Mayhem

by Artist Arthur

  Shrugging, I toe my shoes off, leaving them near the beat-up umbrella stand. After that run my feet are tired and hot. Pop Pop’s already turned around in his chair, so I just reach for the handles and start to push. His room’s on the first floor, right past the living room. Our house is long and narrow, one hallway that branches off into different rooms. We pass the kitchen and the pantry on our way to his room, also.

  At the end of the hallway I turn easily into Pop Pop’s room because a long time ago Dad took the framing off the doors so the wheelchair could fit through. Getting close to the bed, I flip the lock in place so the chair doesn’t roll back out the door, since there’s a slight slant to the floor in the back rooms. I’m moving around to help Pop Pop out of the chair when one shaky arm reaches out and his hand touches my shoulder.

  “They’re coming for you, Jakey. They’re coming and I don’t know if I can stop ’em this time.”

  Pop Pop’s words are clear and I know he’s talking about my powers and possibly Charon. “You know what happened to Uncle William, don’t you?”

  With his other hand Pop Pop wipes his face. He tries to take a deep breath but ends up coughing out half of it. I reach around and gingerly rub the center of his back like his nurse taught me. This helps to loosen the passageways in the lungs, she said. He’s usually on oxygen but gets tired of the tube in his nose and yanks it out sometimes.

  “I know he tried to do what he thought was right. He tried to fight, but he just wasn’t strong enough.”

  “The power gets stronger. Everything is magnified now. I can feel it,” I confide in Pop Pop because I have nobody else to tell. “Sometimes I just feel like it’s going to run me over like a freight train.”

  “You must control it, make it obey you, not the other way around. That’s where William went wrong.”

  “Where did he go? Is he still alive?”

  “He’s in a place I don’t reckon I’ll ever see. No coming back here for William. I knew that the day he walked out.”

  “Were you his Guardian, too?”

  Pop Pop shakes his head and plants his hands on the handles of the chair. With slow movements he pulls himself up. I stand and put a hand behind him to help steady him. He doesn’t want me to lift him into bed, we’ve had that argument too many times before.

  “They only told me to keep an eye on you.”

  “Why do we need Guardians? I mean, you have no powers, how can you really guard me?”

  “Mortal blood and mortal eyes see much more, they said. I know when to warn you, when to teach you and when to step out of the way.”

  The way he said those last words had my stomach twisting. “What happens if I no longer have a Guardian? I mean, Casietta was Sasha’s Guardian and now she’s gone.”

  “We not only guard you, but we guard the secret.” He lay down on the pillows, catching his breath. “And that old crotchety Casietta, she’s closer than you think,” he adds.

  I adjust his pillows and rub his back again. On the stand next to his bed is the oxygen tubing. Without even asking him I pick it up and lace it behind his head, pushing the small tubes to the front of his nose. His blue-gray eyes stare at me, then roll like a child’s. In that instant I remember seeing those eyes on a younger version of this man.

  “Am I a Vortex, Pop Pop?”

  “A what?” he asks looking a little puzzled. “You’re a growing boy who’s standing in my way. Now back up so I can get under these covers. I’m tired and I gotta get up and go to work tomorrow. Tell your grandma to set the alarm clock.”

  I help Pop Pop under the covers, pulling them up to his neck with a weight on my shoulders and a tightening in my heart. Grandma died twelve years ago. Pop Pop’s moments of clarity are coming less frequently. The last time Dad met with his doctors that’s what they told him would happen eventually. Pop Pop was sixty-nine years old, his birthday is the day after Halloween. “One day earlier and I’d have been a demon by default,” he always joked.

  But if my uncle was a Vortex and now me as well, Pop Pop and his jumbled brain might have been closer to the truth than any of us ever knew.

  Looking down at his frail body shivering beneath the covers makes me sad. I have so many good memories of him, so many fun times we’ve shared. I don’t know if he remembers them all. But I do and I always will. “Good night, Pop Pop,” I say softly and step away from the bed.

