Forgotten

by Sarah J. Pepper

  “Lucky you,” I said.

  “Quit smiling like this was your plan all along. You know I can’t stand the sound of you shredding your hair.”

  “If I had your curls, I wouldn’t look like I just walked through a hurricane, and then I wouldn’t have to worry about looking like a train-wreck,” I said, knowing the general appearance of her shadow, since she had allowed me to feel her face and hair years ago.

  “Like you’d use the products needed to make my locks look fabulous,” Bree said.

  “I might.”

  “Right, so why is there dust taking up permanent residency on the hair gel I gave you last spring?”

  I sighed, “You know I hate your so-called donations.”

  “Liar. You’d freak and shave your head if I wasn’t around to doll ya up.”

  “You caught me red-handed,” I said sarcastically, and brought my hands up in the air as if to say ‘I surrender.’

  “You know you look amazing when you let me do your hair and make-up. But no, instead you run around like the natural look is what boys want to see nowadays. I swear you’re terrified to be pretty,” she said, fussing with my hair long enough to make it lay flat across the middle of my back. “That’s your plan, isn’t it – to hide behind this mess of hair? Heaven forbid you actually talk to a guy.”

  “Boys carry all sorts of diseases, duh. Remember the great cootie infection of middle-school?”

  Bree snorted. I envisioned her rolling her eyes. I heard her dig through a small bowl where I kept my bobby-pins. She pulled half my hair back; I never said a word. It was a fight we repeated too many times to count. I’d eventually give in and regret bringing “appearances” up. They didn’t matter; why should they? I couldn’t see. Nevertheless, I knew she was looking out for me in her own way.

  “So do you want to hang out at Strikers, or what?”

  “I’m guessing your mom wouldn’t let you out on a weeknight until you promised it was just a girl’s night?”

  “At least you get to do something other than fold a mountain of sheets. There are enough laundry baskets in your living room that it looks like an obstacle course. Mrs. T went a little bonkers, huh?”

  “Martha opened the linen closet and freaked out when she saw a mouse,” I admitted. I loved Martha, but there were times I was glad we weren’t actually related. “She didn’t find a single rat dropping, but still insisted on washing everything.”

  Deeming my hair presentable, Bree sprayed me down with Bed Head before heading to my closet. I assumed I wasn’t wearing suitable attire, but I didn’t comment. Instead, I felt the top of my head and cringed. My hair was teased to new heights; the rocker-bump had to be pushing four inches high.

  “Where are those military boots I gave you for your birthday? Never mind, here they are – still in the box,” Bree said, holding them up for me to see. Their light gray shapes were apparent against her dark shadow. “For once, make me happy by slipping these on without forcing me to my knees because you insist on making me beg to prove a point that looks don’t matter – they do; get over it.”

  As much as I wanted her to beg, I said nothing, and held my hand out to take them. I’d rather have gone with the indigo flats Martha bought me, but I’d doubt it was up for discussion. After lacing up the boots, she led me out of the house. Her grandfather’s old Ford pickup was parked in the driveway. The passenger door protested when I opened it, welcoming me with a resounding whine. The stench of cow manure was still prominent even though the truck hadn’t been used on a farm for over a decade.

  On the way to Strikers, we followed a mutual agreement. Bree sang while I pretended I was deaf instead of blind. I rolled my window down. The wind streamed through my hair as she sped through the town. The blurred, black shapes of the buildings, vehicles, and people looked like soft shades of grey.

  Perfectly shaped lips formed in my mind as the wind blew over my skin, triggering a vision of a young man’s lips. His smirk didn’t take away their kiss-ability factor, it enhanced it. Just as I looked to take in more of the young man’s facial features, it flickered out.

  The vision was over in a blink of an eye, but the deep red flush color of the mystery man’s lips had already embedded itself to memory. It was the first time I’d ever seen the visualization before, yet it felt oddly familiar. I swallowed the lump in my throat and tried to forget the fact that I had supernatural power to see the future.

  We arrived at the bowling alley in the time it took Bree to belt out two songs on the Billboard’s top one hundred – Green Day and Katy Perry. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that being a back-up singer wasn’t in her future.

  We ditched her wheels for a pair of striped sneakers. The smell of nacho cheese had soaked its fragrance into the walls. Noises from the popcorn machine, screeches from excited players striking out, and rattling pins bombarded my hearing.

  Bree squealed and waved when she noticed Ryker saving a lane for us. It wasn’t long before they were swapping spit. I took the opportunity to inspect the rental shoes, old and stinky. I pressed my lips together and breathed through my mouth. Even though they had been soaked in a bath of Febreze, it couldn’t take away their stench. After slipping them on, I pushed off the plastic chair to grab a ball while Bree and Ryker continued their make-out session.

  Stella and I tapped our way to the ball rack along the far wall near the food court. Testing their weight, I took a chance with a heavier ball. I waited ten minutes at the ball stand before the two love birds finally came up for air. I juggled the ball in one hand while I made my way back to our lane.

  “You owe me,” I whispered to Bree and handed her Stella.

