NaNoWriMo 2010

[Monday]

((good question, i haven't really thought about all the details yet. lol. but maybe. what would you think if he had?))

[Thursday]

((i guess it depends on the circumstances))

[Monday]

“I know,” he says simply yet somehow harshly. I watch as his shoulders lose some of their tension and his fists flatten out on his legs. He looks away but not before I catch the anger in his eyes fade into pain. “But I think it’s too late to go back.”
“What happened?” I ask softly, sure that he’ll know what I mean. I can’t think of any other way to help him but to ask him to tell me about his past, something I know he hates to bring up. Resisting the urge to take his hand in mine is even harder than usual but I want his feelings and decisions to be his own without me invading them to see them for myself. Besides, I don’t want a repeat of what happened earlier. We can’t seem to control ourselves any time we touch, for some reason.
“Yes,” he says honestly. “I do want to talk about it. But not right now. That conversation is going to take more than a few minutes and I think now we need to get you home.”
He stands up then and I frown at him. “Don’t you need to debrief me more on this super powerful threat we’re up against?” I ask in exasperation.
“That’s not the kind of debriefing I’d like us to do,” he says with a devilish smirk. My mouth is hanging agape and I can tell my face is flushed a brilliant red but I for once I can’t think of a word to say. “Don’t look so shocked, Gatsby,” he says still smiling. “I was just kidding. Mostly. And I think it would be better to explain everything in greater detail when the others are here. I’ll talk to them about it tonight when they get back.”
I grasp at this information like a life preserver, rescuing me from my own embarrassment. “Er um, when are we going to have this meeting then?” I stand up and walk with him toward the door, not meeting his eyes, still mortified beyond belief.
He thinks for a moment before saying, “Possibly tomorrow night. I’m not sure, it would be good to have you rest some.”
“I’m fine,” I say automatically, sliding into the car. I reach into my purse and pull out my compact mirror that I had just stuck in there on a whim the night before. But it paid off now as I dusted some of the powder across my cheek, hiding the offending bruise for the most part. I’d go upstairs and put some better concealer on when we got to my house.
Alex watches my ministrations with a raised eyebrow. “Oh yes, you’re the picture of perfect health.”
“You know what I mean,” I say rolling my eyes at him. “There will probably be nothing to see come Monday.” Or at least I hope, I think to myself.
“Well regardless, I’m still going to need at least tonight to convince them to meet you. Not everyone will be happy that I’ve already told you about the killer already anyways. It’s going to take some convincing to get them to believe you’re ready.” I glance down at the cut across his cheek that’s just barely begun to heal. He must notice because he says with a smile, “Don’t worry, I won’t let her get me this time. I’m fast.”
“So some foul tempered woman with dangerous powers will probably try to hurt you again after she hears this new information but all you’ve got for me is ‘I’m fast’? How exactly is that supposed to comfort me?”
He laughs like I was making a joke, which I obviously wasn’t. “I can take care of myself.”
“Yah sure,” I grumble but all he does is chuckle.
Within minutes, we pull up to my house and he leaves me with strict instructions to call if anything comes up, those being broad terms that could mean anything from I need a hot and cold pack for my sore ribs, won’t you take me to the store? to the power-stealing killer guy is standing outside my window, come save me. He also lets me know that he’ll probably be coming by sometime tonight to explain what the others have said about me meeting them and in the very least he’ll call with news.
I walk in the front door admittedly a bit nervous but it becomes apparent pretty quickly that I have nothing to worry about. The scent of little sizzler sausages delectably permeates the air and my parents smile and greet me as usual upon me entering the house and ask if I had eaten any breakfast at Angela’s. I love how blindingly trusting my parents are of me but up until this point I had never done anything that would make them think otherwise. All of a sudden, I want to tell them about the party, about Alex and Tommy, about everything but I hold my tongue. I hate lying to them but at the same time, I know that they can’t be a part of this new world that I’ve entered both because it’s too dangerous for them and because they wouldn’t understand.
The reality of how much my life is changing finally starts hitting me full force. What little breakfast I had already eaten was delicious, but as my mood soured, so did my appetite. I feigned tiredness and slunk off to my room in the pretext of taking a nap after saying I stayed up too late the night before, which is true. But I know sleep isn’t in the cards for me anytime soon so I take the time to conceal my bruises better and to get some other unfinished business taken care of.

[Friday]

((You totally stole a line from my story!! haha))

[Monday]

((lol. what line?))

[Monday]

First things first, I need to call Macy before the girl had a conniption. She had already called me two more times since the last time I talked to her and I knew she was about to reach the point where she’d just drive over here and demand an explanation in person. I sighed as I dialed her number. This wasn’t going to be fun but it was going to be made even worse since I couldn’t tell her the whole truth of it.
“So did you drop of the face of the earth or something?” her voice rings out through my receiver. What is with people not even bothering to say hello to me anymore? Damn collar ID.
“I’m sorry, I’ve just been, you know. Busy,” I say lamely into the phone. Lying has never real been my strong suit, so I thought I might just try to avoid the subject all together. But that doesn’t seem to work for me too well either, because Macy doesn’t buy it for a second.
“Yah, right! Was that party just so amazing that you’ve completely forgotten the little people like me and Angela?”
“The party sucked,” I say honestly. “I won’t be going to another one of those anytime soon, I promise. And you know I could never forget you or Angela, y’all are my best friends and the coolest people I know.” I’m hoping that a little flattery will help soften her up and in any case, it can’t hurt.
“Humph,” I hear her say but I know she’s already getting over it. Macy’s not the kind of person who can stay mad for very long. “Well who all was there? Did you get to talk to Tommy Larson?”
I felt like the little breakfast I had eaten was about to come up just from the sound of his name, but I was determined to hold it together. Nothing good could come from Macy knowing about last night, but I still felt I needed to warn her none the less. “Yah, I don’t think I’ll be talking to Tommy again anytime soon,” I say grimly. When she asks me why, I just say, “Let’s just say he’s a big jerk and you shouldn’t trust him, ok?” I knew she was dying of curiosity as to why my opinion could change about him so much in one night but I was thankful that she didn’t pry. If she pushed me long enough, I might be liable to tell her just to get her to leave me alone.
But instead she brings up another touchy subject, “So what about Alex?”
“What about him?” I ask cautiously.
“Well you went to the party together last night, right?”
“Yah, so?”
“Well doesn’t that mean you two are, like, an official couple now?” She can barely contain her excitement.
“I hardly think going to one party together could allow for such a leap, Macy,” I say evasively. Leave it to Macy to think that something like going to a party together meant we were an official couple. Truth be told, I had no idea where me and Alex stood, if he was my boyfriend or if that was even allowed. Maybe his little friends wouldn’t want us to be together? They sure didn’t seem happy anytime he decided to open up to me, so who knew? If Macy thought we were a couple now, I wondered what she would think if she knew about all the kissing. She’d probably think we should have eloped by now.
“Please just admit that there is something going on there!” she exclaims, exasperated. I pause, not sure what to say, but that’s enough for Macy. “I knew it! I mean, the sexual tension between the two of you! How does that not drive you crazy?”
“Macy,” I say, trying to keep her from getting too worked up. Or maybe I just don’t want to admit how much I want it to be true, that Alex and I could actually be more than just friends? But it’s far too soon to tell. “It is way more complicated than that.”
“Oh that is such a line,” she says triumphantly. “You totally have it bad for him, just admit it.”
“Look,” I say through gritted teeth. “Can we just talk about this on Monday at school or something? I have a bunch of homework I really need to get done.” It’s just an excuse and we both know it but she lets me off the hook, at least for now. I know by Monday she’ll have thought of at least another half dozen questions to ask me.
I sat around my room for a few minutes, trying to kill time reading or watching TV but nothing could hold my attention for long. I couldn’t stop thinking about the crazy killer guy and my new powers, and worst of all, Alex what exactly was going on with our relationship. Finally I decided that I might as well try to get some homework done since I wasn’t going to enjoy anything else anyways. After finishing my homework, I just started staring at my phone, waiting for Alex to call and hoping that he wasn’t in trouble because of what happened. What seemed like hours was only about fifteen minutes but finally it started to ring and I saw Alex’s name pop up on the screen.

