by Dani Hoots
English class was dull, we went over Great Expectations some more, apparently there was more written between the lines that we freshmen couldn’t comprehend, at least that is what Mr. Barnes kept saying. He just wished kids these days could appreciate such great literature, or at least that is how he put it. I felt like arguing with him every time he said that, but I knew it would be a waste of breath. I also didn’t want him to get mad at me and make my grades suffer. Then I would have to deal with my parents thinking I was failing a class all over again.
As class finished and I started to pack up for the next class, I saw a young boy in the doorway to the hallway. He had the whitest blonde hair I had ever seen, pure as snow, but couldn’t have been more than ten years old. He stared at me with his grey eyes.
Everything seemed to stay still as the boy looked at me. I just froze, not being able to do anything but watch him. I felt like I was looking at someone that couldn’t exist, like a ghost, but I didn’t know why.
“Alice, are you okay?” Kate asked.
I blinked and the kid was gone. I nodded towards the doorway. “Did you see him?”
“See who?”
“That little boy,” I shook my head. It had to have been my imagination, I hadn’t gotten much sleep. “Never mind, let’s get to class.”
Math class was next, which, again, didn’t make mornings any more fun. Luckily my locker was near the class so I didn’t have to hurry. As I switched out textbooks, I heard Davis’ voice from a few lockers down.
“She remembers you guys, we need to do something,” his squeaky voice was barely audible over the typical hallway noise.
“That isn’t possible, I suppressed those memories myself,” Malcolm answered. I glanced over towards them, wondering what they could be talking about. All of their backs faced me.
“Davis isn’t lying,” Chase added. “I heard her say she could remember buildings covered in plants.”
I dropped my math book. They were talking about me. I quickly retrieved it and hurried away, hoping they didn’t suspect that I had heard them. I didn’t understand why my art concerned them so. I got random images to paint all the time in my mind, why would the buildings with plants on them matter? Why would they care, what did they think I was remembering, and why wasn’t I supposed to remember it?
Math went by as slowly as possible, which was really normal. Malcolm was in class, sitting a few rows in front of me. He didn’t seem to pay much attention to me and I began to wonder if they had truly been talking about me. It was highly unlikely as they didn’t seem to notice I existed in the month that I had known them. They haven’t even spoken two words to me this entire time, so why would they care so much if I painted a building with flowers on it?
Next was Global Studies, which was fun, with Mr. Lewis, who always was passionate about whatever he was teaching. Today’s lecture was on the Roman conquest. The Empire was a bit crazy, I had to admit, especially the Emperors, but they were often victorious.
Lunch finally came at last. I hurried to the cafeteria with my bento, a Japanese style lunch box that I loved putting together cute meals in, and found a spot to wait for Kate at. I never saw the little boy from earlier that morning again. It was strange, he must have been someone’s nephew or something.
I pulled out my chopsticks and opened my bento.
Now, one of my quirky hobbies was making artistic bentos. And why not? I loved art and after going through half a school day, I wanted something at lunch that would cheer me up. Today’s theme was pirates. The rice on the bottom portion had seaweed sprawled across it like a treasure map. My two boiled eggs were decorated like a skull. Then I just had some fruit and veggies. I was in a hurry this morning otherwise I would have thought something up to design them like. I honestly could have slept in a lot more if I didn’t do this, but I had been looking forward to working with this theme.
“Whoa, nice bento.”
I whipped my head around to find Chase looking over my shoulder.
He smiled as he sat down next to me. “Mind if I join you?”
Since he had already sat beside me, I knew he wasn’t going to take no for an answer. And honestly, why would I say no? He was a nice guy from what I could tell. A joker, sure, but he always meant well. “Sure, why not?”
“Thanks.” He pulled out a sandwich. By the smell of it, it had to have been tuna.
I tried to hide the disgusted look I wanted to make. Although I loved Japanese culture, I despised fish. I couldn’t help it, I just hated the smell and taste.
“That’s all you’re going to eat?” I asked, as that was the only thing in the sack he brought.
“All I want so why not?” He took a big bite and smiled. “Nothing beats a tuna sandwich.”
“Uh, I can think of some things,” I commented as I took a bite of one of my boiled eggs. It was strange talking to him. School had been going for a month now and I rarely talked to anyone in their group. They seemed to keep their distance from everyone, other than all the girls who chased Malcolm around. They looked as if they were searching for something, but what that was I had no idea.
“So,” he started. “I heard you talking about having a vivid image of some buildings...”
My eyes flickered towards him. He was staring at me as I took another bite of my egg. “And I heard you talking to your friends about that. Why is it important? Why do you care?”
He raised an eyebrow and grinned widely. “You were eavesdropping?”
“Weren’t you?” I countered.
“Touché.” He took another bite of his sandwich. “I was just wondering where you got an idea like that. Buildings of flowers and streets of grass.”
I started to reply when it occurred to me I never said anything about streets of grass to Kate. All I told her were about the buildings. There was no way he could know that. “How did you know there were streets of grass?”
His eyes widened. “What?”
