The Wisherman

by Danielle

  Oliver felt Owen looking at him with a look that was partly smug and partly resigned. Oliver supposed that if this had been a simple pissing contest, Owen would have whooped and gleefully yelled “I told you so!” But in the aftermath of Gabriel’s story, no one felt like celebrating. Oliver in particular wished he could take it all back. He wished he had never asked. Now, it would be burned into his brain forever, and if there was one thing Oliver was certain of, it was that he didn’t need any more tragedy.

  “I guess it’s my turn.” Alex piped up, in an unusually subdued voice. Oliver’s muscles ached from sitting so tensely. Alex’s tale was no different from the rest. As he dove deeper in, sharing a story that was more darkness than light, more yin than yang, Oliver felt his heart drop through the floor. Owen had been right of course. Who was he to waltz in like some kind of special case, as if he had the copyright on heartbreak and disappointment? As if he were misfortune’s sole client? The shame came on hard and fast as Alex continued talking.

  Alex was far away now, though. His eyes stared at the ceiling, but he---he was gone, somewhere far, far away.

  “My parents were so proud you know. I was their little prodigy. I could play piano by age three. I was getting everything right on Jeopardy by age five. I was going to be the one, you know. I was going to win the million dollars, and we were going to move into a bigger house, man. I could do it. I knew the million dollar question. Then, shit hit the fan of course.” Alex looked around the room as if suddenly realizing where he was. “I went on Jeopardy. I got it. I got the million dollar question. And they told me I cheated, that I stole the answer card. How would I do that?” Alex cried, as if he were talking to the host of Jeopardy himself. “My dad, man. He knew I knew. He saw it all. He was going to retire. On this nice little house by the beach. He always wanted to open up a little restaurant and sell his food right there to all the tourists. The American Dream, you know. He saw it, the whole thing and lost it all, right there. And it was all because of me.” Alex smiled sadly, tipped his head back and funneled some beer. “And here we are. I’ve got PBR. It was tough, but I got it.” He cracked a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. Malachi jumped in shortly thereafter to tell his story. The fact that Oliver had already heard it didn’t lessen the pain.

  Barely realizing what had happened, Oliver found himself clutching a beer. He threw it back and grimaced at the toilet bowl taste, though he was thankful to have something else to focus his senses on, if only for that moment. Owen swirled the beer in a new glass, and began to speak. His voice was monotone, and it was clear that he had made this speech many times before. “And so there we have it, Oliver. In last place we’ve got the boy who knew too much. I think that about wraps up our little brigade here. Really now, have a beer. That’s the only thing that’ll make all this go away.” Owen took a huge swig of his own. “Are you satisfied now?” He asked, his voice slightly slurred. Oliver froze. He was the furthest thing from satisfied. He was….nothing. He felt strangely numb. He’d once imagined this before of course, coming across a bunch of people just like him. For some reason, he imagined it to be a happy reunion. But as he looked around the room, at Gabriel who was nearly passed out on the bed, Alex who nursed several beers at once, and Owen, who had clearly checked out years before this conversation, this was nothing like what he’d imagined. There was nothing about this that was happy. He looked over at Malachi, who had been quiet for an astonishingly long time. He too had taken on the thousand yard stare, his mind far away from this room.

  Oliver suddenly felt as if he were the only person in the room that was actually alive. He wondered if this was exactly what Delafontaine wanted. “But, this Disciples thing, you have to stick together, right?”

  Alex perked up. “Yeah, we get together.”

  Oliver’s anger flared. “So do something!”

  He had pictured in his mind that this would go over as a rousing call to arms, but the words fell flat. Owen got up, and Oliver watched him and held his breath. He shuffled over to the closet and removed a small broom and dust pan, and began sweeping up the remains of his old tumbler. Oliver’s heart sank.

  “So that’s just it then? We’ve all got these things---he shuddered at calling them powers. Powers were for superheroes, people who saved lives and did good things for the world. With a fresh helping of guilt that he realized he hadn’t felt in quite some time, Oliver remembered that he was not that at all.

