Message-ID: <19981018161421.8522.qmail@hotmail.com> From: "Carol Belyea" Subject: Star - Chapter 2 Date: Sun, 18 Oct 1998 09:14:17 PDT Chapter 2 Alamogordo Airport One week later 1:37 PM Waiting for the connecting flight from Albuquerque to Alamogordo, Al paced as well as he could, given the limitations of his wheelchair. He awaited the arrival of Laurie Shannon, the social worker from the DCS in New York. Traveling along with her was the niece Al didn't know he had until a week ago. During the last minutes of the phone call from Ms. Shannon they had made an agreement to meet in a neutral location. The restaurant in the airport seemed neutral enough for the introductions to take place. He glanced at his watch for the umpteenth time. The flight was delayed by seven minutes and he was already starting to worry. Soon thereafter, the announcement came over the public address system that flight #187 from Albuquerque to Alamogordo was now arriving at gate eleven. Desperately trying to hide his nervousness as dozens of people began disembark from gate eleven, he held still for the first time since arriving at the airport. The excitement of it all caused him to forget the fact that he had no way of identifying the right person as Ms. Shannon when a woman with flaming red curly hair approached him. "Admiral Calavicci?" She asked Al, offering her hand for a friendly greeting which Al did not return. Keeping his hands gripped on the rims of his wheels, he responded, "Yeah, and you're Shannon, right?" He was briefly surprised how quickly she recognized him, completely oblivious of the fact that he was probably one of the few people in the entire airport in a wheelchair. He looked around, "Where's the kid?" She lowered her hand, blushing slightly and answered, "She's still on the plane getting the rest of her things." She glanced around the terminal, "We can meet you at that restaurant over there." Al looked behind him and saw that the social worker indicated a quaint little place called Ray's Cafe. He nodded and agreed to reserve a table for them. While he did so, Al could hardly contain the excitement. He wanted to see what the girl looked like. He couldn't help but expect too much from this initial meeting. He had wanted a family for so long and now he had the chance to start one. The hostess showed him to a table in the corner, moving the chair out of the way since he had his own already. Sipping at a cup of coffee, he waited for a good ten minutes like an expectant father with a wife in labor. Ms. Shannon finally entered the restaurant and was accompanied by a young girl with an empty looking backpack slung over her shoulder. She was pretty and also not very tall. Must run in the family, Al thought humorously to himself. The social worker quickly spotted him behind the table and motioned for the girl along with her to follow. The teen was hesitant but knew better than to disobey the simplest request. Ms. Shannon approached Al, the girl whom he assumed was Carlie following shyly behind her. "Admiral," began the cheerful social worker, "I'd like you to meet Carlie Amorello. Carlie," She turned to the girl, "This is Admiral Al Calavicci." Mentally rolling his eyes from the elaborate detail Laurie Shannon used in his introduction, he pushed the thought aside as quickly as he offered his hand to Carlie. "Hello, Carlie." Al greeted as cheerfully as he could. Carlie didn't move but simply stared at his hand. "Yeah, hi." she said softly in reply. By the way of how embarrassed he looked when he lowered his hand, Carlie figured he had the biggest ego this side of the U.S. And, she thought sourly, most people would stand up when someone introduces themselves. She studied his face briefly and noticed that the guy didn't know weather he should be scared or content. "Well, I have to go get the rest of Carlie's luggage and make a phone call." Said the social worker, knowing that any conversation that happened would make her extraneous. She also wanted to give them their privacy. "I'll be right back." They watched her leave. "Please," Al said to Carlie, pointing to the chair in front of him, "Have a seat." The young girl did, growing uncomfortable from the pack on her shoulders and graciously set it down next to her seat. Al could automatically tell that she didn't want to be there at all. It showed in her sad dark blue eyes. For the first time in three years, he felt his heart. It wanted to reach out to her, knowing the pain that she must have gone through. Unfortunately, given the circumstances, he would have to wait until she allowed him to do just so. For the time being, Al thought it would be a good idea to at least get to know one another before going to the next step: home. He began with the only question he could think of at that moment. "So, how was your flight?" Carlie shrugged, not wanting