The Paragon Element (Book 1)

by Jeff Hale

  Maybe that was why MAGE had kept me in Vegas instead of assigning me elsewhere. They knew I needed this kind of anchor to reality. That, and MAGE probably figured, rightly so, that there would be a lot of questions asked by certain people if I vanished to the ass-end of Texas or something.

  But now that first day of school was several weeks behind me and I felt like I was finally settling into a decent routine. School, then work, then sleep. Rinse and repeat as desired. I headed around the parking lot to the Wall, then greeted Dave and Nina and sat on my usual spot.

  Nina was being conservative in her dress today: a black bra showing through a white tank top that she had either shrunk in the wash or had outgrown when she was like six, along with a very short pair of cut-off denim shorts and knee-high stiletto leather heels. She looked like white trash gone goth.

  Dave was in his usual, a pair of black denim jeans and a t-shirt that stated ‘Immigrants are like sperm, millions get in, but only one works’. Leave it to Dave to find something appropriately anti-politically correct to have on his shirt. I just shook my head and smiled. Some things never changed. Dave had been wearing shirts like that since we were in Junior High.

  “So, Aerick, gotten laid yet?” Dave always asked this of me, like clockwork, every day. I was used to it. My answer was the same.

  “No, Dave, not yet.” I sighed, signifying my displeasure with the topic. He took it as something else.

  “Fuck, man, you need to stop pining over Serena, I know she’s… gone, but really, you’re gonna have to move on at some point. She’d want you to be happy. At this rate I’m about to offer Nina up, just so you can get some and relax, man,” Dave joked, slapping me on the back as he did so.

  I was not happy with where this was going, though the offer was extremely, extremely tempting, even if Dave was only kidding. “Leave Serena out of this, Dave. Last warning. You are my best friend, but I can only be pushed so far. Do not bring her up again.” I snapped this at him and flashed a glare in his direction.

  “Hey, Aerick, ease up, he didn’t mean anything by it.” Nina let out a long sigh. “This is unhealthy though. You can’t remain single and celibate because you’re still mourning her death. We’ve wanted to bring this up for a while now, but didn’t know how to do it. Dave, in his infinite wisdom, obviously favored the frontal approach. I was hoping to talk to you alone about it. I know you miss her, and I know you’re hurting.”

  Nina wasn’t done yet. “I mean, I’m personally just glad to see you back in school and at least starting to get your life back together. We knew Serena, and we know how much she meant to you. I thought things would change once you got back to a semblance of your regular life. I thought you’d get better. But you haven’t. You’ve been miserable, depressed, and you’ve got dark circles under your eyes, so we know you aren’t sleeping a lot. We’re just worried about ya, you know? And I hate to have to ask this, but you aren’t back on the drugs again, are you?”

  Nina was on one of her crusades again, this time obviously to save me from myself. I knew she meant well, but unfortunately she had no idea what I was involved with, and I never wanted her, or Dave for that matter, to know. Well, there were times when I wished I could tell them. Share the burden and have someone to talk to about it. But it was forbidden, and as far as I knew, for good reason.

  Oh, they’d understand, and they wouldn’t think I was crazy, but I didn’t want to endanger them. I had made sure to make a few calls to them while I was receiving my training, though I had told them that I was in rehab which was why I couldn’t see them.

  “Look, Nina, I know you guys mean well. I didn’t mean to snap, but dammit, really, I just need some space. My life is in a weird place right now. You both know that, and you guys are the only ones who know that, and know why.” They didn’t, not really. They still believed I was only recently clean, and that I was still battling the cravings for another hit. I was long past that point, had been for well over a year, and had no desire to ever be under that influence again. I pulled a cigarette from the pack. The nicotine was an addiction too, and still might kill me one day, but it was a damn sight better than sticking a needle in my arm.

  “Okay, Aerick. You win. For now. But you still didn’t answer my last question. I mean it, Rick. If you’re back on the drugs, I want to know. I promise I won’t get mad, I just want to help. I don’t want to see you like that again.” She was very insistent this time.

