Decisions

It was a clear, crisp fall night, and there was an infinite amount of possibilities before Luna and her date for the night. Too bad Luna saw most of them, and the image was not pleasant.

The man before her was Ben, 29, in banking, nice car, nice watch on his wrist, and an even nicer Tinder profile. Luna had assumed he would be a nice, normal, easy date. But superimposed over the man before her, Luna saw his plan for the evening, which involved the roofie he’d slipped into her drink when she’d went to the bathroom. She had tried giving him the chance to not make that choice when she’d first seen it bouncing around him like an annoying fly, by telling him that she had just come from her bi-weekly MMA class, but when she came back, the decision had been made, the pill had been dropped and swirled in, and the images went from the possibility of what he was doing to the very real chance that he would be either taking her back to her place for some very unfriendly activities, or he would become impatient and just take it out to his nice car behind the restaurant.

Luna sighed, picking up her glass and swirling the amber liquid around. She had really been hoping for a normal night tonight, but at least this time, her inability to interact with anyone without seeing their decisions play out in real time would save her from a very uncomfortable encounter. She watched as Ben watched her just as closely, waiting for her to ingest the drink. Instead, she set the glass down a little more roughly than she meant to and gave him a small, sad smile. “This has been fun, Ben, but I think I’m going to head out for the night. I’m tired and I have to work early in the morning. Sorry, hon.”

The disappointment on his face was almost comical, if it didn’t come at the expense of this particular circumstance. Oh, well. Can’t win ‘em all, Luna, she thought to herself. She waved the waiter over, paid for her half of dinner in cash, and wished Ben a good evening before walking through the slightly crowded restaurant. Before she reached the door, she glanced back and saw that Ben had taken her almost full glass of whiskey and approached an unsuspecting woman sitting alone at the bar. Luna’s blood ran cold, and though she had told herself she would actually go home and let this one go, she couldn’t after that.

Luna stepped out of the building and hurried to her cute little Volkswagen, getting in quickly and starting the car. She maneuvered it across the small side road to park in the movie theater’s parking lot that was behind the restaurant. There, she cut the engine again and turned off all the lights, waiting for her date impatiently.

It took a while, almost half an hour, before Ben came stumbling out of the restaurant, the redhead from earlier leaning heavily against him. Luna grabbed the door handle, prepared to jump out if Ben decided to get down to business here, since she had to be fairly close to see his decisions and wasn't sure, but he practically tossed the woman into the backseat of his sedan and climbed in the front. Luna started the car and followed some distance behind Ben, keeping his car in sight but staying back far enough so she wouldn’t rouse suspicion. Finally, after about ten minutes of driving, Ben pulled his car into an empty playground. Gross, but at least it was almost midnight, so there were no kids anywhere near here.

Luna parked down the street, got out of her Volkswagen, and grabbed the digital camera she kept in the passenger seat any time she was out of the house. Then, she pulled her hood up over her head, concealing her blonde hair, and grabbed the face mask she kept in there, as well. It was pretty, had embroidered flowers on it, but in the dark, it should be hard to see. Luckily, Ben had insisted masks weren't needed for the date. That should have been Luna's first red flag, she thought. She shut and locked the door, then jogged down the street to where Ben was climbing out of his car and opening the back door.

Luna wanted nothing more than to charge in and stop it there, but she knew if she did, she would save the girl, but he would do it again. So, she stepped behind a slide, out of view, and aimed the lens of the camera, turning it to the video feature and zooming in. The camera was high-quality, purchased just for her job by the private security firm that hired Luna, and it could catch images in low light and sound from far away like a pro. So when Ben reached in to yank the woman roughly to the edge of the car seat, undoing his belt, the camera caught it all. And when the woman started struggling and telling him to stop, well, it caught that as well.

Luna captured as much as she could stand before Ben slapped the woman and started pulling her pants down. And that was that. Luna slung the camera strap over her shoulder, darted out from her hiding place, and yelled, “Hey!” as loudly as she could. Luna was short, petite, and generally looked like a stiff wind could blow her over, but she grew up in a traditional Southern household. If there was one thing she learned as a kid, it was how to talk loudly to be heard over all of her siblings and cousins. So Ben jumped almost ridiculously high and whirled, panic in his face.

When he saw his new friend was small, he just shouted back, “Go away, this is private, you perv!”

