by M J Hutto
She sighed heavily and shrugged. “My mom kept us pretty isolated after the change. I barely remember my grandparents and you know Dad died right after I started showing signs of changing.
Besides, I don’t think you can base your assumptions on a sample size of two. We might not be the norm. But I guess if even one person didn’t change after the vaccine there might be some ‘splainin’ to do. Ya know?”
I walked to the living room and sat on my oversized fluffy red couch. I picked up the pillow I kept there and hugged it to me while I thought. Jaylin sat beside me and curled up with her knees pressed to her chest. I looked around the sparsely decorated room. The walls were white with murals painted on them. I had done one of a willow tree at dusk with lightening bugs floating around. Karmine had done a beach scene at sunset. Jaylin had done a cherry tree with blossoms floating into a placid lake at sunrise. Kent had done the final scene, the most intricate and beautiful; a couple dancing on a lake of stars under a full moon. You could almost feel the wind whispering through the branches and hear the music.
Kent was an artist; he’d taught us all to paint and draw to the best of our abilities. But he was phenomenal. Every time I looked at the scene my heart broke a little for Kent, who had gone into the family business rather than pursue his art and his heart. Father was less than supportive of the frillier parts of life. Kent had been slated to take over as CEO of VonSable Industries since before he was born. He handled it well and took long vacations where he painted and sketched. Some of his work, what he allowed, was sold on a site he and Vera had set up. The others he gave away with relish. I had some of his work in my home. The only paintings present in my home, actually.
I continued my perusal of my living space, trying to see it from an outsider’s view. Karmine and Kent came over, but I didn’t really see them as company. Jaylin either, for that matter, but she hadn’t seen the place in years.
I had a television and as long as I didn’t use it while I was working with chaos it survived just fine. Same with the microwave and landline phone. A computer might be okay, but they were a bit more expensive to replace if I forgot to unplug them when I started using magic and the circuits inside seemed a little more fragile, at least in my mind. I left things unplugged until I wanted to use them usually. Oddly, blenders seemed to be just fine during spelling, the stove and refrigerator too. Lucky me, I loved my microwave.
I pulled my feet onto the couch and reached for the throw I kept there. What to do? Was there anything to do? I decided there wasn’t. So, he could sense her, did it actually change anything? No. It might make him more suspicious but maybe not.
And maybe it was why he wanted to lead an investigation unit that treated Chaotian users fairly. Maybe he was just sensitive. It would probably require a little more investigation. I looked over at Jaylin, who was staring at me.
“I don’t think we need to do anything right now. I’ve got a lunch and afternoon planned with him tomorrow. I’ll try to get a feel for him and mine for more info. I should be able to do an aura read, maybe I can convince him to let me do a tarot read too. Either way,” I told her, nodding. “I’ll try to get a handle on him and figure out what his deal is. Any other ideas? You think he could be the one that kills me?”
Jaylin was shaking her head slowly before I finished speaking. She ran her hand up under her hair and massaged her neck and head. “I didn’t get that feeling but I don’t know if my intuition is the same now. I’m not sure I don’t have to be in the same physical space as someone else to capably read them, ya know.”
She was looking at Kents mural, her face was full of regret and her lower lip trembled slightly. “Kent looked happy. Is he happy?”
Jaylin hadn’t had much family to connect with. Her mother really had isolated them after Jaylin began changing. She and I had known each other since around the age of six when we first started going to “special camp.” She didn’t live in City 7, but City 6 which was pretty close. Her mother would let her spend part of the winter months, around my birthday, with us. She would come at other times too but always in the winter.
She became sort of an honorary sister to us, Kent her brother. We both mourned his passage into adulthood obligations and away from his passions. It was a sad day when he put away his pencils and brushes to pick up that briefcase. He had fallen into a depression; not the kind where you cry out and scream at the injustice of it but the quiet kind where you simply lose interest in everything you once might have loved. Our beautiful, bright, happy Kent was replaced with a living robot.
