Return of the Sun - 1. Chapter 1

There are those that say the Devil chooses his servants; others say that they choose him. Scott Walker didn't know much about the Devil; after all he hardly felt as if he worked for him in any serious capacity. He was purely a victim of circumstances, the butt of some cosmic joke that had his existence as its punch line.

Scott could hardly say he believed in a Lord of Darkness, Prince of Lies and Master of the Underworld. He had heard all the stories in the church group he had been abandoned at every Sunday for the better part of his childhood. But to actually say that he believed in Satan would be the same as saying he believed in God, and he just wasn't ready to do that.

But as he stared out of the window of an airplane at 30,000 feet over the Atlantic Ocean seeing the sunrise over the banks of clouds, it was hard to deny the possibility of God's existence. It was like the sky was bathed in radiance, turning everything golden, and there was a warmth, not from the tightly pressurized cabin with its climate control, but from within. It was like Scott realized that he wasn't on the ground; instead he was amidst the clouds, up in the heavens themselves.

Scott looked down at the letter, staring at the futile way of explaining his life to his father. An outpouring of emotions from a mind that hadn't slept in nearly forty-eight hours. He knew he should have tried to sleep, but Scott was in an airplane hurtling over the Atlantic and he was terrified that he might miss something. He couldn't understand the little old lady snoring from across the aisle; it was as if flying were something she took for granted.

Scott had flown once before, his first jump across the pond, dragged behind his father's lofty ideas that America was the place to start a bold new life. What a load of bull that had been; Scott was happily ending his time in Exile and he was going home. He had left as a child and was now returning as his own man.

The stewardess bent over the sleeping salesman beside Scott, and he looked up from his letter as she refilled his coffee cup. After stopping her virtually every ten minutes of the flight for a refill she had gained a pretty good idea of when his cup was empty, and without hesitation she always appeared to refill it. Scott appreciated her attentiveness; it made him feel special.

She gave him a warming smile as she nodded to the letter before him, "Do you need more paper, sir?"

Scott looked down and smiled again, "Probably," he admitted.

She nodded as she headed off again letting him focus on the letter once more. What was he trying to say to his father in that letter? He wasn't saying 'I'm going home and you can't stop me!' though to be honest that was what Scott wanted to say to him. It was an eight-year bitterness welling up inside him; he had never wanted to leave in the first place, uproot his life for the promise of something better. That something had never appeared. He had been made to give up his family, friends, his entire culture on an empty promise. What had become of that promise after his father's new wife had divorced him? What had become of it after that great new job had turned out to be nothing more than a ticket to unemployment? Now his eldest son was abandoning the sinking ship, finally going home... after his own promise had failed to deliver.

Scott drank the coffee in a couple of swallows and bent back to the paper. It was nothing more than a summary of his life since he had moved out of his father's house and gone to university. Scott had felt so proud then, so accomplished; he had done it he had succeeded where his dad had failed. He had a chance for a better life... But he blew it. It wasn't that Scott lacked the intelligence to do well in university, but he had discovered life was more interesting to him than learning about things he felt he already knew and didn't care about. After the ninth week of not bothering to show up to class, Scott knew he was failing out, and promptly gave up entirely. He lived out the rest of his student loan and... and was now on a plane back to the only real home he had ever had: England.

Now, he had no idea what he was going to do once he got there. He was an unemployed: 'uneducated loser on a one-way ticket to nowhere seeks room and board as well as a state-sanctioned food budget.' He had no plan, no money. The only thing he knew was that he had to get home, to get the hell away from the US of A and actually figure out what he wanted to do rather than what other people told him to do.

He liked that, so he wrote it down.

Well maybe he didn't phrase it quite so eloquently, but it was better than nothing.

The stewardess returned with more paper and Scott accepted it gratefully; she gave him a sympathetic smile as she glanced at all the sleeping people around him, "First time on a plane?"

"Nope," Scott replied as he scribbled more words on the paper, "going home actually."

"That's nice," she said in her rich English accent, "have you been abroad long?" She was being really sweet, flashing her teeth at him in a way that made Scott mildly uncertain of her attention. Was she hitting on him? If she was, he was in trouble; she was after all his lifeline to the coffee pot. Reject her and he would likely be cut off.

He decided the safest thing to do was play oblivious, always a good tactic in a situation like that. "Yeah," he gave her his warmest smile, "I've been away from home for about eight years."

"Were you at school?" she asked, adamant on starting a conversation with him.

He continued to smile patiently, wondering how she would react if he just came out and said he was gay, "Yeah, I was studying classics in Brooklyn."

She gave him a grin that showed all thirty-two of her perfectly polished white teeth, "Hi, I'm Stacey," she said, as she offered Scott her hand.

"Scott," he replied, setting his pen down so that he could shake her hand. He didn't want to get drawn into a conversation with her, that would imply incorrectly that he was interested, and he really wasn't. Sure she was pretty, but not what he was looking for. The trick was how to convince her of that without seeming like he was rejecting her. He never liked to just shoot a person down, that was cruel.

"So you're going home then?" she asked, continuing her conversation. "What part of England?"

"London," he lied effortlessly, really without thinking about it. It was instinct, especially when he didn't want to upset someone. Give them just enough of what they wanted so that they would leave happy.

She opened her mouth to continue, but the other stewardess at the front of the plane flashed her a dirty look for fraternizing with the passengers and she made her apologies and dashed away.

