Authors: Pat White
Too late.
Surrounded by white. I’m in a hospital. I glance around a waiting area but don’t see Mom or Dad.
Shouting echoes down the hall. “Where is he?”
I spin around and see J.D. with a wild look in his eyes, racing past me down the hallway.
An orderly chases after him. “You can’t go back there.”
“I need to see my brother!” he cries.
A security guard blocks the other end of the hall. A second guard steps up beside him. J.D.’s shoes slip on the floor as he turns and heads back the other way.
“Billy!” J.D. croaks.
Pain grips my chest.
I spot another security guard coming up from behind.
“J.D.!” I call out.
He can’t hear me.
The guard tackles him and they both go down. The other guards swarm over him like ants on a breadcrumb.
I struggle to breathe. I can’t help him. A guard snaps handcuffs on J.D., who’s still fighting to get free.
Two guards pull him to his feet.
“I need to see my brother!”
A guard shoves J.D. against the wall chest first. “You need to calm down.”
Someone bumps into me from behind as he passes. It’s Detective Ryan. I recognize him from the other night when J.D. saved me from oncoming traffic.
The cop flashes his badge. “Detective Ryan, Sammamish P.D. I’ll handle this.”
The guards hesitate.
“Cuffs off,” the detective orders.
A guard removes them.
“Come on, kid.” Grabbing J.D. by the arm, Detective Ryan pulls him down the hallway to an elevator.
“Tell me, you’ve got to tell me,” J.D. pleads.
“They don’t know yet,” the Detective says.
“What happened?”
The elevator doors open and they step inside. I’m still with them, hovering in the corner of the elevator.
“Skateboarding,” Detective Ryan says matter-of-factly. “He wasn’t wearing a helmet.”
J.D. bangs the back of his head against the elevator wall. His eyes water, making them an even more vibrant turquoise.
The doors open and they nearly collide with a gurney. A young man is strapped to it, his head wrapped in gauze.
“Billy?” J.D. hushes.
“Where are you taking him?” Detective Ryan asks.
“Imaging for an MRI,” the orderly answers.
“Billy,” J.D. chokes.
A stabbing pain pierces my chest. I grip my shirt above my heart. Can’t stand the pain; have to make it stop.
“Catherine!”
“J.D.,” I rasp.
“What’s the matter with you?”
I blink. Struggle for what little air I can manage to suck into my lungs. I look up.
Into J.D.’s turquoise eyes. I blink again, glance at the trees surrounding him. I’m back. I fight to remember how I got here. Wait, the party, Greg’s HULU, and running into the greenbelt.
I close my eyes. Breathe deeply. I realize I’m on the ground and my butt is wet from the damp earth.
“Catherine?” J.D. says, softer this time.
I hate that he’s the only one who seems to offer me compassion without pity.
I hate that I might know something that will potentially destroy him. His little brother…
“I have to go.” I get up and he tries to help me, but I pull away.
“I’m fine.” I start down the path. I’m terrified by what I’ve seen tonight.
I’m heartbroken.
For me.
For J.D.
“You’re welcome,” he calls after me.
I keep walking, blinking back tears.
“You’ll get lost,” he adds.
“I’m already lost,” I whisper.
I hear his Vans crunch against the fallen twigs as he follows me.
“Go right at the rock up ahead,” he offers.
“Thanks.”
He catches up to me. “What happened just now? A seizure or something?”
I shake my head. I can’t talk about it, can’t look into his eyes knowing what I know. What I think I know.
I hesitate. There’s one way to know for sure if these things are based in any kind of reality or not.
“Your father hits you, doesn’t he?” I ask, not looking at him.
“No,” he snaps and walks ahead of me.
“J.D.?”
He hesitates.
“Please tell me the truth,” I press.
He shoves his hands into his black jacket pockets, but doesn’t turn around. “Yeah, sometimes.”
My heart sinks. Confirmation. I have to accept the fact that along with my traumatic brain injury I’ve developed the ability to see into someone’s mind. The past, the future, who knows?
I’m desperate to make it stop. I don’t want to feel the devastation, the gut-wrenching pain.
“Do you have any weed?” I’ve heard other kids with TBI’s use it relax and calm their minds.
“Nice try, Princess.” J.D. turns to me, anger lighting his eyes. “Trying to get me busted on drug charges so they’ll send me away for good, huh? I’m not that dumb.”