I shook myself out of that shared memory and nodded. “Vera woke him up. She won’t let him hide inside and she makes him paint or draw. She forces vacations and he spends them worshiping her. She was the first thing he had sketched in years. His art studio is littered with hundreds of sketches and paintings of Vera.
“A collector came in to see his work and offered him an obscene amount of money for them. He said no. Equally obscene amount for just two, one sketch and one painting, and still no. He is in such a better place. It’s like having the old Kent back. Only better because he has his person.”
Jaylin smiled beatifically, sunlight shining through from the kitchen creating a halo of light around her making her appear angelic. Or maybe she was. A light filled tear shined on her cheek briefly. “That is such wonderful news, Kable. I was so worried about him. I’m so glad he was able to climb back to himself and find someone that helped him do that.”
“Me too. Hey, what did you think of Victor?”
She leaned her head back onto the cushions and shrugged noncommittally. “I don’t know. He seems okay. He didn’t talk much. Well except for that whole political thing near the end of dinner. And then he tacked on how he and Karmine met.”
“Yeah, I kinda gave him an open question and he jumped on the political part of it rather than the how I met your sister part. I guess that’s kinda telling. I would worry but I doubt Karmine is looking for anything long term anyway. She doesn’t strike me as a politician’s wife. Or really any wife. Maybe in like a double marriage or something a bit more exciting.”
Jaylin laughed and slapped at my arm. She made contact and it stung. “How did you do that?!?” I exclaimed and tried to smack her back without success.
I was only being honest. Karmine wasn’t looking for forever, she wanted to enjoy herself and be free. I thought it was great and daring and brave. She didn’t depend on anyone. She managed the money she made during her modeling career and was very well to do without her inheritance; with it she was loaded.
“I have no idea. I’ve been trying to touch things all day and it hasn’t worked. I just swatted at you without thinking and made contact. I’m also sitting on this couch but if I start thinking about it too much I’ll fall through, so I’m not.” She laughed a little self depreciatingly and I nodded slowly.
“So, your parents haven’t changed.”
I sighed loudly, “No, they have not.”
She waited for me to go on, when I didn’t, she prompted for more with a rolling wave of her hand. I looked at her with a blank face and she rolled her eyes.
“Let’s hear it VonSable,” she said with such familiarity and love that tears of sorrow leaked from my eyes like rivulets of liquid pain. “Kable, what?”
My shoulders trembled and the hot, fat tears burned their way down my cheeks. I hadn’t cried in such a long time. I’d missed my friend so much and I hadn’t allowed myself to focus on it. And now, here she was. And it was overwhelming and amazing, and I just wanted to hug her, and I couldn’t.
I tried to smile through my tears but I’m sure it looked like some sort of demented clown with melting makeup and feral eyes. A tiny snot bubble came out of my nose, and I snorted a laugh along with Jaylin. The sorrow melted away with our laughter.
“All right, spill. What the hell?”
I shrugged awkwardly. “About a year after you…died…things just got to a point I couldn’t seem to struggle out of. My cha
os seemed to be taking over.”
I shook my head infinitesimally and swallowed loudly. I started to speak and couldn’t get the words to leave my mouth. I hadn’t talked to anyone about this in a long time. Really, only to the therapist and practitioner at the institute. It had been a really dark and volatile time.
My voice cracked as I forced the words past my dry tongue and lips. “It was about a year after, and I missed you so much. Kent and Karmine were off living their lives. Kent was still in a pretty bad place himself. Karmine was in a relationship with some pop diva and jet setting around the world with her.” I could see the question in her eyes, but Jaylin stayed silent. She could ask who later.
“The dreams were bad. I’m not sure they were all prophetic, but some were. I was seeing bad things. REALLY bad things.” I closed my eyes to the images flooding my memories.
“Some were about crimes, murders, assaults, abuse and some were about stuff that seemed really mundane. Everyday things that didn’t really make sense or seem to matter. Those were easier. But it was every time I slept.”
