by Dalya Moon
“She'll come around,” James says. “Come on, time to meet some girls!”
James and I grab some bottles of soda—chilled, thankfully, unlike the beer—and walk down the trail to the lake. The sun hasn't set yet, but the trees blot out the light here.
James curses and snaps some branches. “I fear the trees are displeased with me,” he says.
“How so?”
“Displeased with me,” he repeats. “Movie quote, from Crazy People. Come on, we just watched it last week.”
I walk through a sticky spiderweb and get smacked on the face by some branches. Finally, we step out of the trail, onto the rocky beach. “Ahh, perfection,” I say. From where I'm standing, you could take the perfect photo for a jigsaw puzzle or a postcard. Unfortunately, I didn't bring any of my cameras.
James stops to survey the surroundings. “Is it just me, or is the lake getting smaller every year?”
“You think someone's draining the lake?” I joke, imagining a big white, rubber plug at the bottom, attached to a silver chain, like the plug for a bathtub.
We walk around for a few minutes, gathering dry wood for a bonfire in the communal pit. There are a few people around, but not the ones James is looking for.
“Nothing but old people,” I say to James. “And couples with small children. Maybe all the other kids our age went to a different lake this year, like there's some hot new lake a few miles away. Maybe they stole the water.”
“Nah. There'll be girls here.” He puts his hands on his hips and says, “If you build it, they will come.”
“Familiar ... what's that line from?”
“Conan,” he says with a smirk. “No, Ghostbusters. No, Men in Black. No, Star Wars. What's your best guess, nozzle?”
“You're a nozzle. Don't quote it if you're not going to say.”
“Field of Dreams. You need to watch more movies.”
“If this shrinking lake had cell phone reception, I could have looked it up.” I slap at something on my neck. Great. It's dusk, the mosquitoes are coming out, and I didn't put on any bug spray.
James squints at the dim horizon and drops some wet-looking wood on the pile. “Those shapes. Those are girl shapes. Off that way. Let's wave.”
“Those aren't girl shapes. That may be Sasquatch.”
“Either way, let's have some fun. Come on, wave,” he says.
I sit on a log and finish my can of soda. “Hey, what would happen if you boiled carbonated water?”
James stops waving. “I think those shadows are bushes, not people. They're not moving.”
“Can you imagine a hot, carbonated beverage? Like tea? It would look like it was still boiling, while you were drinking it.”
“You're a strange dude, Zan.”
* * *
An hour has passed since we started the bonfire. I have seven bug bites and I'm three for ten on guessing lines from movies of the '70s, '80s, and '90s. James prefers old movies, because—as he puts it—computer-generated special effects have ruined storytelling.
The fire crackles hypnotically, making me mellow enough. I'm eager to get back to town so I can try to talk to Austin, but since I'm stuck here tonight, I may as well enjoy myself.
James excuses himself for a moment, and to my surprise, returns with two girls in tow.
The girls are not entirely unattractive, but they're both smoking cigarettes, which is a steer-clear sign for me. James doesn't seem to mind, and happily introduces everyone.
I shake both of their hands and try to figure out a quick way to get one or both of them to put a finger in my belly button. Their hands are both moist, which makes me feel strangely protective of my stomach area.
The blonde produces a bag of marshmallows from her big purse.
“Marshmallows! Great, here we go,” I say with a laugh.
They stare at me, open-mouthed.
“You know those are meat,” James lectures. “Gelatin is rendered animal tissue. Those are blobs of fluffy white meat, and you're going to melt them over a fire and eat them. Pig feet.”
“Huh huh,” the one girl laughs. I almost forgot her name, but she has a Miss Piggy nose, which reminds me her name is Missy. “I like fluffy white meat,” Missy says, tossing her processed-looking yellow hair over one shoulder. “Num num.” She pops one on the sharpened end of a stick and licks the powdered sugar off her fingers. She takes an extra-long lick on her index finger, and I shudder at the thought of that moist finger going in my belly button.
