The Unwanted Winter - Volume One of the Saga of the Twelves (31 page)

It was about time somebody
did, shit!

Besides, it was nice to
feel appreciated, to be worth a little extra time and
effort.

Now, all of Sonny’s crap
was behind her. For once, she didn’t feel depressed at having to
face yet another week of school, and assignments, and teachers and
all the other bullshit that came along with High School in the
twenty-first century. Now, she felt ready, no anxiety, and no
dread. She felt
capable
of making it through the week. Yes, that’s what
it was, she was empowered, confident.

She sighed as she put down
her brush, looking at herself in the mirror, knowing it was a
better choice, a better way to live. She continued to stare as the
foremost vestiges of closure crept into her eyes. She knew the road
ahead was long and torturous, this was only the beginning. However,
there was always a first step to any adventure and she believed
she’d taken just that.

She stood up suddenly and
walked to her bed, grabbing her backpack and made for the door,
hoping she’d get the chance to see Shawn before the bell
rang.

It was a better choice. It
was my only choice…

~~~~~~~~<<<<<<{ ☼
}>>>>>>~~~~~~~~

A Change of
Plans

Monday, November
22
^nd
,
12:37 pm…

Anthony Herrera was
walking across the schoolyard, between the grassy area directly
before the main building and the basketball courts when his cell
phone rang. Having just turned it on, as told by his parents should
any plans for the day change while he was at school.
Make sure you turn on your phone at lunch, Tony.
If we ever need to get in contact with you, while you’re at school,
it’ll be at that time. Ok?

Yeah, yeah. Sure,
sure.

Thus, he wasn’t all that
shocked to see there was an incoming call from his parent’s
landline at home.

“
Hello?” he
answered.

“
Tony, it’s
Dad.”

“
Hey, Dad, what’s
up?”

“
I got a
last minute call from my agent about some mundane change to the
book. Even though it’s minor, they want me to drive down to Century
City to write off on these changes in person, right now. So, I will
need you to take the
Dash
bus and swing by and pick up your sister’s at
school for me. Can you do that?” explained his father, sounding
frazzled over the phone. It must’ve been a hectic morning if he was
coming unglued this early in the day.

“
Yeah, sure, Dad, I have
nothing going on,” he retorted, glancing about to make sure no
teachers or school administrators were around to catch him talking
into his cell phone. He was in the clear.

“
Good, and don’t forget,”
admonished his father. “There are a ton of Hot Pockets and chips,
and some of those pouch-thingy drinks. You guys can have to snack
on when you get home. Remember, no stove and no toaster oven - use
the microwave only.”

“
Ok, Dad, I won’t forget.
I’ll make sure everyone is safe and not acting stupid,” he said,
trying to placate his father.

His father chuckled once.
“Alright then, son, I gotta make like a banana and
leave.”

His father hung up before
he could respond, but it didn’t bother him. He smiled at their way
of saying good-bye to one another - make a joke that didn’t make
any sense.

It’s “make like a banana
and split”, Dad!

He was about to laugh,
when his eyes caught sight of a dog running back and forth along
the outer fence of the school, about a hundred yards from where he
was standing. It was about the size of a German Sheppard, only it
was black with the short hair of a Rottweiler and a musculature to
match, though it clearly wasn’t a dog of that breed either. Maybe a
cross breed of some sort, he thought to himself, frowning at the
size of its jaws. At a distance, they appeared too big, its teeth
and fangs too long, almost disproportionate when compared to the
rest of its body. It made the beast look cartoonish, almost
unreal.

And, why is it running
back and forth like that?

He could see it was
trotting down one portion of the fence, would stop and sniff at the
ground, make a few tentative scratches at the dirt and grass, and
then move on. Anthony stood there, putting his cell phone back in
the right front pocket of his jeans and placed his hands in the
pockets of his sweater. The air was cold, even for November.
Temperatures in the low forties weren’t normal daytime levels in
Los Angeles, not by a long shot.

The dog continued to
stride along the fence, weaving one way, then the other. Abruptly,
it stopped right where the backstop of one of the softball fields
stood, behind yet another fence. Anthony had to peer through both
to see the creature. It sniffed and pawed at the ground again,
appearing to lean against the fence, applying its body weight
against the chain-link.
Was it testing the
strength of the fence?
He frowned deeper.
His eyes bulged when the dog opened its huge jaws and bit down on
the fence itself, trying to tear some of it away, but it couldn’t -
though it did bend some of the links in the process.

Is this thing trying to
get into the school?
What the hell was
wrong with this dog? Was it rabid or something?
He couldn’t help but watch as it renewed its’ attack against
the fence, its’ efforts redoubling as it shook the entire section
between two of the ten-foot fence posts. He glanced around to see
if anyone else was watching, witnessing what he was seeing, but
everyone else seem oblivious. He turned back. The dog continued to
rip at the fence with unnatural ferocity.

“
BOO, you little bastard!”
shouted someone in Anthony’s ear, so loud he jumped, nearly lashing
out with a fist. In the last instant, he recognized the large face
of his hulking friend Gabriel.

“
Crap, Gabe, you almost
made me take a swing at you!” Anthony’s heart was pounding in his
chest.

“
I had to do something,
you were standing there like a dweeb looking off into the sunset or
something,” the large teenage boy replied.

Anthony looked him over.
Gabriel was wearing what he always wore: jeans, a t-shirt with some
sort of print on it, and a pair of Addidas low tops. His hair was
mussed, but not styled – typical. Gabriel always looked a few
shades from frumpish.

“
I wasn’t just staring off
at nothing, dude. I was checking out that crazed dog over by the
fence,” supplied Anthony, weighted with sarcasm.

Gabriel craned his neck in
the direction Anthony had indicated. “What dog?”

“
That one, you big oaf,”
replied Anthony exasperated, pointing to where the dog was chewing
away at the fence.

Only, there was no
dog.

There was only a twisted
and mangled section of the fence staring back at him now. He
frowned, his eyes darting this way and that, over the entire
expanse of the fence, stretching for nearly a football field in
either direction before him.

“
You’re losing it, man,”
muttered Gabriel as he turned and walked away.

Anthony remained silent,
still grimacing over the incident, not in the least bit
happy.

Maybe, I am…

