“Yeah. I did,” said my father, becoming suddenly sullen and looking down at his feet. “Well, if you’re all ok, I guess I’ll be going now.”
“You’re not going to phone Mother at the diner?” I asked.
“No, I don’t think we need to bother her. She’s had a lot going on lately. Actually, it is probably better if none of us say a word about this to her.”
“Sure,” I said, not understanding my father at all. He left the house and I heard his old truck clunking down the driveway.
Trapper and Champ were happy to see Johnny, and jumped on him. He bent down and hugged and kissed them, burying his face in their fur.
“Johnny, I was afraid you weren’t coming back,” I told my brother.
“I heard you calling for me, Raven. I came back to help you. I pushed Blue out of my body just like you told me to.”
“So that’s why he doubled over,” I said. “And now I know why he looked fat when he left the house. He had all the money stashed inside his jacket.”
“You can’t let Blue take over your body anymore,” said Candy. “The more he’s you, the harder it is going to be for you to remember who you really are. Trust me, I know this from experience.”
“Yeah, I know,” said Johnny. “But Blue is going to be me for awhile yet, I’m afraid.” He sat on the floor petting the dogs. “Or at least until after the Christmas concert.”
“Johnny, no!” I told him. “You cannot be serious. You need to send Blue away now. Forever. He’s already stolen money and he tried to hurt me tonight. Those are things I know you would never do.”
“Maybe I would, how do you know?” asked Johnny, sounding very confused. “Maybe Blue and I are really a lot more alike than you think. Now leave me alone.” He ran up to his room with the dogs following.
“Raven, do you think that’s true that they’re alike?” asked Candy. “Is Johnny turning into Blue?”
“No, of course not,” I said. “Johnny’s just confused, that’s all. I know they are far from being the same, and the fact that Blue loves my dad and Johnny still hates him proves it.”
“That was such a lucky break that your father was passing by my old house, and there to save us,” said Candy. “That was really nice of him to help us.”
“Uh huh,” I said, knowing my father too well to think that he had really changed. In the past, he often thought only about himself. He had mood swings like crazy and disappeared on and off for years before he actually left us for good. And now he was back in our lives out of the blue – no pun intended. Something didn’t add up, but I couldn’t put my finger on what it was. “Candy, do you think it’s odd that he didn’t want us to tell Mother?”
“Not really. He said he didn’t want to worry her,” she pointed out. “I’m sure he just wants things to go smoothly since he is trying to make amends with her.”
“Maybe,” I said. “But somehow I think it’s more than that.”
“What do you mean, Raven?”
“I don’t know,” I said with a shrug. “Didn’t you say when you and your mother left and Mack went to jail that the gas and electric was turned off in your house?”
“Yeah.”
“Then why did the lights go on when my father hit the switch? And how did he know that they would even work?”
“I don’t understand, Raven. What are you trying to say?”
“I’m not sure about anything,” I answered. “But I still have a bad feeling about my father.”
“What kind of bad feeling?” asked Candy.
“It’s like he’s hiding something,” I said. “Like I can’t trust him. It’s almost like my mother said years ago when he first left us.”
“I still don’t understand.”
“Candy, deep down, I want to believe my father has changed and I want to forgive him for everything in the past. But there is a little voice in my head telling me not to buy his act, just like Blue. I think my dad is covering something up, and that every word he says is a lie. You see, I truly believe that my father is crooked.”
Chapter 11
School was hell the next week. I rarely ever saw Johnny anymore. He usually appeared at nighttime, while Blue took over his body for the rest of the day, flirting with the girls and bragging about just about everything possible. It was getting embarrassing as well as daunting. Johnny didn’t even go to his trumpet lessons anymore because Blue said he was better than the instructor and didn’t need lessons.
