For I Could Lift My Finger and Black Out the Sun (12 page)

8

“John, nice to see you again.”

Really?
I thought.
You’ve gotta be kidding me
. My morning was already pretty terrible. Dad woke up in some kind of bad mood, maybe still fuming over the service at The Rusty Anchor. As you can imagine, it was terrible. I mean, Mom said her crab cakes were good, and I went for fish sticks. But they were just… fish sticks. Can you really screw that up too bad? Sure, I guess you could, but then the government would need to come and take away all your spatulas and make you close up shop. Because that would be pretty low.

But Dad got the prime rib and wouldn’t stop complaining about it.
Looks like it’s going to walk off my plate, it’s so undercooked,
and
Would you look at all this fat!
Plus, the service was truly horrible. Some poor Eastern European kid just trying to make a few bucks in America, but he was slow. And forgetful. And the kitchen was really backed up. Dad was pissed the whole night. He didn’t wake up much better.

So I ate my breakfast and asked if I could hit the boardwalk arcades. A grumble was my only response. Mom was busy with Holly. I left without another word.

And of course, just as I neared the lot where The Hurlstorm loomed above me, I heard his voice.

“Sorry you could not make it last night for pizza,” he said.

I shrugged. “Me, too. My folks made
reservations
… and they didn’t want to change. Anyway, see ya.” I started to run off.

“Hold on just a second, John. I was wondering if you wanted all these extra tickets I have.” Branco pulled out a wad that made my head spin.

“Extra? Those are
extra
? That’s, like, a hundred tickets!”

“Well, I must admit I purchased them without considering how many I would really need. But they are yours if you want them. Or we could use them together.” He eyed me, waiting for a response.

“Listen, mister…”

“Please.
Branco
.” He smiled.

“Listen, mister Branco, this is nice of you and all, but it’s a little creepy. I’m just a kid and you’re… you’re not. Makes me wonder if you’re up to no good. If you know what I mean.” I took a step back.

Branco sighed, with a little laugh. “I am sorry, John, I realize this must look strange. Please believe I have no ulterior motives. You seemed like a nice fellow, and I know so few people around here. If you’d like the tickets, please take them. I will not bother you again, if that’s what you wish.” He held out the long sections of connected red tickets with one hand.

I reached out and he gave them to me freely. I blinked once or twice, trying to think of all the things I could do. The day was mine, and it was going to be
awesome.
“Thank you, Mr. Bran— , I mean, Branco.” I turned and started to run off to find something to ride.

Then, my mind changed. Suddenly, unexpectedly, I found myself stopping. I turned around.

“You know,” I said, slowly at first, then gaining steam. “Maybe one ride would be okay. Have you been on The Zipper?”

Branco slowly, theatrically wrinkled his brow and frowned. “I do not think I have.” He shrugged. “Do you recommend it?”

I tilted my head back in amazement. “Do I? You’ve
got
to try it! Come on!”

* * *

Even as early as it was, there was already a line at The Zipper. The ride was a hot mess. A rollercoaster with a tight climbing spiral tower, two loops, and a super-steep drop, all packed into what looked to be 15 parking spaces on the asphalt lot. I’m sure that falling out of any rollercoaster was a certain death sentence, but somehow the idea that you could be flung out and land in the parking lot gave The Zipper an extra air of danger. When it was our turn, I passed the appropriate amount of tickets over with glee and raced for the front car. Branco jogged behind me, seeming amused by it all.

The car was a small, metal shell. Inside there was a borderline-useless seatbelt, a loose strap that we draped over ourselves in a mild attempt at safety. The only thing really keeping us in the car was the pull-down padded harness. But the ride was old and the harness was definitely not the latest design. And it kinda stuck when you latched it. This was a lot of what made The Zipper so much fun. The ride itself was probably fairly tame, if not for the fact that you assumed it would break down, fall apart, and you’d die at any moment. Branco wasn’t used to it, and couldn’t get the harness to latch. I slammed mine down and it made a loud click, locked in place as securely as it was going to get.

“Hold on, I’ll get yours,” I said, reaching up to grab his harness.

“All right, thank you, John.” Branco sat still, waiting for me. I pulled hard, yanking the harness down over his shoulders.

