Silent Symmetry (The Embodied trilogy Book 1)

by JB Dutton

  Chapter 2

  Dream #2: I’m being watched. My whole life. I can’t see them, but they’re watching me. And the feeling is getting stronger.

  The next day I found it hard to concentrate in school. I’ve always been a pretty good student. I mean, I get by without having to try too hard. Okay, that sounds bad, but what I mean is that I guess I have some natural ability and intelligence, so with just a bit of effort I can get good grades. Anyway, the point is, I spent the day only half-listening to the parade of teachers who all earnestly shared their wisdom with the cream of the crop, smug in the knowledge that they were shielded from the horrors of the New York public school system.

  I could hardly take my eyes off Noon’s hypnotic features and his bizarre body language. But I was forced to, because in every class except homeroom I was seated somewhere in front of him. Cruz, in contrast, was always beside or in front of me. I watched him as he drifted away for long periods, doodling in the margins and dreamily following the beat of a song playing in his head. Every now and then I stretched and twisted around to get a glimpse of Noon. I’d never felt so distracted in class. These boys...

  “Miss Marriner, do you know the answer?” asked Mrs. Poborsky, the Geography teacher.

  My eyes flicked down to my textbook. The only problem was that I hadn’t heard the question. “I’m sorry, I don’t know,” I admitted.

  She wasn’t so easily fooled and wasn’t about to let me get away with it. “Do you even know the question?” she continued, like a dog with a bone.

  This was bad. Day two and I looked like a total flake. I shook my head, ashamed.

  “Which two countries are in both Europe and Asia?” she repeated.

  “Oh,” I exclaimed, relieved at the chance to redeem myself. I knew that I knew this. It was on the tip of my tongue. But it just wouldn’t pop into my brain! Even worse, there was a map on the page in front of me but my mind refused to focus. I shifted in my chair, as though sitting upright would give me clarity. “It’s... It’s... um...”

  “Yes?”

  “Gosh, ma’am...” A small wave of snickering spread around the classroom. Afterward I realized it was probably directed more at my choice of old-fashioned Midwestern vocabulary than my ignorance of geography. “I know, but I really can’t think of it right now.”

  Mrs. Poborsky sighed. “Anyone else know?” Several hands shot up. A girl with a headband and braces was chosen and revealed with a self-satisfied half-grin that Russia and Turkey straddled both continents. “Well done,” said the teacher, then directed an admonishing glare at me: “And next time, Miss Marriner, please pay more attention.”

  I nodded again and glanced over at Cruz, who was grinning at me conspiratorially. I couldn’t help flashing a smile back in his direction and a whoosh shot through my stomach. It felt really good, I guess, but made me wonder if it showed in my body language – am I crushing?

  When we left the classroom, Cruz caught up with me. “Wait up,” he said.

  “Hey, Cruz,” I answered shyly. “What’s up?”

  “Nothing,” he continued, and I knew that he meant it. Awkward.

  “So... where are you headed?” I asked, having nothing better to say.

  “The lockers. To, you know, dump my books.”

  “Me too,” I nodded earnestly. Could I have sounded any more retarded?

  Our lockers were next to each other, which made for more awkwardness as we “after-you-no-after-you”-ed. We finally managed to get into position and the nervous laughter subsided. Then he opened his locker and my eyes opened wide in amazement. The inside was covered in doodles taped to the sides and door, some in pencil, some in pen, but all small and incredibly well drawn. In fact, they were more like miniature artworks than doodles. And each one was of an expressionless face.

  “Wow. Cool!” I exclaimed, peering in at them.

  He smiled at me and threw his books inside. “Thanks.”

  “Who are they?” I wondered aloud, my eyes wandering from face to face. There were men, women, old, young, from different backgrounds but united by one common feature: they were all perfectly symmetrical.

  “I don’t know,” answered Cruz, his face now only inches from mine. “I see them in my dreams. I always have.”

