Okay, so normally if a stranger were to ask me where the nearest motel is I would point in some vague and distant direction and NOT go with him. But, under the circumstances I think it is allowable. I helped Peter back into the passenger side of my car and began driving for the nearest motel, which was, as fate would have it, on the outskirts of town. Once, we parked he handed my a hundred dollar bill, ” Go in and ask for a single room for the night.”
Now, i don’t know much but i do know that they ask for ID at motels. Which means that Peter does not want to be found, and the reason for which he still hadn’t told me. But, i figured he would tell me soon enough and got out of the car.
Once inside the motel room, Peter plopped onto the bed. I could see the mud smudges on his shoulder and he seemed to be in a lot of pain.”Let me get some ice.” I say and grab a bucket and head for the door.
“There’s no need,” He said and grabbed my hand, ” I don’t heal the way you guys do. I just need to rest for little bit, and then we can decide what to do.”
I nod my head and expect him to sleep, but instead he looks up at me,”I bet you have tons of questions for me, eh?” I smiled sheepishly.
“I will tell you the whole truth, but, once in you’re in, you’re in. There’s no going back. You’ll be in danger.” He looked me dead in the eye. That feeling in the pit of my stomach again, and again it wasn’t the burrito. Common sense told me to say something, but instead i just stared. Peter waited for me to indicate what my intention was, but it is hard to do when you don’t even know yourself. I mean there was a lot to think about: my family-i mean i am not off the radar and so my family could easily be targeted. Then, there was school to think about. Did i really want to rick my education over some stranger? But, wait. Isn’t someone’s life more important than sitting in some classroom? Well, even if i do help this guy what about my roommate/bestfriend? I could just hear her grandma now with her thick southern accent, “She knew full well she shouldn’t be messin’ with that man. She just be a mess all over!” These thoughts circled round and ’round my head and i was getting dizzy.
“Are you alright?” Peter asked concerned. He got up from the bed and walked up to me. Instinctively, i took a step back and looked into his eyes. The green calmed me, and then irritateded me. I was acting all weird and twitterpaitted. That’s right twitterpaitted.
“How dangerous is the danger?” I asked eyeing him, in what i hoped was intimidating.
“Are there degrees?” He asked sarcastically.
“Well, yeah!” I said irritatedly. “Duh, i mean there is danger financially, emotionally, and then of course there is the mortal peril kind-”
“Alright, alright,” he said quietly. I was rambling and sortof freaking out. I was making an idiot out of myself. I like to think that i am sort of brave, moralistic, beaken of light. But, in reality i am a big weaney. I looked at him and he said, ” Mortal peril, is that what you called it? Well, that is the danger that you’d be getting into.” I exhaled. Not that the idea of mortal peril calmed me, but atleast now i knew what i was working with.
“Why do these ‘Watchers’ want you?” I asked. He exhaled looked at his shoes and sat on the bed.
“Because i am what the government calls a Drifter. My kind blends into the populace and they don’t like that.”
“Why? doesn’t everyone blend into their culture or society in one way or another?” I asked, “I mean, if you’re a human being what does it matter?”
At my attempt of humor Peter’s face froze. That burrito feeling came back, and in the context this question totally made sense i swear. “You are human aren’t you?”
“Erin, i wish i could tell you what i was. I was born and this is what i am. I heal rapidly, am athletically inclined…” he put his head in his hands. I didn’t know what to do, so i sat on the bed next to him and stared at the cracks in the cheap motel paint. A line of ants were crawling from a hole in the baseboards up to somewhere behind the beaten up dresser. Suddenly, Peter looked up at me. It looked like he wanted to tell me something, but he didn’t. We just sat and looked at one another, and i felt like it was the first time i have ever been seen. His gaze flickered up to my hair and traveled down over my forehead, eyebrows, nose, lips, and then back to my eyes. I realized that i was gazing back at his jet black hair down his olive skinned face and straight nose, and back at those big green eyes. He had stubble on his face from what i can only guess were days of not shaving. I had never seen or been seen like that before, and never since. I was an alien in the world, a world with muted colors but vibrant beings that wander and not ever really know anything. The force that spins the earth continues and changes but, to what purpose? Another day breaks against the self like waves break on themselves in the sea, only to beckon another season for a steady passage of time that decays life. To what purpose? A desert lily breaks through the earthen clay only to whither. But, looking at Peter made all that disappear-i don’t know why or how.