  “…and we’re not even going to use them?” He continued anyway.

  Owen shrugged as if Oliver had just asked him the time, and he simply didn’t know. “Are you going to do something about it, wisher man?” Gabriel lifted his head, appearing mildly interested. Alex stared into his empty beer bottle and hiccupped. Oliver opened his mouth to answer, but Owen cut him off. “There’s no way out of here. We don’t graduate. No one ever does. It’s cursed, you know.”

  “Where do people go, then?” Oliver asked, exasperatedly.

  “People just don’t. They get sick. They disappear. I don’t know.” Gabriel said, and he lifted his shoulders into a shrug.

  “Maybe if you stood up for yourselves for once in your lives!” Oliver looked around the room desperately. “You’re going to let them decide what’s going to happen to you? Are you just going to disappear in six months?” The room was silent once again, and at that moment Oliver realized that it was true. The Delafontaine School wasn’t trying to turn good boys into good young men, it was trying to stamp the very life out of them. It was almost too clever, really, and if he hadn’t been so horrified, Oliver might have saluted the school. It was the perfect crime, to kill a young soul. Realizing that not a single word he said would fall upon receptive ears today, Oliver stood up and left the room.

  He returned to his own room, feeling worse than the day his father died. Oliver didn’t think he would ever be able to forget Owen’s stare, and that it was apparently contagious. As he watched each boy in the room adopt the same stare, he wondered if he too would get it someday. If he would wish on beer cans instead of stars. Oliver fell asleep that night to terrible dreams and an uneasy stomach. All the while, Owen’s stare occupied his unconscious, reminding him of the lost dreams of many.

  Chapter 8

  The next day, Oliver popped up with considerably less enthusiasm than he’d had the first day. “You forgot your tie.” Robert noted, looking at him through his own mirror.

  Oliver looked down and shrugged. “Who cares?”

  He sat down at his usual table for breakfast, giving Paul a solemn hello. He spotted Robert walk through the bagel line, but he darted off without sitting down. Paul, as animated as ever quickly launched into a discussion of the day’s history lesson. He made sure to nod at the appropriate times, but Paul’s discussion had long become white noise to him. He looked over to the center table, and with a sudden flash of anger, he noticed a fourth person who he realized was Malachi. Malachi, Owen, Alex, and Gabriel had their heads together in deep discussion. Oliver’s nostrils flared. So that was it then? They were going to just kick him out of their pity party club? He hadn’t wanted to be a part of it anyway. It wasn’t like it was exclusive. Oliver thought back to Owen’s mocking comment from the day before: “Did you think you were special?” Did they think they were special? If they wanted to wallow and disappear, then that was on them. Oliver had no intention to do anything similar. He hadn’t escaped hell, just to land in purgatory.

  Oliver stared at the center table, while he shoveled mashed potatoes in his mouth in a way that he hoped seemed aggressive.

  “Whoa.” Paul had finally stopped droning about history class---or was it math?—and had turned his attention to Oliver’s eating habits. “You don’t want to hang around them anyway, you know.” Oliver cocked his eyebrow. “Everyone knows what they do after class. You really don’t want that in your life, do you? You’re welcome to study with me and some friends after class instead.” Oliver smiled bitterly, though he hoped it looked genuine to Paul.

&
nbsp; “Thanks, but I’ll pass for now.” Oliver said.

  Paul looked at him, then turned up his nose. “Suit yourself. There’s a history test on Friday, at any rate. I’m going to be prepared for it, even if you’re not.” With that, Paul gathered his books and tray and left the table in a flurry. Oliver looked up at the clock and rolled his eyes. Class didn’t start for another twenty minutes.

  When Oliver felt that he had sufficiently burned a large enough hole in the back of Malachi’s head with his staring, he turned back to his own tray resigned to finishing his meal alone. As he was finishing the last of his eggs, someone cleared their throat. Oliver looked up to see Malachi, Owen, Gabriel and Alex standing around the table.

