FIERY ILLUSIONS (Keeper of the Emerald Book 2)

by B. C. Harris

  At home, I explained to my mother that I had a disagreement with Jasmin. I told her that Jasmin grabbed my sweater and began to shake me. All I did was to try to push her arms away from me so I wouldn’t get hurt. Jasmin fell because she lost her balance trying to attack me.

  After hearing my story, my mother was incensed. Not at me, but at Ms. Cathbert. She was considering rushing back to the school to confront the vice-principal. She was even talking about getting a lawyer.

  I managed to eventually calm my mother for the time being, although there’s no telling what she might do tomorrow. I have never seen her so upset before. Most of the time, I wonder if my mother cares about me. After her reaction to what happened at my school today, there’s no doubt that she’s on my side.

  As unfair as the incident at school was, I knew that further dialogue among adults might lead to questions about the emerald. I didn’t tell my mother about being transported to Drew’s house last night. I couldn’t imagine that bringing my emerald into this problem was going to be a good thing.

  For the past hour since supper, I have been in the basement, mindlessly watching TV and feeling sorry for myself. I’m beginning to understand why some people are addicted to watching the news hour after hour. It can sure help to put your own problems into a different perspective.

  After all, how could a little skirmish with Jasmin and a suspension from school compare to dozens of innocent people being blown apart by a bomb in a market, or thousands of people losing their homes in a flood?

  During the course of the hour, there were a few new stories about the Miracle Man. He has apparently moved into a room in the ancient Colosseum in Rome. Although I don’t know very much about the Colosseum, this seemed to me to be an unusual thing for the authorities to allow. Many thousands of people were rushing into Rome to meet this man. It sounds like the police and politicians are not sure how to handle the situation. One reporter suggested that the man was like a modern day Jesus. If only they knew that he once tried to kill my mother and me.

  As another story about the Miracle Man appears, I hear the doorbell ring upstairs.

  I turn down the volume on the TV. Are the police coming to arrest me? Has Jasmin and her parents filed criminal charges against me?

  For the first time since the confrontation with Jasmin, I consider using my emerald to escape. Where I end up really doesn’t matter, just as long as I’m gone from this community.

  I hear my mother talking to someone. I try to hear the conversation, but the voices are hushed. I suspect I’m in more trouble.

  I stare into the emerald.

  I hear footsteps on the stairs.

  “Emily, it’s Jamie. He wants to see you.”

  I’m so relieved that it’s Jamie, and not the police, that I almost jump into his arms when he reaches the bottom of the stairs. Almost, that is, until I see his face.

  He looks different. His welcoming smile is missing. The look on his face that always told me I was special is gone.

  Have I lost Jamie too?

  Instead of a hug, I smile weakly. I’m not really sure how I should react.

  “Hi,” I offer. “It’s nice to see you. Thanks for coming over.”

  Jamie does not react to my words. I have never seen him so distant before.

  Feeling ashamed that I have hurt the one person at school who always supported me, I turn away and sit down on one of the couches.

  Jamie doesn’t move. I get the feeling that he has something to tell me, but he isn’t sure how to begin.

  I finally say, “I would really appreciate it if you would stay for a little while. I don’t know what you heard at school about me, but whatever you heard is not the truth.”

  Although I think I see a glimmer of relief in Jamie’s eyes, it vanishes quickly.

  “May I sit down?” Jamie asks, sounding much too formal.

  “Sure,” I reply. “Please sit wherever you feel most comfortable,” I add, giving him permission to distance himself from me.

  As Jamie sits on the other couch, I realize I’m having trouble maintaining eye contact with him. He appears to have lost his trust in me. How many friends have I hurt today?

  After a long nervous pause, Jamie says, “I’m sorry about the suspensions that you and Jasmin received.”

  Me and Jasmin? What’s Jamie talking about?

  “What do you mean Jasmin’s suspension? I don’t know anything about her being suspended.”