  It’s when I’ve turned off his lamp and am close to the door that he starts to cough again. I stop instantly, turning around to see if he’s okay. He looks right at me, his gaze penetrating in the dim room.

  “You are who you are, Jakey. Don’t let anybody tell you any different.”

  I nod. It didn’t answer my question, one of the many still floating in my head, but it was okay. This was my Pop Pop and I love him no matter what, so it’s okay.

  “I won’t,” I say, not realizing that who I am and what I am are about to be tested.

  thirteen

  “Can a girl really drive you crazy?”

  Twan’s chewing Twizzlers like they’ve just been invented and won the award for best candy ever. I mean, seriously, his lips are smacking and he’s smiling every time he pulls one from the packet and sticks it in his mouth. The simple things.

  “Depends how close you already were to crazy,” he says over a mouthful of licorice.

  I chuckle even though I’m not really in a laughing mood. Twan’s like that. He’ll have you laughing even if you don’t want to. Something about his laid-back attitude and carefree demeanor that I envy.

  “I mean, I can’t stop thinking about her.”

  Twan’s smiling and nodding his head. He just pulled another Twizzler from the pack and now he’s waving it at me like he’s teasing me or something.

  We’re at Maggie’s waiting for the girls to show up. There’s a lot of kids hanging out here, since it’s still pretty warm to be a few days before Halloween. And because the place is sort of crowded, him waving a Twizzler at me is so not cool.

  “Now, that’s your hormones talking. See, you just haven’t gotten close enough to her yet.”

  He might have a point there.

  “You been close enough to Sasha?”

  “Man, I don’t kiss and tell. But I’ll tell you this, some nights I do go home and can’t get her out of my head. Like the smell of her hair,” he groans. “Drives me freakin’ nuts.”

  I just nod because I know the feeling. “Wonder what kind of shampoo they use.”

  “Don’t know, but if you find out we should go out and buy a bottle, keep it in our house like a memento.” Twan laughs.

  I join him because that’s just silly.

  “You think she still thinks about Franklin?” I ask.

  Twan shrugs. “Don’t think about the exes, man. That’ll mess your head up. Just worry about how you can make her happy.”

  I nod in agreement but I can’t help it. Every time I see Krystal I think of Franklin. It’s weird, I know, and probably borderline insecure. Still, the guy did just disappear into the forest that day, like one minute he was there and the next he sort of disintegrated. I can’t shake the feeling that he’s got to be somewhere, and probably somewhere close. Kind of like waiting for the other shoe to drop. I can’t stand that feeling.

  But for the sake of this discussion I shrug, too.

  “Seen Pace and Mateo around?” Twan asks and I tense.

  I hadn’t seen them since that night coming from Sasha’s house. That was about three weeks ago. They weren’t in gym class but I tried not to make a big deal out of it. Hoping that maybe good luck is finally shining my way.

  “Nah.”

  “You should have told me they were hassling you. I would have handled it for you.”

  Great, now even the one guy at school I think I can hang with thinks I need his protection.

  “I can handle them.”

  “You sure did in the cafeteria that day.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Yeah.” Twan nods and
finishes his last Twizzler. “So what really happened that day?”

  “Just fed up, I guess. Decided to strike first for once.”

  “I see where you’re coming from,” Twan says. “But I was talking about the windows. How’d you make them all blow out like that?”

  “What are you talking about?” The question seems idiotic, since I know exactly what he’s talking about. And that’s exactly the look that Twan gives me. He’s let his hair grow out a little, so his usually close-cropped cut now looks like he could probably get corn rows or something. The one thing about Twan is that he pays a lot of attention to his appearance. Something I never did until Krystal started paying attention to me. So Twan’s hair is neatly combed, his jeans are pressed, not creased, and his button-down shirt is also pressed and not so big it looks like another guy could get in there with him.

