Wednesday, September 30, 2009 Meeting
I opened the door of the old familiar meeting room. After two and half weeks away almost, we had returned to our old spot. I ran my hand along the wall beside the door frame and flicked on the row of lights. The fluorescents first flickered and then as the gasses inside began to warm the light brightened and I could see the room as we had left it. The chairs were still in the circle, one or two a little out of wack where people moved them to get in and out of the circle and there was a stray napkin and a wadded up tissue. I sat my purse down on my usual chair and slid out of leather jacket. I went around and picked those things up, tossed them in the waste basket, straightened the chairs, and went to the snack table and took off the old paper towels we had down and got the roll and tore off a couple of long streamers of paper towel and put them down. I brought some cider, strong and hot with the smells of apples and cinnamon and ginger and lemon zest and a bottle of sipping whiskey for those of us who liked their cider on the stiff side. God Speed was bringing the coffee and Westexan had made pear cobbler from pears off her own tree.
I went over and opened the last window to let in a little fresh air. It had threatened rain all day but now it was cool, damp smelling despite the lack of rain. I lit a cigarette, one of those lovely Turkish blend cigarettes and blew the smoke out of the open window and watched the wind whisk it away. It was good to be back in our usual space. I was so excited yesterday evening when the lead counselor called and said that we could return to our usual meeting place and he would be looking forward to seeing all of us there. As always, I felt a slight shiver when I heard the voice of the lead counselor. I couldn’t say it was pleasant, but to be absolutely honest, I couldn’t say it was unpleasant either.
“Man, finally back to our old place!” said Eric Lover by way of announcing her arrival. “I thought I had forgotten where this place was.” She sat her purse down on the seat by mine.
“God Speed is parking his car,” I said, watching the blue Mustang being parked. Evidently, GS wasn’t satisfied with where he was parking because he kept pulling the car up and back, out and back in. If he was here he would have to confess that the only way he felt totally safe about his Mustang was if he could part it six inches from the door of where ever he was supposed to be but six hundred miles away from any other cars. Eric Lover leaned forward and her lips curved in a smirky smile as we watched.
“What are you all watching?” said a voice.
“God Speed,” we said in unison. I turned to see Liz behind me. “Come watch.” Liz came over and watched with us. When God Speed finally parked, we stepped away from the window. Mel came in. She was the hero of the forum, having gotten us back up and running. She brought some lovely chocolate treats. I helped her unwrap her platters and set her treats out.
Westexan finally made it, God Speed in tow. She had the lovely pear cobbler and a big bowl of warm sugar drizzle to drizzle over it and a big container of cool whip if anyone preferred. No matter who or where you are, when something sweet and good is being served, you can guarantee a crowd and it seemed that no sooner had Westexan unwrapped the spicy sweet goodness of the cobbler, everyone magically appeared. Eric Lover, Liz, Mel, God Speed and I sat down with our plates of goodness and our cups of coffee and watched the others. I saw God Speed’s lip curl at the appearance of Hoyt who was pointedly ignoring God Speed. The Dude wandered in, a big smile on his face.
“What are you grinning about like a possum?” I asked.
“I have an appointment to see my counselor tomorrow night,” he said smugly.
“Oh, I had mine last night,” I said. “But this is your first one on one session, huh?” He grinned and nodded.
Violet and Minnie came in together. Hoyt passed behind God Speed and kicked GS’s chair and GS grumbled a bit and scooted his chair up. I looked at Eric Lover and she rolled her eyes and sighed. Dude sat down with his plate, piled high with whipped cream and commenced to eating.
“I think we should discuss the Theory,” said Vi, as she sat down beside Eric Lover.
“My theory?” asked Dude, his fork half way to his lips.
“Sure, why not?” I said. “It’s a good one.”
“OOO what are we talking about? What theory?” asked Isabella as she and Nia settled together by Dude.
“Dude’s theory, I think it is dandy one,” I said.
“I read that on the forum!!!” said Isabella, excitedly. “It was so good to be back in the forum…I missed publicly appreciating our Bill.” said the dedicated Bill Girl.
“I did too, “ I said. “Did you sign the birthday card?”
