Eternal: Chapter Five, Part 3

Mikael was at the end of his sophomore year by regular standards, but at his year-round school, he still had another month or so of class before he entered into the summer session. I had been surprised when Mitchell first gave me the information on where to find Mikael. I had expected him to be attending a public school, maybe a private academy. Instead, I was traveling to meet him at an all-boys boarding school.

En route, I tried to reason out why he would be at a boarding school away from his family after having been separated from them as long as he had already. It didn’t make sense to me. And even after trying to rationalize it for several hours, I still had nothing.

Once there, I didn’t go to request meeting with him immediately—as was customary—because I caught the sound of his voice out in the field where a group of students were playing baseball. He had never struck me as the baseball sort, but he always had loved games.

The day was beautiful out, warm and sunny, exactly as May should be. It wasn’t easy resisting the urge to feel the sun on my skin as I watched them play from afar. Not only would Drei scold me and very possibly never trust me to be out of his sight again, but it would postpone any interactions I had with Mikael and the others. There was the also the possibility Mikael wouldn’t speak to me if I gave in to my temptation.

Mikael scored a homerun and silently I cheered for him. Observing long enough to see Mikael play shortstop and shout encouragements to his team as they quickly tallied three strikes against their opponents, I headed toward the school, a cold and distant looking place. My best guess was that it had been a mansion converted to a school with additions made to accommodate students. Even the red brick, usually a welcoming, warm sight, couldn’t liven the drab and dark building. Whether it was hyperbolic or not, the sunlight around the school felt like it was being vacuumed away into oblivion.

The inside wasn’t much of an improvement, though it was surprisingly warm, not at all drafty as I had imagined. The walls were a dark mahogany and covered with portraits of graduated classes of boys and past presidents of the institution. They were all stoic and distant, but all of the boys in the pictures appeared as true gentlemen: polished, polite, intelligent, and possibly even ready to be a husband or future-CEO.

A kindly, plump woman scuttled towards me, smiling jovially, making her look twenty years younger than I guessed her to be. She wore a rich blue dress and white flats; her graying blonde hair was pulled into a French twist.

“How may I help you, ma’am?” she inquired in a light voice. It sounded almost as though the words just skipped off her tongue her voice was so light.

“I was interested in speaking with Mikael Summers, if I could,” I said, returning her bright smile.

“May I inquire as to what about?” Her eyebrows arched high over her widened eyes, her smile dampening slightly but still perfectly intact. She didn’t view me as a threat—thankfully—but she was on guard all the same.

“I’m an old friend of Mikael’s, used to babysit him a few years ago,” I said, figuring she was bound to ask that question anyway; “Something has come up recently and I wanted to talk with him about it.”

“What has come up? Something with his family?” she snooped, her face not changing from its inquisitive state.

“It’s a bit of a private matter,” I said, continuing to smile kindly at her. I had this urge to hit her with my umbrella if she continued being nosy. She didn’t need to know as much as she thought she did, and if I didn’t need her approval to speak with Mikael without finding myself in more trouble than I could stand at this moment, I might have given in to my violent desire. Her now plastic smile was especially irritating me.

“Very well, then, Miss…”

“Jones,” I supplied, keeping my voice light, controlling my growing agitation.

“Miss Jones. Follow me.” 

Vampiric: Chapter Six, Part 2

“Why is it all bluish?” I questioned before realizing I had a different question I wanted an answer to more. “How can I even see it?”

“Well, we’re both connected directly to the air. To you, air appears bluish. I always saw it purplish, though lately it’s been more pinkish, but yeah,” she stopped herself from rambling on. “When you open your mind to it, the air will show you everything that pushes it aside. Of course, whatever color you see the air as is what everything else looks like, so don’t take any bets on what colors the person in the next room is wearing. Unless you get really good. When I was younger, I heard rumors of elementals who could eliminate the bias in their minds and have the air show them whatever color was disrupting them. But that’s just rumor. Never met anyone who could. I tried, though. I think if I keep trying I’ll be able to do it one of these days. Wouldn’t that just be great? To tell what the colors around the world are?”

I laughed. “Around the world is a little ambitious, don’t you think?”

“Nothing is ambitious. Once, when I was really bored, I mapped a cocktail party where they spoke a funny language; they all wore beautiful clothing, even though they were all purplish and everything; and they sounded like chipmunks kind of. It was really entertaining to watch. The better you get the more you can learn, like sounds. Sounds don’t come for a long time, though. When they do, you can hear everything said wherever you’re mapping.”

“What about sending? How does that work?” I pressed, genuinely interested.

“Oh, that’s tricky,” she said, her eyes wide but a note of seriousness still visible. “Both people have to be open, one to send it and the other to receive it. Once they’re both open, the person sending has to convince the air to share in the first place. It takes more time to learn. There’s a lot of sweet talking and even some promises not to abuse it for a while—air is very picky and needs lots of flattering. One day it wouldn't let me at all because the person I was sending to had hurt it really badly recently, so yeah. Okay, I'll get back to it,” she said slightly exasperated. “Anyway, so after you convince the air to allow that kind of transfer of information, all you have to do is will the information or image or whatever it is over to the other person. Of course if you're showing them something at the same time then you have to know how to split your focus so you can do what you want and still send, but that goes without saying.”

“Are you going to teach me that too?”

“Well,” she mused, looking off to the side. “It isn't so easy to teach. For everyone it's different, and it heavily depends on your relationship with the air. I would think the air really likes you; it didn't give me much fuss at all. But you know how now; you'll have to figure the rest out on your own.”

