Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder by Quartz Shard Deborah looked out the window at the country side. It was a cloudy day and the grass was almost an electric green compared to the grey sky. She clutched her bag to her chest and sighed, She never imagined that security guards checked your bags at the bus station. She didn't imagine how hard it was to sneak a knife past three security guards. She had only carried two on her. A butterfly in her bag and a small blade strapped to her leg. She put glamour on herself and the security guard perceived her as an innocent..obviously not a type to cary weapons. The security guard had gone through everyone's luggage and hadn't taken anything out. Deborah maintained eye-contact and mind-control the whole time he searched her bags. At the picture of Susan and her hugging on the beach and the extra large box of super absorbency tampons he stopped looking. She immediately felt tired. She avoided the eyes of the other passengers. People on public transportation tended to wander, much like herself. She knew why she left New Salem and her friends behind...that strange urge to escape life in general. She had seriously fucked up with Susan... What had happened with Susan? One minute they were talking,...the next. Deborah didn't know. It was dark, and lovely and candlelit, typical Faye party, and Deborah leaned over and simply pressed her lips to Susan's. Susan had jerked back so violently And they had stared into each outhers' eyes in shock for a minute before Susan whispered. "What are you doing?" Deborah tried to smile....but it kept cracking. She felt incredible pain hin her chest and heart...she knew she was about to cry. She couldn't believe she went for it...how could she be so stupid! While thinking this, Deborah, on the buss somewhere around boston, pressed her face in her leather jacked and let out a small whimper. She felt the hot tears flow, but all she could think was that shocked look on Susan's face...shock and disgust. She just wanted to bury herself and die right now. She smiled imagining herself like an ostrage burying its head in the ground from her problems. She didn't like to believe they were there. She started to laugh while she cried. The other bus passengers pointedly didn't look at her. Strange that she had bought a ticket to Florida and ended up in Chicago. Deborah didn't know what happened. Just that she was running then riding to the bus station and taking the first ticket she could out of there.. She wanted to die...but not being in the inclination to cut her wrists, she decided instead to just never show her face in New Salem again. Stepping off the platform in Chicago, Deborah slung her leather jacket over one shoulder and stared strait up into the sky. Blinking sleepy tear puffed eyes. She'd slept fourteen hours on the bus and was amazed that no one had stolen anything from her. She'd sat among three Spanish ladies and listened to them talk. The foreign language rolling in one ear and out the other as she imagined what Susan would do at this moment. She wished she had done other things than terrorize outsider students in high school. Spanish would come in handy right about now. The first night Deborah checked into a hotel room and lay in the bed and watched cable all night. She pulled out the picture of Susan and she on the beach in Cape Cod...god...everything had seemed possible last summer...even Susan falling in love with a freak like her. Deborah cried herself to sleep. Deborah rented the room for the month and set out to get a job. She felt weird trying to make a life here in Chicago. For three weeks she went out to the same gay club and danced with random women with random faces...she didn't bother to learn their names...they all had one thing in common--red hair. She slept with quite a few of them... in that dirty hotel on the boring brown sheets. She needed validation that she wasn't a freak and that there were other women out there like her...who liked other women. One morning Deborah woke up to find the complementary chocolate had melted in her hair, and the girl she'd slept with accidentally got gum in her hair. She pushed the redhead on the floor, for one minute she thought it was Susan then the girl turned around. Deborah kicked her out immediately. She went to the hair dressers that day and had it cut short. The hair dresser was a girl she'd had sex with. She kept babbling how this was meg ryans haircut and maybe they should get together sometime to go out on a real date. Deborah ignored her and stared strait ahead and wondered if Susan would like her hair. After that, she never went back to the club...She didn't want the validation of sex anymore...she just wanted to be alone. Strangely