"Angus..." I breathed. He laughed again.

"Well, I'm glad to see you haven't forgotten the name, or that I'm the one it belongs to," he said. Lifting my head a bit more, I checked to make sure, just absolutely sure that it was him. The same man I had gone back in time three times to meet, the same man who had gotten me out of the most ridiculous predicaments, the same man I had fallen-into very,very deep water with. He smiled at me, still laughing a bit. I frowned and continued to fight with my apron. "You look like you've been busy."

"I uh-I have been," I said, eyeing the photo in his hand. "Busy," I added quickly. Angus' hand reached up and grabbed my apron, holding it away from my face. "Thank you."

"Been sometime since we've seen each other, hasn't it?" I opened my mouth to agree, when I remembered it had only been a few months. But for him...it had been decades. He tilted his head. "Well, hasn't it?"

"Yeah, yeah! It uh, sure has." 

"And look at you," he said gesturing to me. "What on Earth happened to you?" As he inspected the rope suspending me, I played with my hands. 

"See, our pet store hasn't been doing well lately so my coworker decided swinging me from the roof would get everyone's attention." He stood back and studied me, me eyeing the photo again. 

"Ya' sure got my attention. You always could get yourself in the-" He paused a minute. "Pardon my being so blunt, the stupidest situations."

"I'll have you know, I had everything under control, Mister," I said holding a finger up. He let the apron fall onto my face again.

"I can see that, Hannah Ruth." He laughed at my struggle for a minute, then grabbed it again. I frowned at him, blowing a few stray strands of hair out of my mouth. He stared at me, and I looked down in nervousness. What, you're more than twice my age and you still make me nervous, Young? When I get down from here, you're gonna get it. "Look at you," he said again. 

"Well, I'm no Lucy Parker," I said, my rope swinging me back and forth. He didn't say anything, and I could only guess what his face looked like. 

"Do you need help?" he finally asked after a while. I shrugged.

"Oh, a little wouldn't hurt."

"Here." He grabbed the rope, sticking the photo of us in his mouth, deciding how best to go about untying me. "Thishknotishtight."

"Don't talk with your mouth full," I said. He almost spit the photo out. 

He let go of the knot and I started swinging back and forth again. He took the photo from his mouth. "I said the knot was too tight, I can't get it undone without letting you fall to the ground."

"Thanks for being considerate," I said. Maybe Michelle knew what she was doing when she tied these things. Probably a good thing too. "Sorry you had to see me like this. Dangling like a thread of spit."

"I'd rather it you than the alternative," he admitted. "I won't lie, I missed you an awful lot."

"Missed you more," I said, knowing he would immediately disagree. 

"Don't argue, you're in no position to argue." I opened my mouth when a sharp pull on the rope stopped me. Then another. And another, and Angus was still standing there, watching me ascend inch by inch. "Someone up there with you?"

"Uh, yeah, my coworker." Angus, if it were possible, was getting smaller and smaller and harder to hear. "She's got the rope, she's pulling me up-"

"When can I see you again?" he called up to me.

"Meet me inside! I'll explain everything!" Before I could hear an answer, I was pulled up to the roof of the building, more than once losing my footing and nearly falling again. Two hands grabbed me from behind, pulling me to the opening, and untying me. I was escorted backwards through the ladder, my head spinning like crazy, and finally I reached the floor. The room was loud with heaters and air vents, any voices yelling at me becoming something I couldn't be bothered to listen to. 

My arms hurt from the fingers that grasped them and I massaged them when I was let go, almost shoved into someone else. I turned around to thank Michelle for getting me out of there when I saw Sasha staring at me with the reddest eyes I have ever seen on a human. Michelle being mad at you is one thing, but Sasha mad at you, whether or not she's your boss, is entirely another. Michelle, who I had stumbled into, stood next to me, both of saying our prayers because today, about four commandments were about to be broken. 

"What on Earth is the matter with you two?" she asked, her arms akimbo. "I ask you to spread the word around, not break your necks over it!"

"Well..." Michelle said, swaying slightly. "We told you we'd do anything for these pets-"

Sasha held her finger up, Michelle quieting down without a word spoken. I heard the bell on the door ring, knowing who it was, yet still hoping he wouldn't see me getting my head chewed off. "If anyone had seen you two you could have gotten in serious trouble! Misconduct, endangering the lives of employees, what if Hannah died?" I blanched at the thought, suddenly thankful I was there to hear Sasha yell at me. 

"The rope slipped! It could have happened to anyone!"

"It wouldn't have happened to you if you both had used your heads!" My hair blew around my shoulders, and for a very real second I thought the visitor had left the door open, a gust of wind sweeping through. It took me another second to realize it was just the anger of my boss' voice. "What happened to those fliers I gave you?" I took it upon myself to speak up.

"We nailed them up like you asked us and...it seems the wind took them all down." Sasha rolled her eyes as Michelle nodded. "I mean, we still got the word around!"

"And blocked traffic in about, three streets," Michelle added. I could have kicked her.

"I should fire the both of you," Sasha said glaring daggers at the both of us. Michelle and I stood there with our heads hung, and only raised them when a fourth voice spoke out.

"That'd be a shame if you did," the voice said, its owner coming up to stand behind my enraged boss. "because you have two perfectly good employees here already." I saw that bugger wink at me but I gave him a smile anyway despite standing in fear for my job. Sasha turned around at the voice, immediately giving him a sweet smile and a warm welcome.

"I'm sorry you had to see that, welcome to our pet store, if you need any help these two will be happy to help. Michelle, go clip Tracy's wings. Hannah, spend some quality time with the kittens. Now." She walked toward her office and put a hand to her head. "I'm going to take a nap to ward off my employee-sized headache."

