The Prophecy

by Melissa Luznicky Garrett

  “No,” she said. But she wanted there to be, I thought.

  Coach Wally hollered at us from the hallway. I hoped he had something boring planned, like laps around the track. I needed to talk to Shyla.

  Clutching my arms around myself for warmth once outside, I mentally reminded myself that I should start packing heavier clothes. All I was wearing was a pair of sweats and a thin t-shirt, and I was shaking with cold. I wasn’t the only one. There was a lot of complaining going on. The abrupt change in weather had caught everyone off guard.

  Blowing his whistle to get our attention, Coach motioned with his clipboard for us to gather around. “We’re running the mile today, folks, and I want to see how fast you can go. I want you to really open her up.”

  “Her?” Shyla giggled beside me. I rolled my eyes, my teeth chattering too much to actually talk.

  “None of this lollygagging on the track,” he went on.

  “Lollygagging?” Shyla muttered.

  “Who’s talking?”

  The entire class went quiet as everyone looked around, no one assuming the blame. And then Jasmine pointed an accusing finger at Shyla and said “she is.”

  “What are you, five?” Shyla said loud enough for everyone to hear. “You have to tattle on me?”

  “You can run bleachers while the rest of the class runs the mile,” Coach said.

  Shyla bristled beside me, but she kept her mouth shut. I raised my hand and Coach took a heavy breath. “What is it?”

  “Can I run bleachers, too?”

  Heads swiveled to stare at me. Running bleachers was practically suicide. I wasn’t in bad shape, but those bleachers were killer after the first few times up and down.

  “You’ll have to make up the mile, just so you know.” He looked at Shyla. “So will you. Don’t think I’m letting you off the hook.”

  “We’ll stay after school,” I volunteered.

  This time people actually laughed. I even heard someone say “suck up” under his breath. I could feel the anger rolling off Shyla as she glared at me. Coach was extremely satisfied, though. I doubted anyone in the history of Physical Education had ever volunteered to stay after school just to run.

  As soon as Coach blew his whistle, Shyla and I set off in the direction of the bleachers. She elbowed me in the side, though not hard. “Are you mental?”

  “Maybe. But I really need to talk to you.”

  “And you couldn’t just call me up after school and save us the hassle of having to run bleachers and the mile?”

  “The bleachers were your fault,” I reminded her. “And Coach was going to make you run the mile anyway. Might as well get it over with, right?”

  Shyla started up the stairs at a determined pace, and I followed in line beside her. “So what did you want to talk about?”

  “I have something I need to tell you. And I don’t want you to get mad at me for not saying anything before, but Adrian didn’t want anyone else to know just yet, and I didn’t want him to—”

  “Sarah!” I was glad when Shyla cut me off, because I was starting to suck wind pretty hard. “Spit it out.”

  “Victor called Adrian!” I blurted.

  We reached the top and immediately started back down. “Did you hear me?” I said when she didn’t respond.

  “I heard you.”

  “Well?”

  “Well what?”

  “How does that make you feel?”

  Shyla laughed, but without humor. “I don’t know, Sarah. How am I supposed to feel? Scared? Angry? Like I couldn’t care less? Like I want to claw his eyes out? Try all of the above.”

  “Oh.”

  We reached the bottom step, paused to take a breath, and started back up. “Why do you think Adrian didn’t want anyone to know?” I asked, breathing heavily.

  Shyla laughed again. “Because Adrian has daddy issues. He may act like he’s all hurt and angry, but he can’t let go of the idea that our dad is this wonderful man. As for me, I gave up believing that a long time ago.”

  Shyla’s breath was barely labored, but I was having a difficult time keeping up. Not to mention the muscles in my legs were screaming for me to stop. When we get to the top, I promised myself. Just a few more steps and . . . finally!

  I snagged Shyla’s arm as she turned to make her way down. “Wait a minute. I need to rest or I’m gonna die.” At least I wasn’t cold anymore.

  Shyla nodded and came to stand beside me. From where we were, we had a clear view of the lake. It was going to be a sunny day, and much warmer than it was now.

