Be in the Real (20 page)

“What the fuck are you doing Kaila?” Derrick hollered, grabbing her arm. She spun to face him, ice in her glare. He fell back. His hand rapidly returned to his side.

“I’m hungry and thirsty,” she said simply.
 

She reached inside the shattered door, disengaged the lock and pulled it open.
 

“What if there had been an alarm?” Derrick said, fear lacing his words.

“There wasn’t,” Kaila said.
 

She didn’t bother to tell him that Trillian had cased the place already and had come to the conclusion that there was no security system. But even if Trillian had noticed something nefarious, Kaila wasn’t sure if she could have stopped her actions, since her need felt so great.
 

Kaila had already downed a bottle of bright orange Gatorade by the time Derrick chanced following her inside. He didn’t waste any time cracking open an ice cold Pepsi, he chugged the contents in a few long gulps.
 

With her thirst satisfied, Kaila began stuffing her already full bag with more drinks. When she couldn’t shove anymore inside she went behind the counter, where a computerized cash register sat. She grabbed a handful of white plastic bags and filled them too, adding packs of potato chips, Slim Jims, beef jerky and a few chocolate bars as well. She quickly realized that she had been haphazard in her greed because when she checked the weight of it all she grudgingly had to admit that there was no way she was capable of lugging all her goods for more than a few feet at a time.
 

Ignoring Derrick completely, Kaila tugged two pairs of sweat pants and two tees from her bag. She eyed the white cotton underpants but decided against tossing them since they weren’t the kind of item you wanted to fall short of. She threw her clothes into the garbage can that sat behind the counter then fitted a few items from the plastic bags into the newly freed up space. Kaila left the rest of the bags on the floor at her feet.

It was then that she spotted a sign that read Rest Room, mounted over a closed door at the back. She dug through her bag, retrieved her deodorant, her hairbrush, toothbrush and toothpaste and began to make her way to the rest room.

“You’re actually going to brush your hair and teeth in a place that we just busted into?” Derrick said incredulously.

 
Kaila glanced back at him; his teeth and his fingertips were Day Glo orange from the Cheetos he was busily shoving into his mouth. It was amusing to see him chew rapid fire as if he were in an eating competition.

“It’s what I do in the morning,” Kaila said, pausing for a fraction of a second. “You should brush your teeth too.”

She opened the door to the rest room, the stench of pee and mildew floated out on the overheated air, but it wasn’t enough of a deterrent for her to abandon her plans. Kaila tugged the ball-chain switch that hung from the single bulb above her head. She noted that unlike the rest of the store, this room hadn’t been modernized and didn’t have air-conditioning. The inside of the toilet bowl was coated with brown stains and didn’t look as if it had ever been cleaned. A tiny sink with rust and splotches of black mold sat to the left of the toilet. A solid pink twist-top air freshener that had once been rose-scented sat shriveled and forgotten on the tank of the toilet.
 

Kaila did her best to ignore the disgusting condition of the bathroom and went to work on brushing her teeth. She made sure to spit out as much of the brown tinged water as she could, so none made its way to her stomach. When it came to emptying her bladder, she hovered above the yellowed seat, peeing as carefully as she could while balancing. She was relieved that the rest room had a full roll of toilet tissue that looked as if it had never been used. Appreciative that she didn’t have to have a bowel movement, which would have required sitting on the toilet seat, she finished up and washed her hands. She opened the door to find Derrick standing there. His hand was frozen in midair, about to knock.

He winced as the stink from inside wafted out, surrounding them both in its putridness. A flicker of apprehension crossed his face then he shrugged and walked past her into the room, closing the door after him. Kaila listened to the sound of him urinating, marveling at the idea that she had never heard a man, or in Derrick’s case a man-boy, pee before. She actually would have liked to watch how he did it. Kaila had always been interested in how it looked when males peed. If it was like a hose on full power, or more like a tap dribbling water.

A few minutes later Derrick joined her. He had wet his hair and it looked a little better than before, he had also thankfully rinsed the cheese color from his mouth and had washed his hands.

