Jonah Havensby (35 page)

XX

When it was done, Jonah stood there stock still for a moment. He was waiting for pain. He had overcome the headache pain, and the hand pain was monumentally less than that, but right now nothing hurt. He waited for it another moment before he moved. It was true, there was no pain.

He flexed and opened both hands, not able to believe he had overcome it in such a short time. But then he wondered what he had done right. Was there some trick to it? He’d have to practice more.

The pet carrier wasn’t there, at least Adam got the message. But when he looked at the floor, he saw that the notebook wasn’t there either. And the television was off.

He found his tablet and looked at the clock. Either it took Adam an hour and a half to get the pet carrier outside, or he had taken some time for himself. Jonah suddenly remembered the few dreams he had when it felt like he was running through the forest and swinging through branches. He wondered if that was somehow Adam asking to be set free, or if that was just a remnant of something Adam had already done. He’d have to remember those dreams in the future and try to figure out which one it was.

The video camera was disconnected from the television. With nothing plugged-in the power on the television eventually turned off. He plugged the camera back in and turned on the television. He pressed the rewind button and watched the numbers dial back to all zeroes. That’s when he noticed the notebook was under the punching bag.

Jonah sat down on the floor with the camera on his lap and stretched over to retrieve the notebook. Maybe Adam had left him a message in return. He flipped through some pages, but there was nothing new. He turned his attention back to the television and pushed play on the recorder.

He watched as his hand changed. He mostly watched his face. He could see the scared look on it. He almost laughed because he looked exactly the way he felt. But then his face changed. It was almost peaceful. He remembered when he decided to let the change go and stop thinking about it. That must have been when his expression changed.

Then his body folded into so much sand. It actually caved in on itself. Jonah’s stomach rumbled and he felt a little sick. It was disturbing to watch, but he couldn’t take his eyes off of it. He watched the massive hand and forearm sticking out of the roiling, churning sand that looked like a puddle of mud. And then the hand slapped the floor hard. It jolted Jonah so much he instinctively scooted away from the television when it happened.

He watched as Adam, the Ape-Man, formed out of the sand. The sand built up around him, forming the other arm first, then his head, then his torso. For a moment it did look like Adam was climbing out of the sand.

When the transformation was complete, Adam blinked his eyes. Light green eyes set deep back in his face that Jonah could see even over the television. He looked exactly like his picture. He was kind of a caveman, but he was kind of an ape at the same time. He had long arms like an ape and his head kind of looked like a gorilla’s head, but there was something almost human in the slope of his forehead. He was almost terrifying to see, standing there in real life and not on paper. He was something out of a movie or an animated museum exhibit. But then he smacked his lips and scratched himself in his arm pit like a gorilla would do and Jonah almost laughed again.

Then Adam looked down at the notebook. With a loud snort, he swung at the notebook on the floor and it flew to the corner where Jonah had found it. He hadn’t really taken the time to read it, Jonah realized. Maybe he wasn’t supposed to leave notes for Adam. He knew Adam could write, because he had left Jonah a note about the electric blanket. Jonah remembered the Professor saying Adam didn’t like the notebook. Maybe that was a bad idea. Adam obviously knew what his instructions were, since the pet carrier was gone.

Those deep-set green eyes turned toward the television and then settled on the camera. The Ape-Man looked both sad and angry all of a sudden. He made a hasty move toward the camera that made Jonah back away from the television again, almost like Adam might come roaring through it. But Adam’s big, clawed hand grabbed the camera by the lens. He held it for a moment. Jonah wondered if he was thinking of smashing it. Then the image cut to black. That must have been when Adam pulled the cord from the camera.

Jonah realized he hadn’t gotten sick watching the video most likely because he had nothing in his stomach. He had bought food earlier, but he hadn’t eaten. He hadn’t even stayed at Eric’s for breakfast this morning.

He set the video camera and the notebook down on the floor and found the bag of food by the door. He lined up all eight bowls of food on his new shelf, right next to his new microwave. He took two of the macaroni and cheese bowls and put one in the microwave. With the other, he read the instructions on the back very carefully. He punched in two minutes on the microwave timer. While that was going, he walked outside to get the diet soda from the patio.

He hadn’t realized it was relatively warm in the tree-house. Since all of the curtains were closed, there must have been some heat trapped inside. When he opened the door, he shivered. It was incredibly cold. He picked up the soda and found that it had remained chilled, just like it had been when he pulled it from the cooler at the gas station.

On his way back in, the microwave sounded. He took out the first bowl and put another in. He spent the next fifteen minutes eating his warm meal, which beat cold canned-vegetables hands down.

When he was finished, he realized he didn’t have a trash can. So he had nowhere to put the empty bowls. He decided he would use some of his new money to buy trash bags next time he was in town.

So he went into the room with the claw-foot tub and turned on the water. He didn’t have a sink, so he let the water run into the tub and rinsed the two microwave bowls and his spoon. Then he made sure that there was no residual cheese on the bottom of the tub. He thought it would be pretty funny if he actually did decide to take a bath at some point and wound up smelling like macaroni and cheese.

He replaced the bowls and the spoon back on the shelf near the microwave and then took the two-liter bottle of soda back out to the patio.

Jonah had become too accustomed to hanging out with Eric all afternoon. He was at a loss for what to do next, so he decided to move some things in the tree-house around, but the only things he could really move were the camping hammocks. He left one by the generator so the electric blanket would reach it and he moved the other two against the wall so that all three lined up with each other. The electric blanket was still plugged in, so he left it in a heap next to the hammock.

For a lack of anything better to do, he spent the rest of the evening sorting through the three footlockers to see what was actually there.

