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World of Darkness: The Academy - Unexplained Mysteries [Complete]


Frida Ricci

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Sunday, 8/24/09, 11:23 a.m.

Frida stood in her bedroom, scowling slightly at the scene in front of her. On her bed lay her collection of things she needed to take to the framer. There were several flat pieces stacked on the bed off to the side - these were mostly pieces she'd completed over the summer during her trip to Europe. She hadn't had the time to get them taken care of in New York, and she had decided that instead of leaving them in her parent's capable hands, she'd take them with her and see about having them displayed in one of the local businesses near Dalton. It was a good opportunity for regular people to be exposed to her work instead of just art collectors, and these were several smaller pieces anyway that she might be able to get sold in the nearby town - most of them landscapes of one sort or another, and just the type of thing designers enjoyed purchasing for their client's homes. They usually hung in coffee shops, restaurants, or other similar locations - it gave the owners of such establishments an opportunity to display attractive artwork in their establishment without having to put forward the up-front investment, and they got a small percentage if Frida sold any of the art during it's time on display.

Frida liked that type of artwork, there was little stress associated with getting it just right, and she often painting such scenes as a way to relax and keep in practice. She also enjoyed the idea that someone other than rich people were getting to enjoy the fruits of her labor. She generally kept these types of images priced low so that they didn't fall out of the average buyer's price range. They were mostly small anyway, none of them larger than 20" x 20".

There were also a couple larger pieces, one that she had decided to donate to the school, one that she'd planned to gift to Mr. Bracks, and one that she'd decided to keep for herself. She liked to rotate out the piece she kept on her wall in her room from semester to semester, so she always left what she'd had the semester before back at home in August, and brought a different piece instead. This one was of the canals of Venice - a traditional scene to be sure, but one she enjoyed looking at because of the success she'd had getting the reflection of the light on the water just right.

What concerned Frida wasn't any of those pieces, however - it was tube she'd discovered in the corner of her room where she kept the pieces meant for framing. She'd pulled it out, and within the tube she'd discovered three large drawings. They were of the same woman she'd seen drawings of the other day in her sketchpad while allowing Ravi to peruse the drawings. Like the sketchbook, these drawings seemed to show the woman in three different forms - one as an adult in her late twenties, perhaps. And the other two as different stages of teenagers. The idea that she had sketched something simple in her notebook during her illness hadn't been too disturbing of an idea. But the fact that she'd drawn such complex, detailed pieces, and on such a large scale.. that indicated that she'd done it for a reason. Not only that, but she'd put them with the images she'd intended to have framed, and she had no idea why. Frida rarely framed drawings, they were usually somewhere to start, something to keep her hands busy, or they were done in ink and on very high-quality paper. These drawings were in charcoal - good for capturing detail, but not necessarily her favorite medium.. just one of her quickest. And while the drawings weren't done on sketch paper, they weren't done on her high-quality charcoal paper either, which meant she hadn't necessarily been concerned about drawing them for longevity when she drew them. It almost reminded Frida of some sort of reference drawing - something she had done in order to show to other people for a presentation or drawing lesson or something.

Perhaps she may have considered the idea that these drawings were placed in her closet on accident - but upon finding them, she'd decided to search all of the pieces she had with her here, to see if there was anything else she didn't remember doing. And she'd found a handful of drawings, exactly like these, tucked into her storage closet - the one that would have served the other student, had one been in here with her. Frida's parents had insisted to the school that Frida be given her own room, so that she would have both room to work, wouldn't risk any harm coming to her completed pieces or works in progress as the result of a roommate, and so that she would have the proper storage space for pieces done over the length of time she was away from home. When Frida had spread these out, she'd found several others - ones obviously based off the sketches she had done in her book, of all the same people. Only these were stored with her regular art, and it was only the three pictures of the woman she had decided to have framed.

