Chapter 6 A Secret To Ignore

Julienne was out on the top floor of the building hanging the bed laundries that she just finished washing.

It was Saturday. She’d been alone in the apartment since Rana left for work very early. She woke up past nine am earlier and just lazed around the entire morning. She watched at least two films--a romantic and an action movie. 

By the time she finished watching the two films, it was already lunch. So, she closed the TV for a while and went to the kitchen to make shrimp pasta and toss salad for lunch. Then, she made lemonade for her drink.

She loves weekends. Especially, Saturdays like this. She can laze all day round and just do whatever she wants. Saturday is her solo day as she likes to call it herself as Rana is out in her shop all day while Sundays are for her and Rana. They decide whatever they want to do together on Sundays. The first day of the week. Before work resumes the next day.

She straightened the soft thick white blanket on the pole metal and bent over to get the yellow bed sheet. 

Julienne works in the American Museum of Natural History at Central Park and she knows that Rana is not from their world. It’s a secret she loved to feign ignorance with. 

Because the day she found her it was nothing but an ordinary day. Nothing so special except an ordinary regular family day with her mom and dad out in Central Park having their picnic in the early morning while watching the still waters of The Lake or forever admire the Belvedere Castle from a distance. 

You watch the waters with someone riding on the boat along the way or the birds flying in the sky unless something out of the ordinary catches your attention like a dead human found with their head jutting by the banks or a dead fish maybe that has floated by. A dead man’s body was still yet to be found for no man in their right mind would likely throw a dead body to be seen one day floating on The Lake to open a case so as to catch a culprit.

Julienne was openly admiring the Belvedere Castle again from the distance while munching on her sandwiches. They missed a visit to the park last Saturday because both her mom and dad were busy with their work. She was on vacation from school so she just hung around with some of her friends last Saturday.

She was half-listening to her mom and dad chatting about his dad’s busy schedule in the hospital. He’s a cardiologist at Mount Sinai.

“Don’t you think you need a vacation, James? I barely feel your presence at home these days. We only see each other’s back every day this week.”

“At least we see each other’s backs saying goodbye and good night.”

“We hardly held a full conversation this week except see your back as you leave. You’re like a shadow in the house. Gone in the morning. Back by nightfall.”

“They still say ‘I love you, honey.’, ‘I miss you, honey.’ and ‘I’m back.’”

Julienne hid her smile but she felt her mom roll her eyes at her dad. She continued eating her sandwich.

“When’s your schedule going to change?”

“Next month.”

“Can’t you ask to change them this week? You appear too tired when you got home last night.”

“I can try, Juliet. But I don’t hold the schedule at work.”

They changed their conversation and her dad opened about his latest case of a patient he needed to operate on.

Julienne was sipping her juice looking at the banks again when she noticed something glistening brightly against the banks.  They shone like caramel. A bundle of caramel hair. Maybe they’re just a bundle of long caramel straws that fell by the lake. Accidents of things falling in the water and getting washed off to the banks are quite common.

What if it’s a dead horse out there that drowned? Thinking the question ridiculous still, Julienne rose from her seat. 

A dead horse drowning in the waters? That would be the day. She thought. 

“Julienne, where are you going?”

“Just by the bank, mom.”

She said not looking back.

Julienne has always been a curious person. But then she must have inherited it from her mom Juliet who lives with her curiosity by working inside the museum which is full of more than curious things but wonders.

She walked close to the bank and peered down. 

It wasn’t a drowned horse whose tail has jutted out from the waters. It was an unconscious woman she found lying on her back by the banks. She appeared to be sleeping very peacefully.

Fear gripped her. Is she dead?

“Mom! Dad! There’s someone in here! Quick!”

Julienne shouted and she saw them rising from their spot and running towards her. 

“What happened?" Her dad said studying the unconscious woman. "She’s a girl. Julienne, let’s pull her out of the water.” 

“I hope she’s not yet dead.” Her mom said as they pulled her out of the water. She was dressed in an ancient Indian tribe suit which was wet, crumpled, and muddied. A closer look, it appeared to be a warrior’s suit covered with a soft gray cloak that is now spread with mud. 

