Apokalypsis Book Three

by Kate Morris

  Pictures in frames revealed the family again, but the room seemed lived-in. Not exactly lived-in, but still inhabited because it was clean, no dust on furniture. It was impeccably clean, though. Not a single article of clothing on the floor or an item out of place, and the bed was made. The walls were covered in a mustard yellow, floral print reproduction wallpaper with matching custom drapery.

  “Hey,” he said, startling her from the doorway behind her.

  Wren’s hand immediately went to the spot under her left breast. “Oh, sorry. I got lost.”

  “No problem,” he said without threat or menace in his voice. “Ready to study?”

  “Is this your parents’ room?”

  “Was,” he answered honestly.

  She repeated in question form, “Was?”

  “They’re…gone. Ready?”

  Either he was lying and doing so very well, or the sadness in his brown eyes was the truth of the matter. Did his brother have custody of him? She nodded and allowed him to usher her out the door. Wren avoided making contact with his body and squeezed tightly against the frame to do so. He closed the door behind them and led her back to his room.

  It was decorated differently. There was football paraphernalia everywhere; trophies, plaques, awards, and actual footballs, some that were signed. The room was painted in an historically accurate manner in the reverse trim way with dark gray trim around the windows and crown molding and a cream color on the walls. It was sizable, too. Her bedroom in the trailer would fit in the space he had for his desk.

  “This house is huge,” she mused aloud.

  “Yeah, it was my parents’ dream to renovate an historical home.”

  “Did they do most of it themselves?”

  He nodded. “My brothers and I helped. But, yeah, it was mostly them. My dad hired a designer to make sure it was done right, though. He was funny about stuff like that.”

  “Hm,” she remarked.

  “Let’s get busy,” he said. “This is gonna be a tough project, and he said it would be ten percent of our first quarter grade.”

  She nodded and took out of her messenger bag a notebook. “I’ve done most of it already. It wasn’t that hard of an assignment.”

  “I did a lot of work on it, too,” he said, surprising her. He must’ve read her shock because he followed that up with, “Like I said, football doesn’t define me.”

  She nodded but didn’t say anything. It sure seemed to define him at school. Everyone talked about the star quarterback- what’s his name- like he was the chosen one. They worshipped him. There were even signs around town with his face on them. Well, with him in his football uniform on them.

  “Let’s exchange notebooks and see what we’ve done and compare ideas,” he suggested and offered his.

  Wren was slightly more hesitant. She also had other stuff in her notebook.

  “Sure,” she said, flipping it open to the exact page of her notes. “Just that one and the next three pages. That’s all. No other pages in there.”

  “Okay,” he said as if picking up on her unsure mood. “Here, you can sit at the desk. I’ll sit on my bed.”

  His bedroom was relatively neat and organized for a guy. His bed was bigger than hers, too, not a tiny twin bed. Of course, he probably wouldn’t have fit very well on a twin with his Hulkish size.

  “Mind if I listen to music while we do this? Helps me concentrate,” he asked.

  She just shrugged and nodded. He turned his iPod on to a rock station that was playing mellower tunes at this hour. She recognized a band from the 80s and the song.

  They worked in tandem reading the other’s notes until he perked up and said, “Okay, I got your meaning here, but on page three, I caught a mistake.”

  This garnered her attention. “What mistake?”

  “This equation doesn’t prove this chemical reaction. It busts the theory.”

  “No, it doesn’t,” she protested and rose to walk over and see where he thought he found a mistake.

  “It does. You can’t take two out of the Sulfur element to prove it. See?” he indicated in her notes as she sat next to him.

  “Yes, it does. If you remove the compounded Magnesium, it would,” she argued her point.

  They went around and around until Wren felt her blood pressure beginning to rise. He was starting to piss her off.

  “No, you’re wrong,” he said firmly. “Sorry, but you are. You can look at me like that all you want,” he said with a half-grin. Screw him. Golden Boy wasn’t right, and he sure as hell didn’t know her well enough to state that she was giving him a ‘look’.

