***
Twelve years later
Sorting through the change in her hand, Cassie hastily picked out the nickels and dimes, absently shoving aside the pennies. Sighing in aggravation, she glanced at the unattainable Coke machine before digging into the pocket of her cutoffs once more. All she wanted was a cold soda, was that too much to ask? Apparently as all she pulled out were a few pieces of lint, a gum wrapper, and dirt.
Cassie fought the fierce urge to kick the machine in frustration; it was not its fault that the price of soda had gone up fifteen cents. It was the stupid, greedy, owner of the store. Glancing past the machine, she peered into the dingy windows of the Five and Dime. Mr. Lester was watching her intently, waiting to make sure that she didn’t do exactly what she longed to do most. She wanted to stick her tongue out at the man, but then she would be banned from the store, and he did have the best selection of baseball cards, candy, and comic books in town.
Glancing longingly back at the bright red machine, Cassie heaved a sigh of regret, shoved her change back into her pocket and turned away. She would just have to drink from the water fountain during baseball practice, instead of having the nice, cold, wonderful can of Coke that she really wanted. She scrunched her nose slightly, already dreading the taste of the metallic water fountain.
Grabbing her mitt from the store windowsill, she turned back to the main thoroughfare. She didn’t make it one step before she was brought to an abrupt halt by a tall, thin man, with a pair of glasses perched at the end of his hawkish nose. His light gray eyes ran quickly over her as he studied her intently. Cassie’s hand tightened on her glove as she took a small, instinctive step back. She was not some five year-old who would wander away with a stranger, but she didn’t know what the odd man’s intentions were.
Glancing briefly over her shoulder she was relieved to find Mr. Lester still watching intently, his eyes slightly narrowed as he observed the man. Though he liked to squeeze as much money as possible out of the kids, he wouldn’t allow anything bad to happen to her. She turned slowly back to the strange man. His eyes were still fixed upon her, but she saw no ill will in his steady gaze. Instead, there was an odd sense of relief in his eyes.
A slender girl stepped beside him, her hand slipped into his as she squeezed it gently. Cassie’s tension eased at the sight of the black haired girl who was so trusting of the strange man. The girl studied Cassie from exotically slanted eyes; they were as dark and shiny as a gleaming onyx. Those eyes pierced Cassie, pinning her to the spot as they seemed to see straight into Cassie’s soul.
Slightly unnerved by the girl’s intense gaze and scrutiny, Cassie turned her attention back to the man. Though he seemed to be in his late thirties, maybe forties, old enough to be the girl’s father, they looked nothing alike. His hair was a light brown, going gray at the temples. His eyes were far from dark in color, and unlike the girls smooth olive complexion, he was very fair.
“Are you Cassandra Fairmont?” he inquired, the faint hint of an English accent in his tone.
Cassie frowned at him, not understanding how this man knew who she was, let alone her full name. Her grip tightened on her glove, her stance shifted slightly as she prepared to bolt into the Five and Dime at a moment’s notice. “Do I know you?” She was proud of the fact that her voice didn’t waver.
“No, but I may have known your parents.”
Cassie’s heart leapt into her throat, her arm dropped limply to her side. Her fingers eased their tight grip on her glove to the point that she nearly dropped it. Other than her grandmother, and Chris’s mother, Cassie knew no one that had ever met her parents. Though Cassie often asked questions about her parents, her grandmother rarely spoke of them. Once in awhile, she would share stories of Cassie’s mother when she was a little girl, and her father, as her grandmother had also known him as a child.
However, Chris’s mother never spoke of them; she hated any mention of Cassie’s parents, or Chris’s father. She used the mere mention of them as an excuse to retreat deeper into her drunken stupor, or to hit the bars in search of a new conquest. It was a fact that had once bothered Chris, but lately he had taken to ignoring his mother as easily as she ignored him.
Now, this strange man was standing before her telling her that he may have known her parents, and quite possibly, Chris’s father. It was a lifeline, a level of hope that she had never experienced before. This man, this stranger, could be their one chance to get to know their parents better.
“My parents?” she managed to choke out.
The man’s eyes were gentle as he nodded slowly. “Yes, if they were Derek and Jessie Fairmont?”
The man blurred as Cassie’s eyes filled with water. She rarely heard their names spoken, rarely had the chance to acknowledge that they had ever even lived. It was as if everything about them had ceased to exist when they were killed in the car accident. Not just their bodies, but their memories, history, their entire lives had been buried forever.
Now, they were being openly acknowledged, openly conversed about, and it was by a total stranger. Cassie glanced at the slender girl, surprised by the wealth of caring and understanding that filled her warm onyx eyes. Swallowing heavily, Cassie rapidly blinked back her tears, trying hard not to completely fall apart in front of the strange pair.
Taking a deep breath to steady her pounding heart, and raw nerves, she turned slowly back to the man. “Yes,” she said softly. “Those were my parents.”
Relief filled him; his shoulders slumped as he broke into a brilliant grin. The girl squeezed his hand harder, doing an odd little jump step as she beamed happily. “I told you,” she said excitedly.
The man shook his head at her, but there was no censure in the gesture as he continued to smile brightly. He thrust his hand out to Cassie. “My name is Luther Long; I’ve been looking for you for a very long time Cassandra.”
Cassie stared silently at his extended hand as confusion swirled through her. Though she sensed no ill will from them, they still scared her a little. But then again, the strange man did seem to know her parents, and best of all, he seemed to actually want to speak about them. The temptation was more than she could withstand.
Thrusting her hand out, she grasped hold of Luther’s warm, well calloused one. His grin widened as he shook her hand briskly.
In that moment, when he found her, when their hands joined, her life was irrevocably changed. The course of her destiny forever altered. Over the years that followed, Cassie often wondered if she would have run screaming from him, and the changes that he would bring to her life.