Jared’s eyes went to the cop car and then to the rearview mirror. “Didn’t uh...” He bit the corner of his lip. “Didn’t you just get convicted of being a Shine?”
He checked his side view mirror and the car decelerated.
Shinal was ready to grab him and take over the car, when a family sedan passed them. Two more cars were behind them, ready to leap frog their car given a chance, but Jared matched their speed keeping them amidst company.
“Just stay calm,” Frenchie said. “And you can let us go at the next stop.”
The police sirens were getting louder and as they rounded a bend in the road they pulled within 100 feet of another chopper car. The police cruiser was perpendicular to the road blocking it. A police officer was in the middle of the highway waving the line of cars to a halt.
Shinal turned to glance at the back seat. They were trapped; walled in by the fence, the police, and a driver who knew exactly from where the three of them had come.
Without warning, the car ahead slowed then pulled to the side of the road. Jared didn’t react fast enough. He clipped the car in front of them and sent it careening to the right. Jared then over-corrected, tires squealing their car angled towards the police cruiser.
The policeman dove to the side just before the rear of their car slammed into the police cruiser’s front fender.
“Keep your heads down,” Jared said as he leapt from the vehicle.
“What’s he doing?” Frenchie called from the backseat.
Shinal crept up to the edge of the window. The doorframe and headrest obscured her view, otherwise she would’ve been in plain sight of the policeman who lay on the ground grabbing his leg. “He’s talking to the policeman and pointing at the car.”
Shinal collapsed to the floor.
“We’ve got to get out of here,” Lola said as her door cracked open.
Shinal glanced between the front seats to see Frenchie grab Lola’s shirt and yank her back down.
“And go where?” Frenchie demanded. “If we so much as move we are going to go from having one eye-witness to having nearly a dozen. If he hasn’t turned us in yet, we should wait it out.”
Three agonizing minutes later Jared slipped back into the driver’s seat and slid the car into reverse. The rear passenger wheel grinded into the back quarter panel and when they started forward something broke off the under carriage of the car, freeing the wheel.
Jared smiled at the other cars as he inched past the officer and onto the open road. They drove for a few minutes in the same direction they’d been heading. Shinal was starting to feel like one of those contortionists as she sat in the footwell.
“The coast is clear. You girls can sit up now,” Jared said.
Shinal pulled herself back onto the passenger’s seat. “What was that?”
“That was exactly what it looked like, a roadblock.”
“Is everyone okay?”
He glanced in his rearview mirror, then the side mirror. “The passengers of the other cars are all right. Unfortunately the cop is out of it and he appears to have a broken leg.”
“And he just let you go?” Frenchie asked.
“He didn’t have much of a choice. He’s unconscious. His vitals are stable and there is an RN taking care of him. I told everyone that I needed to drive to the next town to get medical attention.”
“Is there a town nearby?”
“I have no idea. But I had to do something to get you girls out of there.” The car accelerated to felony speeds.
Shinal glanced at the girls in the back seat, unsure if she should dive out of the car or kiss him.
There was finally a fork in the road and Jared turned north onto a two-lane highway that wound its way through the foothills.
“You obviously know who we are. So why are you helping us?” Frenchie asked.
“Actually, I only recognized Shinal.” He pulled out his cell phone, turned on the screen and handed it to her. “But my daughter’s a lot like the rest of y’all.”
The picture showed a girl with reddish brown hair, oversized front teeth, and round freckled cheeks. Her wide eyes and broad upper face made her look like an eminently happy child. Shinal passed the photo to the girls in the backseat.
“That’s my Caroline. After her mom died last year she started showing some unusual behavior. This was right after the Shine incident that destroyed Santa Monica, California and when the government started arresting Shines on sight. We were already homeschooling her, otherwise she would’ve been sent to prison long before the three of you. And I can’t let that happen. No way I’m letting the government get a hold of my baby.”
“Is she um…,” Lola said. “How do I put this – she looks kind of autistic?”
