by Gruder, Liz
Phyllis shyly shared a poem written on loose leaf she’d composed about her cat Millificent. Kaila praised the poem, knowing how much Phyllis loved her cat.
Douglas wore a Star Trek t-shirt with Dr. Bones’s picture that said, “Are you out of your VULCAN MIND?” He read Phyllis’s cat poem, sniffed, adjusted his thick glasses, and handed it back to Phyllis.
In Louisiana, football is obsession. Everyone in Bush, Louisiana had come to see Bush whoop Covington and everyone in Covington had come to see Covington whoop Bush. The energy in the stadium was palpable.
“What are they doing?” Echidna asked. She pointed a long finger at the cheerleaders, Brandy and Tara, dressed in red and white short skirts.
“Give me a B!” they shouted to the stadium.
“B!” answered the crowd.
“Give me a U!”
“U!” answered the crowd.
“Give me an S!”
“S!”
“Give me an H!”
“H!”
“And whattya got!” the cheerleaders sang.
Lucius groaned, holding his head in his hands. Viktor smoldered like a red toad, pissed that The Bourg insisted they come to the game.
“Stop being so miserable,” Kaila said, poking Lucius in his back. She couldn’t fathom anyone miserable when she was the happiest in her entire life.
“Misery is illusion,” Lucius said. “We feel nothing.”
“Could have fooled me,” Kaila taunted.
“Leave them alone,” Jordyn said, squeezing her hand.
“I don’t understand why we have to watch humans fight over a ball,” Lucius pondered.
“They are stupid,” Echidna said, pointing at the cheerleaders. “Why are they here?”
“They’re supposed to inspire you,” Kaila said.
“They inspire me to violence,” Echidna said, her head in her hands.
“They make me hungry,” Viktor said.
“Such false gaiety,” Lucius marveled.
“I don’t get it either,” Pia called. “Football sucks.” Antonia, beside her, smiled.
“But it is good we are together,” Antonia said. “I appreciate you.”
“Not all of you are bad,” Pia said.
“Bad?” Antonia looked puzzled.
The crowd stood and roared as the players trotted onto the field.
“Hey, birthday girl,” Jordyn whispered in Kaila’s ear. “You want us to make Bush win?”
“No interference,” Kaila said.
He nuzzled her ear with his lips. The stadium receded. She wanted to kiss him again so badly, adored the feel of him next to her, his hand in hers. The crowd’s roar matched her hunger for him.
The game was close. With each touchdown, tension mounted. Derek Mendoza, the quarterback, threw perfect passes. Wade Stoops, defensive lineman, held Covington back. The stadium cheered.
Kaila glanced at Melissa and Toby, oblivious to the game and entranced with the other.
“You’re so smart,” Melissa said.
“You are so … creative,” Toby said, the stadium lights reflecting on his bald head. “You have imagination. Through your mind, you travel the span of the universe.”
Melissa gazed at Toby with her lazy eye. It was as if a light surrounded the two. They bought popcorn and hotdogs.
Kaila smiled, seeing mustard on Toby’s small lips as they shared taking bites of the hot dog. They were so cute!
She spied Mrs. Bourg above, observing like a vulture. But Kaila didn’t care. Nothing could spoil this perfect night.
Or so she thought.
When you’re with someone you love, time passes quickly. Hours seem like minutes. At the end of the fourth quarter, the score was tied. Everyone screamed and shook the stadium with stomping feet.
Then, in the last seconds, Derek Mendoza threw a long pass. Phyllis was gazing reverently down at the field. Kaila remembered how she crushed on Derek.
What a pass. Kaila heard Phyllis’s thoughts. God, you are so hot. Phyllis propped her chin on folded hands, her gaze not following the ball, but Derek.
The receiver caught the ball and ran the length of the field for a touchdown. The stadium exploded. The scoreboard lighted with red blinking “TOUCHDOWN!”
“Guess they didn’t need help,” Jordyn said, leaning over to kiss Kaila. His warm mouth molded her lips to his.
It was a custom at Bush High that after a winning game, the football players and cheerleaders went on the public address system and made announcements.
“We are so proud of our team!” Brandy Powell’s high voice echoed over the stadium. Everyone cheered.