I went out of my way to avoid Blue. After my little encounter with him and the knife, I tried to never be alone with him again. I was pretty shaken and didn’t even pursue looking for the stolen money. I guess, in a way, I was in denial about the whole thing, just waiting until after the Christmas concert this coming weekend so I could get my brother back. I was worried about Johnny, but realized that I couldn’t help someone who didn’t want to be helped. I just figured he’d be back after the concert and things would be back to normal then. All I had to do was wait.
But boy, was I wrong!
I walked into my literature class with Candy, already dreading it because I saw Blue at the back of the class flirting with the girls. Gee, they were stupid to fall for his lies. He had his blue trumpet with him and, to my horror, he brought it to his mouth and started playing it.
“Wow, that’s loud,” said Candy.
The teacher thankfully wasn’t there yet or it would have been a problem. Blue had been making a spectacle of himself all week long. He bragged even worse than my little brother, Johnny, used to. He flirted with the girls, and I even caught him kissing Ashley Fenng by the locker rooms in the shadows. He also hung out with Ed and Snake and laughed with the boys. I was sure he was smoking with them in the bathrooms because he reeked when he walked passed. I even thought I smelled alcohol on his breath the other day.
Blue also always had lots of candy and snacks that he constantly passed out to kids. I wondered if he was using that stolen money to buy the things because my mother never had extra money to buy anything like that at home!
And to make matters even worse, Blue had been calling out the answers to the teacher’s questions before any of us had a chance to do it. Unfortunately, he was very smart and that only managed to make the rest of us look dumb since he was only an eighth grader. Then, after he was done interrupting the class every day, he put his head down on the desk and fell asleep. Yesterday, he even started snoring.
“Oh, my gosh, Candy! I don’t think I can stand him anymore,” I said, taking my seat at the front of the class. Candy sat next to me.
Instead of our usual teacher, Mrs. Berry, my horticulture teacher, walked in. She was old and wrinkled and should have been retired years ago. Her sense of style was missing, since she always wore checkered housedresses with work boots on her feet. She was a cross between a little old lady and an army drill sergeant.
“Your mother wears combat boots,” I heard Blue say with a snigger when the old woman entered the room. Thank goodness Mrs. Berry was going deaf lately and didn’t even know Blue was talking to her. However, the rest of the kids heard him and laughed.
“Class, sit down,” said Mrs. Berry in her crackly old voice. “I am going to be your substitute teacher today.”
Half the class groaned and the other half cheered. Mrs. Berry was a pushover at times, but she was also a shrewd woman that you didn’t want to cross or she’d make your life a living hell.
“You there, with the blue hair in the back of the class,” she said, using the wooden pointer from the chalkboard to pick out Blue. “Who are you? I don’t remember you.”
“I hope I’ll be able to say the same about you when I leave,” he said under his breath, making the class laugh again. Mrs. Berry touched her ear – probably turning up her hearing aid – not responding because I don’t think she could hear him.
“Well, what should we talk about today?” she asked, opening a book and flipping through it. “Oh, here is something interesting, having to do with children.”
>
The entire class groaned. Mrs. Berry was known to talk about her grandchildren a lot. Too much, actually. She bragged about them constantly and complained about them at the same time, always saying she had so many grandchildren that she didn’t know what she was going to do.
“It’s talking about the origins of nursery rhymes,” said Mrs. Berry, her nose buried in the book. She had a pair of reading glasses hanging on a chain around her neck and I never understood why she didn’t use them. Instead, she put her face so close to the page to read it that she looked like the nearsighted Mr. Magoo from the old time cartoons.
My heart lodged in my throat. Was she really going to expose the secrets of nursery rhyme characters that I’d been dealing with lately? It would be nice to talk to someone besides Candy about this. Maybe this was a way to find out more.
Unfortunately, I never found out because just then a loud bang of an explosion was heard from the chemistry lab next door. Then the fire alarm went off.
“Oh, my!” said Mrs. Berry, looking up at the ceiling and touching her ear again. “There must be a fire drill. All right, everyone put on your coats and we’ll walk out in single file.”
“Our coats are in our lockers,” said Candy.
