The Unwanted Winter - Volume One of the Saga of the Twelves (93 page)

“
Sorry, I didn’t mean to.
I was just trying to stop myself from looking at Mr. Weirdo over
there, that’s all,” she responded, forcing herself not to look at
Derek.

“
That’s probably why you
almost made me jump out of my skin,” she sighed wistfully. “He does
sleep like a serial killer, huh?”

Kimberly bounced with
mirth. “You got that right, look at him.”

“
No way,” replied Hyun,
half-kidding and half-serious. “What had you asked?” she queried,
changing the subject purposely. “Sorry, I couldn’t make out what
you said over my own squeal.”

“
I was just wondering what
you thought happened to us. Why do think we are here?” Kimberly was
gazing up at the lowered ceiling, following the crisscross pattern
of the tiles, sitting peacefully within the grid suspending
them.

Hyun joined her, letting
her eyes peer upward. “I have no idea. One second, I was looking at
clothes and the next, I heard some awful sounds. My vision blurred.
I felt sick to my stomach. I passed out and threw-up, or threw-up
and passed out. I’m not sure which came first. But, the next thing
I know I’m here, stuck in this wintery land, in a mall with you and
Derek.” She paused to look over at Kimberly. “Do you have any
idea?”

Kimberly felt the other’s
gaze, but kept her eyes locked upon the ceiling above, shaking her
head slowly from side to side. “No, Hyun, just like you, I have
absolutely no clue. I was just taking a stroll through the mall
with a very cool guy, who wasn’t a drug addict or an alcoholic, who
would never hit me or hurt me, and all I could do was watch him
disappear right before my eyes. There was nothing I could do about
it. We reach out for each other and our hands met. I held onto him
so tightly, so different from the way I like to hold hands. I
looked into his astonished eyes as he began to fade. With every
beat of my heart, he became less real, more like mist. Until the
third blast of sound came, I couldn’t hold onto him any longer. I
had to throw-up so bad. I let go. When I finished, I looked for
him, but he was gone. I think I fell to the floor then, crying, all
crumpled up with pain in my stomach until I blacked out.

“
I woke-up just like you
guys, still here in the mall, but nowhere near home, nowhere near
Shawn.” Kimberly hadn’t noticed the tears were streaming down her
face as she spoke, her nose running. Her chest heaving now and
again as the key unlocking those innermost memories
turned.

Next to her, Hyun sat more
erect, staring at her intently, grimacing at the anguish she was
going through, but was unsure how to react. At one time, she
would’ve known what to do. At one time, Kimberly would’ve been in
her arms balling her eyes out, but not anymore, no way, too much
had changed between them.

In a hoarse whisper,
Kimberly heard Hyun muttered a tentative question. “When are you
going to tell me what happened to you? Between us? When,
Kimberly?”

Kimberly didn’t answer.
She couldn’t answer, not now, not here, with Derek so close and
everything else around them so fucked up. She sniffled and let the
tears flow quietly.

After a time, Hyun got up,
obviously angry with her. She stalked out of the store, uttering
nasty things under her breath.

I will tell you, my old
friend, just not now… but I promise… I will…

She cried with hushed sobs
for some time thereafter.

A sleeping Derek never had
a clue.

