Fury

Fury

Chapter Fifteen

Away From It All

She scrambled to back up from the counter as Mario unbalanced a tray full of empty, filthy dishes. She wasn't the only one; one of the customers, a regular she could never quite remember the name of, fell off his stool in his haste to get away from the stack of falling, syrupy plates and glasses. Cate hissed as her foot caught on a sticky spot on the floor, and her other leg went out from under her. She landed, hard, on her knee, and her skirt fluffed out, revealing the shorts she always wore underneath, since that incident with the drunk and his wandering hands.

The dishes shattered on impact with the floor, heavy white ceramic making crashes that sounded as though the huge plate glass windows in the front of the restaurant. The few remaining breakfast diners, mostly older men with the odd woman thrown in here or there, burst into applause, a mocking sound that Mario took in stride as he groaned and grabbed the broom. The other two waitresses rushed over, Katelyn still carrying a glass of milk.

Katelyn helped the diner to his feet, apologizing and stammering in embarrassment as she noticed the glass in her hand. Mary rolled her eyes and helped Cate to her feet, brushing off dust and plate pieces from her skirt, then walked into the back to tell the cook, Steve, to wait just a minute to call out orders because "Mario was a clumsy ass. Again."

Cate winced as she straightened out her outfit, the uniform that was mandatory at Minnie's Home-Style Café, on the outskirts of Phoenix, Arizona. The short (for her, at least) skirt came to just above the knee, and was a lovely, if depressing, light turquoise, and the top, a too-tight sweater with a deeply scooped neck, was bright pink. She was wearing white shoes, now with a sticky brown something stuck to the bottom, and her long hair was pulled through the back of a ball-cap, in matching pink, with Minnie's logo on the front. An apron, utilitarian black, made the whole ensemble just that much better.

Mary came from the back, took one look at her, and pointed to the tiny lunchroom in back. "Go clean yourself up, girl. You're a bit of a mess. Take your time," she added, looking around the nearly-empty diner. "Lunch rush won't start for about half an hour."

Cate nodded, thanking the older blonde woman who wore too much makeup and had taken Cate under her wing from the moment she first started working. Katelyn gave her a sympathetic smile, then turned back to flirting for tips with the middle-aged customers, who were all very appreciative.

Cate shut the door to the tiny, depressing lunchroom and sat on the nearest folding chair, her legs under her, and put her head on her arms, thinking about how her life had come to this. When she had left, protecting not just herself but her family and especially George, she had been panicking.

Ron and Harry arrived quickly, with a short, unflappable medic in tow, and took charge of the situation. Cate watched as George was strapped to a thin stretcher, and he and the medic Apparated away without any words needed. Harry and Ron began to cast charms and detection spells, and were both angrily focused. Cate simply sat there, huddled on the floor, holding the picture and unaware of her surroundings.

A hand on her shoulder caused her to shriek and jump, and the picture to flutter out of her hand. With one look at it, at the words on the back, Ron's face turned red, and Harry's white. They looked at each other, and Ron began to mutter under his breath, his face furious and tightly controlled. Harry sent a Patronus to someone- she didn't catch the name- and glanced down at Cate.

"What happened?"

Cate shrugged, her eyes never leaving the picture-George as he laughingly kissed her again. "I don't know. I went upstairs to start dinner, and he didn't come up. It's only been about half an hour. I didn't think...this is all my fault." The last was said with a whimper, and barely audible.

Harry shook his head, his eyes blazing. "No, it's not. We'll get him through this." He sighed. "In the meantime, I'd like you to go to your parent's house, and stay there. Ron and I'll check on George, and then we'll come check on you, let you know what's happening. Your house is safe, heavily warded, and virtually impenetrable. Someone is targeting you, and I can't protect both you and George right now. Can you do that?"

Cate nodded, an idea skittering across the surface of her mind. "Of course. Just...make sure he's alright?"

Harry nodded grimly. "No one will touch him again. You have my promise. He's safe, now."

~*~

He was safe, as safe as she could make him. She'd gone to her parents, as instructed, but hadn't gone in. The Manor was tall, imposing, and completely unfriendly. She could see herself walking in, to be immediately surrounding by parents and uncles and cousins, and she shivered. She didn't want that. She'd turned around, and began to walk away, with only one or two glances back at her childhood home.