She sat down her in her large chair, contemplating the rolled-up drawings on her bed. After a moment of bothersome mulling, she decided to do what she always did when presented with an unusual dilemma - she decided to call her parents. Perhaps they might have some sort of suggestion that would explain the situation. And her desire to take a trip to the framer today was pretty much eliminated anyhow - at least until she could explain the mysterious drawings. She hadn't made any definitive arrangements for the paintings yet in town, so she wasn't bound by any particular schedule anyway.

So Frida picked up her purse, and flicked it open. She dug around in it for a moment for her cell phone.. but then she stopped as her fingers caught on something unusual, her slight frown creasing into a deeper scowl. She pulled out the offending object, and held it up. It was a set of keys, apparently to an automobile. The only catch was, Frida didn't own an automobile. Her parents had offered to get one for her when she'd turned sixteen, but she'd politely declined. She knew how to drive, of course, but hadn't really seen the need. She didn't go to town often during her stays at Dalton, only once or twice a month at most to see about her artwork in some way or another. And when she was back in New York, she usually went places with one of her parents, and a driver on occasion. So she'd suggested that perhaps a car would be an appropriate gift after she had graduated, and thanked them for their thoughtfulness.

So to find a set of car keys in her purse, so soon after discovering a series of drawings she didn't even remember doing.. that was deeply distressing to the young artist. She studied them for a long moment, unsure of what to do with them, or where to go from there.

,,

*******

A half an hour later, Frida made her way through Lancaster, and out of the dorms. She ignored any looks she got, for she was used to such looks. At the moment, she cared very little for other people's opinions of her or her actions. What she cared about was solving the mystery of the keys.

Finally, she made it to the parking lot, keys in hand. She glanced around at the cars parked there - student vehicles, faculty vehicles, even school vans meant for driving students to the occasional field trip. Frida held up they keys, and pressed the button to unlock the car. Halfway down the aisle she was standing at, a sleek black Lexus beeped, it's headlights flashing to indicate that the alarm had been deactivated. She studied it silently for a moment, just standing there staring at it. Then she walked over to it, and opened the driver's side door. She slid into the driver's seat - pulled way further back than if she had ever needed to drive it, indicating that the owner of the car had at least a few inches on Frida in the leg area. She moved the seat up a touch, and slipped the keys into the ignition. Sure enough, the alarm hadn't lied - the engine roared to life as Frida gave a slight jump of surprise.

She sat in the car for several minutes, just listening to the hum of the engine. She flicked on the radio, taking in the sounds of unfamiliar pop music before she flipped it back off with mild disgust. Then she leaned over, popped the glove compartment, and began to shuffle through the paperwork, hoping for some sort of identification that would help her determine who the car belonged to, and most importantly, how she came into possession of the keys. After a minute of shuffling, she pulled out an insurance card and studied it. With a sigh, she tucked it back into the stack and dropped it into the passenger side seat.

"Well, that doesn't help at all. Who on earth is Vanessa Divine?"

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"Vanessa Divine's my mother."

It was a boy's almost-baritone that answered her rhetorical question, cutting through the purring of the idling Lexus LS and ending in a strangled grunt. Frida pressed the button on the door, the window sliding down with a soft whir and looked out the window, her direct, curious gaze falling on the boy who had spoken.

The young man, about her age, Frida judged, was half turned away from a worn Jeep backed into its parking space, a foot on the side-step bar. Dressed in a pair of shorts and a tight tank-top, the broad shoulders and powerful, defined physique of his V-shaped body was well displayed. Frida leaned forward slightly, glancing up pass the roof of the car to get a look of the boy's face.

It was a face she had seen before, in a few of her classes and about campus. Sean Cassidy. Chiseled good looks and friendly features, shortish hair dark as raven's wing, extremely handsome. There was something oddly familiar to the line of his jaw, the shape of his eyes, more than just her casual acquaintance could account for. His dark brows were lowered over stormy eyes of an intense grey-blue, bright with shock and surprise.

