by O'Brian Gunn
“Dad?”
Charles suppresses a sigh. He recognizes the tone in his son’s voice. “Not now, Miguel.” His low words are snatched away by the fitful breeze.
“But, dad, I just want to know when we—”
He jerks his head down from heaven. “Miguel, I said not now.”
Miguel says no more.
It’s then that Charles notices the man with glasses wearing jeans and a pullover leaning on the back gate as he watches the kites.
“Miguel, go inside. Now.”
His son opens his mouth to protest, but sees the man on the fence, now waggling his hand in a wave. He drops the kite string and hurries inside the house.
The man unlocks the gate and saunters into the backyard as soon as the door shuts behind Miguel. He tugs his sleeves up to his elbows and beams at Charles as he stoops down to scoop up the kite string as it’s dragged along the grass.
“Wonderful weather for this, huh?” He grins broadly as he watches the kite.
“That’s the reason we’re out here, Damon.”
“So I see.”
The wind whips.
“My boy wanted to ask me how long we would be staying here.”
“You’ll stay here until we decide what to do with you.”
“The world already thinks the Johnsons are dead, what else do you want with us?”
String unravels. “You and your family are a loose string, Charles. Know what happens to kites with loose strings?” He looks over at the other man. “They fly away.”
“We agreed to come to the U.S. for your organization’s ideals. We’ve helped you with your experiment, you can let us go.”
The side of Damon’s mouth curls. “You helped us plant the seed. Now we have to start reaping. And remember, when it came time for you and your family to be brought in, you struggled. You were going to run as soon as you saw our vehicle parked outside your house.”
“We weren’t ready to go back.” His Northern speech pattern chips and a Ukrainian accent trickles through.
“That proves to me that you aren’t a man of a your word. Nor are you a man who accepts his fate.” He tugs on the kite string.
Charles drops his arms and drags the kite down. “I’ve heard stories about Americans and your secret organizations.” He adjusts his American accent back into place. “You don’t seem to be very keen on keeping your promises either.”
“Everybody’s got a knife up their sleeve.” The kite loops once, twice in the air. “Oh, nice.” A look of glee. “Did you know a massive riot recently broke out in your old backyard? Right on Lynord Street. Four confirmed deaths and several more injuries. All because someone broke into your house, scooped your brains out, and slit your wrists. Supposedly.”
“Isn’t that what you wanted?” Charles’ kite spirals back down to the ground.
“A result is all that Libera Mentis Machina wanted. I’m just a lab assistant, but I know the lead scientists would have been pleased with anything.” The kite blocks his view of the sun as he winds the string around the spool. “My associates and I only want to study the shared psychology of society. Not our fault if they kill each other in the streets. Something tells me those people were just waiting for something like this to happen so they could get all that rage and bile out.” The kite settles on the green grass. “You and your family still have your powers, just make each other happy.” He lifts a shoulder and drops it as he politely hands the kite to Charles.
“Our powers don’t work like that.”
Damon knits his brows together. “Oh. That’s a shame.” He claps Charles on the arm. “Well, see what you can do about Mrs. Geller next door. Her husband just passed.”
Charles watches as Damon opens the gate, closes it, and locks it back before throwing him a friendly wave and a charming smile.
The man looks at the kite in his hands. He clutches it tightly before snapping the fragile wooden frame. Charles Johnson goes inside to his family.
EPISODE SEVEN: Take It Back
“As with several of his other paintings, Gamez blends two seemingly unrelated events and transforms them into something closely tied together.” Leo steps to the right and points at the painting. “Here we have a man in a grocery store reading the label on a carton of ice cream. And on the other side we see a couple walking hand-in-hand with the woman smiling as she looks at her companion.” He draws his attention to the tour group, a miniscule smile etched on his face. “What’s the connection?” A pause. “Anyone?”
“Both the ice cream and the man go straight to the woman’s thighs.”
A ripple of laughter suffused with a few disdainful glares.
