Chapter Three
Quinn
The house was spotless when we returned from the cemetery. Even the funeral flowers had been removed. White roses replaced the normal vases of cut flowers my mother ordered, but that was the only change. It was as if nothing had happened.
I went to change clothes and then came back down to join my parents. They seemed confused.
"Oh, Quinn, you startled me," my mother said. She and my father sat in their normal spots in the living room. My father was reading and my mother was watching a raucous reality television show.
He put his book down, and my mother paused the television. The same heavy expression they had worn all day returned. If I had not reappeared, they could have convinced themselves both daughters were at UCLA and all was as it should be. I was an unwelcome reminder that Sienna was gone.
"I was just coming to say goodnight," I said.
"It’s only 8 pm," my father said.
"I'm just really tired," I rubbed my forehead.
"Sienna says studying before bed is a good idea because your mind works on what you learned all night," my mother told me.
"Yes, good idea," I said. I did not tell them I had left all my study material at school.
Upstairs again, the weight overtook me. I sank to the floor next to my bed. Sienna was gone and I could just as easily disappear. In fact, I slipped out of my parents' lives just by leaving the room. I could just leave and they would never even notice. Where would I go and what would I do?
I knew, but I was not ready to think about it.
I must have been sitting there for nearly an hour when the phone rang. "Hello?"
"Quinn, I had to call. How are you?"
"Darla? Hi. I don't know. I survived," I said. I pulled myself off the floor and wandered around the room as we talked. "How are things on campus?"
"Crazy. There were about a dozen memorials for Sienna today. The administration has gone into hyperspeed about mental health. I swear to God they would screen us all if they could. There's even talk of a suicide prevention team being formed. They want you to be a part of it. I actually had to explain to them why today was not a good day to call and discuss it," Darla said.
"How am I supposed to come back?" I groaned. "Owen was right, maybe now is a good time to take a break and find out what I really want to do."
"Owen?" Darla asked. "Yes, of course he was at the funeral."
"I hid out in the basement playing video games. He found me and we hung out. It was just like old times."
"Old times like when you had a mad crush on him? Like when he was flirting with you but dating your sister?" Darla asked.
"Exactly," I said.
She sighed. "Well, at least that got a little smile out of you. I heard it."
"I know, I know, but it was really great. He's the only one I can actually talk to around here."
"And it doesn't hurt that he's a 6-foot, blue-eyed blond that's built like a Norse god," Darla said. "I'd let him comfort me anytime."
"Want to know something weird?" I asked. "My mother was crazy today and trying to place the blame on Owen. While she was ranting at him, she said the strangest thing. She said everyone knew about Owen and me. Sienna even knew how well we got along and she encouraged Owen to hang out with me."
"Well, she did only use him as eye candy," Darla said. "Maybe your sister realized you two share something a little deeper."
"But she still dated him."
"Was your sister ever any good at sharing?" Darla asked. "Sorry."
"No, it's good. Owen and I spent all day listening to memories of Sienna that had passed through a perfecting lens. No one wanted to remember that she was real," I said. I flopped back on my bed. "I don't want my sister to be a saint. I just want to remember my actual sister."
"Oh, Quinn, I'm so sorry. You and Sienna loved each other. Sisters don't always get along, sisters don't always share, and sisters certainly don't take it easy on each other. No one knew her like you."
"Thanks, Darla. I'll be back on campus soon," I said. We said our goodbyes and I hung up.
Darla was right. I knew Sienna better than anyone. And now that I thought about it, she had always talked about Owen and me together. She had talked to me about movies Owen and I would like, stores we should visit, and places we should go. Sometimes she sent us off together while she was busy. At the time I would be embarrassed, thinking she was using Owen to babysit me, but now I wondered.
My thoughts were interrupted by a tap on the window. It was followed by a smattering of clicks, pebbles hitting the glass. I pulled myself off my bed and went to the window. Owen waved from the lawn and pointed to the kitchen door.
It was the way he used to sneak into the house during high school. I turned and tiptoed down to the kitchen to let him in. I warned him not to say a thing. We slipped along the hallway and down the basement to the safety of the old leather sofa.
"What are you doing here?" I asked.
"I wanted to make sure you were okay. I drove to the cemetery. I didn't join everyone at the graveside, but I was there. You didn't look like you were doing too good," Owen said.
I rubbed my forehead again. "It, it was a tough drive there and back."
"Your parents? I figured."
For a moment, I thought he was going to pull me into a hug, but Owen hesitated and I took a step back. Instead, he sat down on the sofa and opened the backpack he had brought with him.
