Allergic to Truth
Amy carefully wrung out the moist handtowel, then wrapped it around the
two ice cubes waiting on the kitchen counter. Three steps brought her
to Lita's side; the next second saw the towel on Lita's forehead. A
second one caressed Lita's skin under Amy's guidance, exchanging hot
sweat for cool water.
Lita ordered her body to relax despite its tension at the sudden
stimulus, only to realize the futility of tensing up in order to go
limp. "Thanks, Ames," she sighed.
With Lita's prone form taking up the entire sofa, Amy lowered herself
into a chair near her friend's head. "I can't believe your parents are
still on vacation, with you sick."
"It's nothing. I'll be back on my feet by tomorrow morning."
"With a temperature of one hundred and five? I don't think so."
Lita smiled, slightly nudging the ice and almost causing it to fall off
save for Amy's quick catch and repositioning. "I told you, the
thermometer's high by six degrees. I...that is, my dad keeps meaning to
buy a new one."
"But he's always busy."
"Yeah..."
"You know, I don't think I've ever met him. Or your mom. What are they
like?"
Lita started, but settled back before Amy could react. "There's a
picture on my dresser. It's a bit old, but we never saw the need to get
a new one. I guess I'll always be five years old to them."
"A five year old doesn't hold down the fort like you do, Lita."
"Well...actually, I did start taking care of myself at that age."
Amy raised an eyebrow. "I bet they were proud of you."
"It was tough, I'll tell you. But, hey, you know me: ain't nothing
gonna take down Lita." She laughed at her own joke, which quickly
turned into deep, ragged coughs.
Amy caught the towel as it fell off Lita's head, then fished around next
to her patient's neck for the ice cube which did not hit the floor. Her
hand hesitated a little when it came into contact with Lita's skin, but
a renewed round of coughs shook it off. "More cough drops?"
******
Black paws silently crept through the shadows of a room just short
enough of twilight not to have any lights turned on, their owner only
semi-consciously invoking classic feline stealth. Sure that she had
not been detected, Luna looked up at her target. She tensed in
preparation for the final pounce...
....only for Amy to swivel and pick her up. "Hi, Luna. Serena kick you
out again?"
Luna blinked twice, before settling into Amy's lap. "Not exactly. She
is fighting with her brother, though, so she's going to be insufferable
all night long. Oh, yes, right there, please."
Amy half-smiled and kept scratching Luna with one hand, while her other
hand went back to work on her computer. "What's it about this time?"
"Oh, Serena was complaining about how the principal gave you time off to
care for Lita since you were so far ahead in your studies that a week
couldn't possibly do any harm."
"Serena was mad that I'm taking care of Lita?"
"No, but she wanted to do it herself. Anyway, her brother listed the
ways in which Serena would mess up Lita's care - not once did he say
anything about needing to study - and you can imagine how things went
from there."
"I'll say. Not that I mind taking care of Lita." She paused to
remember the day's events; for some reason, she felt a bit hot at the
end, so she wiped her brow. "I just hope I'm not coming down with what
she has."
"You've been spending an awful lot of time with her, you know."
"Yeah, well, her parents are always gone, and it feels like my parents
are always gone. I guess we've kind of become each other's parents."
"Parents don't go dancing with their kids like you two did last week."
"What are you saying?"
"Just that I've seen that look on peoples' faces before, and...ooh, yes,
a bit harder, please."
Amy wondered why some instinct made her cut off Luna's question with
renewed petting, but soon shrugged it off. Several minutes passed with
only clicks and gentle purring warding off total silence, as darkness
completed its descent upon the land.
Amy blinked, rubbed her eyes, and kicked her wheeled chair towards the
door just long enough to turn on the lights before wheeling back to her
computer. "Hey, Luna? How come you always come to my place when you
want a break from Serena?"
"I would have thought that would be obvious. I mean, I don't always
come here, but there's a good reason why I usually prefer your company."
"I have a lap while working on my computer?"
"Amy," Luna nearly growled. "That might be a good guess for Artemis,
but I'm almost offended."
Amy could not help but giggle at Luna's blatantly mock indignity. "Ok,
Luna, so why do you come here?"