She must be an actress who was strolling out in the park enjoying a view of the lake last night thought Julienne when she had an attack. It must have happened last night. She surmised. The young woman seemed to be of the same age as her as she made a thorough inspection of her face. She had ivory skin and a slender body and her legs were long covered in moleskin boots. Her face was small and oval-shaped. Her lashes were long and her thin lips were blanched from the cold. Her wet long caramel hair covered almost half her face and Julienne moved to tuck it behind her ears.

Her dad checked the sleeping woman’s pulses and found it thready. He immediately called an ambulance from his hospital.

After fifteen minutes, the parademics came and put the woman on the stretcher and put her in the ambulance. They rode with the parademics back to the hospital and the young woman was seen immediately in the emergency. 

Julienne and her mom waited by the waiting area and her dad emerged out after twenty minutes.

“She needs to be placed in the ICU. She has a thready pulse, a weak heart, and is deeply unconscious. Her brain and her heart need to be scanned.”

“I don’t think I will be home tonight.”

Seemed like her dad’s schedule got one more added to his plate.

Julienne started to drop more often in the hospital since they found the young woman by the lake. She felt it was her responsibility to check on her. And when after a week, they still found no sign of knowing who the young woman might be as there was no ID found on her dress, she kept visiting her. She watched her from the glass outside again. 

Julienne is an ambivert. More like an antisocial extrovert. She liked to hang around people but she’s not particularly close to anyone. She’s happy being around people even when she doesn’t have any particular best friend. She has some close friends she loved to be around.

She wondered how it would be like to have a best friend as she looked at the young woman. As usual, she’s asleep. When would she wake up? Does she have a best friend? 

Julienne’s eyes were fixed on her sleeping figure while different emotions surged inside her. She pitied her. No one visited her in a month. She was curious about her. Why was she wearing an ancient Indian tribe dress the day she found her? She should have been found now. It’s already been a month. She wanted to know her more. Become her friend once she wakes up.

Maybe she should tell her she’s her best friend to get her initial reaction when she wakes up. That would be fun. She likes to fool around people and they don’t necessarily hate her when she makes a joke at them. She’s an infrequent prankster at school.

The next day Julienne visited the young woman and she was already awake. And she got her reaction when she jested her claiming her best friend only to be bluntly refused by an amnesiac girl. 

She decided to call her Rana after thinking for a while when the unnamed girl asked her to call her a name. They agreed together that she be called Rana Fielders.

What frankly surprised Julienne at meeting and knowing Rana was she was a woman of many surprises. She was so bad at directions it was hair pulling. And she could teleport.

Anyone who can do teleportation wouldn’t be from this world, right? She was yet to know of a human capable of it and in her entire life and she hasn’t met such kind just so yet.

Except until she met Rana.

Rana was so bad at directions that instead of being annoyed at her for long she couldn’t feel but be amazed at how someone like her could be so helpless as a child when it comes to knowing where to turn right or left. But to compensate for her direction problems she’s capable of teleportation.

She found out about Rana’s capacity to teleport the day she was about to be discharged. It was the day too she found out that Rana has directions issues because she didn’t find the nurse’s station and she lost herself when she was about to see Dr. Rosewood in his clinic. You only needed to turn left to go to the nurse’s station but she went right instead. And while she was told to go to Dr. Rosewood’s clinic she once again lost herself. Julienne just entered Rana’s room when she saw her disappear in the blink of an eye and found her standing on the green lawn of the hospital then back at her room.

Even her parents found it daunting at first. Julienne’s parents raised their brows at knowing that they could be residing with a literal UFO alien at their house but how could her parents even know the answers to where Rana came from when she didn’t know anything about herself. Whenever Julienne’s mom or dad tried to pry questions about Rana, Rana would give them a blank look at her face so they decided to leave it be.

Julienne just finished hanging the last cotton floral blanket when she felt Rana at her back.

“Did you just teleport here?” She asked turning around.

“Yes,” Rana answered standing with her arms on her side.

“You could have walked up here.”

“I’d been looking for you since earlier. I texted you,  Jules.”

“Ooops. Sorry, Ran. Left my phone back in the room.”

“I have brought cakes.” Julienne's eyes glowed.

“Really? Let’s go down!”

And she ran and went behind her and looped her arms around Rana from the back. Then, an idea came to her. They're cakes waiting in the room.

“Rana?”

“Hmm…?”

“Just teleport us!”