  “Three words,” Bree said, holding up three fingers like I couldn’t understand the concept of counting. She wiggled each finger as she lectured me about the importance of finding a boyfriend. “Cooties aren’t real. If you’d buck up and talk to a guy, any guy, you wouldn’t have to be the third wheel.”

  I smirked. “I thought we were having a girl’s night?”

  “And that’s what you’ll say if my mom mentions anything about tonight,” Bree said blithely.

  After making my way to the ball return, I counted four steps forward and two side steps which positioned me perfectly in the lane. The pin’s shadows were hazy but visible enough to give me an idea of where to throw.

  I swung my hand forward and released the ball when a deep, enchanting laugh stole my concentration. It echoed in my ears like I’d been summoned by a god himself.

  “Position seven, four and ten – split ‘em, Winnie,” Ryker said which drowned out the masculine voice.

  I liked Ryker better when he squeaked when he talked. I was about to tell him so when I heard the hypnotic, masculine voice calling to me again.

  He spoke in a foreign language, but it sounded surprisingly familiar, yet I couldn’t quite pin-point it’s origin. His words washed over my skin like water. I swallowed hard, hoping to somehow re-train my throat to suck in air. Then he stopped calling to me, like I’d cued him that I was unnerved by this voice.

  Get with the program, I thought. A guy wouldn’t just shout from across the room in another language to merely gain my attention. And certainly, no one has the ability to caress another’s skin with their voice. I almost wanted to laugh at myself for being so silly.

  Waiting for my ball to come up the return, I glanced in the general direction of where the voice had come - nothing unusual. A sea of shadows was all that I saw. Perhaps I shouldn’t have eaten so much ice-cream… I closed my eyes and tried to clear my head. With them closed, I shouldn’t have been able to see anything or anyone. Lights off so to speak – so convincing me that I didn’t see a smoky outline of a young man standing exactly where I assumed the voice had come from was another thing entirely. I opened my eyes. Again, there was nothing but shadows.

  I heard a thump and rumble, but the noise didn’t register as anything important. What was going on with my sight? It wasn’t until the bowling b
all nearly smashed my fingers upon its return, that I realized it caused the noise. I blushed and hoped no one noticed that I was slightly distracted. I glanced at Bree and Ryker. They seemed to be in their own little world, oblivious to the entire human race. Ryker’s hand rested on Bree’s inner leg. She giggled and then scooted closer to him. I made a mental note to have a serious talk with her about acceptable PDA’s.

  I sounded like a mom. Ryker’s comment about me becoming an old cat lady hit home.

  Trying to concentrate, I slid my hand over the ball’s smooth surface and closed my eyes. Every bit of two seconds passed before I stole another peek at the far wall. A hazy outline of a young man was apparent, again! My jaw dropped, refusing to believe what I saw with my closed eyes. My ball followed suit with my mouth and dropped. I grabbed it before it hit the polished wooden floor, but not before it slammed into my shins. Wincing, I clenched my jaw to silence the words that flowed from my tongue more quickly than I preferred.

  The guy with the hazy outline didn’t move for so long, I thought it might have be an unusual object reflecting the light – until I opened my eyes. Instead of seeing a usual dark shadow, I saw a white abyss. My conclusion was that a dark hole from another dimension sucked in all the light from that exact spot, which made his figure appear light instead of dark, (or I’d gone mental.)

  He stood next to a normal dark shadow that was several inches taller than him. After speaking a thread of sentences I couldn’t understand, the lighted one nodded at me. The taller person’s head jerked – a nervous twitch. I thought I saw a silver lining around the tall shadow when I blinked, but I couldn’t be sure.

  The lighted young man pushed off the wall. He walked over to a chair that was closer to my lane, his white blazing increased with each step. A wave of nausea engulfed me as he approached closer. A cold chill slipped down my spine when he sat down on the chair, still a couple lanes away. The hair on the back of my neck stood on end when he subtly waved at me.

  “Something wrong, Winnie?” Bree asked.

  I wanted to smack myself. I couldn’t recall how much time passed as I stared. My cheeks warmed as I tried to think of any reason why I’d stalled. Finally, I recalled dropping the ball and gestured to my shins like me dropping my ball against them explained everything. I concentrated on pulling myself together and rubbed my leg a few moments longer than necessary. If I kept staring at the guy, I’d be labeled a creeper. Rumors spread fast in our town.

  Convinced that the changes in my sight had to be a side effect from all the sugar pumping through my veins, I regained my composure. Once I was confident that I wasn’t losing my marbles and that my stomach was merely upset because I polished off half of a container of ice cream, I repositioned myself in the lane and threw the ball. Three pins slapped against the lane.

  “Spare,” Ryker confirmed nicely and walked up to take his turn. Our shoulders bumped, “Cheater.”

  I simply raised an eyebrow and gave him the lane in exchange for his seat next to Bree, which was closer to the young man who waved at me. The closer I became, the sicker I felt. My stomach was in knots; my skin was clammy. I leaned close to Bree and asked, “Is there a guy sitting two lanes over, looking in this direction?”