to make eye contact with the strange man. This didn't help Al's situation much. Now he had to think of something else to ask because he knew that was about all the answer he was going to get out of the teenager. "Must be a long flight from Brooklyn to here. Are you tired?" Another shrug in addition to a stifled yawn. It made Al smile a bit, reminded of himself by her actions. She didn't want to let him know that she was tired. Or whatever else she might be feeling. Which was, in fact, perfectly normal and Al understood this. "Ah." He growled softly in understanding. He decided to give a conversation one more try. "How old are you now?" "Fifteen." Carlie answered. Al mentally patted himself on the back for finally getting her to talk. But something happened at that moment that he wasn't prepared for. Carlie, laying down her head on the table and burying her face against her forearms, had begun to cry silently. Al panicked. He didn't know how to deal with a little girl, especially when she was crying. He desperately searched for an answer to the problem. Then, very hesitantly, he raised his hand, stopping in mid-air, not sure if what he was about to do was right. Sighing, he went through with his action after all and slowly stroked the girl's hair. What amazed and relieved him was that she didn't make a move to pull away. So he continued his soothing hair-stroking, hoping it would diminish the child's tears. "I know that what you must be going through is tough." He began, keeping a concerned gaze on Carlie. "It's not easy being fifteen and losing your mom like you did. And I just want you to know that it's okay to cry." "I'm not crying." She said, her voice shaky with emotion. It was an obvious lie but she was trying so hard to make it seem like the truth. After all, she was losing her control of her emotions in front of a complete stranger. In spite of himself, Al let out a soft chuckle, mainly because the lie reminded him so much of himself at her age. "Right. You're not crying and I'm not in a wheelchair. But we can work on honesty a little later." Something made her come to her senses, jerking her head up and looking directly at him for the first time. "What did you say?" He shrugged. "We can work on being honest a little later?" Quickly wiping away the streaks of tears and with a determined look on her face, she stood and moved around the table to see the man in full view. Her eyes widened a bit, the wheelchair he sat in being the confirmation of her fears. "What the hell is this supposed to be?" Carlie asked in an incredulous tone. "You mean you didn't know?" He couldn't believe that the DCS would keep something like his paraplegia from her until the last minute. Al had hoped he wouldn't scare her but that's obviously what he had done. He had also been hoping that she already knew about his disability but that didn't seem like the case and he cursed the DCS for failing to tell her. Her voice was dangerously low when she said, "No one said anything about living with a crip." And with that, she picked up her pack and marched out of the restaurant. Al wasn't used to being around younger people. Especially those who were just starting out in the world. He had argued over the phone with Ms. Shannon that he was too old to be taking in orphans. But since he'd gone through with the meeting after all, he knew his responsibility and he wasn't prepared for the girl's reaction to him. For the first time since his accident, he felt hurt. An unusual pitfall for a retired Admiral in the Navy. Throwing some cash on the table, he followed her in his chair and called after her retreating form, "Carlie. Carlie, wait. I...." but helplessly watched her disappear into the ladies room in the airport terminal without getting so much as even a glance behind her shoulder. Hitting the wheels of his chair in frustration, he hissed to himself. "Damn it. How could she not know?" As he waited outside, a young man, about twenty or twenty two years old, walked passed him and stared. Al didn't have time for this. "You got some kind of problem?" Al asked bluntly, "You think I need you to stare at me?" The man walked on, paying him no mind. With a heavy sigh, Al threw his hands up in the air in defeat. "This is great. Just great." Ms. Shannon finally showed up, carrying a fairly large suitcase and was about to enter the cafe if Al hadn't flagged her down in time. "Over here, Shannon." He called, barking at her just when she was close enough to here what he had to say. "Carlie is inside and I think she's upset. No one bothered to tell her I was a paraplegic. Did any of the brain trust at social services think that could be important to her?" He was very angry. Ms. Shannon shrugged, "I just figured everybody knew." Al was about to explode. "Ah, three years and an entire continent away from a kid who was two busy