August Burning (Book 1): Outbreak (3 page)

16
hours before Outbreak. Washington, D.C

Jaxton’s vision was fuzzy and crisp simultaneously. He felt it
the appropriate word would be “fuzzing”. He needed to tell his friends how he
felt right that instant, and looked up. Perhaps he had eaten too many of the
mushrooms. Then he felt stupid. He knew he had to keep it cool-he didn’t want
people to know he was freaking out. He knew that was an unspoken rule. Instead,
he forced the compulsion down and surveyed the room Jax saw groups of men
strutting like peacocks displaying plumage, and girls wearing far too little
clothing attending to this group of peacocks or that. He felt a familiar
tugging emanating from his loins, and fought to ignore it. He just felt like
surveying tonight, felt like being the man with the knowledge. This was an
experience, he felt. He was really onto something here. He saw Elvis with his
hand on a girl’s hip in the corner. Elvis spoke to her the whole time while
maintaining an admirably stoic appearance. Everything about his manner was
artificial, Jaxton thought with amusement.

Snapping his eyes shut, he massaged his head as he felt a wave
of nausea. “You ok man?” He heard.

Liam, the bear, was staring at him, sipping on a beer on the
couch. Jaxton looked at him hard for a second, and then remembered Liam hadn’t
had the mushrooms. He groaned inwardly; where was someone he could connect
with? Though he didn’t feel panicked, his mind was certainly not at ease. An
idiotic looking frat-star cranked the thumping electronic dance music up, till
it was hammering in his ears. Jaxton suddenly felt overwhelmed. The music was
too thundering, too emotional, and too powerful. The mingling boys and girls
intimidated him, and suddenly he thought he looked like a creep, sitting on the
couch conked out. He tried his best to be chill, whatever that meant, but his
field of vision was a slowly changing landscape. There were no visual creations
parading in front of him, but everything he saw was thru a lens. Sometimes the
lens morphed a person so they were buzzing and blurry with motion, other times
they looked bright and flush with exaggerated natural color.

There was Troy, shouting viciously, beer staining his shirt. He
had a little group gathered around him and he was making exaggerated hand gestures
and grinding up against eager, bright-eyed girls. They didn’t hold it against
him. In fact, they mostly enjoyed it. Attention from the alpha male? Why not?
Jaxton stood and scanned the room, feeling his own stomach roil and roll. He
scratched his own brown beard and rose, ignoring Liam’s concern.

The little hairs on his muscular arm rose slightly as he felt a
soft touch upon him. Jaxton looked down at a girl’s flushed face, who was
grinning like a fool. “Hi there,” she slurred. “I think you bumped into me.”
Out of habit more than anything else, Jaxton felt himself examine her up and
down. His inhibitions had been removed slightly, and he knew he lingered too
long on her exposed chest. He quickly discovered she was very attractive, shapely
and eager. He wished it was Adira. Where had she gone? Jaxton looked around,
ignoring the supple blond. He didn’t really want to be here.

“Yo, I’m not feeling this,” he heard a familiar voice.

Jaxton turned, and felt a wave of relief wash over him as he
found his partner in crime. Bennett was three inches from his face. “Let’s
fucking roll, man,” Jaxton stammered. They shoved past the cloudy-eyed girl and
busted out of the dorm-room, passing six people working excitedly and sloppily
together to heat up a pizza.

“I needed to get clear of there. Jesus, this air feels good.”

They stepped out of the brick building and onto the sidewalk,
the humidity making their sweaty t-shirts stick. Jaxton felt a strong
attachment to his shorter, stocky friend, knowing they had both taken the
mushrooms together. Here was someone who knew how he felt.

“Probably not the best call for a banger in the freshman hall,”
Jaxton said, shaking the feeling that all the buildings were buzzing around
him. Or maybe they were fuzzing. Fuzzy buzzing, he thought.

“Monuments?” Bennett said, clearly wanting to get off the
school’s downtown campus and into the wooded area around the capital’s
monuments of stone and light. Jaxton nodded and they set off at a brisk pace
down the avenue past loud and raucous crowds of unruly students.