“Watch your fing—,” I started.

And then, as the harness clicked loudly into place, I froze. My mouth hung open, forgetting what I was saying in the middle of the word.

I couldn’t help but stare. The harness had slammed hard into its latch… right where the fingers of Branco’s left hand were accidentally waiting.

Or, I should say, where they were before they sluiced out of the way.

* * *

Before I could think or react, the ride attendant was there, checking our harnesses and the seatbelt. She gave a half-hearted tug and then stood, giving a thumbs-up to her colleague in the control booth. I was dumbstruck, staring at Branco’s hand, and he knew it.

“This is
exciting
, John, isn’t it?” He looked straight ahead as the ride lurched and began. After a moment, he turned to look at me. We were almost to the spiral climb. “Is something wrong?”

I stammered. “Your— your
fingers
,” I said.

He held up his left hand, wiggling all five fingers. “Oh yes, you almost got me!” He gave a little laugh, and I realized I’d heard that sound a number of times already. A chuckle more than a laugh, actually.

“But how—,” I started.

Then the car whipped into the spiral climb and all I could do was scream.

* * *

Back and forth, back and forth, to the top. Then spilling out of the tower, plummeting down. Hitting the first loop, flipping. The world going upside-down.

For me, it was a mirror of what was happening in my mind.
How the hell did that happen? He did the hammer trick. That’s… that’s impossible.

Coming out of the loop, I struggled to look over at Branco. But he was gazing straight ahead and smiling, his perfect white teeth gleaming in the sun, his perfect dark hair blowing back in the onrushing wind.

“How the hell did you do that?” I shouted over the wind.

Branco turned, confused. “What?”

“Your fingers!” I yelled. “How did you do that?”

“What, John? What about my fingers?”

Then we hit the crest of the big drop and my stomach flew out of the top of my head. Or so it felt. I turned back to watch where were going as we dropped too fast toward the pavement. I gasped. At the last second, the track curved and we were parallel to the ground. But only for an instant. We hit the second loop and I screamed some more. Beside me, Branco laughed. Not his little polite little laugh, but a big and hearty one.

Finally the loop was done. I took a breath, tried again.

“What happened with your fingers, when I pulled down the harness?” I asked.

“I don’t know, John. What do you mean?” He was still half-smiling from the thrill of the ride.

The coaster lurched to a halt as the breaks stopped our movement. One, then two quick jerks, until our speed was near zero.

“When I pulled down your harness, your fingers were in the way. They should’ve been smashed. But they…
moved
.” I looked at Branco, demanding an answer with my hard stare.

He gave that little laugh again. “They did?” A question. I thought it was a question. But I’ve replayed this moment countless times in my mind since then. And now I wonder if it wasn’t a question at all.
They did
.

All of a sudden, I needed to be off the ride, away from Branco. He could do what I could do. What Bobby could do. What Walter Ivory could do. How was that possible? I didn’t care, I just wanted to be away from him.

The Zipper stopped hard, back in its little station, and I jerked and jerked on the harness, trying to pull it up. Finally, there was a hydraulic hiss, and the harness swung free.

I pushed it out of my way and ran.

9

Like everything, whether good or bad, the beach trip had to come to an end.

It was the day after my rollercoaster ride with Branco. I’d simply avoided the boardwalk for the rest of the trip, and thereby avoided Branco. And so finally, unlike most days leaving the beach, I was glad to be going. I didn’t want to ever lay eyes on Branco again. He scared me, with his polished appearance and charm, and most of all with his
abilities
. His
powers
. Suddenly, things with Branco didn’t seem like they had happened quite so randomly.

I was going to have to talk about this with Bobby.

During the car ride, a long and tedious affair that promised nothing but boredom, I fell asleep. The day was a scorcher, but my dad wanted to keep the windows open rather than use the air conditioning. Hot air whipped my hair around my head as I closed my eyes and dozed off.

And dreamed of a cooler place.

Of winter.

And snow.

I was running through the snow, happy, laughing. I saw the streets and houses of my neighborhood and felt safe and at home.

