“Just for a few months, little wren. Until everything is done.”
I was about to complain more, but she hadn’t called me little wren in years. A wave of homesickness replaced the nausea. I imagined sleeping in our little house. Two hammocks next to each other. Her soft breath in the night soothing me back to sleep after a nightmare. The familiar sounds of the village in the morning. Mr. Ek grumbling about the weather a few houses away. Old lady Kahlay yawning as she made her morning trip out to the garden. Baby Rosita squalling until her mom offered a breast for her morning milk.
Nothing in Virginia felt like home. Nothing, but mom calling me little wren.
The Book
I missed a few days of school after the car hit me. When I went back, slightly bruised and limping, I kept my head down like mom asked. Other than mean-girl Olivia occasionally sneering at me in the halls and Mrs. Louie watching me like a bird of prey, waiting for some minor infraction to pounce on, things quieted down.
Any attempt to blend in just made me stand out so, instead, I cultivated an ‘I-just-don’t-care’ look that must have been relatively convincing. Mom agreed to buy me a few more outfits which helped a lot. Goodwill actually had some great clothes so I adopted my own ‘uniform.’ Curls tucked under a nubby maroon hat, white t-shirt, flamboyant skirt cut just below the knee, wacky scarf, and a pair of knee-high boots that actually fit. Leather pouch from Mr. Ek hidden under my shirt with my passport close at hand. With just a few skirts and scarves, I could make it look like I had a ton of clothes. Mix-n-match, baby.
I figured out when to raise my hand enough to keep the teacher happy but not so often that I looked like a teacher’s pet. I started spending lunch in the library where there was no further sign of crying kids. I spent the hour talking to Mr. Silver. He was one of the most interesting people I’d ever met. He was animated and funny, had amazing stories and was always teaching me cool stuff. I think he was probably a total dork in school, but his genuine enthusiasm for just about anything really was hard to resist. It was like watching a cross between a frumpy librarian and a Vegas magician.
“Good day, Miss Dae,” he gave me his formal head bow.
“Mr. Silver.” I sat and unwrapped my lunch on his desk.
He leaned back in his wooden chair. “Pop quiz, Harper. What you haven’t lost, you still have, correct?”
He poked a finger in the air to emphasize the question and accidentally tipped backward. Grey cardigan, lumpy head, and all, crashed to the ground.
“Oh” I leapt up, “Are you alright?”
“Quite, my dear, quite alright. Nothing a little ice cream won’t cure.” Mr. Silver stood up and brushed himself off. Twisting his chunky ring around his thick finger, I noticed a bruise on his wrist. Tugging down his sleeve to cover it, he sat back down rubbing the knot certainly rising on the back of his head. “Now, answer my question.”
“What I haven’t lost, I still have? Yeah, that sounds right,” I said, still distracted by his fall.
“Then, you haven’t lost your tail, hence you must still have it!” Mr. Silver threw back his head with laughter at his own joke. After a few moments to compose himself he grew more serious, “So, real question of the day, the Skeptics ask us, how can we be sure about anything?”
“You’re not serious. Mr. Silver, you just cracked your head on the ground and you want me to discuss Pyhhro!”
“I’ll be fine, the pain is already going away...so, how do we know what is real? What if the whole world is simply a creation of your own mind? What if you are floating in a void of nothingness simply imagining me and this place and these things?”
“Well, my senses tell me this is all real. I pinch myself and it hurts.”
“But, what if you are only imagining your senses? What if you are only dreaming of that pinch?”
I sighed, not really in the mood for a philosophy lesson. “I believe that the simplest answer is most likely the correct answer. The simplest answer about the existence of the world I perceive is that, because I see it, it exists. It is far too complex for my mind to have created and things continue to exist even when I’m not thinking about them. I guess I have to trust my own experiences and have faith that the world is real. Plus, if I were making this all up, things would be much cooler. The world would be full of magic and dragons.”
