*

It's good to be at home and feel home.

*

Teeside. 

Teeside. 

 Stay, home, address. 

"You both can stay with her." A sweet melodious voice echoed in her head. 

She could stay somewhere. She had stayed somewhere. But, where? she asked herself. It all felt like a dual with herself. A dual conversation. 

Teeside- the masculine voice knocked in.

"Listen up, little one" the hoarse voice bumped into her inner thoughts and she looked up at the dusky face. "Yes, yes- listen up, I know that you know, very well, where you live. So, it would just be easier for you and me, if you just tell me where you stayed in Teeside."

"... It would just be easier for you and me if you would just tell me where you live in Teeside" familiarity rang in her. 

Things made sense a bit. Those words made sense now-- it was Noel. 

Her Noel. 

"Look, I know this is strange and awkward, but we know that your lovely friend has bound us in this  situation and we don't" Noel's voice replayed in her head. 

Vague flashes flushed her. He was there besides her, as always in his unbuttoned t-shirt  hanging over a white short and lose, but not overly lose, black jeans  with his Nike sneakers that he loved to death. His golden-brown hair curled enough to the right length- not touching the neck, falling short of his elf-like ears. A dusky, lean girl hesitantly stood across them. 5'6 ish both of them matched perfectly besides each other, she remembered. She remembered. 

"Oh no, no. It's nothing like that. You guys don't have to feel guilty 'bout anything." she spoke like a chirping bird. "It's just that- just like how June said. I stay alone mostly, so it's, well- alright. Come over."

She was about to continue on, May remembered but, a tumbling figure had rushed in and caught their attention. It was June in her oversized white, denim suspender overall. Yes, that day, even though it was the first, she recalled, Noel and her were well known that she was the hunky dory, tumbling-stumbling sorts. Though they weren't ready to box her in that category on appearance, but, well, they also did not have a choice when they were self-introduced like that. 

"You guys are still here!" June remarked ignoring her fall and the mess of the musical cassettes, 

"Ada come on, stop thinking! You are always so alone. A few visitors for a few nights would just make your day bright! Aha, I have rhyme in me, bruh! It's awesome day, may, take my word. You are going to her house for how so ever long you stay here. Your address shall be-- Highland Park Apartments. Come on now..."

"Highlands Apartments." Her voice cracked. 

That was what she said.

The masculine voice, in front of her, muttered something back.  A curse it seemed so.

It always seemed so.

His spit bubbled on the table she had been staring at. The table she saw, she corrected herself-- it was vintage, quite crooked; brown, broken but smooth with holes in between. 

Mahogany? No, she denied to her mind. Mr. Arthur said Mahogany was tough. This table, she looked closer even though she had endlessly looked at her ever since she came here which seemed to be a forever ago. Anyways, her mind sailed her back to the table in sight- it was fragile, somewhat like her, shaky, squeaky but still standing. 

Her palm holding on to its dear frame, she caressed her fingers over it. 

Pine- she smiled. 

The glum shadow disappeared from her, letting in the swinging light bulbs cast pinch her. She squint at the broken window above.

 A lone streak of sunlight pierced through caressing the rim of the table. She stared.

"Oh, no, no, no!" a squeaky, thin voice reverberated in her mind. Ah, these voices kept her dear life alive in this lonely darkness. "You class of foolish forty craving-to-be woodcarvers- don't you underestimate pine. Pine, you fluffs, has a great deal of stiffness and is resistant to shock" Mr. Arthur, she remembered, pinched his spectacles and scaled them a bit up on his nose, "For you without the money but plenty of ideas and whittlers to make,  Pine makes a solid choice-- easy to work, soft and plenty in nature."

*****

"Dude, stop! Stop" Harlow doubled over himself onto the middle of the road. Holding his stomach, he panted to Nate who ran up a couple of blocks farther, " we've been running for miles now! The gallery's left long back.  We need to get a plan. " 

"Plan?" Nate screamed back in the dead of the dawn. "This, mon ami, was a plan! Your plan to be very specific. "

"And we needed evidence."

"Tch, you needed a degree from Oxford for that?"

"That's ridiculous!"

"Not any less than what you evidently do for evidence, " Nate narrowed his eyes and walked over to Harlow's tired self,  "Something that we were getting was very evident from the very start and to that art gallery police! You, Harlow, wanted to just go for it like you always have. Just rummage into anything be it a posh gallery, or someone's life! Permitted or not- you would just walk in and walk out for your own needs"

"Do remember when I laid out this plan in front of y'll", Harlow snickered.

"Oh! Of course... It's been an honor." 

 "We need to do this, Nate! We have no other choice! It's better than mourning all about it!", he folded his arms and imitated Harlow's voice with a pinch of mockery decorated upon it.

Harlow rolled his eyes and pursing his lips, he stood up straight, "Just because, the Mr. righteous, fragile Nate had to make a run from a gallery at night from a petit art-gallery police-- it became all about Harlow's failures, ain't it?  I don't think it was all about that when you blabbered a hundred game-plans and then, set foot through the delivery door to find proof. "

"And then monsieur" Nate blinked and pressed thin chapped lips, "Do remember my hundreds of plans did lay out the plan to enter after due permissions," he closed in the space between them. "The thing is, Harlow, all your games end up about me." 

Nate was about to storm off when a voice stopped him dead in his tracks, 

"And the thing is, mon amie, tonight you both are my game."

Harlow and Nate turned back in the direction they came from only to see the navy suited patrol. 

Without no other game-plans chalked out for, Nate and Harlow's head hung low and they stepped into the railed van and drove off to their now-bounded destination. 

*****

" Superintended Baker-- I brought some company for you tonight!" the art-gallery policy cheered in his French accent and steered the two into the police station.

"Company- it's been long from your side! Two lads- what's the story for 3am, Mr. Spenster?" Baker asked utterly intrigued as his right eyebrow shot up and eagle-like eyes hawked them up and down. 

"Monsieur, the Queen ordered a unique statue in honor of Sir Henry Harlow, as you know and these two gentlemen, it seems, have been carrying it with them. Right?" Mr. Spenster threw a glance at Nate who guilty gulped. 

"Ah! And the statue being..." Baker eyed Harlow. 

"Indeed. It's unique, as per the Queen's wish."

"It is. Second of the day from the gallery- unique it is." 

"Sit" he instructed Nate and Harlow "Mr. Baker, it's been a long day for your old age, run along . I promise the lads will be handled."

"Very well, sir! Thank you!" the French police waived his beret cap in dismissal and proceeded. 

"What a bloody mess", Harlow muttered to himself. 

Superintended Baker shot him a friendly glance through his grey eyes and smiled, "Not yet bloody, misters! Not yet. " he walked over to his neatly-organized table and sat on his plush chair 

"Take a seat." he gestured and leaned back.

Following obediently to avoid any further troubles, Nate and Harlow exchanged glances and settled themselves across on the dandy, scant chair of plastic.  Cold -- they both acknowledged through pursed lips and waited for the Superintended to continue. 

The very and apparently well to-do officer rocked in his chair and titling his head eyed both the lads. He scratched his chin, smiled and swayed his head leftwards. Harlow and Nate sat there, quietly hanging on to every ounce of patience they had for they knew if they had held on it earlier, they might been further ahead and farther away.  

The officer leaned forward and brushed his little mustache-- "You both..."

"No. No." he dismissed his assumption but unsatisfied, leaned back in his chair and scratched his head. 

"Both of you..." he started again but stopped mid-way. 

"Are with us, Superintended Baker!" a harmonized voice of three barged in the precinct's room.