[Monday]

“Hello?” I say deciding to keep with the normal way people answer the phone instead of what my so-called friends have been doing lately. But she had to admit, it was hard for her to wait another second to get news about what was going to happen.
“Can I come over?” he asks in a neutral voice. I know he’s waiting to give any news until he can see me in person and doesn’t want even his voice to give anything away but this only makes me more nervous. If it was good news, he’d want to share it as soon as possible right? What was I going to do if they decided they didn’t want to include me in their little group of super humans? Just walk around and pretend that there wasn’t a murderer walking around town, with me having a big target on my wrist that screams, ‘Kill me, kill me, I have a power!’?”
“Um, yes,” I say, trying to hide the nervousness from my voice.
“I’ll be there in a few minutes,” he says and then I hear the click of the phone and he’s gone. I walk down stair to inform my parents that Alex will be here soon but as I approach the kitchen I can smell that my mom has started cooking dinner and that it’s almost six o’clock already. My dad is actually helping my mom cook dinner for once, since he’s usually useless when it comes to matters in the kitchen, but they both smile at me when I walk in.
“Hey honey,” says my mom. “I hope you’re hungry, we’re having pork roast for dinner. It’ll be ready in about twenty minutes.”
I smile at her even though there are butterflies in my stomach from waiting to hear the news from Alex and now wondering if my parents were even going to allow him to come over. They had a rule about inviting people over right before dinner time which probably had something to do with the fact that Angela and Macy could put back a lot of food for relatively small girls… My dad never really learned how to share very well. And besides it’s not like him and Alex were exactly best buds at this point anyways. So it’s with a tentative voice that I ask, “Um, guys, do y’all mind if Alex comes over real quick? We need to talk about something for school.” With all the lying I’ve had to do in the last few days, I’d probably become an expert at it in no time.
My mom looks hesitant but my dad chimes in right away, much to my surprise. “Sure, why don’t you ask him to stay for dinner? I think it’s about time that we get to know this young man.” Ok, now I’m really starting to get concerned.
“Daddy…” I say warily. “You’re going to be nice, right?”
“That depends,” he replies narrowing his eyes at me. “Is he going to be kissing my daughter again anytime soon?” I just stare at him, my mouth agape, stunned beyond all reckoning. When I glance over at my mom, I see no sympathy for my plight in her eyes, only laughter. So my dad really had guessed what had been going on with me and Alex that night and not only that, but he had told my mother too. How could this ever be interpreted as a funny situation especially by another woman, one whose dad probably embarrassed her back in the day? Like my life wasn’t complicated enough already without having sadistic parents that can’t mind their own business.
I look at him gravely, trying to impress upon him the severity of this situation while still trying to defend myself. Not that easy of a task, as that turns out. “First of all, I don’t really think that it’s that big of a deal if Alex did, hypothetically, kiss me,” I say, trying very hard not to sound too impertinent but it’s pretty difficult to find a polite way to phrase ‘mind your own business’ to your parents. “And secondly, please I’m begging you; don’t say anything to humiliate me!”
“Now daughter of mine,” my dad says with a mischievous grin. “Why on earth would you think that I would ever do anything to embarrass you in front of a teenage boy that’s interested in you? That would just be ludicrous!”
I narrow my eyes at him none to subtly and say, “The sarcasm really isn’t appreciated right now… I am being completely serious! You really won’t say anything, will you daddy? Just be nice to him, I promise, Alex is a really good guy.” I’m not used to having to fight with my dad or either of my parents, for that matter and I don’t like it too much now. Well I guess technically it’s not a fight, I just haven’t been this annoyed with them since they made me choose between The Barbie Dream House or the Barbie Convertible because they wouldn’t let me have both…
“I thought you told me he wasn’t your boyfriend?”
“He’s not,” I say through gritted teeth. “At least I don’t think.” My dad’s eyebrows shoot up when he hears this but at least it’s the truth. “But I still don’t want you guys to give him hell.”
My dad huffs out a sigh and I hope this means that he’s agreed to play nice. “So when is this not-boyfriend of yours going to get here anyway?” Right on cue the door bell rings. “Speak of the devil…” my dad grumbles but my mom elbows him and rolls her eyes at me and I shoot him a look as I go to get the door.
I swing open the door to see Alex smiling at me and my shoulders instantly relax at the sight of him, and it’s only then that I realize just how tense I was in the first place. All of the stress of the last few weeks was starting to mount and I was impressed with myself for getting this far without any mental break downs. Well at least not any serious break downs. It also makes me realize how much Alex has already come to affect me and for the first time I comprehend that I’m in real danger of falling for this guy who I know hardly anything about. The most frustrating thing of all is that it’s hard for me to tell if I actually am falling for him or if my powers might be influencing me. Or my hormones. But I can’t help it if he looks so effortlessly appealing with his tall powerful body and the confidence that just seems to always be hovering in the air around him. Not to mention his dark hair falling across his powerfully compelling eyes that constantly reminds me of how often I just want to reach out and touch him. However, I get the feeling that Alex might suffer something quite similar when he looks at me because he rakes his eyes across me and steps in the doorway to kiss me before I can even say hello. Not that I mind too much. An early autumn breeze floats in the front door along with Alex but all I feel is heat, from him or me, I can’t be sure.

[Monday]