He chuckled. “Very good. I see you read the Parmenides I gave you.” He seemed proud which made me glow with happiness. “I told you the pre-Socratic monists were too simplistic. Though your ideas about magic suggest you need to read some William Butler Yeats. As Yeats said, ‘The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.’”
“Magic exists, I just can’t perceive it yet?” I gave him my full on skeptical scowl.
“Just so.” Mr. Silver smiled. “In the mean time, here’s your next assignment.”
He produced a book like a slight-of-hand magician. The book was quite a change from all the ancient Greek stuff he’d been giving me. I ran my hands over the embossed cover. Pressed into the soft leather was an image of the sun and moon, intertwined. Though I’d seen many similar images, something about this one was different.
The moon was awash in blood and I almost expected real light to shine from the sun. Above it in simple calligraphy is said, World Religions.
“World Religions?” I asked.
“That’s right. For a change of pace. It’s got some amazing detail about religions I’d wager you’ve never heard before.”
I ran my hand over the cover. “This was written by Martin Silver. Is that you?”
He just smiled.
Mr. Silver’s book was the reason things went totally wrong.
***
When I left school that afternoon, I completely spaced and forgot Mr. Silver’s book in my locker. That night, my evil friend insomnia reared her ugly head. Some nights my brain just won’t turn off. Back in Belize I could get up and go for a walk or there were always chores to be done.
But, in Virginia I was stuck in bed, staring at the white ceiling. Finally, at 3AM, I thought to myself, who would possibly notice if I made a quick trip to school? I’ll fly like the wind and be back here in two hours.
Sure, you might think, won’t the school be locked? Didn’t your own mother tell you to stay inside? But I figured I’d be like some kind of super-sneak-monkey that would move through the night like a shadow.
But of course, when I got there, the building was locked down like a high-security prison. It was ass-cold and my thin Goodwill coat wasn’t doing much. My teeth began to chatter as I walked slowly around the school searching for a cracked window or something.
The building really was strange. I’d been inside a hundred times and still couldn’t have told you what shape it was. Walls jutted off at strange angles, little rooms seemed to stick out of the sides here and there. In the full moon, it felt like the thing went on forever with nary a window ajar. But then, in a little nook, I found the fire ladder.
Maybe there was a way inside from the roof? Though most of the school was a single level, the ladder hung off a spot where it rose to three stories. Which is a lot further up than you might think. As the ground got further and further away, my throat got smaller and smaller until I was practically squeaking the spit down when I swallowed. At around midway past the second floor, the ground started to spin a bit. Who knew I was afraid of heights?
By the time I fell over the edge onto the roof, I was shaking all the way down to my boots. Fairly certain I wouldn’t make it back down, I glanced around searching for a place to spend the night up there.
My breath stopped. Felt like my heart stopped beating. There was another person on the roof with me.
He crouched in the moonlight, black-clad, winter cap pulled down casting a shadow across his face. The man clearly saw me and did not move a muscle.
My mind raced through options. Scream? Run? Jump? Who would be up here like a thief in the night. Other than me. Wait, his black lea
ther jacket looked familiar.
“Artist guy?” I tried to sound confident. I’d read that rapists can tell when someone is insecure. My voice broke like a little kid’s, cracking and rising a pitch. Damned voice.
“Horror writer?” he asked.
I let out a huff of breath. “Holy monkey nuts, you scared the everlovingcrap out of me.”
“Holy what?” He remained crouching.
“Uh, nothing. So, what’s up?” I went for insouciance. A little light hearted humor might make my heart stop jackhammering in my chest.
“I’m thinking of jumping. Wondering what it would feel like.”
“Haha, funny.” I stood and rubbed my sore shoulders from the climb.
“Not joking.”
I could tell he wasn’t. I swallowed hard, even made an embarrassing gulping sound.
No one said anything for a long while.
“Why?” I finally asked.
“Why what?”
