True Heroes (60 page)

              “A talent I discovered. We’re in your mind now, yes? And your mind is spread now, so music that enters your brain is focused through me, into your brain, and into the field we project. You’ve become a jukebox.”

              “No quarters required. Good deal.” He focused on a single song, and suddenly couldn’t stop his mouth from moving. “This was the song my mom always used to tell me to turn down. Even when she could barely hear it from my ear buds, even with the quiet solo near the end that truly invigorates my heart; she still had no taste for it. It reminds me so much of her.”

              Behind Caleb, his blue mirror had transformed into a life-like version of his mother.

              The song changed, Power returning to normal as Caleb focused more on the current strums. “This was mine and Carol’s first dance. My freshman year, August twenty-sixth, ten-thirty-three. She had red punch on her white dress that we both laughed at. My dark-green polo blended into the walls nicely. I feel you, over my shoulder. You can’t be here.” A warm wind clammed his shoulder under his shirt. “What do you want? You’re not real.”

              “What is real, Caleb?”

              The haunting voice offered his hearing a glimpse of penultimate, ignominious action. “I am. You’re not.”

              “In here, we’re all just thoughts.”

              “No, you’re just a memory.” 

              “You always lived here.”

              “I know.”

              “You never thought I was good enough.”

              “I know.”

              “You know now, but you didn’t then.”

              “I know, I know.”

              “There’s nothing you can fix. Nothing you can change.”

              His field suddenly vibrated heavily from the front. The image disappeared from Caleb’s shoulder as Alice’s hand gently ran across the side of the dome. He withdrew it slowly into the outline of his body as he stood, she running up with the blanket and basket in hand. “That was so cool. What was that?”

              “That was me extended out a bit.” He avoided eye contact for a few seconds before flashing a smile. “I’ll explain over lunch.”

-                            -                            -             

              Caleb hadn’t seen the twilight. He hadn’t glanced as the sun bled into the oceans and meadows beyond his furthest sights, but had only stared at the sidewalk, wandering in wonder until he soon found himself in the same meadow as before. The darkness here was substantial; his eyes never illuminated beyond the sentry pastels. ‘You haven’t dwelled on Carol much at all today.’

              ‘I’ve wanted to, trust me.’

              ‘I know. So have I.

              ‘Why you?’

              ‘I feel what you feel Caleb. How could you not realize that by now?’

              ‘I do, but you’re too rational to be that way.’

              ‘And what are you?’

              ‘I’m too logical not to be that way. I did something wrong, I can’t change it. It’s something that is forgiven with time.’

              ‘You failed her.’

              Caleb sighed. ‘I failed a lot of people, and if I ever get the chance, I’ll redeem their memories. Until then, what will be will be.’

              ‘What will be is what we make it. Even you have the power to change some things.’

              ‘I’ll change what needs to be changed and do what needs to be done. Nothing more.’

              Leaves rustled at his back against the darkened bark.              “Who’s out there?”

              Caleb’s calm demand for identity settled for rustling brush for a bit longer in the pitch black before a voice sounded. “Everybody. Who am I speaking to?”

              ‘Your woman. How did she follow us?’

              ‘Good question.’ Caleb stepped lightly forward, only able to guess at obstacles and distances so far into the night brush. “Alice?”

              “No I told you it was Everybody. Who are you?”

              ‘What game is she playing now?’ Caleb smiled a bit. ‘And why are you enjoying this idiocy?’

              ‘Mind your business and I’ll mind mine.’ “I guess I’m Nobody.”

              He thought he saw one of her beckoning brown eyes, but could only guess his sight’s accuracy. “You’re Nobody and I’m Everybody, huh? Well, Nobody, mind if I sit and talk with you?”

              “Not at all, Everybody.” He felt her forehead hit his chest and they both laughed a bit. “I’m here. Careful sitting. Who knows what likes hanging around here at night.”

                Her hands curled around his wrists as he carefully sat her down with a grunt. Letting his butt land hard within inches of hers, she asked, “What are you doing out here, Nobody?”

              “Just felt like thinking. I like thinking in the dark.” He felt the side of her bare arm brush against his. “The interesting question is how did you find me?”

              “I did lead you here, and I do like this place, but only usually during the day. The day makes me feel alive, pretty even.” Caleb held back the urge to reassure her, infinitely cursing his onset timidity. “Like I stand out in a crowd more than usual. I never enjoyed the night alone. It always seemed like a time to be with someone, ya know? You seem to enjoy it alone if you’re out here…well, I guess you’re never really alone, but you know what I mean. Why do you like the night?”

              “Heh, exactly the opposite reason you like the day.” Her head leaned onto his shoulder as his voice lost some volume, keeping his words for her ear alone. “The day shows people for what they are as people, but the night shows us what we are as living creatures. You, me, everyone else in the circle, we all stand out in the day just like a million other weirdos, but the night is when we’re all the same on that level. It’s like closing your eyes in a crowd: every footstep is going the same direction at the same time. We’re one with all of nature on special nights like tonight, when the moon is beneath the tree line and the city is far enough away where the sky is clear. You can see it all, and it can all see us on this kind of night. I don’t know. I think we should all see these nights, then no one would be afraid of the dark.”

              “What if somebody lost themselves in the dark?”

              “Are you afraid of being lost in the dark?”

              “Sometimes,” she nuzzled gently against his stout arm, “maybe that’s why I prefer it with other people.”

              Caleb felt no safeguard. “Nobody could hold you in the dark.”

