“Ow!”
“You ready?” he asked.
“If you’re done assaulting me.”
“Just getting you pumped.”
“You are so going down,” Mellissa shouted over to us.
“Sorry, I don’t speak loser,” Quidel shouted back and tossed his outstretched palm up to me and I slapped him high five. Oh, it was on. Matoskah slammed the ball into air with his palm and the game started. Each wave that curled in was unsteadying and every few minutes one of us girls would topple over and land in the water. For about the tenth time, I climbed back up onto Quidel’s shoulders. Mellissa and Skah were out. They sat on the sand, legs outstretched watching the game. I whacked the ball into the air, aiming it at Rona and she slammed it back to me with just as much force. Quidel gripped my legs tighter when I was just about to take a tumble from leaning too far forward and I sent the ball flying back to Rona. It was like watching slow motion when she dropped into the water head first, trying to hit the ball.
“Yes!” Quidel shouted. I leaned forward, wrapping my arms around his neck. His hands came up behind me and pulled me down into the water, right over the top of him and I squealed all the way down. I surfaced and my hair was loose, my hair tie lost somewhere in the sea. I pushed it all back out of my face before grabbing Quidel and dragging him under. I felt his arms take hold around my legs and the next thing, I was tugged back under. He broke the surface before me and we were both laughing. I couldn’t remember when I’d last had so much fun. When we were all out, dressed and dried, we sat back around the fire, Quidel and I deciding what punishments to dish out.
“I’ve got it,” Quidel said. He was dressed in dark blue jeans with a light grey and blue baseball style hoodie and black lace up boots. He had put in small, square cut diamond earrings in each ear, and I knew Mellissa must be deeply cut up from Drake or she would made some comment about him by now. All three boys were good looking in their own way but Quidel was probably the most obvious. Matoskah won with the best eyes. The only other person I could think of whose eyes were more beautiful was…
“Skah, go up to that beach house over there, the one with the two bikes out front and kiss whoever answers the door.” Quidel said, looking overly satisfied with himself.
“What if it’s a dude?” asked Skah, looking not so thrilled about the idea. I could see Matoskah laughing out the corner of my eye but Rona looked nervous, probably worried what was coming next for her.
Quidel stood up and threw Skah his sneakers. “You pucker up,” he said with a touch of snark.
Skah grabbed the sneakers and slid his feet into them, quickly tying them up. “You’re an asshole,” he said to Quidel. But like a good sport, he stood up and jogged over the pebbly sand until he was knee deep in the tall wispy beachgrass. He didn’t even slow climbing up the steps to the log house with the lights on inside. It was one of three holiday homes by the entrance of the beach before it gave way to the resort. I was anxious for him, thinking who might open the door. Three fast knocks at the door and within seconds it was opened by a girl around our age with shoulder length blonde hair, looking confused. Skah wasn’t wasting any time. He grabbed her face in his hands and went in for the kiss. Everyone burst into hushed laughter around the bonfire and after the kiss went on way longer than expected, Skah finally let the girl go. She looked shocked with an undertone of pleasantly surprised. She looked like she enjoyed it.
“Lucky son of a bitch,” Matoskah mumbled. “She’s hot.”
When a man who looked like he could be the girl’s father stepped up behind her to see what was going on, Skah gave her the flash of a flat handed wave and bolted. The door was closed loudly behind him and he dropped down back in his space by the fire. “Too easy,” he boasted, trying to catch his breath.
“You wouldn’t be saying that if it was her dad who answered the door,” Quidel griped.
Rona agreed, smiling at Skah. “Now that, I Would like to have seen.”
Skah rearranged his hair that was now partly hanging loose around his face.
“I’ll do that for you,” Rona offered, getting up and sitting behind him. She carefully scooped his hair into a low ponytail and started to plait it, tying it up at the end with a red band from her wrist. “There you go.”
Rona patted the top of his head and Skah grumbled pushing her hand away. “Thanks.” So frosty the snowman did know how to show affection.
