Shelby is sitting curled on a futon, watching us, with her foot tapping to the rhythm of my bass lines. She’s enjoying this, and if she’s any indication of how other students will respond, we could do well at the school talent show, which is only a few weeks away.
Most of our song choices lean toward punk rock because it’s just easier for us to play. And when we play loudly, it covers up my limited vocal range. Our set list starts with The Cure and moves to edgier post-punk bands like Bauhaus and Siouxsie & The Banshees, which Shelby seems to really like. As a nod to my dad, we throw in a Replacements song, “Rock ‘n’ Roll Ghost.”
Weezer pauses at the end of our set and grabs at his jeans. “I gotta drain it,” he says, setting his guitar on my bed, running upstairs to the bathroom. He’s a total ass, especially when girls are around.
“You sound great,” Shelby says. “What’s the name of the band?”
Angel is spinning her drumsticks around her fingers when she says, “We’ve been fighting over a name. I want to call us Two True.”
“But there’s three of us,” I say in protest, as always.
“That’s the whole point,” Angel says. “There’s three of us, but only two are true.”
“True in what way?” Shelby asks Angel, as if I’m not even in the room and my opinion doesn’t count.
Angel seems cool and distant behind her drums and cymbals as she glares at Shelby. “Any number of ways,” she says. “Truly in love, truly crazy, too truthful?”
Shelby nods. “I like that you could interpret the name any way you want. What name do you like for the band, Darius?”
“Voodoo Child or possibly Liquidz,” I say.
Shelby shakes her head. “I like Angel’s name better.”
“What name?” Weezer asks, as he jumps down the last two stairs into the basement with a slice of cold pizza in one hand.
“Two True,” Shelby says.
“Yeah, it’s okay,” he says, plopping onto my bed. “Whatever Angel wants is fine with me.”
So that’s how it goes down. That’s how we choose the name of our band. Maybe for other bands it’s that simple too—you create a list of names, and whatever feels right, you go with it. I watch Weezer chewing his pizza as he watches Angel, and I know they must’ve talked about the band name before they arrived. His crush on her might be working, because she seems to like him, too. For a brief moment jealousy surges through me, but it must be the Blood Orange Soda. The drink sometimes causes me to experience unexpected mood swings, and I breathe deeply to calm myself. Are Weezer and Angel “too true” to each other, and I’m the third wheel in a budding relationship? I’m okay with it, I suppose. Whatever Angel and I had two summers ago is lost in the past.
Saturday, October 18
Mom, Kira, and I drive around downtown for thirty minutes to make sure we don’t walk in on Jack and one of his mentors, and we finally arrive at his loft around 9:30 p.m. When I open the rail doors, his loft is dark except for lit candles on the counters and windowsills.
Mom pulls me back. “Wait, let me check. You and Kira wait here.”
“Why, what’s up?” Kira asks, pushing by me.
“Jack?” Mom calls out. Her voice echoes off the floor-to-ceiling windows.
“Be right there!” Jack hollers from the back bedroom.
A woman barefooting down the hallway catches our attention. Her hair is a mess and she’s carrying two wine glasses as she ducks into a back room.
“Who’s that?” Mom asks me.
“One of Jack’s mentors,” I reply.
Mom rolls her eyes, which strikes me as funny because she usually does that when she can’t believe my behavior.
“How pathetic! He knew we were coming over,” Mom says.
“What’s wrong with mentors?” Kira asks.
I laugh at my sister’s innocence. “That woman wasn’t teaching Jack anything he doesn’t already know.”
“Darius, that’s enough,” Mom whispers.
“Oh, he was having sex with her?” Kira asks, grinning.
“Kira!” Mom reprimands my sister, grabbing her arm.
Ha! My mom is realizing that Kira isn’t as young and naïve as she thought. Jack surfaces from his bedroom, and he’s wearing tight jeans and carrying a white T-shirt.
“You’re early.” He’s pulling his shirt on.
“No, we’re not. We’re a half hour later than we agreed,” Mom says.