She nodded encouragingly and I gave a half grin. I hadn’t really thought about that time in my life in a while. I’d moved forward and worked hard not to let myself get into that frame of mind again.
“I, um, I created a potion to stay awake. Wake me up before you go, go; you know like the song by Wham. Worked pretty well. Kept me up for forty-eight hours and then I’d crash for a solid twelve. The dreams came then and were nonstop. So, after the first test I took the potion before the forty-eight hours was up and managed to be up for eight days before my mother found me and freaked the fuck out.
“To be fair I was hallucinating. Visual and auditory. You, Granda, Abraham Lincoln, Sherlock Holmes, Marie Laveau. There were others but I don’t remember most of them and to be honest, almost none of the conversations.”
Jaylin reached over and touched my hand, hers was cold and felt like a tingling, staticky pressure. I tried to mask the uneasiness of the feeling, but she noticed and moved away. I reached for her but wasn’t able to make contact the way she had. I didn’t want to make her feel bad but judging by the sad smile on her face that’s exactly what my reaction had done.
“It’s okay,” she said waving off my concern. “Keep going.”
My brow furrowed and I bit my lower lip. She smiled and nodded her head several times to encourage me to continue.
“So, Mother figured out what I’d been doing with the potion and managed to get me to their house so the thing finally ran out. I slept for two days straight and woke up in terror. Apparently attempted to claw my eyes out.”
I swallowed down the bile rising up my throat, closed my eyes and scrubbed at my face with trembling hands. I could feel the tension in my neck and the headache building behind my eyes. These were not happy memories. Revisiting them was hard and dangerous. I didn’t want to slip back into that state of mind or put my spirit in the place to bring that back without my calling it into being.
“I also tried to shove the antique letter opener my father keeps in the study into my ear after I’d let it heat up in the fireplace. Father walked in as I tried to ram it in my ear. He grabbed the thing with his bare hands. He had second degree burns to his palm.
They took me to some designer spa. It was really a psychiatric facility but for Orokkians. There was a spiritual councilor, a therapist and one of our doctors in house. Come to think of it, I was the only one there at the time; it could have been one of our many ‘homes.’ I really, truly have no idea where I was. It could have been the White House and I wouldn’t have known.”
Jaylin waited to see if I would say more. When I didn’t, she removed her hands from her face. At some point she’d covered her mouth. There were indents where she’d been pressing them into her face. Her voice broke slightly when she spoke.
“Oh, Kable. Oh, honey.”
I smiled with reddened, puffy eyes. “I’m better. It only happened one more time and not nearly as bad. I called my people and didn’t try to handle it alone.”
I took a deep cleansing breath and released it slowly. I forced my body to relax and felt the headache easing away. Secrets are always the most dangerous when they are held deep in the darkest parts of your heart and soul. Shining light on secrets and problems is one of the quickest and simplest ways to take away some of their power.
Being able to share secrets and problems with Jaylin again was a relief. I didn’t have many friends.
“I’ve discovered if I want prophetic dreams, I can take a potion to help get me in the right head space. I have to meditate and focus before going to sleep to have them pinpoint a particular point of interest. If I don’t, I’ll get all sorts of crazy things. I’m only successful about a quarter of the time. With actually getting what I want out of it, not the dreams. I get them more than I’d like even without the potion if I don’t guard against them.”
Jaylin was nodding. “I’d started getting some dreams before…Well, before I died, I guess.”
I leaned my head back and closed my eyes. I was very tired. Soul bearing was exhausting. I wondered how Kent and Karmine would take the news if I told them about Jaylin. Would they think I was losing it again? Hmm, maybe better not to say anything. Definitely not to Mother. I didn’t particularly feel like being shipped off again.
8 Well, Hell
I jerked awake when Jekyll nudged me with his cold nose. Jaylin was nowhere to be seen and it looked like the first lights of dawn were brightening the sky. Shifting around, my neck protested. I was too old to be sleeping sitting up on the couch.