  “Can we sit?” Malachi looked at Oliver, with a look that said he was going to sit regardless of what Oliver said. Oliver waved his hand ceremoniously and they sat. He stabbed at his eggs, eyes buried in his tray as he waited for someone to speak. It certainly wasn’t going to be him. He’d said his piece the day before, and had been treated to the door.

  “We’ve been talking.” Gabriel began, and he looked over at Owen, who nodded for him to keep going. Malachi swallowed. “We want to know what you had in mind. For the Disciples that is.” He smiled slowly.

  ~

  Oliver spent the remainder of the day sharing knowing looks with the rest of the boys. In between classes, they would smile at each other over the secret that only they knew. Oliver looked at everyone else, those who dutifully took notes in History class, sucking up the Delafontaine propaganda, and he pitied them. He spotted Paul staying after History, animatedly asking the instructor if there were any extra resources available in the library. Paul’s eyes had lit up at Mr. Johnson’s impressed look, and Oliver fought the urge to roll his eyes once more. He did not know what he was missing out on, and how could he? Blinded by what he thought was right. Oliver supposed that everyone felt that way at least once in their lives. He shook his head in distaste and headed towards his next class, feeling rather light on his feet.

  The end of the day couldn’t come quick enough for Oliver. As soon as he’d finished mumbling through his session with Dr. Heinz, he’d left that yellow couch as fast as his feet could carry him. He emerged in the basement, and was hit with the familiar smell of marijuana and cigarette smoke. Once, an irritant to his nose, it was now a welcoming scent. As welcoming as any doormat, it said “Welcome home, Oliver.”

  “You want to do what?” The skepticism in Gabriel’s voice was so strong that Oliver began to doubt what had come out of his own mouth. He had to admit that it sounded a little out there in his head, but he couldn’t see any reason why they shouldn’t do it.

  Malachi shook his head. “So, we just recruit everybody, and then what, have a weekly support group?”

  Alex laughed. “Hello, my name is Alex and I know everything. Please join my club.”

  “Will we have to share the bud?” Gabriel looked concerned, and Alex burst into laughter again.

  “No, no, no! The point is to establish community.” Oliver shouted. He looked over to Malachi for help, but he merely shrugged.

  “What do you want this to be?” Gabriel asked.

  “I want this to be….” Oliver stopped to think. He thought of Matron Charlie and how she barked orders at him on the first day. He thought of how the bell rang between classes, and everyone marched out like good little soldiers, into their classrooms where they sat like good little students. He thought of Ms. Latham’s recitation of “Good boys become good men.” And lastly, he thought of the ‘help’, scratched into the pine tree in the forest. That person had perhaps used the last of their strength to send that message, but to who? Who was going to spread that message? Oliver felt a swelling in his chest. He would.

  “I want them to know that they don’t own us. They do not decide who we are, or who we will become. No one does, but us.” He looked around the room, and to his surprise, everyone was smiling but Owen. Oliver felt his heart drop a little and his cheeks flush. His speech had been a bit theatrical, but he meant every word of it from the bottom of his heart. He looked over at Owen, half nervous and half angry at the lack of response.

  After a few moments of tense silence, Owen’s face broke into a wide grin. “Well, it’s settled then. The Disciples it is.” And with that, the room erupted with cheers, and the sound of Alex’s concerned questions. “But we will still drink beer right? We’re not going straight edge?”

  “We need a manifesto.” Malachi said, and he pulled a notebook from his backpack. He ripped out a page and placed it in front of Oliver.

  “We do?” Oliver looked over, confused.

  “Yes.” Malachi said, firmly.

  “We have to remember what we stand for.” Oliver uncapped his pen and pressed it down to the paper, poised to write. He looked around the room at the rest of the boys, who waited with baited breath. Malachi nodded his head, urging Oliver on. He pressed his pen onto the paper and wrote the words “Who we are.”

  ~

  “Where are you going?” Robert eyed him suspiciously over the top of his math book. Oliver stood in the mirror, admiring himself out of his uniform.