Jack’s female friend walks from the back room and stands next to him. I study her. She is probably five foot five inches tall, with long, straight black hair pulled back with a barrette. I’m sure my mom is wondering the same thing I am—how young is Jack’s mentor?
“Everybody, this Sonya,” he says, as he puts his arm around her. “She’s my vocal coach.”
“You’re taking voice lessons?” I ask.
“I like to sing, what can I say?”
“He’s very good when he sings from his diaphragm.” Sonya pats him on his flat stomach.
“Hi, nice to meet you, Sonya,” Mom says. “Jack, if this isn’t a good time, we can come back another day.”
“No, come in and have a seat,” he insists. “Sonya has to leave anyway. She has another lesson to teach across town.”
They hug, and he kisses her cheek. Sonya passes me and I notice her neckline because it’s red, as if Jack might’ve given her a hickey, or maybe a bite. When she notices where I’m looking, Sonya pulls the barrette and hair and covers the spot. She removes her coat from a peg on the wall and is out the door with the coat still in her arms. This gives me an opportunity to gaze at her long legs and tights as she walks to the freight elevator.
“Darius!” my mom says, and I turn to see her already sitting on Jack’s leather couch. He’s fetching drinks out of the fridge. “Why are you staring at her?” Mom asks.
“I wanted to make sure she got to the elevator safely,” I reply.
Jack laughs. “She knows where the elevator is, Darius.”
Walking into the living room, I join them. My mom is sitting on the couch, while Kira is in a leather chair that’s so big her feet dangle just above the floor. I take the chair across from my sister and watch as Jack prepares for my mom’s blood transfusion.
He sets a metal briefcase on the coffee table, unlocks it and opens it up, revealing two IV bags, one with clear liquid in it, and the other bag containing blood. Jack pulls out several tubes and syringes.
“Is that blood?” Kira asks.
He lifts the bag and holds it up for her to see. “Yes, go ahead and feel it.”
“No, gross!” Kira says.
“Jack, she’s only thirteen, stop teasing her,” Mom says.
“Darius, you want to hold it?” Jack asks.
“Yeah, sure.” I take the bag into my hands and it’s cool, as if he kept it chilled prior to our arrival. It feels heavy and slippery. “How much is in here?”
“You’re holding one pint of B positive blood. It’s free of any infectious diseases.”
“How much did this cost?” I ask, which probably isn’t apropos since he already spent the money, and there’s no way we could afford to repay him.
“This is the most valuable mineral in the world,” Jack says, as he takes it from my hands. “Blood is more valuable than gold, because blood gives life.”
He removes a telescoping pole from the briefcase that looks like a stand to hold sheet music. He props it at the end of the couch near my mom’s head and hangs the pint from it. Mom gets comfortable on the couch, wraps herself in a blanket and lies back. She and Jack whisper words in German and I remember that they’ve done this before, that this is a familiar routine for some Vampires.
“What’s the other bag of clear liquid?” Kira asks.
Jack turns and looks down at the briefcase. “Oh, that’s Hespan. It’s a filler. I’m removing two pints of your mom’s blood and replacing it with only one because that’s all I could find on the underground market. Hespan will make up the d
ifference.”
“You’re removing some of Mom’s blood?” Kira asks.
This makes me queasy, too.
“Honey, it’s okay. Jack knows what he’s doing,” Mom says.
“We have to remove some of the disease and replenish her blood supply with healthy blood cells,” Jack says. “I’ll remove two pints and add in one pint of blood and one pint of Hespan. This is the only way to help your mom beat this disease.”
He looks towards me and I know what he’s thinking. He knows there’s slim chance this will give her much more time, because my mom is already very weak with V2. He’s wondering if I’ve researched Jonathan. Even though he cautioned me about contacting him, I get the feeling that maybe now that’s what Jack expects me to do.
“Why don’t you two go upstairs?” Mom says. “This will take about an hour, and then I’ll need to sleep here.”
“Good idea, Virginia,” Jack says. “There’s fruit juice and water up in the dojo. If you two want to watch TV, help yourself.”