I kiss him back because I just can’t help myself but I pull back pretty quickly and for a number of reasons. For one, it’s not as if my parents are very far away at the moment and if they don’t hear our voices from the kitchen, they can probably assume what we’re doing. Besides that, I can fairly easily see us getting carried away in the dimly lit foyer and I honestly don’t think I can handle much more of this without definitively knowing where we stand to use the cliché phrase. I just don’t want us to get so involved to the point where we put each other in danger both emotionally and because we’re supposed to be after a killer. I add that topic to the long list of things we need to discuss tonight, though somewhere after we talk about when I get to meet the rest of the gang.
I sigh in annoyance but smile up at him anyways. “My parents want you to stay for dinner,” I say rolling my eyes. “Is that ok?”
He looks taken aback for a moment, like he’s never received such an offer before or even thought it was possible, and maybe that was the case. But he recovers quickly enough and nods his head in agreement, even smiling a little. “Wow. Should I be worried?” he asks half jokingly but half serious.
My face turns grim for a moment and I whisper, “Good question.” But then I take his hand in mine to lead him to the kitchen, my parents and what is inevitably going to be the most awkward hour of my life. Once again, I try with all I’ve got to block out the rush of thoughts, feelings, and actions that invade my senses against my will the moment my palm presses to his. It takes a huge amount of concentration but for the most part I manage to keep everything out minus a few things that manage to sneak their way into my mind. Mostly I just sense the usual from him, an overwhelming feeling of trust that first allowed me to let Alex into my life but also this feeling that we’re headed somewhere though I don’t know if it’s going to be a good somewhere or a bad somewhere. I just know that whatever it is that’s coming, it’s going to be dangerous but that we’ll be there for each other, like a team. I squeeze his fingers tighter and smile back at him as I lead him to the kitchen and he gives me a cautious smile back. However much it bothers me to get these feelings, I know it bothers Alex about ten times more that he can’t also know what they are.
I reluctantly tug Alex in the kitchen with me and say, “Dad, Mom, you remember Alex?” I ask rhetorically as we’d obviously just been talking about him not even five minutes ago but my dad nods his head at him anyway in what I’m sure is some other man body language thing that I have no interest in interpreting at the moment. Fighting the urge to roll my eyes I ask instead, “Is dinner almost ready?”
“If you’ll go set the table, honey, dinner will be ready in about five more minutes,” my mom says briskly and I feel as if I’ve been dismissed. “I hope you like pork roast, Alex.” She smiles at him warmly and Alex smiles charmingly back at her. I think if he can win over my dad it’ll be a miracle but since my mom practically wears the pants in the family it won’t matter much how he feels about Alex so long as my mom likes him.
“Yes ma’am I do,” he says politely to her as I reach into one of the cabinets to get out plates and then a kitchen drawer to get all of the utensils. My dad just leans against the counter not talking or doing anything other than listening, like a predator in wait. “I don’t remember the last time I had a home cooked meal.”
My mom just beams as she stirs the mashed potatoes and says, “Please, call me Carole.” I groan internally at this but make no protest knowing that that’ll just make matters worse for me. I quickly dispose of the dishware on the table and rush back in to hear the rest of the conversation. “And don’t your parents ever cook for you?” she asks and I wince. Talk about your tactless conversation segues even though I suppose my mother can have no idea what his previous statement was implying.
But Alex seemed to take the question in stride and replied calmly, “My mom died a few years ago and she loved to cook. I’m living with some distant relatives of mine now and family meals aren’t really our thing.” He me a wink and I inconspicuously narrow my eyes at him in mock suspicion. Though not wholly true, I guess calling his roommates ‘distant relatives’ was a s close as he could really come to the truth without arousing suspicion in not just my parents but with the school and everyone else. Though Alex is seventeen, he’s still a miner and I suppose it was technically illegal for him to live with anyone other than relatives. Unless he was emancipated of course but I had never thought to ask him. I suppose it was hard for me to think of a firestarter as needing permission to live with who he wanted but now I felt like it was just one more thing I didn’t know about him and resolved to ask him later along with any other questions I could think of.
“I’m so sorry about your mother,” she says and even someone who hasn’t known her their entire life could detect the genuine remorse in her voice. Dinner finally gets done and the topic of conversation thankfully switches to how school is going and other general nonintrusive questions. Alex tactfully comments on how delicious the dinner is which turns out to be true and I’m beginning to think we might actually get out of this meal with our prides still intact when my dad finally starts in on him. He tries to be subtle about it but pretty much right off I can tell that he’s decided to torture me after all.

[Monday]

“So Alex,” my dad says too casually and I shoot him a look which he doesn’t seem to see. “You and Evelyne seem to be spending a lot of time together lately. I would just like to make clear what your intentions with my daughter are exactly.”
My fork clatters on my plate, evoking a sharp, reproachful look from my mother but I just ignore her. “Um, excuse me, but haven’t we already been through this whole rigmarole once before? And forgive me for reminding you, dad, but this is the twenty-first century now and I’m pretty sure no father has asked about someone’s intentions for like two hundred years.”
I was beginning to think that my dad and Alex had more in common than I had originally thought. It was like neither one of them could even hear me and I was talking to a brick wall. Without glancing my way Alex says, “I care about your daughter very much sir. My only intention is to spend as much time with her as I can, if she’ll let me.” I blush furiously but my gaze doesn’t waver from his face. Does he really mean what that, I think to myself, or is he just saying these things to appease my parents? But then I remember what Alex has told me from the very beginning. He doesn’t lie. I try to stamp down the elation I can feel building inside me but I find it really hard not to feel outright joyous. All the while, my dad has just been looking at Alex in a steady stare, probably trying to figure out if he’s telling the truth just as I was. Finally he must realize that he is because he nods his head as if they had just made some kind of secret agreement. Part of me wonders if my dad would be going through these same motions if I had brought some gawky band nerd home with me one day instead of Alex. Although I know that Alex would never hurt me and my parents trust me when it comes to choosing the people that I’m around, he does tend to look intimidating without even meaning to and I’m sure that it gets him extra attention even when he doesn’t want it.
Thankfully the conversation moves on to other more casual topics and before I know it we’re clearing away the dishes from the table and the butterflies in my stomach that I had kept away return with a vengeance. I tell my parents that we’re going upstairs to talk, my dad tells us to keep the door open of course, and we start heading to my room. Now I will finally get the answers that I had been dying to hear but I found I was a little nervous that I might not here something I liked. After I follow Alex into my room, I close the door to the smallest possible crack I can manage without it being outright closed and immediately start with the most important issue at hand.

[Monday]