Jogging up the worn marble steps, they raised their eyes to gaze
upon a great rectangle of marble columns, soaring to the sky to support a
rectangular slab. Jaxton sighed, appreciating the beauty of the glowing white
marble in the sultry night air. The city stretched out before them. The
hallucinatory properties of his peanut butter crackers had faded on the walk.
Replacing it was an overwhelming need to speak frankly about something,
anything
. He felt slightly giddy, and
highly appreciative. Jaxton glanced sideways at Bennett. The skinny lad with
the messy blond hair was his best friend. Jaxton found himself examining his
prior lust at his friend’s latest fling with disgust.

“Where did Adira go?”

Bennett pursed his lips. “She was there. But she started talking
to two other guys, so I said fuck it.”

Jaxton did his best to sound casual,
fearing suddenly that one day, the girl would be the end of their friendship. “Have
you guys hooked up yet?”

Bennett threw a pebble down the marble stairs. “Eh. We made out,
last weekend. I tried to get her back to my place, and she said she wasn’t that
type of girl.”

“Well, that’s a good sign, dude.”

“I guess. I just feel like I need to get my body count up.”

Jaxton chuckled, remembering how long ago it had been since he
felt that way. “Dude, that shit doesn’t matter at all. All it takes is one girl
and she can erase all your insecurities, all your inexperience.”

Bennett groaned, “Remember the last girl? That chick I met at
that acapella party we somehow got into…yeah, pretty sure I never told you this
but I was so damn nervous I couldn’t even get it up.”

“Jesus man, look. You gotta stop thinking about it as a trophy.
It’s supposed to be an experience. And once you get that down, you’re golden.”

“I gotta have this one.”

Jaxton felt his pulse quicken, seeing how serious Bennett was.
“Why?”

Bennett hesitated. “She’s the easiest girl to be around, since,
I don’t even know. I mean its natural, effortless. Same sense of humor,
finally. How difficult is that to find? I’ve been looking for years, it feels
like.”

“And…”

Bennett chuckled. “Yeah, and she has a great ass. But everyone
knows that. Those dark eyes though, they’re always on my mind.”

Jaxton didn’t say anything, feeling his jealously rising. Why
hadn’t he asked for her number? They had both been there, that day outside the
gym. He grunted, fixated by the shimmering lake that stretched out like a long
finger in front of them; its water was perfectly motionless.

“What the hell are we guna do with our lives?” Bennett gestured
out with a quick flick of the wrist, in momentary disgust.

“We’re guna move to New York, and be roommates. And buy dope
fitted suits, and make a lot of money.”

Bennett sneered, “I don’t just wanna work at some business or a
bank for 60 hours a week. There’s gotta be something else, some fire, dude.
Maybe I’ll become an acclaimed erotic novelist?”

“You could join the army,” Jaxton indicated back up the avenue
towards their university hidden among the city blocks. “Troy seems to be on the
path to seize glory.”

“For this country? Not a chance. How many poor bastards signed
up after the Twin Towers fell and ended up dying in the desert, years after
Bush said
Mission Accomplished
?” He
reached up and sub-consciously made sure his messy blond hair was indeed still
messy. “I don’t even know if I can afford New York, don’t you have any loans?”

Jaxton shrugged. “No. I got that scholarship, and my parents
paid for the rest. Listen, we’re going to graduate. And then we’re going to
move into a swanky little joint. East village.”

“You’ve never even been to the east village.”

Jaxton shrugged, “So what? It’s the happenin’ spot right?”

Bennett smiled and sighed. “Why did we choose such useless
liberal arts majors?”

Jaxton coiffed his brown hair back. “Because this is 2015.
You’re an individual, and you’re going to save the world, and life’s an
inspirational poster, and you need to find your passion.”

Bennett guffawed. “Some bullshit, huh. I wish I could fight with
a great general, march with Caesar, Alexander.”

Jaxton sighed. “The college student in the capital longs to
fight with Alexander. Get the fuck outta here. Look man. Bottom line, I’m not
worried about it. I feel like everything is going to work out for us.”