…
Someday… I will tell
you…

~~~~~~~~<<<<<<{ ☼
}>>>>>>~~~~~~~~

Old Friends, New
Friends

Day Two, Friday, 7:59
pm…

Jason Fong lounged at one
end of the makeshift bedding Kenai had gathered for them over the
course of her long, lonely stay within the Melded World. He stared
across at his longtime friend, who sat mirroring him, lying across
the furniture pads, speaking hushed tones. The subject they had
broached was of the up close and personal sort. Jason could tell
his friend wanted to keep some of his innermost thoughts just
between them for the time being. At least until he got to know the
others a little better, could trust them with the central workings
of his mind. Jason was listening, his attention one-hundred-percent
riveted to the other boys’ words, struggling to comprehend their
meaning. He lay there frowning at some of the unexpected tidbits
ebbing from between Joaquin’s lips.

“…
really, I didn’t have
all that much time with her, you know. After our date last Sunday,
which seems like a million years ago, there just wasn’t enough
time,” Joaquin’s was saying, picking at the heavy blanket before
him. He shook his head from side to side, slowly. “Just two dates,
three days of hanging out at school, and five or six phone calls
was all I was able to have with her… before all of this,” he began
again, looking about the cave. His eyes were moist. She’d meant
something to him. Moreso, than Jason had ever remembered seeing
when he spoke of a girl. “It doesn’t seem fair, Jay. The more I
think about it, it just doesn’t seem fair.”

Jason watched his best
friend swallow hard and a dubious quiet stretched. He could only
stare back at him, too shocked to do more than gape.

About them, the rest of
their companions had clumped into small groups at various points
about the cave. They had eaten dinner and changed back into their
newly cleaned - and dry - clothing. Now, it was the towels that
hung from the clothesline Anthony and Andrew had strung about the
stalactites.

Elena and Mikalah had
taken up with Louis. They were playing toward the back of the cave,
near the large woodpile. They were stacking logs of indeterminate
sizes, building some sort of structure they were excited about,
talking and commenting with varying pitch as they went about
whatever it was they were doing.

Sophie, Anthony and Andrew
sat near the fire, conversing, smiling now and again, while they
all took turns stoking the fire. The goal was to keep it from
weakening, insuring its’ much needed warmth continued spread
throughout their meager living space.

Mugzy and Mr. Patas had
positioned themselves nearer the smaller children, occasionally
making a comment, nodding in agreement, as they watched the
youngest of their group at play.

Garfield had moved, since
they’d all eaten. He was curled up asleep, his body positioned in
between the fire and the entrance. Even at leisure, Garfield was
defending them, should anyone, or anything, breach the portal, he
would be the first to hear it and the first to
retaliate.

Meanwhile, the bear-dogs
sat on all fours, facing each other, talking near where they had
left the shopping carts, obviously catching up on lost time,
reacquainting themselves after such a prolonged
separation.

Jason continued to stare
at his friend, even when the other boy looked up from the furniture
pad and into his eyes. He wasn’t entirely sure of how he would
respond to the others comments.

“
Does it kinda wig you out
that I’m talking about Clarisse like this, Jay? Is that why you’re
looking at me like a deer in the headlights right now?” asked
Joaquin, saving him momentarily from trying to understand what he’d
been talking about before.

This was terra-firma by
comparison.

“
No, man, I told you. I’m
over her,” replied Jason, exhaling forcibly. “The girl I had liked,
or I thought I liked, was more of a figment from a time I hardly
think about anymore. To me, she’s like a character in a book,
frozen in time and not really the same person you went out with or
talked with on the phone. The girl you are talking about now, I
don’t know, let alone understand.”

“
Cool, just making sure,
because some of the things I feel for her run sorta deep and I
really don’t want to make you feel uncomfortable or anything. I
would hate for something like a girl to come between us, especially
now… when we kinda need each other,” explained his friend, the deep
rumble of a chortle resounding in his wide chest.

“
Dude, I would never let a
skirt get between us, bro, you know that,” admonished Jason
adamantly.

Hadn’t it always been that
way?

“
I have to make sure, Jay.
I have too. Though you ignored the girl, after she dumped you, you
pined after her for quite a while. It sort of pissed me off after a
while. It dragged on for so long. You remember, right?” Joaquin
resumed picking at the thick material he was laying
upon.

Jason let out a
semi-exasperated sigh and looked away. “Yeah, I remember…” He fell
silent for a second or two. An old memory popped into his head and
he sat up a little higher, a smile spreading across his face.
“Dude, do you remember when you set me up with that loon Lena
Mendez? I think that was your pathetic attempt to get my mind off
Clarisse. You remember, right?”

Joaquin laughed aloud, his
head tilting back toward the ceiling, his mouth open wide as he
bounced up and down. “What a FUBAR, in the exact meaning of the
phrase! How long had the date lasted?”

Jason paused to consider
the question. “I think about an hour, maybe less, that was all I
could stand.” Jason ran his hand through his hair. It was no longer
standing on end, the fashion he normally styled it. He had let it
dry out naturally, since they hadn’t thought to gather hair
products at the supermarket when they had the chance. So, it poked
up from his head in a myriad of directions, giving him the
purposely disheveled look that had come into popularity of the past
few years, only it hadn’t been by choice. “All she kept talking
about was her ex-boyfriend and how he had messed up on her with
this girl and that girl, and how he’d hit up on one of her cousins
at a family party or something. She kept going on and on and on
about how much she’d sacrificed for the dude, how much she took
care of him, how much she had tried to make him happy.

“
After twenty minutes of
the same crap, it was agony having to sit across the table from her
and listen as she literally told the story of how she shredded
every ounce of dignity and self-respect for this guy.”

Joaquin was chuckling
again.

“
Dude, I
felt like those people on the movie
Airplane
. You know, the passengers
who kept hanging themselves or setting themselves on fire every
time the navy pilot guy told his life story! I literally wanted to
set myself on fire too, man, the way she kept talking about her old
homeboy…”

“
Man, Jay, I am sooo sorry
for doing that to you. Really, I am, but, Sandra -, you remember
her, right? She was the girl from that beach party a few summers
back, the one I had talked to for a while.” Jason nodded. “Anyway
she kept telling me how much her friend, Lena, needed to get out
and get her mind off her ex-boyfriend. We both thought you guys
kinda needed each other, you know. Both of you were hung up in the
past. I mean, I thought it was perfect,” outlined Joaquin through
gurgling fits of laughter.

“
Prefect
my ass… perfectly horrible you mean. I think by the time we
finished eating she was on the verge of tears and I’d had enough,
bro. I was
done
with her. We didn’t even talk about ourselves or get a chance
to get to know one another. It was all about her and her
ex-boyfriend, whatever his name was. It was a total waste of time,
and, not to sound like a douche, but money too.” The strain in his
voice emphasized his frustration with the whole
incident.

Joaquin’s brow furled with
curiosity. “Where did you take her by the way?”

“
Dude, I took her to the
Nightwatch.”

Joaquin shook his head,
even more sorrowful than before. “Ah, man, that’s the place up by
Avenue 64 and Colorado, right?”

“
Yup.”

“
Damn, Jay, that place is
nice, but, shit, it can be expensive too.” Joaquin’s face looked
pained for a moment, but the hilarity of the event was too strong
and eventually his expression reformed as the absurdity of Lena’s
behavior resurfaced. He couldn’t help but smile once
again.

“
Tell me about it,”
mumbled Jason.