I reached out to rub Jekyll’s silky ears and he nuzzled my hand. When I stopped petting him, he put his head in my lap, Jekyll was a shepherd mix, mostly German Shepard though. His back came halfway up my thigh and he weighed in around 90 pounds. He tossed his head and looked over at the door.
I opened my mind to his and he mentioned they were out of food. He didn’t like talking mind to mind much and preferred to communicate in the old-fashioned way, glances and vocalization. He said he didn’t like the way my mind felt in his. He loved me but didn’t want my dirty human brain messing with stuff in his. Hyde wasn’t able to communicate because of trauma suffered early in life. Emma and Lucy would block me completely if I even tried. Leave it to me to choose picky animal friends.
I could usually understand their vocalizations when I was attuned but I not always. It was like learning a foreign language, too much external or even internal stimuli and I couldn’t concentrate enough to understand. Sometimes it was great and sometimes it was frustrating. Like I said, the felines were choosy about what they were willing to do.
“Is there food in the pantry?”
“I cannot open the door darling. No thumbs,” Jekyll’s cultured voice stated pointedly.
“Sorry.” I moved to check and then gave them enough food to fill things up for a week. I gave them each a daily portion of their favorites. Jekyll liked blueberries and sweet potatoes and Hyde liked kiwi and apples. Emma liked tuna flakes and Lucy preferred slivered chicken. I gave them all attention as they desired and made sure their water was clean and free of obstructions. Then I made sure their beds were clean and dry.
I made the trek to the greenhouse and performed my morning duties. I sang a little Ariana Grande, Lady Gaga and Jewel. The air sparkled with morning sunshine and happiness. The chaos was heavy in the air from the growth and potential in the greenhouse. I swirled and twirled in last night’s skirt and bare feet while I willed the energy back to the growing plants. They didn’t seem to mind sharing, but it gave them a boost.
No, I can’t actually communicate with plants. That would be pretty awesome, except I’d be eating their babies so maybe not.
The lights were on in the shop. Maxine and Reva were already baking and getting things ready for the day. I needed to go back home and do payroll stuff. One thing that hadn’t changed with new government was taxes. The government still got their cut. On a positive note, they (the
US government) had cut the national debt in half by taking over growth and distribution of a particularly potent strain of marijuana. The profit margin was extraordinary, and it was one of the many strains available. The US had legalized it’s use. The FDA and USDA formed a subcommittee known as the FDDAA and they were responsible for regulatory matters and keeping it safe for the masses. This move also created quite a few jobs.
By the time I finished payroll and paying bills in my study it was almost time to meet Detective Hottie. I showered and wondered what an appropriate outfit for helping an acquaintance house hunt and showing them the city could be.
I pulled my hair up into twin messy buns, grabbed a pair of old faded cargo pants, a tank top, a faded flannel shirt and a pair of sneakers. I put on a little eye makeup and grabbed my sunglasses. They were large, dark, and mirrored. I found my keys, shoved the fob in my pocket. I had a small billfold attached to the keys so I didn’t need a purse.
I was already wearing my charm bracelet. I added a protection charm Granda had made for me years ago as a birthday present. It was precious to me, so I didn’t wear it out much, but I needed the extra protection and the reminder that someone cared enough to give it to me. I “recharged” it every year on my birthday to maintain the protection and luck and to think about him.
I looked at my bracelet. I might need to make a few more protection charms. I had base charms, I just needed to create the potion and add it to them. I could add that to my to-do list for the day.
I had Jaylins two charms in place, Granda’s clover for luck and protection, a silver dime for protection, a jade bead for luck, a shark tooth for strength, a pentagram for protection, a moonstone encased in silver for wisdom and a silver wolfs head with diamond eyes for loyalty and clarity of mind. I also have an Avenger (A) and an X-MEN (X) charm just because they are cool and I like to be among legends.