Heroes Fic: A Capable Woman 5/28 Adam, Kaito, Angela, Arthur, Nathan, Linderman, Maury & Charles

Chapter Five


                                                                                                                      1974 

                                                       Two months after Richard Nixon resigns due to the Watergate scandal

Now that Nathan was in school, Angela spent more and more time outside of the home. She had no reason to stay in the house all day, especially with her husband at work. During the day Angela’s home was only silent and empty. Arthur was officially a lawyer now working his way up in the world. It was only at night, when Angela and her husband met with Adam, Daniel, and their new-found friends Carlos Mendez and Maury Parkman, that Angela felt any sense of worth. Adam told them all how they belonged together and Angela believed it. They could do great things, Adam told them. Angela finally would have a purpose in her life. This was what she had been waiting for.

It was a beautiful crisp fall day in New York City. Angela decided to sit in the park by the large, Bethesda Fountain, with the famous Angel of the Water statue at the center. It was only blocks from her house, and sometimes on the weekends Angela would observe Nathan and Arthur take in the toy sail boats along the water, while she sat on a bench by the ramble.

But today Angela wasn’t watching. Today, Angela felt like she was doing, that she indeed had a purpose, as she started what was becoming a daily ritual -- sitting in the park and writing down her dreams in a small black notebook. The notebook was a gift from Adam, her name embossed on the front leather: Angela.

"Write everything down," he told her. "No matter how small the detail. It must all be interpreted." And he would sit with her, pushing on an episode through stress and fatigue.

"Fight it, " Adam shouted at her.

"I can’t," she would plead. "I’m trying."

"You must! " he would yell in her ear. "This will not control you Angela, you will control it. Control it! When this happens again, you will fight it, you will not succumb to it. Fight it, Angela!"

And after only a few sessions, and a few months, Angela was able to hold it all in. She was even at the point that if you didn’t know her secret, one wouldn’t know what was going on.

One time at a party, Angela was fighting it, and Daniel knew it. He didn’t see Arthur around and in the middle of a toast, while the crowd watched the man of honor, Daniel nonchalantly took Angela’s hand in his for her to squeeze tightly. And when it was all over a lone tear fell down her cheek. No one was the wiser.
They all helped each other in different ways back then. They were all finding each other in a world where they felt alone – coming together for what they were now calling, "a greater good."

                                                                       ~ 

Maury Parkman kept crossing paths with Arthur Petrelli that year, and although complete opposites – Arthur an ivy-league lawyer from the east side and Maury a gregarious, Jewish-born Brooklyn boy - they made a connection and soon Maury was brought into the fold. Maury Parkman was a shy man who hid behind his bravado. He was a man who wanted to be liked. Liked so much he tried too hard and it was the first thing Angela noticed about him -- she did not like him. She didn’t hate him, or distrust him, yet – she just did not care for his company as much as she cared for others in the group. Maury made off-color jokes in Angela’s presence and had a penchant for flashy suits and rich food. He was new to money; he was a con man in the making.

But, she knew Maury could be a kind man, a knowledgeable man, but he had his demons and she understood that. He had been forced, according to his words, to leave his wife and young son because of his power. He was the first person Angela met whose power wielded consequences of another kind -- the kind that knocked about one’s soul. It would soon become commonplace to the Petrellis.

But, now was the golden age and the cares were nil, at least compared to what they would become, or perhaps it was all just a good show. Perhaps they were already lost.

Angela was amazed how Adam worked with Maury.

"There is no reason why," Adam would say gleefully. "That if he can go into the mind --- he can control it. Senses, thoughts, your dreams, your nightmares."

And Adam was right; it was not very hard for Maury. It was as if all Maury needed was the idea that he could do more, and his ability became what Adam would call, "impressive."