  “Mr. Sorenson wants the theory to be backed up by the equation. This just doesn’t prove that. It would if you used Sulfide.”

  “Yes, it…”

  Her retort was interrupted by the radio issuing a series of beeps as if they were reporting a tornado warning or something. She’d heard that once before when they’d lived in Oklahoma for a few months. This one, however, ended up signaling the beginning of a new program, not a tornado warning. That was stupid. They shouldn’t be allowed to do that. It could panic people.

  “Oh, sorry. It’s a talk radio show now. It starts at eight o’clock every night. Sometimes I listen to it.”

  He walked over to turn it down a little, and Wren followed. The intro music was speed metal followed by more of the emergency alert beeps, then a host’s deep voice.

  “Anyway, let me show you what I think we could do to tweak your equation to make it work,” he offered, earning a well-deserved glare from her.

  She waited while he worked on the formula, bending over and writing it out in his own notebook on a new page.

  “…and tonight, on the show,” the radio host was saying, “a special guest who would like to remain unnamed. He’s a scientist working on this new flu bug, though, so you might want to listen up, folks.”

  They cut to a commercial. Advertising dollars were apparently more important.

  On Golden Boy’s desk was a smaller framed picture of his parents. It made her wonder where they were and if something bad had happened to his family, which made her feel sorry for him if it were a worst-case scenario type situation. Then what he said next didn’t make her feel so sorry.

  “See?” he said, prompting her to look at his work. “Now, it checks. You were on the right track. You were just wrong.”

  She rolled her eyes. “So, you’re a smart jock. Is that it?”

  He shrugged his wide shoulders. “Nah, I just like science and math. And I also can’t screw up my scholarship to OSU.”

  “Ohio State?” she asked and got a nod. “Hm.”

  “You do that a lot. Did you know that?”

  She frowned, “Do what?”

  “Answer questions with non-answers and evasive ‘hm’s’.”

  This really pissed her off. Not the fact that he was right, but the fact that he’d figured something out about her. Nobody had ever done that before. She had to get him off her tail.

  “And I’m supposed to do what? Tell everyone I meet my whole entire life story in like the first five minutes after I’ve been introduced?” she asked. Then she added so that he’d never question her again, so he’d avoid her, so he’d drop the questioning. It burned in the back of her throat before she spat the words laced with pure venom, “Tell them all about me? Is that what you do, Golden Boy? Tell everyone how you’re Mr. Star Quarterback on some lame high school football team, Golden Boy? Pretend you’re really smart and not some dumb jock? Like that’s gonna get you bonus points with me? Is that what you do? Brag it up and girls jump right in the sack without a second thought? You put your smooth moves out there and score off the field, too?”

  He looked away quickly and rubbed at his face as if tired while his mouth formed a sardonic smile. “Wow, you’re a total bitch, aren’t you?”

  Wren’s eyes widened, and her mouth fell open. That never happened. Ever. Nobody, not even adults had ever stood up to her when she cut them low to get th
em off her tail and deflect their attention away. She blinked hard one time.

  “No,” she ground out.

  “‘No’ with your accent? Did you pick that up in California?”

  Shit! Whenever she lost her temper or got super tired, her accent reared its ugly head. She tried so hard to suppress it, hide it, cover it. Bury it and everything that had to do with it under a thick layer of deceit and secrecy.

  Her response was a whispered, “What?”

  “The w ord ‘what’ only has one syllable. You say it and other words like ‘no’ as if they’ve got two syllables.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  He laughed. “Okay. Sure, you don’t. Or should I say doe-weren’t?”

  Her cheeks felt like they were on fire. He had her stressed. It was making it more difficult to concentrate on her American accent.

  “I don’t do that.”

  “Doe-weren’t is not a word,” he imitated, using her accent to prove it to her.