“So how did they take it?” I ask referring to his cohorts the news that I know everything about why they’re here. “No more attacks I hope.” I give him a humorless smile as I take a seat next to him on the bed. He immediately takes my hand in his and I know he’s fine but it still feels good to hear him say it himself.
“No, they took the news better than I expected. They want to meet you tomorrow.” I’m pleased and terrified all at the same time and he must see that in my eyes somehow because he gives my hand a reassuring squeeze and says, “You don’t have anything to worry about, trust me. It’s not possible for them to not like you. Except for maybe Angelica but she doesn’t like anyone.” He smiles at me reassuringly and some of the tension inside of me eases.
“How many of you are there anyway?” I ask. This is the first time I’ve ever asked a direct question about something specific about them. I figure that I need to know some information so I’m not completely blind going into the meeting.
“Six including me,” he replied. “They found me about two years ago and two others, a brother and sister named Jeremy and Jemma, a few months after that so you’re the first new person to join us in a while. We’ve met others before of course, but none who wanted to help us find the killer. You can still back out of that, you know,” he says, giving me a rueful smile.
“Not likely,” I say putting on a brave face. Despite my anxieties about going up against a mass murderer, I just couldn’t see myself walking away from this. Maybe I didn’t choose this path and I was reluctant to become dedicated to it at first but it was one I was determined to stick to now. It wouldn’t be right to back away. This gave me a thought, so I ask Alex, “So I know why you and I are putting our lives on the line here, because it’s the right thing to do. Is that everyone else’s reason too?”
His eyebrow quirks up like he’s amused and he says, “Questioning their motives already, huh?” When I start to protest that that wasn’t what I meant, he just laughs and says that he’s just messing with me. “I asked the same question when I first met Brent and the others. Brent is the one that put all of this together, he’s been helping those coming into their powers for years and he’s been like a mentor to me. And though I don’t particularly care for Angelica or Seth, they’ve known Brent for a lot longer than me and are fiercely loyal to him. So I guess you could trust them by trusting Brent. The other two, the siblings, had a friend that died at the hands of the murderer, a very close friend. They’re out for revenge.”
I nod my head, relieved to find that they all seem to have reasonable motives for doing this. Somehow it helped me to trust them more. “So you’ve been tracking the killer by following the string of murders. How do you know he or she is here now?”
“It’s a him, we have a name and a face. Robert Vartan, middle aged Caucasian about 5’ 11” with brown hair.” His voice is grim as he speaks and when he says Vartan’s name, it’s like the words taste bad in his mouth. “Basically he could be anyone; we could walk past him on the street and not know who he was. Brent has been able to feel his presence in a vague sort of way with the same gift that he used to find you and me. But he can only determine an approximation of where he is which makes him think that Vartan must of found some shielding ability that makes him harder to find. But Brent thinks that maybe your power will be different enough to find where he is because it works in a very unique way.”
“So if he gets away again this time, we’re going to have to follow him to wherever else he decides to go next?” This wasn’t the first time that this thought had occurred to me and I still didn’t know how everything was going to work out if this did happen. For one thing, I was too invested in all of this, Alex, my power, finding Vartan and ending his killing streak so I knew if it came down to it I’d go with them too. But I wasn’t going to deny that the idea didn’t upset me a great deal. I had a life here, whether or not it was with people like me, they were still people I cared about. How could I leave my family or friends behind without a reasonable explanation? What would I tell them, ‘Sorry mom and dad, I have to go track down a murderer, don’t wait up for me’?
“That’s not going to happen,” he says intensely. “No one else is going to die; we’re going to get him this time.” His hand that has let go of mine is clenched in a tight fist and I’m sure he’s not even aware of it. I take one of his hands in both of mine and slowly start to uncurl his fingers.
“It must have been very hard,” I say softly. “To go through this over and over again everywhere you go. But you’re right; we’re going to catch him this time. I won’t let him get away again.” He looks down at me, his eyes going from the sharp pain of his anger to a soft sort of sadness. He leans down and kisses my forehead and then again lightly on my lips.
“Thanks for that.”
“Any time,” I say with a smile. “So I have a question,” I say, taking my eyes of his face and shyly tracing designs on the palm of his hand. “About you and I.”
He chuckles a little but not in a mean way but gentle somehow like he’s trying to comfort me. “Shoot.”
I take a deep breath and decide to just be blunt about it. I’m no good at beating around the bush anyways and if I want a straight answer I should probably ask a straight question. “Is there a you and I?”
He reaches to lift my chin up so that I’m forced to meet his gaze. “You heard what I said to your father didn’t you?”
“Well yes,” I say a bit reluctantly. I think I would have just preferred a yes or no. “But I still don’t know what you meant exactly.” I don’t know why I need to hear a specific answer from him, it just feels like a girl should know whether or not she has a friend who she happens to like to kiss every once in a while or if she actually has a boyfriend.
“What I meant was that you’re the only good thing about that damn place they call a school. That I’m constantly wondering about what you’re thinking even if I know what you’re thinking might drive me crazy and it often does. That I haven’t cared about anyone in a long time and it’s a relief to know that I still can,” he says, smiling at me as he gently puts his hand on my cheek. “All of that I’ve known for a while. But now what I mean is that I want to do this,” he kisses me soundly, leaving me breathless, “I want to do it often and I’ll be damned if I let anyone else have you.”
I try to hide the broad grin slowly spreading across my face as he speaks but it’s no use. “Oh well, if that’s all,” I say offhandedly. And then I kiss him.

[Thursday]

((you know now that your done you really need to catch up on my story!))

[Monday]

