by Melissa Haag
“Just get us there before I bleed out. And don’t stop because I fall asleep. Just nudge me or something.”
He pulled off the gravel shoulder with ease. A chill wind whipped my hair around my face. Even with the layers I wore, I’d freeze by the time we got to our destination. Only a werewolf would bring a motorcycle for a human in November.
We drove north pushing straight toward our destination, forgoing the erratic back road routes. We met up with a group of five other riders on motorcycles. I smiled at one before laying my head back down on Luke’s back. We would draw less attention with others.
Penny grabbed the toy from my hand and hit me.
“It’s mine,” she yelled, her face turning red.
It wasn’t her toy. It had been lying on the ground when we both arrived at the park. Her mother tried reasoning with Penny, but Penny swung out a hand and hit her mother’s face. Her mother, shocked by her daughter’s sudden tantrum, didn’t move to stop the second swing.
I liked Mrs. Hught and didn’t want to see Penny hit her anymore. “Stop.” I said it softly, but clearly, pushing the thought and the inaction toward Penny. Penny’s arms dropped to her side. Her face grew even redder, and she turned to glare at me.
She knew what I could do and had made me promise never to do it to her. It was a promise I had to break.
“You can’t hit your mommy,” I tried to explain.
“I can do anything I want,” she screeched at me. But we both knew that wasn’t true. The hatred in her eyes burned me, and I released her will.
She turned away from me, threw her arms around her mother’s neck, and cried. “I want to go home,” she sobbed. “I don’t want Charlene to have a sleepover anymore.”
I emerged from the dream slightly when Luke reached around to push me toward the center of his back. I’d slid to the side, dangerously unbalancing us. Shivering, I sank right back into the next waiting dream.
Sitting at the long black counter in biology class, I tried to ignore Penny’s quiet mutterings from the table behind me. We hadn’t been friends since first grade, which suited me fine. Middle school had killed any lingering traces of friendship. For two and a half years, she’d tormented me, spread rumors, and caused me nothing but trouble.
I’d been pulled into the counselor’s office at least twice a week for the last three months to discuss the malicious relationship we had. The school was just trying to cover themselves in a bullying case, but I had sat there and listened to Penny’s pathetic explanations for the rumors she started.
Something hit the back of my head. I turned as I reached back to feel my hair. Gum. Penny didn’t meet my eyes but looked straight at the teacher as if she’d been paying attention the whole time.
“Ms. Farech. Is there a problem?” Mr. Melski asked from the front of the room.
“Yes.” I struggled to keep all the emotion from my voice. “Someone just threw gum in my hair.” I stood and picked up my books. “I’ll see if someone in the office can help.”
His eyes flicked to Penny. The faculty knew. So why in the heck did they let her sit behind me? It was a small school. Because we were in the same grade, we had most of our classes together. Not all, though, because I’d managed to squeak into a few of the advanced ones. Hard classes, but I loved them because she wasn’t there.
I kept my pace even as I walked out the door.
The secretary, an older woman who yelled at most kids, made a sympathetic noise when I walked in and showed her the gum. I hadn’t touched it much and had walked carefully so it wasn’t too embedded.
“Why on earth does Penny dislike you so much?” she asked as she worked.
“Because when we were kids, I told her not to hit her mom.” The truth, yet not all of it. Penny was the only one who knew my secret. Never once did I give the rumors she had started any credence. But she and I both knew I could do what she claimed. I just didn’t let her push me to do it openly.
The secretary extracted the gum wad within minutes, only taking a few strands with it.
“Make sure you don’t sit near her at the assembly,” she warned just before I left.
As if I would purposely do so.
I went to the bathroom to check my hair before heading back to class. Hopefully Penny wasn’t chewing more gum in anticipation of my return. The door opened behind me. Penny’s eyes met mine in the mirror.
“Why?” I asked, turning. “What do you get from doing this? You were never mean when we were little.” She continued to eye me hatefully. I tried again. “We were friends once.”
