A Glimpse of the Dark Side: Adult Paranormal Erotic Romance Collection (24 page)

The home itself wasn't something too special.
Meg could afford a fancier one, but the three-bedroom house was all
she felt she needed. She had gotten it for a fair price due to an
uncle's connections in the real estate business. While a bit of a
fixer-upper at the time of sale, it was still very much a good
deal. Unless she needed it badly, almost all her funds were devoted
to the care of her foster children. Deals were something she kept
an eye out for because of that.

With the engine cut off, there was another
degree to the silence that had dominated the trip here. Bruce took
that moment to say something.

"Finally! I thought for a moment maybe she
got lost and we were going to someplace like India,"
Bruce
commented.

"You would have to cross the ocean for that to
happen," Tony replied.

"I stand by what I said."

"What do you think?" Meg asked Tony.

Tony looked up at the house with his shoulders
slumped. His face was tense with worry. Surely his mind was racing
with so many conflicting thoughts. Meg knew that look well. After
ten years of fostering children that had come from many horrible
situations, Meg expected it.

Facing Tony, her face softened with the look a
loving parent would give her child. A look Tony hadn't seen in
years, if at all.

"You're safe here. I promise you that," Meg
said. "No one's going to hurt you here."

Tony nodded, even though the worry did not leave
his features. Meg felt no insult at this. It would be a long time
before Tony would trust someone again, much less an adult that
claimed they were looking out for him.

His father had said he was looking out for him
before the fists went flying. Meg would have to earn his trust.

But Tony's trust wasn't the only one she would
have to earn.

Bruce watched Meg for a moment. He knew that he
would not be able to tell what was in the depths of Meg's thoughts
and soul just by looking at her. Such a power would be nice but not
one he was gifted with. From what he had observed she seemed to be
genuine.

"So far it looks like you've found one of the
good ones,"
he commented, more for Tony's sake than his
own.

Bruce knew that Tony wasn't going to reply to
him. Not now, anyway. Tony was in a withdrawn mood right now, and
talking wasn't something he would like to do in this state.

"It's going to be fine. I'll be here. So you
won't be alone."

Still not saying anything but finally showing a
sign of acknowledgement, Tony looked at Bruce and offered a weak
smile. Bruce smiled back with a grin more positive for the future
to come. Never mind the hurdles, both big and small, that Tony
would have to tackle in the years to come. For as long as Tony
needed him, he would be here.

That was an imaginary friend's job after
all.

IT WAS ALMOST sunset and the sky was turning a
pale pink hue. After Meg had helped Tony bring in his bags, she
showed him around the house. The inside was as simple but
comfortable-looking as the outside. Meg had chosen a light blue and
white color theme for the walls and flooring.

The pieces of furniture were less uniform,
however. At one time, there had been a matching living room set.
But after a few rounds with some of the rowdier children she had
taken care of, the white couch from before had been replaced with a
heartier brown couch.

Even with the unintended patchwork look to the
house, the place had a warm, lived-in feeling to it. Like a true
home.

Bruce gave Meg points for the home environment.
Not that he was keeping score. Okay, maybe he was. But it was his
job to want to make sure everything was reasonably good for
Tony.

"Let me show you to your room so you can put
your stuff away."

Tony nodded again in a distracted way. Bruce
wasn't the only one making a mental score. She led them to the
bedroom nearest to the living room. It was as patchwork as the rest
of the house, but this time it was done on purpose. Each of the
children had the option to decorate the room as he or she wished.
It was a perk Meg felt helped gave them a small sense of control in
a time where they had none.

The last child who had occupied the room was
really into dinosaurs-something that showed from the crudely
painted mural of a normal day in the Cretaceous period. Meg
remembered helping with that particular project. It was fun, even
though she was criticized for adding a mastodon to the scene.

So she was now aware of the fact that the
mastodon was not a dinosaur but a prehistoric mammal. And that it
didn't even exist in the Triassic period. She was informed of all
this by a seven-year-old girl.