“I told Kate that the buildings had flowers on them, not about the grass streets.” I watched for his reaction. He just stared at me, looking as if he wanted to punch himself for saying something he shouldn’t have. So there was something going on that he wasn’t telling me, and it had been me that they were talking about all this time.
Now, the better question was why.
“How would you know that Chase?” I asked.
He stayed silent, probably realizing he had said too much and didn’t want to dig himself in a bigger hole than he already was in. Too late, though, because now I wanted answers.
“Answer me Chase.” I sounded more demanding than I should have, but I really just wanted to know the truth. Something wasn’t adding up and after passing out yesterday I felt like everything was in a haze, as if my world was spinning around off its axis.
“Is he bothering you? I can make him stop if you wish.”
I looked up to find Malcolm standing across from me, his lunch bag a little neater than Chase’s crumpled up bag. I wondered if he also had a tuna sandwich for lunch, which I doubted because no one in their right mind would bring that to school for lunch.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Chase asked, a little snarky, as if he thought Malcolm had really threatened him.
“Well?” He inquired once more. I had totally forgotten about the question he had asked of me.
I shook my head. “No, he’s not.” But that didn’t mean I wasn’t mad about Chase not answering my questions, but let’s be honest, I couldn’t bring myself to start interrogating Malcolm as well. I was too shy and I could already feel my cheeks start to redden.
“Good, I would hate to think he was doing otherwise.” Malcolm gave Chase a look. Chase stuck his tongue out at him. I laughed. With all the things that had happened, I had almost forgot about this morning. Maybe one of them knew about that strange kid.
“Hey, random question,” I began. “You guys wouldn’t happen to know anything about a young boy with white hair would you? I saw a kid running around earli
er and was curious why he was here.”
Chase and Malcolm glanced at each other. They knew something, I was sure of it.
“No,” Malcolm finally answered. “I wouldn’t.”
“Probably one of the teacher’s kids or something,” Chase added.
I nodded, even I knew that it was a lie. “That’s what I thought.”
Malcolm stood there for a moment longer, then nodded to Chase. “Hey, Chase, remember that meeting we had with Mr. Williams?”
“Yeah. We should get to that. Great talking to you, Alice.” Chase stood up quickly and followed Malcolm out, taking his disgusting sandwich with him.
I watched as they left in a hurry, frowning. Mr. Williams was absent today.
CHAPTER 4
“Very good.” Becca stopped the recording of the song “Mad World” by Michael Andrews. It was going to be one of the songs included in the ballet Becca constructed around the theme of dreams. She was awesome like that, and with this being her first ballet which she created from scratch, I was extremely excited about it.
“We will go through this one more time and then you three can practice your hip-hop routine for the pre-ballet performance.” She nodded to Val, Rei, and I.
I smiled. Three of us got to perform a hip-hop routine to “See you in my Nightmares” by Kanye West. It was a fun choreography that we all put together one afternoon, well it took a few to really clean it up. I would have to jump on Val’s back as part of it, so we would need a lot of practice so I didn’t fall off or hurt her, or nearly pull her pants down again…
As I got ready to do our ballet routine, I saw movement out of the corner of my eye at the doors that were left open letting in some fresh fall air. It was the boy from earlier, standing across the street, staring at me again. A car passed by in front of him and he vanished.
I blinked a couple of times, not sure what exactly I saw. No one else seemed to have seen the boy as they were still gathering together to start the song.
“Are you ready, Alice?” Val asked. I must have seemed really out of it.
I turned to her and smiled. “Yeah, let’s do this!”
The music started playing.
“…And I find it kind of funny, I find it kind of sad. The dreams in which I’m dying are the best I’ve ever had.”
Once the song was done, the three of us changed into sneakers and got ready for our hip hop routine. I was glad I remembered my NIKE’s, it always looked weird doing hip hop in ballet slippers. The three of us got in our positions and waited for the music to start.
“... We were once a fairy tale, but this is farewell…”
Class came to an end and I gathered my things. I was going to ride my bike over to my parent’s work off Summer Street, which was only a few blocks away and the ride wasn’t terrible at this time of year. Once November came around I would either have to wait for them to pick me up or find a ride over. There was no way I was going to bike in that kind of rain or cold.
It only took a few minutes to get there, as it was just down the street. I stopped in front of the small old building, hooked my bike to my parents’ BMW coup and entered. There were a few people waiting, as those who filed for extensions needed to file by the fifteenth. And my parents thought I didn’t pay attention to the ‘real world’. Then it would get calm until the New Year came around, things would get even more hectic until April.
I took a seat in the lobby and waited for my parents. Pulling out one of the mangas I put in my backpack this morning, I started to read Oresama Teacher. Though it wasn’t sci-fi or fantasy, I found it to be quite entertaining. I personally would love to have Mr. Saeki as my sensei, but nevertheless, it was fiction.
After about half an hour of reading my manga, my parents were ready to go home. I climbed in the car, starving and excited to have leftover Chinese from Golden Crown that my parents had picked up the night before.