“No, that’s not—”
“What, you recording this conversation?” He eyes me up and down.
I wrap my arms around my middle, feeling exposed, naked. There are worse things, like seeing J.D. fight off the guards, seeing him break down into tears at his brother’s side.
“Please,” I choke. “I just need it to stop.” My eyes burn with unshed tears.
“Whoa, you are good. Come on, sniffle a little with those tears.”
“You’re an asshole.” I shove past him, but he grabs my arm.
“Come on, tell me. What do you want to stop?”
He’s looking at me with those colorful eyes, eyes that were filled with excruciating pain in my vision.
“I see things.” I blurt out and glance away. I won’t risk another HULU.
“Like dead people? Wait a second. I know that one.” He glances up. “What was that movie called, again?”
“I see things I shouldn’t and I know things I shouldn’t and—”
“You’re such a drama queen.”
I wish that’s all it was. But I’ve accepted the fact that my visions do come true, which means I have to warn J.D.
“Your brother…” I can’t get the rest out.
His eyes turn cold and dark. Threatening. “What about him?”
“He’s going to get hurt on a skateboard.”
He lets go of my arm like I’m diseased. “You’re sick, you know that? You can’t destroy my life so you’re going after my little brother?”
With a sigh, I walk around him. Streetlights twinkle from the houses above the greenbelt.
“Tell your brother to wear his helmet,” I offer, and head for the light.
J.D. hated Monday mornings. It meant another week of hell at school. He wandered downstairs and poured a bowl of Cocoa Pebbles. Poured a second one for Billy.
Dad wouldn’t be up for another half an hour. With any luck J.D. and Billy would be gone before the old man regained consciousness. It was a miracle he could keep his job selling office equipment considering the amount of booze he consumed.
But the old man was a master salesman, wearing the smile, pouring on the charm for strangers and saving his rage for his sons.
J.D. spent Sunday in his room, studying and drawing. Watching the house across the street. Not sure why. He thought she’d changed, that she and J.D. were coming to a truce.
Then she threatened Billy. No one threatens Billy, not even the girl he’d wronged.
He heard Billy coming down the stairs. Morning wasn’t Billy’s favorite time of day. He shuffled into the kitchen with his backpack over one shoulder and skateboard under his arm. He dumped them on the floor, sat down and stared at his bowl of cereal.
J.D. slid the milk jug across the table. Billy grunted, poured milk and leaned back against the chair.
“Andrew’s party got busted,” Billy said.
“I heard.”
“Glad I left early.”
J.D. glanced up. “You were there?”
“For a few minutes. I heard Annie Sass was going to be there.”
“Was she?”
“Nuh-uh.” He shoved a spoonful of cereal into his mouth.
A few minutes passed.
Billy swallowed. “Saw Catherine the Great. She was running away from Greg.”
J.D. didn’t want to talk about her or even think about her, yet he couldn’t forget the look in her eyes when she’d raced toward the greenbelt. J.D. feared Greg had achieved his goal and “nailed the retard.”
And for some ridiculous reason, J.D. found himself wanting to protect her. He was drawn in and almost didn’t see it coming. Then she asked for weed. It was a perfect set up, her way to finally rid herself of her nemesis, J.D. Pratt.
“What’s the matter with you?” Billy said.
“Tired.”
“Uh-huh.”
“You got cross country today?” J.D. redirected.
Billy was a great runner. It came with living under the old man’s roof.
“Not today.” He dumped his half-eaten bowl of cereal in the sink.
“Dishwasher,” J.D. reminded.
Billy put his bowl on the top rack, grabbed his backpack and skateboard and headed for the door. “Later.”
“Helmet,” J.D. said.
“Come on, I’m—”
“Billy.” J.D. stood. “You of all people know what a brain injury can do to someone.”
“Whatever.” Billy whipped open the back door and J.D. watched as he swiped the helmet off a porch chair.
“Wear it,” J.D. called after him.
“Yes, mother.”
The kid shoved it on his head as he pumped the skateboard.
It was J.D.’s job to fill in for Mom, make that Mom and Dad. His warning had nothing to do with the Princess’s threat, her premonition about “seeing” Billy get hurt.
J.D. dreaded seeing her again but he couldn’t avoid it, not when they had a lot of the same classes. How was he going to survive?