“Ha!” she barked bitterly. “You were never my friend. You never listened to me.”
I knew exactly what she meant. She’d wanted me to use my ability to make her mom look away so we could sneak candy when we went to her house. She didn’t understand as I did that my ability wasn’t meant for that. Somehow I’d always known I shouldn’t misuse my power.
“You always asked too much,” I said sadly. “Just let this go.”
“No. At some point you’ll make a mistake, and I want to be there so everyone knows I was right about you.” She reached out and slapped the books from my arms. They tumbled to the floor.
“All you’re going to prove is how mean you can be,” I said glancing down at the books. She didn’t answer.
When I bent to pick them up, she pushed me over. I snapped and grabbed hold of her will.
“Stop.” She froze poised in a half-crouch ready to come after me. I held her still with my will, but I forced nothing else on her. I felt bad enough for holding her like that. “I’m really sorry, Penny, but this has gone on long enough. Forget your hate. Remember the friendship we once had.” I picked up my books and stood. “Don’t try to hurt me again.”
I walked out the door intending to get a good head start before I released her. From behind, I heard her yell through the door, “I still can’t move!”
The dream shifted, but not far. I still wore the same clothes.
Sitting on the gym bleachers surrounded by the entire student body, I looked around warily for Penny. She would hate me even more, now. I should have made her forget. I just couldn’t bring myself to mess with someone’s head like that. It wasn’t like anyone really believed her. Other than the bullying, she wasn’t a threat to me. I had no justification for taking the extreme measure of robbing her of her memories.
“As some of you know, there have been cases of bullying. This is a serious matter that this school will not take lightly. We have a short film to help educate you on what steps should be taken if you are bullied, or witness bullying.”
The overhead lights dimmed and a beam of light from the AV room near the top of the gym pierced the gloom. The AV room, a recent addition accessed by a set of stairs outside of the gym, was prized by the faculty as a means to broadcast school news.
A shot of the girl’s bathroom burst onto the white gym wall we used for projection. My mouth popped open as I saw myself walk into the bathroom and go to the mirror. Some students near me started laughing quietly. The faculty, standing on the gym floor, started conferring in whispers as on screen, Penny walked in and we started talking.
One of the teachers left the gym presumably to reach the AV room and stop the movie. The lights in the gym turned on as Penny knocked the books out of my hand. No one moved. Everyone stayed focused on the projection. My stomach filled with piercing shards of ice.
“The assembly is over. Return to your last hour class. Those with Physical Education should go to the locker rooms and wait there,” the principal shouted, unable to use his microphone as the PA had been taken over by my voice, “All you’re going to prove is how mean you can be.”
No one moved. All eyes remained riveted on Penny as she stared at me, and I moved to retrieve the books. I could taste my panic, the flavor disgustingly reminiscent of vomit. Penny had finally succeeded.
I closed my eyes as the recording of my voice rang out. “Stop.” A murmuring rose in the gym, loud enough tha
t others started shushing their neighbors as I gave Penny my little speech and then left the bathroom.
Opening my eyes, I caught the angle of the video change as the cameraman climbed off the toilet and opened the stall door to zoom in on Penny’s outraged face. Penny’s words, “I still can’t move,” echoed through the eerily quiet gym. The last image on the wall was of Penny suddenly falling to the floor. The projection shut off.
My face heated unnaturally. Someone next to me whispered to their neighbor, “Holy crap! Penny wasn’t lying.”
I sat up in the bleachers, surrounded by my peers. All eyes turned to me. A side door opened, and a teacher escorted a beaming Penny into the gym. As I stood, I grabbed everyone’s will but hers and planted a seed. My voice rang out. “You just witnessed proof of Penny’s dogged determination to expose something extraordinary. Instead, all she did was paint herself as a bully and show she has an amazing ability to act.”
Releasing their wills, I nudged my way through my stunned classmates. As I moved, I heard things like, “I can’t believe she was so mean,” and, “I would have slapped her face instead of walking out.”