"Well...Mina already has Artemis, and before you say it, if we were ever
to date, we would not want to disturb any of you...that is, if things
went better than that fleabag could ever hope to pull off, of course."
"Of course, Luna. What about the others?"
"Raye's birds and I do not get along very well. It's ok if I'm there on
business, but the only good relaxation places would be on the roof or
near the sacred fire. The birds would bother me on the roof, and the
fire...well, it's sacred, like I said; I don't want to take it for
granted by sleeping there on a regular basis. It's difficult for me to
get in and out of Darien's apartment without his landlord noticing, so I
only do that when I have to; likewise, Lita's parents are allergic to
cats, so I try not to bother her. The rest live a bit far away, so it
might be difficult to get back to Serena quickly if I had to."
"I thought only Lita's mother was allergic."
"She told me both of her parents were."
"Hmm...well, one way to find out."
"You're going to ask her?"
"No; she needs her rest right now. I'll look it up on the Web."
That got Luna's attention. "You can look that kind of stuff up?"
"Well, technically you shouldn't be able to, but I know this genealogy
search engine that's probably breaking a few laws with the amount of
medical data it offers. Let's see..."
Luna watched, mesmerized, as both of Amy's hands flew over the keyboard.
"You know, even back in the Silver Millennium we didn't have this kind
of data sharing. We had computers, sure, but they usually weren't
linked to each other. Maybe if they were, we could've had more warning
of Beryl, or..."
"Luna?"
"Never mind. Just indulging in what-ifs. But you know, I don't think
Lita would approve of you digging into her personal history like this."
"Hey, she's a good friend. And some allergies can be cured these days;
if her parents have one of them, then maybe this can help her parents
and give them a reason to stay home for a bit while taking the therapy."
"If you say so. Did you find something yet?"
"I think so. This looks like the page I'm after, but..."
"But?"
Amy tapped two spots on the screen. "According to this, Lita's parents
died on the same day ten years ago. And neither were allergic to
anything. I've got to be misreading the data."
"I don't think so. Click on the date of death, it looks like it'll link
to details about it."
She did.
Time is a funny thing. Physically, it can only travel in one direction,
and usually only at one rate unless measured by or relative to something
traveling near the speed of light. But perceptions of time can dilate,
forwards, backwards, even inverted or stretched into some second
temporal dimension. A moment to prepare can be an eternity to the
condemned facing execution, while some humans barely perceive the
passage of decades even when reminded of the passage of time.
A couple hours later, when Amy thought about it while trying to drift
off to sleep, the page had loaded entirely too fast for her comfort.
******
"Amy? You look worse than I do."
Amy slumped against the doorframe of Lita's apartment, wondering just
how dark the bags under her eyes were. "I couldn't get much sleep."
Which was, technically, true: no actual sleep, replaced with a night
full of angsting over what she had decided to do and Lita's probable
rejection of her friendship as a result, was not much sleep. "Lita, I
have to ask: where are your parents?"
"I told you, on vacation."
"No. Seriously, *where* are they?"
"Amy?"
She stepped inside, never breaking eye contact with Lita, and carefully
shut the door behind her. "If they're on vacation, where were they
going?"
"Umm...err, that is...Hawaii! Honolulu; there's a business conference
there."
"So they're doing business while on vacation."
"Yeah, well, it's a working vacation."
Whatever reply Amy may have come up with was preempted by a knock on the
door.
Lita kept her eyes on Amy while walking around her to the door.
"Coming." She turned the knob and opened the door. "Hi, can I help..."
"Hi, honey, sorry to keep you waiting."
Time can also stretch to eternity for any person facing a moment of
overwhelming emotion.
"DADDY! You'realiveyou'realiveyoudidn'tdieohthankwhoa!"
The illusionary form of Lita's father glowed, then shrank down into Luna
with a jeweled disguise pen at her feet. "Serena's been looking for
this. Care to explain how it got into your things?"
"Luna! Why...you..."
"They're both dead, aren't they?" Amy had wandered further into the
apartment, and was poised to quickly take cover in case Lita gave in to
anger.
"They're not dead. They've just been gone for ten years. They survived
that plane crash, and they're on their way back to me. Any day now,
they're going to walk through this door, and things will be just like
they used to be, and I won't have to be so tough all the time,
and...and..."
