“Jazz,” said Bentley, leaning forward on his desk, “even if you saw that, you know that attacking Eric is not the appropriate response. Yes or no?”
Jazz’s eyes squinted as her face flushed red. “Hunter could have broken his neck!”
Bentley slapped his desk. “Yes or no?”
She glared at Eric. “Yes.”
Bentley smiled. “Good. What should you have done?”
Jazz stood. “Kicked him in the nuts!”
Eric leapt out of his chair with fists clenched. “Just try it, you fat, ugly bitch!”
Bentley shot up. “Sit down, Eric!”
Jazz moved toward Eric just as Hunter slipped in between them, facing Jazz. He placed his hands on her shoulders.
“It’s OK, Jazz.” Hunter said. “I love that you want to defend me, but he’s not worth you getting hurt or in trouble.”
Jazz stopped glaring at Eric and looked into Hunter’s eyes.
“OK?” asked Hunter, realizing how long his hands had lingered on her shoulders. He flinched and lifted his hands to jerk them back.
She nodded and grabbed his wrists just before he pulled them away. “OK.”
His stomach clenched. Why had he touched her? He felt beads of sweat pop out on his forehead.
“Eric, you and Jazz meet here after school for twenty minutes of detention,” said Bentley.
Eric groaned. “I’ve got practice!”
“Twenty minutes. If there is any more arguing or threats from either one of you for the rest of the day, you will be suspended. Is that clear?”
“Yes,” said Eric.
“Jazz?” called Bentley.
She lifted Hunter’s hands off her shoulders and squeezed them before letting go. “Yes.”
“OK. I need to speak to Hunter for a minute. Eric, go to your next class.”
Eric mumbled something, jerked his chair to the side and left the room.
“Jazz.”
“Yeah. OK,” she griped, then softly to Hunter, “Talk to me after class?”
“Sure.”
She smiled at Hunter one more time then left the room. He could still feel her touch on his hands as he stared at the door.
“Sit down, Hunter,” said Bentley.
Hunter turned around and sat in her chair.
“What were you writing in Ms. Tucker’s class?”
Hunter’s heartbeat raced as his skin tingled. How could he know? He stared at Bentley.
“All school computers have monitoring software so I can see what’s on your screen anytime I click on your name. The district wants me to do this occasionally to make sure our students are focused on their classroom activity and not using their computers inappropriately. I checked out a few of the students’ screens in Ms. Tucker’s room last period before I saw yours. I was very disturbed by what you were writing.”
Hunter felt his throat tighten. “I already talked to Ms. Tucker.” He tried to swallow. “I’ve had these stories run through my head lately. I don’t know where they come from.”
“And you happened to write a story about Eric and Ms. Tucker?” Bentley squinted his eyes.
“Yes, sir. It just came to me.”
“A story like that could be very damaging to him and Ms. Tucker. Do you have any reason to believe this even happened?”
“No! The story just popped into my head. I made it up.”
“What were you supposed to be doing?”
Hunter hung his head. “Writing a description of a significant object.”
“I see. You are to delete the story now and send Ms. Tucker a note of apology and your description before you leave school today.”
“Sure. OK.”
“Will you delete the story now?”
“Sure.” I don’t want anything to do with it. He opened his computer and dragged the file into the trash.
“Empty the trash, please.”
Hunter did.
“You will not speak about this story to anyone. Is that understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Ms. Tucker doesn’t need rumors spreading about her and students. You need to go to class.”
Hunter stood up.
“Ask Patty for a pass.”
“Yes, sir.”
He left the office and stopped by Patty’s desk.
“I need a pass.” His mind whirled. If the sex between Tucker and Eric weren’t real, then where did he get the story? How could he make it up?
He noticed Anthony, a fifth-grader, sniveling in a corner chair. Hunter raised his eyebrows at Patty, who whispered, “Classmates teasing him about that fire last summer.”
She gave him a pass.
“Jazz sure looked happy when she came out of that office,” Patty teased. “I asked her why. She said, ‘He likes me.’ Did you tell her that?” Patty leaned back in her chair, her eyes twinkling in mirth.
Jazz thinks I like her? Do I?
“No, but I stopped her from kicking Eric in the nuts.”
“And?”
“I held her shoulders. Then she held my hands.” He remembered the fear he felt when he realized he had touched her, but it had felt so natural to reach for her. Why? He couldn’t remember anyone touching him before Jazz.
Patty smiled from ear to ear. “You two are so cute together.”
He left the office and headed toward history until he saw Ms. Tucker walking toward him, holding a stack of papers. What will she say now?
“Ms. Tucker, I deleted that story. I’m sorry I wrote it.”
She studied his face. “I don’t know what kind of game you and Eric are playing. He denied saying anything to you.”
“He didn’t. He pushed me into the Pit after class. We’re not friends.”
She folded her arms and tightened her lips against her teeth. “For your information, he came to my house this weekend to help move boxes and furniture. Ms. Fenster was also helping me. She would’ve slapped Eric and called the police if he’d done anything like you describe in that story. Evidently, Eric has quite the imagination. Or maybe, you do.”
