The Traveler's Key

Chapter Three

Chapter Three

When I woke the next morning I remembered everything with such clarity I was positive it was no dream.  I looked for Cheezit but he was nowhere to be seen.  I made some tsking sounds then remembered he could talk.

"Get your butt out here, feline, and talk to me.  Literally, so I'll know I'm not crazy."  I threw the covers off and checked under the bed. No cat.

"Mom," I yelled, running from the room.  I found her in the bathroom.  "Mom," I said, bursting into the small, steamy room.

"What's wrong?"  She pulled the curtain aside and looked out.  "Is the house on fire or something?"

"What can you tell me about this?"  I pulled the collar of my shirt down and pointed at my birthmark.

"Your moon mark?" she asked and a wistful look settled over her features.

"Yes," I said.  "Did I always have it?"  I don't know what I was hoping to discover with this line of questioning, but if I was even going to consider the possibility it was the mark of the traveler I had to find out whatever I could.  

Mom looked at me like I was nuts.  "Of course you've always had it - it's a birthmark.  Why are you acting crazy?"

"But what about when I was first born, like the second I was born, before anyone took me away.  Did you notice it then?"

She paused a moment, humoring me and thinking back.  "I honestly don't know, Charlie," she said.  "When a baby is born, things are a bit chaotic.  You were covered in all this gunk and stuff and I got to hold you for maybe five seconds before they took you away to clean you up.  Your father noticed it right away when they brought you back, but I can't say for sure about before."

I looked down at the mark I'd hated for so many years because I'd thought it ugly.

"Dad nicknamed it your moon mark and said it was a sign."

" A sign?" I asked sharply.

"Yes," she said, closing the shower curtain.  "He said you were destined to travel to great places, like an astronaut."

When she said the word travel I got goosebumps up and down my arms.   Had Dad known something?  He said I was destined to travel, and the hooded man said I was a traveler.  Did it mean something, or was I simply seeing things that weren't there.

I saw her locket on the sink, the one she always wore.  It had a picture of her and Dad inside.  For some reason, I wanted to wear it.  

"Can I wear your locket?" I asked.  She didn't even hesitate.

"Of course," she said.  I picked it up and clasped it around my neck.  It felt good there and I liked knowing I had a picture of my dad over my heart.  

"Where's Cheezit?" I asked.

"He was scratching at your door last night so I let him outside," she told me.

"Thanks," I said.  I closed the door and went to look for my cat.

I tore through the house, checking all his usual haunts - under my bed, under Mom's bed, behind the couch, on the kitchen window sill, on top of the second floor banister, on top of the refrigerator, in the clothes dryer.  He was nowhere.  This was not Cheezit's typical behaviour.  When he went outside, he rarely wandered further than the back yard.  Sometimes he'd make it as far as the bushes out front.  If he wasn't taking a siesta in one of his spots, he was either visiting his litter box, his food dish, or sitting on my lap.  Up until now, he had been a very predictable cat, certainly not one who went missing or could speak English.