dodging her father's fists to pick up the God damn New York Times! Geez, she's a kid for Christ's sake!" The social worker felt very bad. She knows she should have known better but even at her age, her naiveté was still a slight problem. "I'll go see if she's okay." She said quietly, leaving the suitcase with Al and entering the ladies room. It was very sterile looking and very white. The light reflected off the white tile walls contrasted with the sunlit corridors of the airport terminals and the difference was enough to make Ms. Shannon wince for a second. She thanked God that it wasn't a very busy airport and there weren't any people in the restroom. Quiet sobs could be heard quite clearly from one of the stalls and the social worker knew it had to be Carlie. "Carlie?" Shannon said slowly as she approached the stall, "Carlie, honey. Your uncle thinks your upset because he's paralyzed. Is that true?" The girl on the other side of the stall door tightly scrunched up her face in a failing attempt to stop the humiliating emotions falling from her eyes like buckets. It didn't do any good. She just couldn't stop herself from crying. "He can't be my uncle." Carlie sobbed, leaning up against the stall's wall, "He's a freak. I'm not going to live with a freak." For once, Ms. Shannon thought about what she was going to say before she said it. Carefully thinking about her next statement, she said, "Carlie, your uncle is a good, kind man. We know that for a fact. We would never place you with someone whom we think would harm you. And I'm sorry to tell you this but other than your parents, he's your only other living relative." "But . . . but why is he in that . . . that thing?!" The girl argued, taking a wad of toilet paper and blowing her nose. Ms. Shannon knew the answer even though it was still a depressing subject. Her answer, though, was kept brief yet intelligent. "That's a very important question, Carlie. But it's one that you should ask him, not me." Regaining some of her composure back, she wiped away the last of the tears. "I don't want to talk to him. I just want to be left alone. I can take care of myself, you know." "That may be true, sweetie, but it's not up to us. The law says that you have to have at least a guardian or foster home until your 18, when you become a legal adult. That's three years away." She paused for a moment, waiting for a reaction from the teenager. When there was none, only sniffles, she continued, "Now, we know you're a smart girl. I can't leave you in here so you'll have to come out sometime." With a final resolve, Carlie slowly unlocked the stall door and stepped out, her empty-yet-not-so-empty looking backpack still slung over her right shoulder. The social worker smiled at Carlie's quick decision. "Good. Now are you ready to give him a chance?" "Do I even have a choice?" Asked the teenager bitterly, knowing the answer but needing verbal confirmation. "I guess you don't right now, but it's up to you if this works or not." She held out a business card to her. "I told you I'd give you my phone numbers. Here they are. I want you to call me anytime. Night or day. Even at three in the morning, okay?" The young girl took the card, examining it half-heartedly, and nodded before shoving it into her back jean pocket. Putting a gentle arm across her shoulders, Ms. Shannon led Carlie back out into the airport corridor where Al had been left to wait. She picked up the suitcase where she had last left it. Al was near the window just in front of the ladies room, watching the planes outside and didn't hear the two approach him until Shannon spoke. "Admiral." She said. He turned his light weight chair around and she smiled a bit. "We're back." Al didn't return the smile, clearly still upset with her not telling Carlie everything about him, especially something so important as his inability to walk. "Good," he told the social worker, "I guess we got off on the wrong foot." Carlie visibly cringed at his use of the phrase. He looked up at his niece, knowing how uncomfortable she must be at that moment. "You going to start talking to me anytime soon?" Carlie looked away and shrugged. Somehow, Al knew what was going on through her mind and understood it perfectly. "Yeah, well. I guess there's a lot to get used to here - for the both of us." He looked towards Ms. Shannon, his tone making it very clear that he was still not happy with her. "Do we need you for anything else? Because if we don't, I'd like to take Carlie home." "Oh. Sure." The woman put the suitcase down. "Can you get this to your car?" The statement made Carlie think for a moment. Can people who couldn't walk drive? Al's bitter tone hadn't changed. "We'll work it out. So long and thanks for everything you didn't do." Without responding to his crack, Ms. Shannon hugged Carlie one last time. "Be brave, Carlie, and