Maya - a Naruto Fanfic

70. Loose Ends (3)

The police are there again. Every time she stands to go let them in, her body feels heavier. Even though she's told them it's not Maya, they're still working off the assumption that she's dead.

She's not dead.

"Tanya." The officer nods. She knows him well by now - they always send the same man.

"Officer Wells." She steps aside to let him in. It's a cold day for summer.

"I'd like to ask you a few more questions regarding your daughters case." He learned quickly not to call it murder.

"You'd best sit down then. Tea?" She's already at the counter, bringing out mugs and dropping teabags in.

"If you don't mind." Silence follows. Usually on days like this, she'd be able to hear the birds out in the garden, the traffic outside. Today all she can hear is the buzzing in her ears.

She places the tea in front of him and sits. She won't make this easy for him.

"I... I understand that this has been hard for you, and that all these questions don't make it any easier." Wells picks at a spot on his mug, somewhere a fleck of clay has dried. Maya loves clay mugs. Tanya can hardly stand to drink out of them now, but someone should. Mugs are meant to be used, Maya would say, they shouldn't sit in a cupboard collecting dust.

"It's worth it, if it'll help find Maya."

"Tanya..."

"That wasn't her. I know my little girl. It wasn't her. Is the DNA test still pending?"

"I'm afraid these things take some time."

"Then until those results come through, there's still a chance she's alive. I won't give up on that." She can't give up on that. Maya needs to be alive. Anything less might just kill her.

"Tanya... May I speak frankly?" Wells asks tentatively.

"You might as well."

"I... worry, about what the shock might do to you, if you don't start preparing now for the possibility that Maya is gone. And I also worry that, if the girl we found isn't Maya, you'll spend the rest of your life trying to find her. From what you've told me of her, that doesn't sound like something Maya would want." It's dangerous territory, presuming to know someone's kidnapped child, but overall Tanya has handled things very well, with the exception of that one... mishap earlier on.

She laughs, soft and humourless, "you're right about that. She gets this look on her face, whenever she thinks I'm overworking myself. She frowns, and does this little pout, and then she'll demand that I sit down until she's made me a cup of tea. Of course, as soon as it's in my hands she'll make me stay sitting until I've finished it. Mandatory Tea Breaks, she called them."

"She sounds formidable."

"She is. Once she's made a decision, there's no shifting her. Not unless you can out-logic her, which was very difficult to do when she was 5 years old and didn't want to go to bed."

"She's always been that way?"

"Mm. I don't know where she got it. Even her father wasn't that stubborn, and he was a right mulish bastard." For once, Wells hears the London in her voice.

"Perhaps she got it from you." He wouldn't be surprised.

"Maybe." The weight she's been carrying feels a little bit lighter now, and for the first time in a long time, her smile is genuine, warm and fond. It lights up her face, creases the old laugh lines by her eyes. Tanya's an open book, her face showing ever emotion, even when she tries her best to hide them.

Maya looks so much like her mother, he wouldn't be surprised if she's the same way.