A Hidden Element

by Donna Galanti

  "Lordy, Lordy," Sally sang out as she bounced up and down.

  "Now that's wholesome entertainment." His father jabbed him. Caleb jerked away. "They're both enjoying it."

  Caleb clenched his fists and shoved them in his pockets. "Can we go now?"

  "Yes, Son, only one more thing to do."

  His father pulled out something that looked like a handle. He flicked it open to reveal a small knife he must have picked up in the hardware section. He placed it next to Ray on the counter. Sweat flicked off the red-faced man's forehead as he plunged into buttery flesh.

  "Ray, enjoying yourself?"

  Ray grunted and grabbed on to Sally's hips, sinking into her expanse. She moaned again in delight as her buttocks shuddered.

  "Good. When you're done fucking, kill the bitch."

  His father strode out the door, pulling Caleb along with him.

  "Father, no." Caleb struggled against him as his father shoved him hard through the door. Caleb spiraled his thoughts into Ray's brain. Stop, Ray! She's your cousin, your family!

  Ray stopped his thrusting as if listening to Caleb, but his father's punch to his face ended his brain probe. Caleb staggered back, blood gushing from his nose. Ray straightened his head and rammed into Sally with a loud groan. Caleb drew his hand back but his father's fingers crushed his forearm. He fell to his knees. Blood spattered down his gray robe. The flock widened their circle, silent and watching. His father led as both law maker and enforcer.

  "These lowly forms of life must be controlled," his father said. "We've studied their ways. Now, this first act is how we begin their demise and our rule. We will grow in number with our selected breeding and thrive as these useless beings die out. Watch this historic moment, Son, for anyone who turns away will be marked weak…and unworthy."

  All eyes turned to the inside of the store as the desperate carnal scene played out to the end.

  "I hate you," Caleb whispered, watching the forced lovers before him.

  His father smiled at him in satisfaction.

  Ray arched his back with a moan and finished his business. Sally squealed and pressed up against him. And when Ray raised his knife and plunged into Sally in new ways, she squealed again. And again. Her blood ran onto scuffed tiles and still she squealed. And then she stopped.

  Tears filled Caleb's eyes and he closed them against the evil scene.

  His father laughed. "Don't you see, Son?" He shook The Holy Bible at him. "I am their Way, their Truth, their Life—and Death."

  Caleb did not answer. He remained inside his dark prison and swore someday he would end his father's rule.

  CHAPTER 2: Seven years later

  Laura Fieldstone eased herself up from the rocking chair. She bumped into the lamp. Lately, her belly poked out everywhere. She stretched, feeling the pain. Her back ached from sitting all day, but she had a deadline to get this book written before the baby came. It was the final one in a series of three. She would send it off to her editor and then take a long break.

  She needed a break from the headaches that had returned. She couldn't tell Ben. He would worry, and she tried not to worry herself. Having a baby at forty was much harder than at twenty six. Her body felt older as this baby strained within her. This baby, who took her unaware fourteen years after having Charlie. Long after Ben had a vasectomy.

  Ben joked that one snuck through. Her doctor said it did happen, but her natural mother's adamant belief she had been a virgin filled Laura's mind as her belly grew. No one had believed her mother, and yet it had been true. Surreal. Had her baby also been created from someone other than the man she loved? When she allowed herself to wonder that awful reality she shoved the thoughts down deep inside. They were too horrific to define. This child is mine and Ben's. We created him in love. She said it to herself like a mantra as if to seal it in truth.

  And so this baby grew inside her. A baby who kicked so much it seemed he wanted to break free early into the world. He stormed violently inside her. Would he be violent when he arrived? No. Their baby was perfect. Like Charlie had been. On the outside at least. She had seen the ultrasound. But what would he be like on the inside?

  The thought of what her baby could be twisted in her like a sickness. During those times Ben held her and whispered calming things in her ear. There's only good inside you, he'd say. Our son will be fine, just like our Charlie. There is too much love in this house for anyone to grow up evil, he'd say.

  Like her twin had. Like this child could be.

