Xavier and Earl

I'm sorry for not posting this sooner but the internet where I was was spotty and quite unruly. Thus this is posted after a delay. I continued the saga featuring Xavier of the excerpt previous. With this piece, I tried digging into more of the back story of why Xavier is going to Anton and the identity of the "dead person" he's looking for. It surprised me very much, giving me ideas that I hadn't even thought to contemplate before, but I hope that you all enjoy the revelation just as I did.

Xavier and Earl

Earl began organizing the various pieces of jewelry by type and color for the third time, giving Xavier sidelong glances every so often. Xavier sat in a chair behind the counter, rocking back onto two legs of the chair and fingering a photograph. Whistling nonchalantly, Earl edged his way closer and closer to his friend. Xavier remained absorbed with his photo. As his whistling waned, Earl looked over Xavier's shoulder to see what had so fixated his friend's attention. After seeing the subject of the picture though, he shook his head slowly and walked back towards the shelves of digital cameras.

“She's out there, Earl,” Xavier said quietly, not looking up from the photograph.

“Xavier,” Earl began with a sigh.

“She is out there,” Xavier repeated, crinkling the corners of the photo.

“You've got to let her go, man,” continued his friend as he let the cameras be. “There's nothing more you can do.”

“But she's still waiting to be found!”

Kicking over the chair as he got up, Xavier shoved the picture in Earl's face.

“Look at her! You're just going to give up on her?!”

Earl pushed Xavier's hands away and tried to move past him towards the depths of the shop. Xavier grabbed his shoulder as he passed, turning him back towards the photo. As Earl attempted to move away, Xavier tightened his hold on his friend's shoulder.

“Look … at … her,” Xavier seethed.

“She's dead, Xav. Accept it!” Earl broke out, ripping away his shoulder and grabbing both of Xavier's shoulders in his turn. “You can't let your guilt control you like this. You're going to drive yourself insane. Some people have even already started discussing committing you to Rigby Range.”

He snatched the photo from Xavier's hand and turned it so Xavier was confronted by its image.

“Is this what Sarah would want? You obsessing over Jemma? Losing your hold on reality?”

Xavier stared at the photo, wellsprings forming in his eyes. With a quivering hand, he reached up and took the picture from Earl. Earl released both the photo and his friend's shoulder, moving to lean against the counter. Xavier held the picture in both hands as rivers ran down his face.

“Do you remember taking this picture?”

“'Course I do. It was a week before the accident.”

“We were having a picnic to celebrate Sarah getting into veterinary school. Jemma had helped me make a cake for her.”

A smile quivered across Xavier's face.

“She … she insisted that we write 'conga-rats' instead of 'congratulations' because it had animals in the name. Sarah just about died laughing when she saw it.”

“I remember you freaking out that you'd forgotten the napkins and utensils when it came time to eat it,” Earl added, a smile playing around his mouth.

“Yes,”laughed Xavier as he wiped his face with his shoulder. “I thought I'd ruined everything. But Sarah and Jemma … thy just looked at each other and grabbed handfuls of cake. Like mother, like daughter. They never saw a problem without finding a solution.”

Dropping one hand on the counter to support himself, Xavier covered his eyes with his other arm, his hand clutching the photograph. His breathing grew ragged. Earl watched his friend and dug around in his pocket.

“I can't lose her, Earl. I barely have Sarah and I promised her … I promised her I'd take care of Jemma until she woke up. How can I face her now? How can I say I lost the best thing that ever happened to her?”

Hearing a crackling sound, he removed his arm and looked toward his friend. Earl was holding out a peppermint. Xavier took the mint, unwrapped it, and popped it into his mouth. Setting the photo on the counter, he tried to smooth out the corners. Earl wrapped his arm around Xavier's shoulders.

“You'll cross that bridge when you get there,” counseled Earl. “For now, just be there for Sarah. Focus on what you can do for those who are still here.”

Xavier nodded and continued smoothing the picture, pausing at times to stroke the faces of a smiling blonde young woman and a laughing brown-haired girl.

Xavier and Anton

I realize that I have a bad habit of leaving things unfinished for which I apologize profusely, dear readers. But I had a new idea. In my mind, I pictured a guy in a fedora pulled down over his eyes smoking a cigarette as he leaned up against a wall. The feeling with the picture wasn't that the guy was sinister but he was a bit shady, "working on the side of the angels but not one of them" to quote a certain BBC show. At first, I thought I would need to create a whole framework and story into which he fit and played but then it dawned on me that I could just start writing a scene with him in it and see where it went from there. And so here is the scene. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did writing it.

