When He Calls Us Home | Chris Evans FF ✓

SO WHO DIED?

    "SO you're on holiday?"

     "Well, more like payed vacation, except I'm the one paying it, but yes." Chris smiled, cradling his small cup of tea in one hand against his chest.

     "And you said Joe told you where I was staying?" Chris nodded. She was still quite shaken up over him being in the same room as her, even more so that he came out of his way to her hotel. She quietly took a dainty sip of her tea, not really tasting the flavor of it, with her eyes drawn to the ground.

     Both of them sat opposite from each other on the floor in the living room. Adeline's back leaned against the door to the bedroom, while Chris leaned on the side of the kitchen table's island.

     "I thought it was an opportunity I couldn't pass up," Chris blurted after some silence. Adeline flickered her curious eyes up at him, like a small fawn.

     "Pardon?" she asked.

     He cleared his throat, and sat up straighter. "Finding out you were in New York, and not that far away from where I live in Boston," he replied. She nodded her head in understanding, then quickly took another sip. "So that's why I came, really," he said, voice slowly dying down.

     "Just to say 'hi?'" she said, putting in quotation marks with the use of one hand, free from her steaming mug of tea.

     He laughed. "Ya, just to say 'hi.'" His blue eyes pierced right through her in the dim light, and the way he kept up the smile made her look away shyly. "But anyway," Chris continued, placing his mug beside himself on the floor. "I should get going."

     This had the journalist look up in surprisal. "Already? You just got here."

     "I don't want to take up more of your time," he told, rising from the floor. "I can see you're busy with the cold case." His eyes racked over the mess of cluttered papers around the room, as one of his knee-buckling smirks hit one corner of his mouth.

     Adeline rose from the floor as well, and brushed off her bottom. "I can multitask," was all she said.

     Chris looked at her. "I'd rather not keep you," he paused, then awkwardly said, "Goodnight, Ms. Banks." With that, he turned for the door. 

     As he reached for the handle, Adeline jumped, as if someone pricked her bottom with a sewing needle and she took one step forward. "Wait!" she promptly blurted. "You said that you were on holiday, right?"

     Chris' brows quizzically connected. "Yes, why?"

     "For how long?" she asked.

     A hand slithered through his short-cropped hair as he thought. "Two weeks," he finally said. 

     A smile grew on her face as an idea came to her mind. "How would you like to work on the case with me? I could use a partner in crimes," she said, the smile reaching to her eyes. "Plus my other 'partner' is hours away. I could use a second pair of hands, or a brain."

     For a second, stunned silence suffocated them as Chris looked at her, and not only took in her appearance, far from that, but slowly digested her words. Stuffing his hands back into his fall jacket, he completely faced her, and out of the blue had asked, "So, who died?"

____

     "I still can't believe you remember me," Adeline said disbelievingly. She picked up papers off the ground as the two conversed amicably.

     Chris chuckled. "Remember when you said to me, that it was kinda hard not to forget a conversation with a famous person? Well." He shrugged shyly, and slowly rose to his knees after he picked up a piece of paper. "It's also kinda hard not to forget a conversation you had with someone who you spilled their coffee all over."

     Adeline bite her bottom lip from chuckling, and carried on scooping up loose papers everywhere. "You forgot to say 'by accident.'"

     "Glad to know you find humor in all this embarrassment." The swoosh of papers rattled in the air, when he picked up another, and placed the white sheet in his other hand that held a stack of them. Adeline glanced over at him, mid-way picking up a paper herself.

     "I try to be Miss. Positive," she told, then stood up. As Chris gathered together the last paper off the ground, they sat side-by-side on the couch. Adeline began to tell him everything about the case, and wondered if Chris found any of it a 'bore' to have to listen to. She was surprised to see that he was genuinely interested in the missing child's case, as he went on to ask questions in between her explanation, and how far she had gotten herself.

     She was flipping through papers, trying to find the one she wanted to show Chris, when he picked up Jasper's file. His eyes carefully skimmed the contents. "Did you check out Jasper Collins' apartment in the city?" Chris asked, reading the man's address on the paper.

     Adeline stopped searching for what she originally wanted to show him, and gazed up. "Um, I was, but I haven't gotten around to it." She scrunched her brows in thought. "I still need to Google the address on Google Maps." 

     This brought a smile to Chris' face. "I'm insulted that you didn't even ask me first, I do live here, ya know?"

     She glanced sidelong at him, raised a chocolate brow. "You know the city like the back of your hand?"

     "Duh," he said. "Plus," he paused to look at the address again, "it's not too far from here. We can go now."

     She jumped from her spot on the couch, ran for her coat hanging on the metal hooks beside the door, and her converse shoes at the front door on the shoe mat. "You be the navigator—I'll drive! Do you know if it's chilly out?"

     Chris rose from the couch and shrugged. "Naw, you'll be fine."