Kira slides out of the large chair. “I love you, Mom,” she says, kissing her forehead.
I do the same and look into my mom’s eyes, searching for something, anything that will assure me that she’s ready to fight, willing to think positive.
“You’re looking more like your father every day. You’re a beautiful boy, becoming a man. I love you,” she says to me.
My knees buckle, and I hold back my tears. “I love you too, Mom.” I kiss her cheek and taste her salty tears on my lips.
“I’ll join you upstairs in an hour,” Jack says. “Spend time stretching and warming up. You and I will start your training routine tonight.”
We climb the spiral metal staircase and I look down one more time at Jack and my mom below. He’s drawing blood from her veins, the bag by her side filling slowly, and I notice the fear in Kira’s eyes. She’s much closer to our mother than I am; I guess girls are usually closer to their moms. She and my mom spend many evenings talking about Kira’s school days, her boy crushes, and the mean girls at school. Without our mom around, who will give my sister that kind of comfort and support? Am I capable of listening to Kira’s problems and offering brotherly advice? This is just another reason, among many, that I need to find Jonathan.
Jack’s voice wakes me from a deep sleep, and he’s standing above me with his hands at his side. It’s like the view of Bao Wang after he’s dropped me to the ground, on my back and totally vulnerable.
“Well? How is she?” I ask.
“I topped off her fluids and she’s sleeping. Why are you napping? You were supposed to stretch.”
I stand up and notice Kira asleep on a couch, in front of the TV at the other end of the dojo. He’s not lecturing her. “I can’t stretch for an hour, Jack. Yeah, I dozed off.”
“When is the fight?” Jack asks.
“Halloween night.”
“That’s around the corner. Will you be ready in two weeks?”
“Hell if I know! I’m hoping the Blood Orange Soda will make me stronger and faster by then.”
“A month from now you’d be a formidable competitor to him,” Jack says. “In two weeks, he could still shred you to pieces.”
“Great, thanks for the pep talk, Coach. What am I supposed to do?”
“Double your dose of Soda.”
“I thought you said one bottle a day—”
“Make it two bottles a day. One at breakfast and one at dinner,” Jack says.
“You said not to drink it before school because I’d go to class with a buzz.”
“Wake up earlier for school. Get up at five, drink a bottle, and go for a run. You’ll run drunk for the first mile, but it will burn off.”
“Wake up at five every morning before school?” Is he insane?
“You need to transform faster, and you need that Soda settled in your system before school starts,” Jack says. “Now, let’s work on your moves.”
He steps back three paces and rolls his neck to loosen up. “Come at me.”
“How?”
“However you want. Come at me as if I’m a threat.”
Raising my fists, I move toward Jack off to my left, rather than closing the gap directly in front of him. He adjusts to my first move and lunges toward me, forcing my arms down and grabbing me by the throat with one arm. I use my arms to reach out and grab his throat but he’s got more reach on me, and my arms swing wildly at his arm as I try to break his hold. He’s choking me and I can barely make anything more than guttural sounds.
“You must move quickly toward your enemy, Darius, with purpose. He’s bigger than you, and if he catches you like this, you’ll never reach him,” Jack says.
Gasping for breath, I nod as if I understand, but all I’m really thinking about is oxygen, or my lack of it. My knees wobble. I’m seeing splotches of light. I’m about to pass out.
Opening my eyes, I stare at Jack standing above me, with his hands on his hips. I fainted, and I’m sure he’s disappointed in his fledgling martial arts student.
“Good move.”
Sitting up, still dizzy. “What move? I passed out.”
“Well, yeah, but if you had faked that thirty seconds earlier, your enemy would have let you fall. And you could catch your breath while planning your next move. Stand up.”
Up on my feet, I notice Kira is now awake and watching from the couch. She’s my audience of one, and I’m now more leery of Jack’s moves. The guy is so fast and powerful.
“Let’s work on your hand moves,” he says. “Stand right in front of me and throw punches.”