Penny’s smug expression faltered as she noticed the change in everyone. Her mouth popped open as she stared at me. I walked up to Penny while holding the faculty back with simple wait and see thoughts. I stopped just in front of her.
“Whoever you had filming did a wonderful job,” I said. “If you’re this good over a no name nothing like me, I can only imagine how good you’ll be when you’re reporting on something real. Good luck.”
The sudden silence penetrated my dream. I emerged with my heart racing wondering why we’d stopped. I lifted my cheek from the warm spot on Luke’s back and, in the gloom around us, took in the shape of an old barn on a slight hill in the distance.
“Why did we stop?” I asked when he loosened the strap.
“I’d rather approach the Compound in daylight,” he said quietly.
My determination to push through bowed to his practical reasoning. I didn’t really want to face a horde in the dark either. I didn’t have their enhanced eyesight.
“How is the cut?”
I pulled the strap from over his head and climbed off the back. My legs ached from sitting so long, but I didn’t try stretching them out. The back of his shirt was stained with my blood, but it looked dark and dry. I shrugged in response to his question and asked, “Why here?”
He walked over to me, unzipped the jacket, and once again gently tugged at the hem of my shirt. Only this time, it didn’t lift. The blood had dried to the skin. He frowned as he answered, “They are too used to looking at hotels. I thought this would be safer.”
”This” meant sleeping in the barn. He continued to look worriedly at my stomach as if he could see through the fabric. “Some real sleep sounds good,” I murmured, trying to reassure him.
He sighed and gently touched my cheek. “You’ll tell me if it starts hurting,” he ordered softly.
I snorted. “It hasn’t stopped hurting.”
He smiled at me and dropped his hand. “I imagine not,” he commented as he shifted the bike into neutral and began pushing it toward the building. I zipped back up and slowly followed. Patches of snow coated the ground between tufts of long grass. Shivers trembled through me.
The barn leaned heavily to one side. Many of its old boards had rotted at the base. Still, Luke pushed the bike into the gapping door. Any hint of the dusk’s fading light disappeared after two steps. Disturbing the layer of dust covering the floor with my steps caused the smell of old, musty hay to fill my nose, and I sneezed once. It killed my stomach.
“I’ll look around,” he said a moment before he disappeared into the dark. I looked back at the door, just barely outlined now, and stayed where I stood.
“It’s empty and untouched. We’ll stay here for a few hours.”
He took me by the hand and led me further into the black. He flicked on a tiny LED flashlight attached to the bike keys and pointed to an empty stall partitioned by a half wall. I blushed as I understood and quickly grabbed the flashlight and shooed him away. I’d lived many lifetimes without the convenience of a toilet, but that was in the past. I liked flushing and washing.
After I finished, I moved into the hay-filled isle, clicked off the flashlight, and shuffled toward the front of the building.
“Here,” Luke murmured after I’d walked half the length. I paused and felt a tug on the bag. He led me off to the side and gently nudged me down onto some old hay.
“If I wake up to bugs crawling on me, I will not be happy,” I whispered waiting for him to settle next to me.
When he lay still, I used my hands to find him. He lay on his back and I pressed close to his side. His warmth became a halo around me.
“I promise, I will keep them off of you,” his low voice rumbled under my ear as I settled my cheek on his chest. Too bad he kept his shirt on. Skin to skin, I tended not to dream at all. I flattened my hand on his shirt and let my fingers thaw.
“I’m glad you’re warm,” I mumbled, my eyes already closing. At least I wasn’t freezing. My stomach hurt, my legs ached from all the kicking and moving I’d done during the fight, and my arms just felt like they would fall off. Dreaming might not be the worst.