“Oh, no. We’ll have to go outside in the cold without our coats then. I don’t like this in the least,” said the old woman. “You are all going to get sick. I tell my grandchildren and even my great-grandchildren all the time not to go out without their coats on.”
I started hoping this was truly only a fire drill, because with the way Mrs. Berry moved so slow, we’d all be burned to a crisp if it was real. Everyone picked up their things and headed toward the door. Since they took their stuff with them, that told me they didn’t plan on coming back to class afterward. Since it was the last class of the day, they were probably just going to head home and I had half a mind to do the same thing. Everyone knew Mrs. Berry wouldn’t do a thing about it since this wasn’t her real class. Heck, she probably wouldn’t even notice that we were gone.
“Let’s go, Little Boy Blue,” said Mrs. Berry, hitting Blue over the head with her pointer as she headed out the door. Blue was already sleeping. Suddenly, I smelled smoke and it was too strong to be coming from Blue’s coat. Then I heard the sound of fire engines.
“Candy, I think this is a real fire,” I told my friend. “That noise we heard must have been a real explosion in the chemistry lab.” We hurried through the corridor and down the hallway. Sure enough, smoke was filling the passages and it was scary. I’d never been in a fire before and wasn’t sure what to expect.
“Everyone hurry! The fire is spreading fast,” one of the teachers called out. I suddenly realized Blue wasn’t at the back of the line.
“Candy, I think Blue is still sleeping,” I told her. “I’m going to go back to get him.”
“No, Raven, you can’t,” said Candy. “The smoke is filling the halls. We’ve got to get out of here now.”
“But it’s my brother! I can’t just leave him or he’ll die. Just go, and I’ll catch up with you in a moment.”
“Be careful, Raven,” I heard Candy call out as I turned around and fought the crowd coming toward me, trying to get back to the room before my little brother died.
“Johnny,” I called out, coughing from the smoke, using my hand to try to clear the air. It was getting hard to breathe. “Johnny, come on. The school is on fire.”
I saw Blue still sleeping with his head down on the desk, making me think of that silly rhyme about the boy who was sleeping under the hay instead of tending the sheep. The fool was going to get my brother killed. I pushed aside my fear for him and ran up, shaking him to wake him.
“Blue, you fool. Get up. The school is on fire.”
Blue’s head snapped up and his eyes scanned the room. “What’s going on?” he asked.
“There’s a fire. We’ve got to get out of here. Now.”
He jumped up off the chair, looking around as if he were searching for something.
“What are you doing? Let’s go.” I could hear shouting and the sound of screeching sirens outside. I also heard the sound of the students running in the hall screaming. I looked up to see firemen making their way up the stairs with axes and hoses in their hands. The sound of their heavy boots against the tiled floor reverberated in my head. I was getting dizzy and I struggled to breathe. I grabbed on to my crystal for comfort.
“I’ve got to find my trumpet,” said Blue. “I refuse to leave without it.”
This was the first time I heard him refer to the trumpet as his. But now that I thought about it, it all made sense. I thought it was just the blue bomber jacket that connected Johnny to Blue. But now I realized it was the trumpet, too.
“Forget about the trumpet. Let’s go.” I grabbed his arm and started to run, but he wouldn’t budge.
“I know I left it here somewhere.”
“I see it,” I said, spotting it on the floor through the smoke. “Go!” I commanded. “I’ll get it.”
Still cradling my crystal for comfort, I bent down, touching the blue trumpet. As soon as my fingers skimmed it, I felt a gust of air against me, and everything around me blurred.
“No!” I cried, realizing what was happening. At the most inopportune moment, I was being whisked off to another realm and found myself prone on the ground.
Sure enough, I saw the headstones rising up through the fog. Then someone ran by, being chased by someone else. I saw Cardinal Wolsey and called out to stop him.
“Wait!” I cried.
“Not you again,” the man snarled, still wiping the sweat from his brow with the back of his beefy hand. “You have done nothing to help me retrieve the money.”