Luna reached him quickly and Ben turned and lifted an arm to try a sloppy punch in her direction. She hadn’t been lying about the MMA classes. She really did take them bi-weekly, mostly because she was a small woman working for a security firm as a private investigator, but it came in handy in other ways, too. Luna landed two quick punches, one on his chest, one on his stomach before he could even react. Then Luna lunged down, threaded her right arm behind the leg closest to her, and pulled his leg off the ground. After that, she turned and applied pressure to his thigh using her shoulder, pulling him off balance and landing him on his back on the gravel. The air rushed out of his lungs in a whoosh, and Luna remained standing, keeping his leg in one arm as she lifted her right arm to land another blow. But judging by his stunned expression, she thought he was probably done.

The streetlight was behind her, so Luna probably looked like she was cast in shadows as she looked down at this sorry excuse for a man. She wasn’t panting hard, but Ben started coughing when air rushed back into his lungs. She dropped his leg and straightened out of her stance. She pulled the camera around from behind her back and pulled up the video, turning the screen on the back in his direction. “This really isn’t a flattering look, Benjamin. Oh, well, I’m sure the police will love to see this little clip,” Luna said, pitching her voice a little lower than normal since he had actually met her.

Ben started to protest, but he was still catching his breath and tried to sit up. Luna planted a booted foot in his chest and applied pressure, just enough to keep him down.

“Nope, this ends here. You’re disgusting, but at least now there’s evidence of it.” She then turned to the woman, who had passed out in the middle of the altercation. Sighing, she stepped away from Ben, who had started to cry on the ground, and reached into the car to see if she could grab the woman. No way was she going to leave her here with him. With some managing, Luna was able to halfway lift the woman enough to get her to wake up a little. She struggled at first, but after some consoling from Luna, the woman calmed down and let her lead her away from the car and her attacker. Luna glanced one more time at Ben as she passed. Now his images showed some pretty rough jail time coming his way, which Luna was more than okay with after tonight. Hopefully, that stayed that way.

It wasn’t easy getting the woman to Luna’s car, but she managed. The woman’s images were jumbled and chaotic. It was not easy to look at, so Luna tried not to. After settling the woman into her passenger seat, Luna knelt, took off the mask, and asked the woman if she wanted to go to the hospital, where she lived, what she wanted to do. The woman refused a hospital, though she slurred the words, then fell asleep again before she could say anything else. Sighing, Luna noticed a small wallet sticking out of her back pocket. She dug the wallet out, praising the woman silently for having it on her, and took out the ID. Her name was Avery, and she lived just a few streets away from Luna. She was also the same age, apparently. Luna couldn’t find a phone on Avery, but that was fine because she had what looked to be a door key in the wallet. Luna stood and climbed into the car behind the wheel. After one more glance to confirm Avery was still out by seeing that there were no more images around her—hard to make decisions that affect your future when you’re asleep—Luna took off in the direction of Avery’s apartment.

Getting Avery awake enough to walk up the steps to her apartment was a challenge, but Luna managed, even if it came at the cost of her oldest, and favorite, pair of leather boots when Avery threw up whatever was left in her stomach. Grimacing, Luna let the both of them into the small apartment, fumbling for a light switch while trying to juggle Avery at the same time. The apartment was clean, looked like she had moved in not long ago, and still had a few boxes lying around. That was rotten luck, then, to be approached like that right after moving in. Luna slipped her boots off at the door, figuring she didn’t want to track vomit everywhere, and maneuvered Avery down the short hall to a bedroom where she let the other woman down gently onto the queen size bed there. Sighing deeply again, Luna got to work taking off Avery’s shoes and jacket, but left everything else, figuring the woman would feel more secure when she woke up if she wasn’t stripped like that. Then, Luna stepped across the hall to the tiny bathroom and found a wash rag, wet it in the sink, and joined Avery in the room again to clean up the mess on her face a little before she rolled over and smeared it into the bed.

Avery woke up a little while Luna was doing this, and seemed a little more lucid after throwing some of the rohypnol up. She blinked warily at Luna, obviously confused. “Who are you? Where am I?” she managed to croak out.

Luna gave her a small smile. “I’m Luna. You were drugged, and I was just bringing you to your apartment to sober up. Do you remember what happened?”

“N-no.” Her voice was wavering, and it broke Luna’s heart.

