DEAD AT SIXTEEN (THE KNOWERS Book 1)

by D. A. E. Jackson

  He continued talking, but I truly didn’t hear another word. I simply stood across the living room from him, listening but hearing a thunderous landslide in my head. The sound grew into a building chorus of, “NO!” I knew on a deeper level than I had ever known anything before that I could not do what my dad asked. I needed Mike and his friends—our friends—like I needed food: a lot and several times a day.

  “Lydia!” Dad hollered towards the kitchen. ”Come and help me talk some sense into your son.”

  “You know how I feel about this,” she yelled back. “You got us into this. You can handle it.” The pan and dish noises increased until I thought something would soon break.

  I was able to quiet the roar in my head long enough to get out, “What are you talking about?” Then louder, “You are going to have to explain what you mean, ‘cause there’s no way I'm giving up my friends. Not these friends. So, please, tell me why?” I was no longer confused, and said, “You know what? It really doesn’t matter why. I’m not giving up my friends just so you can be the big man and tell me what to do. I will not give up these friends.” Speaking the words out loud made the feeling even stronger.

  “I... I can’t explain,” he said, his forehead dropping into his hands. He suddenly looked small and vulnerable. I’d certainly never seen this side of him. I can’t say I cared to see it. Dad had always been dependable and strong—like the most reliable school crossing guard that you know nothing about; just always around, even if he didn’t seem to care all that much.

  I noticed that the clatter from the kitchen had stopped and Mom was leaning against the door. “Oh, honey.” I thought at first she meant me, then she walked up to Dad. She spoke very quietly to him but she was kind of emotional, so I could hear some of what she said: “Don’t you think we have to tell him now?”

  This was turning out to be about the weirdest night of my life and I noticed my legs were trembling. I decided I ought to sit down before I fell down, so I half-sat, half-crashed onto the recliner near the couch.

  “Tomorrow,” Dad said to Mom after they’d been whispering for a while. To me, he said, “Tomorrow, can you bring Mike here to the house after school? I need a day to get things together.”

  “S-sure,” I stammered. I took a big breath, getting ready to say much more, but Mom and Dad had turned and walked out of the room before I could speak. Moments later, I heard their bedroom door softly close.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Coming out of my room for breakfast the next day, full of unanswered questions from the night before, I found that Dad had already gone. Mom was still there, dressed for the day, but she avoided the subject like a pro, saying, “Wait till after school” like she was promising me a present to unwrap. That was extremely annoying.

  “So, does Dad know Mike? Last night, Mike said he knew Dad. Do you know Mike too? Can you tell me what’s going on?”

  “No, I don’t know him, your father looked at him, not me.”

  “What? Of course you looked at him. He was right in front of you both.”

  “Well, yes, I saw him. Just wait till after school tonight. Your father will finally explain everything to you. And it’s about time, too. I never met a man as stubborn as your father.” She stopped talking and just looked at me for a moment. “He loves you, you know. I know it’s hard to see sometimes, but he does. He just has a hard time showing it. And you, young man, don’t make it any easier for him.”

  I must have made a sound just then because she took hold of both my upper arms and looked into my eyes, saying, “You have to let him love you, Philip. Let love in. I think you want to. He really does love you, you know?” What was happening to my parents? My cool suburban folks were turning into emotional human beings, and I didn’t know what to make of it. I squirmed out of her grasp and headed off to school early.

  ◆◆◆

  Since I’d gotten to school so early, I thought I’d look for Mike and the others in the library. Of course, they weren’t there. No one was sitting around their usual table and I had to wait until lunch to find them.

  My friends were already seated with their lunches in front of them when I got to the cafeteria. “Hey, Mike,” I said when I’d finally gotten my tray and sat down. I was probably talking too loudly again, but I was excited. “What was that last night? Do you know my parents? They sure seemed to know you.” I began to chew and swallow as fast as I could.

  “No. No, I don’t know them. Why would you think I’d know your parents? That’s so weird.” He practically dropped his fork while stumbling over his words. Jaimie had stopped eating and was watching us like she was recording every detail. Roger and Milton were pretending to carry on a conversation while watching us the whole time.

  “Anyway,” I said, “They want to see you this afternoon after school. Can you come over for a while before we have to be back here for the show?”

  “They want to see me?” he said, surprised. “Did they say why?”

  “They said they wanted to tell me something and Dad said he had to get some things together. That’s all I know.”

  “Well, that changes things. Sure, I’ll come to your house and we’ll get this all out,” said Mike, sounding like he’d just won a fight.

  “So, what are we going to talk about?” I asked Mike. I was feeling more frustrated than ever.

  “Later,” he said between bites of our mediocre school lunch.

  “If you really don’t know my parents, why do they want you there?” I felt like I was starting to go a little crazy.

  “Later.”

  “Wait a minute!” I objected, my volume rising. “You said you did know them last night. You said, ‘I know George.’ Then Mom said she didn’t know you. Now you say you don’t know them. Which is it?”

  “Later.”

  Getting louder, I said, “Why is it whenever I get mad you dummy up?”

  Mike looked at Milton and raised one eyebrow. “How many times have you gotten mad at me?” he asked me, still looking at Milton. The rest of the table got very quiet.