Bennett shook his head. “You remember my neighbor, Dan? He
graduated six years ago. Seven years ago, and he’s living in the same musty
bedroom from middle school. I talked to the guy last summer. He said he was so hooked
by all the things everyone told him he could be; writer, director,
entrepreneur, banker…that he never really became anything. Just grabbed lazily
at some things as they passed him by, all the while thinking he was going to be
doing great things. Now he’s twenty-nine, twenty-nine years old and the prime
of his life is slippin’ away from him. He told me they got him a new bed,
though, his parents did. What a failure. Makes me sick, man.”

“Don’t be too judgey. You waste a lot of your own energy doing
that. And people notice it too. They might laugh with you in the moment, but
they don’t forget that you were the one to say it,” Jaxton answered.

Bennett remained silent, as he usually did after Jaxton rebuked
him.

Jaxton let the moment pass and drank in the damp air of late
May. There was a chill on the night wind that would disappear by June. “I feel
good.” He stood, watching how the dim streetlights cast little dancing shadows
on the neat rows of trees all across the park. There was some magic there, though
he knew its appearance was rooted in a certain fungus he had consumed hours
before. The lights seemed to dance and flicker across the softly swaying
leaves. His mind was transfixed by it, and in a series of moments the
significance of the hour drew upon him, each wave more powerful a revelation
than the last. He had, in all honesty, entered this place as a boy, and was now
a man. Here had had searched for and found friends that he knew would remain
with him for the rest of his days. Last, but certainly not least, women had
been demystified.

“This is actually the end, huh,” Jaxton said quietly.

“Stepping out into the unknown. We’ve had a life-plan for every
year of our life up until now. Guaranteed friends, place to live, all gone. Not
anymore.”

“What kind of finale would this be without our unit at full
strength?” Jaxton laughed, indicating an approaching group of boisterous
youths. Troy, Liam, Elvis, and two girls appeared out from under the gloom of
the swaying trees. Their laughter carried fast up the stepped marble, drawing
the attention of a park guard. The man strutted over in matching apparel, quite
clearly taking himself more seriously than anyone else did. As he attempted to
establish a stern façade, Troy snapped him a mock salute and cracked some jab
that drew the amusement of the women in tow.

Adira approached Bennett, moving like a cat in the night, and
settled down beside him, clasping the back of his neck with her long fingers.
So she was back. She leaned back briefly, and Jaxton met her eyes, which were
penetrating and dark. They made him nervous.

Troy strutted in front, looking utterly lost trying to maintain
his composure. He plopped down next to Jaxton and clasped him on the shoulder,
trying to meet his eyes. He failed, and just leaned back on the cold marble
with his eyes shut. “This feels nice.”

Elvis attempted to strut next to the other female, following her
like a lost dog, though she seemed to ignore him. Jaxton had to suppress a
chuckle as he saw what the evening had done to his swagger. Elvis’s face was
puffy and flushed, narrow eyes fluttering with exhaustion, and his once
perfectly coifed hair was disheveled. He plopped down on the hard marble with
all the grace of a pregnant woman navigating a roller rink.

Liam smiled and shook his head at Jaxton knowingly, and sat down
next to him with broad warmth that the entire group could feel. “Good to see
you’re back on your feet, you were looking a little fucked up in there.”

“You’re tellin’ me,” Jaxton agreed.

“This is Harley. Harley, this is Jaxton,” Liam said proudly, the
words spoken as if he were the group’s protective uncle.
The new girl had hazel eyes that skittered deliciously.
There was a delightful energy in her mannerisms that seemed to draw the others
to her. Jaxton felt his heart beating a little bit faster as he strove to meet
her hazel eyes with his own grey ones. She barely gave him the pleasure. Elvis
noticed the ruffian Troy sleeping on the cold marble, and nodded in drunken
approval, leaning back to copy him with a groan. Harley smiled again, “Two
down.”

Bennett
was already speaking softly to Adira, and Jaxton wanted to leave. He needed to
be sober.