The Unwanted Winter - Volume One of the Saga of the Twelves (19 page)

“
How did you do it, Tony?”
Mikalah asked, now truly confused.

Elena giggled at Mikalah’s
wonderment, but shifted her gaze back toward her brother, an eager
expression written on her face.

Anthony seemed suck in his
tongue like it was a foot long.

Both girls arched an
eyebrow in question, disgust their mutual expressions
asking
,
“
What the hell?”

To which, of course,
Anthony was entirely oblivious. He seemed to collect himself as if
nothing had happened. He tilted his head slightly to the side,
uttering, “You know, I could just see everything in my mind. I
could somehow direct the team, but I really don’t know how I did
it.”

“
Did what?” asked Ernie,
getting up and placing his headset in front of his TV. He returned
to his seat on the over-stuffed BARCO-lounger, apparently finished
with team play for the day.

Anthony turned toward his
uncle, his brow furled in concentration, wanting to get this
explanation as accurate as possible. “Like I said, it was kinda
like a dream, you know? Like a dream you can anticipate and begin
to predict. Over time, it kinda gave me a degree of control. I
mean, I knew it was a game, but I could see everything like I was
in a dream of my own creation, something I could guess at,
interpret, I don’t know
read
somehow. I don’t know how I can answer the
question any better, I just could and we couldn’t lose. I could see
those other teams “toons” and I just knew where they were going to
go just as they did. I was able to move our team into the right
place with the right tactics in advance. It was all happening so
fast; I’m not sure what I was doing, only… I was doing it, all of
it. It doesn’t make any sense, huh?”

Ernie merely grunted and
laughed briefly, already dismissing it as some stroke of luck. He
changed the video setting on the TV from “Game” to “Cable” and
began searching for the college football game he wanted to catch
before he had to leave for a barbeque at one of his friend’s
house.

Mikalah watched her
brother deflate a bit when their uncle didn’t offer any sort of
comment to his reply. She darted a glance toward her older sister.
Elena wasn’t looking at Anthony like he was crazy. Rather, her
countenance was simply determined. Her face was set with the type
of cast Mikalah knew as her “interested” expression. She was keen
on understanding what had happened to their brother. Next, she
would spend a good deal of time trying to figure it out, no matter
what. That was just the way Elena did things. She would ask him
question after question. Most likely, she’d badger Tony to death
with them. She wouldn’t relent until she knew exactly what had
happened and why. Mikalah knew her big sister too well and smiled
at the thought of Anthony barricading himself within his room and
locking the door, trying to get away from Elena and her ten million
questions.

“
So, Elena, are we still
gonna play outside,” inquired the little girl, an early attempt at
saving her brother from eminent torture.

Elena stared at Anthony
for a bit longer, who was staring back with an ever-enlarging
crease in his brow. “Yeah, we probably should, because it’ll be too
cold to play later on. We might as well go out while we still
can.”

