X-Marks: Stealing Shadows

Fountains

Hundreds of children stood in an opened field. Our arms synchronized up and down and our legs together and apart. I despised everything about it. My legs trembled as I forced to keep them moving.

V33 had no troubles at all. She loved drills but most of all being outside. She was free here, for the most part.

"Run it off!" Mr. Foster said, and stood from the bleachers, a whistle under his hairy lip.

I lifted my heavy legs up and down. A fire lit from within my bones.

"Alright, that's enough," Foster said and lowered his whistle, "Head to the fountains."

I wilted to my knees and rubbed my sweaty hands against my shorts.

V33 put her hand on my back, "Let's get some water before the boys do," she said and dragged me against the damp grass and onto the stone path.

I saw him. He was standing against the pink wall and stalking the drinking fountains with his friends like they did every day. There was K21 who tripped every girl in the grade one at least once, M09 who had a habit of picking his nose and J12 who liked to trick other kids out of their food.

"I think no one's using that one," V33 said and pointed to a fountain at the far end of the pink wall.

It was far enough away that I agreed to follow. V33 went straight for the fountain. She wasn't afraid of anyone.

"Here, your turn," V33 said, and stepped down from the fountain and wiped her mouth dry.

I looked behind, then climbed the steps of the fountain to drink. I took slow sips, with my eyes closed in relief when the fountain spout sprayed into my face, and I fell back onto the stone ground.

"What's the matter?" S51 said and threw his head back in laughter, his thumb still pressed against the spout of the fountain.

My face dripped with cold water. V33 was held back by S51's friends.

"Let me go, or else!" V33 shouted.

"What are you two baldies gonna do," S51 said and ran his hands through his thick black hair.

V33 had shouted with so much confidence, I was curious now too. S51 towered over V33's doll-like frame. She was no match for the four boys, no matter how tough she was. I just didn't know how strong she could be. Not yet.

V33 grunted and stepped on the feet of the boys who held her down. They howled in agony and held their feet in pain as they let V33 go. She didn't look back at them. She was going for S51.

She darted for S51, and with a swift kick to his shin, he cowered to the stone path below.

V33 hovered over his writing body. A smug look of satisfaction creased into her dimples. I stood with her to watch the impossible sight below, but soon I was not alone. Dozens of other children had gathered around too.

"Alright, what's going on here," Mr. Foster said and cut through the tangled crowd.

"She kicked me!" S51 said and pointed to V33 with one hand and held the other on his shin.

"Is this true?" Foster asked and turned to V33.

V33 said nothing. Any guilt was free from her face.

Foster took S51 by the hand and lifted him from the concrete.

"S51, don't think I haven't seen the little games you've been playing out here," Foster said and looked to V33 again, "Besides, look at her. I've raised pups bigger than her!"

Foster slapped S51 on the back and walked him through the path of spectators. S51 looked back with something I had never see in his deep-set eyes, fear.

The other children began to crowd around V33.

"That'll show him," a boy said.

"I wish I were there to see it!" a girl said and pushed her way through the crowd.

I watched the growing crowd for V33. A heaviness wallowed in me.

She was a hero.

The thought burned my chest. I was consumed by it, entirely controlled by it.

S51 was gone, and my best friend had saved me. I should have been happy.

Why couldn't I be?