Xavier and Anton

“Thanks for the ride,” Xavier said to the cabbie. “Keep the change.”

“Sure this is the right place? Rather a lonely spot,” commented the cabbie.

“Yeah, I'm sure. I'm probably just early is all.”

“If you say so.”

As the cab drove away, Xavier looked around the street. At the end were the cab's taillights fading around the corner. The stores on the street were closed for the day and looking as if no one cared whether they opened again or not. Along the street were a couple of vehicles as forlorn looking as the buildings in front of which they were parked. A few streets over, a siren sounded. Xavier peered into several of the dusty, empty windows before confirming the suspicion that there was no one else around. Hearing a crash and a scream nearby, he jumped and looked towards the source of the noise. Two cats chased each other out of an alley, across the street, and into another byway. Xavier exhaled slowly and leaned up against the wall.

“You spook easy. That's good to know.”

The young man whirled around to see another person in the street with him. Seemingly out of nowhere and making no more noise than a ghost, the speaker had appeared leaning up against the same wall.

“Are … are you Anton?”

“I go by that name … sometimes,” answered Anton, taking a pull on a lighted cigarette.

Xavier stuck his hands in his pockets and shifted from foot to foot, waiting for Anton to continue. The stranger let out his cigarette smoke slowly. An awkward silence had fallen on the two people, one that Xavier did not feel it was his place to break. He didn't want to scare the guy off by acting too eager, by being overly hasty. But Anton continued to lean there smoking his cigarette as if he had eternity ahead of him. The young man began playing with the insides of his pockets to give his fingers something to do.

“So … you wanted something from me.” Anton finally spoke through an expulsion of smoke.

“Yes, yes I did,” Xavier confirmed with more eagerness than he had wanted to show. “Franny said that you could do just about anything.”

“Well, you know sisters. They'll say just about anything about their big brothers.”

“Then … was she … was she wrong?”

“No, she wasn't,” assured Anton, holding his cigarette between two fingers. He turned to directly face Xavier and looked straight into his eyes. “But you really shouldn't believe everything everyone tells you.”

Xavier took his meaning and nodded.

“I know.”

Turning his back on Xavier and returning his cigarette to his mouth, Anton started walking down the street. Xavier remained where he was and then began following Anton, at a distance. Anton stopped beside a '74 Plymouth Roadrunner that Xavier had noticed but had assumed abandoned by the state of disrepair. Rust lined the edges of the plate joints. The bumpers were dull and looked as if they'd been covered by years of dust. The rear window was so cracked it looked as if a spider had made its home within the glass.

“Well, introductions and preliminaries now aside, how about we step into my office.” Anton waved his cigarette at the front passenger seat as he disappeared inside the car.

Pausing with his hand on the door handle, Xavier looked back around the street. At the far end from which he himself had entered, another cab was passing on its way to another destination. A call jumped to his throat but never passed his lips and the cab continued on its way. He watched it disappear from sight, even waiting till he could no longer hear the tires on the asphalt. A tap on the window brought Xavier back to the fact that he had still not entered the Roadrunner. Pulling the door open and sitting down, Anton began driving away.

“Since you are coming to me on recommendation from Franny, it can only mean that you are in desperate need of something that is otherwise unattainable,” Anton stated, breathing his cigarette smoke out the window.

“Y-yes,” answered Xavier looking down at his hands, his fingers interlocking and then separating repeatedly.

Anton took lazy pulls on his cigarette waiting for his passenger to continue. Xavier kept his gaze fixed on his hands, the color slowly draining from his face. He licked his lips.

“I … I need to find someone.”

“A lot of people do.”

“Yeah … well … I don't think a lot of people are looking for someone like I am.”

“Obviously. Most people go to the police rather than come to me.”

“I tried the police,” Xavier explained through gritted teeth. “They said that I was crazy.”

“I knew that the moment you came to me. Most people, well more like everyone who comes to me is crazy in one way or another.”

Xavier gave Anton a sideways glance. For his part, Anton flicked ash from the end of his cigarette onto the swiftly passing street.

“So, why is it that our city's public servants believe you bereft of your sanity?”

Xavier leaned back in his seat and rested his head and arm against the window.

“They said … the person I'm looking for … is dead.”