ellectrical | May 2007, Let's Go

It's still early morning when Elle steps through to her world, pushing aside what turns out to be the thick glass door of a convenience store, the kind half-attached to a gas station off the main highway, and into the cool night. She'd slept in the bar to prepare for this; her duffel bag is slung over her shoulder, and she'd chosen something softer – a pair of jeans, simple sandals, the Bar's white peasant top and a light blue hooded shirt to go over it – for her return. The sleeves of her hooded shirt are long enough to cover her watch, and even unzipped, the shirt conceals the holstered gun affixed at her shoulder. That's not something that she plans to use if she can help it. The right electric shock is usually much less conspicuous than a bullet wound.

Elle takes for granted that one or the other will become necessary.

There's no one in sight as she walks through the empty parking lot adjoining the store, and heads toward the road beyond it. Light she has plenty of, even without her ability. High lamps provide an orange glow that shines off the pavement and continues on to the road ahead, and the moon is nearly full, though it's getting late enough that even the night sky is starting to pale. If anything is bothering her, it's the silence. Too little noise is something that has always got to her, and it's enough to make her jittery now, but she makes her steps as loud as possible as she walks from concrete to gravel and grass, stepping off the road that leads out of the parking lot, pausing occasionally to try to read the signs in the light that glints off the painted steel. It doesn't take her long to decide on a direction.

It's the walk that's long. Two hours following the road, though she only stops to switch her bag between her shoulders, and check the posted signs to makes sure the mile count seems to be decreasing in the right way. Cars begin to appear and gradually become more numerous as the sky turns lighter. A few slow down, but she ignores them, managing not to tense or reach toward her holster as she does. Neither stops, in any case.

By the time she passes the 'Welcome' sign of her destination, the sun has started to hedge along the eastern sky.

There were two doors hung with 'Open' signs across the road from the White Plains station; one in a Starbucks, the other a tiny grocery store. Elle had arrived in time to not have to wait outside the station, but after finding the ticket counter, she was told the bus she wanted wouldn't leave for another hour. With the hood on her shirt pulled up, she'd decided on the grocery store, though she didn't buy anything more than an apple and a cup of their coffee.

Back in the station, she'd spread over a plastic bench in the small, but open and uncrowded waiting area, and spent a few seconds deciding she liked the coffee she could get from the Bar better. She'd still finished it in half an hour, and then with fifteen minutes left, entered one of the stalls in the station's bathroom. There, Elle hung her duffel bag from the hook on the door, and sorted through it, pulling out her small water bottle to wash down the cheap coffee, then taking off her hoodie and peasant top and replacing them with a white t-shirt, the image of a short, square stone tower on green hill imprinted on its front. Elle has little idea of what makes Glastonbury a tourist destination, but it's just as well for her. The change meant her holster was no longer concealed, and so Elle slipped it and her gun into the bag, leaving the gun just beyond the end of the zipper. Finally, she took out a hair tie and pulled her hair back, and stopped in front of one of the spotted mirrors to make sure her bangs still lay smoothly over her scar.

Since then, she'd boarded the bus, putting her bag in the seat next to her. There were few enough people riding with her that seats were left open in every row; she took one near the back, and dissuaded a potential neighbor by ignoring him when he asked if the seat next to her was taken. The large windows made this easy, Elle didn't stop looking through her own until after they'd left the first stop.

Now, she carefully unzips the top of her bag, just enough to fit her hand in, and feels her way to the small plastic bag she'd packed inside. It's what she'd brought for now, half a box of Thin Mints. Elle zips the duffel closed again, and pulls open the top of the plastic bag, picking out one of the thin cookies as her eyes turn back to the window. It's not that there's much to see – mostly trees, road signs, the cars that slip by in the passing lane and the occasional rush of chain restaurants and gas stations that indicate they're passing by a town. Maybe she shouldn't even be looking out the window, in case they go by the wrong car or camera lens.

But –

Maybe I do.

- she'll have to get used to it.

Three and a half hours later, Elle is on the E train heading north. She'll have to switch to the F, but there will be plenty of chances to do that – the train hasn't even left Manhattan yet. Elle is settled in beige plastic seat with her duffle bag in her lap, though the car itself isn't all that crowded, either. Too late for the morning rush, but too early for the lunch break, not that Elle is familiar with either. Those in her car are a couple reading from the same book as they lean against a pole, a man in a long black coat fiddling with the buttons on his phone (though she's sure there can't be service here), and in the seats across from her, a girl maybe ten years old, with her mother. The girl has short dark hair that's been tightly bound into twin pigtails; her mother is distracted by a newspaper.