  I’ve always gone for the artsy ones. I looked away from the drawings, then locked eyes with his. They were so, so warm... I got totally drawn in. An older guy jostled me, thrusting me forward. Cruz caught me by my shoulders and I noticed Noon about twenty yards away down the hallway. What immediately struck me was that he was standing perfectly still with his eyes closed, an island in a sea of students flowing around him. And he was holding both hands together, stretched unnaturally out in front of his chest. Suddenly his eyes snapped open and met mine. I looked away instinctively. When I looked back in his direction, he was gone.

  “Are you alright?” asked Cruz, concerned.

  I regained my composure and nodded. “Yeah, sure. Thanks.”

  He closed his locker door. “I gotta get to work.”

  “Sure, me too. I mean, I have to run, too.”

  He slung his bag over his shoulder, grinning, and started backing away.

  “Tomorrow...”

  “Yeah,” I answered, my eyes wandering the hallway in search of Noon’s distinctive figure. But he was nowhere to be seen.

  I drifted out the school gates, lost in thought. Something was off about this whole thing. About the last two days. And I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was being watched, like in a recurring dream I’d had ever since I could remember. My thoughts were interrupted by the realization that someone was walking beside me. It was Noon.

  “Oh, hi!” I said in surprise.

  “Hi.”

  That was it. Just “hi” for the next minute. Or was it five minutes? Or twenty? Or twenty seconds?

  “So... you live this way too?” I probed, just so say something, more than really wanting to know.

  “Yes,” he answered.

  Kari Marriner: currently majoring in Awkward Conversations with a minor in Long Silences.

  “I was thinking,” he said abruptly, and I jumped at the chance to find out something, anything, about him. “Maybe we could go to a café and study together.”

  This made me happy.

  “I’ve traveled a lot,” he continued, “and I could help you with the Geography mid-term.”

  “I’m not as bad at it as I seemed in class,” I blurted out.

  “No, of course you aren’t.”

  “I mean, I’m sure you could help if you’ve traveled a lot. I only arrived from Wisconsin two weeks ago and I’ve never been anywhere,” I said breathlessly. “Well, we went to Niagara Falls once, which is in Canada, and I guess you must know that, or, at least one side of it is in Canada, because, you know, it’s a river and it flows into that lake there, which is called something like Lake Canada, but it isn’t that, but anyway, I’ve never... really... traveled. Much.”

  I wanted a freak tornado to suck me up into the sky and dump me back in Lancaster.

  “Lake Ontario,” he stated matter-of-factly. “That’s what you’re trying to think of.”

  “Yes. Oh-em-gee. Sorry – I’d love to study with you.”

  “Good.”

  More silence. At this point I was little more than a sheep following him wherever he wanted to take me. We walked for another five minutes, his eyes again fixed on some distant horizon that was definitely invisible from the skyscrapers of Chelsea... just like the immaculately beautiful woman I had passed outside the Warrington the day before.

  We arrived at a small café called Orchard Grains. When I say “arrived” what actually happened was that Noon went straight inside in silence and I stood in the doorway as the door swung closed. It’s not like I need a guy to throw his jacket down on a puddle so I don’t get my feet wet, but this was just rude.

  I followed him in. The place was filled with students and artsy types engrossed either in conversation, books or lap
tops. Except Noon. He was just sitting bolt upright at a table. Seriously bizarre behavior.

  I made my way to him through the maze of tables and slung my bag over the back of the chair. “Nice place,” I said, unpacking my Macbook Air (courtesy of the ToT) and my lucky fuzzy bunny (courtesy of Mom and Dad before he died). “Where’s your stuff?”

  He frowned almost imperceptibly, as if trying to read my mind.

  “Your Geography notes?” I queried.

  “Why?” he answered blankly.

  “Isn’t that what we’re here for?”

  “Yes. Here they are.” He removed a notebook from his backpack and placed it on the table, pushing away the empty cups left by the previous customers.

  I looked around. “I’ll get the busboy. What are you having?”

  “Milk.”

  Of course. Milk. Not a soda, not a coffee, like your average teen. Milk.

  I ordered our drinks (I splurged on a cappuccino) and saw the busboy clearing off a table at the back. As I got nearer to him I noticed that it was Cruz, his face hidden by a sports team baseball cap. Another weird coincidence.