There were more questions, but I could tell her concentration was wearing thin the more she forced herself to stay focused. My questions could wait until later, when she wasn't as worn.

“How many people are in the cell next to ours?” she inquired, her eyes lighting up as though it was a game to her, making it more apparent how quickly I was losing her.

“Which direction?” I asked; I nodded as she pointed to the wall adjacent to the cushioned corner.

Doing as she had shown me, I draped a thin layer of air over the room and then tucked it around the bluish bumps to give them more shape. The room was as bare as ours. A cushioned corner, a barred window, a toilet like thing, and a door. There were three people in the room, one smaller than the others and curled on the cushions in the corner. From all that I could tell, it was a girl and she was asleep, but it might have also been a guy. I didn't want to tuck too close. The other two were adults, a skinny person and the other was heavyset, both may have been either man or woman from my tucking.

“Three people,” I replied.

“Confident enough to figure out their sexes?”

Opening my eyes, I told her honestly, “No. I don't want to be intrusive.”

She enveloped me in her arms. “At least you know how if you need to.”

“If I tucked the air closer, would they be able to tell?” I queried, curious.

“Yes, Sweetie. While mapping itself isn't harmful, it leads to one way you can kill people from a distance. You tuck too close around the head and they choke on the air; there's too much going in and not enough coming out—don't use it to kill, Abriel. Promise me.”

“I promise,” I said, thinking I would never need to. I had no interest in hurting other people, especially not to that extreme. But it didn't matter this advice may never apply to me. It only mattered that for the first time, she was sane enough to give advice. She was okay. Sort of.

“Air gives life and takes it away—like people kind of—but once you abuse your gift to choose for yourself which it is, air never works the same for you again. It holds it against you until you either die or you completely forsake your gifts; don't let it come to that, Abriel, sweetie.”

“I won't, Mom. I promise,” I assured her.

She pulled away from me then, jumping to her feet and skipping around the room, her goofy smile and wide cerulean eyes back. A song dripped from her lips, joyous and childish.

The sudden change left me feeling numb. We had been closer than ever before—reminiscent of a real mother and daughter—and now she was back to how she had been. If anything, I was more upset with myself for forgetting it would end.

Vampiric: Chapter Two, Part 2

Drei must have sensed my unease after leaving the meeting with Caroline because he made a point of spending more time with me. During the days he was teaching me the tango, his aggravation at my inability to close my feet on the fifth step kept at bay until I finally managed to remember. After successfully completing the step for nearly half an hour, Drei added music to the formula, swiftly taking off into a more complex tango, my feet following obediently, only occasionally stumbling. At those times, he smiled, telling me I was doing wonderfully, and slowed down until I was comfortable again.

After dancing for what felt like an hour, he smiled approvingly, spinning me out and back in, kissing me as I stopped in his embrace. Neither of us pulled away, too content in being close. If things continued as such, I thought I might be able to overlook Caroline’s negativity altogether. If nothing else, it was bringing us closer, even if there was still a nagging voice in the back of my head telling me I had to be cautious.

Ballroom dancing was a way we could be close without necessarily drawing attention to our relationship. The tradeoff was, of course, when we went out at night, I taught Drei how to dance to regular music, and sometimes he added his own twist of classical dance. Though he did try his best, his attempts were humorous as he tried to add familiarity to the new. He often teased this “new dancing” was a cruel joke to make a fool of him.

The day before we were supposed to meet Caroline for her project, Drei and I went walking. He judged it was safe for him since the sun was hidden behind the heavy white-gray clouds. I still wasn’t sure about his tolerance to light. He had once told me sunlight didn’t matter; now it seemed to matter and, though I was curious, he would probably shrug it off as being unimportant.

When we were halfway through the park, it began to snow. I ran out to the center of the open field where snow from earlier in the week still lay peacefully. There, I spun in circles, holding my arms out.

Snow was the one form of precipitation that didn’t make me feel like I was suffocating. Rain made the air heavier and, since air was as much a part of me as my skin and hair and thoughts, it always depressed me. But snow was different. It was solid enough to affect me much like falling leaves—which wasn’t at all.

Drei stood on the cleared path, watching. I stopped, the corners of my lips curling upwards.

“Come on,” I shouted across the distance, waving my arm in a huge arc. “Dance with me.”

“No thank you,” he replied, smiling, his hands buried in his coat pockets.

“Fine,” I said, bending down to scoop up a handful of snow.

“Do not—” Drei’s sentence fell flat as the snowball smashed against his shoulder. At first, he just stared at the clumps of white embedded in the crevices of his coat, bright against the dark material. In one swift motion, he scooped up a handful of snow and tossed it in my direction.

A yelp escaped my lips as I dodged it, laughing giddily.

“It is unfair,” Drei said, the beginnings of a smile on his lips. He was already throwing another snowball in my direction.

“Fair?” I questioned, changing the course of the snowball. “Bombarding me is what’s unfair.”

A couple more snowballs hit Drei as I blocked whatever he threw my way. Even when he attempted dodging my missiles, I just manipulated the air to make sure they hit their target—his punishment for being so resistant to dancing with me.

“What is unfair,” he said—snow dusted over his slightly shaggy light brown hair—“is the fact you have an advantage.”

“I have no clue what you mean,” I teased, running to a new location that hadn’t been scavenged clean.

His amethyst eyes sparkled as he loudly replied, “And that is why you have yet to be hit at all—”

“I’m just that good.” When I noticed him running towards me, a fistful of snow in his possession, I screeched joyfully, running away from him. Drei caught me fairly quickly, holding me in his free arm and rocking us back and forth.