While he was sorting through clothes and various items, he came across a pair of khaki pants he had only worn once last year.  He and his father never went anywhere that was necessarily dressy but he remembered that his father had bought them because they were on sale. That’s when it hit him that he may not have had anywhere to wear the pants then, but he certainly did now. He remembered the Winter Ball was coming Saturday and he had told Emma Wong that he and Eric would go with her. He hadn’t even discussed it with Eric since.

At the time, he hadn’t even thought of the fact he was going to have nothing to wear, and that he would look pretty silly if he went to the dance in his sweater and jeans when, apparently, it was a formal occasion. He wondered what Emma would have thought of him then.

He tried on the khaki pants and they still fit perfectly, although they were a little wrinkled. He put his boots back on, since he didn’t have good shoes. If he wore the pants down around his hips, instead of around his waist, the boots almost looked like they could pass for good shoes. He hoped it would snow the night of the Winter Ball and then at least he would have an excuse.

Jonah put his jeans back on, then carefully folded the pants, smoothed them out, and laid them on top of everything else in the footlocker. If he could straighten out the pants a little bit more, he could wear them and one of his sweaters to the dance and he might just fit in.

Tonight would be the first night he would change into his basketball shorts and t-shirt that he always slept in at home. Once he was in them, it did seem that there was a chill in the air, but that was quickly fixed when he got under the electric blanket. As he snuggled down on the hammock he was instantly comfortable. This was going to be much different than sleeping in his nest in the warehouse.

He tried to keep his eyes open as he began to watch a streaming television show on the tablet, but he quickly grew too tired. The last thing he did before he fell asleep was unplug the Christmas lights. The room went entirely black.

XXI

As soon as he woke, Jonah knew he had changed during the night. He didn’t know how he knew, there wasn’t the associated pain anymore, but somehow he felt it.

He couldn’t tell if it was morning or noon, but he could see daylight coming through where the roof of the tree-house met the round trunk.

Jonah rolled over and touched the tablet, which lit up and told him it was after eleven. Then he plugged in the Christmas tree lights.

Rolling back over into the hammock, it was strange to realize how comfortable he was in his new surroundings. He stretched and decided, since he had nothing else to do, he might just go back to sleep.

That’s when he saw the notebook propped up against the hammock that was just to his left. Whoever he changed into had left him a note. He was going to have to have another internal conversation with himself about not changing without his permission and hope that the others paid attention.

He sat up and stretched again and reached for the notebook. It was a confession from Devlin saying that Jonah had fallen asleep sometime around nine o’clock the night before. At around nine-thirty, Devlin had manifested and had gone out for a while.

Jonah took this first paragraph in stride. He was mildly upset that Devlin had come out without permission, but that wasn’t the worst thing that’s happened. Until he read the first sentence of the second paragraph that started out with “Please don’t be mad.”

This made Jonah sit bolt upright and read a little faster. Apparently, Devlin took it upon himself to race down to a payphone down by the industrial district. He made sure no one was around and then dialed Eric’s phone number using the same code Eric had used to block his mobile phone number.

This struck Jonah as odd. He had remembered seeing the numbers on the phone, but couldn’t recall them off hand. He was sure even if he was standing at a payphone he couldn’t remember Eric’s exact phone number. It was just another piece of the puzzle that the others inside him could recover a memory like that. But the thought had distracted his growing anger.

The note went on to say that he had called Eric’s mother and told her that he was Doctor Havensby. He apologized for having to hang up so abruptly the last time they spoke but felt he had to call again to apologize for the boys’ recent behavior. He said that he had told them both to have Eric home on time before he left for a meeting and apologized profusely for not bringing Eric home himself when he left.

Eric’s mother seemed to really appreciate the phone call, but before she could start a new conversation, he said he had to go and they’d talk soon.

The note was signed with a sweeping large “D” at the bottom and, under that, one sentence that simply said, “Please don’t be mad.” again

Jonah tossed the notebook into the footlocker that he had earmarked for supplies, rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands and scratched his head with both hands. He was annoyed, that was for sure, but he wouldn’t know if any damage had been done until he talked to Eric.

He had to let the anger go, because there wasn’t anyone he could necessarily yell at. These others inside him had certainly interfered in his life in a number of ways, but it seemed like it was always to his benefit. Now it was like they were interfering in things they had no business getting involved in.

On the other hand, it did make sense that Jonah’s father would call to apologize. The boys had lied and said they were at Jonah’s house that night, and isn’t that what any parent would do?

He decided to take a walk to clear his head. Jonah grabbed his jacket and the work gloves, swept the money he had into the pocket of his jeans, and made sure the green gem was in his other pocket. He decided he would walk all the way to the mall. He wanted to see if he could buy a shirt to wear to the Winter Ball anyway and a good two-hour walk would let him work off some steam.

He walked out the door into a burst of freezing cold. There was a steady wind blowing through the trees which he had not been aware of because the heavy velvet curtains were still shut tight. He braced himself against the wind and almost lowered the rope ladder, then almost turned toward the bike, but then he stopped. He turned and went back into the house.

“Okay, Devlin,” he said to himself. “You want to make it up to me? Get me close to the mall. Don’t go running around town for an hour. Don’t go beating anybody up. This is strictly ‘get me close to the mall without being seen.’ Get it?”

He walked over to the generator and picked up the tablet. “I’m checking the time,” he said to himself with a subtle threat and then put the tablet back down.

And Devlin began to manifest.

The next thing Jonah knew, he was standing at the Southwest corner of the woods. It would still be a fifteen-minute walk to the mall, but he felt like he just shaved an hour and change off the trip.

He was standing just inside the wood-line in his coat and gloves. When he stepped out, he noticed it was even colder than it had been in the woods. With nothing to block the wind, his face stung. He pulled up the hood of his coat, jammed his hands down in his coat pockets and began to walk with his head turned as low as he could and still see where he was going.