“You next, Mellissa.” Quidel spiked his eyebrow when Mellissa looked at him with a less than pleased expression. “You wanna take this one, Pria?”
“No way,” I said. I wasn’t dishing out punishment on my best friend, and besides, this was clearly Quidel’s thing. Anything I suggested would probably be considered boring.
“Tell you what, why don’t the boys take one for the girl’s tonight. Mellissa’s new. We don’t want to scare her off.”
“Me too?” Rona asked Quidel, looking eternally relieved.
“Except you,” Quidel said, smiling smugly. “You’re not new.”
“Dick.” Rona threw a thin piece of driftwood at him, hitting him on his shoulder.
“I’m kidding.” He picked up the stick and threw it back at her. “So, Matoskah, that just leaves you.”
“Just get it over with,” said Matoskah. He leaned forward and slung his hands over his knees, sighing impatiently.
Quidel was silent for a minute or two, obviously thinking about what harm he could inflict, when his face lit up. His was the mask of evil through the flames of the fire. Whatever he was thinking was probably just as evil and Matoskah must have thought so too because he groaned under his breath when he saw Quidel’s grin.
“Go back to that same cabin, knock on the door and ask to use their bathroom.”
Matoskah was frowning, and I was having my own what? Moment.
“That’s it?” Matoskah didn’t look like he was buying it. It was too easy, and everyone else looked like they had their doubts too.
“Yeah, but without clothes.”
Skah dropped his head to the floor, snickering and swiped his hand down his mouth. “Her dad is gonna kill you.”
“Scared?” Quidel taunted him.
With one dark and adamant look that said he wasn’t about to back down, Matoskah got up and with his back to us all, shrugged out of his jacket. His t-shirt was next, showing us all the smooth contours of his back and then he unzipped his jeans, pulling them off. I looked away when all he was left in was his boxer briefs. Snickering came from Quidel and Skah and I peeked over to see Rona look away awkwardly, too. Although, I’m sure she couldn’t look for different reasons to mine. If I had to guess, I’d say she liked what she saw a little too much.
Matoskah kicked out of his boxers, still with his back to us and I looked up just in time to see his bare butt running off towards the cabin with his hands covering his modesty. Oh my god, these boys were fearless.
“Nice ass,” Mellissa said, smiling at me.
When the girl’s father opened the door and then disappeared, coming back in seconds, face beet red and with a baseball bat in his hands, shouting, I broke down into a fit of giggles. Tears streaked my face and I wiped them away, gasping for a breath.
“That’s the funniest thing I ever saw,” Mellissa said through bouts of laughter, holding onto her stomach, watching Matoskah running over to us. He was just about managing to keep his bits covered and his hair flew out wildly behind him.
“I’ll call the cops if you knock on this door again,” the man at the cabin door shouted over in rage, cupping his hand around his mouth and the bat never leaving his side. Matoskah was smiling when he ran over to us and he grabbed his heaped clothes off the floor.
His words came out in rushed and ragged breaths. “We gotta get outta here,” he told us, pulling on his boxers and not bothering with anything else, just bundling the whole lot under his arm. “Like now.”
When who I assumed to be the man’s wife, came out onto the steps with a cordless phone in h
er hand, we all jumped up. Quidel, Skah and Matoskah grabbed their surfboards and everyone ran for the parking lot, still laughing. Tonight was the most I had laughed, and it felt good.
***
It was late by the time Matoskah dropped me and Mellissa at the Inn by the Harbor. It was almost midnight; no time to be gate crashing on Matwau. He would probably be sleeping and I had tomorrow to see him. I wanted to ask him about the lance and see if it meant anything to him. The last thing I wanted was to get myself carried away with thoughts of things I had absolutely no idea about. This whole divinity thing was too much for my mind right now. It was bizarre how so many things still managed to shock me. But every time something new surfaced, it always found a way to be more unbelievable the last. I just hoped that tonight I could sleep and save all my crazy thought for tomorrow.
I woke up the next morning and saw that Mellissa was already awake, sitting up on her bed, fully dressed. I sat up, wiping the sleep out of my eyes. I had slept amazing last night. I must have been more tired than I thought, or more drained.