“I will not use this snow against you,” he said, his features serious, but a mischievous gleam in his eyes.

“That’s why you’re still holding it.” I glanced at the clump of snow he still clutched.

“I am still holding it because it told me you deserved this.” I flinched in his grasp as he crushed the snowball on top of my head. He laughed as I shook large chunks out of my hair, my cheeks bright red and cold, both of us wearing veils of snow in our hair. “You cannot avoid me forever.”

“I never said I wanted to.” Our eyes locked on each other.

Everything around us was silent, almost as though it was afraid to interrupt us. All of the laughter and teasing that had echoed in the clearing had faded away. What was left was the soft snowfall and us, together, seemingly suspended in time.

And then he kissed me.

There, in the open, for anyone to see—not that there were many people out for leisurely strolls—in one of the most peaceful settings of which I had ever been a part.

It was a moment free of worry, false pretenses, fear…everything but love.

On the way home, Drei asked, “Are you ready for tomorrow?”

I gazed up at him, unsure how to answer. No matter what, every time I thought about Caroline, or Ian, or the whole faction, I couldn’t shake the feeling something was going to happen. Something was going to ruin what I had with Drei, whether directly or not.

“I don’t know,” I said after a while.

“I will be there with you, every step of the way.” He took my hand in his, stopping to kiss my fingers. His eyes were serious and a darker amethyst than usual. He was right; he would be there. Drei would be at my side so long as I needed him; tomorrow I needed him, more than I had in a long time.

“So long as you’re with me, I’ll be fine.”

Another thought occurred to me as we reached the apartment, though: what if what was going to happen would transpire not because of someone else, but because of Drei?

Elemental: Chapter Eight, Part 5

Nick and Drei argued daily now, sometimes twice. Most days Nick started it, especially when I wouldn’t answer the door and pretended not to hear his knock on my window in the morning. Then Drei pounded on the door a couple of times. I hid in my room, talking myself out of seeing either of them.

I avoided witnessing their arguments, and spent most of the week experimenting, hoping some clarity would be found in the ancient pastime.

Valetta stopped by after the first day, reassuring me she would keep the two from killing each other while I worked out for myself what was needed. She also left some old CDs and a disc player. Old as in music I’d listened to in middle school and had pretended I didn’t like by the time I reached high school.

Her gift became my first experiment. I knew the songs and, never having had the lungs to sing, maybe there was a way to fix that.

The first attempts were a mess of coughs and either not enough air or too much. As I found the right balance of input to match my output, the problem I had was concentrating. Often, just as I was reaching the climax, I would forget to pull more air into my lungs and my voice fizzled out, leaving a drowned moose sound hanging in the air. If anyone had been around to hear, I would have been humiliated and embarrassed.

By the third day of my break, I had mastered it. It surprised me I actually had a decent voice, but it wasn’t like I would be selling records the next week.

After the satisfaction had worn away, I was bored with singing. There was still a challenge in concentrating, but I found my peace to be temporary in that. The moment the song ended, every thought came rushing back. I was to the point that images would flash through my mind as I sang. It was no longer helping. If anything, it made me feel worse for procrastinating.

Abandoning singing, I recalled meditating when I was younger. My mother had insisted it was to aid me in balancing my life as it became busier. More than likely, she just wanted company when she was experimenting with new relaxation methods—like the time she thought it would be entertaining to try a contortionism class. That, by the way, landed her in a chiropractor’s office for two months.

Settling at the foot of my bed—legs crossed, muscles loose, eyes closed—I focused on a blank sheet of paper in my mind’s eye, just as I had been instructed to do years before. My breathing slowed, setting the backbeat for the sounds filling me.

How was I to know my element wouldn’t allow me to meditate?

The blank page was splashed with color and brief sketches of birds, squirrels, and children laughing. Everything flooded into my open mind. It didn’t bother me; it was rather refreshing. There is nothing like being filled with something other than yourself. It didn’t give me an answer, but it revived my will to find one. Unfortunately, Mother would never realize how much those meditation classes really worked.

The second to last night of my isolation, a small troupe of the children visited bearing gifts.

“We’re sorry, Abriel,” Danny, and Derek said when I opened the door.

“We brought you a gift,” Bethanie added as Michelle held forth an ice sculpture of a young woman cradling forget-me-nots. The roots of the flowers laced through her chest, curling into a heart-shape.

“Come in,” I said, surprised at the chill outside.

After settling on the wooden floor of the front room, the sculpture resting on a windowsill, I asked, “What are you sorry for?”

“Aren’t you mad at us?” Mikael responded.

“What would give you that crazy idea?”

“Well you aren’t around anymore,” Xenia added, glancing briefly up at me.

“I’m not mad at you guys,” I insisted.

“Is it Nick?” Bethanie questioned eagerly.

“Or Drei?” Kora added, eyes wide in curiosity.

I was silent a moment. It wasn’t really their fault; it was mine. “No,” I replied. “I just needed some time off.” When Jake looked to ask another question, I added, “Have I missed anything interesting?”

Kora rolled her eyes. “Only Michelle making gaga eyes at Mitchell.”

“Am not!”

“Is that why you’re always showing off super hard when he comes by?” Mikael questioned. Michelle’s cheeks flamed.

“Anthony and Amy almost got caught playing a prank on Nick yesterday,” Derek offered quickly.

Danny added, “Yeah, they were going to make him slip from the lunch station down the hill into a mud puddle and he almost saw them setting it up.”

“Yeah,” Xenia said, “Valetta practically bore holes in them. I’m not sure Nick would have noticed though.”

