Capsule

by Mel Torrefranca

  While Isabella hopped from one wave to the next, she spotted her mom and younger brother resting their stomachs on a dry quilt under a cherry-colored umbrella, phones held out in front of them. Her dad sat on the sand a few feet away, his nose tucked into a fitness magazine. For a brief moment he looked up at the sky, perhaps feeling the vague drizzle—almost a mist—but her dad shrugged it off and turned back to his pages.

  A man leaning against the empty lifeguard tower caught Isabella’s attention next. He wore light-wash jeans and a white button-up shirt, the top few buttons left open. In his left hand was a leather notebook and in his right was a fountain pen. He had no blanket under him. No umbrella sheltering him from the wind. It was just him and a worn messenger bag resting at his side. The man raised his chin, meeting eyes with Isabella, and she paused, her feet sinking into the sand of the ocean floor as she tilted her head to the side. The man mirrored her, rotating his head at a duplicated angle.

  When the man broke eye contact and checked his analog watch, Isabella giggled and resumed her game of wave-crashing. The rain intensified from the occasional sprinkle to full-bred droplets, but Isabella pushed forward, the fresh water streaming down her face and into the salty pool. She trembled as the ocean trekked up to her waist, but in some weird way, the cold returning refreshed her.

  With another step forward the sand grew slippery. Less dependable. It slid around under her, the water circling her legs and pulling her down into one of the ocean’s many dangerous traps. Her limbs slipped out of control, and the lack of sand under her feet left her choking on her own breaths. She gasped for air as her head returned to the surface. “Help!”

  Another wave struck her, the water pulling her further from the shore.

  Isabella’s head ached as she flailed her arms. Her vision burned with salt water with each return to the surface to gasp for air. She caught glimpses of her family panicking to shelter their belongings under the umbrella, but when she opened her mouth to call out to them, water filled her throat, leaving her coughing and inhaling unwelcome droplets of sea water into her nose. The panic gripped her, refusing to let her float, dragging her deeper. The rain splashed against the ocean’s surface and pounded onto the top of Isabella’s head with the goal of pushing her underwater—permanently.

  As the ocean devoured her alive, Isabella opened her eyes at the sound of a man’s soothing voice. She emerged at the surface in time to make out his words clearly.

  “You’re going to be okay.” He spoke loudly, but painfully slow. “I’m about to toss this over to you. I need you to catch it.”

  As she slipped beneath the surface again, a red and white buoy penetrated the air, landing directly above her and casting a rippling red shadow. She used all of her remaining energy to kick her legs and rush to the air with intention. She wrapped her arms around the buoy and coughed the water out of her chest.

  The splattering of the rain against the plastic buoy mesmerized her. She focused on the taps to calm herself.

  Several feet away from her swam the man who had thrown the buoy, keeping himself afloat with his elegant circling limps. He was the same man Isabella had seen by the lifeguard tower earlier—the one who had mirrored her. Even now it seemed as though he were breathing in the same panic-stricken rhythm she was.

  “Can you kick to the shore?” The man’s dark hair flew into his eyes. He reached to push the strands aside, temporarily breaking his swimming pattern.

  Isabella had gripped the string of the buoy for extra support when a wave crashed into her from behind, sending her flying toward the shore. As she coasted with the buoy into the shallow end of the ocean, she looked over her shoulder to see the man who had spoken to her only seconds ago. He floated peacefully as a lofty wave snuck up on him from behind.

  For a moment, he smiled.

  Her scream of horror masked itself as a scream of fear. The other adults at Pelle Cove rushed to the shore, finally taking notice of her dilemma.

  Isabella wrapped her arms around the buoy so tight she could hardly breathe. Her tears mixed with the rain that fell across her cheeks and into the deadly water. The image of the man’s face seconds before he’d disappeared in the wave ingrained itself into her memory forever.

