by Rich Scribes
didn’t want to track it. it would take some time. I was tired and my brain was fogged up with thoughts of sleep, well, trying to sleep. I had the same dream each night. The same one from my dream during class. I awoke from the dream in the same spot every morning with my alarm clock mocking me blinking 7:00. I wanted to jump from the mountain, knowing full well I would be able to fly and no harm would come to me. I couldn’t ever get that far.
A third blinking email light came through yanking me away from my thoughts. Okay, time to see what this was. I clicked the email and this time the subject line was ‘danger’. Nelson had to be playing with me right now, so I clicked on the email. The subject line read ‘danger’, and the ‘from’ field read anonymous.
“You’re in danger. They will be coming for you. You will be the one to bring balance to a society that is ready for war.”
-2-
Wow, Nelson went all out on this one. He must have been watching too much late night TV like I was doing the past few nights. He must still be upset that I didn’t make a move on Ziora. I logged off my computer not paying any mind to what the email said and went to bed…
I awoke at 7:30 I was running late! I never slept past 7:00 this was the first time that I have had a decent night sleep that I could remember. And, I didn’t even have that dream. Which was good and bad because not having the dream did allow me to sleep, but at the same time it was so damn good. I took a quick shower, and tossed on some shorts and a t-shirt. I raced downstairs where my mom handed me a toasted pop tart that I hadn’t been expecting to be toasted and almost dropped it. The bus was about to pull away, and I yelled ‘stop’ of course, all the kids were making faces at me and pointing at me…wasn’t the first and it wasn’t going to be the last time I’m sure.
“Sorry,” I said to the bus driver, Cheryl, as I climbed the steps.
“Don’t worry about it, doll, just hurry and find a seat,” She said with her raspy voice. She was a heavy smoker ( I could smell the nicotine on her breath smacking me in the face.) I started moving towards the back of the bus, and my heart jumped at the same time a knot formed in my stomach. Ziora was on the bus, and she was sitting by herself. How did she find a seat? We were one of the last stops, stupid question, she probably talked one of the freshmen to give her the seat. I was trying to scan the bus for another person to sit with, but everyone was occupied.
“You know…Bryce is your name, right?” She smiled. “You could sit with me.” The sound of her voice was mesmerizing.
“Uh…sure,” I muttered. She scooted over and let me have the outside of the seat. I unbuckled my book bag and placed it on my lap. I kept enough space between us that she didn’t have to worry about me touching her. Why was she on the bus?
“I don’t bite, you know, unless I’m provoked.” She smiled. I held my cheesy smile in check. Just a week ago I didn’t even say ten words to this girl and now we were having another full conversation.
“You know, I’m really sorry for not knowing your name. I guess I should have made more of an effort to get to know you, since we live right next to each other and all.”
“Well, there is the fact that crossing the street can be so dangerous.” I said as she smiled.
We talked until we arrived at school, and after I got off the bus I discovered why her boyfriend hadn’t driven her to school. His muscle bound ass came through the crowd to get Ziora.
“Baby, I’m so sorry I couldn’t pick you up today. I was running late and I didn’t know where my keys were.” He explained.
“They were probably in your pocket, you dumb jock.” I muttered a little too loudly apparently.
“Yo, Shawn, this kid right here is talking smack.” This skater kid shouted out. Oh what happened to the days when the jocks and the skaters were enemies? I was about to haul ass, but I felt a hand grab my shoulder and spin me around.
“You have something to say, geek?” Shawn was a big kid, bigger than me by probably double.
“Hope you don’t throw an interception in gym class.” I said shrugging. If I did get a beat down it would be my first.
“Shawn, leave him alone.” Ziora pulled on his arm pleading.
“No, babe, he has to go down,” Shawn replied. “To the ground.” Oh, why didn’t I just skip school today? Ziora was trying to hold him back, but she failed, because a fist greeted my face, and Shawn wasn’t lying: I did go down to the ground. There was a circle of students around us, but I didn’t think Shawn was going to make another move. He had made his point. He could take down a geek. I stood up and touched my face which started to swell, and I knew it was going to leave a big bruise. The circle started to get bigger around us, and I knew that was going to bring attention of a few teachers. As if on cue Mr. Olgera pushed through the circle with two security monitors.