  “Just going to hang out.”

  “We have a test tomorrow, you know.” Robert said, sounding remarkably like Paul. Oliver shot him a wary look, and Robert pulled his math book up over his face.

  “Yeah, we have a test every day. It’s called life. How do you prepare for that?” Oliver curled his lips into a bitter smile.

  “You’ll cover for me?” Robert’s response was slow, and for a moment, Oliver was afraid.

  “Yeah, I will.” Robert said finally.

  “But.”

  Oliver groaned inwardly.

  “I want to know where you’re going.” Robert had put his book down and was now staring deliberately at Oliver.

  “Tell me.” Oliver stopped combing his hair for a moment and turned to Robert.

  “Relax. I will tell you. I can’t yet. But we’re working on something. Something big, and everyone’s going to want to be a part of it. It’ll be good for…some of us.” Robert said nothing, though he looked thoroughly unsatisfied with the answer and he picked his math book back up again and stuck his nose in it.

  Oliver slipped down the hallway and out the front door, just narrowly avoiding a patrolling guard. As he stepped outside Branson Hall, he saw the lights shut off all at once, and he crossed his fingers that Robert had kept his promise. He approached the window at the basement floor at Knott Hall and rapped twice. A knock returned, and Oliver knocked three more times before the window opened. Contorting himself in a way that he was sure would have been incredibly painful had his body not been presently drowning in adrenaline, he folded himself into the tiny, open space. Several minutes later, complete with hushed whispers and stealth tiptoeing down the hall, Oliver found himself in Owen’s room surrounded by the rest of the boys.

  “What’s our first move?” Malachi asked.

  They sat around the round table stolen from the common room. Alex reached into Owen’s mini fridge and grabbed several beers, but Owen raised his hand and waved them away.

  “This is serious.” He winked at Oliver.

  Alex groaned. “I thought we weren’t going straight edge!”

  “We’ll have plenty of time to celebrate in the future.” Oliver cut in. “How many are there of us?” Owen scratched his chin. “Alex?”

  In response, Alex looked up at the bud-lier as if he were counting the number of joints. “A couple in each year, I expect. It’s not like we’ve ever stood up and announced ourselves. We all thought we were alone when we first got here. Sometimes, you can just tell, though.” Alex said. The rest of the boys nodded.

  “We need a way to identify ourselves.” Owen offered, and a chorus of “mhms” rounded the table.

  “Like, a business card?” Alex asked, grinning.

  “Kind, of yeah.” Oliver said, ignoring the obvious joke in Alex’s comment. “We need a way to show people
that we are here.”

  “Without any of the matrons finding out,” Gabriel pointed out. “So it has to be obvious, but not too obvious. What about an x?”

  Oliver waved away the suggestion. “You think Charlie wouldn’t notice us walking around with giant X’s on our arms. She’d shut us down in a day.”

  Malachi laughed and said in a high pitched voice, “Good boys don’t mark up their arms!” to uproarious laughter.

  “What about a circle?” Owen looked around the room. “I mean, what if we drew black circles?”

  “So we look like we have giant moles?” Gabriel made a disgusted face.

  “Not giant. Just big enough.” Oliver corrected him.

  Owen leaned forward, his eyes more alive than Oliver had ever seen them before. “We could put it just here on our necks. It would look like a freckle.” Owen looked around the room, his eyes wide with anticipation.

  “I like it.” Gabriel said first.

  “Me too.” Malachi followed.

  “Aye.” Alex raised his beer.

  All eyes were on Oliver now. “Alright. I like it. See you boys tomorrow.”

  The development of the Disciples brought a spring to Oliver’s step that he had never known before. The next morning, he examined himself in the mirror, and the black circle that appeared inconspicuously on his neck. He wrinkled his nose in disgust, because it did look quite like a brand new mole. He admired it greatly, however, and when Robert diligently pointed out the smudge, Oliver smiled widely and said “I know.”