“At your body or head?”
“Wherever you want.”
He blocks my jab to his stomach, so I throw another jab toward his jaw. He grabs my fist with his hand and pulls me forward, throwing me off balance. I spin toward him with my right arm and he pulls me back in that direction. He’s never throwing his own punches, but instead he’s grabbing all of mine and tossing them away. Within two minutes I’m exhausted and drenched in sweat, and he’s smiling as if he’s only warming up.
“Way to go, Jack!” Kira calls out.
That’s a good enough distraction for me to stop. “Whose side are you on?”
“Kira, what is your brother doing wrong?” Jack asks.
“He’s punching too much?”
“Correct! Darius, you’re working too hard. You’re fighting like a Normal, with all your brute strength, when you should fight like a Vampire, with speed and grace. Use Bao’s energy, feed off his energy.”
“Of course I fight like a Normal. I’m not even a Vampire yet,” I say in my defense.
“You’re more Vampire today than you were yesterday, you just don’t realize it yet,” Jack says. “I want you to memorize this line: ‘Every day, in every way, I’m getting better and better.’”
That line is familiar to me. “That’s a lyric from my dad’s favorite John Lennon song.” I sing it to him. “Every day, in every way, I’m getting better and better…”
Jack shrugs. “It might be a lyric in Lennon’s song. It was also a popular self-help mantra back in the ‘70s. The French psychologist Professor Coue was one of my mentors. He taught me that mantra. This time I’m going to run at you, down low, and I want you to jump over me.”
Jumping up and down a couple of times, I test the springs in my legs, reciting the mantra in my head. Every day, in every way, I’m getting better and better. “Okay.”
Jack sprints at me across the mat and lunges for my legs and I leap up in the air. To my surprise, I fly up five or six feet and forward just as far, and I land like Jack landed the other night when he dropped from his pull-up bar, like a gymnast.
“Wow, awesome!” Kira cheers.
“Holy crap! Did I really jump like that?”
Jack stands with an approving smile. “The Blood Orange Soda is working. You’re transforming.”
“How high can I go?” I ask, bouncing on the mat, feeling lighter with my newly sprung Vampire legs.
“The bottom of that beam up there is ten feet,” Jack says. “Hit it.”
Running to the beam, I leap off the mat, rising so fast that I have to duck my head to the side to prevent myself from hitting the beam. Tapping the side of the wood is easy, and I drop back to a quiet landing. Like a cat!
“Good job, Darius!” Kira shouts.
“You can dunk, my friend.” Jack gives me a thumbs-up. “Not many white boys from St. Cloud can dunk!”
“Cool. This is so freaking cool! I should try out for the basketball team.”
“Ah, let’s not tell anybody yet about your growing powers and speed,” Jack advises. “You still have much to learn. I want you on two doses of Soda, and running for at least thirty minutes every morning. I’ll let you know when it’s time for your next practice session.”
He throws a water bottle to me. He says to Kira, “Honey, can you run downstairs and check on your mom?”
“Yeah, sure.” She runs across the mat and down the spiral staircase. “Great workout, Darius!”
She descends the metal steps, and it’s the second time that I’ve noticed her respect and admiration for me. I haven’t been the most nurturing older brother to her because I’ve been so preoccupied with my own life to notice hers.
“She really looks up to you,” Jack says.
“I know—”
“You’ll need people like Kira for the fight, people to watch your back. You’ll need a crew.”
“A crew?”
“Yeah, a crew, or posse, to protect you before, during, and after the fight,” Jack says. “Who are your friends?”
At first my mind is a blank slate, but then I suggest, “Angel, Weezer, and Shelby.”
“You need a show of force,” Jack says. “Who else is on your side? Who else desperately wants to see you win against this bully?”
There are dozens of kids who would like nothing more than to see me whip Bao’s ass, but they’re only recent Facebook friends or RenRen connections. I’m not a member of a gang, but then I remember that there’s one group that might be my posse.
Blood Orange Soda: Paranormal Romance Page 10