Sean turned away from his Wrangler completely, keys dangling from the lock, passing an inquisitive eye over the Obsidian Lexus, a pinch of familiarity in his gaze. He crouched down in front of the car, arms crossed across the door, and gaze level and direct with Frida's. There was an easy grin on his face, but the look in his eyes was questioning and dark.

"Frida, right? Frida, funny you should mention Vanessa. I just found out this week that my mother and sisters simply took off for who knows where." Though he tried to keep his voice affable, Frida could hear a note of bitterness in it. He jerked a thumb over a thick shoulder, pointing at his Wrangler. "I was about to go check on the house - it's only down in Denver - since it's empty now. Vanessa called my dad to tell him he could have the house back - they're divorced - but his girlfriend didn't like it, so he left it in my care."

His gaze panned across the stylish interior, again with a look of recognition before meeting Frida's once more.

"So, how do you know Vanessa?"

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Frida studied the handsome young jock for a moment, then shook her head slightly, looking just a touch confused. She shut off the engine and pulled the keys out of the ignition, then glanced back up at him.

"That's just it, Mr. Cassidy. I've never met your mother.. at least, not that I'm aware of. I did, however, have her vehicle keys in my purse. I've no recollection of how they got there, I only found them today."

Her brow furrowed slightly, which was more expression than he ever recalled seeing the odd young artist express before, and she played with the keys idly between her fingertips as her gaze drifted off for a moment to nowhere in particular, somewhere past the Sean, past the parking lot, and indeed past the moment. She murmured softly, though it didn't seem to be to him in particular.

"Indeed, it's been a very odd week all around..."

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"You can say that again," Sean muttered, his tempestuous eyes following the set of keys swinging between the Burton-esque girl's fingers. "Whatever I thought boarding school was going to be like, it surely wasn't this."

Sean cocked his head until vertebrae popped, then gazed steadily at Frida, a mild smile plastered on his face, until she focused on him, on the now, once more. "Well, Frida, I'm not sure how you could've ended up with Vanessa's keys. Maybe she came to campus to pay my tuition or check up on me or something and bumped into you and her keys fell into your purse," Sean conjectured, clearly not satisfied with his hypothesis, but gamely stretching for any straw he could find. The obvious addendum that she hadn't come to see him, even if she was here, was left loudly unsaid.

"D'you remember seeing a woman, tall, over six feet, looking somewhere in her mid to late twenties? Has pale skin and hair as black as mine, though somewhat longer - I guess you can say she's attractive, in an arrogant-imperious-bitchy sorta way." Sean shifted, hands tightening on the door, knuckles flaring white with the force he was using. "She might've been with my sisters - one older than me, the other younger. Cassandra and Savannah look almost exactly like Vanessa, only younger."

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She stared at him intently for several long, uncomfortable moments. Her face seemed to be searching his - not his eyes necessarily, although she did study them for a moment or two. But her gaze went on to the rest of him - the shape of his nose, his jawline, the curve of his cheekbone and the line of his forehead. Then she stood up abruptly and closed the car door behind her, her gaze meeting his, a small frown of concentration on her face.

"Well then. I obviously have. Please follow me."

With that she turned and headed towards Lancaster without a backwards glance, her every assumption being that the handsome jock would do as instructed. Sean stared at her retreating back for a moment, not quite sure whether to be offended at being ordered about, angry that Vanessa had indeed been here without speaking to him, or confused at the somewhat vagueness of Frida's response. Then it dawned on him that she didn't seem to be waiting for him, and that he had no idea where her room actually was, or even what dorm she lived in. So he hurried after the willowy young woman's retreating back, catching up to her and following her wordlessly across the campus.