Leo smiles, drawing his hands behind him just as his power tic releases a warble of force. He manages not to wince this time. “Not quite, but you are close. Here, Gamez is saying that deciding whether or not to buy a pint of ice cream is no different than deciding whether to be with someone who you may or may not even love. Choosing to buy the ice cream may not be as dire of a choice as choosing to love or not to love, but both of them require equal amounts of consideration. Is it worth it? Will it make me happy? Will I regret it in the morning? Is this really the one that I want?”
“Will it taste good with chocolate syrup and cherries?”
Another gaggle of guffaws and shocked expressions.
“Riiight.” Leo draws the word out. “Gamez is looking for some kind of reaction, almost like one you would get in science. Things should be moving, people should be pondering why one thing happened instead of another.
“Okay, I think that’s enough handholding for now. If you’d like, you can explore the rest of the art and exhibitions scattered throughout the museum. I know many of you are interested in Sammy Doherty’s ‘Orion’s Fall’ collection, which is located in the northeast section of the third level. If you have any questions, feel free to ask me or anyone in a blue vest. Thank you.”
A round of applause sings out before the group fractures.
Addie walks up next to him with her hands behind her back, banana curls bobbing and swaying as she smiles and thanks visitors. “Another excellent job, Leo. You’ve really developed quite the knack for this.”
“Thanks. I just stopped worrying about sounding like an idiot and focused instead on keeping the visitors interested and informed.”
“You don’t always get eaten when you throw yourself to the wolves.” She pats his arm and follows the throng of people heading for the elevator.
Leo walks down the hallway, greeting other employees as he passes, stopping for a quick word with Helen in the New Artists room. A voice turns him around.
“Does it hurt?”
Clint is changing the bag of the trashcan in the hallway.
Leo stops, considers, and slides his hands into his pockets. “Does what hurt?”
The other man looks up, well-worn cap casting a shadow across the facial hair on his lined face. “Bendin’ yourself out of shape like you do.” His fingers flutter fluidly as he ties the bag. “You walk around grinnin’ and jokin’, showboatin’ like you happy here.”
Leo regards him. “And what makes you think I’m not?”
“The way you look when no one else is lookin’.” Shrug. “People ignore me. I see stuff others don’t.” He leans the bulging bag against the wall and pulls out a roll of trash bags from his back pocket. “You look at all that still art and I study the movin’, breathin’ livin’ art.” A wink. “Now that’s organic for ya.”
Leo watches as he peels the bag open and snaps it down, filling it with air as it parachutes open. “And what is this canvas saying to you?”
He stuffs the bag in the trashcan. “You’re forcin’ yourself to be happy here. Maybe there’s someone in your life that you want to please. In order to please them, you gotta please yourself...or at least pretend to.” The top of the trash bag is tugged tight around the rim and tied into a knot. “Still ain’t answered my question yet, son.”
“Which one?” Leo scratche
s under his eye with a thumbnail.
“The one I asked when you first started workin’ here.” He slides the trashcan back into place. “Who are you...little mixed boy?”
Jaw muscles flex. “I’m not a boy.”
The other man belts out a splintered guffaw. “Still showboatin’. I know a wall when I see one; thrown up plenty o’ ‘em myself.” He lifts his cap up only to tug it back down. “When you gonna tear those walls down, Leo, let people see the real you?”
Silence swirls.
Leo finally speaks. “Do you know why I put up with your shit, Clint? Why I stop to listen to every ignorant thing that comes out of your mouth?”
Clint waits, blinking. The tip of his tongue flicks out.
“Because I need your steaming shit. I need your adolescent accusations. I need to look at you and the dumb expression on your face every day as you try to bait me.” A slow smile. “Thank you, Clint. You’re giving me exactly what I need.”
Belwine Park is surrounded.
The perimeter of the park is surrounded by Dominion City, buildings, bustle, and Broadway Street barely held at bay by the walking path. The grounds of the park are surrounded by tents, booths, and kiosks. The center stage is surrounded by a swarm of people, more streaming in by the second as a middle-aged woman steps up to the podium and speaks into the microphone.
