Sharon Carver (toilsandsnares) wrote in repose, @ 2016-06-08 21:53:00 |
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Entry tags: | *narrative, sharon carver |
No doubt the first of many Sharonarratives
Who: Sharon Carver
What: Cheeseburger
Where: The Diner
When: Wednesday night
Warnings/Rating: Nada
By week three Sharon was pretty sure she was on a wild goose chase, and likely just further away from where ever in the world her kids were. Looking back on it all the phone call had been a little too convenient, and if it really had been from anyone useful or friendly to her they would have reached back out by now. Instead she was here, in this town, lying as low as possible way out in the open. There was something familiar about this town, and the government facility she'd staked out on more than one night. She'd never been assigned anything here, the familiarity wasn't that succinct. It was eerie, and uncomfortable.
She thought of a dozen different ways of getting into the facility, but she knew her kids weren't in there. The longer time passed without any sign or signal, she was pretty sure she was less lying low in the wide open, and more a sitting duck. She supposed that was what kept her there. Whatever it was that was lurking around, whoever it was that had called her to this town, for whatever reason, it would give her some kind of answer to something. Or a shot to the head.
So she kept going through the motions. Half terrified that every passing minute was getting her further from her goal, but rooted to the spot in the hopes of finding anything that would fill the blank spots in her mind. That alone might lead her to the kids as well. It didn't stop the burning ache, and worry. Twelve weeks. Three months. So much happened in three months in the lives of children. Three months not knowing where they were, who they were with, or if they were safe. It was enough to drive her mad, but she didn't have that luxury.
So she continued going through the motions. She smiled at people she met, she worked in the hardware store, she watched and learned and listened. Finding nothing of import. Intrigue? Yes. There was enough going on around this place to pique the interest of a woman like her for ages. But her interest was decidedly not piqued. She smiled, she worked, she ate. Forcing each and every last one but making it look as natural as anything. It was what she did. Who she was.
She sat in the diner on a particularly normal Wednesday evening, eating a cheeseburger, reading a book, turning the pages one after the other after the right amount of time. No one really had to know she was forcing down every bite, or that she hadn't read a single word on a single page. She smiled at people as they walked by and made eye contact, she said please and thank you to the servers, she ignored the empty bench across from her that should be filled with two squabbling blondes. She contemplated de ja vu with every turn of the page. A phone call had been enough to get her here, de ja vu was enough to keep her there, she was grasping at straws, and she knew it, but she didn't believe in dead ends.