Joe (2 page)

“What’s your name?” Professor Johnson
asked, her tone flat and unpleasant.

My lips pressed into a hard, thin line.
I stared down at my Converses, letting my hair fall forward a little into my
face as I continued my dash to a desk. I could feel the students in the
classroom staring at the new focus of the instructor’s lesson: me. I opened my
mouth to reply, shut it, pressed my lips together. I could feel the word
sticking to the back of my throat, and my head dipped and bobbed a couple times
as I struggled to release it. “Juh-Juh,” I began, snapping my lips together and
taking a deep breath. “Juh-Joe,” I said. I took my seat.

“You’re aware of my feelings and policies
regarding punctuality, Josephine?” Professor Johnson asked.

I nodded, ignoring her assumption about
my name and feeling only slightly more at ease now that I was no longer
standing before my peers like some sideshow attraction. I spoke as slowly as I always
do. The pace of my words, combined with my jerky head bobs and different
appearance make most who hear me speak think me simple. This doesn’t bother me.
My speech is indeed slow and laboring, but my mind is quick and unhindered. I
consider it an advantage to be underestimated in such a way, and as a person
who has lived life with visions and premonitions, I tend to have little time to
brood over what others think of me. This doesn’t mean I jump at an opportunity
to speak publicly. My stammer is even worse under pressure.

“Uh-uh-apologies, muh-ma’am,” I said.
“Wuh-won’t huh-happen again.”

“Don’t apologize to me, apologize to
your grade,” she replied, turning back to the board to continue her lesson.

Earlier I said I disliked Professor
Johnson a touch. I’ll amend that now. I disliked her more than just a touch. If
I thought I could get the words out without stammering, I might have said,
“Sorry, grade.” A speech impediment is an excellent sarcasm suppressor.

I tried to be as silent as I could
manage, but when you show up late to class, the zipper on your backpack seems
to amplify its
ziiip!
sound and the removal of a simple notebook and pen
seem to shuffle as loudly as loose papers in an angry wind. I ignored Professor
Johnson’s displeased glances as I readied myself to take notes on stories I had
read in middle school. I don’t stutter when I read. I read a lot.

We were nearing the end of class when my
left hand began to itch in an unmistakable manner. I squeezed my free hand into
a tight fist, burying my nails into my palms. My throat went instantly dry, as
if the rapid pace of my heartbeat was sucking all the moisture from it and
redirecting it to leak from my pores. I kept my eyes glued to the front of the
small classroom. I didn’t want to watch. I couldn’t
make
myself look
down. My hand, holding a number two pencil, began to work its way across the
page of my notebook, uncaring of the meager notes I’d scribbled there.

I carry with me at all times a drawing
notebook and a pack of colored pencils. Color can make the scenes I draw easier
to distinguish. At the moment, I didn’t have the time to retrieve these items
from my backpack. Later I would wish that I had.

My breathing became labored. I tried to focus
on anything other than the page on which I was currently sketching. The
fluorescents above me adopted a blinding glow. The room seemed smaller than it
ever had. My jaw clenched and unclenched. My left hand continued to move on its
own accord. Five minutes later, it stopped.

I pushed a dry tongue over dry lips. I
didn’t want to look down at whatever future lay on the lined page atop my desk.
I didn’t want the
obligation.
I looked down.

Internally, my stomach was clenching and
roiling, my mind racing and flying. Externally, all I did was stare, my eyes
exploring every detail of the drawing I shouldn’t be able to draw, the scene I
shouldn’t be able to see. Like a rubbernecker of the worst kind. At least I
wasn’t slowing down traffic.

On the page was a scene depicted in
shades of granite that somehow managed to scream red. I have since burned the
sketch, as I had all of its predecessors, but it has in turn burned itself into
my memory. As have all the others.

I knew the setting, not the exact
location, but the setting. The large field with plush grass and oak trees in
the background may have been beautiful, if not for the scene in the forefront.
The paved paths and stone buildings could have been majestic, if the
granite-colored blood was not marring the faces of them. Yes, even depicted in
gray, I knew it was blood, because the horrible, beautifully drawn scene held
other clues as well.

There were bullet holes. And bodies. So
many bodies…

Off to the side, but somehow seemingly
the center of it all, was the silhouette of what looked like a man with his
back to the camera, standing like a shadow in a world of dreadful and leaked
life, angry looking shadow-guns clutched in both of his hands, countless people
cut down at his feet.