"I realized I still had some things of Sienna's that I thought you might want back," Owen said. He pulled out a dog-eared copy of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
I laughed and took it from him. "This is mine. My favorite book," I said.
Owen smiled. "Yeah, that makes more sense. I remember making Sienna read it before we watched the movie, but she was not into it."
"I remember," I said. "Sienna ended up inviting cheerleaders over and making pep rally signs. She sent me downstairs and you started the movie over so I could watch too."
"Well, here's what else I found," Owen said.
I sifted through the few articles he dumped on the sofa between us. "My constellation map. I wondered where this went."
"Sienna gave it to me after the meteor shower last year," Owen said. "I didn't know it was yours."
"Actually, so is the CD mix," I said.
"I loved that mix. I always wondered how Sienna got all the songs. Not really her type of music," he said. "Sorry. This was supposed to help you remember your sister."
I took his hand and squeezed. "But it did! Much more than the rest of today. Sienna knew we liked the same things and she wanted to give you things you liked, so she gave you my stuff."
Owen smiled. "Yeah, Sienna always figured out how to remove the guesswork from anything."
We sat for a moment, and I was happy to finally be remembering my sister for who she was. When I realized I was still holding Owen's hand, the heat went directly to my cheeks.
"Sorry," I said.
"It’s okay, Quinn," Owen said. He moved closer and took my hand again. "Don't you ever think Sienna might have wanted this? She was always matching us up, always putting us together."
"Then why were you dating?"
"Sienna wanted a high school sweetheart. Those stories don't include breaking up freshman year and spending the rest of high school trying to find someone else," Owen said.
"You wanted to break up freshman year?"
"It was pretty easy to discover that Sienna and I did not like the same things," he shrugged.
"Then why were you dating Sienna?" I asked. I thought about my beautiful, perfect sister and my cheeks flared even hotter. "Never mind."
"No, Quinn, it wasn't like that. Sienna made things easy for me. I'm not a joiner, I don't like being in the middle of things. I never would have experienced half of high school if it wasn't for her. I would have been down here." He looked around our basement family room.
"With me?"
I was not ready when Owen looked back. His blue eyes were too bright, his grip on my hand too warm and tight. He leaned forward and the nearer he came, the less breath I was able to capture. I sat airless, and in the vacuum, hope, excitement, and fear fought. We couldn't do this, could we?
"Quinn? Are you down there again?"
"Father?" I asked. I dropped Owen's hand as if it had burned me.
"We're going to order a pizza. Come up and join us," my father said.
I thought about all the food from the funeral and realized the thought of it turned my stomach as well. I had hardly eaten all day and pizza sounded good. Even though all my father's invitations sounded like orders.
"I'll be up in a minute." I turned to Owen and whispered. "Wait a couple of minutes and go out the kitchen door."
He smiled and patted my leg. "Don't worry. I've done this before."
In the kitchen, my stomach was still fluttering with excitement. I felt as if my brain had no control over my emotions anymore and I swung from one feeling to the next without thought. Sienna was gone, I was still reeling in shock, and yet Owen felt the same. About everything. All those years of longing and the feelings might not have been unrequited. I clung to that joyful thought.
"Oh, there you are, darling. I ordered the pizza with the sun-dried tomatoes. Just like you like," my mother said.
"That was Sienna," I said.
"Oh, yes, sorry. I forgot you were home," my mother said. She poured a glass of white wine. "There's a special on the bridges of Paris, your father thought you might want to watch it while we eat. The pizza should be ready any minute."
"That was Sienna, too," I said. "You start without me and I'll go pick up the pizza."
Sienna loved Paris. It was her daydream city. Whenever she was feeling sad or pressured or stressed, she made imaginary plans to go to Paris.
"It feels good to think about leaving it all behind and going somewhere I've always longed to go," Sienna had explained. "Where would you go? And you can't say Paris."
"Las Vegas," I had told her.
"We live in Las Vegas."
"The Strip. All the lights, all the people from other places," I had tried to explain.
"All the flashing screens and video games?" Sienna had cocked an eyebrow at me. "You sound just like Owen. He's always wanting to go there. I mean, it’s fun once or twice, but I'm not into playing video games on wall-sized screens or whatever it is you two like to do."
I fought the overwhelming urge to get in the car and drive the 15 minutes to the Strip. People who lived in and around Las Vegas generally avoided that area like the plague. To me, it had a comforting aspect – like a part of my imagination come to life. And it did not hurt that no one there knew me or Sienna or what had happened.