  She glanced over her shoulder subtly – a guy scouting pro. Bree had her talents, none of which I possessed.

  “There are times I swear you’re faking this whole blind bit,” she squealed but quickly recovered before her voice rose too loud. “Mister tall, dark, and handsome looks too delicious to be posing in a bowling alley. Even his big friend walking up next to him is a hottie! I usually don’t go for gingers, but for him I’d make an exception. He has the body of a lineman –the kind that you can tell is all hard muscle and not just extra padding around the midsection.”

  “I don’t care how they look,” I whispered and hoped her heard the frustration in my voice. “Is the shorter one watching me?”

  “I never said he was short– just not as tall as his friend.” Bree casually glanced again. “Yep, Mr. Abercrombie and Fitch Underwear Model is totally checking us out – like staring us down.”

  “Thought so,” I mumbled, nervously rubbing my arms.

  The tension grew in my back when he stood up and walked closer. The chill flooded my bones. I couldn’t even choke down a minuscule of spit. I wiped my clammy hands on my pants.

  “A Hershey’s Kiss has more fat than his entire body! Speaking of kissing, he looks like the type who’s had lots of practice. You know I have a thing for chiseled eye candy, especially brown haired, brown-eyed ones, Dibs!”

  “Have them both,” I muttered.

  The closer he walked, the more nauseated I became. When he crossed the lane beside us, my ice-cream decided it was going to part ways with my digestive system prematurely. Clutching my stomach, I cued to Bree that the chances of me throwing up, were high.

  She started to argue, but wasted no time racing me to the restroom when I started gagging. I held onto her hand, allowing her to lead me, since I was trying my best not to make a mess in public. Once safely inside the privacy of the girl’s room, she said that I was burning up. I flung open the metal door to a bathroom stall.

  Gripping the sides of the plastic seat, I tried not to think too hard about when the last time the toilet was cleaned. I dry heaved into the butt-water long after my stomach was empty. When I was sure I was done, I took a deep breath and pushed off the seat. Trading the toilet for the sink, I splashed water on my face. The cool water streamed down my eyes, when a vision I could describe to a tee flickered in my mind.

  A moonless night was illuminated by the fire crawling across a young man’s bare back. He kneeled in the sand and faced the ocean. Blue hues danced from his skin, transforming into brilliant oranges and yellows flames. Waves crashed against the shore, echoing in the night. He made no effort to run into the cool water; instead he picked up a stone half-buried in the sand and threw it into the ocean. The longer it rippled in the water, the more clenched his fist became. His muscular arms glistened with blood and sweat, as if he’d just finished fighting even though he bore no combat injuries.

  “Are you coming down with something, or was this an adverse affect of being checked out?” Bree joked, jolting me from my vision. She handed me a wad of paper towels.

  “Not faking. Believe me. I can come up with a better way of not talking to a guy that doesn’t involve sticking my face in a public toilet,” I assured her.

  “We’ll call it a night then. I’ll pull the wheels around.”

  “If you tell Ryker I just lost my lunch, I’ll die of embarrassment,” I stated.

  “Would you prefer I make up a lie about you needing a miniature body bag since it’s your time of the month, or would you rather I tell him you got sick spontaneously after a sizzling hottie tottie looked our way?”

  She had a point. “Just tell him I don’t feel the best. There’s no need to tell him every single detail.”

  I dried my face and followed her out of the bathroom. My stomach was still jumping so I didn’t want to be far from the bathroom. I didn’t have to say anything about my nerves; Bree found me an empty table close to the exit and bathroom without me having to mention anything about feeling unease. She then left to snatch my shoes and inform Ryker about our impromptu departure.

  I closed my eyes and willed the nausea to pass. It didn’t work. In addition to my stomach pains, my head gradually began to ache. It wasn’t long before it pounded. I wished it wasn’t such a long, sloppy ordeal to “say good-bye” to Ryker.

  “May I?” A deep, masculine voice drowned every sound in the bustling hangout.

  My skin crawled. I couldn’t decide what made bothered me more – that I didn’t hear him walking up behind me, or that he smelled of a rich, unlit cigar, but more otherworldly. Digging my nails into my palms, I focused on breathing, since my tongue refused to work properly.

  He pulled out the chair next to me. An ear-splittingly screech pierced my ears as the chair’s l
egs slid across the tiled floor. I wanted to blatantly cover my ears but stopped myself solely because Bree would lecture me to no end if I had acted like a baboon around a potential boyfriend.

  I clenched my jaw to keep from saying something obscene. The smoky outline of his hand reached for mine, which were resting on the table. I quickly slipped my hands into my lap. He cautiously leaned closer to me. I pushed on the floor, creating distance between us. The chair scarcely moved before he grabbed its back, stopping my retreat. His hand tightened around the chair; however, he was careful never to lay a finger on me.

  I opened my eyes and stared at the white figure where a normal dark shadow should have been. His shimmering refection suggested that he was athletic, but I couldn’t get a grasp on his actual physique. The light played tricks, not giving me any indication of his actual size.

  “Sea blue with a touch of hazel trying to conquer your right,” he said, confirming my eye color.