I followed my aunt outside and through the streets to the waterfront. She didn’t say much as we walked side-by-side. When we got to the scene of the first explosion, it was eerily deserted. Normally runners, walkers, and bikers dodged around each other in a complicated shuffle, but today there was only a single runner who gave the leftover flapping police tape a wide berth.
Aunt Kate stood on the edge of the taped-off area with her hands on her hips. She chewed on her lower lip thoughtfully while her eyes scanned the scene.
Tired of waiting for her to decide what she wanted to do, I wandered over to the spot I’d been standing in when Vera blew up. I looked back to the remains of Vera’s bench, thinking about the person I’d seen sitting beside the statue right before the explosion. Was that the bomber? I closed my eyes and tried to remember as much as I could about the moments leading up to the instant when everything went chaotic. All I could remember clearly was how scared and upset I’d been about the prospect of training with my family. Nothing else was very clear.
“Olivia, are you okay?” Aunt Kate’s voice made me jump. She sounded like she was right beside me, but when I opened my eyes she was bent down near the shattered bench. Supernormal hearing at work.
I picked my way carefully over the cracked and broken concrete walkway. When I got to her side, I saw she was waving a sort of wand attached to her iPhone over the part of the bench where the stick had been.
“What are you doing?” I crouched down beside her, trying to see what was on the screen. All I could see was a graph with squiggly lines on it.
She answered as she bent to run the wand under the bench. “I modified one of my apps so that it is able to detect certain chemical signatures. I set this one for a specific signature.”
“Wow. Cool.” I sat back on my heels, once again impressed at Aunt Kate’s skills. “When did you do that?”
“Last night.”
“Oh. Finding anything interesting?”
She sat back on her heel next to me and looked at the screen for a long time. “Yes. I’ve seen this before.”
I waited for her to finish, but she just kept looking down with a bleak expression.
“Aunt Kate?” I prompted her. “You’ve seen this before?”
She looked at me blankly. “What?” And then she seemed to shake herself out of a trance. “Oh. Yes.” She stood up, put her iPhone contraption in her bag, and brushed off her pants. “Yes, but I need to check some facts first before I can be sure.” She looked at me with a serious expression. “This was done by a supernormal. And we have to stop it before more people get hurt.”
Chapter 15
All day at school, people talked about the bombing at Pioneer Square. Anna and I weren’t the only students there, but anyone who had first-hand knowledge of the incident was an instant celebrity. I was getting sick of talking about the latest horrible event, particularly since they only seemed to be getting worse.
At first, Anna enjoyed the attention, but she looked exhausted when I met up with her at the end of the school day. She was sitting on the short wall along the sidewalk in front of the school building. “Hey, Ollie.” She twisted a lock of hair around one finger.
“Hey.” I hitched myself onto the wall beside her. “You okay?”
She shrugged and kicked her feet back and forth against the bricks. “Yeah, they just don’t get it, do they?”
I didn’t have to ask whom she meant. “Yeah, it’s all exciting for them, right?” I glanced behind us at the crowd of guys who were watching us and nudging each other. “But even though you tell people about the carnage, it’s just too abstract to take in.” I put my arm around Anna. “I’m sorry you saw all of that.”
Anna gave me a strange look. “You sound like my mom.”
“Oh, um. Ha.” I dropped my arm. She was right, though, I’d really sounded like Aunt Kate in my head. I shifted uncomfortably. I was thinking of Anna as a normal who needed be to protected, not as my friend who’d been beside me when we snuck out of her house last year at Halloween to spend the night in Lone Fir cemetery. We had convinced each other we were going to see ghosts, but all we saw were a bunch of people drinking and making out. Of course, the way my luck was running now we’d probably see all the ghosts, along with some ghouls, if we went this year.
“Sorry.” I managed a grin.
Hugh’s car pulled up, and I jumped off the wall. I took two steps before Anna stopped me with, “Ollie, you’ve been so weird lately. What’s going on?”