  “You’re an ass,” she said. “I’m not working with you anymore.”

  “Good, you’ll just cause me to get a lower grade anyway. And ‘ass’ doesn’t have an ‘r’ in it.”

  She glared up at him as she snatched her notebook from him and shoved it into her bag. Her chest was heaving. She’d never had this problem before. People left her alone, avoided the weird new girl who was mean and nasty and off-putting. That was the whole point of being a bitch all the time. But this boy was rude and confrontational and didn’t seem at all intimidated by her. He was physically and also now mentally intimidating. Plus, he hurt her feelings.

  “Fuck you,” she seethed in his face, getting a mocking grin of superiority.

  “Fuck you more, princess,” he taunted, his eyes flashing. He placed both fisted hands on his hips.

  “I’m outta’ here,” she announced and sped from his room. She grumbled under her breath, “Stupid fuckstick.”

  When she got to the first floor, the front door wouldn’t open. She panicked. He came up behind her and turned the heavy brass deadbolt he must’ve engaged.

  “Don’t let this hit you in the arse on the way out, sweetheart,” he imitated again and swung open the door.

  Once she was through, he slammed the door and locked it again.

  She growled and fast walked to her car. When she was inside, she screamed her rage and pounded her palms on the steering wheel.

  “Asshole!”

  Wren drove around for a good twenty minutes trying to calm down. She blared the radio, swore, sang loudly, and went through a fast-food drive-thru and ordered a large Coca Cola soda. God, she missed smoking a cig when she was in a mood, but Jamie found them about a year ago and threw them out. Then she was in big trouble. After a little longer, she decided she was calm enough to manage her temper.

  The whole way home, she contemplated telling Uncle Jamie about their confrontation. When she got there, he was waiting up, which made her feel bad because she knew he worked a very early shift.

  “Sorry I’m late,” she said.

  “You’re not that late. How’d it go?”

  “Oh, um,” she stalled and looked at the bags under his eyes. He looked forty-five or even fifty tonight, even though he was only thirty-six. “Fine. It went fine. No worries.”

  He almost seemed as if he weren’t going to believe her, but then he rose, double-checked the locks on the door, and said, “Okay, goodnight. Get some rest.”

  “Yep,” she answered and went to bed, as well.

  She couldn’t sleep, though. Her mind was on that boy, whose name she didn’t even know. What a fuckstick! He had no right to pry like he had. This could mean they’d have to move again. She wanted to stay at least until she was out of high school. That was supposed to be the arrangement this time. Changing to a new school every few months was so annoying. It wasn’t the meeting new friends and all that. It was just that she wanted to put down roots, even if it meant only for a few months to finish out school. Now Golden Boy and his damn nosy snooping could ruin everything.

  Chapter Five

  He’d tossed and turned all night, despite the hard weight training and cardio the previous day. It wasn’t that he couldn’t sleep or wasn’t worn out enough to. It was that damn new girl.

  Dragging his butt out of bed this morning was hard. Elijah showered and dressed in jeans and a long-sleeved black t-shirt that he topped with a tee that Alex bought him supporting the Second Amendment. He couldn’t wait until he was old enough to buy a gun. The legal age was twenty-one. It changed a few decades ago, which had been something that had irritated their father. He wasn’t much of a gun owner, only had a shotgun, but he just didn’t like the government interfering with people’s rights. Wearing shirts like this was against the school’s rules, but not for him. They’d let it slide. He could probably walk in bare ass naked, and nobody would say anything.

  “I’ll be working some longer hours for the next few weeks,” Alex announced over scrambled eggs and sausage that he’d prepared for them this morning.

  “That sucks,” Elijah commented, still out of sorts from the new girl cussing him out like some dude with a sailor’s mouth. Some of the guys on the team didn’t even talk like that. Heck, he hardly ever talked like that. And it was all because she was wrong. And also, because he’d pointed out her accent, something he was pretty sure she was trying to cover up. Why? And what the hell was a fuckstick?