  “You don’t think people can change?”

  “Let’s just say I’ll believe it when I see it.” She turned to me suddenly and asked, seemingly out of the blue, “So, what is going on between you and Caleb?”

  “Not you, too,” I said. “It’s bad enough that Adrian thinks Caleb has a thing for me. I promise I have no romantic feelings for him.”

  “No romantic feelings,” Shyla said. “But feelings regardless.”

  I gave her a look. “But not romantic feelings, so you can stop worrying that I’m moving in on your man.”

  “He’s not my man,” she muttered under her breath, turning away. But not before I saw the smile on her lips.

  I was dreading second period. I didn’t want to see Adrian. I didn’t want to face him and apologize, especially because I didn’t think I had anything to apologize for this time.

  So I walked in and sat down, waiting to take my books out of my bag until Caleb and Adrian walked in, too. That way I didn’t have to pretend to be busy when he walked by my desk. Part of me thought Adrian might stop and at least try to make amends, so I was a little surprised, not to mention hurt, when he ignored me altogether.

  “What’s up with your boyfriend?” Caleb said when he sat down next to me.

  I shrugged.

  “He’s acting like a girl,” he said. And then as an obvious afterthought: “No offense.”

  “None taken.”

  Mr. Wigley came in waving a stack of papers. “Pop quiz. Hot off the presses!”

  “Already?” Caleb hissed next to me. “It’s only the third day of school.”

  For the next ten minutes I pushed Adrian to the back of my mind and worried simply about acing the test. Toward the end of class, however, after the notes had been given and Mr. Wigley was finishing his lecture, Caleb passed me a small rectangle of folded paper.

  Wanna meet after school? Check yes or no.

  Under that were two boxes. I chuckled under my breath and checked the “yes” square. Suddenly, the note was snatched from my hands. I looked up, startled to find Mr. Wigley standing before me with a triumphant grin.

  “Let’s remember back to our lessons in American Government for just a moment, shall we?”

  I already didn’t like where this was going.

  “Let’s suppose this classroom represents a democracy. That means I can’t just open this note and read it. But if we take a vote . . .”

  My cheeks burned with the realization of what he was about to do. “Surely this violates my constitutional right to privacy,” I said, the words slipping from my mouth before I could stop them.

  There were snickers all around. Mr. Wigley’s eyes narrowed until they were slits.

  “Let’s put it to a vote,” he said. “Those who think I should read the note aloud, please raise your hand.”

  I heard the shuffling of bodies and more snickering as hands shot up. It was high school, after all. I didn’t really think my classmates would turn down the opportunity to pry into my personal life. All I could do was sit there and wait for it to be over.

  “By majority, the yays have it,” Mr. Wigley said. He unfolded the paper and cleared his throat. “Mr. Moon wrote: ‘Wanna meet after school? Check yes or no.’ I’m sure you will all be interested to know, Mr. Hunt in particular, I think, that Miss Redbird checked yes. What the note fails to explain is exactly what they will be doing after school.”

  I heard the scre
ech of chair legs from the back of the class and then Adrian stormed out of the room. Mr. Wigley looked at me and smirked. His eyes seemed to say how ashamed of myself I should be. And I was.

  Caleb passed me another note then in a very obvious way so that Mr. Wigley was sure to see. He yanked it out of my hand before I had even opened it, a smug smile on his face. He read it quietly to himself, his cheeks blooming red a moment later, and then wadded the paper before tossing it into the garbage.

  “What did it say?” someone yelled.

  Mr. Wigley ran a finger under his nose. “Nothing.”

  “Aw, come on. Tell us!” someone else shouted.

  And then someone started to chant “Vote! Vote! Vote!” until the whole class was chorusing in.

  “Enough!” Mr. Wigley yelled. He turned a glaring eye on the room. “This is an advanced class. You all are supposed to be smarter than your peers,” he said in apparent disgust. He huffed and shook his head as though he didn’t know what to do with us.

  “Read quietly until the bell,” he said. And then he stormed out of the room.