  07:12:13

  PETER DIDN’T SAY a word to Jackie and Kat before he ran to the shelter of Grove Aid. The front doors hardly opened fast enough to keep him from slamming into the fiberglass. Jackie tried to go after him, but she couldn’t hold her balance well. The asphalt tilted under her feet, and she leaned forward with a scrambled stomach. Seeing Nicholas die that day—seeing that wave crash over his head—it was overwhelming.

  Jay wrapped an arm around Jackie, steadying her. “What’s wrong?”

  “I’ll find him.” Kat’s boots tapped against the asphalt as she stepped calmly toward Grove Aid. Of course Kat was unfazed. She was the only person strong enough to see what they’d seen and act as though nothing had happened.

  “Is Peter okay?” Jay asked.

  Jackie stepped away from her brother, finally regaining balance. Ever since Level Four at Emmeline’s tree, Jay had been the odd one out, but as Jackie faced him in the parking lot, her desire to be more like him rose higher than ever. He hadn’t been cursed to live through what they never should have lived through—what no one should have lived through. Not Isabella. And certainly not Nicholas.

  Jay hadn’t been cursed by the game.

  His arms fell to his sides, and he smiled softly. “Go.” Jay reached for the car door, surrendering his search for answers for the first time. In that moment, ignorance was bliss, and perhaps he was starting to understand that. “I’ll wait for you guys out here.”

  Jackie smiled as thank you before running to catch up with Kat in the parking lot. As the wind tousled Jackie’s hair, she thought back to the gentle expression on Isabella’s face only moments ago. She and her friends had laughed together as they walked to the car with cold cups in their hands. For nearly two years, Isabella had written letters to the nephew of her savior, the boy who had screamed at her and blamed her for the tragedy.

  Jackie reached Kat’s side. They didn’t speak to each other. They simply walked into Grove Aid as a single unit with a single mission.

  Grove Aid was larger than Jackie had been expecting, but the environment was no surprise. Shelves of disorganized toiletries, yellowing discount posters peeling from the walls, and a line of cashiers by the windows who clearly lacked enthusiasm to be working here so late.

  Jackie and Kat trailed along the entrances to the many aisles on a search for Peter. They found him sitting on the stained carpet of a discount candy aisle. He had his knees tucked against his chest and his back leaning on several rows of outdated Valentine’s Day chocolates.

  Jackie sat to his left, Kat to his right. Peter blinked at the shelves ahead of him, not acknowledging their presence.

  Before today, Jackie, Peter, and Kat had hardly known each other—if one could even say they knew each other at all—but now they’d shared one of Isabella’s experiences from two years ago. They had witnessed the death of Peter’s uncle with their own eyes. A sacrifice. A swap of one man for a twelve-year-old girl who had wandered too deep. They were connected in an unimaginable way.

  Isabella should have been broken. She should have been shattered a million times smaller than Peter. She had not only heard the news, but she had seen it. Yet minutes ago Isabella had stood in the parking lot of Grove Aid, hugging Peter as though he weren’t the boy who had blamed her for her worst nightmare.

  “I was really close to my uncle.”

  Jackie flinched at the sudden sound of Peter’s voice.

  “He was ten years younger than my dad, so they never really got along well,” he continued. “Nicholas was into meditation and horoscopes and juice cleanses—all things my dad thought was a load of shit. But you know what? He was the only one who actually talk
ed to me about stuff that mattered.”

  Kat had her legs extended out in front of her. She clicked her boots together. “Did you see him a lot?”

  “Not really, no.” Peter inhaled a shaky breath. “During his six months of the year in California he was alway pretty busy with photography gigs, but once in a while he’d pick Grace and I up from school or take me to lunch. I always looked forward to it.”

  Jackie wrapped her left arm around her stomach, trying to keep that sickening feeling at bay. She hadn’t even known Nicholas personally, so she could hardly comprehend how much his death had affected Peter. The man he looked up to the most, the man who took the time to genuinely understand who he was—he was gone.

  “I’m sorry,” Kat said. “It must have been hard to lose him.”

