Light Read online

  Tim was easy to sum up. It was always ‘YES SIR!’ and ‘NO SIR!’ although he didn’t like the ‘NO’ very much, and loved the ‘HOW HIGH DO YOU WANT ME TO FREAK’N JUMP’ type of thing. Our relationship never used to be like that, but the older I got, the harder he became on me. Mom stood up for me a lot though, but I hated that they ended up fighting over stupid things I didn’t really want to do.

  So lately my relationship with the only dad I knew was everything except the relationship a father and daughter should have.

  Other family, I don’t have them. It was always just Tim and her.

  As I pondered my lack of family, something to the left caught my eye. It was parked right in front of the lake and my entire body felt as if someone had pulled a plug and let all the air out. It was Ty’s pick-up, and I knew who else would be with him inside it.

  When noises from Derek Benson came, I knew it wasn’t just the two of them, but the entire freak’n football team. They sometimes came here after practice and right now, I wished that I’d taken the other stupid road.

  I watched as Clare’s figure jumped off his truck. She wasn’t as tall or as lean as me, thanks to the 50 % Asian blood that flowed through me, but she was not chubby either. She was of medium build, not that there was anything wrong with it.

  Here we go!

  “Oh look, if it isn’t the baseball team’s slut,” Clare shouted loudly and everyone turned and laughed. If these were strangers that did this, it would’ve been different, but they weren’t; they used to be my friends. We used to laugh together, make jokes at the table and even pass notes around in class. Even Nicole, who used to make up the rest of our little trio, had her nose in a teen magazine and pretended that nothing was about to happen.

  I knew I should’ve just walked away, but today was different. I was tired, I ached from head to toe, I was in my still in my darn tutu, I’d just pulled my pants over my leotard and exchanged my ballet shoes for sneakers. I really didn’t have the time for her little charades of insecurity.

  “The baseball team? Really? Now we know who has all the intellectual stem cells between the two of us,” I said and carried on walking.

  “And who has all the grace and beauty,” Clare chirped.

  “And also a shallow mind.” I couldn’t help myself. This is what happened when I started. It was like my mouth had its own passageway straight to my brain and I couldn’t do anything to switch it off.

  “Oh, yeah, shallow minded. At least I know what loyalty means, bitch.”

  I laughed again. “Loyalty. Can you even spell it, Clare?” Instant regret jumped through my core. Hurt rose briefly in Clare’s eyes but vanished just as fast. She was dyslexic and I had been helping her with words ever since we were just tiny little things running around.

  “I know how to spell slut, bitch, and skank.”

  “Well, sorry to burst your bubble, sweetheart. I never did anything with Taylor, but wait, I tried to tell you that, and you still believed the son of a bitch.”

  “That’s a lie, Chas,” Taylor said. “Seriously, you really expect people to buy that? I know what the guys in the locker rooms are saying. I’d never be with someone like you.”

  Clare gloated as she looked with admiration at Taylor and the entire group laughed.

  “Yes, Chas, why didn’t we ever get to see some of the action the baseball team got?” The blond guy with the dark eyes was inches from me, tugging at my tutu.

  “I don’t know Jake,” I slapped his hand away, “probably because you’ve taken too many hits on the football field and can’t even multiply two and two anymore.”

  Jake laughed.

  Suddenly, I was shoved from behind, and I stumbled forward. My backpack flew from my shoulder and fell hard on the road. I got up and when I turned around, Clare’s face was inches from mine. “So what, the guys are below your standard, is that it?”

  “Yes,” I said. “It’s exactly that. I’ve been trying to tell you that, but for some reason it doesn’t want to sink into that closed mind of yours.”

  “Stop saying that. I’m not stupid,” Clare yelled and shoved me again.

  “Then what are we doing, Clare?” I yelled back. “We’ve been friends for ten years, ten years and you go and believe biceps and abs.”

  Clare shook her head with her arms folded across her chest and looked the other way.