              There was silence; the dark around them swallowed the nightly chatter of the beast and insect world while the inky sky stained the light from the wood. He felt his heart hold itself from beating as his lungs suddenly found breath superfluous. It was memorably reminiscent as Power showed him flashes of the night he told Carol of his secret, but guilt and heart-ache stayed away. His frozen blood and clear mind stalled further noises of the world; their closest conversations never reached his ears. No careless breezes bombarded the trees, no clouds shaded a star, no grass leaned in for a closer listen, only Alice’s face rolled up, her eyes suddenly vibrantly visible, and Caleb whispering in his head, ‘I needed you to see her in the dark. I can see now.’ Her eyes suddenly got closer then stopped, a cautious black line between them, before he suddenly felt a wet, tentative kiss grace his cheek, allowing his air to come sweeter and blood to pulse warmer.   

                 Her arm snatched around his elbow and her head turned down, tiny whispers emanating from her mouth that was surely still warm from his cheek. “I’ve never done that why did I do that? What came over me? He’s probably so mad at me now I broke our friendship—it’s ruined.”

              “Hey,” he whispered down to her, “I’m glad you did it. I liked it. Did you?”

              She went on whispering quietly, her thoughts seen clearly in the night. “I did it of course I wanted to but I—my heart is beating so fast I feel—look up at him you’re being rude.” She turned her face upwards, Caleb feeling her heavy breaths grace his chin. “I liked it a lot I think, but I don’t know…I’m—”

              “Flustered?”

              “Yeah, quite a bit.”

              “Don’t be.”

              Caleb released and stood just as her cell phone vibrated from her pocket. He heard her fumbling as he knelt down in front of her, the glow illuminating her face like a spotlight in the night while he kept outside the rays. “David’s gathered everyone at the gymnasium. Apparently the power station went down and half the city is dark.”

              His hand reached into the light while his body remained shrouded, bringing her look up his arm and into the mass of black that blended to the sky. “I guess it’s a blackout everywhere then.” She turned the phone off quickly and grabbed his hand with both of hers, his arm flexing to lift her body easily from the dark grass. They gently fumbled for a bit as their eyes could find more behind their lids than in the open before Caleb repositioned her hands on his shoulders and his own around her slender waist. “Would you like to dance with me, Everybody?”

              He felt his voice tickle the roof of his mouth with the satiny warmth that came from some part he’d thought shriveled. He heard her chuckle and whisper a few lines, too fast for him to hear in his languid state, before he felt her balance with one hand and two small rustles in the grass a few feet away sounded. His shoes were soon indented slightly as her tiny feet balanced on his toes, her face nestled into his neck and her arms holding him close. He began to step; one foot raised an unseen distance while they swayed their joined hips against the still air until the second foot followed suit. The simplicity of the motions was uninterrupted and unchanged; they still moved and breathed and craved a perfectly warm place, but now they were simply doing it together. “What difference does it make how you do things, Caleb?”

              “I’ve never noticed a difference until now.”

              “Why do I think so much around you? It’s embarrassing. I have no buffer zone. I have no—gosh I’ve never been like this before I can’t keep my heart from beating so fast. I’m glad it’s dark my cheeks are so red, I bet—”

              “I can feel them on my neck; they’re pretty warm,” he whispered.

              “—this is gonna change everything. During my past—”

              “Don’t worry about your past,” he whispered.

              “—never thought I’d feel this growing up—”

              “Don’t grow up too fast,” he whispered.

              “What should I do then?” she asked, her attention attuned to his whispering.

              “Be here—” He suddenly felt ground give way under his stepping foot, seconds before feeling wetness up to his knee. Alice’s sweet laugh was almost drowned out by Caleb’s deeper, throaty chuckle as she helped pull him from the water. “You okay?”

              She held her laughing a bit longer before answering, “Yeah not wet at all. You okay?”

              “Yeah…,” Caleb felt a spark of idea and gently tugged at his power. He took a step forward and extended it simultaneously under his feet, creating a walkway above sitting water. His slight show gave him enough sight to see the hole in which he’d stepped was a reservoir from an uprooted tree, crudely shaped into an oblong circle.

              “Where’d you go?”

              “Don’t wander too far.” He extended his power about the shape's edge. He lit his aura very slightly in an attempt to not blind Alice, but the very low glow still startled her. She’d wandered a few feet further from where he saw their footprints in the grass, but walked closer when she saw his face smiling. Her hand ran against the side of his sphere softly, sending tiny sparks shooting harmlessly, joyously around her slender fingers. “Walk on the water with me.”

              “Are you crazy? I can’t walk on water.”

              “Don’t fool yourself,” he extended his hand again as his face, eyes and body relaxed and assumed a welcoming stance, “you’ve always wondered what it would be like.”

              “Have you?”

              “Heh, I’ve always floated at somebody’s command, but I’ve always wondered what it would be like to just float with Everybody. Just once.”

              She smiled again, her large brown eyes looking younger and younger by the second; a child’s eyes, nearly frozen in shocked wonderment over the temporary laws of the world being overcome, even if just for a moment. Alice gazed into his expanded pupils now—his blues still normally vibrant, but surely showing daring and pleading—and took a breath before plunging straight into the sphere. He saw her then as she looked at the sky through his wondrous globe, her softly lit skin grappled to her muscles and bones much like her sun dress to it, the white cotton patterned regularly with hearts, elongated at the ends with invisible strings that drew them towards some unknown anchor. Her hands behind her back, she lightly stepped forward, his field rippling across the outer surface with each compact stride, until she was under his down-turned face and staring into his shrunken irises. “Have you always needed your power to float?”