As I stared at the scene, all of the
blood flowing through my body dropped ten degrees, or so it felt, and I sat in
my school seat and closed my eyes, at first feeling as though it was difficult
to take in air. I clenched my teeth against it all and cursed the universe in a
silent mental string of obscenities and blasphemies for the impossible
foresight that has shaped a great deal of my life.

It didn’t take a genius to recognize
what I had drawn. Even a stuttering simpleton like me got the message loud and
clear.

Someone was going to shoot up the
school. More precisely, someone was planning a massacre at UMMS.

Chapter
Two

The
Decider

April
20
^th
was just around the corner, and since it was his favorite day
of the year, he wanted to do something special, something…
fun.
He wanted
to celebrate not only the birthday of The Great Adolf Hitler—now there was a
man with a vision—but his own Decisions to aspire to greatness as well. He was
starting to believe that he was even better than his idol, who, after all,
had
failed at achieving the perfect society. Hell, yeah, he was better than Hitler.
He was better than
everybody.

For the longest time he had been
thinking small, way too small, but he’d gotten an idea last week that had
morphed into something magnificent. It was all he could think about. The
fantasizing was just not enough. He had to do what he had to do, and he would,
because he Decided.

Last Sunday he’d taken a trip to the
range, tested out his ability to shoot straight. He’d been delighted to find
that he had a natural talent with the weapons. A gift of natural selection, he
thought. It was goddamn destiny. He knew it.

He was being meticulous in his planning,
because he knew no other way to be. Even as a boy he had been very neat and
organized, so much so that his dear mother had always bragged about him to her
friends. “Danny’s such a proper boy,” she would say, and they all would smile
and nod and pat him on the head. “I know,” the others would agree, “so proper
and quiet.” What stupid bitches.

His father had been even worse. Big Dan
would try to interest little Danny in pointless things, like fishing and
baseball, but he was too stupid to help Danny with his algebra homework if he
needed it. Not that he ever did. Danny believed he was legions more intelligent
than both of his folks. Sometimes he would wonder at how they were even
related. He would deny the possibility entirely if he hadn’t needed a blood
transfusion at the age of eight and his ape of a father hadn’t volunteered as
the donor.

Yeah, those two were a couple morons, his
parents. They had lived with Danny for eighteen years and never once figured
out what he really was. They were so fooled by his façade that they didn’t
bother to look past his innocent baby face. If they’d had two brain cells
between the two of them they might have known that they had a…
different
child.

Danny didn’t believe he was insane.
Hell, no. Danny just understood the world differently than everybody else. He
knew the shit they didn’t know. That’s why he would get to Decide. He was also
smarter, so maybe his parents weren’t as stupid as Danny was skilled.
Psychopaths often wear impeccable masks. Anyhow, he didn’t blame them, in
particular.

He blamed
all
of them.

He
hated
all of them, and the
stupid shit they did in their pointless little lives. The girls who wore slutty
clothing and too much makeup, the fucking football players with their tight
uniforms, the ugly girls who wore no makeup, the stupid groups who stood in the
middle of the hallway, blocking it up and talking, the kids in class who always
had some irrelevant, bullshit story to tell, the teachers with the thick
accents who made it hard to understand their lessons, the fucking hippie
teachers who taught useless shit like dance or ethics, the crack-head workers
in the food court, the handicapped people, the fat people, the skinny people.
All of them. So much hate.

Because they were what was wrong with
the world.

But it was going to be okay, because
come Monday, he would do his honest part in rectifying the situation. He would
weed out the lesser forms. Survival of the fittest, motherfucker.

And he really did shoot straight.

Chapter
Three

Joe

Most
of my premonitions happen as flashes of images or video clips in my head, like
with the fall Mr. Landry would have taken down the stairs this morning if I
hadn’t waited for him. These visions usually only tell of smaller disasters.
When the premonition that comes to me involves more people, more damage, it
comes to me through illustrations.

I am no artist. If I were to try to draw
a simple dog or kitten or flower, it would come out looking like the work of a
five-year-old. However, when my gift is in action I believe even Picasso would
be impressed by my sketches. The problem is I only get one scene, one
viewpoint. I don’t get a time, a place, or any other useful information. This
makes acting on my visions rather difficult. All I get is the horror. And the
obligation.