I froze, uncertain what to say to her. Lately it seemed like I spent a lot of time at a loss for words around the people I cared for. I turned to face her. “Um.”
From behind me, I heard Hugh say, “Hey Olivia, you coming?”
“In a minute.” I answered without turning around. “Anna, there’s just been a lot going on, you know.”
She looked past me. “Yeah, I know.” In an abrupt change of attitude, she smiled and waved at the car behind me.
“So, anyway, um, I’ve got to go. Family stuff.” I really had to work on my explanations.
Anna jumped off the wall and brushed off her jeans. She tossed her hair back. “You know, you’re going to have to tell me what’s up with you at some point.” She pulled her backpack over her shoulders. “But right now, I’ve got auditions, so you get a reprieve.”
Oh crap, I’d completely forgotten she was trying out for Music Man. “Break a leg.”
“Yep.” She nodded at me with a determined expression. “Talk to you later.” She gave a last smile in the direction of the car and then walked back towards school.
Hugh honked his horn. “Olivia!”
“Yeah, yeah.” I walked over and leaned down. “Look, I’m going to walk to the warehouse today. Can you tell them?”
Kevin peered over from the passenger side. “You okay?”
“I just need to walk and think.” To brood really, if I was honest. There was so much rattling around in my mind, I was afraid it would all start leaking out of my ears.
Hugh gave me one of his looks that seemed to say he knew what was going on in my head. “See you there.”
When I left the school grounds, I looped my backpack over both shoulders and stuck my hands in the pockets of my jacket. I decided to make the thirty blocks walk to the warehouse through the quiet neighborhoods instead of down the busy main streets.
I walked past cute bungalows side-by-side with funky apartments and the occasional newly-built modern-style house looking out of place in the old neighborhoods. Thoughts and images of the past few weeks drifted through my mind. The sight of a little girl riding her bike with her mother hovering anxiously behind her made me smile. My mom used to hover behind me like that when I was practicing balancing across high places. When she started training me, she set a board across two tables in the basement and, by the time she died, I could walk easily across a board stretched between my house and the garage. Of course, I’d done it at night with Mom watching for any onlookers. Remembering Mom’s quiet smile of pride lit a warm glow in me.
I reached the Ladd’s Addition neighborhood, with its huge tree-lined streets in a spoke and hub layout, unusual in Portland’s grid layout on the east side. I followed SE Ladd Avenue to the garden at the hub of the streets.
A statue of a man graced the center of the garden. Even though it looked nothing like the Umbrella Man, it made me think of the destruction at Pioneer Square. Had Aunt Kate figured out where the stick came from yet? Since Saturday, she’d been head-down on her computer, barely talking to anyone. Zoe said not to worry – that was her mother’s default mode when she was working on a problem.
It would have been nice to sit on the bench and linger among the plants, but I felt a little bit guilty about not getting to the warehouse sooner, so I kept going.
My path took me to the corner of Hawthorne and 12th, home to one of the many pods of food carts around Portland. I considered stopping for some of the awesome fried ice cream, but I knew better than to eat too
much before training. Watching Kevin hurl up his huge breakfast after a particularly strenuous workout one Saturday was almost enough to put me off food forever.
I was half a block from the carts when I noticed a group of girls sitting at one of the picnic tables, but before I could see if I knew them, a skateboarder caught my attention. He was weaving between people on the sidewalk, dodging strollers and old ladies with shopping carts. When a man carrying grocery bags yelled at him, the skateboarder flipped him off while jumping the curb into the bike lane, narrowly missing a cyclist who added his yells of annoyance to the general outcry.
Swerving to avoid another cyclist, the skateboarder rammed into the revolving large sign advertising the food carts. I had a moment to be glad he was wearing a helmet as he fell backwards onto the grass before I saw the large sign start to topple towards the picnic tables. I tracked the sign’s trajectory; it headed directly for the group of girls I had noticed just a few minutes ago. The sign was twice the size of a picnic table and would crush the girls if it landed on them. The girls didn’t know they were in danger yet. They were huddled over someone’s phone and laughing loudly.