What it did do was make Maury almost as powerful as Arthur, but Maury never felt he was looked upon with the same high regard in this group of special people – and that would be his downfall. For power wasn’t just something wielded in one’s own mind, it is wielded in the mind of others. Many would say it was all in Maury’s head, but Maury knew otherwise. Thinking you’re paranoid is one kind of blow to the self esteem, but knowing you’re not is another.

Maury blamed his low self esteem on his lack of an education, his bad luck with women, and the fact that reading was very difficult for him. Being able to burrow into someone’s head gave Maury that arrogant confidence one didn’t want a man like him to have. And soon only being able to read other people’s thoughts left him bored and wanting to hone his skills toward other extremes. It didn’t help that after a short time in the group all of Maury’s friends and co-horts were now able to hide their thoughts from him, well, most of the time. Not thinking of something in Maury’s presence wasn’t a very hard skill to master, once you knew how to master it. It was all about experience.

Carlos Mendez, on the other hand, was a man of very little words. He never liked the decadence of the 1970s, and although he liked hard living, he was never the Studio 54 type; too much disco, glitter and pretension for his taste. He had a penchant for European hand-rolled cigarettes, many glasses of scotch and good looking women. He grew tried of the day to day drudgery of life, and although he did not yet have children, Carlos yearned to have something he could pass down to the next generation. The only thing Carlos Mendez would pass down to the next generation would be his artistic tendencies, addiction and a mutated gene for abilities.

                                                                           ~

Angela, deep in thought, sitting in the park, wrote her previous night’s adventures in her notebook as if there was no one else around, sitting in the shadow of the angel. Angela had no idea the significance of where she sat. She had no idea it was the same spot that only moments after arriving at the Petrellis front door, Daniel Linderman and her husband had shaken hands and agreed on a partnership. A partnership that would change her and her children’s lives forever. It would change the course of history.

What Angela did know about the statue was its history -- that the Angel of the Water, coming from the Gospel of Saint John, Chapter Five, was the angel that bestowed healing powers on the pool of Bethesda in Jerusalem. She did not know how the angel would be significant in her own life. How could she? She didn’t see everything. 

As Angela sat, in between thoughts, she found herself drawing small godsend symbols in the margins of her notebook. When the symbol was revealed to Angela and the group three months after the fact as a pre-cog she thought nothing of it – she figured she had seen it in a dream. She should have thought otherwise. For Angela was wrong; she had not seen the symbol in a dream. Angela would soon learn the symbol was just another thing that connected them all, it was older than her and older than Adam, it was somehow a part of them. 

Suddenly, a wind swept through the park knocking Angela’s notebook closed as she struggled to keep her place.

"So, we meet again, " came that all too familiar voice of the man with the Japanese accent.

Angela could now guess where the man was from, if his face did not give it away. She quickly closed her notebook and set it next to her, almost hiding it with her coat and purse. Angela smiled up at the man telling him silently that she remembered him.

"It seems something is bringing us together, isn’t it?" His voice had a sense of music to it.

"It would seem so..."

"May I?" he asked.

Angela nodded her head as if to say, "It’s a free park." The man sat down next to her.

"I never introduced myself." He set out his hand. "Kaito Nakamura."

"Kato... ?" she tried to repeat his name.

"Kaito," he corrected her. He had a kind way about him.

"Angela Petrelli," she gave him her gloved hand. "Angela..."

He smiled and looked up at the statue. "Angela ... like the angel ..." He motioned his head toward the bronze statue in front of them.

Angela laughed, "Well, I don’t think my mother named me because she thought I was an angel. Not by any means."

"Angels see all. They keep guard over loved ones. Do you do that Angela? Then you are an angel to someone."

"We are all angels and devils Mr. Nakamura. No one is immune to the world’s traps."

"Very true." He looked at the statue.

"I came to see the angel. I was told it was a beautiful sight to see – I have been reading about it -- this is my first time to New York City." He looked at Angela. "And if I may be so bold. I think they have directed me to the wrong angel." He smiled slyly.

Angela looked at him with a half grin for a moment before speaking."You are very direct, Mr. Nakamura."

