What’s Your Name? Letter V

I feel like I have exhausted my ‘communications’ posts. There are only so many letters, memos, texts, etc that people can write before meeting up, right? I plan on continuing the story for as long as needs be, but I shall revert back to my short stories from here on in.

Here are the links to catch up on the previous installments of this story:

Letter Q,  Letter R, Letter S, Letter T, & Letter U.

Today’s letter is V, but I had randomly picked the name Val a while ago to make sure the stories flowed.

Val: a masculine diminutive form of Valentine.

Val

The kid is such a little shit. If he’s not back chatting his mother, he’s making sly remarks about anything I damn say. I know most teenagers are the same, but shit, I could do without his mouth. Half of me thinks that he’s a little gobshite, the other half knows that he’s nervous at the thought of meeting his old man. I guess he’s had a shed load to deal with in a short space of time.

I turn the radio on to keep an ear on the news. Nothing will be broadcast, but I can’t help but listen. No one knows where we’re going, not even the guy who dropped off the car. Tate owes me 3k for this hunk of crap.

“Hey, are you even awake?” Quentin asks, shoving my shoulder, and snapping my attention from the radio. He leans between the headrests, changing the radio to a music station.

“What kid? I thought I told you to sit down and shut up.”

“I want to know what you know about my Dad? Why are there people after him- after me?”

Looking in the mirror, I see that Xena is asleep. The kid knows how to be discreet. I’ll give him that.

“Your old man should be the one to explain it to you.”

“But I’m asking you.”

“No time,” I say nodding to the farm house up ahead. Relief washes over me, at the interruption. It really isn’t my place to say anything, and in truth, I wouldn’t know where to start.

Quentin swallows hard and slumps back into his seat. I see the colour drain from his face before my eyes. He nudges his mother awake, and they both stare out of the window as the farm gets closer.

The upstairs curtain falls as if someone has been watching our approach, and within seconds the door flies open. Two figures emerge; one male and one female. Tate and Sabine. Quentin exhales loudly, and Xena bursts into tears. She throws the door open before I have even pulled to a stop, and races into Tate’s arms. He looks well, really well considering.

Tate opens his free arm to his son, but Quentin turns away from his Dad. “Val, seriously man, I’d rather hear it from you,” the kid says, sidling up beside me.

Tate shakes his head, a stern glower at me, almost threatening me to keep quiet. Fuck you, I think to myself. I just saved your skin, you family’s skin, and you give me that same look you gave me all those years ago? I thought I could get over it, but seeing him has only proven that it’ll always be there between us. I love the guy, but that doesn’t mean I have to like him.

“Okay, kid, but it’s a mind fuck.” I guide Quentin further away from the farm house, from Tate. It may be childish to want to rile Tate, but his son needs the truth, and he wants it from me. “We’re aliens, and the T.D.E.D- the Tracking and Detention of Extraterrestrials Department have been hunting us since 1983.”

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Content belongs to KJ.Chapman