“Why’re you planning to jump?”
“Dunno.”
“But, you came up here to kill yourself?”
“Yep.” Couldn’t one thing in this gods-forsaken place called Virginia go as planned? My quick trip to school turned into something much more serious.
Should I inch toward him and pull him from the edge like they do in cop films? Should I try to remind him of his loved ones? I went for honesty.
“You know, I’d really rather you not do that.”
Nothing.
“If you’re going to jump, could I at least ask you a question first?”
“A what?” he said.
“A question.”
“Uh, okay, horror-girl.”
“Really, not stairs-girl?”
“Please, I’m not actually trying to hurt your feelings. Question?”
“I’ve often wondered, if you plan to kill yourself, why not get on a plane to some war-torn place and help people? Run out into battle fields and drag hurt children to safety or something. That way, when you finally die, you’re doing something amazing.”
He moaned, “Oh crap, your an idealist. Could you please leave me alone now?”
“I would, but I’m actually too scared to climb back down.” I kept talking, “Or, if you don’t want to go to a war zone, why not go out with a bang? Do something totally wild you always wanted to try?
“Like what?” He shifted his crouch but stayed at the edge.
“Like, steal an ice cream truck and drive to Mexico or something.”
He laughed. Leaned back and the moon shone on his face. He’d been crying.
Finally he answered, “I think because, if you’re killing yourself, you’ve given up. You can’t imagine anything being fun or worthwhile.”
“Is that how you feel?” I took a step toward him.
“Yeah. I just feel sort of empty.”
“Well, then let’s give it a shot. If you’re going to kill yourself, before you do, lets do something wild and see if it helps.” I got even closer until I was right next to him. Left my arms at my side, just stood there.
“You going to come with me?” He looked skeptical.
“Yeah, why not. Nothing for me here either. What’s the worst that could happen.”
Rafael
Tough-guy talked me down the ladder while I kept my eyes shut.
At the bottom we realized that neither of us had any idea where to go for life-affirming mischief.
“Hey I know a cool place,” he said. “It’s out in the woods behind the school. There’s a weird spot like two miles out. The trees are cleared in a perfect circle and, right at the center, there’s a rusted metal hatch in the ground.”
“A hatch in the ground? You want to check out a hatch in the ground? Not steal an ice cream truck?”
“Hey, I thought this was my don’t-kill-yourself Choose-Your-Own adventure.”
“Alright, alright.” The cold was really painful by that time. At least a long hike would warm me up a bit. My lips were certainly blue. I wasn’t about to admit defeat.
“There’s a bolt on the hatch that looks new. We need something to cut it open.” He pointed across the football field to the janitor’s shed.
“How about a little breaking and entering?” I smiled though I was starting to have serious second thoughts.
The shed was sealed tight just like the school. It was one of those walk in portable jobs, a metal box. We circled it and discovered some rust on the back corner.
“Here, lets pry this up?”
I kicked at it and the solder holding the panel flaked away.
Together we managed to slide our fingers inside and bent it upward creating a small gap.
“I’ll hold it. You slide in and grab something,” he said.
Eyeing the jagged metal, I huffed but folded myself into a tiny ball and wiggled through the small gap. The shed smelled like grease and dirt, not entirely displeasing. It was pitch black.
“You have a light or something?” I whispered out to him.
A cell phone slid through. I pushed the button and the glow lit the crowded space. I managed not to snort at the photo of the cute little pug as his phone wallpaper.
One wall of the shed was all about lawn care, mowers, cutters, trimmers, and slicers. Things no one had much use for in Belize. The small end wall hung with more practical tools, screw drivers, a massive drill, saws, and a ginormous set of bolt cutters. I turned sideways and sucked in to avoid brushing against anything as I made my way toward them. Reaching up, I yanked on the bolt cutters and totally fumbled. They hit the floor with a reverberating clang.
“Hey you okay!” he sounded genuinely worried.