"Directness, I feel, is the only way to get business done. Otherwise, time is wasted. And time is a very precious thing, it should not be fooled with." He looked over at the statue and pointed to the three cherubs that stood below the angel, on a second level to the fountain, just above the base that lead into the pool of water underneath.

"I’m told the smaller statues – they also have meaning..."

Angela pointed to the statues as she spoke, "Temperance, Purity, Health, and..."

"Peace, " they both said together. Angela looked at Kaito as if she felt she had been tricked.

"I remember now." He raised his eyebrow at her.

"Do you now?" she smirked. Angela sure liked the attention, but she told herself it was all harmless banter.

"And which one are you, Angela?" Kaito asked in his deepest voice. He leaned closer to her. "Are you temperance, purity... health or peace?"

Angela smirked, about to answer.

Suddenly another Japanese man, taller than Kaito, appeared taking Kaito’s attention from Angela.. This caused Angela to also turn and look at the man as he approached. The man in front of them nodded his head at Kaito, but said nothing.

"I am sorry, I must go." Kaito stood and adjusted his coat. He reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and pulled out his business card. "I do not know many people in New York. I am here on business."

Kaito handed Angela his card and she took it between her gloved fingers.

"If you would ever like to finish this conversation. I will be in town for four weeks. Please feel free to call me. It would be my pleasure." He bowed his head and Angela slightly bowed hers in response.

Angela wasn’t sure what to think -- but as she watched Kaito walk away she looked down at the card and had a strong desire not to throw it away.

                                                                   ~

That night Angela had a dream, a dream she wasn’t sure was of the future or merely just a dream.

Angela had learned to go through life without a lot of sleep. Nathan remembers as a child waking up and hearing his mother downstairs at all hours, busying herself with things and projects, mostly reading. Sometimes she would just sit alone in the living room, silent and stoic, looking off into nothingness.

Most people see dreams and sleep as a solace at the end of the day; Angela Petrelli did not. And she tried to live a life with as little sleep as she could. But this dream was not frightening in any way, except one. The man she saw herself with, romantically, in this dream, was not her husband, but the man she met in the park. Angela woke up with a pop, waking Arthur in the process. He of course questioned what she had seen.

"It’s nothing, " she told him and ushered him back to sleep. Angela turned her head from Arthur and smiled. Perhaps it was just a dream.

                                                                    ~

And the next week when she found his card in her purse, she told herself it was not the future, but only a harmless human dream. And she told herself there would be no harm in meeting the man for coffee. There was no harm in having a friend, she didn’t have to act on anything.

                                                                    ~

Kaito Nakamura was a charming man. He smiled and laughed in a very good, very mannered way and spoke in a semi-broken English. In fact, he spoke English better then Angela thought she spoke French, and for sure better than she spoke Japanese. He paid her attention and she liked that. He was smart and knew much of the world. And he thought she was funny. They talked about their travels, places they had been, the political climate and thoughts of the world in general. They did not always agree, but their position on the world seemed the same, something had to be done, something had to be left to the next generation. Still she loved the debate, she loved having normal adult conversation with a man who didn’t see her as the name attached to the other end of a check: Mrs. Arthur Petrelli.

By the time the check came, Kaito was enamored with the dark-haired beauty, her passion and forcefulness, her intelligence and her eyes. He felt connected to this woman in a way he had never felt with another person.

When Angela first sat down at the table he knew she was married, finally seeing that huge ring on her finger, now that she wasn’t wearing gloves. Angela had purposely left her gloves off this time. But that didn’t mean Kaito couldn’t have a delightful dinner companion. That was what he told himself, that was what they both told themselves.

But, in that moment Angela looked over at Kaito, the nice suits, the way he treated her, the way he smelled and she had this awful urge to kiss him. She sprang up, almost knocking over her coffee.

"Angela. " Kaito spoke loudly and surprised as she stood. "Are you alright?" He stood himself.