“Our team is the winner!” Tara’s deeper voice echoed over the stadium.
Kaila barely heard them. Jordyn kissed her hand. Shivers ran up her spine.
Then Derek’s voice echoed on the loudspeaker. “We played a great game,” he self-congratulated. “But there is one thing that spoiled my night.”
The stadium quieted.
“Hey, Phyllis Joiner,” Derek called, his voice resounding in the night air. “I heard you have a huge crush on my ass. But hear this: I would never, ever, in a thousand years be seen with a bug-eyed dork bitch like you. You’re a loser. Hear me, loser. No guy would ever want a freak like you. So quit your pining and die.”
It was as if the hybrids put a time freeze on the stadium. But they hadn’t. Kaila, and everyone in the stadium, turned toward Phyllis Joiner.
Her blue eyes bulged as usual; her mouth hung open.
Then, hot waves of Phyllis’s deepest shame telepathically permeated Kaila. Kaila’s eyes stung with scalding tears. She felt like an elevator whose cable had snapped. She was descending to the center of the earth, merging with its molten core.
“Block her,” Jordyn said to Kaila.
But as Phyllis began to weep, so did Kaila. She’d never felt this hurt, this betrayed, this embarrassed. She was sinking, losing herself in the wave of Phyllis’s all-encompassing hurt.
Worse, Viktor, Lucius, and Echidna climbed up and surrounded Phyllis. They leaned over Phyllis who lowered her head and unleashed the thousand tears that had accumulated through a lifetime.
Echidna leaned close to Phyllis and inhaled. She closed her eyes and moaned.
Viktor leaned closer, his incisors visible.
Lucius bobbed and swayed behind sunglasses as if he were high on heroin at a blues concert.
Echidna moaned louder in the crescendo of ecstasy.
Priscilla Snowden appeared from nowhere, her beautiful face white as her hair. “Get away, predators!”
“Get lost, bitch,” Viktor hissed, his eyes hooded.
Echidna licked her tiny lips, satiated.
Everything happened too fast. The blood drained from Kaila’s brain. She felt Phyllis sinking as she wept. Sinking down into the earth and into a grave where she would never return.
Jordyn shouted, “Erect a shield on your mind, Kaila. Block her out!”
“I can’t,” Kaila sobbed.
“Block!” Jordyn shouted, shaking her. “Block her out.”
Priscilla Snowden wrapped her arms protectively around Phyllis.
Phyllis was oblivious. In shock, her bulging eyes stared unseeing. Her head lowered as tears rained.
“I care, darling,” Priscilla said, pressing her cheek against Phyllis’s. “Hold on, don’t give up, lift up.”
But too late.
When Kaila realized Phyllis had surrendered, she gasped. This was the darkest abyss, a place of shame and loss with no hope.
Phyllis reached into her pocket and pulled out a gun. She held it to her temple and pulled the trigger. The shot echoed through the stadium.
Then her brains were all over Priscilla Snowden. Her body slumped in Priscilla’s lap.
Again a freeze time moment.
Priscilla lifted her face to the night sky. Her beautiful blue eyes filled with tears. “Please, please, help them,” she wept, cradling Phyllis’s inert body.
Kaila’s knees buckled as she traveled into darkness. She could still feel Phyllis crying. This was a hurt beyond death, a hurt staining the fabric of Phyllis’s soul. Phyllis hovered in a dark place, a place of shadows. There were other shadow creatures there yet she was alone. It was the vastness of the night sky but dark as the deepest dungeon. And all she could do was weep with the loneliness of eternity.
“Kaila!” Jordyn’s voice echoed above the darkness.
Kaila sobbed, lost. She wanted to lie down and curl into a ball.
“Kaila, please come up,” Jordyn said, bear-hugging her. “Come up!”
She opened her eyes and buried her head on his shoulder.
Priscilla collapsed on Phyllis’s corpse. Priscilla’s strength and light weakened, like rain on a lit candle.
Then, security guards clamored with flashlights, shining on the blood spatters on Priscilla’s white pants and Phyllis’s blasted dead skull.
Kaila sensed Priscilla’s waning strength, same as in the yoga class.
“I have to go,” Priscilla said gasping. “I have no more.” Her face went white as snowy egret feathers. As the crowd thickened, trying to get a look at the dead student, she disappeared.