  “I don’t know. Never?” This was getting infuriating.

  “How many times have you used the expression, ‘dummy up’ to mean get quiet?”

  “I don’t know. I guess never. Look, what’s going on here?” Mike turned from Milton to me, again giving me that same deep look.

  “That’s not weird,” Roger said to Milton.

  “Not weird at all,” Milton said back to him.

  “Ooh! What could it all mean?” Jamie asked, with her hand in front of her mouth to cover the food she was chewing. The three of them started laughing but were trying—pretty unsuccessfully—not to show it.

  “What?” I asked, glancing around at everyone at the table. “You guys clearly know more about what’s happening here. Can’t you tell me?”

  “Later,” Mike said again, turning his attention back to his food.

  By the end of lunch, Milton had had enough of my endless questioning. “Philip,” he said, clearly irritated. “You have to stop talking now.” Then he turned to Mike, “Or tell him.”

  “What’s the difference, anyway?” Roger slid in there slyly, hoping no one would notice.

  “No,” Mike said firmly. “It’s his parent’s job to do this and I’m holding them to it. What are your folk’s names again, Philip?” he asked.

  “George and Lydia,” I said, more confused and frustrated than ever.

  “Right. George and Lydia. After school. You and me. Meet me at my car. I’m driving.” He stood up, grabbed his tray and was gone. The rest of us just looked at each other. They shrugged their shoulders at me, then we all picked up our trays and went our separate ways.

  ◆◆◆

  After school that day I was on my way to Mike’s car when I happened to pass Roger and Milton in the hall. “What are you still doing here?” Milton asked me, “Aren’t you supposed to be meeting with Mike and you’re parents?”

  “My dad’s not home from work yet, so there’s no rush,
” I answered. “Why are you two standing here in the hall?” I thought that was sort of odd.

  “Milton won’t tell me what special project he’s been working on, and I’m trying to get him to spill,” Roger said to me, but finished with his attention back on Milton.

  “I will tell all of you about it when I know more. It's still in the experimental phase right now,” Milton explained to Roger. “Patience, little buddy. All will be revealed in time.” Milton sometimes talked like how he imagined a college professor would. “But you, Philip, should skedaddle on home. You’ve got a big night tonight!” I was turning to go when he continued, “Oh, one more thing—don’t freak out.”

  “Right,” Roger joined in, “Don’t freak out.” Since I often didn’t understand what my friends were saying, I didn’t try too hard to figure out what they meant, so I headed on down the hall to meet Mike at his car.

  ◆◆◆

  The meeting with Mike and my parents after school was the moment when I learned that my entire life was a lie. We’d barely arrived at my house when Mike walked right up to my mom and they stared at each other for about five seconds without saying a word. Mike did that little side tilt of his head that he’d done the night before with my dad. Suddenly, she let out a little squeak, wrapped her arms around his neck, and hugged him rocking back and forth a bit. Watching them do this gave me the strangest feeling of déjà vu. The feeling of having seen this before was so strong I could even see another version—one with two strangers holding each other—superimposed on Mike and my mom.

  In this other version, I see Mike—but not Mike—dressed in a military uniform and Mom—but not Mom—wearing some kind of old-fashioned dress, hugging him, and rocking. As they separate, the vision disappears. This weird double vision thing had happened a few times by now and the thought occurred to me that I might be losing my mind.

  “So, you do know each other,” I said. This was not helping my confusion at all.

  “No,” Mom replied. “We’d never met until last night at the play. Well,” she added, “That’s not quite right either. Um, I’ll let your father explain it.”

  “Dang it, Mom! Where is he?” I demanded, exasperated. “I'm about to go crazy here! Plus, now I’m pretty sure I’m seeing things.”

  “Oh. Good!” she said, inexplicably.

  “Dad’s finally here,” I said. “I’ll help him.” Then we all heard his car pull up in front of the house and a car door slam outside. “I got it,” I said just before the doorbell rang and I went to open the door. It was Dad with his arms full of books—mostly old photo albums —and a pile of three-ring binders. They were stacked high and threatening to fall at any moment. I grabbed the two off the top and rushed to clear enough room on the table for him. Just as they began to topple, he let them slide onto the table safely. I opened the folder that had fallen in front of me and saw pages with old newspaper clippings and photocopies of old legal documents.

  “Everyone, please sit down,” he said while searching through the photo books and binders. Selecting one, he joined us in the living room. We’d saved the recliner I almost fell into last night for him.

  “Okay, here we go,” he said, rubbing his hands together with the book on his lap. “My name is George. This is 1980. I was born in 1942.”

  “I know what year it is, Dad. Where are you going with this?” I was so impatient, I just wanted him to get on with it.

  “Time,” he said. “Give me some time.” Mom and Mike actually smiled when he said that. I could’ve strangled them for encouraging him, I was that annoyed.

