The tour, of course. Squeezing his hand gently at the thought of having Jack moving around and being apart from her would have been hard but she would have been able to deal with it as long as they could talk on the phone. What killed her were the moments when she couldn’t reach him, spending her free time worrying if something had happened to him as it had gone on for days where she would try to call or text him and get nothing in return. No new messages and the immediate message of his answering machine.
Shaking dark thoughts out of her mind she tried smiling for him. No point in stressing him out. “Y-Yeah..too much too soon can be bad for you..your friends have also asked for you..” Though truthfully only Bernard had but she was sure Mets was wondering where the two of them were.
She definitely needed to contact her friend and let him know they were okay. She hadn’t talked to him in weeks.
Jack felt a nasty pang of guilt. It wasn’t completely his fault – he’d been kept very busy, shunted to and from meetings – but still, he wished he’d made more effort to keep in touch with the few friends he had back here. He swallowed his bite. “Well, I’m back now. And I don’t plan on leaving Metro City again any time soon.” For all its dangers, the city was his home.
“I’m s-sorry we didn’t have more time to talk, Katelynn,” he went on as they kept eating. He couldn’t quite get out what he was most sorry for – that he hadn’t been there for her when her mother died, when she’d truly needed him. “… H-has anything happened I should know about?”
Her eyes widened at his question as she sat back in her seat a moment, heart leaping up into her throat. It was such a simple question yet it was enough to cause her face to pale a moment. I..I wasn’t going to tell yet..b-but I can’t lie..and say everything is fine when it wasn’t..
She felt the blood in her veins turn cold as her hand snaked back and into her lap, nibbling on her bottom lip. Tucking her head against her chest she took a shuddering breath to gain some form of nerves.
“I-I was going to wait to tell you until you had gotten some rest..b-but…Psycho Delic..you know..the one w-who you ran into back in December..cause of me..when I finally decided to go out and get some fresh air he..he found me and used some of his drugs on me..m-made me hallucinate..”
One hand tugged at the hem of her shirt and she tried to keep talking, willed herself to and knowing he wasn’t going to be very happy with the news. She hadn’t handled it well after all.
“I-I ended up seeing things..a nightmare of e-everyone dying in front of me because of the second Psycho..I-I was so angry and scared and I took my de-gun out and I tried to fight the spell when I realized what was going on..I did…and I tried shooting where I thought Psycho Delic was..I…I ended up being arrested b-but I was able to convince them it wasn’t my fault..I-I’m sorry Jack..I-I really tried…to stay safe while you were gone..I did..”
She shook in her seat slightly as she waited for his response, licking her lips in her nerves. She thought she was past attracting villains but she had delusioned herself into thinking such a thing.
Jack had sensed something was wrong, but even with the trouble Katelynn had attracted in the past, he hadn’t imagined it would be this bad. He listened with his eyes wide, horrified – not because Katelynn had fired her gun and been arrested, but because she’d been attacked, and been hurt, when he wasn’t there …
He didn’t say anything in response. Instead, he got up from his chair, came over, and gently hugged his trembling fiancee.
“K-Katelynn, it’s okay.” His voice was a choked whisper. It wasn’t okay, but that was the best thing he could think of to say. “It w-wasn’t your fault. You w-were halluc-c-cinating. Crazy. You d-didn’t know what you were doing.” He swallowed. “It’s n-not like you went out looking for Psycho D-Delic, right?”
Jack Maple 