I darted forward, covering the length of the block as fast as I could run, which was crazy fast. I jumped onto the table, vaguely aware the girls were screaming, reached up to catch the sign in one hand and yelled for the girls to move out of the way. All five girls stared at me in amazement that turned to shock when they registered I was holding up the sign above my head. I noticed three of the girls were Mindy, Karen and Donna. A little voice inside me said crap, but the rest of me focused on getting the girls to move. I ignored Mindy’s glare. She followed when the rest of the girls jumped up and dragged each other away in a huddled mass.
Once they were safely away, I lowered the billboard, stepping down from the table, until the sign rested on the picnic table. I stepped away and sat down on the curb. My hands were trembling with adrenaline. Sounds came rushing in as if the world had been on mute. People started clustering around the skateboarder who was crying and holding his arm. The cyclist he’d almost hit was talking on his phone. Sirens blared from a few blocks away. I knew I didn’t want to be around when emergency personnel arrived. I got to my feet quickly, launching myself into the street. I stopped and took a deep breath to chill out.
Big mistake! Two ladies pulling shopping baskets full of fruits and veggies from the market came at me so fiercely that I took a step back, expecting danger.
“Young lady, are you okay?” one of the ladies asked. She wore a loose pair of khakis and a dark blue, fleece pullover under her rain jacket. Her face was weathered and looked like she smiled a lot, if the wrinkles were any guide. She wasn’t smiling now. Instead her expression mirrored her companion’s, concern mixed with confusion.
I nodded. “Yes, I am.”
“But you held up that sign and kept it from falling on those young girls.” She pointed with the hand not clutching the basket. I reluctantly followed the direction of her finger to see Mindy and her gang clustered together, talking with much arm waving. Mindy saw me staring, gave me a look through narrowed eyes and dove back into the conversation. This time she gestured at me. From her angry face, I didn’t think she was encouraging the group to come over and bow at my feet for saving them.
I lifted my head, alerted by the sirens getting closer. I could tell there was a fire truck and a police car.
The lady was still talking, and I pulled my focus away from Mindy and oncoming sirens back to her. She was nudging her friend. “I was telling Susa here that you are a real hero.”
“Excuse me?” I had a premonition of what her next words were going to be.
“Well, I saw your picture on the news when you saved all those people at the bank. And now you just stopped those nice girls from being crushed.”
I felt my shoulders tighten; if she recognized me, others might. My question was answered when I looked around and realized several people in the gathering crowd were pointing at me while talking to their neighbors. A guy wearing pegged leg pants, a jaunty vest over a white button down, and a fedora was taking photos of the scene with his phone, including me. Moreover, he wasn’t the only one.
My phone buzzed in my pocket, indicating a text had come in. I knew before I looked who it would be, and sure enough, Aunt Kate had written Olivia get out of there. I should have known her search algorithm would pick up posts about the incident online.
I shoved my phone in my pocket and turned to leave by way of Hawthorne, but two police cars and a fire truck pulled up with lights flashing, blocking that escape route. My other option was to slip away down SE 12th, but that way took me past Mindy and her gang. With a sigh, I accepted that was the best route. Susa and her friend had shifted their focus from me to the cops, so they didn’t notice me leaving.
I walked away, trying to avoid looking like I was fleeing the scene of some crime. I knew I hadn’t done anything wrong in the eyes of the law, but I was fairly certain the police would have some questions if they connected me with the bank robbery. Susa and her friend were certain to help them remember.
The crowd had spilled from the sidewalk into the parking lot beside the food carts. I negotiated my way through people who tried to stop me with questions and compliments. I managed to get through by saying modestly it was nothing, the sign is much lighter than it looks, I’m late for work.
Once I was through the crowd, I breathed a sigh of relief and pulled up my backpack more securely before heading off to the warehouse. I grimaced, not looking forward to getting yelled at by Aunt Kate.