  As soon as he left, someone got up and plucked the wadded note from the garbage can. He laughed and then cleared his throat. “It says, ‘Mr. Wigley is a weenie.’ ”

  Biting my lip, I tried not to laugh. I appreciated Caleb sticking up for me in his own strange way, but I didn’t want to encourage him. Adrian would never have done something like that.

  “I have to stay after school,” I said to him, getting back to the original note. “Shyla and I have to run a mile for Coach Wally.”

  “Then I’ll run with you.”

  “What?”

  “I’ll run with you.”

  I was about to protest when I remembered Shyla. Positive she wouldn’t mind at all, I shrugged as if it made no difference to me. “Okay. Suit yourself.”

  At lunch Caleb sat with Priscilla and me. Priscilla, for once, was at a loss for words. She wasn’t entirely sure what to say around Caleb at first, but after he chucked his roll at Jasmine as she and Katie were walking by, they gave each other a fist-bump and that was the end of the awkwardness.

  After the final bell of the day, I met Shyla in the locker room where we quickly changed our clothes. A very big part of me hoped Coach Wally would have completely forgotten about us running the mile, but he was waiting for us on the field, clipboard in his hand.

  “Who are you?” he said to Caleb, to which Caleb stated his name. “Why are you here?” Coach demanded.

  “To run a mile. I believe in being the healthiest person I can be.” Caleb kept a straight face the entire time.

  Coach Wally studied him for a moment as if to judge the sincerity of his words. “Fine,” he said at last.

  He turned to Shyla and me. “Let’s try not to take all day, ladies. The guys are coming out to practice in twenty.”

  Coach blew his whistle, but Shyla and I stood staring at him. He blew his whistle again, harder this time, and motioned impatiently for us to move along.

  The three of us started down the track at a decent clip. After the first quarter mile, however, I began to intentionally hang back so Caleb and Shyla could have a little time together, by themselves.

  I was feeling good and not sucking too much wind, but I was also going barely above a jog. Coach Wally blew his whistle at me as I passed him.

  “Foul, Redbird! Step it up! I haven’t got all afternoon.” I waved and gave him the thumbs-up. Then I increased my speed. A little.

  Somewhere around the three-quarter mile I started to get a stitch in my side. I sucked in a deep breath and blew it out through my nose. I even wrapped my hand around my side and pinched, but it was only getting worse. I slowed to a walk, unable to help it. Luckily, Coach was busy talking to some of the football players who’d wandered out to the field, so at least he didn’t see. Looking over my shoulder, I saw that Caleb and Shyla had rounded the corner of the oblong track and were quickly closing in on me.

  Turning forward again—I had only one lap left—I saw a man, standing not too far away, watching me. At first glance I thought it was Victor, and my heart leaped in my throat. But it wasn’t him.

  Aside from the same bronze skin, there was nothing similar about them. The man watching me was shorter and more muscular than Victor’s tall, lean frame. His hair was longer, too, and he wore it pulled back. He was dressed in jeans, a leather jacket, and boots, and he was leaning against a very big, very powerful looking motorcycle.

  I fisted my hands and stared at the man, trying to place him. He stared back, not even pretending to look away or be busy with something else. There was something very compelling about the man, and I had a sudden impulse to go to him. In fact, I had stepped off the track and had my hand on the gate, seconds from walking through it, when Coach’s whistle blew through my consciousness.

  “You’re not done yet!” he yelled at me. “Where do you think you’re going?”

  I looked back at the man, but he’d already put on his helmet and swung his leg over the seat. He revved his bike as Caleb and Shyla approached.

  “Who is that?” Shyla said.

  “I don’t know.”

  The man stared at us a moment longer before speeding away.

  “You didn’t recognize him?” I asked Caleb, thinking maybe it was some boyfriend of Charley’s who had come for a visit.

  “I didn’t see his face.”

  “Did you see the way he was staring at us?” I said.

  “Not at us,” Shyla said. “I think he was staring at you.”

