by K. C. Hughes
When he heard his parents walk across the Freedom Room, his back faced the door as he stared out the tiny window that was covered with steel bars. He heard a light tap.
“Excuse me, do you know when Deakon is coming back?” his mom asked.
He slowly turned around and faced them. His parents stood where they were with serene faces and raised eyebrows.
“Mom, it’s me, Deakon.”
She smiled gingerly. “Nice to meet you, but can you tell me where the other Deakon is?”
“I am the other Deakon. It’s me, mom.”
Of all the scenarios that played out in his mind about them seeing him, that one never occurred to him. They didn’t recognize their own son.
“I’ll just get the nurse,” she said, turning to leave.
Deakon took three strides with his longer legs and reached her. He grabbed her wrist. “Mom, please, it’s me, Deakon.”
She snatched her arm from his grip like he was a stranger. Something dropped in his gut at his mom’s rejection. She had been his only comfort in a less than comfortable existence.
“My name is Deakon Arnold Metcalf. I was born on October 20th. I just had my sixteenth birthday.”
“Anybody could have gotten a hold of that information, young man,” she said, with pinched lips.
He thought of reciting their address, but that probably wouldn’t convince her either. He looked at his father, searching his eyes for any kind of recognition. Nothing was there. He had to think of something personal. “You guys hired Marc Nash for my protection.”
He saw a glimmer in her eyes.
“I went to Addeson Prep. Got beat up the first day of school,” he said then turned to his dad. “You use to work for Microsoft in Seattle but retired when the stocks split. Oh, and our cat’s name is Spanks.”
After each fact, his mom’s jaw dropped lower and lower.
“The last meal you made before I got beat up was Shepard’s pie, and it was awful.”
He dad let out a smirk. Second’s before his mom’s body hit the floor, he and his dad caught her. Together they heaved her to the bed. Deakon sat on the edge, fanning her with his hand. He told his dad to get Lisee. When they returned, his mom had come to.
She took several gulps, closing her eyes completely shut each time. Every time she reopened them she ogled Deakon. Lisee got her some water and when she rose to drink it, she turned to him.
“What did they do to you in here?” she asked, glaring at Lisee.
“Mom, it was just a growth spurt,” he lied. “You always told me it would come.”
“I guess,” she said, still gaping at him. “But what about your face? It’s um, so different.”
“Maybe it was from the beating.” Again the lies.
“How do you feel, son?” his dad asked.
Deakon snapped his head in his dad’s direction. His dad was showing concern, something that was so alien to him. “Um, I feel fine, in fact, I feel good.”
“That’s all that matters,” his dad said.
Then the most bizarre thing happened. His dad walked over to him and patted him on the back. Deakon’s shoulders slumped down and the emotions in his body converged to one place; his eyes. It felt wonderful to feel unconditional love from his dad.
His mom raised the bag she’d be holding. “I guess these clothes I brought from home won’t fit you now,” she said.
“We can go to the mall and buy him something new,” his dad said.
Deakon jumped up. “Let’s go, then.”
Deakon squirmed in the back seat of the family Volvo. The clothes that Lisee had given him made him itch. The puke-green long sleeve shirt was disgusting. The pants were high-waters, making him look like an overgrown dork. He needed new clothes badly.
They pulled off the main road into the mall lot on the Sears side, as always. They shopped there for everything except groceries.
"Mom, can I go to Aeropostale instead?” Deakon asked.
“Aero po who?”
“It’s a store where the cool kids shop,” he said.
She put the car in reverse and drove to the main entrance of Chandler Mall. Deakon held his head down as they walked in Aeropostale. Not only did his parents follow him, but he had on the old-man clothes. But lucky for him, seconds after they walked in and his mom heard the blaring music, she left the store. His dad, however, followed him around, something that he'd never done before. He pointed to clothes, asking Deakon, 'how about these'. He stared at his dad in disbelief.