“You okay?” I asked Mellissa.
“Sure,” she said. “I feel a whole lot better today.”
“That’s good to hear.” I looked at her closely. She looked a little closed off, but the smile that had crept onto her face seemed genuine enough.
“What happened yesterday,” she started, “You. What you can do…”
Oh no. Had she changed her mind about me and decided it wasn’t that cool after all and just downright scary. Oh my god, What if she told everybody? I was starting to seriously worry about what I had done.
“I won’t tell anyone,” Mellissa said. “I slipped for like a second. I shouldn’t have blurted that out to Matoskah. I was just so dumbstruck, it kinda just flew outta my mouth before my brain caught up with me. I’m sorry, it won’t happen again.”
I puffed out a breath of relief and let the guilt flow through me at even letting myself doubt her. I knew Mellissa like the back of my hand. She would never rat me out or do anything to intentionally hurt me. “I trust you with my life,” I said to her. “I’m so glad you finally know about this.”
“You’ve flipped my whole reality upside down. I can’t imagine the day that will come when I’ll think of what you can do and not stop to catch my breath. It doesn’t seem real.”
“I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to,” I confessed. “Everything is happening to me all at once. I find out I’m not normal. My mom had a secret life. My dad’s totally out of it. I feel lost. I don’t know myself. And then,” I said, disgruntled and peeved with myself, “I have Caleb on top of all that, which is so insignificant but making everything that’s going wrong feel ten times worse. I feel so stupid.”
Mellissa sighed, sounding almost as defeated as I felt. “Those boys are something else,” she said, getting up and coming to sit next to me. “This thing with Caleb will get easier, trust me. I know you think the pain will crush you, and I know every day is long and hard, but it will get better.”
“How can you be so sure?” I asked her. It was highly unlikely to me.
“Because it has to get better,” she said sadly. “There is no other option.” And I knew we were no longer talking about me and Caleb. “So, what magic have you got up your sleeve for today?” Mellissa smiled and I had my happy go lucky friend back. “I really need to have fun before we go back to school Monday and back to boring, old life.
If only life was boring, I thought to myself. I should be so lucky. I remember boring, and it felt like years ago.
“What do you feel like doing?” I asked her. I got up and emptied my bag onto the bed. I picked out a pair of jeans and long sleeved grey tee for me, and gave Mellissa the white, fuzzy jumper and brown leggings. These were all her clothes and only she could pull off a jumper that looked like you had skinned your bushy cat for it. I would only end up looking ridiculous. “Think about it,” I said to her, gathering up my things. “I’m gonna take a shower.”
I felt so much better when I was washed and dressed and both agreeing we were starving, I took Mellissa down to the small diner on the marina that serves the best breakfast I had ever tasted. I would never tell Gracey that, though. She would be way too upset. Food was her thing and until now, probably the tastiest food I’d ever put into my mouth. The diner was verging on empty and after we ate breakfast, the same man who I had seen last time I was here with Matoskah stuck his head out from behind the kitchen door, giving me the same suspicious look. Matwau told me that people here wanted to meet me, but that wasn’t the impression I was getting. I was beginning to think Quidel was right and they considered me more of something to be feared than embraced. As much as it was starting to upset me, I couldn’t let it bother me. They might have loved my mom, but me, not so much, and I would just have to deal with that. They were right to be scared of me. Everywhere I went there was always something much worse and much more sinister following me and I knew it was only a matter of time before it caught up to me. There was a chance they knew that, too.
“Oh, hey…” The voice cut through into my thoughts. “What’re you guys doing here?” Skah was standing in front of us wearing a black hoody and loose fitting jeans.
“Oh, hi.” I smiled at him. “We just had breakfast.”
“The best blueberry pancakes in the whole of the U.S, I think,” Mellissa said. “Whoever that old, weird guy is in there, he’s a genius with a skillet.”
Skah started to laugh. “Bobby. He owns The Silver Fish.”