I turned a corner and stopped, giddily holding out my arms as I opened my mouth to the sky, tongue out, catching snowflakes. I turned in circles for what felt like hours; the icy flakes landed on my tongue and melted.

Then I heard a little laugh. A chuckle.

I dropped my arms and turned toward the sound, mouth snapping shut.

Just down the snow-covered street stood a boy my age. He wore Bobby’s winter coat, Bobby’s jeans, Bobby’s boots. But he wasn’t Bobby.

His skin was darker, bronzed. His hair was dark, too. He held his head up, catching snowflakes on his tongue in a mirror of what I’d been doing, his gleaming white teeth seeming brighter than the snow itself.

Where there should’ve been Bobby’s face, in this memory dream I was having, there was someone else’s: Branco.

He stopped, and tipped his head back down to look at me.

“Isn’t this wonderful, John? This
snow
.”

Dream-Branco started to laugh the same hearty laugh I’d heard on the rollercoaster.

I awoke with a loud gasp, still in the hot car, miles from home.

“Geez, John,” Dad said, looking at me in the rearview mirror as he drove. “Keep it down, okay? You’re going to wake up Holly.”

Absently, I turned to look at my sister, and found her eyes, wide awake, locked on mine.

* * *

The dream wouldn’t leave me alone. I didn’t want to sleep again, for fear of seeing Branco’s face, but I couldn’t get the images out of my mind.

I realized it was a replay of the day Bobby and I had been hit by that car. My idle mind had simply inserted Branco where Bobby should’ve been. Why this was even scary, I couldn’t quite say, but it was.

That day.

That was the day my life changed.

Everything changed.

Not just getting hit by a car, not just the whole business of becoming friends with Bobby. But the
powers
. I couldn’t help but forever link them to that day. So I guess it made sense that my mind took another leap, made another connection between these two things: the day Bobby and I gained our powers, and the new revelation that Branco had them, too. Or at least some of them.

I started to think it might’ve been my eyes playing tricks on me. That there was no way Branco had our powers. Maybe I was just making it up. Maybe Branco had done nothing at all. But there was me, and Bobby, and even Walter Ivory. Could there be another? I had no idea.

God
, I thought.
I’m really losing it, aren’t I?

The powers.

Why me? Why do I have powers? It makes no sense.
I thought hard about the day of the accident. The snow falling, and my forehead pressed against Holly’s, and then Bobby chasing me, and the terrible hissing slide of the red car that hit us. About those thorns that were deep inside me, inside every cell, and in Bobby’s, too. Looking for a way out only when their host cell died. Where did they come from?
How the hell would something infect my entire body?

I paused.

Infect
.

Like a disease.

How did a person get a disease? Handed down from their parents, maybe, or even just bad luck. What else? I thought about the warning labels on cigarettes, announcing that if I smoked I could get cancer. I thought about people always telling me what to eat, not to have too much junk food.

That stuff’ll kill ya
.

How would something get in me and just…
spread
. All over?

I certainly hadn’t injected anything into my body, unless they’d done it when I was in the hospital after the accident. Bobby was there, too, so that would definitely explain both of us. But what about Walter? And if Branco was like us, what about him?

What had I eaten that day? I had no idea. Probably a normal kid breakfast of toaster pastries, my go-to wake-up meal for as long as I could remember.

Did toaster pastries make me superhuman?

Think of the marketing they could do!
Kids! Ask Mom and Dad to get you new Acme Toaster Pastries! Now with uber-powerful thorns!

That was nonsense. But I couldn’t think of anything else.

Wait.

The dream.

Tilting my head up. The way Bobby had the day of the accident. The way Branco had in my dream.

The snow.

Come on, now you’re really being ridiculous
, I thought to myself.
Snow?

Could there’ve been something in the snow that infected me?

Hours later, I was no closer to an answer. We finally pulled into our driveway, and I jumped out of the van and went quickly to my room. My parents hollered for me to come help unpack, so grudgingly I went back and moved the bare minimum number of things before they turned me loose.

In my room, I went straight to the computer and started searching for everything about snow. What snow was made of. (Surprise: It’s water!)

I found a whole debate about whether Inuit’s truly had 50 words for snow. A
debate
about this. The ability for adults to argue about literally anything once again boggled my mind.