  I shot a look at Nina that told her I was being truthful and serious as I took a quick drag off my cigarette. “You know that I’m not. I wouldn’t be here if I was. I’d be in Northside, running the damn things to pay for my habit.”

  “Yeah, okay, Aerick, I’m gonna take your word for that. If I find out, though, that you’ve lied to me, I will put you in the hospital so you’ll have an excuse to be on drugs.” Nina gave me a hard look.

  I took her seriously, because I knew she would.

  Yeah, I could take her in a fight, but I wasn’t allowed to use my powers on civvies, and even if I could, I wouldn’t use them on her. I’d just let her beat the shit out of me, because I would deserve it.

  “Hey, no worries, you’ll never have to do that. Trust me.” I looked her in the eyes so she’d know I was being straight with her.

  “Well, good, 'cause I really don’t wanna have to hurt you. I might mess up that sexy bod of yours permanently.” She laughed as she said it, and I knew she was half joking, and half serious. Didn’t matter. I took the serious side as the more dominant part of that comment.

  “I got it. I mean it, Nina, no need to threaten me,” I said grimly, and she exchanged laughter for irritation.

  “What, you took that as a real threat?” She was annoyed, which I should have expected. She hated being misunderstood.

  “No. Yes. I don’t know.” I shook my head. “I guess I would deserve it and all, so maybe I took it seriously. But come on, I have enough people at this school wanting to kick my ass without adding you to the list.” I put my hand on her shoulder in a gesture of friendship.

  “True enough,” Dave laughed. “Come on Nina, give him a break. Just take his word on it and let the whole thing drop. I’m sure he doesn’t like thinking about it.”

  Nina shot him a glance and glowered at him briefly before just shrugging the whole thing away. “Hey, I’m deejaying at a rave tonight, you should come. You may meet someone there. I know a couple of girls who really want to meet you.” Nina was also the infamous DJ Passion in the local rave scene.

  She had often invited me to her raves, but I had always turned her down due to lack of time. After I had come back from MAGE training, I had always been on the job.

  “I dunno, Miss Matchmaker. I’ll have to see, depends on work.” They knew I had a job, but they didn’t know where, or doing what. I’d gone as far as to say it was for the government to fend off more questions, but I never volunteered any other information.

  “Well, if you’re free you’d better be there.” She punched me in the shoulder.

  The bell rang, and we separated to head to our first classes, which for me was a free period that I tended to just sleep through. As I passed through the parking lot, I could see other students giving Dave and Nina and me knowing glances and steering away from us. A few of the others pantomimed smoking a joint or snorting a line. Most people thought that all three of us were druggies.

  I might have been once, but that was long behind me, a road I never planned on taking again and wouldn’t suggest anyone take, especially not my closest friends. But we dressed differently, and hung out with the stoners, so assumptions were made by those who didn’t know better. Ultimately we just liked making statements about individuality, mainly because we hated the preppy morons who made up seventy-five percent of our school population.

  Dave and Nina were both former nerds, made fun of throughout their lives, much like myself. We had banded together for mutual protection and now the majority of students were wary of us, except for Terrance and his
group of idiots. Terry had always had a dislike for me and my mind went back briefly to that day that I had asked Kelly out.

  “Hey, faggot! Stay away from my girl, ya fuckin’ psychotic dickless piece of shit!” Terry’s voice had come from behind me. I was about halfway home from school and as I turned around I got a face full of fist. I went down in a heap and felt someone kick me in the ribs. I tried to stand and noticed about five people circled around me.

  I recognized Terry, Nick, Karl, Lance, and Justin. All of them took turns raining blows on the back of my head, my back, my chest, my stomach. All because I had the nerve to ask out a girl who I had no idea was going out with Terry. She had even kicked me for my audacity.

  I shook my head to clear the memory as I headed into the school. I took my nap during free period, and after that was Chemistry, which I actually enjoyed. It was over too quickly and I made my way to the gym and P.E. I didn’t really see a need for P.E., at least not for myself; I could outrun, outplay, and outlast everyone in my class, and probably the entire school. I wasn’t necessarily into the thrill of rubbing my classmates’ noses in it, so instead, I just didn’t bother at all and let the teacher think I was a slacker.