I shook my head, this guy was making me emo and all Emersonian-esque. “What do we do know?” I asked. My voice was surprisingly strong and steady.
“Well, we need to get away from here to the Underground.”
“What’s the Underground?”
“It’s the last establishment for Drifters. We’ll be safe there until the Watchers go back to regroup.”
“What is it exactly that the Watchers want?” This seemed too easy and all too confusing to me.
“Us dead, and anyone that helps us.” He said it so simply.
“And the Underground is just like a base for Drifters and there friends?”
“Kind of. It’s a base in the way your government has bases. They protect, plan, and execute. All Drifters want is to live in peace and thrive until the Coming.”
“The Coming?”I asked.
He shook his head, frustrated. “I”m sorry.” I said, “This is all new to me, so i’m sorry that you have-”
“No,” he said,”I’m not mad at you…I’m mad at myself. I shouldn’t be telling you all this. You are already in enough danger and here I am just getting you involved deeper. It is I who am sorry.”
I shook my head, “You are a dork.”
Okay, so that wasn’t as eloquent as i had planned. But, it got his attention so, i guess it’s okay. “I already have decided to help you. Or do you not remember me bringing you here?” A twitch. Great. a twitch that either was a laugh, a sigh, or a yell.
“Alright. I’ll explain what i can to you right now. But, after that we need to change your appearance and get some rest. Deal?”
“Deal.” I said.
So, here is the part where i can try to explain everything to you his way with all the eloqution of his perfect intonation. Or i can give you the spark notes; and since, I am the one telling the story i am going to give it to you my way.
So the drifters have been on our planet for like zabillion years and helped the Egyptians build the pyramids, the chinese and their wall against the Huns, and Guttenberg with his press. I know, right? When Peter was like “The Drifters have tried to help humanity as well as grow along side them for millenia, things like the Pyramids at Giza, yada yada, and the printing press.” I was like, “Hoo, hooold on there, drifterman, what does the printing press have to do with anything?” He was all, “After the printing press the world was changed. Revolutions were waged and won before a single musketed soldier set boot to soil. People found their voice, a faith, and beauty. The printing press changed everything.”
Anyway, back to the Drifters. So, pretty much every major battle, war, and establishment they have been apart of. But, in 1692 in Massachusettes in a little town-you may have heard of it-Salem they were finally outed. I mean, different villages and people groups had figured it out earlier, but they learned to live in peace with the Drifters. However, there was a civil war amongst the Drifters: between one race called the Cassenders and the Crossers. The Cassenders and the Crossers would go into the forest for peace talks, but here is where it gets tricky. The Crossers are called Crossers because they didn’t see interbreeding with humans as wrong, they felt that if there was the ability to naturally fit together then it was another part of nature (enough said about that). Anyway, Cassenders-i don’t really know where there name comes from, maybe they were all Cassenders until Crossers were named-anway, they are purists. So, anyway one night in the forest a little girl named Martha Goodwin comes upon the Drifters in their peace talk and overhears all the sex stuff and sees Goody Glover with one of the Drifters and runs out of the forest. Goody Glover follows her and explains to her that it was an elders meeting, but little Martha questions why the minister wasn’t there. Glover tries to say it is for a party for the minister but little Martha is on to the lie-impure things was the conversation and that is where Martha has Glover. She blackmails Glover under the threat of exposure.
