• Chapter 1, part 1

    I see fire. Burning around me; like killer ballerinas. As they twirl, their red and orange skirts destroy every thing they fly past. I stand there as they circle around me. I run my pale, bony hand through the flames, almost subconsciously. They hit my skin. And even when they do, I don’t feel pain as normal people would. It didn’t even singe my long hair when it passed. Why won't they hurt me, is all I could think. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t stop coming to that one question. Why won’t they hurt me? I couldn’t even think of why I was there. But instead of running, I just stood there, motionless, becoming more and more frustrated.

    Then, I heared the window behind me crash. I slowly turn my head to the sound. But before I could see what made the sound, something wrapped its arms around my chest tightly. Then they dragged me toward the window. And with one pound, they flew up into the air. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know what to think. I looked at their face. The person who was holding me was a boy. He had long brown hair, and his skin looked like sand. But what really caught my attention, was the color of his eyes. They were the deepest shade of blue I had ever seen. They glistened like demons, focused straight ahead.

    As I looked in his eyes, he slowly turned his head to me. When our eyes met, I could have sworn we had met before. Like we had a conection or something. I didn’t know for sure but I think that he felt it to. We held each others glance for a few moments. Then it hit me like a isonomy; a wave of knowing swooped over me and millions of images ran though my head. They ran by so fast that I could barely see them.

    Suddenly, one image stuck to my mine. My eyes flow open. And it suddenly came to me, what I was doing in that house; in my house. I began to struggle as hard as I could. I tried to get away from him, when he was what was holding me up off the ground. At least two hundred feet up. I looked at the house on fire in the distance that was slowly getting smaller by the second. As I looked in the windows, I saw someone run past. Screaming. I couldn’t believe it. I screamed at the top of my lungs, hoping that it would somehow stop what was happening, “Noooooooooooooooo!”

    My body flung up in my bed startled. I quickly looked at what was around me. I saw the dark purple walls of my room in front of me. At seeing that I calmed down a little. As I leaned back on my bed post, I wiped the sweat that was poring down my face. I had that dream yesterday, I thought to myself, but it was a little different then last time. I turn my head to the clock on the side of me bed. It was a silver clock that I had gotten from my mom on my birthday. But that was before the accident.

    It was about three years ago, when I was just ten years old. Before that night, I was a happy little girl with one little brother and one older brother. My parents were scientist who studied ways to create people that could do amazing things; Like making them superheroes. They had a large lab in the basement that they did their experiments in. Every once in a while they would take us down there to watch them work. I always loved to go and see what they were doing.

    But one day, I accidentally spilt something on myself. My mom and dad rush over as soon as they heard the crashing of the bottle. They looked at me with weary eyes like I had never seen. I tried to tell them that I was all right, but they wouldn’t listen. They decided to test me for contaminants. And they didn’t calm down until all of the tests came up negative.

    Even though the test said I was fine, I could feel something happening to me. I was healing faster; I was running faster and I could even feel myself aging slower. It was like I was different then everyone else now. Not that I was normal before but you know what I mean. I decided to call my new skills my “Powers”. Of course I didn’t tell my parents about them. If I did, they would worry more then they were all ready. The only person that I told was Jen, my best friend. So, we decided to keep it our little secret. And for a wile, that worked.

    But then, one night, when my family had just got back from a lovely dinner, a fire arouse in the house. Everyone in the house was killed. Everything in the lab was destroyed and everything I knew and loved was taken away from me; in one fowl swoop. The only things that survived were the clock, and me. Even though it has been three years, I still blame myself for their deaths.

    As I looked at the clock the time read 7:30am. I was about to be late for school! I quickly grabbed my jeans and a black t- shirt. After slipping that and my worn white tiny shoes on, I hurried down the stairs to the kitchen. “Well, well, well. Look who’s finely up,” said Jen with implied sarcasm. “How did you sleep last night, R.J.?” Jen and I have been best friends since we were born. She was like a daughter to both my parents and like another sister to me and my brothers. Then after they died, she seamed like the only person that understood how I felt. And since our families were so close, I moved in with her and her family. Ever since then, she’s acted like a mother to me

    “I slept okay. I just had that dream again,” I said while brushing my thick brown hair. As I brushed the tips that went down to stomach, Jen gave me her worried mom look. Every time I say I have a weird dream, she gives me that look.. She thinks that the dreams I have can help me understand what happened to me; and maybe what other powers I have because of what happened.

    “Was it the one with that boy again?” she said curiously.

    “Yeah,” I sigh, knowing what Jen was going to say next. “But this time, when I looked at him, he looked back at me,” here we go.