Kaila knew then, that she had to go to another place, that the longer the time she spent on Earth, the more her strength dissipated.
And no wonder.
All this while Jordyn held her.
“I hate this place too,” Kaila said, sobbing.
“Don’t hate, Kaila,” Jordyn whispered.
“But I do. I understand why Phyllis felt so alone.” Kaila withdrew from Jordyn. “This is a terrible place. An awful place. Everyone is cruel and vicious! We’re surrounded by haters everywhere.”
Viktor, Echidna, and Lucius hovered nearby.
“Get away from me! It’s her pain, not mine.”
But they leaned their heads near, their eyes large, feeding.
“Hear me clearly,” Kaila said. “You will never feed on my pain again.”
She wiped her cheek with the back of her hand and narrowed her eyes. “Because I will never feel pain again. From now on, I will no longer be part of the human race.”
Dimly, she saw that Jordyn, Viktor, Lucius, Echidna, Toby, and Antonia understood. She felt them encompassing her, taking her.
“I submit to you,” Kaila said. “Take me.”
“No!” Pia cried. “Don’t go with them!”
“It’s done,” Kaila spat. “And Pia. Don’t blame me. If you had this choice, wouldn’t you go?”
“Don’t go,” Melissa begged. “You said you’d help us.”
“We can be friends,” Kaila said. “But I will never again align with the human race. I turn my back; I spit on them.”
Viktor stared with rapt interest.
“We will protect you,” Jordyn whispered. “We are one, now, forever.”
“Hereafter,” Kaila said to the hive. “I want nothing more to do with this world. You have my total allegiance.”
“What are you wearing?” her mother asked as Kaila came to breakfast.
“Oh, no, not joining that cult are you?” Nan asked, spooning scrambled eggs and grits on her plate.
Kaila had donned the silver bodysuit. She liked the material. You could ball it up to an inch in your pocket, then make it expand to a full outfit by shaking it. It didn’t wrinkle or tear, and it repelled liquids and stains. It showed off her curves, her ripe breasts, her slender waist and long legs. Plus, it was the most comfortable thing she’d ever worn.
She had tucked her real hair beneath a baseball cap. She knew not to scare her mother too much.
“Leave her alone,” Mike said, surprising her. “She likes that boy, Jordyn.”
“I agree,” Paw Paw said. “Leave her alone. Are you happy, Goosy?”
“Yes,” Kaila lied.
She was venturing to another world and could never tell. Her family watched her with concern and love.
“Just let me be,” she said.
At the bus stop, Kaila ripped off the baseball cap, letting her real hair hang loose down her back. No more pretending. This is who she was. An alien hybrid. Anyone questioning her could kiss her ass.
On the bus, as she stood next to the driver and stared at the busload of seated students, everyone went silent. Red rage blazed from Kaila’s head. One word, one taunt, and she’d make them pay. She strode to the back and sat between Melissa and Pia.
“Oh no,” Pia said.
“You said you’d like me no matter what I wore.”
“We do,” Melissa said. “Please don’t forget us.”
For a moment, Kaila’s stony heart yielded. “You’re my friends.”
They were lost, mistrustful puppies. She loved them still, yet pitied them. Earth people suffered deeply, while they inflicted pain.
“I won’t forget you,” Kaila said.
But when she stepped off the bus, she raced to the back of the school. People pointed and stared, but she didn’t care. Melissa and Pia stayed behind.
She fell into Jordyn’s arms.
“You are beautiful,” he said.
“She does look beautiful,” the hive exclaimed.
“If we could delight,” Viktor said. “We would delight.” Kaila realized this was as much as an earthly declaration as she would receive from Viktor.
“I admit,” Echidna said, her perfect black bangs above her black eyes, “that if we could feel joy, I would tell you we experience joy.”
“Oh, shut up,” Kaila said. She threw her arms around Echidna.
“Stop. Now.” Echidna grimaced and pushed Kaila away.
“I’m glad,” Toby announced. He threw his thick arms about Kaila.
“Oh, Toby, you are a darling,” Kaila said, hugging him.
