IMPERFECT ORB

by K. Lorel Reid

  The dented and tarnished piece of metal turned over lazily and slowly in the strong wind. Then there was the polyhedron. Mike felt it once again approaching, and as it did he saw colours challenging fierce battle. Confused, Mike used his knees to throw himself flat onto his stomach, trapping the key under his chest. The polyhedron missed him and reared up against a tree. Mike was surprised to look up and see the glass object still in one piece. He felt abandoned as he stared at the dodecahedron. He felt the frightened uncertainty of looking into an expressionless face. The geometric shape no longer reflected colours as though glimmering in the light of the sun. It stood, suspended in air — not even turning — a short distance from the tree with which it had collided. Mike, suddenly convinced that he was only a little boy, lay, innocently, staring at something which he was suddenly certain had enough consciousness to be staring back at him.

  The glass shape again began to move, slowly. Mike watched with a frightened curiosity as the keeper of the magic made its way through the air. No longer turning and spinning, showing off different angles; just moving through the Drop towards Mike.

  Suddenly the three dimensional shape did something strange. It stopped. Somehow Michael knew something terrible was about to happen. So although he braced himself, he knew not for what.

  The earth he lay on was hard although thick and rich. Rich, Mike knew, with microbes. Suddenly the once-innocuous creatures grew. They slithered and pulsed beneath him, getting larger in every dimension. Something bit into his flesh and Mike was up on his feet in no time. Clinging to his shirt were unrecognized creatures, small in size yet many times larger than their usual. With frantic strokes of his free hand Mike managed to rid himself of most of the once microscopic creatures.

  His sneakered feet had vanished about an inch into the soil. Mike looked down now and saw that the entire area on which he had been lying had come alive. Moving quickly on instinct, thinking very little about his actions, he bent at the waist and buried a hand into the living earth. When he straightened up again between his fingers he held the key. Shaking loose anything that was living he headed — the box in one hand, the key in another — towards the caves in search for some type of shelter.

  At first moving was hard but after leaving the silhouette left by his body in the altered earth, the ground became hard again and walking easy. He carefully weaved through trees which stood tall and indifferent, not all of which had been there the day before. The polyhedron, although unseen, made its presence known by resuming once again to flash colours, bright and foreboding, behind Mike’s eyes. Blinding they were and it was with relief Mike stumbled into the darkness of the caves.

  Carefully he set the key and the box on the floor. Just inside the entrance Michael noted that it was darker than usual. Before straightening up the bewildered boy slipped a hand into his running shoes. It was from there he pulled the red lighter. It produced a flame, small and weak, but that, in its dying glory, only lasted for a moment. Mike tried again and this time when the small orange glow arrived he took note of the box and the key. To him they were a burden, to his mother they were a treasure, and to the magic…. Mike frowned. The magic. That had to be it. The magic had to be it. The magic had never acted this way before and he’d never brought the chest down into the Drop before.

  Carefully within the darkness Mike dropped to his knees. Around him he felt with his fingers. Through the air there came the polyhedron at such a high speed it brought into the caves the same type of breeze that was blowing outside. Letting out a cry Mike flattened himself against the cave wall. The carried breeze passed and as soon as it did Mike had the box and the key in his hands. But what should he do with them? If they weren’t brought home in one piece his mother would kill him.

  Pangs of pain attacked his gut, much in the way they had earlier that morning. Then there was that feeling, strong and pulsing. But there was also something else. There were colours that dizzied him instantly. So it was in a haze the key was guided into the key hole of the box.

  Mike would always remember, as though watching a replay in slow motion, every detail of everything that happened next. He would never forget how the glass polyhedron, which had been whistling through the air at break-neck speed never halted, but was completely silenced. The silence had come right after an acrid odour consumed the air. Then, next, to fill that deadly silence, the box was thrown open and out spilled a blue light. Its colour was pale but it shone so brightly it was blinding. When that blue came it brought with it its own magic. It filled the air and made it so thick Mike felt as though he was drowning within some thick batter. Behind closed eyes Mike witnessed the polyhedron, still speeding through the air, explode into splinters, which themselves continued to explode. Again and again the tinkling of shattered of glass could be heard. Whenever Mike thought about it he was surprised that no shrapnel had punctured his skin. As a matter of fact, none of it had even touched him.

  As quickly as it had started the entire thing was over, a crisp slab of heat marking its completion. The blue light, the polyhedron, the magic and whatever it was that had thickened the air so, had all disappeared. The glass dodecahedron had been shattered into pieces so fine they could no longer be seen. Fortunately his mother’s small box and key were still there. Mike, for some reason feeling better about himself, headed out of the caves. He wanted to leave the Drop behind forever. No longer did he have that serene feeling while within the earth’s crater. Nor did there remain a curiosity that he cared to acknowledge.

  As he made his way through what was no longer a clearing — the trees had remained — and up what was no longer a path, through a hidden entrance that was just about completely closed off, Mike thought about what had happened. He wouldn’t tell anybody. What was there to say? All major components of the story had conveniently disappeared. He didn’t quite understand it anyway.

