Lightning Strikes (Hudson 2)

All eyes were on me.

"Why can't you be both?" I said and the classroom roared.

He smiled.

"Yes, indeed, why can't I? Now then," he said, turning back toward the front and permitting me to release the trapped hot air that threatened to make my lungs explode. "Let's return to Act I, Scene I."

When I felt my legs return from two wet noodles to flesh, bone and muscle again, I rose as quickly as I could and slipped quietly out of the classroom. What had gotten into me that I would do such a thing, have so much nerve? Now I could never permit him to see me accidentally. I could never spy on him and his family for fear that if I was discovered, he would surely connect me with this day in his class. Maybe this was good, I thought. Once and for all, I've brought it to an end. Let him live his life and let me try to do something worthwhile with mine.

The bell rang to end the class hour before I reached the stairway and doors to other classes were thrown open. The students burst out as if they had all been holding their breaths under water. It brought laughter to my lips. This was more like an American high school. I was actually jostled about as they streamed by me, their voices loud. Someone tapped me on the shoulder and I turned to face a tall, darkhaired boy with a twisted smile. Two other boys were beside him, both with similar grins.

"Excuse me," he said, "but haven't I seen you before in one of my dreams?"

"I doubt it," I said. "I'm not permitted to go to places like that:'

His friends laughed as his confidence leaked out of his smug grin.

"Excuse me for talking to you," he shouted after me as I quickly started down the stairway.

I went back through the lobby, past the girl at the information booth and out the front entrance where I paused to get my bearings. I knew I had to get to the tube station and take a train. I had wandered so far, it would probably take me more than two hours to get home and I would miss my duties before dinner.

I stopped to ask a friendly-looking lady directions and then continued, now feeling rather stupid about missing my own classes and bursting in on my father's class. I had to stop to buy a ticket since I was traveling out of my zone. After I had done so, I turned to follow the directions to my platform and nearly fainted on the spot.

My father was standing there, a smile on his face.

"Well now, who's following whom?" he asked. "Do I have good reason to think it's you following me?"

Of course, I couldn't help wondering if he had spotted me near his home the past week as well.

All I could do was shake my head. His smile widened and deepened with interest and curiosity.

"You're not a student at the college, are you?" he asked me. That question I could answer.

"No," I said.

"Okay. You've got the advantage on me, Miss ...?"

"Arnold, Rain Arnold," I said.

"Rain? Interesting name. How did you get it?"

"My adoptive mother named me," I said quickly.

"She wasn't a native American, was she?"

"No. Just an American," I said. He laughed.

"An American in London. Sounds like a movie." His eyes glittered with amusement. What beautiful, deep, dark eyes he has, I thought and tried to imagine the first time he turned them onto my mother and she got caught up in their power and beauty. "What brought you to my class today?"

"I, I'm in the Richard Burbage School for the Performing Arts and I've been doing some Shakespeare," I said. "I thought it might help me to know more."

"Don't they study the plays you're performing before handing you lines to memorize?" he asked.

"Yes, but not as detailed as you do," I said.

Skepticism tilted his head to the side.

"You discovered that with only ten or fifteen minutes of observation?"