"What brings all of you here," I asked as I scanned the crowd, "Tracy is your soulmate in the crowd?"
They all smiled, "Well," my mother began glancing at Tiffany, "we haven't seen you since you were shot, so we thought we'd pay you a visit."
"It was planned to be a visit at the house, but considering what happened," Garret said, trailing off.
I shook my head, "No," I began, "It's fine. I'm just surprised, and Tracy, you haven't answered my question," I finished as she grinned, standing in an outfit similar to mine but with black slacks and no blazer.
"Oh, yeah, she's in the crowd right now waiting for the speaker," she answered, and I smiled. "There are rumors that it's going to be you," she added.
I chuckled but then realized that they weren't joking, "What," I asked, stunned, "I don't know what to say."
Tiffany chuckled, "You freak out just as much as Aili did when we kept coming," she said as I sighed.
"But she didn't need to say something to thousands of people after she woke up and was brought up to date," I said as I shook my head. "Ginger," I began turning to the manager, "Is this rumor true?"
"Yes, it is true," he answered, "People want to know if the first soulmates are alive, and they wouldn't stop crowding the store until they knew if you two were okay."
I shook my head once more as I paced back and forth, "What do I say," I repeated over and over again.
"You and Aili were saying something about planning to answer some questions with a live video on something," Sam said from behind. "Why don't you say something along the lines of what you were going to say?"
Right then, I had a lightbulb moment, "Thank you," I said to her, "I just got an idea of what to say; when do I need to be on?"
"Right now," Ginger said with a sense of urgency in his voice. "I can't exactly rush you anywhere right now, but I'm pretty sure these people wouldn't mind helping you weave through the crowd," he said, nodding to the five people around me.
Garret shrugged, "I wouldn't mind shoving some people back," he said as Tracy grinned evilly.
Sam sighed, "Unfortunately, Mr. Horrell, that is not how bodyguards guide people through crowds," she explained as her outfit changed into a summer dress. "May we hurry? I sense that this crowd is getting anxious, and there is someone that I want to see," she added, and I nodded.
"Let's go," I said just as I saw Garret's and Tracy's shoulders sag as Sam lead the way, and the two flanked my left and right.
Tracy glanced at my hand, "What did you do," she asked, and I sighed
"I'll tell you later," I answered, and she nodded, "I need to be composed for this because I have a feeling a lot of reporters are here as well. You and I both know from both life and movies that reporters pick up on everything," I said as she smirked
"That I do," she said once we reached the stage, "Break a leg," she said with a wink before diving back into the crowd to look for her soulmate
No one else said anything as I grabbed the microphone that was given to me, and I climbed the stairs to face the crowd
"So, I hear that some people are curious about our health instead of wanting us dead," I began with a smile as the crowd cheered. "As you can see, I am alive, and well, the same goes for my soulmate, Allison. You're probably here to know about the basics of what happened and who caused it; am I right?"
The crowd cheered in response as people jumped up and down as if I was a singer performing a big hit.
I sighed, "Well, I'll give it to you in short since all of you are probably hot and tired of standing here in this crowd. Before the intruders arrived, Allison and I had stood up to two people; one of them being my father. After that, the amazing manager, Ginger Repetto, told us that we could leave early due to my relationship with my father. We were upstairs in the staff room when we heard the intruder alarm go off; I had let our guard know what was going on as we discussed our way out. As we were discussing this, I got a text from Ginger saying that Allison was the target. We snuck our way to the back of the store without being noticed. We almost got out injury-free if it weren't for a sniper getting Allison," I recalled, in short, trying to keep out the hidden tunnel. "There will be a more detailed story on our live stream on Instagram once Allison is better and on her feet. This live stream is so none of us will get hurt, so we don't have to understand everyone talking all at once. I will only take a few questions, but I cannot speak for my soulmate," I finished. "Who's ready to start asking," I added with a smile
I pointed out to someone in the front of the crowd as I noticed Tracy right next to her. "Hi, I may be asking this for a lot of people in the audience. What happened to your arm?"