“What is this money? Why is it so important?” I asked.
“It’s the money I stole, being the king’s almoner,” he told me. “I am being sentenced to death and the only way to save my life is to take that money back to the church. My son stole it. I know he did. Now, I have to go and catch him.”
“Wait!” I shouted, stopping the man once again. “What if I told you I knew where the money was and that I could put it back where you buried it in the ground?”
“I don’t know what you mean, but burying it isn’t going to do a bit of good,” said the man. “Didn’t you hear me say I need to take it to the church? Ah, there’s my illegitimate son now. I’m going to kill him.”
The man reached out and pulled someone to him. “Give me the money!” he demanded.
“I don’t have any money,” the boy screamed.
“Johnny?” I looked up to see the frightened eyes of my little brother. “Johnny, he’s going to kill you. Run. Run away now.”
“No. I’m going to help you, Raven.” Johnny reached down to help me, and when he did, the cardinal took a big stick and brought it down over Johnny’s head.
“No!” I cried as Johnny’s eyes rolled back in his head and he crumpled to a heap at my feet.
“Forget the money,” snarled the man. “If I am going to die, then you will die with me.” He raised his hand to hit Johnny again. I couldn’t let him do it.
“Leave my little brother alone!” I shouted, hurling my body at the large man, bringing him to the ground. When we hit the ground he somehow ended up on top of me. With all his weight against me, my lungs felt like they were being crushed and I couldn’t breathe. I looked over to Johnny lying unconscious on the ground. We were going to die here in this other realm, I was sure of it. I tried to move again, but I was stuck.
Then I looked down to my crystal and it was glowing. I figured it was going to transport me back to my own realm, but I didn’t want to leave without Johnny.
“Johnny,” I cried. “Johnny, go back to your body. Get rid of Blue. Johnny, do you hear me? If you stay here you are going to die. Do it, Johnny. Do it, now!”
I felt the swish of the air against me as I started to transport to my own realm. I stopped struggling and it was no longer hard to breathe. I felt a sense of
peace wash over me and I felt like I was floating on the clouds with the voices of angelic beings in my ears. Then I suddenly thought of Johnny and how he was still in the other realm and going to die because I wasn’t able to save him.
“Johnny!” I cried out, my eyes opening wide to find myself lying on a stretcher. Some kind of mask was over my face and I ripped it off.
“Hey now, leave that on, Raven, and don’t fight the medics.”
I looked up to see my father standing over me.
“Dad?” I said, feeling confused. I heard the sound of the screaming sirens and looked over to see firemen on ladders, and lots of smoke. “What happened?”
“Raven, thank goodness you’re all right,” I heard my mother’s voice next.
Candy pushed through the crowd with my mother right behind her. My mother reached out and hugged me, almost smashing me with such a tight hold.
“I saw the fire on my way to work and came right away,” said my mother, letting me go and looking at my dad. “Bert, what are you doing here?”
“I happened to be passing by and came to help,” answered my father, leaning on his crooked wooden cane. “When I saw Candy, she told me Raven was still in there, and I went back in to find her. A beam fell, nearly smashing her. It’s a good thing I was there or she might have died.” Amazing that a man who used a cane was able to carry me out of a burning building. I didn’t know what to think.
“Johnny!” I blurted out. “Where is Johnny?” I had the sick feeling in the pit of my stomach that I’d never see my little brother again. Tears filled my eyes.
“I’m here, Raven,” said Johnny, walking up with scrapes, cuts and bruises. His hand was wrapped up in a big, white bandage.
“Johnny, is that you?” I asked cautiously, hoping it was him and not Blue. Because if Blue was still here, that would mean Johnny was still in the other realm – and probably dead.
“Don’t worry, it’s me, Raven,” said Johnny, giving me a hug. “I only have a burned hand but I realize now, because of my stupid choices, I could have gotten both of us killed. I’m sorry, Raven.” Tears filled his eyes. “Can you ever forgive me?”
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