She led them to Lancaster dorm, through the main doors, and down one of the first-floor hallways. She reached Room 103, turned the doorknob, and pushed the door open. Sean followed, hesitantly. He'd never given much thought to what Frida's bedroom might look like, but as he stood there looking around, he realized it was nothing like what he would have expected. Some part of him had expected dark, gothic decor - lots of black and gray, and some cobwebs, with perhaps some bright but disorienting splashes of color thrown about, like something out of "The Nightmare Before Christmas", or perhaps "The Addams Family". Instead, stepping into Frida's bedroom was much like stepping into a room from the past. He knew Dalton allowed people to furnish their own rooms if they preferred - it was, after all, an elite private institution. Still, the sophisticated elegance of the room took him off-guard. Her furniture was elegant and old-fashioned, and her bedding looked luxurious and expensive. Though it was neutral, he was surprised at the amount of lightness - even though it had the same two windows his did, it seemed so much brighter in here, with the light filtering through the soft white sheers. Her room was mostly shades of white and gray, though the furniture was stained a deep walnut and she had a large, comfortable (but still old) looking light blue-gray armchair and ottoman. There was even two small pillows to match it laying on her bed. She had an antique-looking mirror hanging over an equally old and Victorian-looking desk, and the surface was covered with old-fashioned jewelry, dainty glass perfume bottles, and a silver-handled brush and mirror set. On the wall over her bed, there was a large empty spot where it looked like a large painting usually hung, and on the other wall there were several smaller paintings of different images, all framed in different but equally expensive-looking frames.

The other corner of the room was the only part that was less surprising to him - it was the corner that appeared dedicated to her artwork. She had a painting still drying on an easel, it appeared to be a painting of a small alleyway in Europe or somewhere like that - you sure didn't see streets that looked like that here in the United States. There was a small stool, and a small end table with a couple drawers that was covered with various types of art supplies, both on top of the table's surface and spilling out of the drawer. There was a cup full of brushes and paint tubes and bottles that he couldn't identify. And everywhere where there was space - tucked into a corner by the bed, stacked up neatly on the small table between the bed and the chair, and covering the surface of her dresser, there were colored pencils, markers, art books, and sketchbooks. Frida seemed to collect art supplies like other girls collected jewelry, magazines, and clothes combined.

Still not saying anything to him, Frida sat her purse down on the dresser, along with the keys to Vanessa's car. Then she walked over to the bed, picked up several pieces of rolled-up paper that seemed to have been left on the bed, and unrolled them. She picked up what looked like small, decorative sandbags, and used them to weight down the corners so the drawings would remain unrolled. Then she motioned for him to come closer and look.

"There.. I found these today. Are these of your mother, and your sisters?"

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Stepping into Frida's room, Sean couldn't hide his surprise at the decor. He had sort of expected the antique furniture, but not the overall sophisticated elegance of the furnishings. Though the atmosphere was lighter and the knick-knacks different - Vanessa had a fondness for tribal art and artifacts, both authentic and imitation - Frida's room could have almost seamlessly fit in his mother's large house. It was an odd thought, considering the vast differences in the two women.

The other side of the room garnered a brief nod and a small grin of understanding. It wasn't all that different from the state of his room, at least his half, except that the organized clutter of art supplies was replaced with an organized clutter of sports equipment. One's room often told much of one's loves. Sean smiled bemusedly and sauntered over as Frida beckoned him to her side.

The smile froze on handsome jock's face when his eyes fell upon the unfurled pieces of paper, throat tight as he saw what was drawn upon their surfaces. A hesitant hand reached out, stroking the textured grain of the thick paper, lightly smearing a charcoal drawn calf. Sean's heavy breathing intertwined with the heavy rustle of the paper.

"This... this is undeniably them..." Sean affirmed softly, eyes going from one drawing to the next to the next.

"Vanessa." Sean pointed at the tall, athletically statuesque woman in her mid twenties, dressed in a skirt-suit.

"Cassandra." A younger woman, not yet twenty, dressed in heels, tight slacks and a button down shirt, her figure every bit as impressive as the slightly older woman.

"Savannah." The youngest woman, somewhere in her mid teens, though it was hard to judge her exact age. Not as tall as the other two, her halter top and skin-tight jeans revealed a rapidly developing figure that promised to be their match in time.