Chapter 7
The next morning I woke up much earlier than I ever had before on a Sunday. Alex wasn’t coming to pick me up for the meet-n’-great for a couple of hours yet, but I had been tossing and turning restlessly all night and just decided it was best to wake up with the sun. I had gone ahead and asked my parents for permission to hang out with Alex today after he left the night before so at least I didn’t have to worry about that on top of everything else. When I trudged into the bathroom I found that the bruise on my cheek was barely evident at all but I went about covering it up anyways just to be on the safe side. Then again, maybe it would be to my benefit to show off my bruise so that they wouldn’t get the impression that I was weak.
After spending as much time as I could on getting myself ready, taking an extra long shower, even blow drying my hair which I never did, I slipped down stairs to try to eat some breakfast. I heated up some microwavable oatmeal, to jittery to worry about making something more complex, and ate a few bites before giving up. Neither one of my parents were up yet. They both preferred to sleep in when they could, like me, so I flipped on the TV to a rerun of a show I used to love about three women with supernatural talents. I just shook my head and changed the channel. It was all fun and games until the fiction became your own reality.
As the minutes slowly ticked by, I was thankful that we had decided to do this earlier in the day rather than later. I would go stir crazy if I had to wait any longer than nine o’clock. When eight fifty five rolled around, I was already standing outside leaning against my father’s car. The crisp morning air seemed to calm my nerves a bit and I felt a little better when I finally saw Alex’s car appear around the corner. When I climb in, he smiles at me and says, “How are you feeling? You look a little queasy.”
“Thanks, that makes me feel a lot better,” I say back icily but he just laughs. “And here I thought I was getting better at hiding my emotions.”
“You are,” he says. “But I know you well enough to tell, even when you’re being careful.”
We’re just pulling up to his house when something occurs to me that I forgot to ask about the night before. “Wait,” I say right before he opens the front door. He pauses and looks at me curiously. “Do they know? I mean about you and I…?” I ask, blushing furiously and hoping my color will turn back to normal before they see me.
He smiles softly as he takes my hand in his and says simply, “Yes. Not that it’s any of their business but I thought that maybe they should know why I’m going to be kissing you.” With that, he opens the door and as I follow behind him, I see five very different looking people milling about the front room as we walk in. Most of them are looking our way, some with kind faces, others with impassive ones, but one girl just keeps soporifically staring at the TV as if she didn’t even hear us come in. In this way it’s like she’s forcing me to acknowledge her presence even while she ignores mine. Immediately I know this must be Angelica. I don’t know what I expected her to look like, but she seems to be in her mid-twenties and even though she’s half facing away from me, I can tell that she’s very pretty, enough to make me even more wary of her. She has short curly red hair, a curvy figure, and an air of snide maturity about her that made me feel like I was about twelve years old.
“Evelyne,” says an innocuous looking man standing in the middle of the room and I’m glad to have my attention taken away from Angelica. He looks to be the oldest in the room by far though he still looks younger than my parents. He stands about my height and has cropped blonde hair and intelligent looking eyes. “My name is Brent. It’s so wonderful to finally meet you.” He smiles kindly at me and I smile back in return as he continues the introduction. “Am I correct in guessing that Alex hasn’t yet told you about our specific gifts?”
“He told me that you were the one that found me,” I say, relieved that my voice doesn’t sound too shaky. “But you’re the only one he’s told me about.”
Brent gestures to the two very similar people at his right, a boy and girl who looked very much alike but were very far apart in age. Both had light brown hair and pretty blue eyes. The girl looked to be just a couple of years older than me, but I was shocked to see that the boy was just a child, probably only about eight or nine years old. I hoped that whatever power the boy possessed, it was enough to keep him safe if he ever needed it. Brent rested his hand on the boys shoulder and said with a smile, “This is Jeremy. Jeremy, why don’t you show Evelyne what you can do?”
The boy nodded his head and in a blink of an eye he disappeared. Brent laughed when he saw the look of surprise play across my face and explained as Jeremy appeared again. “Not many of us are as young as Jeremy is when we first come to our gifts but as you can see, his is quite powerful. His entire body and whatever’s directly touching his skin at the time will also disappear.”
“All of my socks have to have holes in them so my shoes will go invisible to,” Jeremy says shyly. He gives me a sweet smile and I already know I’ve found a friend in him. His sister steps forward then, obviously more outgoing then her quiet brother, but with the same friendly smile.
She sticks out her hand for me to shake and says, “I’m Jemma.” When I touch her hand I feel something akin to the trustworthiness that I feel when I touch Alex though obviously not as strong since I’ve just met her. I know she’s kind, strong, and fiercely protective of her younger brother. I’ve gone from jittery to completely relaxed in about a few seconds and it’s nice for me to see that even if I have problems getting along with Angelica, Jemma and I will have no such reservations. “What I can do is a bit more difficult to show then the squirt here,” she says, ruffling Jeremy’s hair playfully. He doesn’t seem to mind though and he even laughs. “I’m sort of like a ninja except with an extra supernatural kick. You know, I can climb things really quickly, run super fast, jump impossible distances without being injured, all that jazz. Think of me as having just way awesome agility.” She says all of this with surprising matter-of-factness, not as if she’s trying to show off or anything.
However this doesn’t stop Alex from saying with a teasing smile, “Oh and don’t forget your incredible modesty, Jem.”
She leans over and to me and whispers as if the whole rest of the room can’t hear her. “Don’t listen to him; he’s just jealous that he’s just a walking match and I’m a freaking ninja!” We both laugh and I’m beginning to think that I had been ridiculous for getting so worked up when I see Angelica and another man I didn’t notice before stand up. I can’t believe I missed him, the guy is huge. He towers over Alex and is about as thick around as three of me and all of his body looks likes its solid muscle. He looks to be in his late twenties, maybe even early thirties, but the laughter lingering behind his eyes lent him a more youthful appearance. He had unremarkable brown hair and brown eyes but is handsome in the classic sense and is staring at us with an amused sort of look on his face. It was like looking at a young Clark Gable if Clark Gable had ever been a body builder.
“I’m Seth,” he says in a deep but friendly sounding voice.
“I’m going to go out on a limb here,” I say, grinning bemusedly, “and say that you’re talent is being really strong?”
He laughs out loud and replies playing along, “How did you guess?”
“Complete shot in the dark,” I say shrugging my shoulders. I don’t know what I had been expecting when I met them, but I’m grateful for how relaxed I feel talking to them. I can also feel how happy Alex is that everyone is getting along with me so far which of course makes me happy. I wonder if he was worried that they would embarrass him just as I was worried my family would embarrass me and the thought makes me want to laugh.
“Finally somebody around here with a sense of humor!” proclaims Seth with a grin.
“Hey,” protests Jemma. “I resent that implication! We can’t all be chuckle heads like you.” Her voice is mock serious and I can tell that this isn’t the first time that they’ve had this discussion and it seems to be some kind of joke among them. Everyone laughs except for one person in the room. I think my mom would use the words ‘sour grapes’ to describe the expression on Angelica’s face.
Seth must notice too because he claps a hand on her shoulder and I see her knees shake a little from the force of the blow. She glares down at his hand and you could not pay me enough money to be the hand on her shoulder right now. If looks could kill, indeed. It takes me a moment to realize that perhaps that statement wouldn’t be necessarily to far from the truth for her is she so wished it. “Don’t worry about Angelica here, she always looks this grim,” explains Seth not bothering to remove his hand. “I think I’ve seen her smile once in all the years I’ve known her and that was only when she saw some kid fall off his bike.” I would laugh if I thought he had been making it up.
“Seth,” she says in a chilling voice. “You might want to take your hand off my shoulder. Unless you want to see it next to your foot.”
He laughs but moves the offending digits nonetheless. Brent shakes his head but still smiles as if this kind of casual banter about removing limbs happens all the time. Who the hell knows, maybe in this house it does. “Angelica here has a fairly deadly skill, kind of like Alex’s ability in that way. She can cut people or objects with her mind’s eye, though it can’t cause much damage to anything too strong like titanium doors for instance.” This reminds me of the cut on Alex’s cheek that still hasn’t healed all the way and it’s just then that I realize it must have been her that did it. It’s pretty obvious that she has a quick temper and I understand how hard it’s going to be for me to not get on her bad side, especially if she tries to hurt Alex again. I have to remind myself that this mysterious Vartan guy is our enemy and not the fiery redhead standing in front of me and looking so pugnacious. Though I don’t like the comparison that Brent made about Alex and Angelica’s powers being similar in their deadly nature, I am grateful that Alex has something he can use to defend himself and me if need be.
“Cutting through a human wrist, however, would pose no problem,” she says with a fairly sadistic grin. So Seth was wrong, she does smile, just only if it’s about something gruesome. Lovely.
“I don’t think you could cut through these puppies,” he says kissing the knuckles on each of his hands. “If they’re strong enough to punch down a brick wall and tear through a steel door they could probably withstand you, Angelica.”
“Would you care to test that theory?” she asks wickedly.
“No thanks.” He smiles as if this is all great fun and I realize that besides the threat of mutilation, it actually is kind of fun. Weird.
“As much fun as it is to break in the new girl,” Angelica says with the dull boredom back in her voice. “I’ve got more important things I could be doing.” She trudges up the stairs and I can faintly hear a door close a few seconds after she disappears from my view. The others don’t seem to mind or make anything of it and I have to assume that this type of attitude is typical and not specifically because of me. Alex did warn me she wouldn’t like me, after all.
“Now that we’ve made it past the introduction,” says Brent, not even bothering to comment on the exit of one of his merry band of warriors. “Do you have any questions for us?”
“Only about a million,” I say with a smile.

