The memories would not leave Milo. He dreamt about the first night he and Maisie spent together (Milo slept on her chest), the time she took him to Cleveland Park in Greenville and put him in a baby swing, and that first horrid trip to the vet. He saw when she stood up for him when the mean dog next door picked on him while he learned to walk on the leash. The dreams should’ve felt beautiful, but they didn’t. Maisie was not the fourteen-year-old girl Milo knew during those days. She didn’t care for him anymore. It was sad but true.
He awoke to a loud thunderclap and rain pounding the window in the morning. Milo yawned, stretched, and pushed open his cage’s door. He yowled when he saw Maisie was not in the room. She abandoned him. Why didn’t she wake him like she did the past few days? There was untouched food in his bowl, but Milo refused to eat. He had to leave and find another owner who wouldn’t choose a girl over him.
Milo unclipped his collar with his teeth and dropped it at the foot of Maisie’s bed. He trotted into the common area and saw Feya, not Maisie, dressed in her costume and fixing lunch. Milo snuck by her and Daisy and ducked under the room’s couch. He eyed Feya and the front door.
Feya kneeled and tickled Daisy’s chin. “Let’s go out before I leave, girl, and then I’ll bring you back. You do not want to stand in the rain all day.” She stood and pushed her lunch box to the kitchen counter’s wall.
“Arf! Arf!” Daisy got underfoot, but Feya stepped over her and approached the front door.
She grasped its handle and pulled it down. “You need to stay here today.”
Milo prepared himself. He went low and stretched his paws. As soon as Feya opened the door, he sprinted. Milo rushed by her and Daisy and knocked Feya down.
“Milo!” she yelled, struggling to her feet.
The battlefield unfolded before him. Milo hurried out to the pouring rain, tore past the benches and rock gardens, and found himself in Flamingo’s main walking area, buildings surrounding him. He passed confused college students and noticed Feya and Daisy chasing him.
They crashed into a small group of kids, and Feya snatched one of their shoulders. “Milo!”
She could try all she wanted, but nothing would change his mind.
Milo dodged East’s pools, the sitting area in front of Apprentice Hall and the Community Center, and the chess game between the buildings. He jumped over one of the security gates to the bus loop.
“What the—?” asked the guards.
Milo turned left at the end of the sidewalk and dashed down a new one aligned with the bus stop and main road. He peered over his shoulder and saw Feya running for the first time.
Milo nearly caused an accident at the crosswalk, where the buses pulled out, but hardly noticed. He hit a golf course with a broken gate around it and hopped over it, too, to lose Feya and Daisy. He crossed a rotten bridge hidden in a grove of trees but was light enough that it didn’t break. The bridge did creak, though.
Now trapped in No Man’s Land, Milo searched for an escape.
“Milo! Come back! Please!” Feya squeezed through one of the gate’s broken doors. Her prosthetic leg became caught, but she released it and darted for the bridge, Daisy close behind.
Fear coursed through Milo’s veins. He planted his feet and shouted, “Mrow!” at Feya.
It was too late.
The bridge snapped under Feya’s weight. She fell through it and smacked the muddy ground at the hole’s base—right onto her prosthetic. It flew off her stump and twirled like a boomerang away from her.
“Mrow!”
“Arf!”
Daisy and Milo slid down the hole’s walls, rain pelting them like bullets, and cantered to Feya.
She rested on her front, unconscious, blood dripping from a wound on her head.
Oh gosh! Oh gosh! Oh gosh! What had Milo done? He and Daisy tried to wake her, but Feya didn’t stir. The puddle under her right temple turned red.
Oh gosh! Oh gosh! Oh gosh! “Mrow! Mrow! Mrow!” Milo bellowed at Daisy.
“Arf!” she returned, nodding.
Soaked and paws covered in mud, Milo climbed out of the hole, slipping more times than needed, and leaped back over the golf course’s gate.
Lightning flashed, thunder boomed, and the wind howled, but Milo ran, ran, and ran. “Mrow!” he screamed when a lightning bolt hit the sidewalk further ahead, leaving a black mark in its wake. He tripped and rolled into the grass.
Milo shakily rose and kept moving through the warzone. He looked like a cheetah coming in for the kill. He cut across the grass to the bus loop and tossed himself into the fray of moving buses.
Seeing him, the drivers halted and shouted, “Stupid cat! Get out of the road!”
The storm raged on, but Milo did not give up. This was his fault. He had to make it right.
He galloped onto the Route D bus. It was the only one that had its door open.
The bus driver and frightened CPs pulled their legs onto their seats, clutching their knees.
The middle-aged driver drew his phone, but someone in the bus’s way back announced, “Wait!”
A girl, who wore the costume Milo sometimes saw Maisie in, stood and hustled down the vehicle’s back stairs. She carefully approached Milo and put her raincoat’s hood over her head of medium-length, red hair. “What’s wrong, boy?”
“Mrow!” Still panicking, Milo led her off the bus, away from Flamingo, to the golf course’s gate.
“Oh My God!” the girl shrieked at the sight of the still-unconscious Feya. Even though it was raining, she removed her phone from her pocket and placed it under her coat’s hood. “911? I need help! Please! It looks like a girl fell through a bridge!”
Exhausted, out of breath, and plagued with guilt, Milo collapsed at her feet and shut his eyes.
Maisie would never forgive him.
***
All-Star Sports was under a 101. It was when all pool and outside activities stopped due to lightning being within six miles of the location or closer.
Maisie and Natacha sat in the breakroom with the housekeepers for their 1:00 break, eating their sandwiches and chatting.
“So, you good so far?” Natacha’s eyes diverted from Maisie’s Elsa and Anna lunch box. A smirk tugged at her lips.
“I’m getting there,” Maisie replied. Female 1, the position Natacha was training her in that day, was easy enough: check the lobby bathroom and ensure the lobby looked decent and remained dry for Guests.
“That good.” Natacha zipped her lunch bag and set it on the floor beside her ankle. “Any plans for weekend?”
“Feya and I are talking about going to Epcot. She wants to try Soarin’.”
“Oh.” Natacha showed off her white teeth. “She will love that.”
“I know she will.” Maisie’s phone buzzed. “Oh, excuse me. It may be Feya.”
“You good,” Natacha chimed.
Nevertheless, once Maisie checked the collar ID and saw the call came from Orlando Regional Medical Center in Downtown Orlando, all color drained from her face.
Oh God.
Her breathing intensified, and she shakily answered. “He-Hello?”
“Yes, hello. Is this Maisie Claire Foster?” a deep, male voice questioned on the other line.
Oh God. Something happened to Feya. “It-It is.”
“This is Dr. Chase Alexander calling from Orlando Regional Trauma Center. We’re sorry, but your friend, Feya, has had an accident.”
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End of Act Two: The Wartime Era!
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