The Elements Trilogy: The Secondaries

Chapter 26: Lightning

I never lost anyone important to me to death. But I knew the four girls in my life had. And one of them was basically sitting directly in front of them. I knew Diamond had lost an older brother in a car accident about three years ago, and I knew she blamed herself. Everyone knew that, even though it wasn't her fault. Everyone knew the story.

Her brother Thomas and herself had always gotten along, until one day they got into a huge fight because Thomas' new college was across the country, and he started yelling at Diamond. Of course little 13 year old Diamond did the only thing she could think of; she ran. Straight into the road, into the path of an oncoming vehicle.

Thomas had ran out into the road, and shoved her aside. She was thrown onto the curb, but he was hit by the speeding car, and was killed instantly. She was put in a psych ward for six weeks after that, and when she came back, she was a serious introvert.

Everyone had lost Troy to death. I didn't really know the details, except that he betrayed them, and Skylar was the one to kill him. Other than that, she wouldn't say anything else.

And then there was Jamie. Jamie, the love of Skylar's life, and Diamond's favorite guy besides Tony. Jamie, the one who was sent to kill them, but ended up saving them. The one who died, trying to help them. Jamie, the one who seemed to be sitting across from us now. Except it was Stacy.

Identical. Clones. But not the exact same. And I think it hurt them more than helped them.

Everyone sat in awkward silence, unsure of what to do. Suddenly, a phone started ringing. Everyone jumped, and Diamond dug her phone out of her pocket.

"It's Skylar..." she glanced around at everyone.

"Don't answer it," Evalynn said immediately. "She'll just pry the truth from you."

Diamond gave the phone an apologetic glance, as if somehow Skylar could see it, and hit the reject button. Almost immediately, Evie's phone started buzzing.

She grumbled something under her breath and hit the reject button.

Bzzt bzzt. "Geez Sky!" Evalynn turned her phone on silent to make it stop buzzing.

Suddenly, the Jigsaw puppet cackled out of nowhere, and Tony turned bright red. "Sorry," he muttered as he pulled out his phone.

His finger hovered over the answer button, but Diamond grabbed his arm. "What are you doing?!"

"Skylar scares me!" He admitted.

"Skylar scares you?" Evalynn snorted. You're like twice as tall as she is."

"Yeah, but she's mean!" Tony pouted. "She's like Bruce Banner!"

"Who?" Evie asked.

"The Incredible Hulk," he answered before swiftly answering Skylar's phone call.

"S'up Sky?"

Panic surged through my body; Tony and Diamond were terrible liars.

"Where are we?" Tony suddenly got a pained look on his face.

Everyone froze, and stared at him.

"We're uh, helping David with extra cloning stuff." It wasn't technically a lie, but it was still a sorry excuse. "Why?" Tony's voice was suddenly rising in pitch. "I, uh..."

But instead of answering, he yanked the phone away from his ear and he hung up.

"Tony!" the twins shrieked in unison.

"I'm sorry! I panicked!" His phone started cackling again and he yelped.

"Oh give it here!" Harry snatched the phone out of Tony's hand, and answered it. "Hey, baby." he said smoothly, a smile sliding on to his face.

I felt my own face wrinkle with disgust, and I saw Stacy's crinkle up the same way.

"I'm doing fine, baby, how you doin'?" Harry smirked. And even though I knew he was just relentlessly flirting with her to get her to hang up on him, I was still annoyed by it.

"Oh I just wanted to talk to you, baby." Harry said. He chuckled a little bit. "Oh, come on now, don't be like that. I'm not doing any harm...Sky? Skylar?" He hung up the phone with a satisfied look.

Stacy's fists were clenched, and I wasn't the only one who noticed.

Harry quickly tossed Tony's phone back and hastily said, "She can't stand it when I hit on her."

Diamond stood up. "Stacy, where's the bathroom?"

Stacy blinked. "Oh. Down the hall, first door on the right."

Diamond quickly left, and a heavy awkward silence settled over everyone.

Someone knocked on the door, causing everyone to jump. Stacy got up and peered through the peekhole. "Oh, it's my friend, Timothy."

"Oh, hey, I met him at the pool!" I said eagerly. "He kinda looks like the boy version of Diamond!"

"What?" Tony said sharply, as Stacy let Timothy inside.

I glanced up at Timothy as Evalynn drew in a sharp breath, and Harry let loose a "Holy shit!"

My heart started pounding in my chest. My mind was spinning. I could not believe I didn't notice this before. How could I not have recognized him?

"Hey, guys, who is-"Diamond stopped in the middle of her sentence. Her eyes grew enormous, and she stumbled backward. Her mouth slowly opened, and one word slipped out of it: "Thomas?"

Hey guys, so I started writing a book called Jamie. It's about Jamie Shay growing up at The Forces, and it's narrated by him. So go check it out if you love Jamie.