  It was well past noon and despite his late breakfast Michael Gregory was thinking of lunch.

  * * *

  The creature, hidden way back in the far reaches of the cave — much further than Michael Gregory would ever go — settled in for the deep sleep. The crystal and its magic had once again been destroyed. It made no difference. It had happened before. And just like before, the magic would use the elements around it, the creature itself and others to remake itself from the sand into which it had been ground.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Samantha and David occupied one of the long wooden tables in the Ceedon’s Valley Public Library. They stood on opposite sides of the table, bent over the evolving poster that they would use for their presentation. Samantha had one knee resting on a wooden chair and was shuffling pieces of paper around a large piece of black Bristol board. She was facing the front entrance of the building. David sat opposite her and had a view of the check-out counter which stood opposite the front door. Along the wall closest to them were display cases filled with memorabilia documenting highlights of Ceedon’s Valley history; which, David supposed, had to exist — highlights, that is — though he couldn’t imagine what they could possibly be. The other end of the library was lost beyond the stacks. At random intervals slated windows could be seen there too. The sun was setting. It was getting late.

  It had been a gruelling week but thankfully it was Friday. Mr. Peters had not let up, not one bit. Both Samantha and David were exhausted — tired of constantly being grilled about the details of grade eleven science — but both too desperate to quit. About halfway through the week the students had started presenting their projects to the class. Every day two or three pairs would present. The first few had not gone well — Mr. Peters had been blunt in his disappointment. The others had been quick to up their game — big time. Mr. Peters grudgingly admitted satisfaction.

  Currently David and Samantha were framing up and trying to organize one-page vignettes onto the Bristol board in a logical manner.

  “Are we reading this top to bottom or left to right?” David wanted to know. “Why isn’t the
History page on this side?”

  “Good point, Herr Einstein,” Samantha replied in a surprisingly good German accent, “why didn’t you make the history page shorter so it could fit?”

  David smiled. Her accent really was quite good. He immediately reached for the scissors and without saying a word trimmed all the excess white space off the page that detailed the History of Nuclear Physics and placed the page where he thought it should go. There, it fit — just barely.

  “It’s all relative,” he said cheekily. He knew there was no way he could do an accent as good as hers so he didn’t even try.

  “Oh yes, when you trim away the excess you give the project room to grow,” Samantha replied, now using a milder European accent — dutch or something. She ran her fingers delicately along the edges of the re-shaped piece of paper. He supposed she was now the careful botanist.

  David laughed. She really was good. He had had no idea that she had a thing for accents. David laughed again; perhaps a bit too loudly. He received “the look” from over the top of the librarian’s bifocals from where she stood at the checkout counter. He would have stopped there but Samantha had him going again. This time, he thinks, she was Dr. Moreau, or some equally shady character.

  “We will put together the pieces yet, David, to create something greater than its parts,” she continued in a lisping English accent.

  And it was not just the way she said it, it was her whole demeanour: One moment she appeared mild-mannered, too old to be rushed, the next she seemed tall and thin with a pinched, careful face; a moment later, she was hunched over and haggard, like the weight of her limbs were dragging her down. David had to remind himself that it was still Samantha. And when he did, he laughed even harder.

  This all proved to be too much for the librarian at the counter. She raised her clear, authoritative voice to remind them that this was a library and all conversation was to be conducted in a quiet manner, please.

  Samantha plopped herself back into her chair, David slouched into his. He let his head fall backwards and closed his eyes for a moment. In addition to their presentation due the following week they had their exam to study for the week after that. And tomorrow, to mark the start of the Ceedon’s Valley Summer Festival, there was the marathon. David had been having second thoughts about the race all week. Not about whether or not he should run it but about his distance. If he ran the full marathon, he’d spend the rest of Saturday and perhaps most of Sunday recovering. He could do the half marathon instead. He’d finish the race earlier and the recovery time would be far less. He could still win it, he was sure. The prize money wouldn’t be as great but at least he wouldn’t be sabotaging himself on the science front. He could do the full marathon next summer….

  Samantha giggled.

  David’s eyes flew open.

  “What?” he asked defensively. In truth he had forgotten where he was and that she was sitting there across from him.

  She giggled again and pointed towards a nearby display case. “I was just thinking about how much that woman looks like Mike in a dress.”

  David saw it instantly and let out an involuntary, “Ha!” of his own.

  Sure enough the picture on the yellowed front page of an ancient copy of the Ceedon’s Valley Evening Harold showed an unsmiling woman with pinched, delicate features, just like Mike’s except actually sterner, ironically. It was hard to tell from the black and white image but David got the impression that her hair had been red and curly, too, judging by the few wisps that had managed to escape her tight bun. She wore a long, modest skirt and a high, ruffle-collared blouse. She posed seated in front of a large wooden desk with an equally stern looking man in a full three-piece suite sitting at the opposite end of the desk.