  Sometimes Ben laid her down on the bed and showed her in sweet ways how everything was all right. They still drew fire from one another after fifteen years. She laughed. She was eight months pregnant and Ben still touched her with his flames. Even at fifty-one he couldn't get enough of making love to his very pregnant wife. But Charlie could be home any moment now from school, and that spiked her worry about him again.

  She eased her anxiety by picking up the first children's book she had ever published, and rubbed her fingers over the cracked cover of a blue pony riding across the sky. Big Brave Blue. He was a flying pony who lived in the clouds. His colors blended into the sky and even as a runt he flew faster than any other pony, but he grew up lonely. His size and color separated him from his world's orange herd of giant ponies, but he had an advantage besides speed. He could blend into the sky making it hard for their enemy, the Dragon Beasts, to catch him when they plundered their land.

  And when he faced the Dragon Beast leader and killed him in battle to save his herd, his own kind looked at him in a different light. When others like him were born, the herd realized they were evolving into an improved species, and they called upon tiny Blue to lead them into their new future.

  She could hear Charlie's voice. Again, Mommy. Read it again. And she did. And then he would tug on her sleeve and quote his favorite line. Being big doesn't mean you're brave—only big of heart does. Am I big of heart, Mommy, like Big Brave Blue? She would look down at his little head and breathe his baby smell and say, the biggest heart of all, Charlie.

  That was before he'd discovered his differences. Now her heart ached for him most days as he faced the bullies who saw them, too.

  She peered out the bay window. The water raged rough across the Sound today. Waves ripped up and pounded toward land, a watery creature bent on blind destruction. The wind creaked through their ranch house. Wild and primordial and unfettered. Some days it called to her. It filled her with a deep yearning for something she didn't understand. On those days she felt unsettled, waiting for something, anything to happen. She wished to be the wild wind at times, unbound and free. The wind taunted and beckoned her at the same time. It's why she loved living on Puget Sound.

  She had fallen in love with the grandness of Washington State. A place different from the Northeast where she came from, which held memories of her peaceful childhood. A place where she and Ben met. It had also been a place of horrific times. Of losing her parents, her friends, and nearly Ben. Their home now, in being so different, helped her forget her past.

  She thought living across the country in Oregon was far enough to forget. It was home. She had persuaded Ben to stay on the west coast. His photography assignments allowed him to live anywhere, as did her author lifestyle. And they could leave behind their violent past that had flung them together. Close enough to be home. Far enough away to forget.

  Today though, she urged the wind away. She had things to do before the baby came and didn't want to become lost in restlessness. Where was Charlie? She peered out the back door into the woods that their house backed up to. She hoped he hadn't taken a detour through the woods from school. She wished he took the bus. He spent too much time in the woods alone, as she had as a child.

  The woods stretched deep for miles. A person could get lost in them. Or die in them.

  Perhaps the wind blew a yearning in her son as well and the woods provided him comfort. She couldn't take this from him, not with the burdens he carried. Someday she would tell him t
he true meaning behind his abilities. But not yet. She wanted him to be old enough to handle it—and not let it destroy him.

  There. Charlie's tall figure strode from the woods, hunched over. Taller than his father, he tried to hide his height. Being 6' 5" at fourteen was a physical trait that made him a target ripe for teasing. Not to mention his other features. She waved at him, but he didn't wave back. He put his head down and slowed his walk to the house. Now what?

  Laura rubbed her belly and opened the door for him.

  "Charlie, I was getting worried," Laura said. "You went to the woods after school, didn't you?" She looked down at his muddy knees, wondering what he had been doing out there this time.

  He nodded but didn't look up, just shuffled in the door. She sensed his sadness, frustration, and anger. She wondered what he was thinking, but he seemed to have an innate ability to cloak his thoughts. Did she really want to know all the wild ideas that went through a fourteen year old boy's mind? Ben told her definitely not.

  "What's wrong?" Laura hugged his waist from behind at an angle.

  "That jerk, Brian, at school, that's what's wrong."

  He turned around and set his backpack on the deacon's bench by the door. When he looked at Laura she gasped.

