The Brothers, Chapter 1: September

There are always three. Legends always have three obstacles - three challenges to prove the hero's worth, three paths to be taken. That should have tipped me off. The problem is, when you're sixteen, you don't understand the implications of a glance, a touch, or a joke. It's all one giant experiment you orchestrate on yourself – something you can't fully know until you're looking back at it many years later. At that time, I was hardly contemplating the nature of my life. I wasn't even concerned about starting another year at yet another school, where I'd once again be the new girl.

It was a cool September day when I first encountered them. I remember autumn came early and leaves were falling slowly in the brisk air. Those remaining on the trees were bright orange, gold, and the deepest of reds. Trees, like all living things, act according to how things feel, not a schedule determined by some outside force. So far north, the time line was different. Mostly, we had lived in the South where it was green year round. But here, in the Northeast, autumn comes early every year. There was more than one Indian legend about such things, but at the time I couldn't remember any of them clearly. I was in a mixed state of shock and dread. Once again my life was changing faster than I wanted, courtesy of my mother. The trees seemed to sympathize, crying red and yellow leaves.

As I walked that morning to my new school, I thought about how the trees seemed to whisper to me – called to me – telling me the stories of their plant lives. I shook my head. Whispering plants are the work of daydreams. My guess is lots of people get lost in their fantasies as they walk to school. They dream about everything but that fateful walk stirring up dread of their new homeroom, the new school bullies, or the inevitable new-found isolation.

I could have picked the three brothers out as being related. Each was the image of the other with some intentional mistakes. A change of height, length of hair, and a shade of Aegean ready skin showed their blood. How could I know I would change them? How they would change me?

I should have been able to see it. It is the mark of the other I carried with me, something outside that kept me from truly being a part of anything. Every day as I walked to school fantasizing about how things could be different, I put my hand out in front of me. Sometimes it felt that if I could be in just the right place and time my hand would disappear and I would find a place hidden beneath this one – a reality layered under the one in which I lived. Then I could step through to the other side. That day, when I stuck my hand out, as usual, nothing happened. I sighed in disappointment.

I blamed my parents who carted me around from town to town every so many years. Lately, it felt like months. That day was my first at this particular school. It had been less than a year since our last move. Our moves had gotten more frequent. Maybe they felt I could cope with it better – never making any connections so there were none to break. I didn't expect anything different.

Meeting the first was an accident. In high school, certain people tend to flock together, forming cliques which could be seen even from a distance. As I didn't know anyone from the area, there was no one to meet me. The student body milling around the entrance, like so many high schools across New England, boasted collared knit shirts, khakis, and boat shoes. It was clear from my fitted second hand red pants, big black boots, and black velvet shirt I did what I chose. Even though I rarely made lasting friends, I was never a wall flower. When I was twelve, I was one of the first girls to have a noticeable chest and hips. From then on my figure had taken the hourglass to superheroine curves. It was impossible to hide myself even when I tried. Everything clung to me in one way or another. It was both a blessing and a curse.

It must have been my red pants that caught the boy's attention, or maybe it was the fact that I was new and female. He came loping up to me across the brick and stone courtyard before first period. His hair hit just at his shoulder in a shaggy shape that looked like it had been a long time since he last cut it. Despite his unkempt hair, he was hot. Maybe it was the way it partially obscured his light brown eyes, or the way it shook as he walked. Normally someone like this coming towards me would have made me feel awkward. With this boy, all I could think was he reminded me of a lion.