during all this she felt that when the full moon rounded she'd be back on the beach again, trying vainly to sit next to Susan to maybe to hold her hand. But a full moon came and passed and Deborah was still there. She felt the stubborn need to make Susan come to her. Deborah took to wandering the streets downtown...she was looking for, something she didn't know what. Just that it was that one store, nook or cranny that was out of her reach. Finally, one afternoon Deborah looked around and knew she was lost. She knew she was in a back alley somewhere...she must have taken a wrong turn while not looking. She wandered a little aimlessly and came across a strangely marked door. Her feet hurt so she walked in, feeling the place was friendly...She didn't think any self-respecting gang would mark their lair with a black dandelion. Inside was a warm glowing shop. She suddenly felt,...whole. She knew this was what she was looking for. It had herbs and candles and little dolls hanging from the ceiling. Deborah stared openmouthed. What was this? Was she drawn to the magic here? She went over to a huge sheaving unit that covered a whole wall and looked in the tiny drawers to discover many tiny stones. Behind glass cases were little knives and many types of incense. Deborah was shocked. She thought her coven was the only group of witches in the world. She stuck her hand in a drawer and pulled out the first stone her hand touched. As if in slow motion, she looked down at her hand and found a tiny piece of citrine. Suddenly flashes of Susan flooded into her head. Susan dancing on the beach. Susan laughing. Susan limping on her heals...Susan playing the drum at Circle. Goddess...where was she? What was she doing? Intense longing and homesickness over took her, and she sat down on a stool. Deborah blinked at the girl who was staring from behind the counter. She was the redhead Deborah had slept with and who had gotten gum in Deborah's hair. She was shuffling a tarot deck and whistling She was a pretty red-head, but skinny, not like Susan. Susan was like the mid-day sun while this girl was an afternoon breeze. The girl stopped shuffling her cards and glanced at Deborah. She smirked when she saw her and blew a large pink bubble. She extended the hand with the deck splayed out like playing cards. "Draw a card." Deborah pushed out a shaking hand and did so. It had a picture of a man, hanging by one foot in yellow garb. She handed it back to the counter girl. "The hanging man, patience, if you act now you will hurt yourself. Draw another." Deborah picked a card out of the middle of the deck. It had a sitting boy being handed a cup by the wind while three sat at his feet. "The four of cups, when you stop chasing it, what you desire will give itself to you. Draw one more card." Deborah did, A dead man lay bloodied on the ground with ten swords sticking out of his back. "The ten of swords." The girl looked sharply at Deborah. "Go home and wait, the worst is over and you shouldn't be here. She'll be waiting for you when you get there." Deborah's mouth gaped open. And she fled the shop. She grabbed the first ticket back to New Salem and anxiously twisted her hands during the whole ride. She couldn't sleep. She stared out the road the whole time. She pestered the bus driver about taking shortcuts. He finally threatened to pull over the bus and kick her off. She tapped her foot and listened to music. She tried to read but couldn't keep her attention. Goddess...was the girl right or was Deborah fooling herself? She ran, with tired feet, from the bus station and down Crowhaven Road. She hadn't stopped moving in two months...from dancing, to sex, to walking aimlessly looking for that push back to here, now New Salem and home. It was finally time to rest. She turned in to go home. She stopped walking when she saw Susan sitting on her door step. She was wearing a headband holding her hair back...the fire waterfalls spilled from around it. She Was wearing a pink dress and strappy heels. There was dead silence as Deborah's tired eyes stared, and drank in the sight of Susan, long deprived from them.. Susan fidgeted and said, "I have been looking for you for so long....I finally found you...I made a call to a girl in the city. She'd said she'd help me get in touch with you." Susan stopped fidgeting and jumped rushing to embrace Deborah. She knocked the breath out of her. Deborah was shocked and stood there for a minute before slowly her arms came up to hug Susan back. She smelled the inhaled the perfumed smell that Susan emitted...was that ylang ylang? It felt so good...she forgot her bitterness and just ...was there for the moment. Finally Deborah said deadpanned, "What do you want?" Susan whispered. "I wanted you to come home"