“No, he's right,” the other girl says. She's got asymmetrical, straight black hair and tattoos visible around her wrists. The two girls are nearly opposites: Missy is curvy with yellow hair, while the other girl is pale and stick-thin with raven-black hair. The dark-haired girl continues, “I don't mind gelatin. I don't get any readings from Jell-O, or marshmallows.”
“Readings?” I ask.
“That's why I'm vegetarian,” she says. “If I eat meat, I can feel the vibrations and the emotions of the animal from when it was killed.”
“No way,” James says. He couldn't sound more impressed if she'd started sneezing gold nuggets out of one nostril and silver out the other.
“Yeah, meat makes me really sick,” the hard-looking angular girl says, her expression earnest. “But marshmallows are okay. I don't know why.”
“My friend Zan here also has a psychic ability,” James says. “He can see into your soul if you poke him in the belly with your finger.”
“Does it work with tongues?” Missy sticks out and wiggles her tongue, which, yep, has a silver stud right in the middle. Why do girls think that's going to be a big turn-on? Nobody wants something sharp and metallic being raked along his body parts. Wait, actually, that thought gave me an interesting feeling. Never mind.
“You could try the tongue,” James says. “But he's a kinky little bastard and he loves the finger. He likes it when you wiggle around.”
I hold my hands open, palms upraised. Seriously? What part of secret does James not understand? We're barely a couple of hours from our town; we're not in some foreign country where we'll never encounter these people again.
“I wanna go first,” Missy says, eyeing my midsection.
“It might not work,” I say. “My powers might be broken.”
“Kiss me while I do it,” Missy says, shoving another marshmallow in her mouth. “I've read about psychic stuff, and sexual tension can really amp up the wattage.”
I look over her shoulder at James, who nods, encouraging me to go for it.
Best to get it over with quick, I tell myself. I lift my shirt and lean down to kiss her cheek. She steps up to me, her hand getting closer, then suddenly she grabs my face and turns my head. She thrusts her tongue in my mouth at the same time her finger goes in my belly.
I taste the marshmallow with undertones of ashtray. It's not going to work, I think, then, so that's what a tongue piercing feels like in your mouth.
CHAPTER 8
Missy's finger is in my belly button. The fire crackles in slow motion. C-rrr-aaa-ck, pop, hiss. An individual ember rises from the glowing logs and arcs toward my face, but I can't move. I begin the motion of closing my eyes, but I'm distracted by the tongue in my mouth, which tastes like how hot garbage smells.
In my vision is Missy, waving a gun inside a jewelry store. She's wearing a black mask, but I know the girl in the vision is her—I can sense more than just what's visible, plus her yellow hair's sticking out. The side of her neck is fresh and unlined, suggesting this armed robbery is not far in the future.
I'm having a vision, I realize with a start. My power still works.
Dimly, I note my physical eye closes just as the errant ember from the fire sears my eyelid. The pain spreads, sizzling, but I can't move to brush the ember away.
I desperately want to come out of this vision, but I'm stuck watching as Missy, with a dimpled, maniacal grin, runs along the side of someone's car, digging her keys into the paint. She smashes store windows and grabs e
lectronics in a montage of wanton property destruction. The horror! This vision can't get any worse, can it? Oh, but it can. I am treated to the image of her squatting, doing something unspeakable all over someone's new-looking white tennis shoes.
I want to get out of this girl's Secret Town as soon as possible.
I will myself to come out of the vision, to pull away, but it's difficult, like waking myself from a bad dream in progress. The selected reality of this vision clings to me like mud, sucking me down.
Oxygen. I need oxygen. I visualize pushing her away from my physical body, repeating the action for what feels like a hundred times before my muscles finally work. The world tightens up and my head pops out of the mud of the vision. Finally, I'm actually physically pushing her away, completely disengaged, though the echo of her ashy, pierced tongue is still in my mouth.
She gives me a cagey look.
“Anything?” James asks.
I rub the sore spot where the ember from the fire hit my eyelid. My skin's tender, but not burned.
