Animal

by G S Banks

  ‘You tried to save me,’ I say.

  ‘I tried,’ she says, grinning. ‘We both nearly sank, but I tried…’

  We prop each other up, with Alisdair hovering next to her, then arm in arm, we hobble to the finish line. Once there we fall over, and then somehow, the whole thing seems so ridiculous we burst into giggles, like a pair of five year olds. Everyone stares at us, bemused, including Alisdair. I catch his eye for one brief moment and I can’t help wonder how foolish my words at the start of the race must sound to him now.

  17. Chess

  Seven days since Kelci was taken, Trainee Quarters

  It takes ages for everyone to warm up after our icy day and because we are back so late we are permitted to change into our own clothes for the rest of the evening. There were two more manifestations today. Rodriguez, it seems, is a Fish. He dealt with the ice pool much better than I did, clearly. He hardly felt the excruciating cold. Fish can tolerate the lowest of temperatures, I know that because Dad used to swim in the rooftop pool without the heating on in the middle of winter. I think we can safely say that I am not in any danger of manifesting as a Fish any time soon. But that thought makes me sad because I always secretly wanted to be able to swim to the bottom of the ocean with my Dad. Then there’s an Icelandic girl called Kristin, who always wears her blonde hair in plaits, who manifested as a Horse whilst finding her way through the maze, of all things. It can happen anywhere, we are told. Just not for me. Rodriguez’s eyes shine aqua and Kristin’s did glow chestnut brown for a while, but she looked confused and lost and was eventually led away somewhere by Artemiz. Everyone is manifesting, everyone except me.

  I’m still drowning and pulling others down with me. Tonight we are permitted one hour to ‘relax’ in the games room. We eat a dinner consisting of fish fingers, mashed potatoes and beans, then we are led into a room crammed with a snooker table, a ping-pong table, board games and lots of worn but comfy looking armchairs. I spot a little table in the corner with a chess set on top. Dad taught Kelci and me to play chess as soon as we could understand what the pieces did, telling us it would ‘sharpen our minds’. I make a beeline for the table whilst Alisdair, Ben and James pick up the snooker cues. Lucy is already bouncing a ball on a ping-pong bat. I hover near the chess set and pick up one of the pieces. Hand carved wood.

  ‘Hey! Heather wants to play,’ says Lucy, suddenly.

  ‘Sorry?’

  Can I just pretend not to hear her?

  ‘Heather! She wants to play!’

  Apparently not. Lucy is nudging Heather on the shoulder. She wears a baseball t-shirt that must be intended for a child, it’s so small, and a tight pair of jeans. Before I can answer Lucy is pushing her over to the chess table and sitting her down, then plonking me in the opposite chair.

  ‘There! You two can have a nice game,’ she says, beaming.

  Is Lucy aware just how annoying this is? Heather and I glare at her as she darts away, bouncing the ball against her bat. Then we stare at each other for a few seconds. I feel Ben, James and Alisdair watching us from the pool table.

  ‘We don’t have to play,’ I say.

  ‘You’re not being all spoilt again are you?’ she says, her voice oozing like molasses. ‘Surely not, not after I saved you today?’

  ‘I’m grateful for what you did. I’m just saying, we don’t have to play.’

  She pouts her lips slightly and leans forward. I see the freckles spattered across her nose, her cheeks, across her collarbone and chest.

  ‘Are you scared I’ll win, honey?’

  ‘Not in the slightest,’ I reply.

  A pair of hoop earrings poke through her hair.

  ‘Come on, play!’ hollers Lucy from across the room.

  ‘This isn’t punching people,’ I say. ‘It’s not climbing and it’s not running. This is chess.’

  She rolls her eyes, leaning back in the chair, letting her elbows land on the armrests.

  ‘Oh please. You don’t think I’m aware of that? You think you’re the only one smart enough to play chess? You don’t have to be a stuck up little English girl to play this game. Even girls like me can learn chess if they want to.’

  What is it with this chick?

  ‘What do you mean, girls like you? Like you’re so different to me?’