  “They’re probably related,” David said smiling. “His family has deep roots here.”“We all have deep roots here,” Samantha replied, sounding unimpressed.

  David agreed. Unless you were just camping for the summer, most of the families in Ceedon’s Valley could trace their lineage back to this very plot of land for generations. Ceedon’s Valley was strange that way. Nobody came to stay and nobody left for long.

  “His is a long line of politicians: mayors, city councillors — that sort of thing.

  David leaned sideways and turned his head so that he could get closer to the framed newspaper clipping and read the caption. Sure enough the lady in the picture was the mayor of Ceedon’s Valley in the 1800s. When David was done reading the caption he let his eyes peruse the photograph. She really did look like him; like she could be his mother — even more so than his actual mother looked like she could be his mother. Family genes were funny that way. He let his eyes stop roaming and tilted his head in confirmation. He had zoomed in on a small chest atop the desk in front of which the past mayor posed. He recognized that odd chest as being amongst Mrs. Gregory’s collection of antiques. He’d seen it in her living room many times.

  “Definitely related,” David said to Samantha, pointing out the chest to her.

  It was then that the librarian appeared at the end of their table to inform them, a little too smugly, David thought, that the library would be closing in twenty minutes.

  Outside the sun had all but disappeared below the horizon. All that was left was a slight cusp of bright orange and a thin line of the same running parallel to the horizon before diffusing away into the sky. Dusk had come to Ceedon’s Valley and with it a warm, pleasant evening had emerged. There was no breeze. If this night were any indication, tomorrow would be a perfect day for a run, even if it would only be a half marathon.

  David and Samantha had decided to head over to Samantha’s house. They wanted to fix some of their slides and run through the presentation at least once. Samantha had promised to help him carb up by making spaghetti, so he instantly agreed.

  Now the route from the library to Samantha’s house did not bring them alongside the Drop, but they did cross one end of the path perpendicularly. Of course, by some odd luck, just when they were crossing said path both looked in the direction of the Drop. Both recognized instantly the dorsal view of the person walking away from them along the path. Not that the profile was all that recognizable. There was definitely something wrong with that posture; something not quite right about that gait. Interestingly, tucked into the crook of one arm and supported by the other was the very same wooden box that David had pointed out to Samantha only moments before.

  David and Samantha paused mid-stride and looked. Neither one spoke. The figure definitely looked as though he was having trouble moving; as though the mere act of walking was causing him a great deal of pain. David knew he should have called out to Mike and approached, but he just couldn’t deal with one more thing at the moment. He knew Mike hadn’t forgiven him for breaking his toy. Gently he touched Samantha at the elbow and the two started moving again. Out of the corner of his eye David thought that perhaps Mike, sensing something in his periphery, as people often do, had turned in their direction. Had he seen them? Did he know it was them? Instantly David’s guilt ballooned. He squashed it. They needed to keep moving. He still had to get to bed early. He had a race to win tomorrow.

  As promised Samantha cooked up a storm. Huge, spicy meatballs simmered in tomato sauce while a big pot of buttery spaghetti was boiling away. There was already a huge bowl of green salad in the fridge. When her mother caught wind of what they were up to she had protested, saying there was fish still warm in the oven. Samantha held her ground, though. It had to be spaghetti, David had a big race tomorrow. David needed the carbs.

  David could tell Mrs. Reid didn’t know whether to be amused that her daughter was cooking or annoyed that she was making a mess. So, like parents of teenagers everywhere, she settled for exasperation and left them to it.

  After polishing off two large servings of spaghetti and meatballs, David sluggishly followed Samantha up to her bedroom. He sat on the floor, his back propped up against a large steam trunk that stood at th
e foot of her bed, his long legs stretched out in front of him. Samantha sat at her small desk and immediately began typing away on her lap top. David rolled his head in her direction. It took him a while to realize what he was registering and then it hit him: she was typing — with all ten fingers, nonetheless.

  “I thought you couldn’t type,” David stated easily, bringing his hands to rest contentedly on his protruding stomach.

  “Oh that. That’s just part of my public persona.”

  He mulled over her answer. Public persona? Did people really have that kind of thing?

  “I’m working on a screen play,” she continued, excitement creeping into her voice. “I just really need to get down a few ideas and then we’ll switch back to this all-consuming science project…. Sometimes life is so much stranger than fiction…. I mean, you just can’t make this stuff up,” she said, thinking back to that embarrassing night when she had fainted in front of David and Mike. In her own defence it wasn’t just the fright — she hadn’t eaten since lunch and had been feeling light-headed all evening.

  David mulled it all over in his mind and then understood. A screen play.

  “Let me guess,” he said, “you’re the female lead.”

  “Actually, I can see myself playing one of any number of parts, but yes, I do rather favour the heroine.”

  She paused in her typing and smiled whimsically in David’s direction. David supposed that he didn’t look convinced because before he knew what was happening Samantha had risen from her chair, brought both hands up to cup her face and with a look of pure horror and distress let out a blood curdling scream.