“He has been really distracted lately,” Bethanie said and all of their smiles began to fade. “He’s not as much fun anymore. And he’s being a stupid jerk whenever Drei comes around.”

“Ugh, you’re telling me,” Michelle huffed. “I used to think he was kind of cute until he became little Mr. Fireball all the time.”

Derek said, “He has been rather stupid about the whole thing.”

“Both of them have been,” Danny amended.

Mikael said, “To be fair, I think taking on a vampire when you’re just a normal person is the more foolhardy.”

“Well I’ll be back in a couple of days,” I said, hoping to lighten the mood again. I hadn’t intended for them to suffer for my imprudence. “Then you can show me a new game.”

Jake, who had been quiet after I’d preempted his question, gave me a skeptical look but didn’t say anything; the others jumped excitedly, promising they’d have a really great game by then. As they walked away from my cabin, Jake turned back. It was strange how subdued he was compared to the others. For a moment, I feared he would return to my door with some other question to which I didn’t have an answer. Then he caught back up with the others, smiling and nodding as they discussed what new game they might create.

Elemental: Chapter Seven, Part 3

I wanted to turn the topic away from the serious discussion questions, afraid it might lead to something I wasn’t willing to admit; say, special feelings for a special someone who was already with another unnamed person. “What’s your favorite color?”

We changed the game to favorites for a long time. Nick loved the color green, he obsessed about Italian manufactured cars, and wanted to go to Europe someday. He hated school, could never master any instrument past three notes, and indulged frequently in the golden oldies that give you that feel-good bubble of happiness in your chest—his words, not mine.

My favorite color, as he learned, was pastel blue, I wanted to live in France someday, and had a fascination with stuffed bears (my massive collection left behind). My dislikes included liars, shopping, and the meaningless jewelry lessons my mother had forced me through. We went on to cover numerous other topics, usually playing off of each other for the next question. Favorites lasted a good hour or so, surprisingly enough.

“How many girlfriends have you had?” I inquired, pulling out of our “favorites” category.

“Two,” he replied easily. “I went out with one for a week before she dumped me for her ex, and the other I went out with for three months before she said I needed to marry her or leave her. We were 16, so I told her she was insane and left. She’s getting married in June to the guy she dated after me.”

“At least one of you found a happy ending,” I remarked before I could stop myself.

“Well, no one ever said I wouldn’t find mine.” His jade eyes held mine for a moment and sent a shiver down my spine. Why did he affect me this way? That was my biggest question, especially when I still barely knew him, despite our game. “What about you?”

“No girlfriends for me,” I joked, relishing the wide-eyed look he gave me. “I’ve had three boyfriends,” I continued, still smiling as his face returned to its interested but distant listening state. “One was because Sara broke up with him and he was such a mess she told him I’d go out with him; so I did, for a month before he got over her. Then there was the bad boy at lunch that no one liked and I ended up completely smitten over. Total disaster; it lasted two weeks before he admitted he had only been with me because he wanted to be with Emily but had lost interest, and therefore lost what grain of interest he had in me. He wasn’t the first I had experienced something like that with, but he was the only one with that intention I actually dated.

“Then there was Richie, who broke up with two of my friends at the same time and then asked me out. We dated about three months. He was a drunk and thought I would do anything he asked, so I left him, and never looked back.” I decided at the last minute not to tell him the exact circumstances. It wasn’t his business really. Well, it might have been but I wasn’t going to let it be. Not yet at least.

“Definitely more interesting than my story of the exes.”

“I think you beat me with the marriage one, though,” I said, pressing my lips together and grinning as I nodded my head slightly. “First date kiss?”

“Only if both of us agree it’s the right time,” he replied without missing a beat.

“How many times has that happened?”

“Never.”

“Thought so;” I couldn’t help smirking at his deflated, theatrical pout.

“What about you, Miss Experience?” His eyes were gleaming and the crooked grin returned.

“If the timing and the person are right,” I answered, fully realizing how cheesy it sounded.

“And has that happened?”

“How often do you find the right person?” I countered, leveling my gaze with his.

“Once in a lifetime according to every poet in the known universe.”

“Exactly.”

He pouted his lips, and I took my turn. “Were you a good person?”

“Am I or was I?”

“Were you?”

“Not always. I screwed up a lot,” he responded, gazing ahead at the mess of tripping children, new cacti and puddles of mud. There was a hesitancy to his voice, as though he was ashamed of himself. “I enjoyed pulling pranks and ‘hacks,’ if you will. Nothing too serious. All for kicks and giggles; I wasn’t caught until last year…but not by whom one might think.”

The way he finished speaking made it very clear he was done. I understood, since there were things about my past (and my present) I didn’t want to bring up any more than I had to. But I couldn’t help but wonder what his secrets were like. How bad were they? Were they anything like mine? Better? Worse?

“What about you? Were you a good person?”

I didn’t answer; I knew I hadn’t been; I had been shallow and careless and concerned more with not falling off the top of the pyramid. I made a lot of decisions I never wanted to remember. And Nick didn’t need to know any of that. No, that wasn’t right. I didn’t want him to know any of that; I didn’t want to think how knowing those things would change the way he looked at me.

“So…I guess not a good question to ask.”

I wanted to say, “No duh,” but couldn’t bring myself to pull out of my upright fetal position. I had asked it first, after all; I should have realized it would come right back to me.

“If you could do anything right now, anything in the world, what would you do?” he asked instead.