  “I would never do that to you, but it doesn’t matter what I say, your mind was made up the minute that idiot felt like a rat and crawled back to you.”

  “That is not what you said that night at the party.” Taylor had that smirk plastered on his face. “The night you decided to try and have all this.” His hands ran up and down his body as if we needed direction.

  “Seriously?” I started to laugh. “It just shows you how well you really knew me if you think I was going to fall for a tool like you. Screw you, asshole.”

  “In your dreams.”

  “Lame comeback,” I said as I pulled my backpack over my shoulder and walked on.

  As I started to walk, it seemed like today might just be my lucky day, that they were going to leave me alone and let me pass, but as I walked past the second tree, Derek and Jake, both linemen, blocked my view.

  My heart beat slightly rose but now wasn’t the time to show them a hint of fear. They were like a pack of wolves, looked like animals and thrived on fear. “Get out of my way Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum.”

  They laughed. “Make us,” Derek sneered. Now I’d heard some rumors about him, and none of them were any good. Stealing his mother’s pills and drugging girls to have his way with them was the highest on that list.

  “C’mon guys, let the skank go,” Clare said.

  “They won’t do anything, sweetheart. They’re just messing with her a bit,” Taylor said softly but not softly enough. I could hear the giggling coming from Clare. How could she enjoy this so much?

  “Fine, just don’t do anything I wouldn’t,” Clare yelled.

  “Then it looks like I’m screwed.” Seriously, keep your freak’n mouth shut.

  Derek and Jake started circling me as if I was a piece of meat. I closed my eyes as my heart started to thump inside my chest. Run and their fun would begin, and I was no animal.

  I opened my eyes and more members of the team joined in. Some of these guys had really been my friends, or so I’d thought. One of Derek’s wing men, Mark, a guy with really short hair that looked like he had giant’s DNA flowing through his veins, came close and sniffed my hair like someone that had to be locked up. I turned around and glared at him. He just laughed and backed a bit off.

  “That is enough!” Nicole finally said as she put her magazine down and came closer.

  Tommy, a red head who was an extra on the football team, grabbed her.

  “Let me go, you idiot,” Nicole yelled at him and he laughed. “Clare, make them stop for crying out loud. It’s Chastity.”

  “Good, maybe it will teach her to stay away from her best friend’s boyfriends.”

  “She didn’t do it,” Nicole said. “Taylor is a douche.”

  “Stay out of this Nicole!” Taylor yelled. “Before I tell Clare about your little schemes.”

  “What schemes?” Clare asked, but I blocked out the rest as the ogres were really starting to freak me out. Would they really do that, and if they did, would Clare and Nicole really watch as they took their turns?

  “Ooh, look, I wonder what the little ballet princess is hiding underneath those slacks of hers.” Derek touched the hem of my slacks. I slapped his hand hard, and more of the guys started to touch me.

  “Get the hell away from me.”

  “Clare, make them stop!” Nicole yelled again.

  “No, she deserves it.”

  Those words angered me as my heart beat faster. I thought I was close to passing out as my head started to spin, instead I felt loose, soft grit inside my hand, and there was a lot of it. As I rolled the material around my fingers, it felt as if the entire world
stopped for a second, or just slowed down.

  I could smell Derek’s smoke breath close to me, it stank and I felt the soft warm breath of Sam, another idiot on my face.

  A mixture of cologne overpowered me as the four guys stood really close to me. Their hands touching my arms and clothes.

  Then I saw the grit in my hands again. It was soft, not like sand, and it had a light golden color to it.

  At once the slow motion stopped and I threw a handful of the stuff, hitting Mark full in the face. He crouched and tried to get it out his eyes. I felt more sand in my hand and Jake was next. I didn’t know where it came from or how any of this was even possible, but right now that didn’t matter. As I threw a handful at each and every one of them, a refill was waiting patiently in my palm.

  Derek was next and before I knew it, all the boys were coughing and crouching down. Then one by one they fell over, in a fetus position with eyes closed and soft snores coming from their lips.