  I took a page from his book this morning and put on my best jeans. Well, I have a couple pairs of really good jeans, still hanging in my closet near the back because the old ones seemed just fine. Anyway, this morning I put on the better ones and wore a black T-shirt tucked in, with a button-down shirt that I didn’t button over the top of it. Since I cut my hair last month I found that I really like being able to see clearly out of my eyes without having to move stray locks away. So I keep it cut now and even add a little of some product my dad uses to give it shine. I think I look pretty decent. But Twan isn’t interested in how I look just now.

  “Man, I saw you look at those windows and they all broke out. Now are you gonna sit here and tell me you didn’t do that?”

  “I’m not telling you anything,” I say because I don’t want to tell him about my power. But something tells me he’s not going to let it go.

  “Okay, then let me just put something else out there. How did Franklin get in that water a couple months back? And where is he now?”

  “I thought you said I should stop thinking about Franklin.”

  He crumbles the Twizzler paper and looks at me seriously. “I know there’s something going on between you and the girls. I’ve been around you guys a lot these past few months and I’ve been noticing a lot of strange things.”

  “Strange like what?”

  “Like how Krystal stares off into space likes she’s seeing something nobody else does, then one of you asks her what ‘they’ said. And how Lindsey can sometimes finish a person’s thoughts. At first I thought maybe I was just reading into things, you know, trying to fit in with you guys, since I’m going out with Sasha. But lately, even she’s been acting strange. Not to mention people around Lincoln are just disappearing.”

  Oh, man, Twan has been thinking about this a lot. And he actually has very good points. I did kind of worry when Sasha first started seeing him and they both were hanging out with all of us that he’d hear or see some things he shouldn’t. And now here it is.

  “Why didn’t you ask Sasha about this?”

  He shrugs. “Figured I’d get a more honest answer from a guy.”

  And there it was, the unspoken challenge. If I don’t give him an answer that sounds believable enough he’ll hate me and keep thinking something’s going on. If I do tell him he’ll think I’m crazy and maybe even his girlfriend, too. Doesn’t seem like there’s a win in this situation at all.

  “It’s complicated,” I say, hoping he’ll let it go at that.

  Twan moved his wrist, looking down at his watch. “Way I see it, we have about another ten minutes before the girls walk through that door. That gives you ten minutes to sum up all the complicated stuff so I know what’s going on around me from now on when we’re together.”

  I shouldn’t tell him. I know this, and yet I feel like he’s got a valid point. If he’s going to be hanging out with us—and from the way he and Sasha look at each other, he is—then he should know what type of craziness we’re attracting. Because just like he was there when Franklin fell into the water, and when the birds attacked at Sasha’s house, he’ll probably be around for something else.

  Then again, what if telling him somehow involves him? I really don’t want to be responsible for anyone else getting hurt or going missing over something I don’t quite understand myself. In the end, the fact that I feel like it’s me against the girls, against the Darkness to save the world, wins out. It would be nice to have another view on this situation from a male perspective, and a strictly human perspective as well.

  “We’re not like everyone else,” I start.

  “‘We’ meaning, you, Lindsey and Krystal?”

  I shake my head. “‘We’ meaning, me, Lindsey, Krystal and Sasha.”

  If his face could grow anymore serious it did. He even sat up in his seat, leaning his elbows on the table. “What do you mean Sasha? How’s she different?”

  I clear my throat and put my elbows on the table just like him. Leaning over a little closer, I’m careful to lower my voice. “You have to promise this doesn’t go beyond us. I mean, your crew can’t know. Your family can’t know. Nobody. Deal?”

  I wait while he contemplates.

  “Deal.”

  “See this?” The sleeves to my shirt aren’t buttoned so it takes about two seconds to pull it up so he can see my M.

  “Sasha has that same birthmark,” he says.

  I nod. “We all do.”

  “Why?”

  I don’t really know how to explain this. I mean, I could just say it but it sounds surreal even in my head. “We have these supernatural powers. Something about the weather and extra energy during the months we were conceived. So anyway, we can do things.” That sounded okay, I guess.

