at me from the adjacent bed, her eyes filled with worry and her hands were trembling. Before the conversation had started between us, one of the police officers peered through the back of the ambulance. His bulky frame nearly overshadowed the entire ambulance. His brown hair was kept in a way that would usually look neat, if he weren’t exhausted from the long hours. I recalled him being the one to pull me away from the car before the explosion.

What had disturbed me was that I could recall him from earlier tonight – Ethan. The cop that had been assigned to her disappearance.
“You kids alright?” He asked generally concerned. For a moment, I expected Paige to respond but she remained silent in her state of shock. Of course.

“I-I don’t know... “ I said,  voice still shaky. My head still felt like it had been stuffed with cotton but at least the pain that had pestered me earlier had passed.

“I see. Could you two please follow me to my car? I’d like to ask you and your sister a few questions back at the station. If that’s okay with you, that is.”

Sister? I shook the question off. Must have been Paige’s doing. “Questions about what?” I asked nervously.

“The gang that attacked you. I believe that you can ID their faces.”

“Of course.” Paige shot a worried glance at me but remained silent. I couldn’t refuse without raising suspicion and I realized that. I just had to find a way to play it out I guess. Paige had already set down the ground work.

Although Ethan’s car hadn’t been marked, it still felt as if we were common criminals, restrained in the backseat by shackles – even though there was no dividing grid nor shackles, just the restraint of our secrets. We had to watch our words because for all we knew, merely a sentence could seal our fate.
We didn’t speak.

I don’t recall the details of the station, just the room we were asked to wait in – small, no windows, a regular wooden table and of course, like every other place in this city, cold, unforgiving white walls.

Ethan sat down in the chair in front of us. His hair had been combed neatly now but his eyes still sank deeply into its sockets as if it had been cowering from the light, hoping to find refuge in the darkness of sleep. He slid a folder onto the table filled with small files and pictures.
“Recognize any of them?”

Usually, I was terrible with faces. I would know someone for weeks and yet not recognize them. This time it had been different. That scowl and menacing gleam in his eyes. Right off the bat, the first photograph had been Nathan. I signed and slid it forward.

“I see. Nathan had been causing a lot of trouble around here lately. But, why would he have any interest in you?” Ethan’s tone took a dangerous turn. The room rang silent and I began feeling as if the walls had been constricting on me. The fact that there had been no windows slowly began settling on my chest like a ten ton anchor, yet Paige seemed unnerved.

“Usually the good copy, bad copy routine is reserved for suspects. You think we suspects?” Her accent flared and that seemed to startle him slightly. He sat back.

“I see. Forgive me, force of the trait.” He massaged the bone in the centre of his eyes. “Besides, good cop, bad cop works with two cops. Not one.’’

“Whatever.” She said while twirling her complimentary cup of coffee before taking a sip. Her expression remained neutral and the room was again silent expect for the nerve wrecking sound of her slurping.

“How does it taste?”

“Like shit.” She continued drinking.

“Oh.” Staggered back. “Anyway, can I get your names please?”

“Daiman Price.”

“Melinda Price.” Paige’s pseudonym sounded so natural that at one point I believed it.

“I see. I really can’t shake the feeling that you guys are not siblings.”

“Because of my accent? Because I don’t sound English?”

“Yes.’’ He said blatantly, nearly challenging Paige to break.

“I see. Hope  you don’t go about telling that cute little Asian son of yours that he doesn’t look like yours.”

“Tristan? How the hell do you know him?” Paige tossed his wallet across the desk and my first thought was what the hell? When did she swipe it from him?
He was just as amazed but quickly took offense to it. “Never speak to strangers.” She said before he could get anything in, her accent flaring again as he sat down.

“May we leave now? You’ve gotten what you brought us here for. It’s time to let us get on with our lives now, don’t you think?” I said standing up. I don’t recall having so much agitation at the moment but they way I spoke, my words dripped with venom. I wanted out. I couldn’t stand being in this room no longer, confined like a prisoner with my jailer dangling the keys to my cell ahead of me, mocking me.

“Where too?” He asked and I realized that the car had been burned down. We had no means of getting around this time of the night. That’s when I felt an annoying buzz in my pocket followed by an even more monotonous beep.

Beep-beep.

Beep-beep.

I pulled my phone out and my heart stopped the moment I saw the caller ID.
Bee- I quickly slid my finger across the screen and answered. My heart no feeling like it was vibrating in the centre of my chest, slowly moving upwards, suffocating me.


“Yeah, Gordon, it’s me... “