“I would be honest with everyone I’ve ever known,” I replied, the words just falling from my lips.  A voice in my head screamed, demanding to know what I was doing. But I went on, feeling guilty he was so willing to be honest when I just wanted to hide things from him. “I keep so much to myself, and sometimes I just wish I wasn’t so afraid to tell it straight, to everyone who deserved it. You know?”

Nick didn’t disappoint when I glanced at him, searching for reassurance I wasn’t mad. “I feel the same way sometimes.”

Neither of us said anything, and the silence between us echoed with the giddy screams and laughter below.

“What would you do?” I asked after a moment, needing to break the quiet.

“That’s too easy;” he smiled crookedly. “Kiss you.”

The thought tripped through my mind and I couldn’t decide if I wanted to kiss him or not. So I did what I did best, pretend. Leaning in, as if granting his wish, Nick followed suit. I almost felt cruel when my lips stopped a breath away from his and announced, “Try again.”

I stood and walked down the slope, calling the children to clean up before lunch. They groaned and obligingly agreed, but their disappointment was nowhere near equal to that of Nick. He was confused and grudgingly realizing what had happened.

My mind hoped he realized he wasn’t as desirable as he thought himself to be, while my heart chided he was more than I might be able to handle.

Elemental: Chapter Seven, Part 2

 “Like 20 questions?”

“Not really. The object is just asking questions. Each person gets one question per turn. No winner, no rules, you don’t even have to tell the truth; but…it’d be nice if you would;” his jade gems were serious and piercing.

“I’m game;” I smiled, interested in how this would turn out and hoping he would lighten up again. I liked it when he wasn’t so serious; it kept me from being too serious. “You start.”

He leaned back on his hands, his lips scrunched to the side in thought. “Why are you here?”

I thought a moment, judging just how much to tell him. Drei had warned to be careful, and thus far we had all limited how much we tapped into our power, causing him to believe most of it was mere coincidence. What he didn’t think was coincidence, we worked to convince him he imagined. It had become quite a game with the kids; it was rather entertaining hearing the stories and conspiracy theories they developed and built upon until we had forgotten what had started it all.

“Because I can do this,” I said after a moment, picking a flower resembling a fairy hat from beside me, using the air to lift it from my fingers and presenting it to Nick.

He plucked the blossom from the air saying, “Nice parlor trick.”

“Not so much a trick.” I didn’t really want to explain. Showing him was one thing; actually telling him outright was quite another. “My turn, right?”

Nick nodded, inspecting the flower for wires or something, trying to make it levitate as I had moments before, only to watch it fall to the grass repeatedly.

“What was your life like before?”

“Before the fire?” he clarified. At my nod, he continued slowly; “Well, we were happy. Kit and Kate had just started second grade and were ecstatic, finally allowed to buy non-matching clothing sets. My mom had insisted until then that twins were safer dressed alike. Really, she just thought they were cute dressed the same. Dad had been promoted and was talking about moving, which of course led to arguments with my mom; she insisted we stay and not uproot our lives because he wanted to. He was threatening to leave and just send money back, which she said was irrational and that we needed him. And then they’d jump straight to making up;” his cheeks flamed as though he had stumbled across this once and regretted it since.

“I used the instability of their relationship to stay out late. I never did anything I might later regret, but being around people who did somehow made me feel less cowardly. The first time I misjudged the night’s events and showed up late to be caught, they ripped me a new one, then apologized for stunting my growth and just asked if I would stay away from those guys. Course I didn’t…and now I kind of wish I had. Who knows, maybe they still would have been around.”

“I thought you said you were happy?”

“Kit and Kate were, I was, and Dad was; Mom just didn’t want to move, otherwise she was thrilled for Dad and the rest of us.”

“You really miss them,” I stated, thinking about my dad at home, wondering for the first time how he was holding up.

“What was your life like?”

“Before coming here?”

“Well, it is a reciprocal question.” I laughed as he wiggled his eyebrows. The first time he had done that, I tried and he fell over laughing so hard, I couldn’t help but laugh. I could tell from the look in his eyes he was thinking of the same thing.

“Superficial,” I started, forcing myself to look at what my life had really been like. “My dad worked all the time, I never knew my mom, and my mother was in constant denial of there ever being someone else. I was an only child, left to my own devices—one of which was a credit card with a limit I never reached. I had friends who were more like snakes with pearly smiles, but it was better to be on their side than to be against them. And then Drei saved me.”

He waited a moment longer, as though expecting more explanation, but I wasn’t going into the details of why or how he saved me. Nick needed to know that as much as he needed to know why I was here.

When the tension in his relaxed position returned, I knew he was ready for me to ask him another question. “What were you thinking that night, when they were talking about making you leave?”

Nick shrugged and looked out past the kids to the lake.

“Really,” I insisted, resting a hand lightly on his knee. I had been so concerned with everyone else in the room, I didn’t know, and I kind of wanted to.

“Well,” he drawled, as if still thinking. “At first I was just preparing myself for it. Trying to convince myself that it was nothing and at least I had met you, and I was feeling better. I had kind of expected it,” he admitted, “but just the mental preparedness of myself was lacking. But then you argued for me, and I couldn’t believe it. You barely knew me and yet you were fighting for me against one of the most frightening guys I’ve ever met. And I couldn’t stop thinking about how amazing and brave that was.” He didn’t shrug, as I had expected him to, to lighten the weight of his words. Though I had looked away to hide my flaming cheeks, I knew he was staring at me with those piercing eyes, trying to measure my response.

“What were you thinking?” he questioned after a moment.

I didn’t respond right away because I didn’t know how. The night was a blur; I couldn’t even remember what Drei had said really, let alone what I was thinking.

