The Shadow Sight

Chapter Four

The rest of the day passed without incident. Moxie was indeed correct—Mrs. Cook assigned a five page essay on the “excitements” of their summer vacations due on the coming Friday. “But that’s less than a week!” Moxie had complained. Charlotte merely wondered how she was going stretch drawing to a five page essay.

It was soon revealed that the girl that had so gently suggested Charlotte find a new taste in shirts really was a senior, though they did have algebra two together. She learned her name was Maiyze and that if you left her alone, she wouldn’t beat your face in.

“I heard that over the summer, she killed a bear and ate it…with her bare hands!” A blond junior boy gossiped to his group of friends. Charlotte didn’t doubt it—she could kill a whale with her breath alone.

The rest of her classes were tolerable since she avoided the front seat in all of them and she didn’t once pass Jeremy Simmons in the halls.

“His locker’s at the other end of the hall where mine is,” Greg provided helpfully in the bus on the ride home.

“Well it’s better than near me,” Charlotte sighed.

When the bus arrived at their stop, Moxie and Greg hurried off, chattering about school and cats. Charlotte hung back, taking her time to gather her things and walk down the bus isles. Looking out the window she saw Moxie and Greg laughing and holding hands as they trudged through the damp cement and low-hanging clouds. She sighed again. For years she’d had a crush on him, staring at him from a distance and drawing him in notebooks she could no longer find. She had never said anything to anyone for fear of being rejected, but the feelings were still there. But whom did he decide to ask out? Moxie, the girl who couldn’t stop talking about herself.

Charlotte walked home in silence, looking at wet cement and cracked asphalt. If only she had said something sooner. But she hadn’t and she knew she had to pay the consequences for it. There may be regret, but the mistake is still there, she always said.

“Hey!” distant voice called from behind. At first she ignored it, bewildered as to why anyone may be calling to her, but as the shouts continued, she finally turned.

A boy, about her age and height with bouncing blond hair and flailing limbs, was jogging up behind her, struggling to catch up. Charlotte slowed her walk to an eventual stop and looked on amazed as he finally arrived at her side.

“Man, you walk really fast,” he panted, bending over to catch his breath. Charlotte stared at him, finally recognizing him as beautiful but elusive Caleb Johnson–Gabriella Johnson’s older brother. She pondered the possibility of him being as bad his sister, since she hadn’t talked to him in the last five years, but decided that though they looked awfully alike, Caleb’s blue eyes were nowhere near as cold as Gabriella’s yellow ones. She might as well give him a chance.

“Here,” he said, finally standing up and handing her a semi-crumpled sketchpad. “You left this on the bus. If I knew you were going to be this hard to get a hold of, I would have just given it to you tomorrow.” He chuckled and looked at Charlotte expectantly. Without much else to do, Charlotte turned without a word and continued on her path home.

Caleb pulled up beside her with his hands in his pockets. “So uh, what’s in it?” He inquired.

“What’s in what?” Charlotte frowned.

“Ah, so she does speak,” he broke into a grin. Charlotte stared back. “In the sketchpad, silly. What’s in the sketchpad?”

Charlotte found that a ridiculous question. What else would be in a sketchpad other than sketches? Frogs?

But Charlotte didn’t say this aloud. Instead, she let the silence hang as they neared their street. Caleb remained quiet as well, instead looking around at the houses and trees and the clouds in the sky. When at last they reached the midway point between their two residences, they stopped simultaneously and stood side by side. Caleb watched Charlotte from the corner of his eye and Charlotte watched as Edgar approached, eyes so silted they almost didn’t exist. He let out an angry meow and nipped at the tip of her sneaker.

“Now, now, Edgar,” Charlotte scolded as she knelt down and scratched his head with the pads of her fingers. “Don’t get mad at me. I told you before, I don’t have a choice—I have to go to school. If I could stay home all day with you, I would.” Edgar pushed into her hand and purred vigorously.

“He’s cute.” Caleb’s voice made Charlotte jump inside, though she held it in. She had forgotten he was there.

“Thank you,” she said as she stood. “His name is Edgar. After Edgar Allen Poe.”

“Yeah, I got that,” he chuckled.

Silence again. Caleb was looking deep into Charlotte’s eyes, almost as if he was searching her soul. Uncomfortable with the attention, Charlotte blushed and looked toward her house. She just needed to make some sort of excuse, no matter how weak, to retreat inside, away from strange boys who stole sketchpads.

Unexpectedly and almost as suddenly as they had assembled, he swooped in, planted a kiss as soft as a baby’s breath on her cheek, and disappeared inside his house, leaving Charlotte to wonder how someone so evil could be related to someone so…nice.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A/N: The picture to the side is Caleb.