Bruce pretended to cower from the Tyrannosaurus
Rex painted on the wall, even if the carnivore was in pastel pink,
as that had been the girl's favorite color. The coloring only added
humor to Bruce's acting. Tony chuckled softly at this.

Meg did a quick look around to make sure that
she had not missed anything when setting up the room. In
preparation, the room had been vacuumed and dusted thoroughly, as
well as new sheets fitted on the bed. A fluffy quilt completed the
comfortable setting. All seemed well enough to Meg.

"Where's Bruce going to sleep?" Tony asked.

Meg paused to think about how to answer that
question. She hadn't considered sleeping quarters for an imaginary
friend.

"How does Bruce like camping?" she asked
afterwards. "Because I have a sleeping bag he can use if he doesn't
mind."

"Sounds good to me,"
Bruce said.

"Bruce says its fine," Tony relayed to Meg.

"I think the sleeping bag is in the closet in
the hall."

Meg had meant to get the sleeping bag herself
but Tony dashed off to look for it himself. She decided to start on
the unpacking while he looked through the closet. There wasn't much
to look through. Tony did not own much-mainly a collection of old
and slightly threadbare clothes, some sketch pads, and some
pencils.

At the bottom of the bag, she found something
slightly out of place.

It was a book. The title read
Friends
Indeed
in bright red lettering and the cover was colorful and
obviously kid-friendly-children with big smiles on their faces and
odd-looking creatures on it. Picking it out of the bag, she
discovered it was a fairly thin book. It was very much a young
children's book.

Why a thirteen-year old would have a book that
was geared for an age group far younger than himself was a mystery
to Meg. She would have to ask Tony about it. She moved to place the
book on the bedside desk. A loose page in the book slid out of
place and onto the floor.

She quickly bent down to pick it up. The text on
the page itself was eye-catching. It was printed in royal purple in
a style that suggested it was scrawled on parchment paper long
ago.

Meg couldn't help but read a bit of it. What she
read struck her as odd, and she found herself reading it aloud in a
way to that would reassure her she was indeed reading these exact
words.

"Cross your heart and now you take from your
mind a thought to make. Hold, think it over twice. Then what you
wish for will come to light."

It was an odd bit of writing for a children's
book, Meg felt. If she didn't know better, she would think the
passage was a spell of some kind. The rest of the book seemed
normal enough for a children's book, and gave no sign of any deeper
meaning she should be worried about.

"Strange," she mumbled to herself.

"HEY. DON'T KNOCK it. It works," Bruce commented
aloud, though he knew Meg would not hear a word he said.

Though if that was true, why did Meg suddenly
look to his direction with wide eyes and let out a surprised
gasp?

The book dropped from her hands a moment after
the gasp. The fear in her eyes quickly turned to anger.

"Who the hell are you? And how did you get in
here?"

Bruce gazed around the room a couple of times to
look for the person Meg was talking to. It then dawned on him that
she was staring straight at him. He felt an odd sensation as he was
used to people looking through him.

"You can see me?" he asked.

"Of course I see you! Now get out before I call
the police!"

"Oh boy. Look, there is a reasonable explanation
for all this. Well... not so much reasonable as more... say...
fantastical. But I promise that there is an explanation and that I
am not at all a bad guy-"

The porcelain lamp that had survived a close
call during an unapproved indoor baseball game a few years back
became a throwing weapon. Bruce missed catching the lamp with his
face by mere inches.

"I hope that wasn't expensive." Bruce said.

A considerably less expensive but hard-covered
book was the next object hurled at him. It made a fairly sizeable
dent in the wall.

Bruce winced at the realization that the dent
could have very well been made in his skull if he hadn't been fast
enough to avoid it. Thankfully, Meg had run out of things to throw.
Unfortunately, though, she was moving towards him with a look akin
to an angry mother bear's.

"Hey look, you're cute when you're angry and all
but I really think we should both relax here."