“What is going on here?” He looked between us both.
“Nothing, sir, Shawn was showing me how gravity works in his world. I wasn’t really that impressed.” Shawn gave me a look as to say that I was lucky a teacher was there.
“How about you all impress me, and get to homeroom,” He commanded to us and the crowd. I knew within a few minutes that this would be all around school, and, of course, video internet outlets. Video phones were everywhere. I walked slowly into school rubbing my face. Shawn did pack a punch. I went to homeroom, and signed in. Since facing English was not something I could handle I decided to use my free pass from Mr. Wilson and go to the computer lab.
I entered the computer lab and signed in. This was one of the only places in the school I could just relax. The only people that hung out here were geeks, and students that needed to get a computer assignment done. Being the end of the year very few people were here. A stressed out looking freshmen in one corner, and maybe a couple of sophomores that were more interested in flirting than typing. The teacher that ran the lab loved when I was in there, because then she could take a coffee break for the whole period. I was basically the one helping any student that needed the help. Once she saw my face, she lit up like a child on Christmas morning.
“Bryce, nice to see you again.” Ms. Hayes said.
“Feigning for your caffeine fix?”
“Well, since you mentioned it, yes, yes I am.” She smiled with her yellow smile and left the room. I rolled my eyes, trying to figure out how that lady had a job. I was in my place of peace with a bruised face and that’s what mattered. I wasn’t going to the nurse. Everyone would expect that, so I stayed here. Then all of a sudden my phone made a pinging sound. A text. It was a text from Nelson, of course.
Why didn’t you tell me you got beat up? He asked in his text. I didn’t really want to bother with this conversation right now, so I put the phone by the computer keyboard and ignored it. Nelson was always trying to be into the latest gossip, and tried to hang out with the cool kids. What he didn’t realize once they got out of high school they weren’t going to be all that cool, but I was going to let him figure that out all by himself. My phone went off again.
Dude, you have to tell me what happened! I rolled my eyes. One more time and I would have to turn my phone off. My presence had killed the romance of the sophomores, and the frazzled freshman had finished printing something a moment ago and left. All alone. I went on the internet to check some websites. Some of them were blocked off due to the school’s firewall, but come on: I wasn’t exempt from all my classes for nothing. I hacked the firewall, and started searching the web. Then my phone pinged a third time.
Go on mymovies.com you have over 100,000 hit already. Look under boy meets FIST of thunder. I quickly typed the web address into the URL bar, and looked up what Nelson told me to look up. There I was: a thirty second video of me hitting the ground faster than a sack of potatoes. I touched my face again. It hurt. Well, at least I got my first high school ass beating out of the way, and all it took was the end of my junior year.
The day went by snail slow. Of course, I w
as a celebrity at school. Well, one of these celebrities that went to rehab. There was a lot of whispering and pointing. Lots of ‘that’s him’ comments. I tried to block it out, but even Nelson was in my face. At lunch he was grilling me about the whole ordeal.
“So, tell me the specifics. Did you try and steal Ziora away from him?” I was getting annoyed on how much he was fixated on this girl. Jealous? Maybe, but I’d didn’t even talk about her as much as he did.
“No, she had nothing to do with this.” She really didn’t. I just didn’t like she was with the king of all douche bags. I sat down outside with my tray of food. Nelson joined me.
“Yo, Bryce,” a voice said from behind me, “Something has been bugging my computer, and I can’t figure out what it is.” I looked up to see Trent. Why did it have to be today where people had to ask me questions about computers? Trent sat down next to me. Great, now I had to actually talk to this kid. He wasn’t a bad guy. He was actually pretty cool, especially since he didn’t ask me about the stupid fight. I just was in a foul mood and didn’t want to talk to anyone. The reason I tolerated Nelson is because I have known him since kindergarten.
“Well, bring it to school tomorrow, and I will help you with it.” I took a bite of my sandwich.
“I’m