  After sitting on the bleachers in the gymnasium, not even in my ‘uniform’, and watching the rest of the mundane kiddies play basketball, I got up and left about ten minutes early, completely bored out of my mind. Sports were something I’d never seen the point in, let alone me playing them. Then again, maybe it was because I had a hard time trusting people I wasn’t close with.

  I got an early start on my walk to my next class, History. The halls were empty as I headed across the school. After the bell rang, students started pouring out of the classrooms to fill them, and soon I was being jostled on all sides by people. I felt hemmed in, almost claustrophobic. Did I mention that I hate large crowds?

  A couple of girls walked by me and gave me appraising looks as they passed. One was a blonde and the other a brunette, both slender, with long legs, short skirts, and wearing tight, low-cut shirts. I glanced over my shoulder and the blonde was still watching me. When she saw me looking at her, her head spun back to look forward and I could hear her giggling with her friend. Meh, high school girls and their immaturity.

  History would be an interesting class if things were done differently in it. The teacher, Ms. Hanson, had a tendency to quote the textbook rather than actually teach the class. She was young, probably in her mid-twenties, and kind of sexy, with curly light brown hair that fell to her mid-back, and hazel eyes. She always wore white blouses and tight black slacks. She usually had the top few buttons on her blouse undone, so that when she came and bent over to help someone with a problem, you could see right down her shirt. I very much enjoyed that aspect about the class, for obvious reasons.

  I had to wonder though, at just how much effort she put into her lessons. Class went on as usual, with her having us read aloud. She didn’t bother to elaborate or mention other sources, or give us her opinion on the subject, instead treating the text as gospel. She gave me an annoyed look when I raised my hand and said the book left out some important stuff about John Smith, the famous explorer. The book made him out to be some noble hero, which maybe he was, but he was also an alcoholic womanizer. True story. Really. And the truth about Pocahontas? Well, that was in MAGE’s historic records, so I just kept that to myself. Ms. Hanson didn’t much appreciate my attitude towards one of ‘our esteemed forefathers’ and gave me extra homework as a result. Apparently, she thought I was one of those slow kids, because she gave me two weeks to finish it.

  Lunch was after History and I escaped outside and headed to one of the vending machines that were scattered around campus, got myself a soda, then went out towards the Wall. There was a snack truck that parked around the corner from the Wall to take advantage of all the stoners that hung out there and I got a bag of chips and a stick of beef jerky from it. The truck had soda for a buck, but the one I’d gotten from the vending machine had only been twenty-five cents.

  Lunch in hand, I went to the Wall and waved at my few friends. I hadn’t seen Val anywhere today, but we had different classes and different lunch periods. A girl named Jessie approached me and put her arm around my shoulders. She was tall, slender and didn’t have much up top, but I still found her attractive. I was usually very much into larger chests, but I made an exception for Jessie. Her blonde hair was cut so that it fell to her shoulders, and her blue eyes were hidden by a pair of sunglasses. She had some killer legs, and she tended to wear skirts and boots with heels. Today was no exception: ankle boots, a long black skirt that was slit up the sides, and a white blouse that was tied up so that her stomach showed.

  “Hey, Rick!” she said, and kissed me on the cheek.

  Before I’d dropped out of school, most girls hadn’t bothered to give me the time of day, but since I had gotten back, for some reason, I was actually pretty popular. It drove Nina crazy since I wouldn’t date any of them. Or sleep with any of them. Apparently quite a few of the girls that hung out at the Wall were interested in me for either, including Jessie, although she was in the latter group. But most of the girls that hung out at the Wall were way too young, fourteen or fifteen; the older crowd was becoming a rarity and I had no clue as to why. Jessie, thankfully, while still younger than me, was seventeen.

  “Hi, Jessie. What insane plans do you have for today?” I asked her this because she tended to have insane plans. Plans which could get dangerous if she stumbled onto the right knowledge. Or wrong knowledge, depending on your point of view. She was always trying to summon up some spirit or entity.