Meg replied to Bruce's comment with a punch to
the gut. Bruce stumbled back with a gasp of shock and crashed into
the bookshelf. Tony came running in to the sound just in time to
see Bruce slide down amid some fallen books and Meg going for her
cell phone.

"Get out of the house, Tony. I'm going to call
the police."

"Meg! Meg, stop! He's my friend!"Tony grabbed at
the phone, managing to knock it away.

"Tony!"

"Meg, please! You can call the police but they
won't see him. I am the only one who is supposed to see him and no
one else!"

Confusion was a natural and proper response to a
situation such as this, and Meg was certainly confused. She most
likely would have called the police anyway if Tony hadn't seen the
Friends Indeed
book and picked it up.

"Did you read the poem out loud?"

"She certainly did," Bruce said as he slowly got
to his feet again. "Didn't even know anything would happen because
of that, though."

Maybe it was all the coincidences. Maybe it was
the oddness of the book. Or it may even have been Tony's desperate
look. But something told Meg to consider this whole situation at
more than face value.

"Wait. Isn't Bruce the name of your imaginary
friend?" Meg asked.

"She pays attention. Ten more points there,"
Bruce commented. "And five more for the fantastic throwing
arm."

"It's the same Bruce." Tony said. "He's an
imaginary friend."

"I CAN'T BELIEVE I beat up an imaginary
friend."

"And I can't believe you threw a lamp at me.
Nice gut punch, by the way," Bruce said.

With a cold compress pressed to the back of his
head, Bruce sat on the couch in the living room. Tony looked more
concerned about the bump forming on his head than Bruce seemed to
be. Meg was still trying to make sense of all of these.

"So... what are you supposed to be? Some kind of
superhero? I mean, I thought imaginary friends were more like
unicorns and talking butterflies."

"I'm a librarian, actually. At least I am
according to Tony. Thankfully, it seems about right. I do enjoy a
good book," Bruce said.

"Not many kids think up a librarian as an
imaginary friend," Meg commented.

Bruce chuckled. "True enough. But then I suppose
I'm thankful for Tony imagining me as I am. I could have been
something like a purple kangaroo. I imagine that wouldn't be as fun
for me."

"Hmm... that would be a problem. Considering you
would be a male kangaroo and you would have no pouch to store
things-which would be the single best reason to be a kangaroo,
after all."

"Exactly what I'm saying," Bruce said.

Tony smiled as Bruce gave him a supportive pat
on the shoulder.

"Either way, I am what Tony wanted. So any
behavioral problems you can blame on him."

"Hey!" Tony cried.

"I'm kidding, kiddo. Just kidding."

Bruce took the compress off long enough to feel
at the back of his head. He winced and quickly reapplied it.

"Can imaginary friends be hurt at all?" Meg
asked in concern. "I mean like, can I give you a concussion?"

Bruce stared into space for a moment as he
thought the question over. "I actually don't know. Here's hoping I
can't. It's not like there is a hospital that can treat me if I
do," Bruce replied. "But I can tell you we can get headaches. At
least I can."

Meg couldn't help but feel a bit of
responsibility for the headache. "I'll get an aspirin. I mean, if
you can actually take one."

"Make that a whole bottle. No wait. How about a
whole bottle and some tea if you have it?" Bruce called out to Meg
before she left the room.

THE CANISTER OF loose tea leaves was fairly easy
to find. Meg often had a cup during late nights and on nights where
a child had a bad dream or, at times, a memory. It was good to have
something soothing at those times.

More than one night had been spent with her and
a child sitting at the table as she drank her cup of Jasmine green
tea and the child, oftentimes, hot chocolate.

After setting up the dented metal tea pot, she
took out her favorite purple mug and a less favorite mug with a
picture of a cardinal painted on the side.

Tony stepped into the kitchen, just as the tea
was almost finished steeping.

"Everything okay in there?" Meg asked.

"Yeah. Bruce is whining a bit but he's fine,"
Tony said.

He fell into a short silence before biting his
lip slightly and asking a question.

"You're okay with Bruce, right? You're not going
to send him away?"