“I don’t think I was,” I began slowly. “I just remember that I knew it was unfair and at one point that I was ready to leave if Drei wanted me to. What he was doing wasn’t right, and it made me—it made me so angry.”

Nick nodded, like he knew this already and just wanted the confirmation. “Your turn.”

Elemental: Chapter Seven, Part 1

Chapter Seven: The Trees Have Eyes

Part of me felt useless with the children alternating their games to match the warming spring weather, trusting each other to be creative in altering them or creating new ones. There was still the occasional need to resolve a problem or patch up a scraped knee, but they were considerably more independent now. Not to mention much friendlier towards each other from when I’d first arrived.

Nick kept me entertained, a distraction from my former pastime. He would spin fanciful encounters of foreign lands and unconquered mountains crushing him in defeat. I couldn’t be certain what was true, but it was refreshing to laugh again, even if it was only because of faux chivalry.

One particular afternoon, we were lying side by side on the springy new grass, a color to rival Nick’s eyes. The children were running around playing a version of tag that would have had complaints of cheaters had any other group of children been involved. Michelle, Jake, Danny, and Kora judged what was fair and unfair according to the regulations I had set up in the winter. Of course, they had modified it so Nick would be more likely to believe all the tripping and mud slicks were not entirely out of the ordinary.

“What are you thinking about?” Nick questioned quietly. I felt his eyes on me as I followed a puff of cloud passing overhead, pondering briefly what would happen if I tried to change its path.

“Nothing really,” I said, for an instant believing I had seen something in the folds of fluff. Why did unrealistic things jump out at me when my mind was elsewhere? I guessed it happened to everyone, but it seemed so strange that it happened to me, even after I had spent so long practically ignoring things like clouds unless it rained.

“Want to do anything?”

“I don’t know,” I replied, tearing my eyes from the cloud and whatever it was or wasn’t hiding. “You?”

“Well,” he began, an uncharacteristic hesitancy to his voice. In the two weeks he had been here, he hadn’t been hesitant about anything, not even flirting with Lily to obtain some posters for his room. “I want to get to know you.”

Instead of saying anything, I tossed his statement around in my mind a while, wondering if I was willing to let him know me. I was somewhat tempted to laugh, even. No one had ever said they wanted to know me. Most people had just assumed who I was and I had felt compelled to fit that image. I learned to be really good at it, too, which was perhaps the saddest part.

“How?” I sat up to face him.

He followed suit. “Ever play questions?”

Elemental: Chapter Six, Part 6

That night, Nick slept in my bed and I stayed curled in the rocking chair. Though Drei didn’t return, I managed to find sleep without him. My dreams weren’t the best, but it was an improvement on my former state. As strange as it was, I found the lack of his scent didn’t bother me this time, almost as if I had maxed out on my nightly interest in it.

I woke early again, knowing my duties were would not be dismissed a second day and the children would be running around in no time.

Valetta stood in the doorway, leaning elegantly against the frame. That’s when I noticed Nick wasn’t there. The covers had been pulled neatly across the mattress, the pillows fluffed and stacked, my blanket folded across the foot. There wasn’t any indication he had been there.

“Where is he?” I demanded, jumping to my feet and halfway across the room. I felt betrayed, certain she had removed him when I’d let my guard down believing she had been on my side the previous night.

“Calm down,” she said gently, unmoving.

“What did you do?” I tried to withhold my anger since she was so calm but I wouldn’t exactly call it contained.

Valetta stepped forward, radiating composure. “Lily and I asked Mitchell to move him to another cabin. It is not entirely appropriate for both of you to share.”

“Wish you would have said something sooner,” I mumbled, feeling small for jumping to conclusions. At least he was still here.

“You were still asleep when he woke. I volunteered to explain it to you.”

“Why?” I asked. Was she planning something? Aside from last night, she hadn’t treated me very well.

Valetta sat on my tidy bed, turning to me, motioning I should sit as well. “I regret my behavior towards you upon arrival. It was disrespectful, and I should have given you a chance,” she said quickly, holding my gaze.

I looked down, not really understanding what she was doing, or why. “What changed?”

“You proved me wrong,” she said, as if it had been that simple all along. “I had perceived you as selfish and not much more grateful than the brats—sorry, children,” she corrected automatically. “Last night, though…that was impressive.” A slight smile crossed her features. “No one stands up to Drei. He is the leader; that is a universal truth for us. He is not wrong, though we sometimes disagree with his decisions; he always thinks of how it will affect us all, not just a few…or even one.” She smirked at me, though I could have been imagining it. Valetta didn’t seem the type to smirk. Part of me wondered if I had woken up in an alternate reality, or if I’d truly woken up at all.

I decided my mind was playing tricks on me and considered her words. I could understand what she meant. It was like high school: the popular people were that way for a reason. Everyone else either fell in line or fell by the wayside. Yet, this was also different, because he didn’t seem the type to lead for the sake of leading.  

“It’s like he gives you a purpose outside of living for yourself. Something to aim for,” I said softly.

“Exactly.” Our gazes met and I realized we weren’t so different. Both of us understood wanting the control, not having it, and knowing there was greater safety amongst those who did.

“I admire you,” she went on, “because you were not afraid to face him.”

“Without your support, I would have lost,” I insisted, trying not to blush.

She smiled at me, different from how she smiled at Drei, but a genuine smile all the same. “I supported you because I knew you were right.”

“What is the deal with Martin, anyway?” I asked randomly, remembering his excessive butt kissing the previous night.