Tracy smirked, then winked at me once I made eye contact with her and sighed, "Okay, that is probably the key question for many of you," I said. "What happened to my wrist," I repeated as I shrugged off the blazer one-handed. "I will tell you that, but I'd advise you that if you run into a situation like mine, don't ever do this. You'll be paying more than just your soulmate's medical bill and will learn to be ambidextrous. This begins around where Allison got shot," I paused, "I had received a message from our guard that there was a sniper. Still, I didn't warn her in enough time as she already had the door open. Before making our way to the door, I had urged her to go first since she would've known the path better than I would since it was my first day. Well, when we got into the car after she was shot, her name started fading on my wrist. After urging our guard to take us to the hospital at the fastest speed possible, we got there, and she was wheeled into the surgery room. Once she was in there, I fell to my hands and knees onto the ground and started crying," a rogue tear started going down my cheek. "As I was crying like that, her name disappeared from this wrist; in my fury, I started hitting against the floor, hoping that it would appear again. I passed out from exhaustion and woke up with this cast on my wrist," I finished with a sigh, "any more questions?"
This time I pointed to a man in the back, "Good evening ma'am," he began standing up with a pen and paper. "Claus Da Silva from The Relationship Spectator. Could you please tell us who the person was that organized this attack, or is that confidential?"
I glanced at Sam, who had her arm over someone else the same height as her; she gave me a nod of approval. "I can tell you the answer to that," I began, "it was my father and his guard who organized this attack. They are properly punished. As for his soulmate," I began with a pause. "She had no hand in this. I met her half an hour ago. We had talked. When she had attempted to apologize for her soulmate's action, I refused," I finished as another reporter shot up.
"Miss Layzer," she began while looking like a superhero from DC comics. "Lindsy Triggs from 24 Hour News; why would your father attack you and your soulmate? Did you two have bad ties," she asked as I glanced in my mother's direction this time. She, too, nodded as I began to explain my relationship with my father.
"His family isn't fond of same-sex marriage because they follow the book of their religion from cover to cover," I began. "I respect the people who do up until they abuse it and hurt the people that I either associate with or care about. He was very abusive to my mother and me for a while. I had tried to distance myself from him since he was toxic to me, and I didn't want that to be introduced to Allison. There isn't much else to say about how our relationship was with each other. He was only out to berate me because I wasn't anywhere close to what his family is like."
"Is there by chance that his family could attack as he did," the woman, Lindsy, asked.
I shrugged, "I don't believe they would attack us," I began, "they saw how abusive he was to me. They didn't even hold it against me when I was trying to distance myself from him," I answered. "That's all of the questions for today. If you follow Allison's and I's accounts, you can see more about our lives just, please remember that we're just as normal as you."
With that, I grabbed my blazer and walked off the stage, handing the microphone over to the stage manager.
"That was wonderful," Sam said as the girl in her arms smiled
I nodded just as Tracy came with her soulmate, "Thank you," I said, "who may this be?"
It was Sam's turn to smile this time, "This is my wife, Shanda Blackwell. We chose to keep our own last names to remember the past that went through to get here," she said, introducing the woman in her arms. "She and I are co-goddesses of gay relationships and the LGBT community; she said that she came here to tell you something and see me," she explained, and I grinned.
"It is a pleasure to meet you, Shanda," I said, "what is it that you would like to say," I asked as she grinned.
"I want to say that you and Allison are the best soulmate couple that I've seen since this started," she began. "Most of the people who began as straight and was forced to become either gender-fluid or bisexual have had abusive relationships. I'm glad that you're one of the few that aren't that way," she said, and I grinned.
"I agree with that," Sam said with a nod, "she had told me that when she was waiting to be placed with her couple that she saw a lot of abusive couples. She also thought that you would be abusive with everything that Allison could've hidden from you," she added, and I shook my head.
"I would never be abusive to a person," I began, "as you may have heard, my father was abusive, and I would never want to carry that same trait. It is an honor to get this compliment from both of you; if I may ask Shanda, who is the couple that you are guarding over?"
Shanda nodded towards Tracy and her soulmate. "That would be your friend and her soulmate that you helped find; they are right next to you in the ratings of best relationships on my list," she said. I chuckled as I saw the two blush.
"Wait," Tracy's soulmate began, "you're the one that helped Tracy find me," she said, and I nodded.
"That I am," I said, "you must be Maurine Nakae. It's a pleasure to finally meet you."
"It's a pleasure to meet you too. I hope I can meet Allison soon. I heard that she's a wonderful person," she said, and I smiled while suppressing a chuckle as Tracy blushed some more.
"That she is," I said, "Thank you for the question about my wrist. By the way, from what I'm guessing, you got that question from someone else."
"What," she started in defense, "I really wanted to know," she finished, and I laughed.