“Strangely, yes,” I say. At this, he looks almost disappointed, and it occurs to me: James wants me to be normal, like him—as in, without any gifts or psychic powers.
“Your future holds lots of jewelry,” I say to Missy. “And a gorgeous, expensive-looking car. I don't even know what make or model the car is, because this is a ways in the future, but it's red, sleek, and awesome.”
She smiles, which adds on at least a point to her attractiveness, despite everything I saw. She's no Austin, but I think that aside from the criminal activity and tennis-shoe-watering, she'd be okay. I didn't see the whole picture, just glimpses. Maybe she had a perfectly good reason for robbing a jewelery store.
“Tell me more,” she says greedily, a lust for destruction in her eyes.
Help me, I silently plead to James, but of course, he has no way of knowing what I saw. This power of mine is not a silly magic trick; I just saw into this young woman's soul. I feel like I stole something from her, and now I have an obligation to give back. I have no idea if I can change the future, but I ought to try.
“There's more,” I say. She lunges in for another kiss, but I catch her by the shoulders and hold her at arm's length. I sit on the log and pat the spot next to me. She joins me, at a respectful distance.
Quietly, I say, “I also saw a dark path, with immoral activity.” She leans in as I continue, “It leads to ruin.” I totally sound like Yoda. Hey, that's good. Keep going. “If you choose well, you'll get everything you dream of, but you must avoid shortcuts.”
She nods solemnly, and I sense she wants to believe my advice as much as I do.
“Tonight's meeting could change your fate,” I say. “If you're willing to do the work and not take the easy path.”
“Sometimes life is hard,” she says.
Above us, the stars twinkle knowingly. “You're not wrong,” I say.
“Thank you.” She shakes my hand and we smile shyly at each other. Maybe this is why I have this gift in the first place. I should be helping people.
“Do me next,” squeals the friend, the angular one with the black hair.
“Okay, but no kissing, you naughty girl. I have a girlfriend.”
“You have a girlfriend?” James repeats.
“Yeah. Of course, she doesn't know it yet.” I kick at the sand and rocks near my feet.
In unison, the two girls say, “Aww.” The bonfire lets out a good crackle.
Girlfriend. Of course that's presumptive, and I do need to ask Austin out yet, but I'm enjoying the thought, even though there is still the issue of why my power didn't work with her.
The black-haired girl squeezes onto the log between me and Missy. “I'd love to know what you see in my future. Please?”
“Of course,” I say. A family with small kids stops by to admire the bonfire. We chat with them for a few minutes before they wander off. I lift my shirt and the black-haired girl takes an appreciative look.
“You've got some nice abs there,” she says.
“No he doesn't,” James says, lifting his own shirt and rubbing his stomach. “Look at these washboards! Vegan diet keeps the fat away.”
The black-haired girl whispers in my ear, asking if James has a girlfriend.
“He's all yours,” I whisper back. She smiles and plugs her finger into my belly button.
* * *
The world gels around me as usual. Funny how a bit of experience with the supernatural and after a while it's as routine as watching a movie at the multiplex. As the curtains open on this vision, I find myself wanting popcorn.
This girl's Secret Town is not nearly as dark as her friend Missy's, but she has secrets. She doesn't recycle. She reads her friend Missy's diary and lies about it. She has several email accounts with different names, which concerns me, but not as much as the next thing: she honks at people in traffic. She honks when they drive too slowly for her liking, or when they don't use their turn signal.
Now, I'm all for encouraging other drivers to be aware of their mistakes, but goodness knows two wrongs sure don't make a right. People who honk in non-emergency situations should have their hands removed. Or, less drastically, their horns, I suppose.
The music in the vision changes—apparently this vision has a soundtrack!—and now I'm watching her have an intimate moment with a guy, cowgirl style. He's enjoying himself when BAM! She punches him in the face.
