Available Darkness Season 2

asked.
    “It’s OK, I guess,” Abigail said, quietly.
    “What do you like to do for fun?”
    “Read, watch TV, play games. Sometimes I draw stuff. But I’m not that good.”
    Larry said, “Don’t let her kid you, she’s a great artist!”
    “I’ve never been good at art,” Katya said. “Though I do love to read. I loved Harry Potter , but I guess everyone else did, too. Have you ever read the Paratime series?”
    Abigail leaned forward, “Yeah, I loved it!”
    Katya’s eyes brightened. “I’ve never met anyone else who read them before,” she practically squealed. “Or at least not that we talked about. Do you have a favorite one?”
    “I only had one book,” Abigail said. “It had a bunch of stories in it. How about you?”
    Katya laughed. “Same. I just had one collection, but I read it like a thousand times. I’d never read anything like that before, with all the parallel worlds and histories. I loved it, and I liked Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen best.
    Abigail felt genuinely and quite suddenly happy. “That one was in the book I had! The story I liked most was He Walked Around the Horses . It should’ve been boring, but wasn’t.”
    Paratime small talk turned into a ton of other topics and scraped two hours from the evening. Conversation drifted from books and stories to Katya’s early childhood in Ukraine, to a nightmare family she briefly worked for right before the Radleys. Katya held her tongue, not trashing them too bad, probably thinking Larry might not hire her if she talked bad about her clients. But it was Larry who coaxed the stories from her, one by one, slowly at first, then relentlessly after he practically split his middle laughing about a time the spoiled rotten mother of a horrible brat refused to change a single diaper. Her kid would sit in poop all day if the nanny wasn’t around to change her. Her husband, a nice guy and ugly enough to put up with her crap, challenged her to change one. She did, but not without puking all over the place.
    By the conversation’s end they were gobbling pizza and sitting together at the dining room table. Abigail felt herself relax, a little, and actually start to maybe like Katya, the first woman she’d known in years, besides Stacy. While Stacy was nice enough, she was still Abigail’s captor, along with Randy the monster who kept her in his closet, so Abigail never felt completely at ease.
    “So,” Larry said as he swallowed a pepperoni Abigail plucked from her slice and put on his plate — she hated the thought of eating pigs, who she felt were too cute to eat. “You want a job? Abi is really sweet, and I promise you’ll never have to change a diaper.”
    Katya laughed. “Yes, I’d love to watch Abi. Do you prefer Abi or Abigail?”
    Nobody had ever asked Abigail her preferred name. Ever. She loved that Katya had done so. While she didn’t mind Larry calling her Abi, because he’d been doing it for so long, she did prefer Abigail, and told Katya.
    Larry looked stunned, “You mean you don’t like Abi? Wow, I feel like an idiot!”
    “It’s OK,” Abigail said. “I don’t mind either name, really. Besides, you talk fast, and Abigail probably takes too long to say.”
    Larry acted wounded, “Ouch. Burn.”
    They all laughed. It had been a while since Abigail had laughed — too long. As she watched Katya’s infectious smile, she felt like the dark cloud that had been hovering over her life for so long might finally be lifting.

    * * * *

CHAPTER 5 — John

    Anchor Harbor, Washington

    John sat at the back of The Hideaway Bar, named appropriately enough given the circumstances, waiting for what seemed an eternity.
    The waitress, a redhead with green eyes and ample cleavage spilling from her tight black tee, eyed him from behind the bar. John returned her smile, nursing flirtation as much as his whiskey. Something about her, beyond the obvious, had worked its way under his skin, making John wish he could have sex without draining the life from another.
    It was funny how quickly lust turned his words into innuendo and his thoughts naughty, considering how long it had been since he’d even entertained the idea of sex. Of course, he rarely put himself in situations where he’d run into nubile women.
    She sauntered over to his table for the third time in 15 minutes.
    “Your friend usually this late?” she asked, grinning as she sat across from him at the table.
    John tried to avoid looking down her shirt, but failed