He grabbed a pair of 28 inch waist jeans and held them to his stomach. Way too small. He asked the cute sales associate, who'd been eyeing him, for the next size up. Still no good. She measured his waist and inseam, talking non-stop. When her hands touched his legs, way too close to his unmentionable, he let out a sniggle. He bought everything she suggested for a total of $800, mostly skinny jeans and hoodies. He walked out of Aeropostale wearing a new outfit and tossed the old clothes in the first trash can he found.
He bought six pairs of Supra Skytop sneakers at Foot Locker, wearing a pair out the store. He looked cool and felt cool. He even caught a few girls at the food court glancing at him with lingering stares.
Most cool!
He had grown to a thirty one inch inseam. Deakon did the math and calculated that he was six feet tall. He touched the bracelet on his wrist and wanted to say a prayer of thanks, but he didn’t know who to pray to. His dad was an agnostic and his mother was whatever the TV evangelists told her to be.
After they arrived home, he went to his computer and ordered the LG Revolution smartphone for overnight delivery. While he was online he checked his Facebook account. He never knew why he checked it with only two friends, but to his surprise, Karri, Lisee and the sales associate from Aeropostale had each sent him a friend request.
The next morning while getting ready for school, his mom came into his room.
"Honey, why don't you stay home and rest?" she asked.
He'd just pulled his black hoodie over his head and sat on his bed. "I feel fine, mom, really."
She sat at the desk chair with her chin resting on her palm, looking at him. "You've been through so much," she paused. "I-um, I just don't want anybody doing that to you again."
He looked up at her from strapping his Skytops. "I don't think you have to worry about me getting beat up," he stood up from the bed and raised his arms to the side. "Look at me." He spun around and winked at her.
Deakon walked to the kitchen with a bounce in his step. His mom followed behind. Forgetting his backpack, he made a sudden stop turning on his heels and bumped into her. For the first time, he saw the gray roots of her hair from the top of her head.
He grabbed an apple from the fruit bowl on his way to the garage. When he saw his scooter, he stopped in his tracks. Riding a scooter was not cool. He walked around it with the apple clutched between his teeth, staring at. He needed a car. He’d gotten his permit six months ago. And since he turned sixteen, he could get a driver's license. A thought flashed through his mind. He could guilt his parents into buying him a car because of his recent trauma. But that didn’t feel like the right thing to do. Maybe he would come out and just ask. He glanced at his watch and hurriedly jumped on it, leaving the helmet in the garage.
He arrived just in time for sociology. Instead of sitting in the back away from the others, he picked a seat in the middle. He no longer lived in fear. He leaned back in his seat, glancing at his longer thighs. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Karri walking down his row. She sat down right next to him. He immediately swept the classroom with his eyes looking for Matt. He wasn't in class.
“Hey Deak," she said. "You look good. New clothes?” she asked, rumbling through her backpack. Her shoulder brushed his as she removed her laptop.
“Hey back. Do you like them?”
“What!” It wasn’t a question. “I love them. It's amazing how different you look."
“Different good or different bad?” he asked.
&
nbsp; She scanned him from head to toe. “Definitely different good.”
He let out a closed lipped smile.
“Thanks for accepting my friend request on Facebook.”
He nodded, trying for cool points.
She leaned closer to him. “Hey, by the way," she said, whispering because the professor began speaking. "Delta Sigma Phi is throwing a party this Friday. Do you wanna’ go with me?”
She was so close that he could smell her cherry flavored lip gloss. Her lips were arresting. When she spoke, the plump parts thinned and swelled with each word. It was like seeing a symphony of the lips. He could've stared at them all day.
Deakon had never gone to a party in his life. After no one showed up for his sixth birthday, he never asked for another one. And none of the other kids invited him to their parties. To be asked to go to a college party with one of the prettiest girls on campus felt tremendous. But he was afraid of dancing in front of other people. The only time he danced was in his room, sheltered from laughing eyes.
“I sorta’ have plans this weekend,” he lied. “I’m going car shopping with my parents.”