~~~~~~~~<<<<<<{ ☼
}>>>>>>~~~~~~~~

The Jacket

Monday, November
22
^nd
,
2:38 pm…

Elena waited by the fence,
her backpack slung across her back. She clasped her math book in
her left hand and her souvenir
Disneyland
water bottle in her
right. Back and forth across the field of her vision, she gazed out
over the small street next to the east exit of her grammar school.
It was the designated exit where parents could pick up their
children from school two years running. She was waiting for her
Dad, who was sure to drive by any second now. He was running
late.

Beside her, squatting down
upon one the big roots of the age-old magnolia tree standing
closest to the gate leading out to North Avenue 57 was Mikalah. Her
younger sister was talking to herself about some poem she had to
learn in three weeks and recite to her class from memory. Elena was
about to tell her to shut up when a breeze swirled about her, cold
and wintery. She forgot what she was about to say.

Christmas weather,
was the thought that bubbled to the top of her
consciousness as she shivered and then giggled at the prospect of
how much fun she was going to have in the coming months.
Christmas was a time for sweaters and long pants,
and jackets -.
O
h, crud, my jacket!
Her eyes bulged
as she realized she’d left her jacket in the closet of her
classroom.
Oh man, Dad is going be super
mad if I forget my jacket AGAIN!

“
Mikalah!” she exclaimed
suddenly.

“
What?” her sister asked,
annoyed at the interruption of her memorization process.

“
I forgot my jacket in
class! Dad is going to be really mad if I don’t bring it home
again, so I have to go get it,” she said in a rush. Already she was
taking a few steps away from the fence and the tree, back toward
the main building of the school where her classroom was located on
the second floor.

“
Ok, but you better hurry,
because he’s going to be mad if you’re not here when he gets here,
even if you do have your jacket with you! He might just leave you
here!” Mikalah called after her sister and then turned back toward
the street, peering through the fence, her tiny brow
furled.

Still, there was no sign
of her father.

Maybe, I have
time!

Elena ran as fast as her
encumbered, young legs could carry her, hoping her teacher, Mrs.
Smith, hadn’t already left for the day. It was hard to guess with
her teacher, because sometimes she would leave within minutes of
her student’s departure and other times she would stay as late as
6pm when the last custodian left for the day, having cleaned and
locked-up the entire school for the night.

Maybe today I’ll be lucky
and she stayed behind for a bit
, Elena
pleaded with herself, afraid of having to face her father without
her jacket again. This would be the second time this week, and the
fifth time this month. Why couldn’t she just remember to go into
the classroom closet and get it? How hard could that possibly be,
right? Mikalah never seemed to have a problem remembering to bring
her stuff back home. Why did she have such difficulty?

She made her way through
the rear double-doors of the first floor of the main building and
immediately turned to the right, bounding up the stairs that would
take to her classroom above.

*****

Outside, Mikalah gazed
heavenward to see the sun duck behind a huge bank of dark,
foreboding clouds. The wind began to swirl about her, cold and even
colder the second time it came. She stopped practicing her poem and
pulled the zipper of her jacket all the way up to her neck, folding
the collar back upon itself to ward off the increasing chill.
Despite her efforts, she shivered. A storm was gathering above her.
She was certain it was going to bring much more than rain and wind,
thunder and lightning. This was going to be different; she could
feel it deep down in her bones. This one felt like a true winter
storm, like the ones she’d seen on The Weather Channel, the ones
that battered the mid-west and the northeast of the
continent.