Silence. No one dares speak a word. The stranger sits across from us with the same stone-faced expression he had when he sat down a few minutes ago. Ripley is still on the line, and while I can’t see him, I feel he’s holding back a torrent of words and tears. Fang sits to my left, laser-focused on the phone in front of us. Every detail is apparent to me: her long, shallow breaths; the minute twitching of her jaw; the barely perceptible trembling of her arms; the look of complete shock on her face. Fang glances up at the dino across from us, then leaps out of her seat and sprints for an exit. By the time I call her name and get up from my seat, she’s already out the door and headed down the sidewalk. By the time I’m out the door, she’s already rounded a corner and headed towards our apartment. All I can do is follow at an ever-increasing distance and hope I can calm her down when I get there. Torched by the summer sun, drenched in sweat and out of breath, I push past the door that was haphazardly left open. I hear Fang rummaging around in the bedroom, and I hobble over to the doorway. A pair of suitcases lie open, clothes still on their hangers strewn across the bed. She comes into view with more clothes hanging off of her arms and tosses them towards the suitcases. She turns around and notices me, then looks expectantly. “Well? Are you going to just fucking stand there, or are you going to help?” Without waiting for an answer, she heads back into the closet. “What are you doing?” I ask with great exhaustion. “The fuck does it look like? My dad found us, so we need to go. Now, if that wasn’t obvious.” She heads back to the bed and starts to stash clothes away, not bothering to fold them. “And then what?” She hesitates, her wings twitching in agitation. “Where are you even planning on going?” “Who cares?” she hisses. “There are more important things to worry about right now.” “Fang. Stop.” “Were you not paying attention? The guy who threatened to put you in prison is on your ass, and you want to stop?” “Were you? He was begging to help us. Begging for your forgiveness.” She stops tending to the suitcases, staying in place slanted over the bed. “So what? He’s- he’s fucking lying.” “Why? That-” “He just is!” she blurts. “Well, I don’t think he’s lying.” “You don’t know him like I do.” “You ever heard him cry before?” She opens her mouth to respond, but nothing comes out. “Cause that’s what he was doing. Crying. For you.” “We… we can’t stay,” she mutters. What isn’t she getting? “We have to! We’re out of money and we’re running out of time. We do this again, we’re going to be sleeping on concrete instead of a bed.” “We… I…” She collapses to her knees and buries her face into the blankets. The sound of muffled weeping bleeds through shortly after. “Look, I-” I reach out to her, but she weakly shoves me away. “Get off me…” she moans. I sit down with my back to the bed a couple of feet away. This was always going to catch up to us sooner or later. Just didn’t think it would be this soon. My eyes wander around while trying to think of something to say, and they fall on the front door that’s wide open. Guess I should fix that. I push myself upright and slowly head over to the door. As I place my hand on the knob, I spot a tall gray dinosaur leaning against the wall outside of the doorway looking directly at me. The only thing that stops me from shouting is the sudden shock clenching all of my muscles at once. “Catch,” he says, reaching into a pocket and tossing its content at me. I barely react in time, the object bouncing around in my hands a few times before settling into place. It’s a phone. “Call him when you want to talk, call me if you want to leave. Any questions?” This Castle guy knows where I live now. Great. “I already knew where you lived.” Fuck. “Take your time. Just not too long, I’ve got places to be.” He walks away, throwing up a little wave as he leaves. I stuff the phone into a free pocket, close the door and return to the bedroom. Fang is sitting on the floor with her back to the bed, wearing a morose expression. I slide down next to her, but decide against speaking. Ripley can wait. It’s better if we take some time to think some things through. “I don’t want to…” Fang whispers after a few minutes of silence. “I can’t go back.” “We don’t have to,” I whisper back. “But we can’t do this all on our own. We need a miracle, and one is offering itself to us.” I wind my fingers between hers and squeeze. “All we have to do is say yes.” She squeezes back. “Do you… do you think we’ll be good parents?” Parents. That word is like a sledgehammer to the skull. I’ve spent this entire time thinking about what we need to do leading up to that point that I haven’t spared a thought to what comes after. Parents. Looking after our own flesh and blood for eighteen years or more. There’s simply no way I can know how that will go. “I think we’ll do just fine.” ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I had waited until the next day to show Fang the phone and relay the offer I was given. She glanced at it a few times, but didn’t seem to want to give it the time of day. Now that evening had rolled around and there were fewer excuses for distraction, she stares at the phone sitting on the kitchen table. She constantly shifts through thinking, reaching, hesitating, retreating, and thinking again. There’s going to be a breakthrough at some point. “I can’t do it,” she groans in frustration and shame, holding her head in her hands. “It doesn’t make any fucking sense. None of this does. There’s… there’s something we’re not seeing. I don’t like it.” She looks up at me. “You get me, right?” “I think so. At the same time, we’re not going to get any closer to seeing whatever it is by closing our eyes.” She looks away and shakes her head, not pleased with the answer I gave. “Look, we have to do this sooner or later. Waiting won’t make it any easier.” I take the phone off the table. “I’ll warm him up for you.” I walk over to the couch and look through the phone. There are only two numbers in the contacts list - one labeled Ripley and the other labeled Castle. I dial Ripley and put the phone to my ear. This will be the first time we’ve spoken to each other since… a few days after all this shit started. These last six or seven weeks have felt like a year. “Hello?” Ripley’s low and gruff voice is unmistakable, although it seems to have lost a bit of the edge I remember it having. “Hey. It’s Anon,” I reply. “Oh. Hey.” He sounds disappointed. “How are… how are things going over there?” “They’ve… been worse. Your buddy showed up at a good time.” “He’s not really my buddy. Sorry for yesterday, by the way. He told me he was going to do something completely different, but it sounds like it freaked you two out.” “It’s… it’s alright. I don’t think it would have made that much of a difference.” “If you say so. I’m just glad you two are okay. Naser and I were bedridden with worry.” God, Naser. He’s gotta be pissed that I was yanking him around so much. “Yeah… is he doing alright?” “Better, now,” he replies. “Think something happened between him and that parasaur girl, though.” Wait, Naomi? “What do you mean?” I ask, failing to sound less interested than I actually am. If he noticed, he doesn’t show it. “Haven’t seen her or heard her mentioned since not too long after you two left. They seemed pretty joined at the hip, so to speak, so it wasn’t hard to notice.” Naomi out of the picture? I glance over at Fang, who’s still sitting in the kitchen across the apartment. I don’t know if she’s within earshot or if she’s even paying attention. “What about Trish?” I ask quieter than before. “Seen her around?” “She showed up a handful of times, but I wasn’t too interested in talking, especially after that false report. Pardon me for asking, but was there a… falling out between them?” “A bit, yeah…” That opens up an interesting possibility. Might be easier for all of us if we can bite the bullet and go back to Volcaldera. Maybe… “Anyways…” he mutters. “You two figure out what you want to do?” “We’re… still discussing it.” “Alright, well, take your time. No rush.” “Yeah…” There’s a long, awkward pause. Guess that’s everything we needed to say. “I’ll hand you over to her now.” I get up and walk over to the kitchen, holding the phone out for Fang to take. She looks between it and me a couple of times, and I indicate that I’m not really giving her a choice. Tentatively, she takes it, then rushes over to the bedroom and shuts the door behind her. Well, it’s quite literally out of my hands now. All that matters now is how badly Fang does or does not want to step foot in Volcaldera again. If there are any apprehensions about seeing Trish or Naomi there, they should be irrelevant now. Reed said he was going to stick with Trish, so he probably won’t go where she won’t. If there’s anything else between her and either Naser or her dad, it should be workable. I’m not sure how long they were talking on account of our only clock being in our bedroom, but Fang eventually emerges. She places the phone back on the table and sits next to me. She was definitely crying, but despite it, she seems to be in an alright mood. “How’d it go?” I ask. “Good… I think,” she replies. “He didn’t say it, but he really wants us to come back. I just…” She trails off, looking at nothing in particular. “Just what?” She sighs heavily, her mood shifting negatively. “Naomi.” Her voice is guilty and fearful. “I don’t know what I’d do around her. I wouldn’t be able to even look at her… or Naser….” “I think they broke up.” That breaks Fang’s train of thought immediately. “What? Did- did dad tell you that?” “Well, he said he hasn’t seen Naomi around for a couple of weeks. That might as well be months for them.” “I… wow. That… I guess solves that. There’s still Trish, though.” “Your dad hasn’t seen her around much, either.” She raises an eyebrow at me. “You’ve got a lot of answers.” “I asked some good questions.” She shrugs. “Well… do you think we should go back?” “I don’t think it’s a bad idea, but I don’t know if it’s the better idea either. At the end of the day, it’s your family, not mine.” “Convenient time for you to stop answering questions,” she smirks. “I’m just saying, this shouldn’t be my call. Speaking of answering questions, did you tell him about… you know?” “What- holy fuck, no! Over the phone, are you crazy?” “I was just wondering! I mean, you’ll have to drop that eventually. And if you’re not going to do it over the phone…” “Be quiet. I’m still thinking about it…” “Right.” She punches me in the shoulder. Deserved. “Oh, I almost forgot.” She jabs me in the ribs with an elbow. “Ow, what the fuck? That was not a two-fer!” “I told you I recognized that guy.”