#
"If you're ready now, we can take the long way into town. I know you love that drive," my father said. He strolled into the kitchen, checking his watch.
"That was Sienna," I said. "Sienna liked to take the long way because she had a dream house picked out on top of the hill."
Summerlin was a relatively small community, so the long way was actually just a tour of the neighborhoods. The houses were impressive and it was fun to drive at night and peek into other people's lives.
The pizza place we liked was only a few minutes away, but Sienna and my father were sometimes gone for nearly 45 minutes. They drove around and plotted her perfect future. She wanted to be surgeon at one of the exclusive private hospitals in Las Vegas where she could treat rich people from all over the world without leaving her hometown. My father had even taken on clients from those hospitals to make sure Sienna would have the contacts she needed.
My father stopped and his watch arm dropped. He just stood in the corner of the kitchen and stared at the floor. "Well, the pizza will be ready soon. We should leave in about 15 minutes."
He shuffled back towards the front room as I leaned on the counter. I clung to Sienna's idea of a daydream city. It was easy to picture Las Vegas. I always started with the Paris Casino, the faux Eiffel Tower was something I often teased Sienna about. From there, I pictured the Bellagio's dancing fountains and the Luxor's sleek black lines. I also loved the rollercoaster facade of New York, New York and the white columns of Caesar's Palace.
I focused in on the arcade at the MGM Grand. Beyond the normal kid games, they had interactive and full-sized gaming consoles where you could actually feel like you were inside the game. I wanted to step inside one and let everything else fade away.
Still, my daydream was not holding. Sienna was right. Tonight, Las Vegas was not far enough away, and I had 15 minutes to escape. I put my head on my arms as I leaned on the counter and tried again.
This time my daydream city was a foreign land. Dark plains that held pockets of fog, black granite cliffs that jutted up before shadowy mountains, dim forest glens and silent stands of towering pine trees.
I had enough time to at least cue up Dark Flag and take a look around. I headed downstairs to the basement. There, I brushed aside the items Owen had returned and settled in on the worn leather sofa. Our widescreen television buzzed to life on the home screen of the video game, and I quickly booted up my character.
Dark Flag was the perfect daydream city. Sienna would have scoffed at it, but it made sense to me. She planned trips to Paris in her head, and I was jumping into the virtual rendering of the place I wanted to escape to. The game started with a dark screen full of black thunderclouds. Lightning flashed across the screen and the surround sound exploded. The game then dropped you through the thunderstorm and deposited you on the starting grid, a rainy road outside the walls of a looming city.
I thought for a moment about entering the city walls. It was easy to wander around there and people watch. The multiplayer online game attracted millions of people from around the globe. Walking through the virtual city was what a lot of new players did. It was a chance to see what other people had done with their avatars. You could also purchase weapons, charms, and spells, instead of earning them in the field. Or you could head to one of the many taverns and interact with other avatars, as Owen had explained.
I turned away from the city. The whole point of my daydream was to escape from people, even virtual people. I knew Owen had been playing the Black Fields with his clan, so I turned in the opposite direction. I had never been inside the Pitch Forest, and I had just enough time to explore before my father expected me to join him in the car.
The Pitch Forest was a massive landscape of huge pine trees and redwoods. My human avatar was tiny in comparison. The animation was amazing, and for a while, I was perfectly content to look around and admire the quality of the game. Here and there the trees had carvings on them – signs from other players about which way the wayside inn was located and where the ogre caves could be found. The players themselves had created an entire language of symbols that I had just begun to unlock.
"My next victim," an underling player said.
All new players to Dark Flag started off as underlings. The lower evolved humans scuttled along on hands and feet like hairless dogs. Players stayed in that form until they fought others and earned their evolution. Dark Flag did not make it easy to sit down and start playing.
It had taken me three days to evolve into an avatar I wanted to play. "Wrong, newbie," I said.
The underling jumped at me and I knocked it back with an easy sequence. I could have killed it, causing the other player to have to wait an hour before rejoining the game, but the hand-to-hand combat was a good distraction.
The underling found its footing again and picked up a rock. "I'm not helpless," it said.
"You're not smart either," I sent my avatar forward with a sharp kick.
The rock slipped out of the underling’s hand and we grappled again. Underlings used teeth and nails to fight, but my leather jacket and pants, purchased in Black Wall City, kept me safe. I punched it back and we circled around again.
Just when I thought it was going to attack again, the underling spotted a Green Elf and decided to go after easier prey than me.