He never had social skills and the thought of standing around with college kids swaying to the music, holding red plastic cups filled with keg pumped beer made him shake in his new Skytops.
“That’s cool. If you change your mind, inbox me.”
He smiled. Friends, Facebook and frat parties. Life was good. New worlds were opening up and he was thrilled about it.
His next class started in ten minutes and he walked with a clip to the Engineering Center. He didn't mind the walk as the crisp air fanned his long hair. It was the middle of December, the perfect time of year in Phoenix with the temperature hovering around eighty degrees. Students sat on the sloping hills in different sized groups, either studying or hanging out. Other students bustled around campus in a frenzied hurry as he did. When he reached the PE building, he saw Matt and two of his rogue friends. The same ones who put him in the hospital. Out of seventy-two thousand students, he couldn't believe his odds of running into them again.
“Is that you, Freaky Deak?” Matt asked. His two groupies laughed.
Deakon froze in place. He wasn’t afraid of Matt any longer, but him plus two other guys was frightening.
“Heard you got out of the hospital. How did it feel?”
They bent over with laughter and didn’t care that they had broken his rib and punctured his lung. They didn’t care that they caused deep worry for his mom. They didn’t care about the intense pain they caused him. They were taunting him for laughs.
For laughs?
Deakon’s skin heated up and his face turned red. Venom raced through his veins. Then he heard whispers in his ears. He looked up to see if anyone else heard it. They circled him and he felt a rage build up. Visions of their blows and kicks flashed in his mind. He flinched as the memories of the pain flooded back. He lowered his head and cupped the bracelet for relief or comfort or something. And then it happened.
With his head still lowered, Deakon stood perfectly still. The whispering and the horrible visions of the beating stopped. An dark feeling overcame him, draining the fear and replacing it with an icy courage. Without lifting his head he stared at each of them. His eyes penetrated theirs with unwavering focus. A deathly still overcame him.
“It would be in your best interest to walk away,” Deakon stated in a throaty voice.
"You think because you grew a few inches, you are a tough guy, huh?" Matt asked.
Matt let out a strained laugh, but the others didn't join in. They inched closer.
Deakon raised his head. “You’d be better off beating on each other than messing with me.”
They stopped with a puzzled look on their faces. Then their jaws clenched. Their eyes budged in horror, when suddenly, one of them turned to Matt, who remained frozen in place, and jabbed him hard in the left jaw. Immediately following, the other guy slammed his fist into Matt’s right jaw. Shock exploded over Matt’s face as he stood defenseless, taking blow after blow from his own groupies. Students rushed over, surrounding the fight, as they pounded on Matt. No one thought to break it up, instead, a few people took pictures with their cell phone cameras. When both Matt's goons ran up and body slammed into him with a full frontal attack, Matt broke out of the spell and fought back. It was two against one in a fist-flying, body slamming brawl. He heard a girl hollering for the police. After the campus police broke up the fight, Matt had to be carried away with a pulpy, bloodied face.
Deakon remained standing in place well after the crowd left. He wasn’t afraid of what just happened, but rather, a new feeling flowed through his veins. It was dark and evil. He got a thrill seeing them turn on each other. Even though his scientific mind told him it was impossible, something deep in his gut told him that he made them do it.
He missed his physics class and instead of hanging around campus for his other classes, he skipped the rest of the day. He was so distracted that it took three attempts to remember the combination to his bike lock. He didn’t remember how he got to his subdivision, but when he reached his street, he wasn’t paying attention either. A neighbor, four houses down, backed the Lexus from her driveway and T-boned his scooter. That got his attention.
As he walked the rest of the way home, he kept looking at the point of impact on the scooter. His right leg should’ve been crushed. He glanced down at it and he didn’t see as much as a wrinkle in his jeans. He wasn’t injured, but the bike was totaled. He threw it on the front lawn and rushed in the house.
Deakon trotted to the kitchen where he knew his mom would be. She was at the counter cutting carrots when he grabbed her arm.