  Twan’s looking like I just spoke another language. “Say that again.”

  But I don’t get a chance to because in the next instant the girls come in, Sasha pushing her way onto the bench next to Twan, Krystal sliding in beside me. Lindsey pulls a chair from another table to the end and smiles.

  Yeah, she’s really smiling, something I haven’t seen in a couple of weeks. Glancing down real quick before she has the chance to scoot all the way under the table, I see she’s wearing black capris, but her shirt is bright yellow.

  “Hey, guys,” she says, looking from me to Twan.

  Then comes the frown. It’s a little wrinkle in her forehead that draws her eyes closed a little tighter so that I can barely see them now.

  “What did you do?” she asks, looking at me.

  “Nothing,” I say quickly, then look away from her. But I think it’s too late.

  “What’s going on?” Krystal asks.

  Twan looks away from me to Sasha. “Jake and I were just talking,” he says, but he’s looking at her like she’s just grown another head.

  Aw, man, this is going to be so bad.

  “Talking about what?” Sasha asks slowly. She looks to me then back to Twan.

  “He told him,” Lindsey says sitting back in her chair with a slight thump.

  “Told him what?” Krystal says. “What did you tell him, Jake?”

  Twan looks at me and I look at him, knowing its hopeless. So I shrug. “I told him about us.” Better to just fess up since Miss Mind Reader over there already took the lid off the proverbial can of worms. I guess technically I did that when I used my power in front of half the school. But that’s just being technical and I’m not going that far into admission right now.

  “No,” Sasha whispers moving slightly away from Twan.

  “Jake! You didn’t,” Krystal sighs then looks over at Twan.

  “Wait a minute,” Twan says. “He didn’t just go all true confessions on me. I asked him what was going on with you guys. I’m not blind you know. I’ve seen and heard some things these last few months. None of you were that good at keeping this little secret.”

  Sasha’s shaking her head. “I didn’t want you to know.”

  “Why?” Twan asks her. He’s looking right at her now but she’s holding her head down. He touches her arm, rubbing until she looks up at him. “Why didn’t you want me to know?”

>   “Because now you’ll think I’m some kind of freak.”

  “I’ve always thought you were a pretty girl, Sasha. I still do,” he says and I hope as far as sweet talking goes that this line is a winner. If not, I’m going to be in the doghouse with Krystal and Lindsey and most definitely Sasha.

  “How much did you tell him, blabbermouth?” Lindsey says, still eyeing me.

  I swear it feels like this girl knows all my darkest secrets. I should start wearing black from head to toe just to be safe.

  “I only told him that we have powers because of the energy generated by the weather.”

  “So you can read minds?” Twan asks Lindsey, looking directly at her.

  “Yes,” she answers. “Sometimes.”

  “And you see things?” He directs his question to Krystal.

  She looks at me briefly, rolling her eyes when she turns away. “I can see and talk to spirits. I’m a medium.”

  Twan’s hand drops from Sasha’s arm.

  Sasha takes a deep breath, then shifts in her seat so she’s sort of facing Twan. “I can teleport.”

  “What’s that?” he asks, looking as if his mind is definitely having a hard time taking it all in.

  “If I wanted to I could disappear from this spot and reappear outside or any other place I think of. I can also project myself to another place while my physical body stays here.”

  With one of his hands Twan wipes his face. “And you? You blow out windows and beat up bullies?”

  I chuckle at that, reaching desperately for the easy conversation Twan and I were having before all the supernatural stuff came up. “I have super strength.”

  “He’s telekinetic, too, aren’t you, Jake?” Lindsey says, folding her arms across her chest.

  See, I knew she was reading my mind. Gotta make a real effort not to think about Char…the other stuff when I’m around her. “I can move things with my mind, yes. I’m still a little rough at that, but it’s definitely growing.”

  “We’re all growing, our powers, I mean,” Krystal says. “It’s like we’re getting prepared.”