She'd walked to the nearest village, a tiny Muggle place, and had found a bench just off the main street. She sat there, arms tightly around her, and made a decision. Standing again, she hugged her arms tightly around her, closed her eyes, and Apparated.

She Apparated to the Transportation office of the Ministry.

It had taken a little under twenty minutes to get permission to travel to France, because she had gone to school with the clerk, a boy named David Greer who had always fancied her, and because everyone knew her family's name. In France's Ministry, a snippety, older woman named Capucine Margaux drew up her papers to get to Russia, with warnings of recent troubles there, and, when nearly finished, was replaced by a bored, caustic girl, barely eighteen, named Veronique Vespasian, who signed the papers with a flourish, handed her a stylish, moth-eaten scarf, and ordered her from the room.

In Moscow, a helpful man who spoke little English helped her with the papers- a stack nearly four times as large as that in France- to get to America. She kept looking at the clock, calculating how long it would take Harry and Ron to begin tracking her. The Russian Transport Officer- named Ivan Aliev- stamped everything with an official seal, handed her the copies, and then an old soup can that would take her to the American Office of Magical Immigration in San Francisco, California, America. Then he asked her, in halting English, to breakfast, if she could stay that long, with a look that begged her to say yes.

She waved goodbye, grabbed the can, and appeared in a tiny, cramped room, with no furniture other than a clock on the wall that read 5:46 pm. She had left London at nearly eleven at night the previous day.

The door to the room opened, and a middle-aged woman appeared, looking harried, and gestured wildly. "Well, come on then."

The tiny, cramped room was in the back of a large, cramped office. Several other similar rooms lined the back wall, and two other people darted between opening the doors and finding more people to pushing people into the rooms, holding small objects, obviously trying to get them to leave.

The woman pushed Cate into a chair at a desk piled high with papers and flopped into the seat. A tall, bald young man with skin the color of charcoal rushed past, his sleeve on fire, and an elderly woman speaking a completely foreign language followed, a parrot with a smoking beak on her shoulder, shouting after him.

"So, what brings you here?" the woman asked, as if this office weren't in complete disarray and they had all the time in the world.

Cate had had plenty of time to think, and had come up with a story to protect herself. "I'm from London. You know, England." The woman nodded, and a quill began to take notes. "My husband has been...has been hurting me. He said he had every right, because of...well, it doesn't matter.. My family is gone, and I have no one keeping me there. So I left. I don't want him to find me. I need a safe place to go."

The woman looked at her sympathetically. "Are you asking for asylum?"

Cate nodded, relieved. "Yes, please."

The woman, who hadn't yet introduced herself, grunted. "Granted. You'll be assigned a case worker, who will visit you today or tomorrow. They'll determine if you qualify to stay here permanently, and will help you find a job, a place to live, and whatnot. For now, you'll be placed in a halfway house, just until someone can look in on you. Any questions you have will be answered by your case worker, who will be..." She began to dig through some papers, finally pulling out a small card in bright yellow. "Muirgan Mallory. Oh, you'll like her," she said with a bright smile. "Now, go to that young man over there, Brian, and he'll show you how to get to the house."

Cate felt like a whirlwind had picked her up and shaken her world. "That's it?"

The woman nodded. "Yes. Is there anything else I can help you with, because I'm extremely busy..." She looked up as the man who had been on fire stalked past; the old woman following him no longer had the parrot, and she looked murderous.

Cate shook her head, stood, and walked away. She glanced back, where the woman was glaring suspiciously at a young man with a purple scalp. She didn't even know the woman's name.

Her case worker was a short, slender woman with wild red hair and a heavy drawl, from Texas, apparently, and extremely friendly. Muirgan (who told Cate laughingly that her parents, both born and bred in Texas, simply liked Irish names and had given all nine of their children unpronounceable names that would haunt them forever) had helped her settle into a tiny apartment in Phoenix, and found her a job at Minnie's. Cate liked the imagery- rebirth- that Phoenix promised. She also gave her a card with a phone number, and then showed Cate how to use the telephone that came with the apartment.

She'd been here for almost two years, now, two long, uneventful years. The first few months found her looking over her shoulder, though whether she hoped to see George or dreaded it were beyond her. She hadn't received any owls, but didn't expect to; Muirgan promised that she wouldn't, and that the apartment was currently owl-proof.