  I looked at the empty spot where the man had been just a few seconds ago, but not a trace of him remained. Coach blew his whistle again. “Let’s wrap it up, folks!”

  “Come on,” Caleb said. “It was nobody.”

  But I wasn’t so sure about that.

  SIXTEEN

  “It’s only because I’ve been doing this a lot longer than you,” Caleb said during our practice session later that afternoon, sensing my frustration. “You can’t expect to get it perfect the first time.”

  I lowered my hands and took a deep breath, giving up for the moment. “I’m smart, so why can’t I do this?”

  Caleb laughed. “It’s not some test you can study for. Quit stressing out about it. You’ll get it. Just give it time.”

  My breath came out in a rush. I scrubbed my face with my hands, tired from a long day of school, running a mile, and now this. It was getting late, and my stomach was starting to make loud, rather embarrassing, gurgling noises.

  “How old were you when you first discovered you could . . . you know?”

  “About eleven, I guess. It was fall. My dad was raking leaves into this really big pile for me to jump in, and I stood in the middle and started spinning, like this.” Caleb stretched his arms wide and twirled in a circle like I had done at least a hundred times as a kid.

  “And then it was like I was in the middle of a tornado, and the leaves were swirling all around me. I thought it was great. But my dad just stared at me with this horrified look on his face. I thought he was mad at me for messing up his work.”

  “And then what?”

  He shrugged. “I remember my mom and dad fighting a lot after that. And then my dad eventually left. I never saw him again. One time my mom got mad at me and said I was the reason he left. So of course Jasmine thinks it’s my fault. I don’t know . . . maybe she’s right.”

  I stared at him, trying to determine if he was serious. “You don’t really think that, do you?”

  Caleb looked down at the ground. “Sometimes I don’t know what to think. You’re confused about why you ended up the tribe’s Spirit Keeper, but my life makes no sense. Maybe it never will.”

  Caleb swirled his finger and a small tornado of leaves circled at his feet. “Show off,” I muttered, recognizing a change in subject when I saw one.

  He grinned. “So are we going to practice, or what?”

  I bobbed my head. “Practice.”

  I mimicked Caleb’s mo
tion, but nothing happened until I got so frustrated I shook my fists at the sky and inadvertently summoned a strong wind that rained red, yellow, and gold leaves on our heads.

  Caleb laughed. “That’s one way to do it.”

  “It wasn’t exactly what I was going for.”

  “It’s all about channeling,” he said. “Your emotions are all over the place. You have to focus.”

  “I am focused!”

  “You’re not. It’s like learning how to whistle,” he said. “You can’t just pucker your lips and blow. You have to form your lips into the right shape and adjust the stream of air just so or you won’t get any sound.”

  I shook out my hands. Little droplets of sweat had erupted at my temples despite the coolness of the afternoon, and I wiped them away with the sleeve of my hoodie. “I’m trying.”

  “What were you thinking about just now?”

  I didn’t want to tell him at first, but he was staring at me so intently I knew he wouldn’t leave it alone until I did. I rolled my eyes. “Adrian.”

  He waved his hand. “Forget about Adrian.”

  “I can’t.”

  He looked to the sky as though for patience. “Yes, you can. You have to.”

  My chin quivered and throat burned. Caleb’s eyes widened. “Oh, God. You’re not going to cry, are you?” he said.

  I spun around so he couldn’t see my face. “Of course not!” I choked out. “What do you think, that I’m just some needy, over-emotional girl?”

  Caleb’s fingers closed over my shoulder, and I turned at his touch and slumped against his chest. He put his arms around me, hesitantly and awkwardly, patting my back.

  “There, there,” he said, as though I were a baby in need of reassurance. I laughed. He was definitely out of his comfort zone.

  I was about to pull away when I looked over Caleb’s shoulder to see Adrian staring at us, mouth hanging slack with shocked outrage. “Adrian!” I yelled. But he had already turned and run off. “Adrian, wait!”

  Caleb grabbed my hand as I started after him and jerked me to a stop. “Let him go.”

  I tried yanking my hand free, but Caleb only held on tighter. “But he thinks—”