~*~

It’s already dark outside by the time Alex and I left many hours later. As we walked to the car in silence, I was able to reflect over everything I had learned that day. I felt like I was some kind of annoying version of a hydra. Every time one of my questions was answered, two more came to mind. But Brett was endlessly patient with me and I managed to learn a lot. The first thing I had asked was what had been bothering me the most from the beginning.
“How can I control it better?” I ask without hesitation after Brent said we had all day to talk about whatever I wanted and that I could ask away whenever I was ready.
“Ah,” he says with a knowing nod, glancing down at mine and Alex’s hands still touching. “Yes that would be important to learn first. But not just for the obvious reasons.” My face heats up when he says this but no one seems to notice or they’re too polite to say anything. “Once you have better control over your power, they’ll be stronger and more focused. This will allow you to do a number of things that would be impossible for you to do now.”
“Like find Vartan?” I ask curiously.
He grins and says, “Yes, exactly, though that’s probably just the tip of the iceberg. I’ve never known an empath with your kind of power before so there’s no telling what you might be able to accomplish with enough training.” He dismisses Jemma and Seth to go do some training alone but requests that Jeremy and, of course, Alex remain to help us. “Now Jeremy and Alex both have powers that are affected by their emotions and in the beginning they had very little control over what they could do with them.” Though I had already surmised as much about Alex, I glance over in shock at the little boy in front of me. It would be a pretty horrible experience to disappear every time you got the least bit upset but even more so for just a child.
He smiles faintly when he sees the look on my face and says, “At first it was fun, to be able to hide and sneak around without anyone being able to notice. But we started to panic when I couldn’t figure out how to change back to normal. But Brent helped me and he’ll be able to help you too.”
I nod my head grimly and with that, the lesson begins. Mostly it involves a whole lot of concentration, some progress, and a lot of frustration. Since my power is less tangible then turning invisible or catching things on fire, it feels like I have to work that much harder to make it stick. All three of them are giving me advice but I tend to find that Brent helps me the most. He just has a way of saying things that makes them so much easier for me to understand. But around the end of the second hour I’ve managed to be able to feel nothing off of either Alex or Seth with less effort then it had taken me a couple of hours before. I’m delighted at the progress but Brent quickly warns me that there’s more to come.
“It seems that right now, you’ve only been able to get a read off of people from your hands but I want to see if you can project that to the rest of your body and possibly even the area around you. Of course that will also make it that much harder to be able to control when and what you do feel.”
I groan but he gives me a reassuring pat on my arm which somehow doesn’t feel condescending at all but only comforting. I’m beginning to see why Alex likes him so much; he’s a natural born leader. Though no one has said as much, it’s pretty obvious that Brent is running the show and no one seems to mind too much. He is the oldest of us and by far the most experienced and besides that, he just seems to have something in him that inspires loyalty.
When we’ve decided that I’ve learned enough self control for one day, we go upstairs to discuss our fugitive with the other three. When we walk into the room, I can see Jemma and Seth sparing in the big roped off mat in the center of the room that I noticed the first time I was here. While Seth was dangerously strong and could probably squash Jemma if he got his hands on her, Jemma wasn’t making it easy on him. She flitted across the ring, doing amazing dives and flips in order to steer clear of Seth’s crushing blows.
Distracting though it was to see two people so gifted facing off, Brent called my attention to the task at hand. I mumbled a sorry, a little bit embarrassed and hoping he didn’t think I was an easily distractible person but he just shakes his head good naturedly and says, “Don’t apologize; it is truly amazing to watch Jemma and Seth.”
The wall we’re facing is mostly covered by a huge white board with tons of pictures and writing on it. Some of the pictures are pretty gruesome too and it wouldn’t take a genius to figure out that these are the murder victims at the crime scene. I knew I was never going to be able to erase those faces from my mind and they only strengthened my resolve that the monster that did this had to be stopped.
“As you’ve probably already guessed,” begins Brent, his mouth set in a grim line, “these are some of Vartan’s victims, all of the ones we know of.”
I look up from the half a dozen people on the wall and just stare at him in shock. “You mean there could be more?” I ask incredulously.
He nods sadly and says, “We don’t know how many he got too before we started keeping tabs on him but we don’t think it can be much more than this.” I don’t feel much reassured, and Brent probably notices this if his next words are any indication. “This is why we need as much help as we can get. I don’t want Vartan to take any more innocent lives.”
I nod my head and he continues. “From what we can tell, he went after those with weaker powers first so that he could build up his strength before taking on anyone stronger. We’ve been able to find out what most of their gifts were. That’s what’s written in red here, you see,” he says, pointing to the words directly beneath the first victim’s picture. Her power had been a heightened sense of sight and the girl looked like she couldn’t be much older than me. In the picture of the murder scene, her face was twisted in a horrible expression, as if she had been looking right in the eyes of her attacker as he ended her life.
I tried to focus on the task at hand and not all of the family and friends of the victims that must have suffered along with them. “This may be a stupid question but the real world is still going on outside of all this,” I say gesturing at us and the board. “Surely the police are involved, what do they make of these murders?”
Brent didn’t seem to think that my question was pointless at all, much to my relief. “Though it’s quite possible that a detective or medical examiner might be one of us and therefore notice that a victim was marked for power, they wouldn’t have any reason to believe that the victim was attacked specifically for that reason. In fact, in most cases, Vartan stabbed his prey multiple times after the fatal wound to the heart and had taken the valuables on their person to make it look like a random mugging.”
The next question was fairly obvious and Brent was ready for it. He was smiling before I even began to ask. “If he was so careful to disguise his motives then how exactly did you know what he was really doing?” I didn’t mean for my question to come out in an accusing tone but it must have. Alex gave me a look which I purposefully ignored and I could feel his chagrin clearly enough through our connection. If I was going to be party to a murder plot, though obviously Vartan very much needed killing, I wanted to know all of the details first, politeness be damned. I might respect and appreciate Brent but that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to ask the hard questions to get the explanation that I wanted.
“No, Alex, I’m glad she asked.” I guess I wasn’t the only one to notice Alex’s reaction. Hmph. I didn’t like that Brent felt it necessary to inform Alex that he wasn’t offended by me. I especially didn’t like that it made Alex feel more at ease. At that moment I was grateful that I was the empath and not Alex. “It’s the nature of an empath to want to get to the heart of the matter. My gift, like yours, is difficult to explain and even more difficult to understand. I think Alex has told you that I am able to sense those like us nearby and sometimes I can also know what gift they have as well. It was so easy for me to tell what you were because I’ve met another empath before.” I had time to wonder just how many people with power he had met in his life before he continued.
“I was living in a small town when one of the first murders took place. I knew there were several people in town with powers but I never tried to make contact with them. Then one of the people with powers that I had recognized died. But their gift didn’t die with them. I tracked down that power and that’s when I found Vartan and connected the dots. I’ve never gotten the chance to confront him. I believe he knew that someone was tracking him because the next time he killed, it was to steal a power that made it hard for me to pinpoint his exact location. At best, I could only tell what general direction he was headed and I’ve always been one step behind him.”
He had been explaining all of this to me with his back turned, staring at the white board and the people he couldn’t save but then he turned around to face us. His explanation was making me regret my former bluntness. The pain in his voice was ringing clear as a bell and I didn’t know if I could have been as strong as he had to have been.
“But everything will change now that we have you.”