  “No, it’s good. It’ll help us bankroll some dough.”

  “I still think I could get a part-time job, man,” he complained for the thousandth time.

  “No, the school covers all your expenses. Don’t worry about working. I just want you concentrating on your game and workouts.”

  He tuned out a bit as his brother droned the same spiel he’d heard so many times.

  “Elijah!” Alex said forcefully, drawing his attention back. “Hear me? No girls.”

  “I know. What the heck? I already know that.”

  His brother’s eyes searched his as if trying to figure something out. Elijah looked down at his food and began inhaling it. He didn’t need Alex worrying about whether or not he was staying focused. Besides, other than that damn new girl, he was.

  “Homecoming dance is coming up,” he mentioned, although school dances weren’t really his scene. Since he was now the starting quarterback, it would be expected of him to show- he was supposed to represent the school in the highest degree, to the highest standards and set an example. He went to homecoming in the ninth grade with a girl. The whole night had been miserable. He’d spent it hanging out with Jeremy instead while their dates were in the bathroom piling on more makeup and then ogling the senior boys. He hadn’t been to a school dance since. Now, he was the one being ogled. It was not a spectator sport he enjoyed.

  “Homecoming,” Alex repeated and sat quietly while he thought about it. “Well, I’m sure your coaches and the school boosters will want you to go.”

  “Yeah, but what if I didn’t? I’m not really into dancing and crowds and all that.”

  Alex nodded and took a bite of eggs. “Doesn’t matter. You probably should put on a show. It’s expected. They’ll probably crown you homecoming king. And prom king and whatever other bullshit traditions they’ve got. I took Wendy Levy to the prom.” His eyebrows jerked up twice. “Quite the night.” Then, at Elijah’s frown, cleared his voice and said, “But don’t you do that. Just the dance and home.”

  “Damn, guess I should’ve taken that free ride to St. Ignatius up north,” he joked, making his brother laugh. “Probably wouldn’t have to worry about dances.”

  “Nuns and church in the middle of the school day? No thanks. I wouldn’t recommend it having done it in middle school.”

  Elijah laughed. “I’m sure. How many rulers did those old biddies break on your knuckles?”

  “Made ‘em tougher,” Alex joshed and flexed his fingers into a fist. “I hit ‘em with a hammer at work, I just laugh.”

  “Yeah, right,”
Elijah mocked. “Probably cry like a little girl. Anyway, I really don’t want to go to some dumb school dance, though.”

  “When is it?”

  “I think Jackson High School’s is the third week of October, so ours is probably the second.”

  “Just a few weeks from now,” his brother confirmed, getting a nod from Elijah. “You’d better ask a girl to go pretty soon. I’m sure they’re all just waiting to accept their boyfriends’ invites until they see who you’re asking, QB.”

  He rolled his eyes and groaned. “Greaaat.”

  “Privilege has its perks, my brother,” Alex teased, knowing he didn’t want to go to the dance.

  “It’s kind of embarrassing most of the time,” he admitted.

  “Don’t worry. You’ll get used to it. Just stay humble,” Alex advised. “And if all goes as I think it will- and how your coaches think it will- you’ll make QB at OSU in your sophomore year. Then you’ll really have to be careful. You think the jersey chasers are bad now? Just wait, little brother. You’ll have to watch out for who’s fake and who’s real. The girls in your high school just want to date you ‘cuz you’re the star of the school. The girls in college will be looking to lock that shit down. Make you their baby daddy and shit. I mean it. They’ll do it any way they can, including getting knocked up by you. It’s not often that a high school quarterback is talked about on ESPN. Just watch out for fake people. A lot of clingers out there, Elijah.”

  “Yeah,” he responded after his brother finished his what felt like a ten-minute soliloquy. It also made him think about that new girl. She wasn’t fake like the other ponytails. She was a bitch right to his face no problem. Definitely didn’t want to date him.