Over the years I have considered the
possibility that I was given my gift so I could help people, that I could make the
world a better place. I have all but discarded this possibility. For one, it
seems to me to be incredibly pretentious. For two, if I have been designated by
the Almighty to do something about the tragedies that affect our world, why
then not just tell me the
when
and
where
? My belief now is
something closer to a reality in which I am being made to suffer. I think
ninety-nine percent of people feel this way at some point or other in their
lives. I hold stock in those numbers.

You may think this is an easy way for me
to write off this
obligation
I keep mentioning. It isn’t. Whether I
believe in a greater purpose or not, I believe wholly in the fact that I am
obligated to do something about the visions I see. Not because I am a hero.
I’ve told you I am not. But because I know if I do not at least
try
to
stop the bad things from happening, I will suffer even greater. I will be
ashamed, or worse;
guilty
. If I try and fail, I will suffer also, though
not as much as I would if I gave no effort. This is why I am no hero. My
reasoning is mostly selfish. I don’t feel bad about this. I hold stock in
numbers on this matter as well.

I flipped to a new page in my notebook.
I would no doubt study my drawing in intimate detail later on. At the moment,
in a classroom surrounded by so many other people, I couldn’t bear to keep
looking at it. At the head of the class Professor Johnson was giving us
additional assignments for next week. I copied what she wrote on the board in
my notebook. I had no idea what the words said.

After this, she dismissed us. I gathered
my things and managed to slip out the door before Johnson decided to berate me
again. The hallways of the school were bustling with students going about their
day. The sight of them all made my throat dry.

I had thirty minutes in between my first
class and my second class. As usual, I headed straight to the classroom where I
would be studying creative writing for the next few months. The classroom would
be empty when I got there. I was glad for this. Everyone I passed in the
hallways was now a suspect in my eyes: the girl with the pink polo shirt and
short skirt that my mother would deem inappropriate in an educational
setting—or any setting, according to her—the shaggy-haired skinny boy with the
skateboard tucked under his arm, the group of people wearing all black and
skulking in the corner, the people with their noses tucked into textbooks, the
janitor, the woman serving coffee behind a counter, all of them. Everyone.

One of them was a soon-to-be killer. If
I couldn’t figure out which one, many more than one would be victims.

I made it to my next class and slipped
through the door with a sigh of relief. The lights were off in the classroom,
but because of the windows on the west wall, the room was by no means dark. I didn’t
bother to flip on the lights. Sitting in shadows soothes me.

I considered pulling out the book I had
been reading this morning, but didn’t. I knew from experience that my mind
would be able to focus on nothing other than my drawing until after the matter
was over. I closed my eyes and rested my forehead on the top of my desk. I
thought about my options.

The obvious one would be to alert the
authorities about what was going to happen. The problem with this option was
that I would have to give the tip anonymously to avoid questions I wouldn’t be
willing to answer. Also, I didn’t know exactly
when
the shooting was
going to take place, and if I caused a false alarm, that may delay their
response time when the time really came. Long ago I had decided that going to
the authorities in situations like these was unwise. Call me selfish, but I
couldn’t risk exposure.

Another option would be to tell my
friends, Kayla and Kyle, or even Aunt Susan about it. They all knew about my
gift and would do their best to help me find a solution to this problem. But I
had decided against this option long ago as well. While they would all be
willing to help me, it was unfair of me to drag them into such things and add
stress to their lives because I was feeling either lazy or inadequate.

Sometimes I feel quite alone. Again,
stock in numbers.

There was what you might call an upside
to my gift: When the shooting started, I would know.

I would
feel
it happening. The
horror, the disbelief, the shock and the rawest of blood-freezing terror, and I
would know. The downside to this aspect of clairvoyance: If I wasn’t in the
right place, at the right time, or at least in the very immediate vicinity, I
would more than likely be too late to do any good at all.

Disasters like the one I had sketched in
the previous class period did not come to me often. In fact, barring the
daycare incident, the fire incident, and the last one, I would say this new
mission I had just involuntarily been pulled into was the worst I had ever
foreseen. While the previous three had been as equally horrifying, this pending
disaster was on a different level completely because of one thing; the
potential body count was so much higher.

I was face to face with a potential
massacre. I rubbed my head. I could feel a migraine coming on. It was times
like these that made me wish my gift had come with the receipt. Actually, I
suppose I’ve
always
wished that. I told you, no hero.