As for real answers, I found nothing.

Of course there was nothing; it snowed all the time in the winter. Why would that particular day’s snow be special? Wait. What day was that? I thought hard and came up with the date, or at least a close approximation. It was relatively easy to narrow down, what with it being the same day I was hit by a car and admitted to the hospital and all.

I searched for unusual or noteworthy events on that date.

And found nothing. I mean, sure, a lot of stuff happened. Congress failed to accomplish something, the president made a speech, a string of robberies was going on across town and police were stumped… but nothing stood out. I scanned other results. The typically dominant football teams were still dominant that winter; the typically crappy ones were still crappy, even though their fans always expected miracles. In other news, people were, as always, unprepared for the snow when it started to fall that day. What might have been
special
about the snowfall, though? I looked at the weather records.

And that’s where I learned about the comet.

P0921/Magellan passed between the Earth and the sun, with Earth drifting through its tail for a couple of days — including the day of my run-in with the hood of a car. There were interviews with astronomers about when the comet might be visible to the naked eye, even a few reports about a bunch of nutjobs holding ceremonies to greet it, to worship it in some way. Making something mystical out of it.

But it was just a comet. Just passing through. So what?

Dejected, I turned off the computer and tried to forget about it. So what if some stupid comet went by. I needed to figure out how the thorns got in my body. I didn’t know for sure it happened that day, the day of the accident, but that was my hunch. Everything seemed to trace back to that day. These little things, these thorns. Like parasites, like
alien invaders
in my body.

Hold on.

Aliens.

No way.
I quickly flipped the computer on again.

Then, of course, I waited, annoyed, for more than five minutes as it rebooted. Ah, computers. They’re making our lives easier, aren’t they, folks?

What was a comet’s tail made out of? The answer — well
answers
— came quickly. First, there are really two tails: a dust tail and an ion tail. The dust tail is made of, you guessed it,
dust
. The ion tail contains water and other ions like carbon monoxide. Water. Like snow is made of. But still. How would water from a comet reach Earth? And would it even matter if it did?

After a bit more research, I found that some scientists think water on Earth might actually originate
from
comets in the first place. And of course, other scientists think those guys are completely off their rocker, so who knows what to believe, right?

My head was spinning.

So… on or about the day my life changed, the planet passed through a comet’s tail, which was made of water ions, and those water ions may or may not have filtered down through the atmosphere to me. A dumb kid, sticking his tongue out in the snow.

I laughed out loud. What a bunch of bullshit.

Flicking off the computer once again, I got ready for bed, all twisted up with confused thoughts.

* * *

A little while later, on the last day of the summer before school started, I decided to go looking for Bobby. I vowed to myself not to mention the whole comet thing. Bobby’d freak for sure.

I’d almost never gone to Bobby’s house to find him, for fear of running into his parents. I wasn’t going to start this time. Instead, I looked for him at the empty warehouse bay. As I approached the building, the noise from the lumber yard droned behind me. Yet ahead… I thought I heard a sound like a loud slap. Then two more.

I stepped to the back door and found it open.

“Bobby, you in there?” I called into the shadowed interior. There was no answer. The late-afternoon sun was thick and heavy outside, but the bay itself might as well have been a thousand feet under ground, daylight nothing but a bitter memory. I could see almost nothing inside. I went in anyway. If the door was open, I figured Bobby was in there somewhere. He probably couldn’t hear me over all the noise from the lumber yard.

Three steps inside the door, I froze.

Something, no,
someone
was lying on the floor, still. I blinked and blinked, squeezing my eyes, willing them to adjust more quickly to the darkness.

“Bobby…?” I stepped forward.

The body moved. Beside it, next to one slowly twitching hand, I saw a glint of metal. It was the gun — Bobby’s gun. The person on the ground was definitely Bobby, but why did he look so… strange? The body moved again. Not really moved, but flowed.
Formed
.

The irregular shape where Bobby’s head should have been shifted and coalesced. As my eyes finally got used to the darkness, I saw Bobby’s face staring upward, features swelling and sharpening, like a clay sculpture being smoothed into shape.