“That’s okay, that will happen. I can still take you to the hospital if you would like. Nothing happened before I got there, but you might react badly to the drugs.”

Avery shook her head and tried to sit up. Luna supported her, slightly surprised when the other woman let her. “No, no hospitals. I don’t want to answer their questions.”

“That’s fine, too. Do you think you can stand? You might feel better after a shower, and I can try to find you some food to soak the drug up.” Avery looked at Luna like she had grown a second head or something. “Or I can leave you alone or call a friend for you if that is what you want to do. That’s up to you.”

Panic flashed in Avery’s eyes, and her hand shot out to grab Luna’s surprisingly fast. “No, please don’t leave me.” Then she started crying and leaned her head into Luna’s shoulder.

Luna cradled the other woman and held her, letting her cry it out. Her heart wrenched with Avery’s sobs. It wasn’t fair that, had Luna not been able to see what she could see, she would have been in Avery’s position. But if she also hadn’t turned around and seen Ben approaching Avery, she couldn’t have saved her. Luna didn’t know which was worse. But this is the outcome that was decided by three separate people’s decisions, so it was the one Luna had to work with.

After calming Avery down, the other woman asked for a little privacy so she could change. Luna obliged, telling her she would wait in the living room. Luna ended up digging up from Tylenol in the bathroom and grabbed a large bottle of water from the kitchen, so when Avery walked out of the room in a long sleeve shirt and pajama pants, Luna held it out with the instructions to take some pills now and drink all of the water before she laid down, and that she would feel better in the morning.

Just as Avery took the proffered bottles and as Luna was about to give her her number in case she had any questions or needed any more help, Luna saw a flash of Avery swallowing the whole bottle of pills, which was nearly full. The words stuck in Luna’s throat in panic, but then that image disappeared, and Avery met Luna’s eyes and asked, “Can you stay with me tonight? I would feel so much better. I know you don’t owe me anything else, but you have been such a lifesaver already. Please?”

“Of course,” Luna said, the adrenaline dumping out of her system from the image she had seen. Now, it was replaced with Luna making pancakes for Avery in the morning, a perfectly normal, surreal scene after Avery’s almost suicidal decision.

“Also, sorry about the boots. I will pay you back for them,” Avery offered, a small, sheepish smile playing across her face now.

Luna chuckled. “It’s fine. They were due to be replaced, anyway. Come on, let’s get you into bed.”

“You can sleep in here with me,” Avery offered as they walked back to the room. She was tall for a woman, almost six feet, so she had to look down at Luna as they walked. “The couch is small, even for someone as short as you, so it will be more comfortable.”

“Are you sure?” Luna asked. “I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

“Are you kidding? I would be more afraid without you in here.”

How could she say no to that? They climbed into the bed, Luna keeping her distance from Avery until the other woman scooted closer and asked her if that was alright. After confirming it was, Avery sighed and snuggled in, mumbling before drifting off, “Thank you so much for helping me, you sweet angel.”

Luna let Avery sleep for a while before she slowly and carefully pulled the memory card she had swiped from the camera out of her pocket and inserted it into her cell phone. She turned her volume down and checked the video, glad to see that neither her nor Avery’s faces were clear in any of it. Then she opened her burner email account and sent the video to her contact at the police station, Damian. He was a detective that, for some reason Luna could not fathom, accepted the anonymous tips she sometimes sent and usually went after the perp with minimal questions asked. She added the contact info she had dug up on Ben before their date (come on, you know a PI is going to do some due diligence on a date, even if they are from Tinder) and sent the email with the message “THIS IS NOT THE FIRST TIME HE HAS DONE THIS, BUT HERE’S SOME PROOF TO GET YOU STARTED.” Luckily, Tennessee was a one-party consent state, so even if it wasn’t quite enough to arrest Ben on here, it was enough to open an investigation and be used as evidence later.

After that was sent, Luna put the phone on the floor and looked at Avery. She looked so peaceful while she slept, but Luna knew first-hand that the decisions that were made tonight could have very well ended with her in some pretty rough shape, if not in the ground. Luna wasn’t quite comfortable involving herself in the decisions of others on a regular basis, but when something like this happened, she usually made the decision to step in, consequences, such as having to babysit a stranger who now saw her as some kind of savior when she was far from it, be damned.