give him a chance." She whispered. Pulling away, the woman gently touched the girl's shoulder for one last reassurance before heading back to the terminal. Carlie didn't want her to go, but she knew she had no choice in that matter. She was left to face another obstacle in her life and she really didn't feel like handling it. How can they force her to live with someone who couldn't even walk? Al watched Shannon walk away then turned his attention back to his niece, whom was still watching the woman go. He sighed. "Okay, throw your stuff on my lap and push us toward the exit." It had only been three years since he became a paraplegic and in more common cases, it takes longer than that to adjust to it. Therapists were surprised by Al's quick rehabilitation and couldn't explain it. They didn't know Al too well anyway, not well enough to know that he takes what life dishes out to him and deals with it. Carlie, on the other hand, might have been an exact duplicate of him, right down to his same curly hair (though her eyes were more of a blue-gray color which wasn't a Calavicci trait) but she was still young. Al knew she *could* deal with it, she just didn't want to. "I can carry my own stuff." She replied stiffly, picking up the suitcase. It was heavier than she expected and under different circumstances she probably would have asked for help. She wasn't about to let some crippled old man touch *her* suitcase. Al really didn't have a problem with her answer. Putting on some weight-lifter's gloves, he said casually, "Fine. The car's right in front." The unusual duo got the suitcase in the car and had a brief argument on Carlie's decision about sitting in the back instead of the front seat of Al's Camery. "I haven't been a cabby in decades," he had told her, "so you can ride up front. Whenever your up here and buckled in, we can go." The girl had hesitated but didn't want trouble so she ended up sitting beside *him* in the front seat of his car. He was trying to be very nice to the girl. Now knowing that she really didn't want to have anything to do with him, Al thought he made a good choice by *not* buying a teddy bear for her arrival. In the car, which he hadn't started, he offered her a book to read for the long drive but she turned it down and sneered at it. "Looks stupid." She said with a scowl, tossing it on the floor by her feet. Al just about had it. "What does? The book? My legs? Or the way your acting?" Carlie countered his statement and narrowed her eyes. "Shut the hell up, old man." When it came to being a Calavicci, arguments never really got violent (just really loud) and Al knew this to be in Carlie's personality too. After all, she was related to him. Al just laughed slightly at her come back. "I'd better let you know right now, kid. If you think you can get the upper hand, then you're wrong. I want this to work between you and me because I think we're two peas from the same pod. I know every move you're going to make because I've already made them. So, if you need to be mad as hell right now, go ahead and do it. Be as damn mad as you can. It's not anything I haven't seen or done before myself." With that finally said, he started the car and backed out of the parking space. The airport was at the very edge of the city of Alamogordo and the desert highway that led to Stallion Springs wasn't far from that. Carlie had stubbornly crossed her arms and stared out into the desert. "Finished?" She asked curtly. "That's up to you." Al answered, even though she meant it as a rhetorical question. "It's all up to you." "It's always up to me." Her tone suggested that she didn't like the idea at all. She wasn't comfortable sitting next to this . . . *What do they call them?*, She thought. *Something that starts with para.* She huffed a bit at the idea that she was probably one of the few her age that even knew *that* much, since she never really had any respect for the intelligence of the rest of her generation. "I can't argue that." Al told her, "Bottom line is that it *is* always up to you. You choose whether or not something will work." *And I really want this to work between you and me.* For years, though Al liked his independence, another part of him so desperately wanted a family. Al had once considered Sam his family but the accident seemed to have changed that. The Becketts, especially Donna and Johnny, will always be his family and he still hoped for a reconciliation with Sam. But now that he had his chance for a real family, flesh and blood, he wasn't about to let it slip away so easily. At the same time, Carlie longed for her own independence, thinking that was all she needed to get by. She didn't need anybody, or anything, especially love and affection - or so she thought. Al knew better than that and when it came to those matters, he can be very patient indeed.