  Jamie hesitates as though he’s choosing his words carefully, or perhaps he’s hesitating because he’s trying to understand what I said.

  “I think Drew talked to Ms. Cathbert about what happened between you and Jasmin. At least, that was the rumor in the school. I might be wrong but, I think that Jasmin also got suspended.

  Drew talked to Ms. Cathbert? What did he say to her? Did he tell her the reason why Jasmin and I were fighting? Did he tell her that it was Jasmin who assaulted me and that I was trying to defend myself? If this was true, why didn’t Ms. Cathbert telephone to apologize to me?

  “Did you see what happened in the hallway?”

  He shakes his head. “As I exited from the classroom, I saw Jasmin falling backwards. It looked like you had pushed her. Then I saw Ms. Cathbert arrive and take you away.”

  “Did you talk to anyone else about what happened?”

  Once again, Jamie shakes his head.

  “Do you feel comfortable telling me what you do know?” I ask as kindly as possible.

  He looks sadly at me almost as if to say, “You are a different person than I thought you were.”

  “When I first arrived at school,” Jamie begins, “I saw you and Jasmin going down the hallway and into the washroom. She looked really upset. You appeared to be worried.”

  Jamie pauses as though he’s waiting for an explanation. I can’t lie to him even though I know the truth might destroy my friendship with him.

  “Your friendship is very important to me, but I realize that what I’m about to say might have a negative affect on how you feel about me.”

  Jamie looks anxious, almost as if my words have confirmed the worst about what he heard about me today.

  “You know I wanted to return back to Tamor to talk to Capurni last night,” I say, trying to choose my words carefully.

  Yes, Jamie nods although his face suggests his uncertainty as to how this relates to what happened today at school.

  “Last night,” I continue once again, “I went to bed thinking about returning back to Tamor, but I couldn’t do it. I was worried about going back there, so I decided to wait for another day.”

  Jamie smiles as though he understands. After all, last night I talked to him about wanting to visit Tamor, but I also shared my anxiety about returning back there.

  “After deciding to wait, I began to drift asleep. As I was doing this, I thought about my day at school. I remembered seeing Jasmin and Drew walking through the hallway holding hands. I guess this caused an emotional reaction for me.”

  Jamie leans back into the couch. He doesn’t look happy. If what I have said so far is bothering him, I wonder if he will still be here when I finish. I know I’m beginning to play with the ends of my long hair.

  “Anyway, to make a long story short,” I continue, wanting to get the story out as quickly as possible, “I suddenly found myself in Drew’s house. I think my emerald took me there. It felt like I was in a dream. Drew and I were sitting on a couch watching TV. The next thing I knew, Drew and I were kissing. Almost immediately, I told him what we were doing was wrong. I used the emerald to return back to my house, but it was too late; the damage was done.”

  “And Jasmin found out this morning,” Jamie says as he shifts uncomfortably on the couch.

  I pray that he isn’t going to stand up and walk out without hearing the rest of my story.

  “Emily,” I hear my mother call out. “I’m bringing you some cookies.”

  My mother has rescued me. Jamie can’t possibly leave now. He will ha
ve to eat some cookies.

  As my mother enters the room, she quickly glances back and forth between Jamie and me. It looks like she’s appraising the situation. While there are times when I wish that my mother would talk more, at the moment I’m glad that she simply leaves the cookies on a table and quietly returns back upstairs.

  “Yes,” I answer Jamie’s previous question as I offer him a cookie. “Apparently, the moment Jasmin arrived at school this morning, Drew told her that he no longer wanted to be her boyfriend, but he didn’t tell her why.”

  “And when Jasmin came to you upset, you didn’t fill her in on the details of what transpired between you and Drew last night.”

  I shake my head with embarrassment.

  As Jamie sits, holding a cookie in his hand, but not yet biting into it, the full impact of this mistake hits me. If I had been honest with Jasmin from the start this morning, what happened next might not have spiraled out of control. Yes, she would have been angry at me, but we might have worked things out without either of us getting involved in a public fight resulting in our suspensions from school.