By the time the plane finally landed sometime the next morning, Scott had her telephone number in his pocket and an empty promise to call her. But that really didn't matter after he passed the first garbage can on his way towards the baggage claim area after an excruciating wait in line to have his passport stared at. He threw the number away in it along with the letter he had written his dad.

Scott was home, whatever that meant.

Now, Gatwick Airport is one of those places where the world connects to everywhere else. It is an intersection of cultures, lives, families and commerce. Scott, however, was simply looking for a way out of there as soon as possible. He had cash in his pocket, enough to get him to Eastbourne, but from there it was anyone's guess. Realistically he couldn't afford to take a cab home from the airport, and bussing would just take too long. And he wandered his way down to the train station at that point and reintroduced himself to the wonder that is British Rail. Connex South Central to be precise.

Scott had been subjected to the travesty of public transportation in England before he left, and hadn't experienced the blessed gift of privatization. He was shocked to discover that instead of making things better, it had made an already bad system even worse. The trains were still made up of the ancient carriages that had been around since his father's childhood, just a little worse for the wear after so many years. The reliability of the trains actually arriving on time was non-existent, and the hope that you would actually get to where you wanted to go, well that was left squarely in the hands of God.

He sat in a first-class compartment; he shouldn't have done it, spent the extra money on train fare for the luxury of a door to his seating area, but he did. Scott was going home, though he hadn't had a shower yet, or a chance to change his clothes. He needed the chance to relax.

Scott realized quickly that his illusion of peace on the trip down to the coast was broken when a young woman about his own age wrestled her luggage into the same compartment. She gave him an apologetic smile as she fought to stow it above her. Ever the gentleman, Scott helped her, and as the train began to roll, they were soon engaged in a discussion.

She gave him the once-over as they sat across from each other. Scott didn't feel like anything remarkable, short dark-haired and dark-eyed with a goofy-looking grin that everyone thought was too cute. It only made him self-conscious, and he had to keep remembering not to grin every time he blushed. It only encouraged more cute comments. His clothes were rumpled and he had on his high school varsity jacket that he had earned playing soccer. It marked him like a giant neon sign saying "American" but he really didn't care. He'd earned his jacket through blood, sweat and tears and he wasn't about to get rid of it because he was back in England.

Scott didn't remember which of them had started the conversation, her or him, but they were soon conversing like old friends. Scott told her of his travels abroad, and Serena apparently was on her way home from Canada. She had been visiting her aunt. Her first real trip away from home on her own.

Scott had asked her where she was going, and when she had told him Halisham, Scott had been shocked, replying that was where he was from. She of course asked him what school, and when he countered with Grovelands Elementary, she naturally replied that she had gone there.

They sat in quiet awe at the way life plays out sometimes. Scott had travelled across the ocean twice, spent eight years in a country he had never wanted to go to in the first place, and there he was sitting on a train with someone he had been to elementary school with. The world was a shockingly small place.

Scott had apologized for his appearance; he felt like death reheated and he knew that he probably smelled like it too. Serena took it in her stride and countered that she wasn't too much better. Had Scott been straight he might have taken it as a sign from the Almighty to ask her out at that point. And he knew she had to be wondering why he hadn't, but Scott kept his head about him and steered the conversation back to school and how the country had changed since the last time he had been there.

When the train reluctantly wheezed its way into Polegate Station and they both debarked, Scott hefted his bags to catch a bus for the last leg of his journey. But Serena was having none of that; her mother had driven out to meet her, and Serena filled her in on Scott's situation and who he was. Her mother also gave him a once-over.

"Are you related to Rita Walker?" she asked in a matter-of-fact kind of tone.

Scott nodded, "I'm her grandson."

And that was that, Scott was being driven home. It turned out Serena's mother attended the same church as his gran and they knew each other well. Scott didn't argue; it saved him the money of a bus fare and a hefty hike with his bags on his back. So a few minutes later he was standing at the curb looking up at the brown brick semi-detached house he had spent his childhood living in. It was about halfway down Meadow Road, across from a large square patch of grass everyone called 'the green.'

He was still thinking like an American, he chided himself as he hefted his backpack to his shoulders and gathered up his suitcase. He wasn't expected; he hadn't called ahead to let anyone know he was coming. Why he hadn't done that he didn't know; if he had been thinking... but the decision to leave university and come home had been a sudden one.

Scott took a deep, anxious breath as he rang the doorbell and set his bags down. Well that was it, the end of his journey. He was terrified, his heart beating in his chest as the door slowly cracked open.

"Yes?" the old woman asked as she stared at him through thick bifocals.

Scott felt jarred, there was the woman who had raised him from diapers, been a mother to him his entire life until his father had transplanted him. And she looked so old, the lines on her face were so deep now, and her hair that had once been a rich chestnut-brown was completely silver, but those eyes were still very much the same.

"Can I help you?" she asked in a voice that reminded Scott of when he was a little boy.

He worked his jaw a few times, before he finally managed, despite the emotions in his words, "It's me, Gran..."

She looked again, harder, as she tried to place who the short dark-haired young man was on her doorstep. Was there nothing in his face of the little boy she had hugged good-bye to before he had gotten on a plane eight years ago?

"Scott?" her voice was faint, and filled with emotion of her own, and Scott dropped his backpack to rush into her arms.

Home...