Sean stared in silence at the drawings, somehow better than a photo, the charcoal masterpieces went beyond being mere visual representations. In fluid strokes, Frida had somehow managed to capture a portion of their... essence. Vanessa's cool arrogance and fiery fierceness was on display, a hardness overlaying her hidden sense of deep betrayal. Cassandra's longing for... something and Savannah's adolescent uncertainty, trying to hide it behind a teenaged smug cynicism. It was all there.

A stormy eye flickered as something suddenly occurred to him, staring at the three drawings sitting side by side. He knew that his sisters greatly favoured his mother, he was told he did too, but seeing the drawings together, he realized the familial resemblance went deeper than that. The drawings could have been all of the same woman, taken at different stages of her life. Unaccountably, the powerfully built young man gave a violent shudder.

Mechanically, Sean turned his head, to look at Frida with wide eyes, roiling, blue-grey tempests. "You - you must've seen them, met them. They must've been here. There is no way you could've captured them so - so truthfully otherwise." Frida watched as Sean's face, usually friendly and open, hardened with a hurt anger. "Dad said they probably went off to a woman's retreat or commune or somethin' and doesn't know when or if they're gonna be back."

Sean turned and moved to stare out one of the windows, smacking a fist into his palm, though when he spoke, his voice was a resigned sigh. "Vanessa is a bitch. but they couldn't even be bothered to say good-bye."

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Frida was silent for a moment, her gaze flickering back and forth between the angry young athlete and the immaculate women in the portraits. Then she sighed, and sat down on the edge of the ottoman, her pale but elegant fingertips playing with the keys she held in her hands.

"I don't know what to tell you, Sean. All I can do is tell you the truth, and so far it's infinitely unhelpful. I know I have these drawings in my sketchbook, too. I can tell you I don't remember any of this - drawing your family, receiving these keys. I can tell you that it frightens me."

She picked up another rolled up group of papers that appeared to be the same size as the drawings of his mother and sisters, and then began unrolling them, and laying them out on top of the ones of the women in his life. This pictures were infinitely more disturbing. They seemed as realistic as the previous drawings, but yet utterly unbelievable because of the subject matter. People with milk-white skin and eyes that were black where they should be white. Women in odd, primitive costumes that, for all their difference in clothing selections, reminded Sean eerily in poise and expression as the drawing - and his memories - of Vanessa.

"I know you don't know me, Sean, so you don't understand how odd these drawings are to me. I don't draw fantasy. I don't paint science fiction. I create art based off of what's here, in front of me, what I see in the world around me. It's entirely too much subject material to cover in a lifetime, no matter how hard I try, and I've never seen a reason to apply my talents to fantastical visions of things that don't exist. So for me to have created these drawings - and look at them, they are in positions and poses just like any other drawing I'd do, like I caught them in the middle of some activity, where they were unaware that I was capturing their image - this is truly outside of my normal behavior. Unless I did see them, and don't recall it - which is a disturbing idea, both because of the lack of memory itself ,and because of the subject matter specifically. It's completely.. out of character. And that's what frightens me."

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Sean looked at the other sketches, stormy eyes narrowed in concern. The black eyes, like depthless pits, in particular, made soft fingers of ephemeral dread run up his spine. That the sketches had such a life-like quality only made their unhuman eyes even more disturbing. With an effort, he pulled his gaze away and kept it on Frida as she revealed her concerns.

When she was done, Sean gave her a complicated shrug, not sure exactly what to say or how to reassure her. "Er, well, it seems rather obvious my mother was here. Must've been when everyone was down with that flu-fever thing. Maybe you drew these when you were sick... mixin' what was real with your dreams or somethin'? These women, they seem an aweful like Vanessa. Cassandra too, come to think of it. I... wouldn't worry about it too much. Everyone has moments of sheer lunacy, right?" Sean ran a hand through his hair, clearly not satisfied with his explanation, but unable to come up with anything better.