“We understand,” volunteered Antonia, who had her tufted hair held in check by a silver headband, “that this is your way. And so.” Antonia opened her arms. Kaila and Antonia embraced.
“You are the brothers and sisters I never had,” Kaila said.
“That may be true,” Lucius said, always in sunglasses. “But I shall refrain from the group hug.”
“We take you,” Jordyn proclaimed, his golden eyes glowing. “Now that you are with us,” he said, “we need to infuse you.”
The hive formed a circle around Kaila.
“Trust us,” Jordyn said. “We are offering you protection. What happened the other night must never happen again.”
“Human emotion can destroy you,” Viktor said. “But it has benefits.” He licked his lips.
“Though you receive thoughts,” Echidna said, “we will show you methods of receiving and also how to block.”
The hived lifted their eyelids and their eyes blackened. Kaila raised her chin, feeling the rising sun. She looked into their eyes and accepted their gift, feeling knowledge invade and permeate every cell of her body.
Simultaneously, her eyelids opened wide and her eyes went black. She was joining them, accepting them, feeling them, knowing them, absorbing their knowledge, thus unlocking the doors of her dormant powers.
The bell rang.
Kaila felt exultant in the rising sunlight, its rays deflecting off her silver bodysuit. She felt like she had a right and privilege—and the knowledge—to walk amongst the gods.
Jordyn gazed at her with the power of a distant sun.
Nothing will separate us now, he said with his mind.
Nothing, she said, gazing at him with black eyes.
Kaila strolled into English in her silver bodysuit. She may as well have walked in stark naked. She stared with defiance at everyone in their seats. They were humbled, for if they dared utter one word, she would silence them. Satisfied, Kaila took her seat.
Melissa poked her back.
“You okay?” she asked.
“I’m good,” Kaila said.
“Um,” Melissa seemed lost for words. “You gonna have lunch with me and Pia?”
In Melis
sa, Kaila saw all the loneliness, the insecurity and her dreams. But more so, she felt her friend’s concern. It radiated from her, sure as the sun.
But Kaila could not commit to lunch. She had another place now.
Philip, the guy with the long hair, had his head on his desk. Kaila knew then that he was messed up on Somas, muscle relaxers. She received images of him living in a trailer in the woods.
She saw that his dad raised animals for dog fights. One had its teeth removed, helpless as bait in a vicious dog fight ring, other canines tearing his flesh apart. She saw the boy rooting through his father’s medicine cabinet, stealing the Somas. If she were human, she might have felt sorry for him. Now he was a ridiculous human drugging himself to anesthetize negative emotion.
Brandy Powell passed her desk, did a double take.
“Oh, so you are one of them today?” she twitted, tossing her strawberry hair.
Is my stomach showing as I suck it in? Kaila heard Brandy’s mind. Actually, she looks really pretty with those big blues eyes and blonde hair. The silver is weird, but she has a power and she’s really smart. She kind of scares me. Will Derek like her more than me?
Despite hearing Brandy’s insecurities, Kaila was sick of her flip, sarcastic remarks. She lifted her eyelids and stared at Brandy. She envisioned a dart thrown at Brandy’s chest.
“Ouch,” Brandy cried, clutching her chest. Her demeanor swiftly changed. She scurried to her desk, head bowed. Reveling in her newfound power, Kaila knew she had to be prudent.
A paper football hit the back of Kaila’s head. Wade leered at her. In his mind, she detected images of naked women on a computer screen, saw that he imagined doing to her all those things those men did to those women on the Internet. He had her naked, bent over—gross!
Kaila blocked him. She wanted to thrust a huge pole straight through the middle of his perverted brain but knew better than to start slamming every person in the school. She seethed with pent-up rage.
The fluorescent light above her blew out. All the students in the classroom looked terrified but said nothing. Kaila drummed her fingers on her desk.
I wish Kaila wouldn’t go with them. She heard Melissa’s thoughts behind her. Then what will we do? She said she’d help us. I feel sicker every day. So tired. I can’t sleep at night anymore. I’m scared. I’m seeing ghosts. And what about Pia? She’s pregnant! Nobody gay gets pregnant unless they choose it. Why can’t she see what’s happening? I thought she was our friend. I liked her, but she turned on us. God, this hurts. Aren’t there any true people?