Despite the Martha incident the peace talks continue but a couple of weeks later Martha brings her little brother and two sisters to spy on the Drifters. The people of Salem notice that the Goodwin children are acting strangely, and a Reverend Cotton Mather is called in. Martha explains to Mather that Glover is not of this earth-which of course she had wrong, Glover is just a human woman in love with a Crosser. Then, Glover is outed before the community to be otherworldly, which was misunderstood by Mather to mean she was a witch, and Glover is eventually hanged. By now the Drifters have united to protect their secret, however, it is too late ,for many children of Salem joined the bandwagon of accusation. Most notably Abigail Williams, who herself was a halfbreed, but of course did not know.
By now Mather’s famous Memorable Providences, Relating to Witchcrafts and Possessions has been published and Salem is a hotbed of activity for paranoid humans and political Drifters. Later, Crossers were killed for staying in Salem to protect the humans from the Cassenders who wanted to kill the whole lot and move on,just as they would do later in Roanke. Tituba is the most famous and was actually a leader in the Crosser party for over one hundred years, and was later “sold” to a new master. To this day Tituba is looked at as a mother to the Crosser party. By then across Europe and North America witchhunts were conducted and the Watchers, a secret society founded by Cotton Mathers’ last wife Lydia George, was founded. Mathers would come under great emotional and financial strain because of Lydia, but would remain in the dark about the Watchers. So, that’s the history lesson that i was given and must say is shorter than Peter’s version.
O and the Coming. That is the time when their ship, i guess you would call it, is coming back for them to take them to their original planet or heaven. Peter tried to explain it to me, but all i can get from it is that it is more like a spirit transcendence not a physical rapture. Anyway, this Coming is the real reason the Cassenders don’t want interbreeding, because they don’t want anyone with even a teaspoon of Drifter in them left behind on this decandent planet. Yeah, i was offended at first too, but they have a point.
“Well, that is some history you guys have.” I said after Peter told me everything.
“Well, this is just one chunk of it and unfortunately, when this part is recounted our time will be in this chunk.” He said, “Now, we need to change your appearance and mine.”
“Why mine? They didn’t really see me.” I am weird about altering myself. I like myself, i mean besides the verbal diahorrea thing.
“Because, until we can get to the Underground if you are recognized both of us are doomed.” Doomed. It was like watching Power Rangers except, there was no promise that the end was good. The burrito in my stomach did an uneasy turn and i got the goosebumps.
“Okay, Erin, let’s do this.” He said,” Why don’t we just cut your hair and dye it and rename you for now. Then, after everything blows over you can go home.”
“Do you really think that the Watchers will let me go? I mean, i think if they find out who i am then my family and I will never be able to get away. I mean at the very least they will question me, and now i know so much about you and your kind.” I hated to admit it, but now i was involved alot more than i thought i would be. And so are my family and friends.
Peter looked at me again, and then shook his head, “No. I don’t really think they will.”
“Fine. Let’s alter me and get going.” We got back into my Ol’Aspire, which Peter told me i would have to sell since they would be able to track the plates, and went to Wal-Mart for hair dye.
Once, we got to Wal-Mart, i looked at the dye and saw some really cute blonde highlights that i thought would look AMAZING with my dirty blonde hair, but Peter pulled out some black dye.
“H-to the no, I will look so bad. everyone will be able to remember me because i will look goth. NO.” I said
“This is not a fashion show, Erin, we just need you to look different.” Peter tried to reason.
“Yeah, i’ll look different. So, different that when the Watchers interview people and show your picture they’ll say,’ and he was with someone, she was really gothlooking you know?’ Instead of being like, ‘i don’t think he was with anyone’ because i look so average.” I grabbed the box with blonde highlights and added, “besides if i cut my hair to look black and short then they’ll really be able to spot that a mile off. We’re going with the blonde.”
Yeah, so i know it is absurd to be arguing about hair dye at a time like that.
Anyway, back at the motel I dyed my hair and Peter cut my hair, horribly i might add, to my shoulders which i had to even out. But, I did look different and i felt sad that my old life was gone.
When were done with all that Peter took a pillow and settled on the floor while i took the bed. I laid there for a minute before asking, “Where is the Underground anyway?”
“The desert”
I groaned and rolled over to try and get some sleep.
