Читать книгу Of Things Gone Astray - Janina Matthewson - Страница 30

CASSIE WAS EXHAUSTED. THE TIDE of people that had surged around her after the discovery of her roots had baffled and broken her.

Her mother’s panicked screams had first brought security running. Then there had been medics, and a call over the loudspeaker for a doctor that resulted only in a seething crowd of curious onlookers.

All attempts to prise Cassie out of the floor had failed. The roots that her feet had become looked small, but they were strong and seemed to run deep. It wasn’t until Cassie was shaking with hysteria that someone saw fit to move the people on. They had brought some screens, like the kind you see in hospitals, and placed them around Cassie so she was protected from the curious stares. Cassie had forbidden her mother from spending the night behind the screens with her, but she was sure she was somewhere around. The nearest chair, probably.

The relief at being alone, or at least feeling alone, was dizzying. The freedom to think hit her like a drug. There was one thought that she had been frantic to return to: where was Floss? Cassie had checked the flight details until she had them by heart, and then gone on checking them. She couldn’t have been wrong.

And Floss must have been on the plane. If she had missed it, there were hours in which she could have let Cassie know what had gone wrong and how it was being fixed. She had been coming. She had been coming to Cassie.

Cassie didn’t doubt Floss’s intent to be there. Floss loved her. Floss would do anything to be there. It was not possible that Cassie could love Floss with so much of herself and Floss not love her back. It was not possible that the tether connecting Cassie to Floss went only in one direction.

Floss was coming. She was coming and Cassie was determined to be waiting for her.