  “Hey, Cruz,” I said, and he looked up, startled. Then his features softened when he realized who I was.

  “Kari!” he beamed at me.

  “You work here?”

  “Since the last two weeks.”

  “Cool! I was just... I came in with Noon to study for the Geography mid-term.”

  He scanned the room quickly and stopped at Noon’s table. I followed his gaze. Noon was sitting with his eyes closed, hands resting on the table, fingers intertwined.

  “Looks like he’s meditating on continental drift,” said Cruz, and I burst out laughing.

  “He is a bit of a kook,” I confided to him, “but he seems like a nice guy.”

  “Yeah, he’s cool.”

  “When you get a minute, would you mind clearing off our table?” I asked.

  “For sure. I’ll be right over.”

  I edged my way between the tables and Noon opened his eyes.

  “Tired?” I queried.

  “No. You?”

  “No, I was just asking because you... you looked like you were asleep.”

  “Right. No, I close my eyes to concentrate.”

  I sat down as Cruz arrived with a tray and cloth. “Hey, bro,” he said to Noon.

  “Hello, Cruz. I’m pleased to see you,” was the unenthusiastic response.

  “Yeah...” said Cruz as he piled up the empty mugs on his tray. He wiped off the table and went back to his station.

  “So what were you concentrating on?” I asked Noon.

  “Excuse me?”

  “You said you had your eyes closed because you were concentrating.”

  “Right. I was concentrating on geography. Isn’t that why we’re here?”

  “Uh-huh.” Well, this study session was going to be interesting.

  As it turned out, Noon loosened up, and over the next couple hours we immersed ourselves in plate tectonics, a subject that he was for some reason super knowledgeable about. Despite – or maybe because of – his weird body language, there was something almost hypnotic about him. Was it the evenness of his features or the calmness of his voice? I mean seriously that face. Cruz hung around our table and kept looking over at me being cute and smiley, but my attention was totally fixated on Noon’s piercing eyes. Can’t. Look. Away.

  My phone buzzed. Mom checking in on me. She’d be home at 6:30 – still another hour. Before I could answer her text, I heard a crash at the back of the café followed by two voices yelling at each other.

  Cruz stormed out from behind the counter, throwing his apron down on the floor and shoving empty chairs out the way.

  The café manager appeared. “And don’t even think about coming back to collect your pay!” he fumed at the disappearing Cruz.

  All heads in the café turned from the door being slammed by Cruz back to the manager. “Sorry, folks,” he apologized, picking up the discarded apron.

  “Oh-em-gee! I wonder what happened there?” I said to Noon, who seemed very perturbed by the turn of events. “Poor Cruz! His boss looks like such a douche.”

  Noon simply said, “We should leave.”

  This surprised me. We had been getting on great, and I think I even learned something about the Earth’s crust. “Well, I don’t have to be home for a while. You?”

  “There’s no point staying,” he said.

  “What do you mean? We’re half-way through the chapter. I thought we were going to finish it.”

  “No.”

  “Okay... Because you have to get home for supper?”

  “No. Yes.”

  I was confused. Who wouldn’t be? “Which is it?” I asked.

  “It’s yes. I need to get home.”

  He put away his notebook and pushed back his chair without even looking at me. I shook my head and closed my laptop. I felt kinda hurt. But suddenly it was like a fog had cleared inside my head. “No, hold on,” I said, and opened it again. “Leave if you like, but I’m staying.”

  Noon calmly put his hands together and closed his eyes. He looked so weird and yet so peaceful. After a couple of seconds his eyes snapped open again and he frowned at me. I smiled and it was like he realized he was being an asshole. “I apologize,” he said, and sat back down.

  I had to admit it, I was crushing on him, and the strangeness was part of it. There was something about him that was incredibly attractive and yet incredibly foreign, almost alien. For the next 45 minutes we chatted and it was great. Okay, if I have to be honest, I chatted and he listened. He soaked up my life story with attentive ears, nodding and asking the odd question. Before I knew it, it really was time to leave. He offered to walk me home, and I agreed, my mental fog now completely replaced by a warm, fuzzy blanket of... what? I’d just met him. Snap out of it, Kari!