Shinal whipped around in her seat not believing that someone would call a child autistic based upon what was in a single photograph.
Jared nodded. “Yes, she is. She hasn’t said a word in over fifteen years.”
A large lump swelled in Shinal’s throat as if she’d just developed an Adam’s apple. Raising an autistic kid to the age of a teenager had to be hard enough, but then to complicate that – he was a single parent and his handicapped kid was a Shine. “Where is she now?” Shinal asked.
“When I’m traveling, she stays with my sister just outside of Indianapolis. But I have to move her. The other day I insisted that she help with the morning dishes before going outside. She threw a typical tantrum; pouting, arms flapping, the door slammed. She lay down on the living room floor, covered her head with a pillow and rolled around trying to scream. All the moisture in the room disappeared and the living room floor got so hot that her cousin burned his feet just walking across the tile. She can’t control herself or her powers. My sister’s afraid Caroline’s going to hurt her son or destroy the house. And frankly, so am I.”
“Eventually she’ll learn to control her powers,” Frenchie said. “It just takes some time and practice.”
“It took us eleven years to teach her to use the bathroom. How long do you think it’s going to take to teach her to do that? Neither my sister nor I have any idea how to teach her to control her powers. Nor how to do so without blowing down or burning up a house.”
“There has to be someone that can help,” Shinal said.
“What about you?” Jared asked. “The three of you – couldn’t you teach her?”
“I wouldn’t know how to,” Shinal said. “I didn’t even know I was a Shine until the other day when the lab rats announced it to the world.”
Lola sat back in her seat and cradled her tummy. “Same here. In fact, I’m still not convinced that I even am a Shine.”
Jared’s eyes went to Frenchie, who was still hunched over the front seat, but she sat mute. “What do you say, Blondie, can you help?”
Several seconds passed without a response from Frenchie. Shinal stared at her, willing her to accept. She glanced at the road behind them.
“Fine,” Frenchie said. “I’ll help her. As if we really have a choice.” She sat back, and glared out the window.
CHAPTER 6
Birds chirped. The morning sun rose over the rolling hills of Northern Indianapolis. The only thing Jared craved more than a hot cup of coffee was to see his daughter, Caroline. He turned off the air conditioner that was used to keep him awake all night and cranked up the heater. “We’re almost there,” Jared said as the car came to a stop at a small intersection.
Everything in the community had that if-it-ain’t-broke—don’t–fix-it attitude, including the local movie theater now showing movies from early last summer. He turned into a cul-de-sac and stopped in front of his a house, a single story home surrounded by a chain-link fence. The backyard lead up to the suburban hills that were yet to be developed. A sparse forest lay just beyond.
Caroline stood at the end of the driveway flapping her arms and shaking her hands like a spastic chicken. It was a cute little dance and one that Jared had come to love. As he parked the car, Caroline clapped sev
eral times and ran around to the driver’s door smiling so hard that it looked painful.
Jared stepped out of the car and held his arms open. “How’s my princess?”
She darted in and gave him a quick, awkward hug, and then hopped backwards.
“I love you too. Have you been a good girl? I have a surprise for you.”
She clapped her hands again and glared at Shinal, who was the first of the girls out of the car.
“Does she look familiar?” Jared asked.
Caroline gave no response.
He got closer, careful not to touch her, and whispered in her ear. “Think Olympics. Think gymnastics.”
Shinal rounded the front of the car and put out a hand.
Caroline squatted, put her head down, and did a forward roll. Halfway through the somersault her back and the bottom of her skull slammed into the pavement, followed by her arms and legs.
Jared and Shinal ran to her aid, followed quickly by Lola and Frenchie.
The young girl stared upwards with eyes the size of golf balls. Her cheeks were puffed and eyes swollen like a four-year-old child that was about to have a meltdown.