As I climbed into Alex’s car, for him to take me home that evening, I felt more relaxed then I had since the first time I met Alex. We had even made some semblance of a plan before I left and even though that plan had to do with killing someone, it still felt better knowing what was going to happen rather than letting my imagination run wild. We didn’t talk for most of the ride home but when we pulled onto my street, Alex finally broke the silence between us. I had only just now noticed how tense he was beside me. I remembered his reaction to my question to Brent earlier and I began to feel the tension in earnest.
“I’m sorry,” he says. I expected him to be angry with me for disrespecting his mentor but he’s caught me off guard again. I was all ready to argue with him about it and I had to make myself relax as I realized there wasn’t even a reason to be angry.
“About what?” I ask him. But I’m pretty sure I already know what he’s talking about.
“For earlier, when I reacted badly to your question to Brent. I know you felt my… frustration and I wanted to apologize for that. It was stupid of me to expect you to trust him instantly when you’d only just met him. I’ve known him for a few years but it feels like I’ve known him my whole life. It just caught me off guard and I’m sorry.”
I don’t say anything immediately. I think about how weird it is that I can feel his emotions so strongly without even trying. Under normal circumstances, I might not have even picked up on the fact that he had gotten frustrated with me in the first place. I think that it’s so weird that the first time I’m falling for someone is happening simultaneously to discovering that I’m a completely different person then I thought I was. It makes it hard to separate what changes happened because of my power or because of Alex. And then I think about Alex himself. How I care for him so much when so much of him was still a mystery. It was enough to make a girl wonder what a “normal” relationship was like. But far from enough to regret any of the decisions that I had made so far.
“No,” I finally say. “You have nothing to apologize for. If you can’t blame me for the questions I want to ask, then I can’t blame you for your immediate reaction to them. It’s not like you can help how you feel, and no one should have to say sorry for that.” We had long since pulled up in front of my house and I was sensing we were falling into a pattern here. Did a lot of people have serious conversations in their car or was that just unique to us? But trying to fit myself into what was “normal” had never been my mission in life before and I wasn’t going to let it bother me now.
I smiled at him, and he glanced at me like he expected me to be playing a trick on him. “Most people wouldn’t be that reasonable,” he said.
“I feel like I have an obligation to be more understanding of other people’s point of view because of what I can do, you know?” I say with a shrug. “It’s not fair that I can tell what someone’s feeling before their necessarily ready to share it with me. Theoretically, I could just tap into anyone’s emotions any time I want, but that doesn’t feel right unless they want me to be there.”
“I somehow get the feeling that we’re not speaking strictly about your power anymore,” he says dryly. Yah, so subtlety has never been my strong suit but at least I get to the point pretty quickly. “Is there something in particular that you’d like to ask me?”
I can’t tell by his tone whether or not he thinks the change of subject is a good thing or a bad thing and I don’t happen to be touching him so I can’t cheat. But I decide to press on anyways. “I want to know about her,” I say in a nervous rush.
We both know who I mean when I say ‘her’. All of a sudden my fingernails become completely engrossing; I can’t look away from them. Until he puts his hands on top of mine, that is. Instantly I feel relief because I know from my ability that he’s getting ready to tell me more about his past. However, this is instantly overshadowed by a wave of pain and sadness. Whatever memories he’s about to share with me, I know they won’t be fond ones.
I barely resist the urge to yank my hands out from under his and he can see the stricken look that’s probably blatantly stamped all over my face. He takes his hand off mine and I feel horrible at how relieved this makes me. Whatever misery I feel from just touching him, I know he must feel ten times worse, having actually lived through it. I take his hand firmly back in mine and my eye contact doesn’t waver. “If you can do this, so can I,” I say simply.
He nods and the look in his eyes is like the fire he has power over has turned inward against him. “My mom…” he began. “She was amazing. My dad was never in the picture but I never felt like I was missing anything with him gone. She worked hard to make our life good. Made sure I got into a really great school and still found room in the budget to start a college fund for me. She taught elementary school, but that didn’t always pay the bills. I think she felt bad sometimes that we could never afford to have the nicest stuff. The kids at school might say things but I was smart and I learned to be tough. It was easy to forget about them when I’d bring straight A’s home for my mom to see. Besides, that made it easier for me to tell the difference between the people worth knowing and those that I shouldn’t give a rat’s ass about. None of my friends cared where I bought my clothes or that sometimes my mom had to work two jobs. And we were so happy. Her smile,” he gripped my hand tighter. “I miss her. So much.” I wish I could be stronger for him but the emotion washing off of him in waves was to powerful. I could fell everything and experiences that had happened to him years ago felt like they were just happening to me. Tears were already tracking down my face and we hadn’t even gotten to the worst part yet, the part that was coming all too soon.
I squeezed his hand tighter and whispered, “What happened to her?”
He shook his head, trying to fight his way back from the past. He finished the rest of his story in a dull, quiet voice. “So much happened and none of it seemed that bad until the end. First of all, the rent doubled. The landlord knew that he could up the prices, knowing that it would still be cheaper then picking up and moving somewhere else. The cost of living in San Diego is a lot higher then it is here. And the tuition at my school was always rising, even with the scholarships I got. I told her that I was fine with going to a public school instead but she wouldn’t hear of it and honestly I didn’t fight her too hard about it,” he said shaking his head. “If I didn’t always like the most of the students at my school, I liked having that kind of access to knowledge. Not many kids get that, especially in single parent homes, and I guess I was proud of that. But finally I convinced her to let me get a part time job, just a few days a week after school to help pay some of the bills. Most days I took the bus to work because we only had the one car and my mom would sometimes work nights at the corner store. But that day I was running late. I got in a stupid fight with a kid at school. My mom didn’t have to work that night so she let me take the car. Before I got home from work, she decided to walk down to the store, the same one she worked at every now and then, but she never made it there. A witness said someone robbed her at gun point. Shot her three times. She didn’t even make it to the hospital. More than anything, I wish I could have been there. I should have been there.”
He rubbed his free hand over his face and into his hair, erasing the wetness that lingered by his eyes. I was a mess at this point but I couldn’t find it in me to look away in search of a tissue or napkin in my purse. He looked down at our hands still clutched together as if surprised to still find me there. He lightly touched the side of my face with his free hand and wiped away my tears with his thumb.
“I haven’t told many people this story, at least not the full version. Just Brent, really. That makes this,” he said, lifting up our hands from the center console of the car slightly to indicate what he meant, “all the more strange. Your power should bother me more than anything else but it doesn’t, it never has. It feels right for you to know all this, like you already knew it before you even met me. I didn’t expect that. How do you do it?”
I just shook my head. I was way beyond words at this point. To go from the agony of his past, to the serenity he got from the telling of it, to the affection toward me in the end, all in a relatively short amount of time almost made me dizzy with emotion. And all of this was just from him! I couldn’t even sort out how I felt, much less anything else.
He released my hand but only to cup my face with both of his. “You are truly amazing, Evelyne Primrose.” And when he kissed me, I tried to give back all he had given me and more.