"I have to go. I can’t... I’m sorry. Kaito. I thought. I thought I could do this, but I can’t. I can’t be here with you." She grabbed her purse and pushed her way behind her chair in the crowded New York City restaurant. "I’m a married woman...," she said in a soft rasp. She tried to leave and Kaito grabbed her arm lightly.

"Angela. There is nothing wrong with two people – two friends sitting and talking. That is all this is... companionship."

She looked at him with wanton eyes. Angela leaned in and whispered in Kaito’s ear, "But, I want more," she trilled. "I thought I could. But, I can’t. I’m sorry. We both know why we’re here." She lifted her head away from Kaito’s ear and looked at him.

Kaito nodded his head, understanding, and he let Angela walk out of the restaurant. 

                                                                      ~

That night Angela arrived home to be informed that Daniel had found three new people to join the cause. Charles Deveaux arrived first. He was a tall, handsome black man about Arthur’s age. He wore a brown leather jacket and had more confidence in his eyes than Angela had ever seen -- Angela liked him instantly. He would soon become one of her closest friends. There was something about Charles that made one want to open up to him, ask him for advice. It was like his heart was a part of his skin and he felt deeply. He was Angela’s perfect confidante. They would get into debates and she would always listen to what he had to say, until the day he died, but when she had her mind set on something it was hard to sway her. In the end, Angela and Charles had lived different lives. She was a rich white woman born into privilege, while Charles had grown up a semi-middle class black man, drafted into the army and had pulled himself up by his boot straps; made a name for himself. But, Charles never treated Angela any different than anyone else and she never did the same to him. They may have both been from different worlds, but they had both been through pain. And pain is what really connects us all. Charles would take Angela to her first live Jazz show and introduce her to his friend Richard Drucker, but that was later, much later.

The second to arrive was Suzanne Ammaw, a waft of a thing, she looked like she might blow away. Her blonde hair was cut short, making her look like Mia Farrow or Goldie Hawn. She wore sandals and had a huge smile on her face all the time. She knew her effect on men and she seemed to know it since birth - she was a girl who knew how to have fun. She was young, younger than Angela by two years, and she almost skipped around the room like a little girl, but she did not have the brain of a child. You knew she was smart, in fact she was a genius, beyond the fact that she was one of the special people – she was a groovy chick.. She was French and hailed from the Ivory Coast.

Finally the third person, a man, was expected and was introduced to the group. And no one was more surprised than Angela Petrelli when the man who walked into her house was Kaito Nakamura. They never talked about that day at the restaurant for years, but at that moment it became an unwritten, unspoken thought that they would have to be friends and they would make it work.

"We can change the world, we can fix it..." Adam said lifting his glass to toast with his new band of merry mates. "We belong together. Together we can do great things." And they all clinked glasses. Kaito Nakamura now made nine.

                                                                       ~

The sound of Stevie Wonder singing, that’s what Nathan remembers. He remembers it from when he was young. Wafting up from the living room to his spot on the landing where he would hide, wanting to be part of the action, wanting to be down with the adults. It’s a distant memory of when his parents were young. When they had small intimate get-togethers with friends, most of which Nathan can hardly remember because the parties stopped shortly before the age of true vivid memory. When the secrets started, and never ended.

Too young to understand what was really going on downstairs, Nathan does remember the laugher, the smoke, the clinking of glasses, the intense conversations between arms and legs as he tried to see the faces with out giving himself away. But, what Nathan would most take notice of, in the farthest distance of the room, the one image he could see, was that of his parents. And he remembers it the most because it was the only memory of his childhood that he can remember seeing both of his parents happy, and at the same time. He just remembers them having a good time. It seemed like such fun and young Nathan yearned to grow up so he could be just like them - he had no idea how prophetic that wish was.