"Um, look, you think you can do me a favour? I gotta go check on the house and I might as well bring her car back. If you take her car, I'll lead in my Jeep then drive you back. If nothing else, you'll get a chance to see the house. Maybe something there will jog your memory of Vanessa and my sisters, maybe give some partial answers. I saw something like in an episode of House I think. I'll throw in lunch too, if you don't mind picking up something along the way. What do ya say?"

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Frida considered it for a moment, the nodded slightly. She wasn't any more pleased about his reaction than she had been about her lack of memory, but getting a look around the house seemed like as good of an idea as any, so she gathered up her things and the keys, and followed Sean out to the parking lot. She climbed into the sleek black vehicle and watched as Sean climbed into his Jeep. She adjusted the mirrors along with the seat again, so that she'd be able to actually drive the car. At least it seemed she hadn't done that so far.

The drove along the roads, Frida following Sean's Jeep at a steady and relatively safe distance. Once they reached his mother's house, she parked next to him and climbed out of the car, pressing the alarm button and closing the door behind her. She looked around at the building, trying to see if any of it jogged a memory - but so far, she felt nothing.

"Very well.. what now?"

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"We go inside, I guess."

With an awkward shrug, Sean led the way up the circular driveway to the front door, fishing in his pockets for the set of keys his father had given him. The key turned in the lock with a soft click, then the door swung open soundlessly. Sean looked back over a shoulder at the enclosed grounds of the house, gave Frida another shrug and a crooked grin, then stepped inside.

Already, the ambiance of the place was different, feeling... not abandoned, but empty, as if the occupants had simply left for a while. There was no music playing in the background through the integrated sound system, no pop or rock that Sean's sisters favoured, nor the classical tones or tribal beats of his mother.

Sean scuffed along the hardwood, glancing around, looking to see if anything was disturbed. Everything seemed to be where it belonged. The tribal masks hanging on the dark paneled walls, which he had once rather liked, stared down at him with open eyes in seeming judgment, questioning his right to be here.

Taking the stairs three at a time, Sean checked the rooms on the second floor. The guest rooms and study were immaculate, untouched, save for the tumbler and half empty bottle of bourbon sitting on Vanessa's desk. Peeking in his sisters' and mother's rooms, self-consciously not taking a single step inside, he couldn't even tell if they had taken anything with them, to wherever the Hell they had gone.

"Well, Frida, doesn't seem like the house got any uninvited guests," Sean said, standing in the gleaming, white tiled kitchen a few minutes later, going through the fridge. A few things that had already gone bad were thrown in the garbage. "It looks like Vanessa and my sisters just went out to the store or movies or somethin'. Still nothin' ringin' a bell for you?"

Sean shifted from the fridge to the freezer. "Huh, still plenty of stuff here. I'm not a bad cook, I can make something for lunch, if you want. There's some burgers or chicken cutlets I can barbecue, stuff to make sandwiches, some other things too."

Sean got out the fixings for a quick sandwich and placed them on the island while he waited for Frida to yea or nay his idea. As he was slicing the crusty bread, which had gone slightly hard, he surreptitiously eyed Frida from beneath his brows. She was an odd one, but certainly pretty, and definitely not like other girls.

Under her dark, direct, penetrating gaze, Sean was suddenly acutely aware that he was alone with a girl, a weirdly cute one, in what for all intents and purposes, was his home. He looked up, beginning to give her a grin when his gaze went past her, glancing out of the kitchen window looking out on the yard, and noticed something sinking in the pool.

"What the fuh...?"

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  • 2 weeks later...

"It does seem wasteful not to use the food that's available to us already, especially considering you said your mother and sisters would be gone for awhile.. funny, Mother usually has the hired help clear out our fridges before we leave on a long trip..."

Thanks to Ravi's recent attentions, Frida wasn't entirely oblivious to the fact that Sean's attentions had become slightly more.. personal. She was about to return his grin with a slight smile when she saw his gaze shift past her. She turned, taking a step forward so that she could see what Sean (with the several inches he had over the teenage artist) could see easily from where he was standing. She gazed out the window for a moment, fingertips resting gently on the counter near the sink, before making the obvious statement.