“My name is Joanna Banks, and I’d like to start off by saying thanks to all of you for attending the Johnson Rally.” A deep breath. “The catalyst for this rally occurred three days ago when a riot sparked just five blocks from where we’re standing. The cause of the riot wasn’t the tragic death of the Johnson family, it wasn’t anger, or prejudice, or misunderstanding. It was silence.”
She looks out at the audience.
“Silence is deadly. It’s a poison that burns through us before we even know it’s there. Alpha-Omegas and non-powered humans have to start communicating with one another. We can no longer glare at each other from opposite sides of the street. We can’t support each other in secret, afraid of what our neighbors will think of us if they knew how we really feel. It’s your right to speak against just as it’s your right to love and accept. I’d like to open the floor now and get a discussion going. There’s no specific topic, I just want you to come up and let us know how you feel about the way the world, your world, is changing around you. Because no matter what you think or how little you care, this. Does. Affect. You. Who would like to come on stage?”
Giorgio leans against a tree, standing in the deep shadow cast by the canopy of leaves and branches. The sun sets to his left, golden half-sphere peeking out between the towers of the Oleander Hotel and The Lavender condominiums. He watches as a middle-aged man with shaggy hair and red-tinted glasses makes his way on stage. The man accepts the microphone from Joanna’s small hands into his own, turning enough to let Giorgio and the rest of the audience see his palsied left arm slightly twisted and curled toward his chest.
“My name is Freddy, and I’m a freak.” A few uncomfortable bubbles of laughter froth up in the audience. Freddy slightly ticks the corner of his mouth up. “People often look at me with pity or veiled disgust in their eyes, and they do that because that’s how they’ve been programmed to feel.” He takes a breath and rubs at his palsied limb. “Anyone who doesn’t look like everyone else is often automatically pitied. I don’t need your pity, but you may need mine.” He places the microphone on the podium. Then Freddy disappears.
The audience cries out in communal confusion.
“I’M OVER HERE!”
Heads whirl as one. Freddy waves to the crowd from the information booth fifty feet from the stage. He vanishes.
“HERE NOW.” The row of food tents one-hundred feet from the stage.
“Up here.” The words spill from the speakers. Freddy is back on stage. “When I said I was a freak, I didn’t mean because of my gimp arm...well, I did a little, I guess.”
More laughter that Freddy joins in with this time.
“I’m a guy who can barely move his left arm and has a top speed just above Mach two.” He waves to the crowd as he ambles off stage.
Joanna shakes his hand. “Thank you, Freddy!”
“Adam? Adam, I—I think I may need your help. I shouldn’t have done it, but I did and now it’s—I thought I could do this, but I can’t. I just wanted it all to stop. Please...Call me when you get this.”
Bisset’s eyes slip to and fro. She listens. She waits. She watches.
No Seraph.
No The Dragoness.
The empty pill bottle and the phone slide from her hands. The bottle hits the floor with a thock, bounces, rolls. She can almost feel all eight capsules churning in her gut, blocking the voices in her head and administering peace to her mind.
The smile starts out as a twitter, the laugh a burble. Both swell into full conception. She slides off the toilet seat, clutching her sides as laughter pulls and pushes at her muscles. Tears ease down her stretched cheeks. She rolls back and forth on the floor.
Unbridled delight.
Bisset opens her mouth to say something, seals her lips, and shakes her head. She stands from the floor and looks at herself in the mirror. Her reflection looks back. One face. Her true face. Her true self. No ivory feathers, no golden-green eyes. No perfection. No imperfection. Just...
Bisset.
Her hand quivers up to the reflective surface, reaching tentatively. She touches her lips, her nose, slides her fingers across her cheeks and curls. A bittersweet burst of laughter and tears. A deep breath flows into her mouth.