                                                                  ~

The one thing Angela Petrelli loved to do was dance. And in the early days when the group got together, outcasts who had finally found each other, when all work was done, they had fun. Before they all got caught up in it, before they were all drunk with power, it all had to start somewhere. It was the 1970s and Angela and her friends were the "me" generation, the peace and love generation looking for answers – trying not to get jaded and yearning for a better world. They were the baby boomers searching for some light at the start of terrible times. They had optimism. They were young. They didn’t know any better.

They sat around, like most people their age, smoking, drinking, having heated and powerful discussions, but for them it wasn’t just talk, it was talk that would lead to action. They would soon become the decision-makers – they would learn what power felt like, and they would like it. The room dripped with possibilities.

Sometimes when Angela thinks back on that time in her life, after the grey film of disgust leaves her consciences, all she seems to remember is the music. The sounds of Stevie Wonder, or Elton John, mixed with a haze of smoke and laughter. She never looked back on it all with nostalgia, like the men did, to her it was a time that only led to disappointment and heartache. Angela Petrelli looked to the future, her present and past was of no concern. And although she can’t even bear to remember how deluded and fresh-faced she had been, she does remembered that she sure liked how the music sounded and how it drew her in.

Arthur sat with the boys, looking at his wife dance to the music and enjoying herself. It would soon become a rare sight. He smirked and grinned because she was his. They weren’t perfect, but they had each other. Made for each other in so many ways they had not yet discovered. Perfect fits and perfect companions for a life ahead, in the good and bad, in sickness and in health, love and disgust – together they would be tested. For marriage was not made for madness. But, that was what comes next, this was now – the precipice of gluttony.

Charles eyed Arthur looking at his wife. "That’s a mighty handsome woman you have there." He said jokingly, putting his hand on Arthur’s shoulder, a cigarette hanging between his thin fingers and a stiff glass of bourbon.

Arthur noticed that all the men in room were looking at Angela and he liked it. He couldn’t take his eyes off of Angela, because he felt like no one else could. Arthur had what they all seemed to want and he enjoyed that. He liked how it made him feel – he liked the power.

"Excuse me, gentleman. " Arthur raised his eyes at the men and rose to his feet to join his wife on the dance floor.

Looking at Arthur Petrelli, it was not hard to guess he was a man women wanted to be with and other men envied – this group wasn’t any different. To them Adam and Arthur became their football stars. Adam was wise and open to helping them find themselves. And Arthur wielded so much power, wielded so much charisma; he was handsome, smart, took no prisoners, successful, had the gorgeous wife and perfect family. Arthur Petrelli was the American dream, decked out with Italian good looks, a charming smile and soulful eyes. But, as Arthur would say about others," looks can be deceiving, " and his life with Angela and Nathan was far from perfect. It was just deceiving, and it would be forever more so.

They were a couple that looked good together, they were a couple that danced well together, they looked ideal. But looks show nothing that is beyond the surface. It is nothing but a barrier to the truth. The Petrellis were not perfect and far from happy. The happiness in the moment was genuine, but it was always fleeting when reality set in.

The men still couldn’t take their eyes off Angela.

"If only beauty like that could save the world, " Maury joked, not yet with cynicism in his voice. He took a swig of his beer.

Adam eyed what the men where looking at, Angela, and glared in her direction.. "I’m sure that’s what they said about Helen of Troy."

And Adam inhaled slowly on his imported cigarette and ever so slowly let the smoke waft off his lips and spill into the air. After almost four hundred years of life, Adam Monroe did not trust women very much.

The grass is always greener on the other side of someone’s fence when you’ve never set foot on their lawn. And Daniel Linderman looked on watching off in the background and he knew that one day he would be as rich and powerful as Arthur. That one day he too would have it all, or at least look like he did. And Adam would help him, they would all help each other. He would finally have people he could trust. Together they would save the world. No matter what the cost. 

                                                               ~

\Chapter Six: Tension mounts. Temptations rear their ugly head. The madness takes hold. And The company is formed. (Click to continue)

Previous Chapter Four, click here.