“Let’s get out of here before we get caught,” Derrick said. He finger-brushed his damp hair. His hair spiked up a tiny bit with the move then fell promptly back into place.
 

Derrick led the way. Kaila noticed that he had retrieved the plastic bags that she had abandoned and had them clutched in his fists. On the way out he snatched a package of Band-Aids from a shelf and stuffed it into one of the bags in his hands. Kaila wondered if he had blisters on his feet like she did.

After they had left the store it didn’t take long for the building to be lost behind the tangle of trees that they were threading through. Instead of walking on the road and chancing being spotted, Derrick had insisted that they keep off to the side, trekking through the grass at the edge of the forest.
 

Kaila would have much preferred to lie down beneath one of the towering Cypresses and sleep. It felt as if she hadn’t rested in days. Derrick however, convinced her that they needed to meet his friends who would be giving them a ride to town. Kaila was suspicious about just who these friends were, but Trillian had convinced her that doing things that were unfamiliar was part of the plan; Kaila’s rigid routines couldn’t be adhered to outside of Wildwind.

They walked for what seemed a full day, but according to Derrick was just a few more hours. Finally, at precisely 9:05 a.m. according to Kaila’s watch, they cut out of the trees at the side of the road and stepped into a clearing. Judging by the piles of scorched wood, the naked stone foundation, and the single structure, a barn that was collapsing in on itself, the farm had been deserted a long while back. She gasped when she saw the banana yellow Camaro parked at the bottom end of the curved driveway, close to the road.

“There they are,” Derrick said, releasing a relieved sigh. He dug into his pocket and retrieved a lime colored pill.

“Here, take this, it will relax you,” he said, shoving it toward Kaila.

 
She opened her mouth like a bird would to its mother when it was receiving a juicy worm. He dropped the pill onto her outstretched tongue and she dry swallowed it, all the while gazing warily at the car. Though she knew she had to rely on Derrick’s judgment to get them to Pauline, she hadn’t expected to have more people, strangers, be part of their plan too.

“Who are they?” Kaila asked.
 

Derrick had been uncomfortably vague about these supposed friends and it had only made her hackles rise more with apprehension.
 

“I told you, they’re friends,” Derrick said coolly.
 

The change in his whole demeanor had been almost immediate, as if he had stepped into another persona all together. His spine had straightened and he worked his hands through his hair a few times until it lay perfectly flat against his scalp. His eyes were hard and focused, his stride purposeful as he made his way toward the car. Kaila could just make out two heads in the Camaro, but the position of the sun made much more than that initial observation impossible. She made to follow Derrick but he spun to face her, a half-grin curved his lips.

“Wait here for a second,” he said.
 

His tone left no room for discussion. Kaila watched him stride forward and was once again taken by his absolute transformation. Though she didn’t want to admit it, Derrick had slid across an invisible line from man-boy to all man.

He closed the distance between him and the car. When he reached the vehicle he leaned down into the drivers side. His arms rested casually on the edge of the open window. He spoke for a few minutes then signaled for Kaila to join them. Although she had been waiting for the invitation an icy chill traveled through her. She froze in place, unable to will her feet to take her to Derrick. When more time had passed and she hadn’t joined him, Derrick waved her over again. This time his moves were more exaggerated.

Only after Trillian reminded Kaila about the reason that they were there, about Pauline and the time constraints that bound them, did Kaila concede and move forward. She advanced cautiously, like an animal that sensed a trap but wasn’t sure where exactly it was. As she drew closer she spotted the two occupants of the car in plain view.
 

The driver was dark-skinned with long dread locks that fell to his shoulders. He wore a purple t-shirt that Kaila couldn’t help but notice that it had a gold-tone embossed infinity symbol, with the word infinity written in a way that it was a part of the symbol. Seeing the symbol both intrigued and excited her and her hesitation dropped away. She quickened her pace not bothering to look any closer at the driver or the guy positioned in the passenger seat. She believed that the symbol was like a crumb on a path, leading her to something awe-inspiring.
 