“Him?” She waved her hand dismissively, scoffing. “He will do anything to stay in Drei’s good graces. We all figure Drei will leave sometime and start a new camp elsewhere. Martin wants to earn control when he does.”

“And Mitchell?”

“He is a typical vampiric male. The only exception is that everyone likes him,” she admitted, smiling like any girl dishing a good bit of gossip. “What about Nick?”

“He’s…” I began before I realized I didn’t know what to say about him. “…different.” The word felt like the best fit. I didn’t know much about him yet, but I knew he was different from any other guy I had ever met.

She cocked her eyebrows. “Is that all?”

I shrugged, playing it down more than necessary. “Yes.” She didn’t say anything, as though expecting me to elaborate in the silence. Yes, we had bonded. Did I trust her? Not yet. I wasn’t convinced she was anything more than an acquaintance. So I wouldn’t tell her how much Nick staying meant to me, or how I felt he was safe and yet a mystery I wanted to solve.

“I’ve got to go,” I said instead. “The kids.”

“Oh,” she replied, shaking her head as if she had forgotten where we were. “Yes, of course.”

I smiled meekly, hoping she would forget to ask later, though, with my luck, I doubted it.

Outside, the children had already begun playing, except it was them against Nick in a game he must have thought up. It involved lots of mud and mini fortresses dotting the mud-ball field. From the looks of it, they had their fair share of casualties. I sat away from them, watching the onslaught as someone finally broke Nick’s defenses and nailed him with blob at close range. He split them up into separate groups and they continued on their own as he made his way toward me, plopping down in a sloshing mess.

“Hi;” his smile shone through the hardening muck.

I smiled back. “Hi. You’ve made quite the mess.”

“Of myself or everyone else?” he questioned jokingly.

“Both,” I replied, unable to help smiling more.

“That was the plan,” he insisted light-heartedly.

I laughed, thinking how strange he was. How completely unexpected he had been. “Don’t overexert yourself.” I was only slightly concerned so much activity would cause him some other injury.

“Don’t worry. I’m stronger than I look.” His smile was slightly crooked, causing me to question if he wasn’t maybe a little dangerous.

“You keep telling yourself that.” I said, looking away from him to the children at play below us.

“Sure thing,” he assured, smashing a mud-ball on my head.

I gasped from the cold and the shock of the thick goop dripping down my neck and over my ears, watching him laugh beside me. Pushing him over, he started rolling downwards as I sprinted to the muddy field below to pay him back, telling him as much. Even though I complained, for once, I was honestly enjoying myself.

Elemental: Chapter Six, Part 1

Chapter Six: Something Unexpected

The following months flew past in an uneventful blur. Though Drei always seemed just a breath away, I had separated us further; I kept conversations brief with him, and all frivolous chatter to myself.  Despite this, he stopped by every night to lull me to sleep. The one night he didn’t, I couldn’t sleep at all. It wasn’t easy to keep him at arm’s length, but I knew it wasn’t supposed to be.

Nearly every day my charges desired a new game. It wasn’t long before they seemed to forget they had ever fought. When this realization struck me, I decided it was time to develop games they could conduct without me. I spent the winter days sitting on the hillside, gazing out over their play and stranded in thought. Of my former friend group, I had been the one to think the most; that paled in comparison to my current preoccupations. I avoided unpleasant thoughts of the past and the circumstances leading me to this point, but I rather enjoyed the random philosophical questions that came to mind.

Occasionally, one of the children require my assistance with an injury or a problem. I would find bandages and disinfectant or listen attentively as the situation was revealed, offering what advice or mediation I could. Then, usually feeling better, he or she would run off to join back in the games.

There was a day, some weeks after my arrival, when I met the other vampires controlling my fate. I remembered a few—such as Lily with her pale locks and piercing blue eyes and Mitchell with his bald head, ebony skin, and gorgeous black eyes—but most I couldn’t recall even if someone whispered their names in my ear again. They were all too similar and equally quiet—at least in my presence. The meeting was largely a formal introduction; the entire time Drei spoke, I endured the feelings of animosity, annoyance, and doubt hanging in the room. Perhaps the real reason so many were forgettable to me was that my concentration had been spent more on trying to shield myself from their emotions instead of learning their names.

The one event managing to stay vivid in my memory was Christmas.

I knew the vampires were busy scavenging for presents; with only 12 of them and roughly 40 children, they had quite the workload. The only reason I knew, however, was because I noticed there were considerably fewer of them hanging around during any part of the day—I was fortunate enough to see Valetta only a few days a week, a vast improvement on three times a day.

On Christmas morning, we were all treated to a feast of sorts: bacon; eggs made sunny side up, scrambled, and pouring through the center of toast; sausage; milk; a variety of juices; and a wide selection of fresh fruits.

Then came the presents, brought out in heaping, velvet red sacks. Several of the children had also received gifts from their parents—I guessed from a P.O. Box in some nearby town. Personally, I wasn’t expecting anything. Christmas was more of a child’s and lover’s holiday in my opinion. Besides, I really didn’t need anything. Or so I told myself.

To my great surprise and delight, Mitchell approached me from the brightly littered slope of lawn and handed me a rectangular box.

“Here,” he said as I inspected the snowflake design for some telltale sign.

“Who’s it from?” I questioned after a moment.

His lips upturned into something more mischievous than jolly. “I would say Santa Claus, but something tells me you are too old to buy it.”

I steadied my gaze on him, a playful twist to my lips. “So what will you say?”

“It is a secret persona to whom I am supposed to report your reaction at a later time.”