“I can’t explain it, Ms. Tucker. I’m sorry. I didn’t know he went to your house this weekend.”
She raised her brows and shook her head. She didn’t believe anything he’d said.
“Do you still want me in your room after school?”
“No, but if I hear anything about this story again, I will take you to Mr. Bentley.”
“He already knows.”
“What?” Her nostrils flared.
“He was monitoring my screen when I wrote it. He made me delete it.”
One hand grabbed her throat. “Oh, my god! He knows?”
“He didn’t believe the story. I promise.”
She gritted her teeth and left.
Hunter’s stomach fluttered as he backed down the hallway, watching her stomp toward the copy room. How was he ever going to get square with her?
He turned around, walked to the classroom door, and opened it. The room was dark, and everyone was watching a video. Hunter waved his pass so Mr. Flynn could see it. He nodded and gestured toward an empty seat. As he walked to it, Eric grabbed his arm and pulled him down so Hunter’s face was level with his own.
“Don’t mess with me, Hunter,” he growled.
“Not trying to, but answer this one question.”
“What?”
“Was Fenster at Tucker’s when you went over this weekend?”
“Yeah. Who told you? Stay out of my business, Hunter.”
“Guys!” shouted Mr. Flynn. “Pipe down.”
“Sorry.” Hunter sat down. “What are we doing?” he asked Lonny next to him.
“Taking notes for a quiz on this video.”
Hunter flipped up his computer lid and looked at the images moving on the SMART Board. Something about the Alaska Constitution. As he watched it, he realized his visions weren’t like movies in his head. He was actually the
re. He saw everything in three dimensions, and he could smell odors like the vanilla on Tucker’s neck.
He opened the story of Eric and Vanessa he’d emailed to himself and looked it over. Maybe both of them were lying. But they both claimed Fenster was there. So confusing.
The pounding started. Shit! Not again.
He focused on the video, trying to concentrate, but the thumping grew louder and louder. He saw himself walking down the hall and stopping at the door. He listened but heard nothing. He reached out his hand toward the silver door handle then saw the wall fade away at the end of the hall where he saw a boy sitting on the porch of a small house, throwing pebbles into the yard. Hunter turned from the door and walked toward the boy.
Mosquitoes buzzed around the boy’s face as he sat sweating on the front porch of his house off the Parks Highway in early June. The sun beat on his back as he swatted bugs away from his ears. The boy rose and knocked on the front door.
A man’s voice shouted from inside the house. “Stay outside!”
“I’m bored! I want to watch TV!”
The boy heard rapid steps approaching from inside, so he ran down the steps into the yard. A man in boxers opened the door and glared at the boy.
“Anthony, I’ve been away for a week and want some time to talk to your mother, so you need to find something to do out here.”
“For how long?”
“About thirty minutes.”
“Why can’t I watch TV while you talk to her?”
“Anthony, I already told you what you need to do. Get the ashes out of that burn barrel, shovel them into the wheelbarrow, water them down, then take them out past the trees.”
“Gordon, I’m ready. Come and get me!” Anthony’s mother called from inside the house.
Anthony saw a big grin stretch across his father’s face as he looked back toward the door. “On my way, Ariel.” Then he barked at his son, “Get to work!”
“Yes, sir.”
Gordon almost skipped back into the house and shut the door behind him.
Anthony dragged himself to the burn barrel out in the yard. He stopped two feet from the barrel and turned to the side, breathing slowly and deeply. Suddenly he lifted his knee, turned toward the barrel as his foot shot out in a side kick while he yelled, “Kiai!”
The barrel tipped over with a thud. He got the shovel, dropped down on his knees and stuck it into the barrel to scoop out ashes, which he then dropped into the wheelbarrow. Clouds of ash and perhaps some smoke drifted above the pile. He walked back to the house, grabbed the end of the hose, and pulled it to the wheelbarrow. About ten feet away, however, the hose tangled and wouldn’t stretch any farther. He turned on the water and tried to squirt a stream into the barrow. After a few minutes of mostly missing the ash pile, he tossed the hose down and strode out to the barrow, which he lifted and wheeled toward the trees. Right at the edge of the yard, near a pile of lawnmower clippings, he dumped the wheelbarrow over. After shaking it empty, he started pushing it back toward the house.
He didn’t see the fire until he pushed the wheelbarrow alongside the porch and turned around. The clippings were in flames! He grabbed his hair and pulled, stifling a scream. What should he do?
He picked up the hose and started to run toward the trees when the hose locked up, causing him to roll onto the ground. He scrambled back to the tangle and tried pulling lengths of hose through loops and out of others.
The fire had spread to a couple of trees as a gust of wind blew by him.
His nostrils flared as he screamed, “Dad! Dad!”
He grabbed the wheelbarrow, pushed it to the hose and filled it halfway, all the time looking at the spreading fire. Then he ran with the barrow across the yard. By that time the flames were dancing above his head. He tried to get closer, but the heat burned him, so he shoved the barrow as hard as he could then ran backward. When the wheelbarrow turned over spilling water into the grass several feet from the flames, he raced back to the house, screaming. “Dad! Dad!”