“How was your day, Meredith?” Mom asked as she got into the car. Again, they never called me Alice. It was like that part of me was part of a fantasy I was living in, as if ‘Alice’ was the artist in me and if they ignored it then it would simply go away.
I buckled my seat. “Fine.”
Dad started the car and backed up from the parking spot. “Dance too?”
“Yup.” It was a simple answer, I knew, but if I went into detail they would never understand. They didn’t think it was an accomplishment when I could perfect a brisé in point. Or the fact I could dance in point.
It was all meaningless fun to them.
“What are you doing this weekend? Are you going to go to Kate’s house?” Mom asked.
I thought about it. I didn’t have much homework so going to Kate’s would be a good plan. Then I could talk to her about Chase and Malcolm, maybe. But then again, she would think it was just because I liked Malcolm when really that wasn’t the case. This time. “Probably, I need to call her. I’ll do that when I get home.”
When we got home I called Kate and her mother said I could come over the next day for a sleepover. We decided we would meet at the downtown mall and hangout for a while, because that was really the only thing to do in Salem. There were also some fun antique stores downtown too that we had fun exploring, especially Engelberg Antiks. Last time we were there we found what looked like a secret society code book. It was pretty exciting and I still needed to do some research on what exactly it was.
Once I hung up the phone, dinner was ready, or at least the leftovers had been reheated. My sister Lilith was home from racquetball practice as well. She had her own car, a little green Volkswagen Bug, and could drive herself. Once she put away her stuff, we all gathered at the dining table.
“So,” Mom began as the clatter of utensils hit the plates, except for me since I was the only one who knew how to use chopsticks. “How was your day Lilith?”
Lilith ran her hands through her long, light brown hair, twisting it back into a pony tail. “It was great, physics was fun, chemistry was great. Eugene is such a great teacher and thinks I can study physics on a scholarship for sure.”
Eugene was an interesting teacher at our school. He got away with practically breaking every school code in his lab: allowing food during class, playing music, wearing Crocs… Those Crocs, I swore.
“That would be perfect. Then you can save up your college funds for a house.” Mom smiled.
“And I also beat one of the head boys at racquetball today,” she added.
“That’s great; teach those boys how to play.” Dad smiled.
“Coach says I should be able to get top ten in the girl’s division for state this year. I’m hoping she is right.”
“That would be fantastic, Dear, we are so proud of you,” Mom said. I tried not to cough. They were always proud of her. Her and Edith, our older sister who was in medical school at OHSU in Portland. She came home every once in a while when she had time, mainly to have Mom do her laundry for her.
“Meredith, how did you do on that math test you had earlier this week?” Dad asked.
Crap, they remembered. They always remembered. I poked one of the pot-stickers with my chopsticks. “I did okay.”
“So an ‘A’?”
“More like a ‘B’ minus,” I mumbled.
“A ‘B’ minus?”
Before he could lecture me, I held out my hand. “It’s fine, the final will replace the lowest grade. I will study harder next time. I already talked to the teacher and he said I shouldn’t have any problem getting an ‘A’ after the semester ends.”
My sister leaned over and whispered in my ear. “It’s because you spend so much time at dance and painting. If you gave up those useless hobbies of yours, you could spend more time studying.”
“At least I have a creative mind,” I snapped back. I really shouldn’t have said that because I knew it would just encourage her more, but I couldn’t help myself. I hated it when she treated my things as hobbies instead of being my passion and what I wanted to do with my life.
; She moved back to her spot and rolled her eyes. “If what you do is considered creative. I’ve seen your work; it’s crap.”
I slammed my chopsticks down. “Take that back.”
“Why? It’s the truth.”
“Girls, stop arguing,” Dad finally interfered. We stopped and went back to eating. I hated my sister. We always got into fights like this and it was always her judging me and making me feel like crap. She acted like she knew the future and what was good for me. Apparently she knew more about me than I did.
“But she is right,” Dad went on. “You should focus on your school work more instead of your little hobbies.”
I wanted to scream. Not this again, it was all I needed on top of everything else that was going on at school. I wished for once they could just believe in me. “But that’s what I want to do, I want to become an artist.”
“Someday, dear, you will learn that there are better careers out there. Then you will thank us for making you study more.”
Like that was going to happen. I finished eating my food in silence, not wanting to draw this fight out again, as it was a reoccurrence in our house, and finally excused myself to my room. I slammed my door closed behind me and wished I could lock it to keep my sister out. I knew she would poke her head in here after a few minutes. She always liked making matters worse.
Just as I predicted, my sister came into the room merely seconds later.
“What do you want?” I asked as I lay on my bed and started reading the next volume of Oresama Teacher. I wanted to know more why Mr. Saeki was so keen on adding students to the school. I always found manga to be a great escape from reality, as I could fall into the world and forget everything my family said to me.
Lilith didn’t come any further into the room than the doorway. “I wasn’t joking, you really should focus on better things. Everyone in our family is successful. It would be a shame if you weren’t.”
I rolled my eyes. “Being successful isn’t everything.”