“Yeah, just dropped the bolt cutters.” I bent down to pick them up, and saw something shiny on the floor.
Oily.
I stepped closer. It looked like big blobs of some kind of thick liquid dripping off the tools above. I shined the light upward. A series of really freaky stuff hung along the ceiling. One was long and pale with a pointy end. One was bone white and serrated like a bread knife. Wait, was it actually made out of bone? Another looked like a black glass knife secured on a carved wooden handle with a strip of leather. All of the strange implements were spotless except for the last one that looked like it hadn’t been hung up properly. It dangled off the edge of its hook as though it were about to fall.
I tilted my head and leaned in to see better. I would swear it looked like a stingray spine which made no sense. Stingray spines were used in traditional Maya rituals for blood letting. Why would there be a Maya bloodletter in a Virginia janitor’s shed? Sure enough, the tip of the spine-thing was smudged with something dark. The coppery scent of blood hit my nose and I back peddled, crashing into the wall behind me.
Every single power tool hanging from the wall crashed to the ground with a cacophony of metal clanging on metal. I dove aside, barely making it out of the way of the pruning sheers that landed with a reverberating bang.
“Harper!” Raf shouted.
“I’m okay.” I stood up and looked back at the total chaos I had managed to create. Every single tool had fallen, including the bizarre, blood covered stuff. I’d destroyed the place in less than ten seconds. I do have a talent.
“There’s,” I searched for the right words. “There’s bloody things in here.” Brilliant description Harper. “I mean, like blades with blood on them.”
“Okay.” He drew out the word. “Just get out of there.”
Shoving tools away from the opening, something sliced along my finger and I cried out. A thin line of blood ran across my palm and dripped onto the floor. I scrambled through the hole, remembering Raf’s phone but forgetting the bolt cutters. Grabbing his arm, I got to my feet and let a shudder run all the way through my body.
“That was totally not alright.”
He looked at me, squinty eyed, like he was trying to figure something out.
“Seriously, there was blood in there.” I brushed the metal flakes and grass bits off my clothes
then pressed my sleeve against the small cut on my hand.
“Yeah, torture in the library and bloody tools in the janitor’s shed.” He held up his hands. “Well, there goes our exciting plan.”
“What?” I was so shaken I’d momentarily forgotten.
“You know, the adventure to make me feel all alive and stuff.”
“Oh, bird nuts. Let’s go find another shed in someone’s yard.” I started off toward the nearest neighborhood when he laughed.
A real one. It built slowly and moved from his belly to his chest. He bend over, one hand on his knee and genuinely guffawed.
“You okay?” I was confused.
“Harper, you are definitely unlike anyone I’ve ever met. You’re really gonna go steal some bolt cutters with me?”
“Yeah, of course.”
His face got all screwed up. “Thanks.”
I realized he was trying not to cry. “Sure. Thanks for not jumping. Think how much that would have ruined my day.”
“Ha ha, no I really mean it. I’m not even sure I would have jumped. But thanks for not just, I don’t know, walking away.”
“Yeah, no problem.” I stopped walking and faced him. “This is kind of embarrassing, but I don’t actually know your name.”
He laughed again.
“I’m Raf.”
“Raf?”
“Yeah, Rafael.”
“Raf, nice to meet you. I’m Harper.”
“Yeah, I know. Stairs-girl,” he gave me a lopsided grin. It looked good.
Together we realized the sun was rising.
“Hum, looks like our adventure will have to wait.”
“Yeah,” I said with a disappointed frown, “I’d better get back before my mom realizes I’m gone.”
We stood awkwardly for a few moments before he waved with another faint smile. “Well, thanks, for real. We can try again, maybe?” he said and headed off down the road.
I walked back to my apartment to change before school thinking about nothing but that smile.
In Trouble, Again
A line of grim-faced adults awaited my return to school that morning.
Jade Moon (Celestial War Book 1) Page 3
