When the fire department failed to determine the identity of the remains found in the Highbrook neighborhood blaze, Nattalie knew that she was finally free.
Her extreme strength had caused tremendous amounts of trouble for her, and on that night, it actually served a purpose. She stormed through the brick walls, flames burning her flesh and her lungs, to reach the young boy that was trapped in his room. She left him in sight of the firemen before she ran choking back through the alleyway to get through her basement door and into safety. Nattalie knew she couldn't go running to the emergency room without having to explain the burns. Her immediate hope was that this was one of those exceptional times her body decided to heal beyond the human condition. Most of the burns damaged the skin into numbness, but as fate liked to congeal all her good things into a mass of bad. The largest patches of melted flesh were wrentching with every twitch, every movement, every breath and sigh.
Luckily her body only suffered long enough for her to nearly die of hunger and thirst. She had tiny bits of sleep and no ibuprophen left by the second day. She flopped between trying desperately to sit in her large recliner without moving, and screaming in frustrated pain. As soon as she could see in her reflection no sign of serious injury, Nattalie started to pack all of her essential items. Silently she disappeared. After seeing the report that a mysterious woman had broken through the wall of a house to save an unidentified male child, she knew that there was no way to salvage her situation safely.
If no one knew about her, and her ability to defy physics and gravity itself, she was not threatened. Her lonely pathetic life was intact. Sad, but intact.
In Michigan, there were plenty of places to rent with her meager savings she had stowed away. In Ohio a neighbor had seen her pick up the back of the car to reach the dropped chap stick. In New York, a man had tried to mug an old beggar, and she had accidently thrown the scum a little too far. In North Carolina a tree swept into a small flood plain and had to be held at bay while a boat full of rescue workers struggled to cross to a small presipice. Each time her identity had remained a mystery, and hopefully her stories would never be linked, and no one would ever really try and find out who she was. Otherwise her passport would be the next step.
The girl who had died in the fire was remembered silently by her family, and her new home established in a county 120 miles away. She rented a home close to a cemetary, and started to look for new work.
Nattalie found the historic house charming and gigantic. Although it didn't have much of a yard, about 3 feet of grass to be more accurate, the price was right. Crime in the area kept anyone but the desparate or the insanely stubborn from staying there too long. She liked that the windows all came with full thick, dark drapes. She didn't have to worry about moving around the furniture. She didn't have to worry about too many people seeing her or trying to become friends. The less other's knew of her, the easier it was to disappear.
Now she had thought of becoming a vigilante, most times her strength had done a great amount of good for others, but she knew that with technology the way it was, she would be identified sooner or later and her random acts became nationalized. She just wanted to be a person and constantly wondered how it was the general population lived.
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She managed to get a volunteer shift at the Cemetary doing lawn work in the first week. She had yet to find a job, and with her recent escape from fame on the other side of the state she had hoped a temp agency would not be necessary. Temp agencies do identity checks, and although she doubted anyone had filed a missing person's on her, it was not a risk she wanted to take until it was completely necessary. With only 2000 dollars cash left, it would only take 2 months to run through it.
Her typical grocery bill was that of a size four family. The only side effect she had from the ferocious strength was an appetite to match. One cupboard was completely devoted to peanut butter. Another one was full of ground wheat flour. Her bread machine had saved her life on many occasions, and although the diet could get nauseating, she found that no matter how dull the bread started to taste, it was affordable and nuroushed her needs.
While browsing Craigs list for odd jobs, a knock came from the front door. She had thought she picked a neighborhood that would ignore her, but fate did like to mess with her idea's of how things work. Getting up from her cold wood floors, Nattalie walked up to the small windows at the top of the door to look out. A sprite old woman peered up at her smiling. Long tendrils of super curly black locks snuck out from around her ears while it looked she attempted to straighten the rest up into a bun. Silver specked the mass of it and her bright marroon lips showed traces of a long eventful life.
"Hello young lady! I'm Beatrix, but you call me Auntie Bee!" She had started greeting Nattalie before the door had begun to open.
"I'm Nattalie." She had discovered the shorter she could make these little hello's, the faster neighbors would go away. She began to say, "I really can't take visitors at the moment." but Auntie Bee poked her head around the corner and walked straight in.
"I can never understand how these historical houses get so little love." Bee pointed to the restored Oak banister and rails, "Oh they fixed them... such a shame they rent this out."
Nattalie wanted to feel offended but was finding it hard to resist human contact after running for so long.
"And don't worry about the mess with all those secrets, Good Ol' Bee has her own and would never tell anyone about you!"
There was a second Nattalie could hear the glass handle on her front door cracking before she cautiously responed. "I'm sorry I don't understand Ma'am."
"Oh don't you even try young lady. You are not the only one who can do 'special' things." She smiled and set her wrinkled ashy hand on Nattalie's. Nattalie couldn't help but release it and flop onto the staircase next to her to sit down.
"You know what I am?"
Auntie Bee laughed. "You're a human being!"
Nattalie felt dizzy. Maybe she was dreaming all this. "oh..."
"You are also like me. You have a secret that other human beings do not. I'm thinking your strength is not only in your body, but in that heart you hide from everyone."
"How?" Nattalie felt the one sided conversation would end anytime now and she would realize she had never made it out of the fire. She would wake up out of a coma in some hospital and be told that it's been years and she had been dreaming for the last 15 years of her life.
"Well, I can connect people to their intentions by looking at them, and usually the story reveals itself when the person has so much hiding inside them that it bursts into me." Bee looked around the empty house and nodded. " I have some spare furniture in my garage that the old tenant left behind. You're welcome to come get it tonight if you'd like." Bee held up her wobbly arms and pointed to her bicep. "My strength doesn't lay in these old bones, so you'll have to go through the back yards and carry it yourself."
Nattalie just shook her head and began giggling. "Auntie Bee huh?" She smiled her first real smile since she had arrived. "I always assumed I was alone."
The old woman headed for the door. "I need to head home for a bit and take a rest Nattalie, your story has made me very tierd." Nattalie had yet to speak of anything then being alone. "I can tell you'll be over to talk soon, so I'll go take a little nap for us."
Auntie Bee paused long enough in the doorway to point to the small red brick house on the left. "That's me, so come on over and knock real loud, but try not to break my door, it's very old. "
Nattalie wanted to ask when but the phone rang from the bare dining room. Auntie Bee shouted, "See you later!" as she shut the door behind her.
ok, part one looks good, now I need to find part 2 in this mess of entries.