“You’re okay, Caroline. Breathe. I’m just going to check you out,” Jared said as he systematically patted her head and neck going through the routine he’d learned in his prior life as an EMT. “Everything’s going to be okay. Breathe. Just Breathe.” His eyes didn’t leave her face as he patted down the left side of her body and then the right. His fingers hesitated at her elbow for a few seconds before moving on.
Caroline’s eyes shot to her father’s, knowing that he’d found something. She glanced at his hand and then her elbow. She started wheezing.
“It’s okay, sweetheart. Just calm down. It’s just a small scrape.”
Her eyes swept across each of the girls and then she sat up. Her hand slipped on the frost-covered driveway.
Jared caught her. “Woah. Slow Down. Stay still for just another minute while I finish checking you.”
Caroline clung to his hands. She was calm now. The look of terror had left her. Red smudges covered her hands just as they covered Jared’s. She felt her elbow and then glanced at the thick, sticky blood covering her fingers.
Her eyes dilated and bulged, and then she began holding her breath again.
“No, no, its okay, Caroline. Everything’s going to be fine,” Jared said. He wiped the blood off her fingers, desperate to stop her. “You’re okay. Just take a breath.”
Caroline’s lips were clamped shut. Her cheeks turned rosy red.
“Please sweetie,” he begged.
Her forehead and palms turned bright red. The frost on the ground around her thickened into a bright white circle and started spreading across the driveway.
“Move,” Jared said as he grabbed Shinal and flung her on-to the grass. Frenchie and Lola followed.
“What’s going on?” Frenchie asked.
“You guys wanted to know about her powers. Well, here it is. She’s some kind of superconductor that can spread heat or cold to everything she comes in contact with.”
Caroline was twitching back and forth like an injured beetle. Occasionally an arm or leg would flail during the tantrum. The black car tires froze solid and turned a light grey, all six of the car’s windows fogged up, and then the car’s still-hot engine cracked releasing a green stream of antifreeze out of the bottom, which turned into a fluorescent icicle.
“We have to help her,” Shinal said, stepping forward.
Jared grabbed her and motioned for the other girls to stay back. “It’s not safe. She’ll burn out in a minute. And her injured right elbow – it really is just a scrape.”
As if on cue, Caroline’s spasticity stopped, and she lay still.
Jared held up his hand and signaled for the girls to give him a minute. He crept forward one foot at a time until he was again crouching down next to his daughter. “You see. I told you, that you would be fine.” He kissed her on the cheek and she slowly opened her eyes. As she did, he backed away.
He pulled her long sleeves back down over her arms and checked her body again. “Everything’s alright now. How do you feel?”
Caroline’s impossibly bright smile returned.
Jared helped her to her feet. “I think our three guests are getting a little cold. Should we go warm up with some cocoa?”
Caroline gave three quick claps and raced inside ahead of the group. Jared followed, hoping that one of their newfound friends would be able to help his daughter.
CHAPTER 7
Auntie Katherine, Jared’s sister, made a chicken pot pie for lunch that was good enough to serve in a southern restaurant. And then Frenchie finally got to shower and manually clean her hair. Of course she could clean and fashion her hair without so much as blinking, but she still loved the feel of doing it manually. When she was done, she said goodbye to the simple farewell dress her mother had given her and traded it in for a pair of hand-me-down jeans from Katherine and one of Caroline’s long-sleeve T-shirts. Then she joined the other girls in the living room. The five of them looked like they were each awaiting tryouts for a Gap commercial.
Frenchie slid onto the couch next to Shinal. “How on earth am I supposed to teach her anything? She can’t talk. She can barely walk. I don’t think she even understands English.”
“She understands perfectly,” Shinal said. “As soon as Jared asked her if she remembered me and gymnastics she tried to do a somersault. She knew exactly what he was saying.”
“Then why didn’t she shake your hand or make some other gesture?”
Lola looked up from the laptop computer she’d been so engrossed in since the moment they’d entered the house. “She’s autistic, Frenchie. She’s wired a little different. You can’t expect her to act like you and I.”