Elle pretends to be distracted as well, though all she has to occupy herself is the end of the duffel bag's zipper, which she twiddles back and forth as the train stops and continues on. The girl is twisting around one of the hand rails, waving a plastic toy in the shape of a wand with a star placed at the end. It's yellow with sparkles inlaid, and occasionally, the girl presses on the toy's side, though this does nothing at all.

Each time, however, the girl calls to her mother. Elle doesn't need to listen to know what the problem is, though the girl's mother ignores her.

After four shouts and three stops, Elle looks up from twiddling the zipper. Her eyes seem to meet the girl's as though on cue; without saying anything, Elle holds her hand out, palm open. The girl's eyes don't leave hers, not even when she reaches toward her, and puts the toy in Elle's hand.

The process is simple enough. Elle looks down, turning the plastic wand over in her hand, the sparkles inlaid in the yellow plastic glittering in the fluorescent lights that line the top of the car. She digs her nail into a groove in the back, and pops open the cap over the hollowed out portion of the toy that contains its batteries. The plastic cap is set in the seat next to her, and she taps the wand against her left palm, sliding the two AA batteries into her hand.

She sets the wand aside now, too, and picks up both batteries one at a time, holding them for a few seconds between her thumb and index fingers. There's no visible sign of what she's doing, and just as quickly, she's replacing the batteries into the wand, and clicking the cap back on.

It's not until she's handing it back to the girl that a voice snaps –

"Sarah."

The girl's mother had finally looked up, her eyes blinking between the two of them as the girl takes the toy back. "You don't give your things to strangers."

It's nearly startling that the girl doesn't look back to her mother. She doesn't even answer, only presses the button on the toy once again. The star at the end of the wand lights up, illuminating the yellow plastic, and a noise like the sound of bells emits from it.

"She said she was going to fix it."

Elle blinks to the woman.

"Yes, well –"

The mother stuffs her paper into her purse and reaches out to grab the girl's shoulder, pulling her back to the other side of the car, and into a seat.

Directed to Elle, without really looking at her – "Thank you."

Elle doesn't answer, but it doesn't matter. Though there's no connection to the F, Elle pulls herself up, and gets off at the next stop.

She had thought it was about knowing where to look. That she'd become so used to it because rather than being the exception, most of the people she'd known in her life were like her. Now, as she waits on the platform for the next train to come, Elle realizes that it wasn't that they were the exception. It wasn't about knowing where to look. It was about knowing how to look.

They're everywhere.

There was no point in spending more money than she had to. Elle could understand that. She isn't sure what anyone would expect of her if they were looking, and she doubts it would be this. It wasn't too close to where she was really heading, but that would work out for the best - the motel is a four story walk-up about five blocks from the station she'd exited at 169th street. It had a small lobby lit with flickering fluorescent bulbs and walls painted a shade of taupe that reminded of her of the halls of the Hartsdale facility (though the dim scent of cigarette smoke and the plastic over the sofa in it did not), and the man at the desk gave her a key and a subway map.

The room itself has barely enough room for the single bed and a dresser with a small television on top. A closed door immediately to the left of the entrance leads to bathroom. There's a window that looks into the alley between her building and the next, with not much in it aside from a dumpster and the tattered posters that on the brick walls. After setting her duffel on the bed, she sets the 'Do Not Disturb' sign around the doorknob, and draws the cloth curtain over the window.

Elle sits on the bed, her eyes falling to her duffel bag and then to the television – they've left the remote control on top of it. It's not too late in the day to start some recon, but instead, she picks up the remote, and clicks on the television. After going through the channels twice, she settles on one that looks like news, or at least involves anchors and illustrative graphics.

Then minutes later, she's hit the mute button, and pulls her bag over to start going through her things. Suddenly, work seems like the better idea after all.

She's unpacked as much as she's comfortable with unpacking (clothes, cookies, another New York City subway map) about an hour later, and decides to finally look into the bathroom. This door, however, leads something else entirely.

"Better than a bathroom," Elle mutters, before heading back to the bed to grab her bag.