Prologue - Alone in a City of Dreams

December 17th, 2035
Bridgeport, New York

The sun shone through the thin clouds as snow remained piled up across the city of Bridgeport, a large town in the northwestern portion of New York state. Children were released from school for Holiday Break a few days before and spent their time down at the city park for a festival fun, while the grown-ups across the town still had to do their day-to-day jobs to get money for Christmas presents for their respective friends and families.

While Bridgeport, a glamorous night-centered town bordering Lake Ontario, was a rather impressive city to those who lived in the hills to the north or to those who visited, it wasn't so much impressive to some people. The ferry and factory ports on the western side of the city were old and run down, the town's famous diner was on an island that the great lake had begun to erode away, and much of the area had a gray, damp, industrialized feel; even with the happy, whimsical look it had gained due to the level of snow on the ground. Then again this could have been the opinion of a single man who lived in the town, whereupon moving to the place was the single most terrible idea he'd ever had in his life.

The man walked through the city, his dark-brown outfit a dead giveaway of who he was. Most of the people in the city knew him, and even then many across the country knew who he was. The man walked into the library to return a lost book, then down the street to the art gallery to view a new sculpture on the ground. Finally he walked to the city government office, where he vanished into the building for hours. When he finally left, he did so to much despair from the people inside who were quite sad to see him leave, as to them his presence gave them a good feeling about themselves, whether it was his personality or the side comments complementing them.

To them, their Mayor was one of the best people they've ever met, but to the man himself, he was the worst person who ever lived.

The man jumped into his car, which was brought to the street by his mayoral aide, and drove across the city's eponymous bridge to a large house overlooking the city off in the distance. He stepped inside, took off his outwear in exchange for a causal jacket, and walked over to the window to look at his city. He then stayed there to use a phone to call his office.

"Janet? Yeah. Hey if anyone calls looking for me, tell them I'm out going to bed for the evening. I'll deal with any situation tomorrow, okay?... Okay thanks Janet, you're a keeper."

The man then put his phone away but then something caught his eye off in the corner of his room, something which caused him to pick the phone up again and dial a number for information.

"Yes, could you look up the number for someone for me?... personal call, yes. Umm, Annabelle Jade Kethrin.... Where? Hidden Springs, Alaska."

The person on the other end of the line put the man on hold while looking up a number for him, but after a few moments turned the connection back on. "There is no listing for 'Annabelle Kethrin' in Hidden Springs."

"Damn. Can you search any other towns? Hidden Springs? Twinbrook?"

"Searching.......... yes. One listing for Annabelle Jade Kethrin, Twinbrook Louisiana. Calling."

The phone rang for a couple seconds, which to the man felt like minutes, before finally someone answered. "Hello?"

"Hey Annabelle? Hey it's Thomas Jameson."

*click*

"Yep. She's still mad." Tom thought to himself. He sadly put the phone on the charger and walked away, but rapidly turned back around when the device rang again. The name on the phone's caller ID rang "Kethrin, Annabelle" and he answered it so fast that he was worried he'd break the phone. "Hey."

"What the hell are you calling for, Jameson?!" 

Tom was hit hard by her words, which had a decade long to boil up. Sure Tom could have made a visit out to Hidden Springs or wherever she lived to stop in, or at least had picked up the phone to say something, but didn't until just now for reasons that even he was unsure of. Still this one particular evening finally made him realize what he wanted to do. "I just wanted to say... Hi?"

"Hi... ten years without a single word out of you and you decide to call up out of the blue to say 'hi'? Wow Thomas," Annabelle said, harshly, "You certainly know the right words to sweep a lady off her feet! And in case you forgot, yes I still use sarcasm!" 

Suddenly Tom heard a woman's voice on the other end of the phone. "Hey mom I just got back from getting Coral from her cute little winter dance. Who's on the phone?" 

"You'll never believe it, Keera... it's TOM! Take... take Coral out of here. And you leave too. I think I'm about to yell a bit and I don't want my daughters to see me this mad."

"Mom, I'm twenty-seven. I've seen some anger in my life. I've had anger like that. Remember that nasty divorce thing I went through? Yeah."

"Just... go."

"Say hi to Tom for me."

"GO!" 

The whole conversation Annabelle had with Keera stunned Tom. "Wait wait wait, Who's Coral?"

"My daughter. Ya I have a ten-year old daughter. Things like that happen when you vanish for a decade, Tom without calling, without sending a letter, without clicking 'send message' on SocialNet. And if you ask who her father is I will not tell you. So DON'T ASK!"

Tom could have cried. Him leaving her seems to have left Annabelle to be even more angry and cynical than she already was. This whole conversation made him feel fifty times more guilty for leaving her behind in Hidden Springs.

"Annie... I'm... I wanted to tell you I'm sorry I left. I'm very sorry. I... I didn't want to leave, I just had no choice."

"We all have a choice Tom. You chose to leave Hidden Springs, and I'm choosing to hang up right now. You've done a lot of stupid things in your life, but that was the be-all end-all of them, buddy-boy. Goodbye."

"Annabelle, NO. Just hear me out please! I know you're not just mad about me going, but about everything else I've done, and I want to apologize for them too! All of it! Please, just hear me out."

"Five. Minutes."

Tom sighed. "Okay. First of all, I'm sorry for well, everything. The jokes about you, leaving, even I'm apologizing AGAIN for what happened in Hidden Springs, August 2022. Please, Annabelle... just listen..."

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