    “Maybe that means you'll meet him today,” she smiled at me a teasing smile.

    I looked at her with disbelief hot in my eyes. "I’ve had that dream I don’t know how many times. What makes you think that this dream means anything?” I asked her that but I knew what she was going to say again. Jen was going to say,"did the guy look at you in the other dreams you had?”

    “Did the guy look at you in the other dreams you had?” Jen said with a sassy attitude. See, I told you. I can read minds, its another one of my powers, but I don’t need to for Jen. She’s just so easy that all I have to do is guess. I rolled my eyes at her. “Hey, are you reading my mind again. I told you never to do that. At least not to me.”

    “Actually, I wasn’t. Your so easy that I don’t have to use my powers,” okay I said that with a hint of sass but that’s all.

    “Oh really? Fine, then what am I thinking right now; and with out using your powers.”

    “Your thinking that there is no way I can guess what you thinking. And as you can see, there is.”

    “Am I really that easy? I always thought that I was hard to read.”

    “I guess you are that easy but that’s okay.”

    “Well, we should get going. If we hurry we might get there on time today. Oh and don’t forget that I have something to do after school so just go home without me. Okay?”

    “Yeah,” I said while I was grabbing my backpack. We always walk to school, even if it’s a 30 minute walk there.

    As we made our way down the sidewalk, I saw that Jen was unusually quiet. Normally, we were always talking on the way to school. Now that I think of it, we always have our mouth running 24/7. We even get in trouble for talking in history. Not that there is anything better to do in that class anyway. I mean really, who wants to hear about the history of the state Sifflardstarter. And yes it is a real place.

    Anyway, I thought that she would start talking on her own so I didn’t do anything for a while. Then when she didn’t do anything, I thought that I should say something. I hope I don’t do anything stupid. "So, um, what’s new?” I say with my face to the floor. Jen just kept her head looking that we were walking. “Hey, Jen, is everything okay? Did something happen with you-know-who?” You-know-who is Jen’s boyfriend by the way.

    Her eyes shot open. “NO! Um, I mean, um, nothing is wrong with us. It’s just, um, never mind. Nothing's wrong,” She said with some overly expressed anger then sadness. And the way she reacted told me that she was lying to me. And I hate when people lie. Especially to me.

    “Really? Are you sure?” I said with a sly smile. This time I would use my power to read her mind and see just what she was lying about.

    “Y-yeah. Really. Don’t worry about me” but that’s not what she was thinking. What she was thinking was totally different.

    As I looked into her eyes, I saw what she really thought. “Man, I really don’t want her to go to New York after schools over. Oh, why is it that my mom has to go to Japan with me and leave her in the big city. What a minute, R.J. can read my mind. What if she’s reading my mind right now. Why is she staring at me like that? Oh crap! She is reading my mind!”

    At that, I shook my head and got out of her mind and back to the real world. “Well, yeah I kinda am reading your mind. And, um what was that about me going to New York and you going on a Japanese vacation? When were you going to tell me?” I looked at Jen with a little look of betrayal in my eye. I mean, wouldn’t you feel that way if someone was booking you on a trip you didn’t know about; and to NYC no less. To me, New York is the worst place to go. Especially when your just in 7th grade. What, are they trying to kill me?

    “Well, um, uh, I w-was going to tell you, but, um, I, um…..” she looked away from me for a moment. She apparently didn’t really want to keep the secret from me and that kinda confused me. When Jen tries to keep a secret, she usually wants to. But this time she didn’t. She just didn’t.

    “'But, um,' what? Why didn’t you tell me? Did you think that I couldn’t handle it or something? Because I can handle a lot of stuff. So just…..”

    “Because I didn’t want you to go!” Jen said with a shocking amount of anger and sadness. She said it like she really wanted to get her thought through to me.

    By that time we had stopped walking and were just staring at each other. It was all coming together now that I knew why she was acting so weird. She didn’t tell me because she didn’t want me to go. I felt so bad for saying that stuff to her that I thought I was going to barf right there and then. I didn’t know what to say to her that would help. So I said the worst possible thing that I could. The lamest thing that could ever come out of my mouth at this time; the one thing that I shouldn’t have said.

    "I'm sorry,” I couldn’t say anything else. No mater how hard I tried, those words were all I could say. The way I said it came from the bottom of my heart and I really meant what I said, but that didn’t really make it any better.

    “It’s okay. You didn’t know about it, so it’s not your fault. Um, can we just forget it?” Jen really wanted to drop the subject and I was fine with that. We didn’t talk the rest of the way to school.