  Clare and Ty ran to the guys and crouched down. Ty felt for a heartbeat, but from the sound coming from their lips I knew they were still alive. I waited for men with cameras to jump out from behind the trees, yelling GOT YOU or something but it didn’t happened.

  The fear on both Ty and Clare’s faces were real.

  “What did you do?” Ty yelled.

  “Nothing they didn’t deserve!” I yelled back hoping he would just back the hell off.

  “You’re a freak!” Clare yelled, and stormed at me. More sand accumulated in my hand, but to me, she was still my best friend, one whose mind had been closed by the idiot that was busy running away.

  I opened my palm and let the grit fall to the floor. A breeze picked it up and blew it softly into Clare’s face.

  She stopped in her tracks, give a huge yawn and lay down on the ground.

  Was she sleeping?

  I looked at my hands. The grit was gone, there weren’t even traces of it inside my palm, nothing made sense.

  “Just go,” Nicole said as she crouched down next to Clare to investigate.

  I stood still as a statue trying to process what was happening to me.

  “Chastity!” Nicole yelled again. “Go!”

  I looked down at Nicole. My legs finally started to move into the direction of home, and grabbed my backpack that had fallen on the turf.

  I reached the city of Chicago fast and almost ran into a police officer that was chatting to one of the waiters. Guilt over what I’d just done was evident on my face so I ran in another direction.

  “Hey, you there, stop!” He yelled.

  I didn’t listen and he chased me for a couple of blocks but he had probably had one too many donuts on a daily basis and couldn’t keep up. I took so many turns down back alleys that when I finally stopped I had no idea where I was.

  I breathed hard, trying to catch my breath and looked back at my hands. The was still no trace of the grit. It had just vanished. My heart beat fast again and cold sweat dripped from my temple as flashes of ogre-like bodies, almost the entire football team, falling down right after I threw the grit at them came to mind. Coach was not going to like this, and how was I going to explain any of it to anybody?

  What the hell did I just do? I glanced at my hands one more time. What the hell was happening to me?

  I’VE LIVED IN CHICAGO ALL MY LIFE AND I HAD NO idea where I was. The buildings all looked the same, foreign and it felt as if I’d been transported to another place, far, far from home.

  My phone had broken when Clare shoved me and it’d fallen to the ground.

  It was in the front pocket and I knew Tim was going to kill me for ruining my first phone. The black screen had a huge crack and the phone didn’t even try to turn on.

  Eyes scanned me up and down as I wondered through the city, wearing only my tutu over a pair of slacks. I’m sure I looked like someone who’d just escaped from the loony bin. Walking into another alley, I removed my torn tutu and walked with the thing in my arms. When the sun started to set, fear got hold of me.

  It was funny how strange people get. They knew that I was lost. The fear was evident on my face as I walked in circles, because I could’ve sworn I’d passed the laundry shop on my left half an hour ago, yet none of them stopped to ask if I needed any help.

  Soon I found a bus stop and plunged down. Traffic was jammed and I just wished that by some miracle I would find my way home tonight.

  As I sat, my eyes caught the bruise on my arm illuminated in the lamplight. It was in the shape of finger marks and I couldn’t recall who’d given it to me. It had been Derek or Mark.

  The bruise was turning purple now, but the only thing I saw was the soft golden grit-like dust leaving my hands as I threw heaps and heaps at them, behind my closed eyelids. Where did it come from?

  My mind was seriously going on a trip and I started thinking that maybe Derek slipped some of his mom’s narcotics inside my glass of juice at lunch and this was the result, but when I pinched myself, it felt real.

  “Meow,” a cat close by said as it jumped onto my lap.

  “Shades?” I stared at the cat with huge eyes. It looked like her, she had those two round markings around both her eyes and raven black fur with a grey bushy tail. The markings around her eyes were what gave her the name, because it looked like she was wearing sunglasses.