"You said the right things, my dear," my mother's voice said from behind once I stopped laughing.
"Thanks, mom," I said as I turned to see both her and Tiffany smiling.
"Allison is probably grinning like a fool in her hospital bed," she said when I smiled. "It is good to see you walking around. I would love to see you both walking around, though, since I haven't seen you together since you helped her move out of the dorm," she added.
"I am happy to be walking around," I said, then chuckled, "I hope there's not an incident between now and then so you can see us together."
Tiffany chuckled, then nudged my mother, "You want to tell her, or do you want to wait until both of them are here?"
My mother shook her head, "No," she began, "I want to tell her," she said, which made me arch an eyebrow. "Liz," my mother began facing me, "Tiffany and I are soulmates."
My eyes widened in surprise, "Really," I asked, and they both nodded, "I am so happy that you found each other. Granted, it may be a little weird when you two get married since that would mean that my soulmate is my sister-in-law, but I don't mind," I said as the two women laughed at how flustered I became
"Ma'am, you can't come back here. This is only for family and friends," a voice said from our behind Tracy and Maurine.
I turned to see a man trying to keep Lindsy from approaching but wasn't winning, "I am a blog writer, and there is one thing I need to plug her life," she grumbled as she wrestled with the man.
"Should I let her through or see if the security guard wins," I asked Sam. She and Shanda chuckled.
"Let her through," Sam answered, "she's not a normal person," she added before walking away.
"She can come," I said to the guard, who then started chasing after her.
"I'm sorry, ma'am," he said, "it's sort of like a brick wall ran into me; her strength overpowered mine."
I smiled, "Maybe because a lot of reporters have had practice doing that kind of thing," I said as she approached me, and the guard huffed in response.
"Thank you for that, Miss Layzer," Lindsy said once she got to me, "so this is your family and friends?"
"Give or take a few," I said, "a couple of people I just met today; how can I help you, Miss Triggs?"
"Oh, right," she said, pushing her glasses up on her face, "my news is mostly online, and I would like to plug your account so more people can follow you two for your life. When will that be again, and what is your account?"
As she was explaining, she got out a pen and a notebook, "The time for the live is unknown considering the events that took place. I believe that it will happen once Allison is well enough to speak without pain. As for the username for our account," I paused, trying to remember since I've only been on it once. "It is Raiz," I said, and everyone reacted at once. "We may have used a ship name generator to get that name," I added with a blush as Lindsy wrote down the name. "I feel like we should get to know each other," I began, "You seem like a good friend to have."
Lindsy smiled as she pushed her glasses up, "It would be great to get to know you as a friend instead of a celebrity. I hope to see you around," she said with a smile before walking away.
I then turned to everyone else, "What," I asked as they looked at me, stunned.
"I believe my best friend just befriended a Kara Danvers look alike," Garret said dumbfounded.
"Well, if she is exactly like Kara, then we have luck on our side," I said as everyone smiled.
I met many more people, many of them being celebrities that I came close to fangirling over. Lucky for me, I kept my composure throughout the whole thing up until I got back to the house in Aili's car as it hadn't been returned to the garage yet.
"So how was your first time driving," Sam asked after repairing the damage that I had done to the car.
"Terrible," I exclaimed, "I don't even have my temporary license. What if a police officer pulled us over and I couldn't provide a license?"
Sam only shrugged, "I would've charmed your State ID to make it look like a temp," she said. "Besides, it was Aili's idea that you have experience driving by driving her car back," she added, and my eyes widened in her direction.
"So, you're saying that she wouldn't have minded the damages," I asked; then Sam laughed.
"To an extent," she answered, "I don't think she'd be fine with a missing mirror and some broken window along with a missing bumper."
I groaned, "She probably wouldn't be fond of the indents in her steering wheel either," I said. "I don't even know how I was able to do that."
Sam shrugged, "I can't help you in answering that tonight, but we'll look into it tomorrow," she said. "Go get some sleep. I believe Cliff is going to visit you tomorrow. He mentioned something about a government job," she said, and I nodded.
I wished Sam a good night before I headed up the stairs to the bedroom. Cliff had just recently won the presidential election and was at the party today against the advice from all of Congress. After I changed into my pajamas, I laid flat on the bed, alone.
Now I know why Aili cried that many times when I was healing, "Why can't we get a break," I asked the room as the tears came. I soon curled up in a ball and cried myself to sleep, dreaming of how I would've lived my life if things hadn't gone the way they did.