Seeing Lita on the verge of tears, Amy gently hugged her to bring her
the rest of the way. While Lita collapsed onto her shoulder and
succumbed to body-wracking sobs, Luna flipped the pen up and balanced it
on her head, trotting in just before Amy nudged the door shut again.
"Damn it, Amy. No one's ever guessed before. But if you can...I might
not be able to keep it a secret any more."
"Shh, shh, it's ok. I promise I won't tell anyone. And neither will
Luna. No one else is going to guess; no one else knows you like I do.
Not even Serena."
Years of pent-up tears gushed like a reservoir through a broken dam,
soaking Amy's shoulder over many minutes. Amy muttered words of
encouragement and gently guided Lita into a more comfortable pose on the
sofa, while her mind confirmed and prioritized the questions generated
by her empathy's curiosity.
Eventually, inevitably, the tears dried up, or at least slowed down. By
this time, Lita's head had slipped into Amy's lap; her still watery
vision looked up at Amy's face and briefly morphed it into a good
approximation of her former boyfriends, but she knew it to only be a
trick of the light. "Why did you have to guess?"
"Because." Amy traced the curve of Lita's chin. "If you're in trouble,
I want to know. And once I knew, I couldn't stand the thought of you
sufferring alone."
"That was a mean trick, you know."
Luna, having deposited the pen with Amy, took shelter in a windowsill.
It was sunny, warm, and far enough away for Lita to give Luna time to
flee if Lita came after her. "Blame me. Amy had no idea I would do
that. Now, about the pen?"
"Serena loaned it to me - that's the truth, I swear - but ol' meatball
head may have forgotten. I hope she never remembers; it has been so
useful..."
"How do you mean, 'useful'?" Luna regarded Lita with a critical eye,
though it was hard to tell on her feline face. "Sailor powers are to be
used only for fighting evil, not for personal gain."
"Yeah, show me the line between 'personal gain' and 'making it so I can
keep fighting evil'. Ever since my parents died, I've been forging
their signatures and mimicking their voices - I had to use a voice box
at first, but lately I've been able to do it on my own - in order to pay
the rent and sign various forms. Their bank account had me as a
co-signer; I think it was supposed to be a joke at first, but when the
bank heard they were dead, my being alive stopped them from closing it,
even if I was underage. They had a lot of investments; I had to sell a
bunch of stuff in order to pay the bills, but I think I've got enough to
last me through college. I borrowed the pen so my folks could show up
at various meetings."
Amy had to wipe her own tears away. "Lita..."
"That's where my 'Karate Maniac' reputation came from. I never could
keep up the act forever, so when the authorities became too suspicious,
I got myself kicked out and transferred elsewhere. It also helped me
discourage any kids who got too close to the truth, but I never actually
punched anyone who didn't deserve it."
Luna closed her eyes. "You're going to have to tell the others
eventually, you know."
Amy looked up. "Why?"
"You know perfectly well why. She said it herself: she can't keep up
the act forever. If the authorities found her out, she's right, she
would have trouble sneaking out to be Sailor Jupiter."
"She only needs to keep it up for a few more years. I think she can do
that, especially if I help."
Lita's eyes widened. "Amy...you'd do that for me?"
"Of course. I...umm, Luna, you know where the pen is, can you tell
Serena I have it?"
"I will."
"Now, please?"
"What's the rush? This sunbeam is nice..."
"Because on the count of three, I'm going to close the window on your
tail if it's still there. One..."
Luna leapt out onto the balcony, and was quickly gone.
Lita blinked. "What'd you do that for?"
"Lita...I...that is, we...I care about you a lot, Lita. And I think I
discovered something else last night. When I thought about what you
must have gone through, I..."
"Amy?"
"I'm not sure how to say it...oh, why say it?" Amy yanked Lita's face
up to hers and kissed.
It could have been hours for all that it felt like at the time, but it
was over too quickly as judged by both Amy's and Lita's later
reflections.
Lita broke the kiss. "Amy? What about Greg?"
"I told everyone: he's just a good friend. We're not really any closer
than any one of your boyfriends."
"I didn't know you were homosexual."
"I'm not. Just Lita-sexual."
The next few hours lasted as long as they felt.
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