xp_logs | Emerald Isle: Any Town, Ireland.

It's been three days. Terry is learning that you can't always go back.

Terry let herself into the hotel room where they were staying today. Because of the circumstances, she was the one running all the errands. It made her painfully aware that she could have left. But she couldn't bring herself to do it. No matter how many times she started towards a pay phone or sat in the car and stared at the road, imagining herself going right instead of left--she couldn't do it. Not to Tom. If she left him...nothing was ever going to get better. She had to stay and see this through. Things would be different this time, right?

"Uncle Tom? I've got lunch." She dropped the bag on the table and shrugged out of her new jacket. Everything she was wearing was new--the inevitable result of having gone off with nothing but the clothes on her back. Somehow though, changing into new clothes, it had felt like she was shedding the Terry that remembered New York.

"That's a lass," Tom said distractedly from where he was sitting at the small table, poring over maps. He had sent Terry out for a roadmap of the area last night, and had been peering at it and muttering to himself nearly the whole morning.

Somehow she didn't think that he was looking for the quickest way to Dublin. "Yeh've been fussing over that all day. What's in yer head?"

"Practical considerations, Terry love," he said with a slightly sardonic smile, looking up at her. "I find meself somewhat short on funds, and living the free life is expensive."

Well...cats couldn't really change their stripes either. Her jaw tightened. "I don't want yeh doing anything illegal. We're in plenty of trouble as is." She sat down and started pulling sandwiches from the bag. "What are yeh planning?"

"No one's going to get hurt, Terry, if this all goes as planned," he reassured. "Some rich banker-types will be light some money, that's all."

He'd always done this. Fancied himself striking back against the wealthy for the weak. She set his food on top of the map where he was looking. "Aye, then they'll raise rates for those who aren't wealthy and it'll be the poorest that pay."

"When did yeh get so cynical, lass?" Tom chided her, picking up the sandwich with a brief nod of gratitude in her direction.

"AP econ." Terry unwrapped her own sandwich but didn't eat it, frowning at him instead. "I'm serious, Uncle Tom. I won't let yeh pull anymore jobs. There's always someone as gets hurt and it'll come back on yeh ten times as hard." She didn't know if Sean was looking for them, didn't know if he'd just cut his losses and moved on. But the garda would be looking for them even if Sean wasn't and Terry didn't think that they wouldn't be caught sooner or later.

He blinked at her. "Terry, lass... it's not as if I broke out of prison with much money on me," he said somewhat helplessly. "How do I keep us if I don't make sure yeh and I have some resources?"

"I don't know. But yeh can't start stealing again. Yeh'll have to find out some other way." She dragged a hand through her hair and pulled a lock of it around to nibble on the end. "I can get a job," she offered. "That should help us a bit."

"Absolutely not, Theresa Cassidy," Tom said in a stern, almost paternal voice. "Once I've gotten us settled in a new place, yeh will be back at school."

"Settled? And how do yeh plan to get us settled then when yeh're a wanted man?" She was trying not to think about school or of the fat and thin envelopes arriving from universities. Most of all she was trying not to think about how her friends would react, knowing she was gone. Trying not to think of Bobby.

"One step at a time, lass," Tom said, apparently not noticing her inner turmoil in the least. "One step at a time..." His attention was back on the map.

She stood up, shoving back from the table. "I'm going out. Yeh aren't being reasonable and I'll not sit here while yeh plan something this stupid." She stalked over and grabbed her jacket.

"Don't stray too far, lass," Tom said, watching her with a little frown, as if he didn't understand why she was making such a fuss.

Terry stopped and looked back at him. "No. I won't." She let the door slam behind her.

~*~

Terry kicked a pebble as she walked, letting it skitter ahead of her then catching up and kicking it forward again. It was nicely mindless and that combined with the chill breeze tossing her hair about, kept her occupied for some time. It was only when she reached the end of the street and her pebble skipped into the road that she lost her battle with her thoughts and they streamed back in, bumping and jostling, confused beyond measure.

He wouldn't change. She knew that. No matter how much she wished it otherwise, no matter how much she begged or screamed Tom would be the same man that he'd always been. He would lie. He would cheat. He would steal. And he would hurt people without regard for anything but how it benefited him. Even if the one who got hurt was her.

She stopped and leaned against a building, tilting her head back to look at the silver-grey sky, tears welling in her blue eyes. There was a physical pain in her chest, like someone squeezing her heart.

She couldn't go along with this.

"Here now, are yeh all right?" Terry jumped and wiped at her eyes, nodding. It was a moment before she could focus on the man who'd stopped to talk to her. He looked like he was her father's age--he probably had daughters himself given the way he was looking at her.

"Aye. I'm...do yeh have a mobile? I...need to call home."