The job was going nowhere, but it gave her something to do, something to help pay for the things that she liked. She had a little potions lab in the corner of the kitchen, and was trying to brew a batch of Wolfsbane for herself. Transformations had been tricky, but Muirgan's younger brother, Rodhlann (he begged her to call him Rol), was a magical carpenter, and helped her build a wolf-proof cage in the middle of a safe zone in one of the nearby national park, within Apparating distance and with built-in Muggle-repelling charms.

She hadn't made many friends, but the other waitresses at the diner were nice, and the cooks sometimes made her food to bring home, if they were in a good mood. She felt lonely, sure, but Muirgan helped, and being busy did as well. When Rol, after finishing the cage, asked her out for a drink and dancing, she turned him down, saying that she wasn't quite ready yet. Since she had moved to Arizona and hidden herself away from everyone, she hadn't gone out on a single date. Not that she had dated extensively before, of course, but she still loved George.

She jumped when there was a tap at the door, and Mario, looking extremely embarrassed, poked his head in. "Mary says you gotta come out now."

Cate smiled at him, quite well aware that it didn't look genuine. "Thanks."

The boy- he was a few years younger than her, about a head taller, and twice as broad as she was- flushed again. "Sorry about...about before."

She shook her head. "Don't worry about it." She stood slowly, testing her ankle. "Damn."

He frowned. "You hurt yourself?"

She shrugged. "Like I said, don't worry about it. I'm fine."

~*~

The lunch rush was always crazy. They were one of the few diners in the area, and the food was good, so the people taking off for lunch were always packed and in a hurry. She darted between tables, smiling sympathetically at Mario as he nearly unbalanced another tray and Mary stopped to yell at him. The diner was filled to bursting, and soon Cate was sick of the smells of burgers, tacos, beans, and whatever else the customers wanted.

By about three, it had slowed enough that they could each stop and take lunch. Steve, the cook, always ate on the go, even though the manager, Tim, a skinny bald man with no sense of humor, had expressly forbidden it. Cate ate quickly, making up for the half-hour she had taken before, and Mary didn't say a word when she came out of the room five minutes later, having inhaled her sandwich and orange.

Katelyn left at three fifteen; she was a college student, with classes at night; the night waitress, Rita, wouldn't be in for another hour. Mario followed at three thirty; the other busboy, Joey, would come in after school. It was just Cate for now, with Steve cleaning up the lunch mess. She had taken a long shift, today; she didn't want to sit in her tiny, depressing apartment and watch her cauldron bubble.

She whipped through her orders, drew in quite a number of tips (especially from the young male college crowd), and, by the time her shift ended, was utterly exhausted. At least tonight she wouldn't be stuck with clean up; Mario had been ordered back in, with pay, by Mary, to make the place spotless with Joey.

She walked back to her apartment- she couldn't even think of it as home- on a throbbing ankle and with a pocket full of cash. She loved waitressing, if only for the ready cash and the anonymity. She carried the hat in one hand, and kept her other tightly attached to her purse, which held her wand. The streets weren't too busy, now, and she was at her door in less than five minutes.

The red paint was peeling in the corners, and the brick of the building was chipped at the edges. The windows on the lower floors all had bars over them, and the doors were all attached to a high-tech security system that was probably worth more than the building it protected. She walked slowly up the stairs to her second floor rooms, and, when she was inside, flopped onto the sagging couch.

Merlin's beard, the place was depressing. It had pale beige paint on every wall, and the cupboards were all painted a drab shade of yellow. The refrigerator was full, though, and the cupboards. She had bought plates, silverware; she had even splurged on curtains, and the cheerful blue against the drab beige was nearly painful to look at.

She sat for a long time, listening to the ticking of the clock and the bubbling of her cauldron, before she rolled onto her back and put her feet, shoes and all, onto the other end of the couch, hearing the groan and creak of the broken board in the center. She put her arm over her eyes and took several deep breaths.

There was something she always said when she was in this mood, a reminder of why she put up with this place and this outfit and the job and the dirty city and the unfamiliar food...

George was safe. George was safe. George was safe.

She kept chanting it, over and over in her mind, as she screamed her tears and frustration into the pillow she kept just for that occasion.

Following her nightly ritual, she fell asleep with tears drying on her cheeks and the mantra in her head.

George was safe. Safe without her.