Mikalah giggled, knowing
Anthony wasn’t out of the woods yet. Elena would bombard him later.
She could tell by the look on her sister’s face.

~~~~~~~~<<<<<<{ ☼
}>>>>>>~~~~~~~~

Fugue

Saturday, November
20
^th
,
9:37 pm…

She knows I love her with
all of my heart and my soul. She knows the very center of me
belongs to her. She’s seen me express it, reveal it, unearth it
with every look, every stare, every touch, every kiss I give her.
She knows I have eyes only for her… and she loves it. She craves
what I give her.

She does. Yes, she
does.

She
has
to…

He had already searched
and found a large roll of trash bags from underneath the kitchen
sink, quietly miffed at that, because they should’ve been in the
utility closet on the back porch instead. The search itself had
already cost him precious time. He didn’t have extra time to
squander looking around blindly for the precious items he
had
to gather this
night.

He pulls one free from the
roll and wads it up in one of his hands and makes his way back to
the porch at the rear of his house, his parents’ house, looking for
something else that just might help. Something that’ll make things
a little bit easier… for him...

For
Her.

…
And, there is no doubt in
my mind or anyone else’s that she loves me with just as much fervor
and abandon as I love her. There is nothing in the world I wouldn’t
do for her. There is nothing in this world she wouldn’t do for me.
Nothing! She has done so much for me already. The feel of her, the
smell of her – all of it, exquisite!

Only…

He sees something and
quickly grabs for it. Then, he rips open the trash bag and tosses
it within. The bag, only opened partially, catches this new item in
its’ middle. Its round, hollowed-out center form a bulge half way
down inside the bag, but he pays it no mind. Details, he can work
them out later. His head bobs up and down as he looks for more
instruments, tools – whatever items he needs to make things
easier.

He just needs a
few…

…
She is trapped, held
prisoner and against her will, her true will. This is the Will that
wants, with every ounce of strength, to scream out her love for me.
But, she cannot, because of her circumstances, because of her
condition!

Yes, that’s it, that’s
correct – her condition! The trap comprising her life, the confines
she is forced to live within. Where they lie to her, every day,
those who tell her they love her most… the ones who tell her who
she can or cannot love.

This time, they haven’t
succeeded in her quelling her true emotions, because they were too
deep. They didn’t possess the ability to wash them away like
before. Her true feelings, feelings for him are
unbreakable…

He sees the rope and adds
it to the duck-tape, already in the bag. He spies a short pile of
rags and adds them as well. Then, he pauses. His eyes flash this
way and that within the closet, knowing he will need more supplies,
more tools.

Make it easy. Make it
simple, he thinks, realizing he won’t find the last item here. With
a nervous twitch of his hand, he closes the twin doors of the
closet, and glances about the enclosed back porch, before he takes
a few long strides to the back door. He yanks it open with more
force than is necessary, but doesn’t care, ignoring the loud
screech coming from its protesting hinges. Anger rises of its’ own
accord, from the center of his chest outward – warm, soothing,
fiery thoughts. He enjoys the emotion.

…
Who can love her more
than me? Who, any one of them - those, they, the others, the
purveyors of falsity, trying their damnedest to keep her from me?
From me, are they serious? The one she desires most in
life?

Ha! Stupid! Fucking
idiotic! They make me laugh, because they’re so ignorant. They know
nothing of my love, nothing of her strength, of her determination.
They are all imbeciles. She knows what they are inside. She doesn’t
believe them. She knows they’re false.

I’m all she has left. I’m
all she needs. She knows this too. She lives with that one tiny
notion of hope and longing... longing she has denied herself for so
long, too long! The truth has been revealed to her.

This why I must act, this
why the time is now, today, especially after her vehement act the
other day. Her public display, her violent so-called rejection of
the truth. The act is becoming more than just a rouse, even a lie,
it’s too much for her to bear, too much for the purity of her soul
to manage. It was the sign I have been waiting for, ever since the
wondrous day amongst the flora and the fauna, where she held me and
talked to me, while I rested in the warmth of her arms, my head
nestled where it belongs…

He peers around the
darkened kitchen, the ambient light from the fifty-two inch flat
screen in the living room, flickering and flashing throughout the
rectangular space. In the back of his mind, he is aware his parents
and younger sister are watching some program on the television. As
quickly as thoughts of them come, he forgets they ever existed. He
glances about the kitchen once again.

…
Atop her thighs, my
forehead rubbing against her firm bosom, so young and full of life…
I can almost see her erect nipples through the sheer material of
her bra and shirt. She had been so excited to have me so near to
her, touching, stroking. I can smell her sweet breath…

What else does he need?
What other tools can he find lying about?

All the while, she had
murmured to me, talked to me in her sweet, gentle voice. It is the
one she saves only for me, when we are about to become intimate
with one another. She had such a wondrous future planned for both
of them, filled with so much love and raw desire. I remembered how
she blushed as she confessed how much she wanted me, wishing for
the two of us to become one, for me to be…

What else!

Something catches the
corner of his eye and makes him frown. He reaches out for it, but
stops when the palm of his hand rests upon its handle. Another idea
interposes, and the thought that tried to boil to the surface,
flitters away, like a startled bird. He remembers what else he
needed. They are in his room, in his backpack, in a small sleeve
within one of the zippered sections. He had bought them right after
their trip together, when she had given her heart to him and their
relationship had blossomed. He’d known even then, in those first
fleeting moments, they would be together. She would give herself to
him. She would lay back, open herself to him…

He has to be
ready!

I will be ready, my love.
I promise!

Without a second thought,
he bounds up the stairs to his room, muffled laugher coming from
the TV in the living room, his family oblivious to his movement
throughout the house. He attains the landing atop the stairs and
makes a beeline for his bedroom door. He had closed when he had
gone downstairs, to keep out curious eyes. He opens the door and
locks it behind him, searching for his backpack. He finds it and
begins to rummage through it with brute force, suddenly frantic he
might’ve misplaced them or one of his parents had found
them.

Please no! Please no!
Please no!

I will find them, my love!
We will be together just like you told me that day, in the garden,
you sitting on the bench and me lying upon it, my head and
shoulders across your lap when you held me close and whispered your
devotion to me. You quivered, remember, beneath the weight of my
head, already so hot down below…

He finds them and yanks
them out, twelve of them in their brightly pictured box with glossy
writing, promising they would be the thinnest ever, give a natural
feel unlike any other brand. He smiles briefly, walks over to his
bed. He has discarded the trash bag and its contents there. He
opens it and roughly tosses them inside as well, thinking, trying
to focus, but he is finding this more difficult now. Images,
memories, feelings, touches, smells, tastes of her have filled his
mind to capacity, blocking out all other attempts at
coherency…

…
Soon, my love, my light,
I’m growing for you now, stiffening. Be patient, I am almost
ready…

…
ready…

Is he… ready?

He glances around as if
someone else has spoken to him. His eyes wide, fear running up and
down his spine. He wonders if someone has discovered his small
stash, but there was no one there, only him.

Him.

Him!

And him.

He is alone.

All the “him’s” are
alone.

His heart is pounding in
his chest. The first beads of perspiration began to dot his
forehead and upper lip. His brain is still firing random thoughts
of her. Recollections of her, remnants of her expressions, her eyes
and her smile caught in the corner of her lips, her hair in his
face, the smell of it, the feel of one single strand running
between two of his teeth. Oh, how he loves to remember. He hardens
at the thought. His eyes had been closed. He could see the glow of
the sun made red behind his eyelids as he felt one long, sinuous
hair, pull its way through the narrow gap near his gum line. He
could have done it all day long.