  “As I said,” he repeated, “I was born in 1942. This man” —he opened the photo book and pointed to a copy of microfilm of an old newspaper and, specifically, to a smeary image of two men standing in front of a building shaking hands —“The man on the left? He died in 1941. His name was Harold.” He looked straight at me and said in a slow voice, “I was also Harold.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “I'm not exactly Harold,” he said quickly as if he knew he was losing me. “I mean, Harold died and is buried in the ground so Harold’s body is long gone. He’s dead. But I know everything Harold knew. I am George. I am Harold. Before Harold, I was Anselmo, before that Ada, and Franklyn before her. Before that it gets tricky.”

  “Why are you telling me this?” I nearly shouted. “If you’re going to lie to me, at least lie about something believable. This one is just stupid!” Exasperated, I turned to Mike. “Come on, Mike, let’s go!”

  “Except, well, it’s true, Philip,” Mike said, slowly looking up to meet my gaze.

  “What do you mean?” I shot back. “Of course it’s not true! Why would you even say that? Let’s go. Now!”

  “Sit down!” Mom commanded in her serious mother voice. “I’m sorry, but it is true. All of it. And oh so much more! Now, sit down please and let us explain.” I could not have been more confused, but I buckled under parental pressure.

  “Five minutes,” I said. ”I’m giving you five minutes and then I’m out of here.” Then to Mike I finished with, “Whether you come with me or not.”

  “Maybe it would be better if Mike explained part of it,” Mom said to Dad. “Maybe it’ll be easier to take.” She gestured for Mike to go on.

  “Okay, then. Here’s the story,” he began. “There's a group in the world called ‘the Knowers.’ It’s a small group of humans who are born and reborn with memories of their previous lives. They know things, get it? The Knowers? Anyway, when one of the Knowers is reborn, he or she receives their memories around the time of puberty. We call it their ‘Awakening.’ At least that’s when they are supposed to start remembering. Sometimes, though, the signals just don’t come through. That’s when the parents, who are almost always one or both members of the Knowers, help the child to retrieve their lost memories. Except when they don’t," he said, glaring at my parents.

  “I am one of the Knowers. Both your parents are. Jamie, Roger, and Milton are, too. We’ve all been waiting for you to Awaken someday. When you didn’t, your parents should have helped you.” He turned to them, then asked, “Why didn’t you help him?” He looked genuinely hurt.

  “I’ll explain,” Dad said softly. He continued in place of Mike. “The Knowers have an eternal job here on Earth. That is, to remember everything. And we use that information to help mankind. You see, we are able to use the vast store of knowledge about the past to predict where and when catastrophes are about to happen and help minimize the damage.

  “It’s like statistics. We use all of the data we collect over lifetimes to predict the probability of a particular outcome.” He paused when he noticed the skeptical look on my face. “Let me explain it better,” he said. “It’s like a hot stove. Your experience has taught you that if you touch a hot stove, it will burn you. Imagine what you would know to be true if you spent lifetimes collecting data and predicting outcomes.”

  “I don’t mean just earthquakes and fires, but of course those, too. We—the Knowers—do our best to help mankind avoid grave mistakes by seeing them before they happen, then doing what we can to change the tide of events to avoid calamity.” He paused for a moment with raised eyebrows, perhaps waiting for a comment from me. When I said nothing, he continued. “We can also detect people who are destined to cause great misery and destruction due to their actions. Once we predict something terrible is starting to develop, we wait until another member of our order confirms it, then we take the appropriate action.”

  Dad stopped again for a few heartbeats, probably still waiting for a reaction from me, and then said with mounting enthusiasm, “So, you see, Philip, the Knowers fill a very important need. We keep great swaths of people alive and out of the hands of tyrants and murderers.”

  Dad continued, “So, as Knowers we remember the past and receive Knowledge about the future. Well, sometimes. Sometimes the Knowledge is very specific. At other times, it’s just too general to be of any use.” I was speechless. I was just sitting on the couch, completely co
nfused and speechless. He must have taken my silence as an invitation to continue and added, “Now that you know, I might as well admit to you why I kept all this from you.” I may have finally perked up at this news. I really didn’t know how they expected me to react.

  “Philip,” he pressed on, “When you were born, I looked into your eyes and I knew, I just knew that you would not live to be a man. The older you got the more I realized that this untimely death I’d seen coming was tied to the Knowers. I became convinced that if you never Awakened to the Knowledge, you might yet live a full life. So, I kept you away from studying history or our family past or using ‘the Look,’ which is how we recognize each other. It’s a specific way of looking, really looking at another Knower’s eyes, and recognizing them from your past. Then you begin to remember all the things you shared before.”

  “I was never convinced,” Mom interrupted in a rush. “I could never confirm the prediction. That doesn’t mean it’s not possible, it’s just not definitive.”

  “Mike?” I pleaded, stunned, hoping he would poke or pinch me and wake me up from this hallucination, help me find my way back to the normal family I thought I had.

  “I can’t say anything about you not living long enough to become a man. I haven’t seen that. But otherwise, everything George has told you is true, I’m afraid. As for me, I was born in 1961. My Previous was Ingmar, who was born in 1914 and died in 1960.” Mom gasped and reached across the room to him. Mike smiled reassuringly at her. “Ingmar grew up on a farm in Kansas,” Mike continued. “He joined the war after Pearl Harbor. That’s where I, um, where he met you. You were-”