“Though she’s a pleasure to be around, we’ve noticed she’s very aggressive with others. I wanted to suggest an outlet for her energy.” The daycare administrator handed my father a slip of paper. We sat in her office, just the three of us. My legs dangled from the chair, and I idly swung them back and forth. Moving helped. I didn’t feel so mad then. I arched my neck to look at the paper. It had a picture of a man kicking and some words. I didn’t care about the words, though. I liked the picture. I liked kicking.
The dream shifted.
The other kids congregated around the playground equipment, laughing and chasing each other. I stood back, watching them play with a smile, but not joining. Whenever I tried, they stopped playing to lie around. Sometimes a few of them even took naps. Meanwhile, something inside me grew, tightening my skin to the point of discomfort, to the point I grew angry. So I stood on the outskirts, never really joining, and they let me be though they threw an occasional friendly wave my way. Everybody liked me. They couldn’t help it. I made them feel good.
A new boy walked over to one of my classmates and took the ball from her hands. Her lips quivered, but she didn’t cry. Instead she walked away. I felt indignant for her and watched the boy stalk away from the group to play sullenly with the ball. I frowned at him.
With most of my classmates further away, I approached him knowing my skin wouldn’t tighten too much.
“Why did you do that?” I demanded.
He looked up at me with narrowed eyes. Anger, hurt, and uncertainty flooded me.
“Why are you so mad?” I asked. Usually the people around me were happy. But even happiness, when I soaked up too much, made me feel tight inside.
His eyes opened a little wider before they narrowed again. He balled his fist and swung at me.
I blocked just as my instructor had taught me. The boy dropped the ball to try another swing. I blocked again. He gave a growl of frustration and started swinging wildly. I continued to block the blows, flowing into the different stances and moves, enjoying the movement. The emotions poured off him, and I unwillingly soaked them up, but what we did helped burn them out of me. Soon I could see him tiring and took two quick steps back. I didn’t want to drain him. I liked that he didn’t lie down like the other kids did. He was different, and playing with him helped me. I felt deflated in a good way. I bowed to him as I’d been taught.
I smiled at his shocked expression. “Do you want me to show you how to block next recess?”
He nodded his mop of sandy blonde hair. I felt the tears hiding behind his grey eyes and reached for his hand, willing to help him again. I took his hurt away as the teacher walked over to us to scold us for fighting.
“We weren’t fighting,
” I explained. “We’re training. He’s my partner now.” I wouldn’t need to stand alone anymore.
The teacher shook her head indulgently and shooed us inside.
“What’s your name?” the boy asked.
“Isabelle. What’s yours?”
“Ethan.”
* * * *
“We’re less than an hour away,” Luke called over his shoulder. The move twisted the healing bite on his neck. I hated seeing it, probably as much as he hated the cut on my stomach. His injury, at least, healed faster.
I nodded in response, but otherwise kept scrunched behind Luke. Heavy wet snow blanketed the ground. The wind bit into my skin, chilling it until it stung. I couldn’t tell if I felt so cold because of the temperature, which barely hovered above freezing, or because of a fever. My stomach had hurt when I woke and I worried that the moldy air, or dirty clothes I wore, might have caused an infection.
“Shit,” Luke swore and swerved.
I lifted my head from his back, but didn’t see anything. Turning, I saw a werewolf running behind us. Before I could panic, Luke opened the throttle, and the bike screamed down the road, distancing us from our pursuer.
“They know,” he yelled back at me.
No kidding. I clung to Luke, watching our pursuer. Only three roads into the pack’s territory and ultimately to the Compound. One came in from the north, one from the southwest, and another from the east. We’d abandoned the eastern route when we’d run into them last time. When they’d found me south of here, we’d kept heading north hoping they’d think we’d switch from the obvious. There was no turning around anymore. We were too close. They now knew our direction and would be ready.
The lone wolf stopped running and stood in the middle of the paved lane, no doubt communicating to the rest of the pack. The bike screamed down the road. I didn’t dare try peeking around Luke to see how fast we went. If the wind had hurt before, it really tore at me now. We rode for another ten minutes without sighting anything. Then, hell opened its mouth and started spitting at us.