"Sean.. you have a mattress in your swimming pool."

Without further comment or waiting for a reply, she walked over to the elegant French doors that led out to the patio and opened them, stepping outside to investigate the curiosity.

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"I... yeah," Sean said to her back as he followed her into the back yard. The double-sized mattress bobbed low in the pool, completely water-logged. Sitting in the middle of the deep end, the mattress was out of reach from the deck surrounding the pool.

Turning to the pool shed, planning on getting the skimmer so he could pull the mattress closer, his eyes widened as the fell upon the pool house, noticing the open door, splintered and hanging from a hinge. Whenever he visited his mother, he spent most of his time there and it looked like someone else had too.

"Frida, stay behind me! Just in case whoever did this is still in there," Sean said in a fierce whisper. He approached the entrance, trying to keep his steps light, fisted hands coming up defensively. Back against the wall next to the door, he took a deep breath then dashed inside.

At his first step in the pool house, he froze, hands falling to his side. "What the hell happened here?"

His room was destroyed. The bed frame was flipped on its side, endtables and TV stand shattered after apparently being thrown at the wall. The shelves, wardrobe, and drawer chests were all pulled down and smashed. Stunned, he staggered into the room, his room whenever he stayed with his mother. He looked at the holes in the drywall curiously and made a fist, placing it in the opening. It was a perfect fit.

"Who would does this?" Sean asked rhetorically, voice distant. "And why would they limit themselves only to the pool house and leave the main house alone?"

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After a moment or two, and no sound of any sort of coming from the sound of the pool house, Frida followed Sean in. She looked around at the room, at the destruction and chaos that seemed to have touched every corner of the living space. She stepped closer to Sean, glancing up at the handsome jock with a concerned expression.

"Should we call the police, perhaps?"

But even as she said it, something in her voice and her expression told him she didn't think it was a good idea. Something about this seemed to speak to Frida, she was almost certain this was another piece of the puzzle that was piling up around them.

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  • 2 weeks later...

"Why?" Sean answered with a snort, noting her concerned expression. "Only the pool house was vandalized. The cops will take one look at the house and figure we can cover the lost and they won't trot out all their CSI shit just for this. They'll say they'll do their best, but don't hold out hope. Hell, I'm not sure if anything was even taken."

With a sigh, Sean looked around the destroyed room, then began collecting debris and piling it outside for later disposal. On his second trip, he took the time to pull the sopping mattress from the pool to add to mound of garbage, shirt spotted with wet areas.

"Guess I'll have to clean it up myself. We have the stuff to patch up drywall in the garage. It's not that hard." Sean continued for a few minutes more, but after barely making a dent in the wreckage, gave up in disgust. "Looks like I have a weekend project. Joy. Anyway, lets go see about that lunch I mentioned, you don't have to watch me work."

Though the heavily muscled young man seemed to take the event in stride, Frida's dark, discerning eyes perceived the tension in his thick shoulders. There was something about this that spoke to Sean as well, though is was nothing he could have put into words.

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  • 4 months later...

Frida nodded softly, accepting his refusal to notify authorities with the same unruffled air that she had suggested doing so in the first place. As he worked, dragging the mattress from the pool, Frida gathered up some of the obvious debris into a pile. Once he resigned himself to the length of the project, Frida scooped the pile of debris into a small, neat pile and brushed it into a trash can with the efficiency of an artist cleaning up her studio.

"That sounds fine. I am sorry I couldn't be of more help."

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"Your company was more than help enough, Frida, honest," Sean replied with a brief grin. And it was true. Having someone to share unanswered questions with made them feel less ominous, if no less puzzling.

"C'mon, time to make something to eat." The two teens turned and headed back inside the main house, Sean getting the French doors for Frida with a nod.

