Arts
And then it was the next afternoon, and Timi was waiting on the platform. And there was John Quick, in his long coat, with a laptop bag in one hand and a carry-on in the other. He paused in the door of the train, at the top of the steps, and took a deep breath. He looked alert, and happy to be home; she took that as a good sign. He saw her, then, and stepped down onto the platform, smiling uncertainly. She wished she could rush up and hug him, but her arms, like his, were full of baggage, so she only smiled and said, “It’s good to see you, John.” “Good to see you too, Timi. Are you, um, getting on here?” “Yes—and so are you, please. There’s no time to explain, but I’ve had a vision, and I’ve made a plan, and I’ve got a ticket for you, and you’ve just got to trust me on this.” “Really? I … I mean, of course, I’ll trust you. I just … where are we going?” “I’ll explain all about it. Just, let’s get on the train now—please?” “Okay, Timi.” He stood aside to let her board first. “Actually, we’ll board down there,” she said, motioning further down the platform. “The train guy explained it to me. Because we have a sleeper.” He froze. How funny—she hadn’t noticed it before, but she could actually see when the fear of being alone with her took hold of him. That was it! Poor guy! “Don’t worry, Doctor,” she said sternly. “Sandra got us a nice room, and there are two bunks. So you don’t even have to touch me—unless, you know, you really want to.” She batted her eyelashes at him, and then laughed. “Come on,” she said bracingly, firmly gesturing toward the sleeper car. “We have a lot to talk about.” She marched forward, resisting the urge to look over her shoulder to see whether he was following. He was, of course. Their sleeping compartment had a recliner, a tiny toilet and shower, a sofa that folded out to make the lower bunk, and a nice window to look out of. Timi guessed there’d be more to look at tomorrow; the snowy farmlands going by at the moment looked all too familiar. On the whole, the sleeper made for a nice, private space—but that was obviously too threatening for John, who clammed up with fright the moment they were alone in it, even with the door open. “Oh, get a grip, John!” Timi exclaimed. “You’re afraid to be alone with me—I get that. It’s even, like, flattering, in a way, now that I think I understand what it is. But just to be sure: when you go all wordless like this, it’s not because you’ve forgotten I’m here? It’s not because you don’t like being with me? It’s not because you find me boring, or unappealing, or kind of pathetic, or anything like that? “No!” said John, aghast. “I think you’re … I think about you a lot, really, and I … it’s just that you’re so … so perfectly …” “Sweet Lady!” Timi laughed, taking pity and cutting him off. “We have so much work to do! Come on, Doctor Quick, let’s go get a table in the lounge car. We’ll get you a glass of wine, and you won’t have to be alone with me, and I’ll tell you why I’ve hijacked you.” They sat across from each other at a table in the lounge car, and Timi told John all that he had missed over the last ten days. He already knew about Sandra’s sickness, and about the squirrels, and about the sulfur shelf, of course; but he didn’t know about Mark’s healing, or about their Imbolc Circle. And he didn’t know anything about Brigit’s Hearth. “Mark still thinks it might be Saint Brigid—or says he does. But you can’t blame him for clinging to that. He seems so much a part of the Circle now, that you forget, sometimes, how different his tradition is, and how recent all this is for him. Anyway, when he immersed himself in the pool, the Lady of the Hearth healed him completely. Not a bruise left on him anywhere, Sandra says. And you should have seen him before! “Then we had our Imbolc Circle down there, just last night. We asked the Lady if there was anything we could do to help her, and then right away I felt this vision pressing on...