  “Oh, I figured I’d try to use a Satanist’s Bible to summon up a demon!” She nibbled on my neck and whispered, “I just need to be able to finish the final incantation during an orgasm, and I know who I’d want to be there for that.”

  I squirmed away slightly and looked at her. For a brief moment I had an image of me, her and the janitor’s closet, but I dismissed it as a hormone driven delusion and shook my head. “Now, now, I have a one dark ceremony per month rule, and I’m already two over my limit.” It was almost the truth, but I made sure to pitch my voice to make it sound like I was just joking in an attempt to get out of having sex with her. I dropped to a crouch to get out of her encircling arms. “Besides those incantations you get never work, and I only sleep with people I am in a relationship with, you know that.”

  She pouted and stomped her foot once, then flashed a dazzling smile. “Oh well, had to try! Someone is going to get you, Rick. I hope it’s me, but I think I’d just settle with knowing you got laid, and loosened up! Anyway, got an extra smoke?”

  I nodded and pulled out two cigarettes, lit both and handed her one. “So what else are you up to these days?” I hadn’t really talked with her in a while outside of a wave here and there. I sat down and invited her to join me.

  “Not much, my parents are trying to set me up with some guy. He’s the son of my dad’s boss or something. He came to dinner last night.”

  “Really? What’s he like?” I asked, a slight bit of jealousy surfacing.

  Jessie and I had dated briefly a long time ago. It had seemed weird for me at the time because I felt like I was cheating on Serena, who had still been alive then. Serena and I hadn’t officially been an item, but I still felt guilty being with someone else.

  “Boooooring. He’s too old, and is into trucks, horses and runs a bank or something. Not really my thing, you know? You are much more interesting.” She leaned into me and put her hand up my shirt, running it across my chest. I shivered slightly at her touch.

  “Why is that? Not like I do much these days. It’s all about school and work with me,” I said, trying to maintain my calm. I would ask Jessie out again, but I couldn’t with my current career. Same reason I couldn’t date Val. Or anyone for that matter. At least, that was what I told myself.

  “Oh? But you listen to the same music I listen to, you get my creepy little jokes, and you are just more…
well, like I said, interesting. Okay, and you have that whole bad boy look going for you too. That helps. A lot.”

  “Well, unfortunately, as much as I would like to go out with you again, my work schedule just doesn’t allow for it. I work pretty much from the time school lets out until almost midnight, and I work all weekend usually.”

  “That’s too bad.” She pulled her hand slowly from my shirt, her fingertips brushing my skin, and put her finished cigarette out. “I still remember you coming over when my parents weren’t home and us fooling around. I still say you have magic fingers.” She smiled suggestively at me.

  She was referring to the fact that during our ‘fooling around’ session I had had my hand down her pants, fondling a certain… part of her. She had enjoyed the experience immensely. I had too, except for the extreme feelings of guilt that went through my mind during the whole thing.

  “So tell me again why you broke up with me?” she asked, her brows furrowing as though she were trying to remember.

  “I felt guilty about us being together.”

  “Why again?”

  “Because of another girl,” I admitted in a mutter.

  “Oh.” Jessie nodded as the recollection came to her. “Yeah. Her. How is she these days? She still your keeper even though she lives nowhere near here?”

  Was Jessie trying to be overly cruel? I knew she had been upset when I broke it off with her over Serena, but as I glanced sideways at her, I realized she truly had no idea that Serena was dead.

  “She’s… not… around anymore,” I said quietly, a lump forming in my throat. I will not cry, I will not cry. I might have learned to live with Serena being gone, but there was no way I was, or ever would be, over it.

  “Oh. I’m sorry. She break up with you? Oh. Wait. You two weren’t even together,” Jessie sniped bitterly.

  “Let it be,” I whispered, but I knew she could hear me because she was still leaning on me. I was trembling a little, my heart beating against the inside of my sternum, and it was beginning to hurt to breathe.