I looked behind me at the simple wooden hanging sign above the entrance of the diner. On it, in what looked like hand carved, faded blue chalk was the name, The Silver Fish. I’d never took any notice of it before.
“Is that Bobby who’s in there now?” I asked Skah. Bobby who knew my mom. Bobby who hung up her picture and the flower with it that refused to die.
“He’s there every day it’s open. The place would lose business without him. He’s the genius on the skillet.” He winked at Mellissa. “You wanna come with me? I was just heading out to meet Q and Mat.”
“Sure,” Mellissa said. “You wanna do that?” She turned to me and I nodded.
“Sure.” But I had something I needed to do first. “I think I forgot my cell in there,” I said. My cell was in my pocket but I needed an alibi.
“My car’s just over there, by the road.” Skah pointed out a red Golf parked on the roadside.
“Just go with him,” I said to Mellissa. “I’ll catch up.” And when they started walking away, I turned and sucked in a breath of what the hell am I doing? Then walked up to the counter in the diner. I wasn’t stood waiting nervously for long when Bobby appeared from the kitchen doorway, wiping his hands on his apron. His greying hair was pulled back from the nape of his neck into a long plait and his eyes were narrowed solely on me.
“What do you want?” he asked. His question wasn’t hostile and he spoke softly, but it was said with wariness and a hidden intuition that I couldn’t be trusted. It was so powerful, I managed to pick all of that up from one question.
“To ask you about my mother,” I said quickly, before I could back out.
“You need to leave here,” Bobby said calmly. “While you still can.”
Was that a threat? “Why?” I asked with increasing trepidation.
“You are not supposed to be here.”
“I’m not supposed to be here?”
The door rattled open behind me. “Will that be all?” he asked, like I had come in here to order another round of pancakes.
I stood there, gaping at him in disbelief that was slowly turning into anger. “You won’t tell me anything?” I asked again.
“I have customers to serve,” he said, moving along to the other end of the counter to attend to whoever was standing there, eyeing the food through the glass cabinet. I stopped at my mom’s picture on the way out, feeling like a fool for coming in here and the perky lily nestled into the corner of the frame wilted under my stare. I stepped
back and looked at Jack who had forgotten all about the customer he was serving and was looking back at me, wide eyed.
“Sorry,” I muttered to him, and I left. As soon as I got closer to Skah’s car, I plastered on a more relaxed expression and got into the back seat.
“You get it?” Mellissa asked me. She was riding shot gun.
“It was in my pocket the whole time.”
“It took you that long to figure it out? You’ve been in there almost ten minutes,” she complained.
“It just took me a really long time to figure it out,” I said to her. And I realized for the first time how true that actually was. It took me all this time to figure out that the only help I needed or was going to get, was from myself. I just had to make sure I didn’t let myself down.
Skah popped the trunk on his car and I reared backwards when he pulled out what looked like a medieval weapon on steroids.
“What the hell is that thing?” Mellissa asked, looking about as frightened as I felt.
“Bow and arrow,” said Skah, smiling when he saw our horrified reactions. He slammed down the trunk. “Only not as you know it.”
“What do you want that for?” I asked, not willing to go any nearer to him until he either put that thing down or found some way to explain himself.
“Bowfishing.”
“Bowfishing?” I echoed.
“Yeah,” he said, still smiling. “You’ll see.”
“I guess we’ll see.” Mellissa followed behind Skah, which left me no choice but to go with them. “No the wonder he brought us out here into the middle of the wild,” Mellissa said, turning back to face me. “He wants to kill us.”
I looked down, watching my step over all the foliage and shook my head with a chuckle. “That says more about us,” I said. “We’re the ones following him.”
We were in the wild, or as close to the wild as you could get. There was nothing to see apart from the cedars, grass, broken branches and the occasional glimpse of the clear blue morning sky. When I thought it would never happen, Skah ducked through the gap in the trees and right after him, we came out by a lakeside. Smack dab in the middle of it was Matoskah and Quidel, bow and arrow in hand.
Falling Darkness: The second book in the Falling Awake Series Page 24