After a moment more of staring—a vain hope I might wear him down—I slowly peeled back a corner of the paper.

“It is not surgery,” Mitchell teased.

Though the remark was rhetorical, I found myself saying, “I’m not four either.”

Beneath the cheap snowflake paper was a velvet box, the kind jewelry usually comes in. Popping open the lid, Mitchell craned his neck to sneak a peek as my free hand flew to my lips.

On the silk bed lay a minuscule gold chain—at least 14 karat gold if Mother dearest had taught me anything at all—supporting an angel constructed of different gems. Her head was a diamond with a golden halo, iolite wings, and an amethyst gown.

“Who gave this to me?” I repeated, my heart pounding.

Mitchell merely grinned secretively and loped away.

Elemental: Chapter Five, Part 6

They gathered on dry ground near the lake’s shore, bathed in sunlight. For the first time, I realized how different the groups were from each other. Most of the earth elementals possessed varying shades of brown hair and eyes, while the water elementals were mostly blonde and blue-eyed. I wondered if air elementals were just a jumble of anything, or if they were similar to Mom and me.

“What’s with the feathers?” Danny asked, skeptically.

Michelle added, “None of us can do anything with them.”

“Not with your elements,” I conceded, glancing around, hoping everyone was listening. “But I can do plenty. Today, we’re going to learn to end this silly segregation of the elementals.”

“This is how it’s always been, though,” an older boy from the water elementals piped up. He didn’t say it in a demeaning way. If I wasn’t mistaken, he sounded somber about it.

“Name?” I asked.

“Jake.”

“Well, Jake,” I replied, “we’re ending that business today. We’re here because we’re going to make changes in the world. And if we aren’t united, how can we expect anyone to unite with us?”

A few of the older children agreed this was a good point, while some of the younger children smiled or made faces at the other group. I was beginning to think all they needed was someone on their level to instigate a change instead of perpetuate what had become the norm; I just hoped it worked and I wasn’t blowing steam.

“So,” I began, drawing attention back to me, “we’re going to play a game, and I’m going to lead it.”

“What do we do?” a small, dark skinned earth elemental asked. “Mikael,” he said quickly, as though it were an afterthought.

“Mikael, what we’re going to do is this.” I lifted one of the feathers and made a show of blowing a little air underneath to give it lift. They watched, mesmerized by the feather now floating over their heads. It drifted under my will toward a girl on the outside of the water elemental group. Knowing an argument would ensue if I didn’t even it out, I sent another unseen feather toward a boy in the center of the earth elemental group. The first feather ducked under her long golden waves while the other slipped into his pocket.

“No fair!” someone shouted from the earth party.

Many more cries of injustice filled the air while the water party complained it was only right. I caught the eye of the boy with the feather in his pocket and sent a whisper to his ear. He pulled out the feather and silenced everyone on his side by showcasing his own treasure. “It is fair,” he insisted, standing. When they finally took notice of him and quieted, he added, “Derek.”

The girl stood also, saying, “Xenia.”

“Each round, two people will have a feather,” I went on to explain, “except you won’t know who, only the people with feathers will. You all have to work together to figure it out. When you have six candidates, we’ll see if you chose right. The winners will either be those with feathers or everyone else.”

“Bethanie,” a dark blond, tanned girl said, raising her hand. “So it’s a guessing game?”

“Sort of,” I admitted. “But there’s a twist. You have to question each other, but you can’t question anyone from your elemental group. And no one is allowed to lie; I’ll know if you do.”

“Kora,” a pale brunette said suddenly. “Because you’re special?”

“Because I’m an air elemental,” I corrected. Drei might have thought it was special and unique, but I wasn’t going to buy into that with them; it would probably only backfire. Besides, bringing them together was about emphasizing our similarities despite our differences.

They were unsure about my claim since they’d never met an air elemental before. Then Jake pointed out I had made the feather fly and they all agreed this was perfectly plausible. It was something I missed from my childhood: the undeniable way something so simple can lessen the complexity of a question.

Thus the game began. It was interesting to see them mingle as if they had done it forever. The most enjoyable aspect of the game, however, was listening to all the creative ways people denied having the feather when they did. Thanks to water in the blood and contact with the earth, most of them could tell when someone was nervous or excited, so the feather holders lost more than the whole. By the end of the third game, there were no more snide accusations toward others, just curiosity filled requests. The change, in just a few hours, was incredible. If only adults could be like these children; special or not, they had accomplished a sense of—hopefully enduring—unity.

Valetta approached us toward the end of our tenth round. Both of the feather holders were in the six candidates and the group won again. Even though the feather holders lost, the two joined in the celebration of cheers.

She cleared her throat. Immediately, the children faced her, silent, but joy still burst inside them and apparent in their anxious stirring. They wanted another game and she was an interruption that demanded attention and respect. “It is time for lunch,” she said, seemingly oblivious to the whines and disappointed fussing. “Please line up.”

They obediently slumped up the slope to where vampires were waiting to pass out meals.

Valetta gave me a look before stalking away. She was either curious as to what I had done, or envious that she had been unable to do it herself. Either way, it was nowhere near the friendly smile she had showered upon Drei earlier.

I waited until last to receive my lunch. When I arrived where the children were sitting, I was somewhat surprised—though mostly relieved—to see the groups were demolished. It became even more obvious from the way they flocked around me, asking me to sit with them and show them more tricks. Some even requested I create a new game for the next day. Their words were filled with excitement and wonder, and their eyes overflowed with adoration. Something about the whole situation made me feel important and less petty than I knew I had been. It was uplifting.

A shame I still felt alone.