  “Yes, I failed to tell Jasmin the truth. Now I know that this was a huge mistake.”

  “And I assume that it was Drew who told her.”

  “Yes, I think that must have been what happened,” I say. “At the end of our ancient history class, Jasmin and Drew were waiting for me in the hallway. It was pretty obvious that Jasmin was upset.”

  Jamie stares at me as though he’s evaluating everything I’ve said so far.

  Finally he begins again. “And you pushing Jasmin?”

  “Actually she rushed at me, grabbed my sweater and started to shake me. I was terrified. All I did was instinctively try to push her arms away. In her rage, she lost her balance and fell backwards to the floor. Unfortunately, that is the only thing Ms. Cathbert saw, and from what you have said it appears that’s what you saw as well.”

  “And Ms. Cathbert suspended you for that?”

  “Actually, Ms. Cathbert never even asked me for my side of the story. She quickly recited to me the school’s policy about zero tolerance. With that, I was given a three day suspension. I had no idea that Jasmin might have been suspended until you told me this.”

  The telephone rings.

  Normally, I’m the person who answers it, but before the second ring, my mother has already picked it up. There are rarely any telephone calls on our landline for either of us.

  I hear my mother talking upstairs. I’m dying to know who she’s talking to.

  “I should be going,” Jamie announces as though he might have made a mistake coming here.

  “I understand,” I reply. “I can’t change what has happened, but one thing for sure is that your friendship, Jasmin’s friendship and even Drew’s friendship are all important to me. If there’s anything I can do to heal the wounds I’ve caused today, I would be more than willing to do it.”

  “Your friendship with Drew?” Jamie replies with uncertainty.

  He stands.

  Before he moves, my mother comes down the stairs.

  Seeing that Jamie is ready to leave, she begins to talk quickly as though she’s hoping that something she says might convince him to stay.

  “That was Ms. Cathbert on the phone, the vice-principal at your school.”

  The puzzled look on my face encourages her to continue.

  “She said that a student approached her this afternoon and told her that you were the victim in what transpired this morning. She said that after this new information, Jasmin admitted that you didn’t knock her over. Jasmin told her that she fell after losing her balance, not because you pushed her. Ms. Cathbert said that she would like to see you in her office first thing in the morning. She said that your suspension will be withdrawn.”

  I don’t want to cry, but tears are welling in my eyes. I forget that Jamie is in the room. I rush to hug my mother.

  As I regain control, I say, “Mom, I need to talk to Jasmin. We had a misunderstanding and a big part of it was my fault. I have hurt my best friend.”

  “I think that’s a good idea,” my mother says, “although I think you should wait another hour or two. Let Jasmin have a little more time to think about what happened as well. If you want, I can drive you over to her place and drop Jamie off at his house as well at the same time.”

  I don’t miss my mother’s suggestion. She’s helping to ensure that Jamie stays a little longer.

  As I turn to ask Jamie how he would feel about my mother’s suggestion, I notice that he’s sitting on the couch once again.

  - 7 -

  A STIMULATING CLASS

  One of the benefits of having a teacher like Mr. Kraviak is that it provided a great deal of time to think. Unfortunately, the thinking is rarely about ancient history. Watching several other students texting behind their books while a few are doing their homework for another subject suggests that there’s a wide range of learning that’s occurring within our room, and none of it has to do with what is being taught.

  Last night was a bust with Jasmin. She refused to speak to me. Although Jamie stayed at my place a little longer until my mother drove him home, he wasn’t his old self. I have a lot of repair work to do with my friends. As for Drew, I texted him that we needed to talk today at lunch. He texted me back with “Yes, I’d love to be with you during lunch.” I suspect he doesn’t have any idea of what I want to talk about. Perhaps I should have given him a little warning.