I'm laughing when I come out of the vision and back into the real world next to the crackling bonfire. James is talking to the other girl, Missy, but his attention is on her friend. The corners of his mouth turn down when he glances at her hands, both now resting on my knee.
“Will I be rich, or famous, or both?” she asks.
“I didn't see very far ahead, but I'm sure if you find something you're exceedingly good at, and practice really hard, you'll get somewhere.”
She cocks her head and narrows her eyes. “What exactly did you see?”
I gently scoop up one of her hands and hold it in mine. Her touch is cool, amphibian-like. “You need to be more calm when you're driving. In the future, you will use your car horn during a non-emergency situation, and your honking causes a terrible, terrible freeway pileup. Several people are killed, including children.”
She gasps.
“And some ponies are killed,” I say.
“Ponies?” Her eyes are so wide, with miles of white all around the irises.
“Kind of a circus-related thing. But that's not the point. You must never honk again, unless it absolutely is an emergency. Promise?”
“I do,” she says. “I promise.”
James breaks our moment, saying, “Missy, don't waste your marshmallow meat by burning the crap out of it.”
“I like it this way.” She waves the flaming marshmallow around her face for a moment before blowing it out.
James hands the marshmallow bag to the black-haired girl, causing her to let go of my hand. He seems fidgety and annoyed, even though coming out to have a bonfire and test my trick was entirely his idea.
“Meaty marshmallows,” he says to no one in particular.
My back feels chilly now. Sometimes the visions make me sweat, and my damp back is cooling off rapidly. I'm suddenly exhausted and irritated by my best friend. He dumps a pile of wood onto our already-hot fire.
“Hey, jamtart, save some wood for later,” I say, but he tosses the rest on. I can't help myself, but when James gets crabby like this, I want to poke at him.
“Ask the vegan how he likes his escargots,” I tell the girls.
He wheels around, the side of his face orange and yellow from the fire. Now it's his turn to make the seriously gesture.
“Escargot,” says Missy. “You mean slugs?”
“Snails,” says the black-haired girl. “I thought you were vegan. You eat snails?”
James stirs the fire, sending a torrent of sparks skyward. Tonight, the moon is closer to full, and I remember last night, when Austin and I joked
about reaching out to pinch a piece of moon.
“Ha, ha, hilarious, Zan,” James says without a trace of humor. He stops menacing the fire and comes to sit on the log on the other side of me, so we're all facing the lake. The boats and noisy watercraft are gone for the day, leaving only the quacking ducks and calm waters.
The night envelops, the warm glow of the fire isolating the four of us within a bubble of warmth. The girls urge me to tell them about the escargots, and with begrudging permission from James, I do.
* * *
Here is the story of James and the snails:
After a nasty bout of stomach flu, my best friend James decided to become a vegan. It's not a religion or anything like that—more of a philosophy. A vegan is someone who doesn't eat or use any animal products—no milk, or cheese, or leather shoes. You can't even use honey if you're vegan, because it comes from bees. From bee slavery, as James says.
So, James was doing a lot of reading about the benefits of becoming vegan, and he wanted to change the world, starting with his family.
One night, he was out dining with his family to celebrate some business deal his father had made. I was there too, since I'm practically a part of the family, plus I'm not one to turn down a free meal.
There we all were, at this tiny little French restaurant with these strange pig and cow masks on all the walls. I'd never been there before, and after one glance at the prices on the menu, I was pretty sure I'd never go again.
James was dismayed at the presence of colorful pig and cow masks on the wall in combination with the day's dinner specials. He got up on his high horse and commented that if people really wanted to eat meat, they should consider bugs, because they're a sensible and sustainable supply of protein. He'd been reading about crickets, and how some people call them land shrimp in an attempt to better market them as food.
I asked if crickets were good for dipping in that red sauce that's great for prawns, or if their little legs would fall off in the dip bowl. Before James could answer, his father exclaimed with delight that the menu contained escargots, and perhaps James would like to order some, as they were sorta like bugs. I've since learned that snails are gastropods, not insects at all, but the comparison was still made.