“Well that’s for sure.”
Caroline walked across the room carrying a juice box. She sat down on the ottoman.
Shinal nudged Frenchie.
“Hi, Caroline,” Frenchie said. “Did you know some of us girls have powers to do some unusual things? Kind of like you did in the driveway this afternoon.”
Caroline looked straight ahead, probably just happy that someone was paying attention to her.
“It takes some practice to get your powers under control and your dad wants to see if I can help you with yours. How does that sound?”
Caroline gave a light grunt.
Frenchie closed her eyes, hoping that someone else was going to chime in and help.
Instead she was nudged again by Shinal’s foot. “You can do it,” Shinal whispered. “Try to make it fun.”
Frenchie had an idea. Maybe it would work and maybe it wouldn’t, but she knew how she could make this fun. “Do you want to play a game?” she asked.
Caroline’s impossible smile somehow brightened.
“How about if I show you my powers and then you show me yours?”
Caroline nodded.
“I can control hair. The growth, the color, the size, just about anything about it. Do you want to see?”
Caroline’s head jutted forward.
“To do it I have to concentrate really hard on the hair follicles and then I basically tell them how to behave.” She nodded and gestured with her eyes towards Shinal, who was sitting behind her and to the left. “For example, if I wanted Shinal’s hair to match her outfit I would simply tell her hair follicles to turn her hair blue with pink and purple highlights.”
A few seconds later Shinal’s hair exploded out of the tight ponytail in fluorescent blues and pinks with purple highlights dispersed throughout her part. “What the…?” she ran over to a mirror that was mounted on the wall by the front door. “No. No. No. Change it back. Don’t mess with my hair.”
“Would you prefer to look like Ronald McDonald?”
Shinal’s hair instantly took on the look of Ronald’s three-foot red afro.
Caroline clapped three times and then ran over to examine her hair.
�
�Do you want to see me do it again?” Frenchie asked.
More smiling and nodding came from the mute.
“Okay. This time we’ll do Lola,” Frenchie said.
“Oh no, you don’t,” Lola said. “Don’t you touch my hair.”
“That’s the beauty of it, Queball. I don’t have to touch you at all.” And with that all of Lola’s beautiful curly black hair disappeared. Her bronze head looked like it had been buffed and shined at the bowling alley.
Caroline clapped again and started flapping her arms.
Jared walked out from the other end of the house and grabbed his suitcase. He wasn’t wearing a shirt and had a towel wrapped around his waist, since it was finally his turn to shower.
Frenchie spotted her finale.
“You see, Caroline, those are some of the first tricks I learned. Now changing the hair on someone’s head has become easy. Almost second nature. But with a little more practice you can do things like this.” She nodded to Caroline’s father, who was in midstride crossing the center of the room.
Moments later every hair on his body had grown four inches in length. Jared now looked like a werewolf. He screamed, dropped his towel, and ran to his bedroom.
Caroline screamed too. But her scream didn’t sound like her startled father’s. It was a high-pitched screech that shattered the mirrors, the windows, and every piece of china in her aunt’s cabinet.
Frenchie covered her ears. And then noticed the intense heat radiating from Caroline. She was glowing like red hot embers. Frenchie stumbled back a few feet.
Both Shinal and Lola jumped up from the couch.
“Its okay, Caroline. It was a joke. Your dad’s fine. Just calm down.”
The floor tiles began burning her feet. The wooden couch legs started to smolder.
“Caroline, you have to stop this. You’re going to…”
A loose magazine that Shinal had dropped to the ground caught fire. Almost instantly the chair next to it was covered in flames. Aunt Katherine dashed out of the room and back in, armed with a fire extinguisher. She started dousing the flames.
Frenchie had to calm Caroline down. She took a step forward, but walking into the depths of hell couldn’t have been hotter. She jumped back into the kitchen and looked at Lola and Shinal for help.
Shine: Season One (Shine Season Book 1) Page 54