  She narrows her eyes.

  ‘Different to you?’ she says. ‘We are about as different as two humans can get.’

  I give her my best look of outrage, even though I’m not sure exactly how offended I should be by that statement. She shakes her head, slowly.

  ‘Who turns up to a place like this and says the beds aren’t to their taste?’ she says.

  ‘I’m claustrophobic!’

  ‘Yeah well, this opportunity is all I’ve got. Beds or no beds. When I get home my mother probably won’t even realise I’ve been gone. She’s most likely on the couch right now, drinking herself to sleep. Not to mention my step-father. Well, he calls himself that but he’s never been anything like a father to me. Where did you grow up?’

  But before I have the chance to answer she carries on.

  ‘In some big house in Manhattan from what I hear… With famous Anitar parents. I bet you never wanted for anything. I bet it was all so easy. I came here hoping I’d seen the back of girls like you, brought up with so much privilege they don’t know what they’ve got. With your perfect lives, your perfect clothes and your perfect families, thinking the world owes you something, just because you were born.’

  ‘I don’t think the world owes me anything.’

  She thinks all this about me?

  ‘I’ve not always had it easy,’ I say.

  I think of Terence, of Kelci.

  ‘You don’t even know me,’ I go on. ‘Do you really think that having Anitar parents equals happiness? That’s ridiculous. Besides, look at you.’

  She lifts her eyebrows.

  ‘Go on,’ she says. ‘This will be good.’

  ‘You’re privileged. You’re the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen!’

  I suddenly realise this isn’t much of an insult.

  ‘What I mean is… You’re so beautiful, people like you just for existing!’

  She smirks, quietly, keeping her eyes on me.

  ‘Beauty isn’t everything,’ she says.

  ‘Yeah well, neither is money.’

  ‘It is when you don’t have any. Looks don’t last forever, honey. My mum was once so beautiful she won so many beauty contests she couldn’t tell you how many. But lately she’s suicidal on her birthdays, just because she doesn’t look like she used to.’

  She shudders, as though recalling a horrible memory.

  ‘I’m not going to end up like that.’

  All I can do is stare at her, astonished and with that, it seems like the conversation is over. There’s nothing left to say apart from:

  ‘Let’s play.’

  And so we begin. Immediately I am planning a path to her King. That’s how Dad taught me. Never take your eye off the piece you need to win, never get sidetracked. I make my first move and Heather returns with hers. The atmosphere between us intensifies and things go very quiet. I make some good moves and she counters them, but really she’s just defending herself. Finally, something I can do around here. I begin to use a sequence of moves that I often use when playing with Kelci. It practically never fails. I move my knight, poised for attack and Heather squeezes her eyebrows together. She looks at me suddenly and her eyes flash and when I say flash I mean literally – flash – from hazel to bright yellow for a second. What was that? She leans back in her chair, takes in an enormous breath and squirms.

  ‘Are you ok?’

  She doesn’t answer. She sits back up and makes her next move – taking my knight. Didn’t see that coming. I make another move, sure that checkmate is just around the corner. Before another second passes she moves again, capturing my queen with her queen. What? I need that piece for my sequence. How did she get so good all of a sudden?
By now she has a strange look on her face, concentrated.

  ‘Heather,’ I say raising my voice to catch her attention. ‘What’s going on?’

  Her eyes lock with mine.

  ‘My mind,’ she says. ‘Something is happening in my mind.’

  She’s sweating. I play another move but I already know she has me. Three moves later, played so fast I can hardly see her hands, and she has my King defenseless and exposed.

  ‘Checkmate,’ she says.

  It’s undeniable. I wait for the gloating. And the insults. But there’s nothing. Instead she looks bewildered. She puts her head in her hands and I hear Ben’s voice behind me.

  ‘Is she ok?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘She said it’s her mind …’

  We all watch as Heather takes her hands from her head revealing her eyes – shining yellow and her hair – even thicker and more luscious than before. She doesn’t speak but she doesn’t need to. She’s different and we can all see it. For God’s sake. Right in front of me …

  Heather Jackson is now a Fox.

