He settled down to listen, closing his eyes for the time being. This part of the journey wouldn’t take that long, maybe a bit over an hour or so, but he had a feeling he’d need all the strength he could muster.
The town at his last stop was small. There was a very long main street and a sprawling center around it, but it seemed quieter than he’d expected. Then again, while doing his research, he’d looked into the human angle of things and discovered that the town was losing people to both natural ageing of the older generations and the migration of younger people searching for jobs that were scarce here.
It was the perfect place for a farm full of shifters though, and Derek could understand why they congregated here.
Derek had asked around and somewhat knew where the Jarvela farm was located. He wasn’t a hundred percent sure that was where Cal and Kit would be, but his hunch was that he was right, somehow. The Council had very few places they would trust their most valuable people with. Or, like in this case, the ones that they owed the most. And boy did they owe Cal, whether Cal or the Council members themselves were ready to admit that or not.
As he walked along the main street, looking for a café, he wondered how to get to the farm. He knew it was at least twenty miles outside of town and that there were no car rental places here. When he spotted a café, he took off his backpack so he’d fit both his body and the pack through the tiny entryway that held doors to both the café and a salon of some sort, as far as he could tell. He placed his pack by the table at the window and went to get his coffee. The guy behind the counter was friendly and immediately started to speak a bit of broken English.
“Hey, you wouldn’t know how I could get to the Jarvela farm?” Derek asked as he doctored his coffee with some milk. “I’m trying to surprise them, so I don’t want to call anyone.”
The guy thought for a while, seeming open and not suspicious, which spoke volumes about what kind of people lived here. Derek liked that.
“You need to find Joonatan at the garage in town. He is friends with Mikael,” the guy finally said. “I’ll make you a map.”
“Okay, thanks so much.” Derek smiled and went to enjoy the coffee by the window.
It struck him interesting that there were people of many nationalities around there. One would’ve thought that there would be mostly white people somewhere this remote, but he could see people of all colors walking past—even when there weren’t that many people to begin with.
“Here.” The guy placed a paper in front of Derek. He’d drawn a good map with some points of interest to guide his way to the garage that seemed to be on the other side of town. “It’s a bit far on foot, but it’s a nice day, eh?”
Derek chuckled. “Don’t worry, I’m used to walking a lot.” He saw a woman with a head scarf and dark skin walk past the window pushing a stroller, he asked, “How come there are so many African and Middle Eastern people here?”
“Oh, we have a lot of refugees and immigrants. Not everyone likes it, but I don’t mind them. It’s people, you know. There’s room.”
The bell above the door chimed as a couple of elderly ladies came in, chattering and greeting the guy cheerily.
He moved back behind the counter and Derek was left to finish his drink in peace. When he left the café, he waved at the guy over the head of another customer he was serving and got a smile and a nod back. Yeah, so far Derek liked this town just fine.
The walk to the garage in the industrial part of town would’ve gone faster if Derek hadn’t stopped at some shop windows, the statue of a man who looked incredibly flamboyant in his old-timey way, and the sheer amount of nature everywhere.
The parks were well-maintained and green, and there were flowerbeds here and there, too. What really made Derek’s heart happy for some reason, was the river he had to cross. He stopped at the beautiful arched bridge and admired the peace and quiet. Small towns. He could remember this kind of hum of distant traffic from his childhood.
Derek snorted as he lifted his pack onto his shoulders again. Apparently you could take the boy out of the small town but not the small town out of the boy, or something along those lines.
To his surprise, the parking lot of a small neighborhood grocery store was pretty packed, and he wondered why that would be. There were more cars here than in the bigger market parking lots that were situated on both sides of the main street.
Someone walked a little dog along the other side of the road when he turned into the industrial area, and he smiled at the lady who seemed a bit startled for some reason. Ah, right. Finnish people weren’t small talkers or social people with strangers. Even smiling at someone like this could be thought of as weird. Derek almost called “sorry!” at her back, but managed not to make a scene.
The garage was exactly where the café guy had drawn its location. The doors were open and he could hear the telltale sounds of clinking tools and quiet music from a radio from inside.
“Hello?” Derek called as he stopped by a stack of tires right outside the double doors.
The clinking stopped, and soon a tall blond man emerged from behind the vehicles.
“Hi, can I help you?” he asked, wiping his hands on a rag.
“Yeah, are you Joonatan?” Derek asked, trying to pronounce the Finnish name like the café guy had.
“Yeah, that’s me.” Now, the man seemed a bit suspicious for some reason.
“You’re friend of the people at Jarvela farm? I’m here to surprise them, and I don’t know how to get there. I came by train, so I don’t have a car,” he explained quickly, somehow sensing that his window to get this right was short.
“Who do you know exactly from there?” Joonatan asked, leaning to the back of a car, keeping his distance from Derek.
For two seconds, Derek thought about lying, but then decided truth was the best policy.
“Nobody. Or, I’m actually not sure. I know that a man named Mikael owns the place, but I’m looking for someone important to me, and his son. I’m not sure if they’re here or not, but it seemed like the most likely place.”