“I did,” said Nia. “You need to do that Isabella.”
“I will make sure to do that,” she said, cutting into the cobbler and scraping up a piece. “This is so good.”
Ilovetheviking, Vikinglover, Linzy, TBF and Renee came in and got their treats and sat down. We were all excitedly talking and did not notice until the lights went out that our counselors had arrived. We settled down quickly.
“It is nice to be back in our accustomed place again,” said the soft southern voice. “You all seem to be in high spirits this evening.”
“We are glad to be back in our forum,” said Linzy. “Thanks so much Mel, from the bottom of our hearts for getting our forum back up.”
“Well, you are welcome, sorry it took me so long,” she said.
“And I hope the folks at AS.org know how much we appreciate the forum space they gave us,” I said. “I left a little note thanking them.”
“And of course, we are glad to be back in our own meeting room,” said God Speed. “It is important for junkies to have that feeling of normalcy.”
“How did everyone recover from the Autumnal Equinox celebration?” asked the lead counselor.
“It was such a great party,” said Minnie. “Aslinn is planning a costume party at her house.”
“Yes, I received my invitation today,” said my counselor.
“Will you counselors be there?” I asked. “If you all haven’t received your invitations, you are all invited.”
“We shall be there,” said the lead counselor. “What shall we talk about this evening?”
I looked over at Dude and GS gave him a nudge. He sipped his coffee and gathered himself.
“Alright, so I have a theory about who kidnapped Bill Compton,” said Dude.
“Do you?” said the lead counselor.
“Yeah, it’s just a theory that Aslinn and I were hashing out last night. See, I think Sophie Anne is definitely behind all this, but she was not necessarily the one who did the actual taking of Bill Compton,” he said. “This is what I think. She discovers that Bill knows that she is selling V. Why she is doing that, is anyone’s guess. Now Bill is a threat to her peaceful little kingdom. And she is annoyed with Bill anyhow because he doesn’t think like a Vampire anymore, at least in her estimations,”
“Why not?” asked Liz.
“Well, because he is monogamous with Sookie, he feeds only from her, so she at the very least finds him…strange….so she thinks that she has to do something with Bill to get him out of her hair and she hears about the goings on in Texas with Lorena showing up at Godric’s Lair and making that big scene and embarrassing Lorena. Now, here is where we get really speculative: we have to assume that Lorena has been living in Russell Edgington’s kingdom for a while. Perhaps it is through him that Sophie Anne contacted on behalf of Lorena by Russell. Of course Sophie Anne would feign indifference, it’s all a big cat fight, below her concern. It is a problem for Lorena to handle, who impresses upon Russell how disrespectfully Bill treated one of his subjects…yadda yadda yadda…and voila…we have Bill kidnapped and in Lorena’s clutches,” said Dude.
“But what about who took him?” asked Eric Lover.
“I think, personally, it was a were or a younger Vampire, mainly because the person who kidnapped Bill using the silver garrote was wearing gloves at the time. That would be a way for Sophie Anne to declare ignorance and wash her hands of the whole deal,” he finished.
We sat in silence, thinking over everything the Dude said.
“And of course that would leave Eric out of the loop. The queen was not too highly impressed with Eric either because he allowed Bill to find out about the V business and this leaves him wide open for moving in on Sookie,” said True Blood Fan. “But how does Eric get involved?”
“That is easy,” I said. “Sookie is on her own, she feels like the injured party, not just because Bill was taken but because she feels Eric owes her something for tricking her into drinking his blood, and he is a very strong Vampire. If I were going into what I might consider enemy territory, I would want a strong Vampire at my back.”
“But will Eric do such a thing?” asked Hoyt.
“What? Go and get Bill out of whatever shiatsu he finds himself in?” Hoyt nodded at me. “Not for Bill’s sake, that is for sure, he could care less. But for Sookie, to get a little closer to her, I would bet money.”
“Well done, great first meeting back in our familiar surroundings,” said the soft southern voice. “We’ll meet again next week.”
The counselors stood at the big windows and watched us get into our cars. Then Eric turned to Bill and favored him with a glance.
“Interesting theory,” he said to the dark haired counselor.
“I concur,” he said, a bit tersely.
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