* * *
I spend the week trying to figure out who I can warn about Greg’s plans and what I’ll say. He hasn’t been benched yet and isn’t in Cooper’s art class anymore so I’m not even sure this HULU will come true. Still, I wonder who might be able to help. Mr. Burke? Nah, he’d want proof. Mr. Rimmer? He’s pretty cool.
Accusing someone of a future crime is serious, especially when it’s the varsity football star.
We’re having lunch in the Commons and Taylor must sense I’m upset about something. “You have fun Saturday night with Greg?” she asks.
“Cops came before I could have enough fun.” I smile.
She winks. “We
so
scattered before they got there. You and Greg have another date set up?”
“Not yet.” I smile confidently. “I’m not worried.”
Okay, besides finding an ally to help me stop Greg, I also have to keep up this charade without losing what’s left of my sanity.
Yet I want to keep my distance from Greg. I’m haunted by the look in his eyes when he set fire to the laundry bag. A menacing look that seriously creeped me out.
“You seem…distracted,” Taylor pushes.
I shrug, drink my diet cola and glance across the Commons.
Into J.D. Pratt’s eyes. He’s walking towards me. My heart races.
I wonder if his brother is okay, if J.D. is avoiding his father’s beatings, if he’ll ever speak to me again. He’s uttered maybe three words to me all week. I admit that I miss the sound of his voice.
J.D. aims for our table, but at the last minute glances over my shoulder and passes by. Only then do I realize I’ve been holding my breath. A hand squeezes shoulder and I glance up.
Greg smiles down at me. “I won’t let him hurt you again.”
“Thanks.” I force a smile and study my half-eaten burger.
The warning bell rings. We get up and dump our trays. Greg stays close.
“How are you feeling?” he asks.
I shrug. “Worried about my Algebra test.”
“Need help?”
“I’m getting help after school. But thanks.”
Greg puts his arm around me. Right. He’d asked me to “go out” Saturday and he’d assumed I’d said yes.
I don’t remember answering him.
I’m stuck, pinned like the doe.
“Hang on a sec.” I pull away to get a drink at the hall fountain, a really long drink.
I turn to him. “Sorry, the meds make me thirsty.”
Maybe if I keep reminding him how broken I am he’ll dump me for someone perfect.
I glance down the hall and see a group of kids taunting J.D. His brother, Billy, is part of the group and doesn’t speak up in J.D.’s defense.
“Come on.” I loop my arm through Greg’s and start walking. I know he’ll be tempted to watch or worse, he’ll want to participate.
Seeing J.D. being abused makes my stomach burn. As we head for my next class, Greg glances over his shoulder at J.D.
“Are you still stalking my girlfriend?” Greg accuses.
J.D. doesn’t respond. He hovers about five feet away, ready to follow me into class. That’s been his M.O. this week: follow, but don’t speak.
“Greg, I can’t be late for class,” I protest.
I sense his blood pressure rising so I lead him away. Taylor skips past us with a victorious grin. I don’t know why it’s so important to her that I hook up with Greg. We turn the corner to class and…
J.D. bumps into Greg.
Greg spins around. “You want a piece of me?”
The kids who were taunting J.D. laugh and rush past. They’d shoved J.D. into Greg for the hell of it. I shoot J.D.’s brother a death glare, but he averts my gaze and keeps walking. Jerk.
“I said do you want a piece of me?” Greg threatens.
“It was an accident, Greg,” I try.
Greg isn’t listening. He grabs J.D. by the shoulders and shoves him against the wall.
“Greg, come on,” I encourage.
Let’s see how he likes being benched.
“Greg, stop.” I touch his arm.
Consumed by rage, he doesn’t hear me. He grabs J.D.’s jacket and whips him around, knocking J.D. into me and sending us both crashing to the floor.
Okay, so today I could have used a helmet. I focus on keeping my head as far away from the floor as possible and brace my fall with my hand.
Before I touch down, J.D. grabs me and whips me around so I land on top of him. He cushions my fall. Again.
“Mr. Hoffman!” Cooper shouts.
And it begins.
I’m going to be sick.
J.D. studies me. “Are you hurt?”
I scramble off of him, not wanting to piss off Greg even more.
“Principal’s office!” Coop orders Greg.
Greg doesn’t move. He glares at Coop.