By the time she had reached the Camaro all her reservations were a thing of the past. She was in a state of bliss, knowing that she was in the exact right place in her journey. The symbol had shown her the way and now all she needed to do was follow, to discover and know, and no matter what the adventure showed her she would trust that the universe would always point her in the right direction. With those thoughts lodged firmly in her mind, she scrambled into the back seat of the car. She pushed to the far side near the window so Derrick could slip in beside her.

The interior of the car smelled a bit like burning grass. It was a similar smell to that made when lightning hit a tree and fire spread to the fields of tall grass and forests surrounding Wildwind. This had happened a few times in the years that Kaila had lived in Wildwind. One time had been very bad and the fires had come close enough to the facility that there had been talk of evacuating. An unexpected shift in the wind had pulled the raging inferno in another direction and Wildwind had been safe. Still, Kaila remembered the scent of burning and how the moon had appeared red in the sky at night and how the sun had made the soot and smoke filled air, turn pink with streaks of yellow and gold like the scaly body of a river trout.

Even before Derrick slammed the door closed the driver turned around. His gaze came to rest on Kaila in a way that made her uneasy. Another glimpse of his tee pushed the anxiety away. He shoved a hand forward, a hand-rolled cigarette burned between his pinched forefinger and thumb. Kaila immediately recognized this as the source of the smell. She had gotten a whiff of cigarettes many times before, outside, when patients or staff went out for a smoke, but this wasn’t the same as that, this was something else.

“Is that marijuana?” she said brightly, thrilled that she was getting to see in real yet another thing that she had only known about in virtual.

The driver grinned, showing teeth that were brilliantly white against his thick dark lips. Kaila wondered if he had used those whitening strip kinds of things that she had seen advertised on television.

“Exactly that,” he said.
 

His voice was a rumble in his throat, with an undertone of smooth that had Kaila’s heart beating faster at just the cadence of it. His was the kind of voice that she could have listened to forever, soothing and calm. He pushed the joint closer to her. After a moment’s hesitation, she took it deftly from him.

“I don’t think she should…” Derrick started to protest.

 
Dred-man threw up a hand, silencing Derrick immediately. Kaila studied the skinny end of the joint for a few seconds, unsure exactly how to do it.

“You just put your lips around the end, not touching you see, just as if you’re going to kiss someone, but you stop just before you do…”
 

Kaila pulled the joint toward her mouth, pursing her lips into an O.
 

“Now suck in the smoke through your lips, real slow like…that’s it,” he said as Kaila drew the white smoke into her mouth, then her lungs. A gut-wrenching cough came next as her virgin lungs protested the toxic smoke.
 

“Easy now,” the driver crooned, his voice washing over her like warmed chocolate. She wanted to enjoy the sound of it, but couldn’t stop choking. Derrick plucked the joint from her fingers. She continued to cough with a force that made her head spin. As she sputtered and tried to catch her breath she regretted that she had tried it at all. Her violent reaction had her wondering what the allure was for inhaling the substance.
 

Seconds later, a rush of euphoria surged through her. She relaxed back against the seat that smelled of leather and cologne. Soon she was riding a wave of oblivion. When Derrick rolled down the window beside him, fresh air replaced the smoke. Kaila closed her eyes, basking in the glory of being, knowing, and the feeling of floating on a cloud, high above the world where she saw everything and more.

“Sleep now,” the voice soothed.

 
Kaila listened, falling into sweet unconsciousness.

CHAPTER 25

“It is in the light that we see the darkness, and in the darkness so goes the light. Wake up.”

Kaila cracked her eyes open at Trillian’s urging. It seemed odd for Trillian to be asking her to wake up since she had never done it before, but Kaila understood that Trillian was excited to see what the real world offered. The early start might also have been because Trillian needed an outlet. Before Kaila had left Wildwind she had been worried that if she didn’t give Trillian time to write about their adventure it might prove problematic. If that happened, Trillian would shift control, take what she needed and do what she liked, and everything that Trillian liked might not be the right choice in this foreign world that Kaila had traveled to.