Mindy stepped in front of me, blocking my way. She had her arms crossed over her chest and her lips pressed together tightly. Her friends arrayed themselves behind her. Karen and Donna mirrored Mindy’s unforgiving stance, but the other two girls, who I only knew by sight from school, looked at me with expressions of amazement.
“Hey, Mindy.” In reaction to her aggressive posture, I kept my hands dangling loose at my sides, and I shifted so I was standing firmly on both feet. Like Uncle Dan had taught me.
“Don’t hey me,” she spat the words out quite literally; I leaned to one side to avoid the spittle flying everywhere. “Do you have some kind of hero complex? What are you trying to prove?” She sneered at me. “Did you like the attention you got from the stupid bank robbery so much you just had to do it again?” She glared around at the scene where the skateboarder was getting medical treatment. He’d stopped crying and was holding his arm protectively. The cyclist was still at his side.
Mindy waved her hand at them. “Are you going to accuse that guy of breaking the law and have him arrested? He’s hurt and needs to go to the hospital. He needs help. He didn’t do anything wrong. Leave him alone.”
I blinked with surprise. I just wanted to get out of here. Why was she accusing me of narcing on the skateboarder? Then I got it; she wasn’t talking about him. She was referring to her brother. I peered at her, trying to read her face. Did she really think her brother was a victim in the bank robbery?
I took a step to the side to go around her and her posse. “Look, I’m –”
“Stay away from me, you freak!” Mindy stepped back and held up her hands, as if I was going to attack her.
I froze, thinking, What does she know? I couldn’t speak for a moment. If Mindy knew my secret, I couldn’t imagine what she would do with that information.
“You probably use steroids or something to make yourself stronger so you can go around pretending to save people.” Mindy spoke through gritted teeth. Her face was flushed and set. “When really you’re poking into people’s lives. You. Should. Leave. Me. Alone.”
With that she turned and marched off through the crowd. Her posse gave me one last collective glare before following her.
I stood, staring after them in shock. Mindy needed some therapy, stat. I shook my head and became aware that the crowd was dispersing. I could still see the police lights, so I wasn’t in the clear yet. I made for the warehouse, fo
rtunately in the opposite direction of Mindy and her craziness. I stopped to text Aunt Kate that I was on my way and got a terse About time in response. Yep, she was not too pleased with her latest trainee.
When I arrived at the warehouse, I was breathless, not from rushing but from trying not to use my super speed to get there faster. It wasn’t that I wanted to be yelled at. I was just anxious to find out how bad my screw up had been. The temptation to run super-fast was superseded by fear of how much more I would be yelled at by my aunt and uncles if I were caught.
Zoe was the first to see me. She was sitting near the door, tugging on her running shoes. “Oh dude, you are in for it.” To my surprise, she looked sympathetic rather than judgmental.
“How bad is it?” I dropped my backpack on the floor.
Zoe glanced towards the classroom area, where I could see Aunt Kate standing by a laptop, typing quickly. “Best to get it over with.” Zoe stood up and punched me lightly on the arm. “The first time you get in trouble is always the worst.” She pulled the door open and left me staring after her. I guess it was good to know I wasn’t the only one who got into trouble around here.
I took a deep breath and started over to face Aunt Kate, but before I could go two steps Emma dropped from the ceiling to land in a crouch in front of me. She stood up and put a hand on one hip.
I didn’t give her the satisfaction. “Yeah, yeah, I know…big trouble.” I walked past her without giving her a chance to respond. I was so over bratty people today.
Aunt Kate was a different story. I felt bad about being caught in supernormal action. I’d only been training for a short time, but every day she reminded us not to be seen using our abilities. Normals didn’t know about us, and we didn’t need them finding out. Popular theories were that the normals would be afraid of us or want to be like us. They might experiment on us, expect us to be their saviors, or they might try to kill us.
She didn’t look up as I approached, but she did shift over so I could sit next to her on the couch. “Olivia.”
The Supernormal Legacy_Book 1_Dormant Page 13