  _______

  No matter what I do, I cannot get to sleep this evening. I stare at the ceiling, my mind going round and round and round. Heather manifested, just like that. Right in front of me. I even helped her do it, by playing chess with her! But how did she do it? How did she make it happen? Did she make it happen? Or did it just happen to her? I can’t work it out. But meanwhile, I’m still here, failing at everything … and Kelci is still god knows where. There’s been no word from my parents. I can’t bear to think about how they must feel right now.

  I hold her glasses case in my hand. I brought it to bed with me, a reminder of why I am here. My mind drifts to the time we all went to buy her very first pair of glasses: me, Mum and Kelci. She was only small at the time and wriggly, very wriggly. Every time I tried to hug her or put her on my knee she would squirm off in the opposite direction. But she was cute. So cute. She loved a soft toy she called ‘Mi Mi’, a grey bunny, of all things. Her hair was both blonde and curly then, not straight like it is now. And she had sweet red lips and a button nose that I liked to poke. Her first pair of glasses were pink and plastic and she looked even more adorable when wearing them. Since then, Kelci was hardly ever without glasses and if she did take them off she acted like a mole. She wouldn’t know it was me until I got close. I miss her. I miss her terribly.

  I close my eyes tight and try to sleep. I need all the energy I can get right now. But there’s nothing for it… My mind drifts to Mason. Somehow, here, with these people, doing these things, none of it seems real anymore. Like I’ve made him up in my mind, a make believe boyfriend, a delicious dream. But when I think of his sweet face and his tanned hands, I miss him too. I miss the simplicity of being with him, that feeling of his lips brushing against mine, the warmth of his breath against my cheek. If only he knew what I was up to right now. He wouldn’t believe it.

  The future I imagined for us… Can that ever happen? I dreamt, all the time, of us moving in together one day, into a perfect apartment. With an enormous closet… You see those women in New York, sauntering around Central Park with diamonds on their fingers, drinking coffee in elegant cafes. I bet they all have enormous closets… I want to be one of those women… I wanted to be one of those women. I don’t know anymore. Does it make me spoilt, like Heather said, to want to live like that? Is it wrong? No one here wants to live like that – that’s for sure. But does that make it a bad thing? I lie awake for a long time until finally, thankfully, sleep takes over.

  18. A Burning Building

  Eight days since Kelci was taken, Muldoon Island

  I am stood close to a river some distance from the Muldoon campus. I am staring at James’s face which is encased in a massive helmet and he’s talking loudly at me, wearing a silver suit that is too big for him. It’s a challenge day. We all wear silver suits with helmets. In front of us is the blackened shell of a metal building being consumed by the flames of a blazing fire. Strapped to our wrists are huge digital timers set to ten minutes. Licks of fire are coming out of the windows. The flames are so strong they reflect orange and gold onto the helmet screens, meaning I can only just see James’ face as he talks.

  ‘I am not going in any burning building. No way! Nuh-huh. Who’s going to know if we die in there? My Uncle Steve’s never going to know what happened to me, out here on this damn island. Look at those flames! Besides, what is this?’

  He tries to look down at the suit but the helmet won’t allow his head to turn that far.

  ‘This suit is like some kind of joke. It’s like… It’s like foil. It’s not going to protect us against those flames. We’re like a bunch of uncooked turkeys! About to be put in the oven! We’re going to get cooked! I’ve been through some crazy stuff since I got here… I’ve been drowned, thrown from an airplane, been through mud, ice… But man… I hate fire.’

  His arms are waving about wildly. I agree with him but I can’t get a word in edgewise. I’m just not convinced Lady Muldoon and her team have got it right this time. Ben, who stands close by, has morphed into a shining mountain in the suit. He smiles down at me through the helmet screen. Lady Muldoon starts to speak, but it is hard to hear, because the crackling of the flames is even louder now.

  ‘Today is a test of teamwork. Inside that building there are a number of mannequins. You will be matched in pairs and each couple has ten minutes to enter the building, retrieve one of those mannequins and bring it safely out here.’