“I’m calling a family meeting,” Deakon said
“What’s going on?” his mom asked, looking up with a pinched face. “You’re acting strange.”
He led her to his dad’s office. Deakon couldn’t remember the last time he’d been in there. The plantation blinds were shut and made the room darker than the rest of the house. It smelled a little musty. Stacks of papers littered the desk and yellow Post It notes covered the edges of his monitor.
“Dad, Mom, I need a car.”
His dad rubbed his chin and looked at him. “Maybe next year. Besides, freshmen aren’t allowed to drive on campus.” He didn’t get mad at the intrusion, which surprised Deakon.
His mom wiped her hands on her apron and didn’t say anything.
“Technically I’m a junior, with all the college credits I took in high school.”
“Umm, you’re right. But I think you should wait till next year,” he said, turning back to the monitor.
Deakon glanced at the bracelet. “The lady down the street ran over my scooter,” he said. “It’s totaled.”
His dad rose from his chair and walked around the desk. “Are you okay, son?”
“Not a scratch, but I need new wheels, ” he said, surprised at his dad’s spoken affection.
“Alright then, I guess we need to get you a car.”
CHAPTER 11
Deakon drove his new Mustang GT off the dealership lot. His dad insisted on the Ford Focus, but Deakon insisted on the GT, black and yellow, of course. It had been so easy persuading him to get it that he wondered if the mysterious bracelet had anything to do with it.
His dad rode in the passenger seat, running programs in his head. Deakon knew the look on his face; drive-by coding. He was grateful for the silence because it gave him time to do some decoding. As he got comfortable driving the powerful car, he wondered where the bracelet came from. He knew without a doubt that it caused the strange things that happened to him. After he nearly ran a stop sign, he pushed the bracelet, his new body and his new powers out of his mind.
When he got home he logged onto Facebook and inboxed Karri.
Hey Karri if you still want me to go to the party Friday night I want to go. Got a surprise to show you.
He thought it would be cool to drive her to the party in his new car.
But first, he had to study for his driver’s test. That night after re-reading the manual, he was confident about passing the written section. He lay in bed staring at the ceiling, fantasizing about all he could do with his new powers. He could walk in the bank and ask the teller for all the money in the drawer. But he didn’t need any money. He could use it to get Karri to be his girlfriend. Everything he thought about felt wrong and unnatural. What felt natural, though, was finding out about the bracelet. And until he did, he made a promise to himself that he wouldn’t use the power for personal gain.
He felt better immediately.
The next morning while sitting behind the GT, the heavy-set road skills tester barely fit in the passenger seat. His arm spilled over the middle console and rubbed against Deakon’s arm. And he smelled like burnt popcorn. Deakon sailed through the test, but when he tried to parallel park, he almost failed. During the first attempt, he couldn’t see beyond the tester’s large body to judge the distance between the parked cars. Deakon got nervous when he saw him scribble something on the score sheet. During the second failed attempt, he squirmed in the seat brushing the tester’s arm. The smell of the popcorn distracted him. At that moment the sun’s beam hit the gold bracelet and caught Deakon’s attention. The thought of using it danced through his mind. But instead, he took a deep breath, used his knowledge of geometry, and viewed it as a mathematical equation. He passed on the third and final attempt.
Before he left the DMV, he gaped at the photo on his driver’s license. No longer was he the wimpy kid with wild hair and thick glasses. He was handsome, very handsome. His eyes changed the most. They were huge but in a good way. They came across as sweet and sensual with a childlike innocence. His hair hung over one side of his face, looking like the cool kids hair. He didn’t have to fear threats from mean kids, because he had grown tall enough to be a threat. Deakon had transformed into something.
He arrived home and walked into the kitchen. His mom stood at the counter looking over a Paula Dean cookbook. If she wasn’t redecorating the house or doing charity work, she could be found in the kitchen following someone else’s time tested recipe. Apparently, it didn’t guarantee edible food.