  "Charlie, what happened?" His left eye had a cut above it and his lip swelled on one side next to a darkening bruise on his cheek. He shoved his hands in his pockets, but Laura pulled them out and sighed over his scraped knuckles. She pulled him to the sink and ran cool water over his hands, smoothing away the dried blood.

  His nail-less fingers stretched long and thick in her small ones. Her pink painted orbs stood out in sharp contrast to his flesh-like pads. How she wished his nails had never fallen off as a newborn. He flexed his fingers and pulled away from her then plunked his large frame down on the bench. Legs and arms spewed everywhere like Bambi on ice. His silver white hair had streaks of mud in it. She got a clean dish rag and wet it, pressing it gently to the cut over his eye. He grabbed it from her. She saw flecks of blood on his shirt and hoped it was his.

  "I'm okay, Mom," he said then blew out a big breath. "Didn't mean to grab."

  Laura sat down next to him. "Tell me."

  "I came out of study hall and ran right into Brian with his gang. He called me a Fieldstone freak and said I belonged in the Guinness Book of World Records. Giant albino pod-man. It's his newest nickname for me." Charlie stretched his long fingers out wide.

  Laura took his hand. "You have beautiful fingers. They're—"

  "No, Mom, they're not." Charlie snatched his hand away and held it up to her face. "I am albino pod-man. Look at me."

  "I don't think so." She touched his hair. "Your dad doesn't think so."

  "Yes he does. He thinks I'm a freak."

  "He does not think you're a freak. He loves you."

  "I heard him with you. He said I'm not normal and I'll never fit in."

  Laura wished for the thousandth time Charlie had never heard their conversation. It had been late at night and they had no idea Charlie had been passing by their room then. Words to sting for a lifetime.

  "He didn't mean it in the way you think, Charlie. He just doesn't want you to have a hard life."

  "Whatever." He turned away and crossed his arms.

  "We can do the surgery, Charlie."

  "Like Dad wants me to have? Then everyone will know I have artificial nails on me, like I'm a girl or something."

  "That we can change. Your hair color we can change. Your height we can't. Someday you'll be glad to be tall."

  "Someday can't come soon enough." He sighed. She moved beside him and touched his hand again. This time he didn't pull away.

  His teen years loomed long in front of him. How she wished she could make it better for him. Make all kids fair and nice. Sometimes she wanted to tell Charlie to pummel Brian, but she had to be the grown up and maintain self-control. It was the core of everything she taught her son.

  "So then what happened?"

  "He had an accident, sort of." Charlie smirked and bent his head.

  "Accident? Really?" Laura crossed her arms and leaned back into the bench. Her belly ached, muscles pulling from all directions to hold up the weight she bore. One more month she had to get through.

  "Okay, it wasn't an accident but I've had enough of him, Mom!" Charlie stood up and banged on the kitchen table with a sharp crack.

  Laura frowned at him. "Remember what happened the last time you got so angry. You smashed the lawn mower to smithereens and it cost you all the money saved up to buy a new one."

  "Self-control. I know, Mom." Charlie leaned up against the kitchen counter. "Sorry. Sometimes I get so mad. I hate having to control it. It's not fair."

  "I understand, but you know what your strength can do. You didn't use it against Brian today, did you?"

  "I tried not to." He shook his head. "I wouldn't do it to someone on purpose."

  Laura believed him, but she wondered if the 'tried not to' would result in a phone call soon from Brian's mom. Charlie was a good kid at heart, sensitive to hurting others. He didn't want the strength that came with his powers. Laura never spoke of them as powers to Charlie though. She called them genetic anomalies. It softened them.

  She told him they were part of an anger syndrome. His outbursts often triggered them, and Laura used this as a reason. Their pediatrician agreed and said Charlie had some anger tendencies and gave him techniques to combat them. His nail defects were explainable. Ectodermal dysplasia. A condition where a child is born with nail defects or no nails at all. But that's not what he had.