He banged on the door then tried to open it, but his father had locked it from inside. Gasping for air, he banged harder as he screamed. He collapsed to his knees as he banged on the front window.
Finally the door opened. “What the hell do you want?” his father screamed, leaning halfway out the door.
Anthony pointed at the fire.
“Damnation!” Gordon ran out onto the porch in his boxers then ran back inside. After a minute, he ran back out with pants on, trying to put on his shoes. He yelled back inside, “Call the fire department! We have a fire!”
Gordon ran to the hose, cursed at the tangle, frantically pulled and pushed the nozzle until he could pull it to the edge of the yard. He shot water as far as he could, but the flames had already moved north, spreading quickly in the wind through dry grass toward another clump of trees.
He dropped the hose and ran to his son. “I told you to fill the wheelbarrow with water before you dumped the ashes!”
“I couldn’t get the tangle out!”
“Then you shouldn’t have dumped the ashes, you moron!” He grabbed his son’s waistband and spanked his bottom several times. The boy collapsed on the grass, crying. Gordon sat on his heels and grabbed his head.
“Gordon! What happened?” yelled Ariel from the porch, wearing only Gordon’s shirt.
“Your son started a fire!” He grabbed Anthony’s shirt and dragged his crying son roughly back to the porch where he flung him at his wife. “Put him in his room and don’t let him out. And get your clothes on!”
Anthony clung to his mother, crying, one eye peeking at his dad who ran to the garage, pulled out a fire extinguisher and a shovel, then ran toward the fire as sirens blared down the road.
“Hunter! Hunter!” his teacher yelled from the front of the room.
Hunter blinked and saw everyone in class bending over their desks.
“Here, Dude,” said Corey sitting to his right, holding out a sheet of paper. “Take it.”
Hunter took the paper from Corey’s hand and looked toward his teacher.
“You have fifteen minutes to take this quiz. You can use the notes you took.”
Hunter stared at the paper and realized he had missed the entire video. Before he started making up answers, he sent his latest story and the one about Eric and Tucker to Jazz with the subject line “Do not open yet.” He needed her help to figure this out, but how would he explain either one? She’d think he was crazy. He had to talk to her.
As he wrote random answers to each question, he remembered last summer driving down from Fairbanks for the first time, heading toward their new home. A large fire had spread along both sides of the highway for about twelve miles up to the edge of Nenana. Firefighters were still knocking down isolated flames near the road as they drove by. He remembered following the blackened area, noting its twists and turns until it stopped near a house—the same house he saw in his story. A sudden coldness hit his core.
This happened.
If it did, then how could the other one not have?
Chapter Seven
Joe wondered if Hunter would know whether a story or two on his wall were missing. The two he held in his hands had to disappear.
He had thought seriously about burning them all, just like he had burned all the family photos and mementos several years ago. Except this time, Hunter still had the files on his computer.
Doctors had warned him about the impact of triggers on memory. They had told him whatever progress Hunter had made dealing with his PTSD could disappear quickly if he saw a photo of his mother or brother. Who knew what item would hold special meaning for him. Better to burn everything than leave some small thing, which could set off the screaming and depression and self-mutilation again.
The story in his left hand described the dressing room incident, which he had shoved deep into his past, blanketed with shame and confusion and fear. For weeks afterward, he had worried that someone
would have heard them, but nothing happened. He’d made extra efforts to say something sexual about girls in front of his friends, even boasting he’d had sex with one or two. In locker room showers, he’d kept his gaze well above the waist, refusing to participate in pulling towels off of freshmen or making jokes about penis size.
He’d never admit to others or to himself the excitement he’d felt with Parker. He rationalized the event as enticing because it was illicit.
The story in his right hand described another incident, one he’d totally forgotten until he read it.
During a basketball trip when his team slept in the home school’s library, something else had happened. A teammate slept on a cot near where Joe lay on the floor on top of his sleeping bag. He thought he was having a sexual dream about a girl when he woke up to find Sam’s hand hanging off the cot holding his erection. Joe tried not to move, though his heart was racing. He kept staring at the hand as he panted for breath. He watched for any signs that Sam was awake then turned his head around to see if anyone else watched them. All was silent and still except for the throbbing below his waist. He tried to pull himself away from Sam’s hand, only to hear the boy mumble something in his sleep and grip tighter. Joe tried to think of something else so his erection would disappear, but he couldn’t. He tried to deny his excitement, but couldn’t.
Then he was sure he felt Sam’s hand move. And again. Joe looked around once more, then reached down to Sam’s hand and slowly pulled it off of him. Joe quickly got up and quietly exited the library, heading for the bathroom. He locked himself inside a stall and tried to slow his breathing.
A moment later he heard the bathroom door open and footsteps until he saw bare feet under his stall door. It was Sam.
“Hey, Joe. You OK? You need some help?”
All of this plus what happened afterward was in the story his son had written, this time using Joe’s name. The story was dated a month ago. Joe could remember nothing in Hunter’s behavior during the past few weeks that suggested he suspected his father was the kid in this story.
A homosexual. Something he tried desperately to hide from his father and himself. His dad would have killed him if he’d suspected.
Someone To Kiss My Scars: A Teen Thriller Page 5