In the pristine kitchen, Sean checked the freezer, pulling out the box of chicken cutlets and finding it half full of chicken wings instead. That was fine - he knew a simple but tasty BBQ sauce that was easy to make. He turned on the radio to a local rock station and got to work.

While the wings defrosted in the microwave, Sean put various tablespoons of tomato paste, brown sauce, white wine vinegar, honey, olive oil and garlic in a small bowl and thoroughly blended them together. Head bobbing and humming softly with the music, he tore off two sheets of heavy aluminum foil and greased them up. He peeled and quartered two potatoes and deftly sliced some onions, green peppers, and carrots - the veggies were getting a bit soft, but they'd be fine after being grilled. Just as he was placing the quartered potatoes on the aluminum sheets, filling the spaces with the veggies and topping them with slices of bacon, the microwave beeped.

Sean sprinkled the side dish with salt and pepper then grabbed the plate of wings and head back out to the large, stainless steel barbecue and began grilling their lunch. Throughout his preparations, Frida studied the muscular jock, engaged in the domestic activity with easy familiarity, her intense eyes dark with curiosity.

"What? Surprised a teenaged boy actually knows how to cook?" Sean gently teased when he noticed her inspection.

"No." Frida tilted her head slightly, then reconsidered. "Perhaps a smidgen surprised. After all, most people our age either live with their parents or are residing in some manner of dormitory. In either case, their meals are usually provided to them."

"I guess. I my case, after my dad and Vanessa divorced, it was just me and dad, and dad often worked late. I learned to fend for myself." Sean deftly flipped the wings and foil wrapped potatoes nestled in the coals.

"Actually, I was more intrigued by what you were preparing." She gesturing gracefully at the meat sizzling over the coals. "Our domestic helper tended towards more European cuisine. I have never watched someone prepare something so... American."

Sean's grin turned wry. "I'm Canadian."

"Of course." For the longest moment, he thought she was going to smile, but instead she bowed her head graciously. "My pardons." He sure he wasn't imagining the amused glitter in her dark eyes.

While the meat finished grilling, Sean went back inside and washed the few dishes he had made while preparing lunch. After a moment, Frida stepped up to his side and began drying the bowls and knives he placed on the drying rack, her movements delicate and precise.

Forty minutes later, the two of them sat at the island in the kitchen, lunch sitting before them. Biting into a chicken wing, Sean watched his dinner companion expectantly, wondering what she thought of the meal.

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  • 5 weeks later...

Frida ate quietly, which was a bit odd for Sean at first.. he was used to the incessant prattering of other teenagers, his Father's attempts at engaging him about his daily routine, or Vanessa and his sister's animated conversations - the ones that had excluded him entirely. But Frida ate silently, seeming to focus on the meal itself, which was fairly complimentary, the more he thought about it. Following Frida's lead, he noticed that as one ate without words, he noticed the slightly charred taste of the skin, the faint spiciness of the sauce, and the varied textures of the vegetables. It was, in all honestly, the most attention he'd ever paid to a meal.. and he found he enjoyed the actual food far more than any recent meal he'd eaten, even the fancy steak dinner with his father and his now-future stepmother.

Once the two of them had finished, they gathered up the dishes. As Sean put away cooking supplies, Frida loaded up one of the two dishwashers, the one that was only as deep as a drawer, for people like Vanessa and his sisters who ate out far more frequently than they cooked. He handed her the small drop-in plastic-wrapped pellet of dishwasher soap, and she closed it and started the wash cycle as he finished placing the last spices in the cabinet.

"The meal was lovely.. thank you very much, Sean."

He nodded slightly, and nabbed his keys from the counter. Aside from cleaning up the pool house, there wasn't really anything left for them to accomplish.

"No problem.. it was pretty good, huh? Anyway, thanks for coming out here with me to drop off the car. You ready to head back now?"

She nodded, and gathered up her purse. Then the two teens headed back to the Jeep, and back to the academy.

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