Chapter 8

The next morning, as I stood in my driveway waiting to be picked up for school, I couldn’t help but think that I had gotten far too acclimated to Alex’s punctuality. It was only five past seven thirty, but those five minutes were dragging.
Last night’s discussion with Alex led me to realize a few things. Here I was, so psyched that I had finally gotten my boyfriend of sorts to open up to me a bit, and I had no one to talk to about it! There was no way I was going to talk to either of my parents about something like that (really, did any teenager ever talk to their parents about their significant other, excluding the Brady Bunch?) and it suddenly dawned on me that the last time I had spoken to either of my best friends, I was still trying to deny that anything had even happened between me and Alex. I hadn’t even ridden to school with them in weeks and that had been a tradition for us since Angela got her license at the beginning of sophomore year. I had been so caught up in Alex and the whole you-have-a-mystical-power-thing that I was turning into a shitty friend. I couldn’t allow that to happen, especially after everything they had done for me through the years. Some people like to forget, but middle school is a hell that is nearly impossible to get through unscathed without a couple of good friends, and I had the best.
So after calling both of them up last night and leaving a thoroughly cryptic message about needing to catch up and that this involved leaving for school half an hour earlier than usual, I curled up in bed and tried to think about exactly what I would tell them. Unfortunately, my body had other plans and I was fast asleep long before I had thought anything out.
Even with these extra few minutes ticking by while I just stood in the drive way, waiting to see Macy’s car pull around the corner, nothing was really coming to mind. I figured that my best bet would be to wing it. English papers I could write, but planning out an entire conversation was never going to happen.
Finally, they pulled up to my house. Angela was already sitting up front but she had to get out to let me squeeze into the back seat. The car is older than her little brother, it only has two doors, and all the vinyl on the seats is cracked but as long as it had the two basic amenities (AC and radio) and didn’t break down, we were happy. I scoot to the middle seat in the back and poke my head up front, smiling from ear to ear. I realize that this probably looks kind of creepy, but I can’t make myself stop. I had a lot to be happy about and sometimes you don’t realize how much you’ve missed your friends until they’re right in front of you. “Morning!” I say, still smiling.
Angela raises her eyebrows while Macy kind of glares at me from the driver’s seat. “You are way too happy for seven thirty in the morning,” Macy grumbled.
I notice the coffee mug clutched in her hand and ask in a sing-song voice, “Was someone up too late last night?”
“No,” she grumbles. “I just have a normal human reaction to waking up at an ungodly hour.” I laugh as she puts her car in reverse. She has a point; I’m usually the last person to be this chipper in the morning. But I guess my good mood plus getting a solid ten hours of sleep last night worked even better on a case of the Mondays then a Starbucks double shot. Also, I was a bit nervous about confessing all (well, almost all) to my friends which made me a bit jittery.
At the corner, Macy turned on the blinker like she was headed to school, but I asked her to shop. “I need to catch you guys up on recent events and I’d rather not do that on campus. Do y’all mind if we go the park?” I ask.
They glance at each other like they’re suspicious but Macy turns the other way, in the direction of the park. Neither one of them has to ask which one. Back before any of us had cars or even knew how to drive, we spent a lot of time riding our bikes the each other’s houses. There was a park in the neighborhood we lived in that was about the same distance for all of us to get to so we ended up meeting there a lot. Even when Macy and Angela both got their cars, we still liked to go there. We’d get Whataburger late at night and take it there to eat or bring a deck of cards. But most of the time we just sat up in the multicolored plastic and metal playscape and just talked. It was one of my favorite places in the world but it had been so long since we’d been there. I had a bad feeling that the time for hanging out at a playground was coming to a close.
We were all silent as we piled out of Macy’s car and climbed to the top of the playscape were there was enough room for us all to sit comfortably. Or as comfortable as you can get sitting on really hard cheese-grateresk material. That was how we determined of our unofficial allotment of time at the playground. When all of our butts got too numb from sitting on something that was really meant to be played on, we knew it was time to pack it in. How uncomfortable the plastic was often depended on the quality of the conversation we were having.
“Evelyne,” Angela starts in once we’ve all sat down. She looks concerned where as Macy looks pretty anxious. I guess I hadn’t acted as calm as I thought I had. “Is there something wrong? You look kind of… on edge.”
I sighed and ran my fingers through my hair. “Nothing is really wrong exactly. Just… different.”
Realization seemed to dawn on Macy just then. “Right,” she said smugly. “This is when you’re finally going to confess that there is something going on with Alex after all, aren’t you.”
She’s half right, but it’s not the fact that me and Alex are an “item” now, whatever that means, but more as how it actually happened in the first place. Which means that I’m going to have to explain as best I can what happened with Tommy at the party the other night. Hence the nervousness. I had no idea how they would react.
“Me and Alex are sort of together now, I guess,” I start to say. “But I don’t want y’all to get the wrong idea, like we’ve been together for a long time and just weren’t telling anyone. We didn’t really figure out how much we liked each other until after Tommy’s party Friday night.”
The obvious question followed, the one that I both knew I had to answer, but dreaded all the same. “What happened at Tommy’s party?” Macy asked.
She seemed completely unaware of what I was about to say but I could tell the Angela knew I wasn’t about to tell a story about hilarious high school shenanigans. I blew my bangs out of my face and tried to compose myself as best I could.
“While we were at the party, me and Alex kind of got into a fight. I pretty much knew by then that I liked him more then I probably should so I was already frustrated about that.”
“What were y’all fighting about?” Angela asked, her voice full of sympathy.
“I don’t even really remember,” I hedged. It’s not like I could tell her that we had fought about the creepy murderer we were hell bent on killing and how I might be a target now. It made me sad to think that there was a definite limit to how honest I could be with them now but that was something to worry over another day. “But I had convinced myself that he didn’t really care about me and that hurt more than I thought it would. So I hightailed it out of there. I was confused and upset and obviously not thinking very clearly. I latched onto the first available person who wasn’t Alex and convinced myself that it was OK for him to drive me home.”
“Evelyne, what happened?” asked Macy, as an expression of horror dawned on her face. “Who did you ask for a ride?” She grasped my hand and I could tell that about a million different scenarios were running through her head, none of them pleasant, and all of these ideas laced with extreme dread. It made my stomach turn to think that many of these thoughts weren’t far from the truth. She already suspected who the person was that I got a ride from, based on the conversation we had over the phone the other day, but Angela was still completely in the dark.
“Like an idiot, I ran up to Tommy and begged for a ride home without giving Alex any kind of explanation or even telling him where I was going.” This was as much as I could get out while looking at them and I stared at my lap as I nervously wrung my hands. “I wasn’t even paying attention to where we were going and by the time I realized that something wasn’t right, that in fact things were very wrong, he had parked his car in the middle of nowhere.” I couldn’t even glance at them but they were so quiet that I felt like they weren’t even breathing. I had to take a shaky breath myself before I went on.
“He tried to… well; I think you can probably guess what he tried to do. I fought back of course, but he- he hit me. I think the shock of it was worse than the actual pain.” I had to shake myself out of the memory of that first earth shattering blow. The worst of it was over but I still needed to get the rest of the story out. “But then Alex showed up. He pulled Tommy off of me before anything bad had occurred, really. I can’t even think about what might have happened if he hadn’t shown up. I would have been a lot worse off than split lip and a slightly bruised cheek.” I shuddered and finally looked up. Angela was crying and Macy looked pretty upset as well. Actually, she looked really freaking pissed off, if I was being completely honest.
“That fucking scumbag!” she seethed. She wasn’t exactly yelling. It was like her anger was way past the point where volume could make a difference. “I swear to God, if I ever see that little piece of sh-”
“Macy!” I say, cutting her off before she can go into full on rant mode. “I appreciate the sentiment, really, but it’s alright. I’m fine now, revenge has been exacted and all that jazz.”
“Did you file a police report?” asks Angela. She’s wiped her tears away and I take it as a good sign that her practical side is making an appearance in this conversation.
“Well…” I appreciated her concern, but I hadn’t actually even thought about it after that night. “Not exactly.”
“Why the hell not?” said Macy furiously.
“Alex sort of beat the shit out of him,” I said, matter-of-factly. “He was barely moving when we left and I had to convince Alex not to go back for more.” I had debated whether or not to tell them about Tommy’s car too but I decided it was best to leave Alex’s pyrotechnic skills out of my story. Telling them something like that would only lead to more questions that I wouldn’t be able to answer.
“Anyway, I think that Tommy got the message. I’m not even sure if he’ll be at school today. I really hope not.”
“Damn,” said Angela, shaking her head. She rarely cussed at all, which gave the sentiment I bit more severity in her case.
“I couldn’t have said it better myself,” replied Macy in an equally stunned voice.
The rest of my story was much more concise and easy to explain. I stuck to the truth completely, excepting the supernatural murder plot bits. I told them that I wasn’t up to facing my parents that night and went home with Alex instead. To which Macy jokingly replied, “You spent the night with him already?! You slut!” even after I explained that nothing happened. I even told them about him coming over for dinner the next night and our conversation concerning whether or not we were a couple at this point.
It was a relief to have something so light hearted to talk about after all the bad with Tommy and learning about Vartan had happened. I was so unbelievably happy to have my friends back. We finally had to get up to leave though when we realized we only had ten minutes to get on campus before the first bell would ring. We had been sitting there for over an hour and none of us had even thought to complain about our asses going numb from sitting on the Playscape.