  “Yeah. It’s different for you though, isn’t it?” Peter shook his head, recalling the memory they’d seen at Quasso Drive. “I know you’ve been trying to cry—trying to feel something—but to be honest with you, the feelings you keep chasing you won’t want anyway. Why don’t you just accept that you’re stronger than everyone else and move on?”

  “Because that’s not the kind of person I wanna be.” Kat gripped the carpet at her sides, her face burning. “Ever since Emmeline died it’s just been me and my dad, working through it together. And I love him so much, but when I imagine him gone someday, I can’t imagine myself crying.”

  Jackie had never held so much hatred for Capsule before. The game was here to torment Peter and Kat, to force them to relive the lowest points of their lives. To remind them of everything they’d lost.

  “This game is sick. And not the good kind.” Kat looked over at Peter and Jackie, that same anger reflecting off her eyes. The one thing all three of them could relate to at that moment was how much they despised Capsule. “These memories keep sending us to the past. And when we’re not dealing with that we’re searching for the next level, constantly stressing over how much time we have left. When do we get our chance to be Isabella?”

  As abstract as Kat’s question was, Jackie understood her perfectly. When do we get our chance to be Isabella? The fourteen-year-old girl had seen the worst, yet she’d somehow learned to move on. She lived for this moment. Nicholas had changed her, but his death didn’t define her. It would have been nice to stop stressing over the past and worrying about the future. It seemed the trio had been living this way even before the game had begun.

  Peter, unable to accept the heroic death of his uncle.

  Kat, torn apart by her inability to grieve.

  And me—Jackie turned in the direction of the parking lot, where Jay sat in the driver’s seat of his Toyota, alone—failing to move on from my jealousy.

  Peter retrieved Jackie’s phone from his pocket and handed it back to her. “Kat’s right. This game is a trap.”

  Jackie opened Capsule to reveal the countdown page. The game wanted her to obsess over the numbers. The game wanted to control their worries, their fears, their emotions. The three were ruled by the game. Ruled by the clock. Ruled by nothing but a balance of regret and dread.

  “I don’t get it.” Jackie shut her phone off. “We do what the app says, win the game, and everything goes back to normal. The way today was supposed to be.”

  The way today was supposed to be, Jackie repeated to herself. If Capsule hadn’t appeared on her phone, where would she be right now?

  “It’s weird, isn’t it?” Peter ran his hands along his polo, trying to straighten out the fabric, but he gave up after a few recurring wrinkles. “After everything that’s happened, Capsule plans to wipe our memories at the next location. But if we restart the day and don’t remember any of this, doesn’t that make it all pointless?”

  “I guess it depends on how you look at it.” Kat shrugged. “You could say that about life too.”

  The three sat in the gloomy Grove Aid that night, the distant lights from the windows across the street taunting them. Right now, at this very moment, high school students were having a fun time together at the spring dance. They were living.

  Jackie set her hand against the floor to push herself back to her feet and winced from the pressure on her wound. “I think we deserve a break.”

  Peter frowned at Jackie, leaving her uncomfortable at first, but she realized he was simply sorting through his thoughts. He eventually stood and faced her with a smile. “You’re right. We do.”

  “This game wants to have complete control over us.” Kat stood next, joining their line. “Let’s take one moment for ourselves. Just one moment where we aren’t trapped in the game.”

  They left Grove Aid at 8:29 and stood in front of the sliding doors, swatting away the moths circling through the air as they laid their eyes on the school building across the other side of the busy road. To most students, Grovestown High was simply a place to host another silly school dance. A place where they could have a little fun for the night. But to Jackie, Peter, and Kat, Grovestown High was their escape. Their safe place. The present moment in a world plagued by the haunting past and terminal future.

  Peter stepped forward, standing in the center of the parking space Isabella had been in minutes ago. It was the first time Jackie noticed how dirty his shoes had become. Earlier this afternoon they’d been pearly white, but now they were covered in dirt. They were muddy. Messy. And maybe—just for tonight—he was okay with that.