  Shadow runs between us, sniffing the ground as if searching for something. Lady Muldoon tells us to stay low and avoid the flames. Do not exceed ten minutes, do not get stuck, do not set self on fire. James repeats her words, disbelieving.

  ‘Do not set self on fire?’ he says, hopping up and down. ‘Do not set self on fire?’

  It feels like some sort of joke is being played on me as she then announces that Heather and I are being paired up. I find Heather in the crowd and we exchange a glance. I sense that she is just as dismayed as I am, but she hides it better than I do. She hides everything better than I do. For once, even she cannot make the fire suit attractive. Right now she looks just as shapeless as the rest of us. First up is Ben, alongside a girl called Lily, a German girl with curly hair and thin lips. As they disappear off through the black doorway, James paces up and down, still talking and shaking his head. They are gone for just under ten minutes, then they’re back out again, empty handed. James runs to Ben and reaches up to help him with his helmet.

  ‘Dude, are you all right?’ he says.

  Ben’s blonde hair cascades out of the helmet, gathering in front of the black marks on his cheeks.

  ‘I am in the heat of the moment,’ he says, shaking his head.

  ‘What?’ says James. ‘No Ben, in the heat of the moment… You wouldn’t say that now, that means… something else.’

  Ben knits his eyebrows.

  ‘Something else? Like what?’

  ‘I don’t know, like, you did something you shouldn’t have because you’re so angry, you know? In the heat of the moment.’

  ‘But I am not angry,’ says Ben.

  James gives a long sigh whilst Alisdair and a longhaired Canadian guy, Steve, go next, but ten minutes later they too come out with nothing but frowns and gasps as they pull off their helmets. It’s the first time Alisdair has looked out of his depth. The same happens over and over until it gets to the unlikely pairing of Dominic and Linda. Dominic speeds ahead but just before they get to the doorway he turns to Linda and pulls her in by the shoulder. Nice. I’m so nervous I can hear the beat of my own heart and seeing James pace up and down in front of me is only making it worse.

  How am I going to hold up in a burning building with Heather Jackson as my only company? After ten minutes Dominic and Linda are past back out. Linda’s left arm is on fire. She’s moving fast, much faster than I’ve ever seen her move before. She runs straight into the river, flapping her arm, extinguishing the flame
s. She pulls herself back out then lies there for a few seconds before taking off her helmet and giving a weak thumbs up, whilst Dominic stalks beside her, glaring. This sends James into overdrive, and it only gets worse when Lady Muldoon announces that he and Lucy are up next.

  ‘You can do it, James,’ I hear myself saying, despite the fact that I have no confidence I can do it myself.

  All of a sudden James stops talking and stands perfectly still. He holds his hands together and looks like he is praying. Without another word he finds Lucy and together, they disappear through the door. I’m surprised he actually went inside after all that. Like the other pairs, they disappear for ten minutes, but once the time has passed, they make no appearance. I start to wonder about them and glance over to Lady Muldoon… She looks at her watch. More seconds pass. Alisdair is the first to speak up.

  ‘I’m going in to find them,’ he says.

  ‘No,’ says Lady Muldoon, holding up her hand. ‘A few more minutes.’

  A look of thunder passes Alisdair’s face but he does as she says. We all stare at the building, wondering what’s going on inside. There’s no sound apart from the flames… All eyes are on the door. One minute… Two minutes… Three minutes… Just as Alisdair starts to move towards the building, a head pops up in one of the uppermost windows.

  ‘Hey, hey!’ says James. ‘Look at me!’

  He clambers out on the windowsill. My heart stops. What is he doing?

  ‘Oh my god, don’t jump!’ I scream, rushing over.

  I can’t stand it… The thought of him dropping from there… Ben is right behind me but before we get to where he is, an exhilarated whoop fills the air. James jumps clean out of the window. I gasp, covering my mouth with my hands. Lucy is on his back! And they’re not dropping straight to the ground, they are soaring through the air in a big arc.