We arrived in Whistler with the familiar Inukshuk sculpture greeting us. The village was in full swing for the holidays. I was so glad to be back. We first stopped at my condo to make sure the contractors had finished putting everything back together from the first run in I had a short time ago. We all entered in as Matilda began running around the entire place as if she was making certain everything was as she left it. Sure enough, the contractors were finished. They had done a great job. While we were in Kingston, we decided to put this one up for rent. Then I would move into their larger condo. I was so excited to obviously be living with Athen, but there was a part of me that would miss this place since I had spent so much time here. I was glad it was still mine. I was only renting it out. I took the boxes we had brought into my bedroom and began putting in all of my clothes and things I didn’t want to leave without.
Cyril and Arie were in the living room and kitchen cleaning those cupboards out and packaging those items up to take with us. I was grateful for their help. It made the process much faster. My goal was to do a little bit each week while we were up here and then get the process started to rent it.
Athen and I had, also, secretly discussed getting a house possibly outside of the village, a small one where we could be a little more secluded away from the hustle and bustle of the village. We would still want to keep both the condos in the village and maybe rent them as vacation rentals in between. It was too good of a spot to give up, but the idea of a house was pretty intriguing. We were going to bring it up to Cyril and Arie to see what they thought about the idea.
I was getting the last of the pictures off my dresser, and I saw one of the first ones of Athen and myself pre-phasing. I knew I finally had the proof I needed. I had changed since the whole reintroduction process. It wasn’t only the eyes.
“Aha! I exclaimed to Athen.
“What is it?” he asked coming over to where I was sitting.
“I do look different than before. Look at the picture!”
“Sweetie, the only thing that changed is your confidence level and the color of your eyes. It just so happens the camera picked it up. But, honestly, you always took my breath away.” He smooched me on my head and went back to whatever he was packing up for me.
“Huh.”
We finished up and rang the bell captain to move the boxes down to our car. Our next stop was my new home for now. I was super excited to enter into the condo for the first time with the thought that I wasn’t leaving. Sleeping in Athen’s bed was even more miraculous. We decided to have dinner out somewhere after we brought everything up and then hit the sack early to start our first full day on the entire mountain. Plus, I knew that with sleeping next to Athen, I probably wasn’t getting to bed quite that early.
We were at Araxi enjoying the wonderful truffle oil fries when Arie got a call on her cell phone. She excused herself, and I realized it must have been about the snowboarder.
“What do you think the news is?” I asked Athen.
“Last we heard the trail was a little cold. Are you sure you haven’t had anymore visions?”
“Nothing.” I was disappointed in myself. It seemed like I was leading everyone on a wild goose chase.
“We’ll just see what she says when she gets back. You’ve done a lot more than you are giving yourself credit for.” Cyril was trying to be supportive, but it didn’t help how I was feeling. “Especially this early on in the game.” Cyril winked at me trying to make me feel better. If only he knew about all of my visions.
Arie returned to the table, and her facial expression said it all.
“Well, the clothes you had described in your vision were dead on.”
My heart fell to the floor. We were too late.
“They haven’t found the snowboarder,” she whispered, “But they found his clothes along with his other belongings he had the day he went missing. No other sign of him. They’re on the run for sure.”
“Do you think he has been turned?” I asked, my throat scratchy like sandpaper.
“I really don’t think so, not yet anyway. I think they’re enjoying toying with us,” she said flatly.
“What about those hikers? What do you think has come of them? Is this related?” I asked, not sure why it mattered.
“Yeah. It certainly is related, but I don’t know what the significance is yet,” Cyril said, shaking his head in frustration.
Our entrees arrived, and as was becoming usual, we had to shake our previous conversation. It took some getting used to switching gears so often. It was exhausting mentally, but from what I could tell, the only way to maintain some normalcy was to be able to switch it off. I was getting the hang of it pretty quickly, all things considered. However, what I looked forward to most was falling asleep in Athen’s arms and waking up in them the next morning. I noticed myself shoveling in the food that much quicker as these thoughts bounced around. I looked over at Athen and noticed he was shoveling it in at a pretty steady pace too, and I chuckled to myself.