  I liked to think that Shades was mine, but she wasn’t. Tim was highly allergic to cats. She was a stray and would come to my window every night begging for a bowl of milk and a warm place to sleep. She’d been my secret keeper for the past year and I didn’t know what I would do if the cat ever got run over by a car or got hurt.

  It felt nice seeing a familiar face, even if that face belonged to an animal.

  “I’m so dead. Tim is going to kill me.” I looked down at the cat with both my hands cupping her cute scrunched up face gently. She was a Persian, and I couldn’t understand how she could be a stray.

  “It was Clare and her gang, look.” I showed her the marks on my arms and she stared at them. Yep, she really did. That was why I felt I could tell her anything. She always acted as if she understood everything I told her. I blabbed the whole story as she was nestling herself on my lap. When I was done she opened her eyes and just gave me that look, the one that said, “Don’t worry, everything will be okay and that Clare is a bitch”. I giggled at that thought.

  Shades jumped off my lap and stretched. She looked back at me and started to walk further down the street.

  “You’re just going to leave me here?” I yelled after her as she ran past people’s feet. She turned around and came back.

  Okay, that was freaky.

  I just stared at her as she rubbed herself on my leg and looked at me again. She started to walk again and something inside of me said that I should follow her.

  I knew it was silly and I felt extremely stupid as the cat led me through dark alleys and rushed down some stairs. There were plenty of homeless people sleeping below the streets. Fear crept over me as they stared, but they stayed on their cardboard mats. I even climbed through a gutted window and was back on the street.

  Chas, you’re stupid, the cat has no idea what you said.

  Still, It was better to be with someone familiar, even if that someone was Shades, than being alone with strangers looking like I was crazy. Guess talking to a cat furthered that possibility.

  We turned so many times and walked a block or two before she made another turn. It felt like hours and it was finally starting to sink in that this cat had no idea where she was going. She was probably looking for her next meal.

  Suddenly, she stopped and didn’t want to go any further. I crouched down and blew out a huge gush of air. It was dark and the only lights that shone were from the street lights. I picked up the cat and held her close to my face while scratching her ear.

  “This was stupid, huh? I shouldn’t have followed you,” I spoke softly, close to her ear.

  Shades stared at me as if she was chirping something at me and
I giggled and looked around.

  I saw Ms. Botty’s flower shop and I stared at the cat. My eyebrows knitted as I looked at Ms. Botty’s flower shop again.

  Ms. Botty’s flower shop was two blocks from where we lived. Mom purchased flowers once a week from her.

  “Thank you, you genius,” I kissed Shades on the neck and the cat jumped out of my arms and ran in the opposite direction of my house.

  I giggled, this feeling was so strange. Mom was never going to believe that a cat brought me home, or maybe she would, she was a bit fruity and believed all sorts of crazy things, but Tim wouldn’t. He was the realistic type and would probably give me the worst beating for scaring Mom like that.

  My heart jumped into my chest. Tim had only given me a hiding once. He was from one of those families that believed that you should bend the tree while they are still young. Mom didn’t like it one bit and I could still remember the huge fight they had that night.

  I stopped for a second when I saw three cop cars in our driveway.

  My heart pounded. What the hell was I going to say? I didn’t even have a story and telling them the truth would win me a straitjacket for sure.

  I couldn’t think of anything and lying was just going to end up biting me in the ass. I wasn’t a liar. The one time I had lied, I found out that I was really crappy at it, and decided to only speak the truth as best as I could. But this time the truth was insane. Nobody was going to believe me.

  I closed my eyes and opened the door. A familiar smell lingered in my nostrils. It was warm inside and I felt like crying as I’d really had the crappiest day ever.

  Mom gasped as she ran to my side and folded her arms around me. We looked nothing alike. She was a red head with beautiful blue eyes and very sensitive skin. Me, I had dark, shoulder length, raven black hair with high cheekbones. I assumed I must look like my father, who I knew was Asian as it was clear in my appearance.

  “Where the hell have you been?” Tim screamed and rushed past three cops who were taking a statement in our living room. “Do you have any idea what you just put your mother through?”