The door slammed leaving Michelle, me, and our new visitor to ourselves. Michelle went straight to work rummaging around the front desk for the feather clippers while I trudged my way over to the kitten room. Amadeus had Rosie in a real good hold between his teeth. "Hey, hey!" I opened the little door to their play pen and pulled Amadeus away, resulting in a similar bite on my hand. "Don't bite thy neighbor, haven't you heard?"

"Havin' fun in there?" I was about to turn around when I realized I was halfway through the little door, wrestling with uncooperative kittens. Why this man always seemed to catch me in the most ridiculous situations is something I'll never figure out. But of course, so is how I get myself into them in the first place!

I pulled myself through letting the ginger kitty free, to which he found Mickey to play with and gave him a swat of the tail. Dusting myself off, I turned to greet the man-my best friend. It had been so long for him...who knew what he was thinking of all this? 

He didn't look any different, to tell you the truth. He was still the same man from 1975, who owned a blue knit blanket his sister made him. The same man who threw himself a New Year party in his room and the same man who found me in the fire. I spent so much time with this man, yet, when I looked at him, it was like a whole lifetime went by without me. Without him in mine. 

"Angus," I said again, still surprised to see him in the little run down store, let alone this dinky town. I fixed my apron and walked to to him, still tilting my eyes down to see him. 

"Hannah," he responded. 

"It's...nice to see you again."

"As it is you."

I rocked back and forth on my feet. 

"How've you been?"

"Good, yeah. You?"

"I'm fine, bit shaken up. How's Ellen?"

"She's just fine, shoppin' around a bit," he said gesturing with his hand. "So uh... care to tell me when you got a gig as an acrobat?"

I had to laugh at his wording. "We tried the normal ways first, hanging flyers and all that. But it's real windy outside and they all came down. So we sort of tried something else."

"I'll say it again. Certainly got my attention. I couldn't do that, much too high."

"Much too high for me too, but she insisted." I shrugged thinking of little Samson. "And I care about these animals, I want them to go to good homes. If that means performing aerial tricks then so be it."

"You're dedicated to your work, an' that's a good thing. But uh...I'm guessing your boss didn't approve of it as much?"

"How much did you hear?" I asked, hanging my head. Angus shrugged and tried to hide back that little smile of his.

"Most of it, I think." I hung my head lower. He lifted my head up to meet his and tapped his foot. "Hey, at least you didn't lose your job over it, you got away with it!"

"At least I didn't die," I mentioned casually. He laughed a bit, realizing the real relief.

"Oh yeah, that too," he said. Standing there talking with him, along with seeing him below me as I dangled from the roof, made me realize just how much I missed him. As shy as I was I wasted no more time in letting him know.

He stumbled backwards a bit but steadied himself and returned the hug. It was warm and comforting; familiar as if we hugged each other every day upon greeting, and sincere as if we hadn't seen each other in ages. Which was certainly true, feeling that the ages were even longer than they were. I stood on my toes, all too eager to finally see him again, finally talk to him again. "I missed you," I said.

"Missed you too," he said. "For God knows how many years it's been. You know?"

"Lost count. That and, it hasn't been nearly as long for me, not even a year."

"What, that's not fair," he said separating slightly. "Have you gotten taller?"

"Have you gotten shorter?" I joked. Again he tried to hide his smile.

"Alright, let's drop that subject then." I hardly heard the door open but I sure heard it slam closed. Michelle stood there, staring at the two of us locked together. I put some space between us and cleared my throat.

"Sorry to interrupt," Michelle said staring at me. "I-just needed to grab a few paper towels." A multitude of paper towels, way more than was necessary was grabbed from the roll and bunched up in her hands. "Welcoming the customers, Hannah?"

"Michelle, this is a friend of mine, friend of mine, this is Michelle." Angus wasted no time in offering her his hand, which Michelle reluctantly grabbed.

"Hi, nice to meet ya'."

"Hello," she said nearly dropping her wad of paper. "I'm sorry again, I didn't catch your name."

Before he could answer I spoke up, grabbing her arm. There's not too many Anguses on this planet and Michelle being a classic rock fan would surely recognize him. I needed to speak with her before she freaked out in front of him. "Michelle, can I speak to you a minute please?"

"Please," she responded following me out of the room. Not a single person was out to hear us. Man, business really was going down the toilet. Anyway, I pulled her to stand behind the desk so she could put her paper towels down. "Who was that man?" she asked getting to the point.

"Like I said. Friend of mine."

"Hannah, the only 'friends' I have at that age are my aunts and uncles and what not. Care to explain?"

"What, I can't be friends with someone a little older?"

"A little," she scoffed. "It's not that it's just..." Her eyes went wide. Pushing me aside she ran to the little door where Sasha's office was behind and looked through the window. Sasha was probably on the phone since Michelle didn't tarry hurrying back to me. "Is he from the retirement home?" she whispered. I could have choked on thin air.

"No! Of course not, and I'll ask you to keep your voice down!"

"Me keep my voice down?" she asked. "You know what they think of this place, Hannah, we'll be out of business if he gets any inside information. That's it, I'm moving back with my parents." I sighed at her inability to listen and grabbed her shoulders keeping her still.

"He most certainly is not one of them, I'll have you know. He's my friend. We've been friends for a while and I haven't seen him..." I said twiddling my thumbs. "In a while."

Michelle blew a lock of hair out of her face. "What's his name then? He go by Mr.?"

Claiming the world record for sighing at eleven in the morning, I told her. "You know a band by the name..." I winced. "AC/DC?"