  “Nero reigned for fourteen years from 54 to 68 AD. Generally described as a monster, he murdered two wives, a step-brother, and his mother. His mother was Agrippina who was the sister of Caligula. Nero became emperor at the age of sixteen,” Mr. Kraviak states in his monotone as he launches into the life of another Roman emperor.

  At the age of sixteen? I’m fifteen. Imagine being the emperor of the world’s most powerful empire when you’re only sixteen years old.

  It’s beginning to sound like every Roman emperor was involved in murder and endless forms of deceit to maintain their power. Were all their lives full of secret dealings and power struggles?

  My meeting with Ms. Cathbert first thing this morning left me thinking about my own family secrets. My mother insisted on being present during the meeting. Wow, did I ever see a different side of her.

  Normally reserved and never outspoken or aggressive in any kind of way, my mother ripped Ms. Cathbert to shreds. She made it very clear in no uncertain terms that Ms. Cathbert made a serious mistake by suspending me before she had all the information related to my incident with Jasmin. Whenever Ms. Cathbert attempted to defend herself, my mother raised her voice and step-by-step destroyed whatever the vice-principal had to say.

  There was absolutely no doubt that it was my mother and not Ms. Cathbert who was in charge of the meeting. A peculiar thing I noticed about my mother’s voice when she got angry was that it appeared to have a touch of a British accent in it. I had never noticed this before.

  Through conversations with other parents at her work, my mother knew much more about my school than I ever imagined. She criticized the school policy on the open use of cell phones throughout the school. She also made it very clear that if there were any negative pictures of my disagreement with Jasmin on any form of social media that my school would be legally responsible. When Ms. Cathbert tried to argue that controlling the use of cell phones in the school would be impossible, my mother noted that there were other schools in our city, and she named them, where students were not permitted to use cell phones anywhere in the school. My mother noted specific examples of classes in my school where teachers even sat at their desks texting their friends. I was shocked by the in-depth knowledge my mother had about my school.

  After Ms. Cathbert apologized to me, my mother insisted this apology should also be made in writing by the end of this school day. Failure to do this would result in immediate legal action against Ms. Cathbert and the school.

  I left the meeting with a new admiratio
n for my mother. She was tenacious beyond belief. Throughout the morning I wondered if I had witnessed the true personality of my mother. If so, where had this part of her been hiding for so many years? What had caused her to become so withdrawn and quiet until today? I couldn’t help but think it had something to do with my father’s disappearance. Was my mother a different person before my father vanished? What has my mother been hiding for all these years? Like the Roman emperors, my family also has its secrets.

  “In his early years, Nero was a good emperor. He supported the arts. The empire was prosperous. In 64 AD though, a great fire burned much of Rome to the ground, an inferno that many blamed on Nero. After the devastating fire, Nero immediately began the rebuilding of Rome which included a massive new Golden House with an artificial lake on the property. It was said that Nero burned down Rome so that he would have more property to build his mansion. Whether this was true or not, Nero took this possible secret with him to his death. At the age of thirty as his troops turned against him, Nero committed suicide.”

  In spite of all the power and wealth, there weren’t many happy endings in the lives of the Roman emperors. As Keeper of the Emerald, I have a power greater than that of any Roman emperor. Can I use this power to create a happy ending for my family? Although I screwed up in my use of the emerald yesterday with Drew, this won’t happen again. It’s time for me to learn how to harness its powers. It’s time to use the emerald to find out what really happened to my father years ago.

  “During Nero’s lifetime, he had a giant bronze statue of himself erected in the area of the Palatine Hill which is now part of the Roman ruins near the famous Colosseum. The statue was more than thirty meters, or over one-hundred feet, high. It was so massive that it became know as the Colossus. In fact, it is thought that the nearby famous Colosseum derived its name from the statue of Nero even though the Colosseum wasn’t built until after the death of Nero.”

  “Colosseum!” an unexpected voice shouts out in our class. It’s arrogant Martha. She’s sitting up in her chair, trying to appear to be taller. Martha is short. As well, her dark hair is short.