All in all, it was five minutes of distraction. I still had enough time to wander to the high cliffs and look down on the Black Fields, or I could finally accept a quest and start playing the game in earnest.
The redwood tree nearest me had a carving of a sideways “S.” The symbol meant a Soothsayer was near. Soothsayers could be fought for Fate spells. Or, if you found them and asked, they would assign you a quest.
I searched amongst the tall trees for the telltale glow of a Soothsayer's trail. Their footprints glittered before fading, and after a quick search, I found some that still sparkled. I followed the trail until the Soothsayer appeared.
"Will you fight for your Fate, human?" it asked me.
"I wish a quest," I said. I knelt in front of the Soothsayer. The first time I had encountered one, I did not kneel, and it knocked me out for 10 minutes for being rude.
"Your quest will not be easy. It is far beyond the Black Fields, far beyond the capability of a mere human," the Soothsayer said.
"I want to try."
"Then you must travel far and find the warlock that will lead the Southern clan. He holds a Portal Key. Use that key to enter the dragon's cave. It has been too long since it flew. The Black Fields must be scorched, you must release the dragon," the Soothsayer said.
The game was evolving based on the players that dominated. The creators had certain ways of leveling the playing field, such as plagues, natural disasters, and dragons. It was my quest to activate one of those levelers. That also meant I had the power to warn people or lure them to the Black Fields and eliminate my enemies.
My first instinct was to find Owen and tell him about my quest, but before I could leave the Pitch Forest, I was stopped by another player. The Green Witch was unnaturally voluptuous, as most female avatars were. Her iridescent green dress clung hard to her curvaceous frame, and even as she spoke to me, her avatar struck several sexy poses.
"Don't go that way. Clansmen are all over the trail. It’s not safe," the Green Witch said. "Unless you have something to trade."
I did not dare ask what she had traded for safe passage. "Thanks, but I think I know some of them."
"This isn't the Light Clan. It’s new, started by a Thief King. They play dirty," the Green Witch said. "They have Thrall Spells. You can lose two lives or be stuck watching them play for a full 24 hours."
I thanked her and made my way cautiously through the Pitch Forest. I needed to follow the trail out to the Black Fields, but I barely knew how to play, much less how to play dirty.
I heard the chatter the closer I got to the trail. The Thief King was building a camp among the redwoods. Once avatars were well-established, they could actually create dwellings. Base camps or homes allowed a player to recharge without leaving the game.
I stopped and studied the command menu. I needed to know how to walk silently. I also needed to know how to hide. I wanted to hear what they were talking about.
"I know there's a way to make the Thralls do what we want," the Thief King was saying. "I read about the possibility of a Thrall army. We can do that and take on the Light Slayer."
I recognized Owen's player name. He was called Light Slayer because early on he had found the Sun Sword. It was part of the reason he was able to become Dark Flag's first clan leader. Too bad others were catching on fast. I did not like the sound of a Thrall army.
I made it past the camp and crossed the trail without being seen. Once I was amongst the redwoods and pines again, I relaxed.
It was a big mistake, since out of nowhere, a Cloaked Corpse appeared. Cloaked Corpses traded the ability to speak for unlimited lives. They were not able to work together with other players so they were often alone. But because of the unlimited lives, they were impossible to kill.
I had no spells, only a Frost Sword. The Cloaked Corpse attacked, and before I could think of a plan, I had to fight. If I did not avoid its razor sharp nails, there was a possibility my avatar would also become a Cloaked Corpse. They were the Dark Flag version of zombies.
I was about to give up and try to run when a bright flash of light obliterated the screen.
"Don't worry, Quinn, I got you," a voice said.
Light Slayer appeared, his Sun Sword sending out solar flares that blinded the Cloaked Corpse. He did not even have to fight to chase off the other player.
"Stop, don't," I told him. "There's a new clan nearby. A Thief King."
"His name's Balon," Owen said. "If we let him get more established, there will be bigger rewards when his clan falls." Still, he sheathed his Sun Sword and told his clan members to go and spy on the rival clan.
We were alone in the Pitch Forest.
It was strange to stand facing Owen's avatar. When he removed his helmet, I saw his avatar looked exactly like him. Not many people chose to be themselves in the game, but there we were, animated versions of ourselves.
"I'm glad you're here," Owen said.
"Me, too." I was about to tell him my quest when I saw his avatar pause.
"Sorry, Quinn, I gotta go," Owen said. He exited the game and Light Slayer disappeared.
I stood by myself in the Pitch Forest.