She reaches over and twists on the hot water to the shower before starting to disrobe. She steps in and shuts the sliding door and lets the water spray over her body. Steam reels and rises around her, surrounding her. She enjoys the sounds of silence pounding her head while the water pounds her flesh as she suds her body up, rinses off, steps out, and towels off.
“So this is what it feels like to be in your own headspace.” The whispered words ring hollow in the small bathroom. “This is what it feels like not to have voices in your ear telling you things you don’t want to hear.”
No response.
“This is who you are, Bisset. Not an angel sent to save everyone and not some seductress created to cause suffering. You’re a normal, ordinary woman.”
Her stomach growls.
“A normal woman who needs some food.”
She stops toweling off her legs.
No response.
No. Response.
No.
Response.
She swallows the small lump in her throat as blood pumps gently in her ears.
She suddenly feels very much alone.
Leo wipes at his mouth as he exits the cafeteria, tossing his napkin and sandwich wrapper in the trash as he pulls his tie from over his shoulder. He pushes the door open and steps out into fresh air, a setting sun, and the soft distant sounds of Century Heights.
He looks up at the architecture of the Dominion City Art Museum and can’t help but smile at the slanted angles, curves, and sharp lines that shape the unusual seven-story building.
He reaches into his pocket to pull out his lip balm when he snaps his fingers, remembering something. He backtracks and takes the path to the Abstract Building instead of the path to the Sculpting Square. He punches the code into the keypad and walks in.
A flicker of movement
He stops and softly walks backward to the room where the employee lockers are housed. He peeks inside the pool of murk and watches as Clint yanks open a combination lock and peels the door open. He reaches and rummages inside, tip of his tongue worming across his thin lips. A crooked smile twitches across his mouth as he pulls out a woman’s wallet, peeling it open and taking a few bills.
He jumps when Leo clears his throat.
Leo snaps the light on and watches Clint fumble and drop the purse. Bits of paper, tissues, tampons, and a clinking change purse spill out.
They both stand still, s
taring.
“This is the part in the novel where your character makes up a dumb excuse for why it only looks like he’s stealing.”
Clint starts to reach down for the fallen purse, stops. “Why? I am stealin’, ain’t no use lyin’ about it.” A jittery chuckle. “Lyin’ is your job.”
“At least I have one.”
The janitor takes a step forward, wad of cash still in his hand. “Com’on, man. You know these one percent mutha fuckas ain’t go’ give us nothin’. We gotta take what we want. That’s real affirmative action.”
Leo puffs out a wry laugh. “Earlier today you referred to me as ‘little mixed boy.’ Now we’re working class brothers in arms?”
A dismissive wave. “I was just teasin’ you, tryin’ to make you tough. You may be mixed, biracial, mulatto, or whatever, but you white as a snowflake.” A shuffling step. “Please don’t tell Addie you saw me in here. I need this job.” He lifts his cap up and tugs it back down in a nervous gesture. “Please, Leo.”
Leo looks up in the upper right corner. Looks back.
Clint wrings his thin hands together. “You said yourself that you needed me and the shit I put you through, you said you ‘preciate it. If I get fired, who’s gonna give you that, huh?”
Leo blinks and clears his throat.
“Come. On. Man. Pleeeaaasse.” A finger bobs at the row of lockers. “That was Janae’s purse I took money from. You know how that bitch is, snobbier than a housecat.”
Leo doesn’t respond. He looks at the bills peeking out from the side pocket of Clint’s work pants.
“Ohoh, this? This is from Ira’s purse. You know she just got a raise, so she can stand to lose a few dollars. I ddn’t take all o’ their money, just a few bills so I can take the bus home and buy my dinner. Can you believe I been workin’ here for four years and they still ain’t give me a raise?” His hand wipes down his mouth.
“I’m not even going to try to follow that line of logic.”
Clint’s twisted grin droops. “So whatchu gonna do?”
Leo regards him for a moment. Then the turns on his heel and walks out of the door.