  “I’ve been wondering.” Jackie stepped off the curb and joined him on the asphalt. “That one entry, the one you labeled anonymous. Who was it for?”

  The sky darkened, its orange and pink hues morphing into a deep red.

  “I wrote it for me.” Peter’s light chuckle faded into a frown. “Who am I kidding? It was all for me.”

  The moon hovered in the bloody sky, a source of comfort among a sea of pain. Before today, Peter hadn’t seen the death of his uncle. He had simply heard the news, and that news destroyed him. That news had led him spiraling down a path of self-hatred. A spiral that had brought him back to school his sophomore year as a changed boy. A boy who now ran Moral Moon.

  Jackie thought back to all of the horrible things people had said about him. Brookwood High assumed that just because he ran a nasty blog they could say anything they wanted to without being the bad guy.

  Because it’s okay to bully a bully, and it’s okay to murder a murderer.

  Right?

  07:00:32

  THE INSIDE OF the Grovestown High gym was pitch-black, but the dotted lights flashed so frequently it felt as though Jackie were constantly under a spotlight. She blushed at the sight of the students’ fancy clothing, their outfits putting her casual sweatpants, muddy sneakers, and oversized checkered flannel to shame.

  At least I’m not dressed like him. Jackie grinned at Peter’s orange polo and khaki pants. He really did look like a nerd who buttered popcorn at the movie theater.

  The four stood against the wall of the gym, Jackie and Jay on opposite sides of the line they’d formed, Peter and Kat sandwiched between them. Together they watched the clumps of students laugh so loud it almost sounded as though they were screaming. The busy chattering mixed with the distorted music from the low-quality speakers formed an ensemble from hell. Jackie hardly recognized the current song as Talking to the Moon by Bruno Mars.

  “This is the final location?” Jay’s voice fell flat. It was more of a statement of disbelief than a question.

  “Not quite.” Kat took a step forward, breaking their line. She swung the backpack off her shoulders and tossed it at the wall on the spot where she’d stood a second ago. Emmeline’s keychains clashed against the polished floor as Kat gestured to the collection of sweating high school students. “We’re taking a detour.”

  To their left, a foldable plastic table against the wall featured an insulated dispenser and stacks of paper cups. At first Jackie thought the tablecloth was burgundy, but the indec
isive colors in the air made it hard to tell. A pair of students exited the blur of bodies in the middle of the gym to fill their cups with dark fluid from the stainless steel dispenser.

  “Oh wow. Would you look at that?” Peter said. “They’re drinking mud in Grovestown. Why am I not surprised?”

  Jackie faced Peter with crossed arms, but he took a few steps forward before she could express her frustration with him poking fun at Grovestown. He passed Kat, approached the table, and plucked a cup of his own from one of the many stacks. After pouring himself a serving of hot chocolate, he turned around and raised the cup in the air as though he were giving a toast.

  “To the game.” He closed his eyes, brought the cup to his lips, and gulped. As Peter lowered his head and stared at the twirling fluid in the cup, he smiled.

  Jackie’s frustration toward Peter and his judgments vanished, and her eyes narrowed from the pressure of her wide grin. Peter had taken a first step to breaking his habits. His good habits. Because even good habits for the wrong reasons did nothing but tear people down.

  Peter’s choice to drink hot chocolate held no significance to Jay. His mind wandered somewhere else. “I haven’t been to a school dance since…” Jay closed his mouth as Kat looked away from Peter and faced him. “I just don’t get why we’re stopping here first.”

  “You don’t have to.” Kat’s voice rose to a higher pitch as though she were mocking her own words. “The world doesn’t owe us answers, Jay.”

  Jackie hadn’t noticed how tense Jay had been until his shoulders dropped an inch with a light chuckle.

  Peter tossed his half-empty cup into a trash bin on the way back from the table. His eyes darted between Kat and Jay. “I’m not so sure Emmeline would approve.”

  Jay’s face grew red, and Kat crossed her arms. “Oh shut up, Peter,” she said.