"Quinn? Can you go get the pizza by yourself?" my mother asked from the top of the stairs. "Your father had to make a phone call."
He would have gone with Sienna, but I was used to being sent off on my own.
#
I got in the car, my head full of Dark Flag. It was easier than thinking about anything else.
Owen's avatar moved differently than any other player. He knew the commands and sequences so well that his avatar moved fluidly. I was impressed – and more than flattered that he had arrived just in time to save me. The game had notifications so a message could be sent when certain players logged on. Owen must have added me. Dark Flag's first clan leader saving some novice human; there was going to be talk.
I smiled to myself. It was nice that there was a whole other world where rumors like that were thrilling instead of awkward. I was wondering if I could handle the same talk in the real world when a knock on the window made me jump.
"I could use a little fresh air," my father said, getting into the passenger seat.
That meant my mother was taking a downturn. "Fresh air" was my father's polite way of saying he could not take the brunt of her blackening mood. He clipped his seatbelt on and turned the radio off.
"Should I take the long way?" I asked.
He nodded as I realized I had no idea which way the long route was. I turned right out of our driveway. My father did not seem to notice the world outside of the car. I kept driving and he did not care. He studied his hands quietly until I wondered if he had drifted off to sleep.
"Sorry for sending you out like that. I should have just gone myself," he finally said.
"It’s no problem. I wanted the fresh air myself," I replied.
My father opened his mouth and then popped it shut. He scrubbed his chin a few times before he said anything. "Your sister always had something to say. She was easy to talk to. There was always the next step of her plan to discuss, the accomplishments she could already check off. Sienna was going up and up."
"Thinking about the future made her happy," I said. The words left a painful reverberation in the car.
Sienna was only happy when she was discussing future plans. She never stopped to concentrate on where she was – or who she was with, for that matter. She lived to become a projected version of herself. The perfect version of Sienna was always a few steps away in the certain future.
If she lost that certainty, even for a moment, a gloom fell over everything around her. When Sienna stopped to look around her, she found faults everywhere and her mood plummeted. I knew that was exactly what had happened, but I could not tell my father.
"What about your future?" my father asked. "You don't seem to spend much time thinking about it."
I gripped the steering wheel harder to keep the accusation in his tone from knocking us off course. "I have been lately," I said. "I think I should meet with my advisor again and discuss majors. There might be a better fit out there for me."
"Of course. Some people would take a tragedy like this and turn it into a reason to work hard with every breath. And some take it as an excuse to go spinning off into la-la-land," my father said.
I held on tighter. "No. It’s just I think I let Sienna influence me too much. She was always so excited about becoming a surgeon, she made us all excited about it too. I think that's why I chose nursing, not because I loved it. You have to love it to be good at it."
My father pinched the bridge of his nose. "Please, for the love of God, don't tell me this, not now. From what I see, all you love is hanging out in the basement playing video games. How are you going to turn that into any sort of respectable career?"
I turned the car, taking a shortcut through a neighborhood towards the pizza place. The drive could not be over quickly enough for either of us. "It's an entire international, multibillion-dollar industry. People have very successful and very respectable careers in it."
"People? You mean like that Owen Redd? Please, Quinn, you cannot be drawing inspiration from a guy like him."
"Owen is creating his own career, his dream job. How can I not be inspired by that?" I asked. I realized too late we were on the street where Owen lived. His apartment, the top-floor loft of a three-story 6-plex was two blocks ahead. I had driven Sienna there dozens of times.
"Turn right up here," my father said. "Looks like the police are causing some kind of detour.”
I bit my lip and turned. Two squad cars were parked outside of Owen's apartment building. One of the uniformed officers at the curb was pointing to the top-floor apartment. "I hope there wasn't an accident." My heart flopped and my ears buzzed; the memory of the last time I saw flashing emergency lights squeezed my heart.
My father ignored me. "You need to understand something about people like Owen. He's taking the easy way out. Just because he has a talent does not mean he'll make a living at it. If he's telling you that then it’s a lie."
"How can you say that? You don't know anything about Owen," I said.
"I've seen enough guys like Owen. I've had to defend them in court. If he's telling everyone he's made a successful career out of sitting around on his couch, 10-to-1 there is something illegal going on. Sure, it might look good on the surface, but he's cheating the system somehow," my father said. "Your sister understood the only way you get ahead is through hard work. Following your dreams means you're either dirt poor or you are running a scam."
I drove the rest of the way to the pizza parlor without saying a word. I was worried about Owen, but my father's words filtered into my brain like acid. What did I really know about what Owen did?