  Some kids would have liked Charlie's abilities. Not Charlie. He hated being strong like a bully. He hated kids who teased. He never teased. He wanted to treat everyone the same way he wanted to be treated. He acted older in so many ways but immature as any teen. Laura never knew when he might exhibit maturity or immaturity. Right now she had the feeling the immature part was about to be revealed.

  "So?" Laura raised her eyebrows at him.

  "Well, his pants must have been too baggy as they kind of…fell off him in the hallway, in front of all these girls. He tried to pick them up but somehow his shoes got tied together and he fell over. Those tighty-whities mooned everyone. So sad."

  "Charlie." Laura tried to sound angry as she overcame the urge to laugh.

  Charlie shrugged. "Mom, come on. It was too funny. I'm sick and tired of him picking on me. He teased me last week for wearing tighty-whities in the locker room and now everyone knows he wears them, too. Besides, I didn't hit him or anything." He stopped smiling and looked down. "Well, not then anyways."

  "What did you do, Charlie?" Laura was afraid to know. The memory flickered of their cat, Romeo, and an overenthusiastic five year old Charlie who liked to hug. Only he didn't know what his hugs could do. They buried Romeo in the backyard and told Charlie it wasn't his fault, but it didn't make Laura cry any less. She had loved that cat. There were no more pets from then on.

  "He said I pantsed him and—"

  "You did."

  "Yes, but then he said he'd get me after school, so I thought I'd avoid him and take the woods home instead of the bus—"

  "And because you wanted to let off some steam, right?"

  "Yeah, okay. But not at anyone. I wanted to feel better. Not so…angry." He gripped the counter and bit his lip. "But Brian didn't take the bus either, he followed me. Him and his stupid friends. He hit me first, Mom."

  "I believe you."

  "I let him hit me. I told myself he's inconsequential, like you told me to think. I did. I tried to keep on walking and ignore him, but then the others started hitting me. It wasn't fair. Three of them against one." He clenched his fist, looked at it, and shoved it in his pocket. "I laughed at Brian and told him he's irrelevant."

  Laura suppressed a smile.

  "He didn't even know what it meant. What a dummy. So I told him to go find a dictionary. He hit me again and I hit him back. I tried to do it light, I swear, but—"r />
  "But what? What did you do, Charlie?"

  "I think I broke his nose." He blew out a giant breath. "Blood came out everywhere. I didn't know a nose had so much blood in it."

  "Oh, Charlie." Laura stood up, pressing a hand to her back, and walked over to him.

  "I hate myself." She took his strong hands. He stood tall over her with a child's heart trapped in man's body.

  "Don't say that. I love you. Dad loves you."

  "Why am I like this, Mom? I don't want to be special, okay?" He pulled his hands away. "I didn't want to hit him. I swear. You can have a doctor make me fingernails and toenails. Can a doctor make me normal, too? Take away these things I can't control?"

  He jerked away from Laura and got a drink from the fridge. The phone rang. Laura sighed. It could only be one person.

  Brian's mother.

  CHAPTER 3

  Charlie snuck back out to the woods after his mom got off the phone with Brian's mom. His mom acted so cool and calm about what he did. He wished he could be more like her and not like her at the same time. Did that make sense?

  She left then to do errands and his dad was still out on some wildlife photo shoot in the mountains. She didn't say he couldn't go out to the woods so it didn't feel like disobeying. He just needed to get out his frustration. No Brian and his stupid friends. Charlie replayed the moment again where he had embarrassed Brian. Pants down. Butt in the air. Girls laughing. Awesome. But he did feel bad about hitting him so hard. He really, really hadn't meant to.

  He needed advice and he hoped Ghost Man would be there. He had called him that since he first saw him at seven. The man said he was Charlie's special secret. As Charlie got older he felt odd not telling his parents, but how could he explain he'd been seeing this guy all these years?

  It would make him even weirder. His dad would think so. He never understood him. He wanted him to be normal. He wanted him to have the nail surgery. I'll never be normal! Why can't he accept me for who I am? Because I'm not good enough, that's why. The main reason he didn't want the surgery was to defy his dad, even to spite himself, and so he remained the freak he was born to be.