Saturday 10:30 a.m.
We drove along under a canopy of oak trees toward my house, and I was lulled like a child in a rocking chair, cradled in the pleather of the driver's seat, warmed by the late morning sun. I loved living on our little island. To be so small, it was a place of contradictions and wonder to me. Shrimp boats by the river. White sand by the ocean. And wild Florida in the interior. I felt comfortable here. Free.
The air conditioning blew cool air through my hair, and Jess, who had leaned her seat back and propped her feet up on the dash, made an "ooof" sound and threw herself forward to turn up the volume when Tom Petty started singing "Wildflowers". I could swear my soul was smiling.
Never in a billion years was I expecting to see the vehicle that came barreling towards us. I watched in seeming slow motion as it veered into our lane, swerved out, then back in again.
I had enough time to formulate the thought, "Is that guy drunk?" before jerking the wheel away from the shiny black Porsche that looked so much like a giant bullet aimed right at us. "Shitty-Shit. Shit." I thought again, but all that came out of my mouth was an undignified scream as I plowed into the bushes to the right of us. The Porsche executed a 360 spin. Maybe more than one. I wasn't sure since I was staring at the bright green leaves of some un-named wild scrub-brush by that point, but I heard the screeching of tires, and low and behold, a few feet down from me, it too had found its way off the road. But its shiny chrome bumper had mowed down smaller saplings, bowing them forward as if they were now in filial supplication to their forefathers further on in the wooded thicket. Somewhere ahead of me, a rabbit jumped. A snake skittered. People came to Florida for our beaches, but the oceans here were not tame, and neither were the wildlands surrounding them. No matter how encroached upon, the scruffy little wild patches remained, resilient to the careless foot of man. I could see where one sapling had refused to completely submit to the Porsche's onslaught and, as a result, it stood tilted but cocky. One tire of the sporty little car was off the ground, having ridden up its nimble trunk like a ramp. The Porsche was sitting at an odd angle, balanced on the axel now, its tire flat but flying. Its headlight smashed, fender and side panel crumpled.
I was just sitting there gawping at the entire scene like an idiot, panting with adrenalin and confusion in equal measure. But Jess, who had rolled to the side and face planted against the window, pushed herself off with a "What in the mother-loving merciful crap?"
"Are you OK?" I managed.
"Do I look OK to you?"
She looked pissed. That was for sure. "Actually, yeah," I replied after giving her a once over.
"I mean emotionally!" she huffed. "Where is my other slipper?" She began to scour the floorboards. I looked back and spotted a puff of pink.
"It flew back there." I nodded helpfully to the back passenger floor. "I'll get it."
"You do that," she muttered. In fact, she was still muttering things as I opened my door and walked around my Ford to reach the rear passenger door. I'm glad I didn't hear whatever it was. When I opened the door, I managed to catch, "and you need to go back to driving school is what you need to do..."
"Here's your slipper." I interrupted her tirade by dropping the slipper in her lap.. Alright, maybe it was on her head.
"Girl!" she screeched.
"I need to check on the other driver."
"The other driver can go to..."
I shut the door with a sigh. Jess had reached her limit. It meant anybody and everybody was going to have it. It wasn't my fault the guy in the Porsche couldn't stay in his lane. I did the best defensive driving I could possibly do. It wasn't like I was trained for some rando to come at me. Still, the smaller car took the worst of it. I hoped the driver was alright.
No sooner had I thought that than the Porsche's door opened, and the driver unfolded himself and ungracefully stumbled out. When he stood, I immediately recognized him.
No. Freaking. Way.
This just wasn't happening to me. I froze in place.
Hector Delarosa.
This. This right here was a prime example of what that affluenza you read about on the news does to a body. When people weren't just rich—they were spoiled rich. I mean, my family was pretty well-off. My mother was a nurse. Dad had a little bit of money from his family so he can stay home and be a dad. We have the freedom to do that. We didn't worry about where groceries are going to come from. I knew we had it good. But some people sat around on the south end of the Island with their eight car garages, and told themselves that their shit smells like carnations and their farts are perfumed with gladiolas. Over fancy dinners on plates that cost more than most people's cars, they'd toast to how superior they were because they could buy and sell the rest of us two times over. We either took out their trash, or we were their trash.
Well, screw Hector and a pox on whoever gave a teenager access to that Porsche. I puffed out my cheeks and blew out a gust of disgust. Hector could sit on the side of the road and wait for the police, for all I cared. I was going back to check on my car.
Of course, no sooner had I pivoted back to my baby to see how bad she looked than Jess swung open her door and joined the party.
"Figures!" She threw her hands in the air, "Goddamn stinking Delarosa thinking he owns the whole road. Now, look!"
She was marching towards us both in full "get-em tiger" mode, and I wasn't going to stop her. I mean, if it was going to come out—better him than me. I glanced back to Hector and mentally shrugged. I heard her scream at him about how this wasn't the halls at school and he couldn't just do what he liked, as I looked over my Explorer. Thankfully, Baby seemed alright. Her front bumper was a little scratched, but no broken headlights. The bushes were a fairly good place to crash, and I had managed to slow down enough. I sighed. It was only then, that I realized things had gotten quiet. Odd. I peeked over the hood and found Jess standing over Hector, who was sitting down, knees to his chest, head on his knees, looking every bit forlorn. My friend was was just glaring down at him.
"What did you do?" I yelled over to her.
"Come over here," she yelled back.
For curiosity, I obliged.
When I got there, I stood beside her, my eyes shifting between the two of them. "Now what?"
"Something is wrong with him," she told me.
I just stared at her, waiting for more.
"Like for real. He just sat down like that. Like a puppet with his string cut."
I looked at Hector. Then, slowly turned my head back to her.
"Stop looking at me," she demanded, raising her voice. "I didn't do this! This boy is damaged. I mean more than usual."
"Uh..." I was at a loss for words, yet with hundreds of questions swarming my head. Why did she care? Why should I care? What was wrong with him? but I settled for, "What do you want me to do about it?"
"I dunno." She sighed and threw her arms out dramatically, "Call the ambulance or something. He's clearly got some kind of head injury. He won't talk."
Oh. Right. Ambulance. I almost laughed. It was so simple. Where was my brain today? I reached in my pocket for my phone when Hector, who had been so still, reached out with speed I didn't think he could possess, and grabbed my leg, "No Ambulance," he barked.
"Ahhhhh!" I screamed and kicked at his hand. I stumbled backward and landed on my butt.
"Crap!" Jess was right there with a hand up. "Are you alright?"
"No. He touched me," I grumbled, "With his filthy hands. Gross." Also, my ass hurt, but I wasn't going to admit that out loud.
Hector had returned to sitting with his knees back to his chest. His hands were now covering his ears like I'd offended him with my words, and he didn't want to hear them.
It was a terrible flaw to have, but anybody would tell you that despite my twitchy nature, curiosity is my Kryptonite. I am the person who would push the giant red button just to see what it would do. Jess and Sy both tease me about it. I'd end the world by button-pushing. Die by exploring the basement in a horror movie.
Whatever my malfunction, I found myself leaning in toward Hector, the boy who bullied me... because I was now hopelessly curious about why the hell he was curled up by the side of the road.
There wasn't a scratch on him that I could see.
"What's wrong with you?" I asked.
He said nothing, just made a strange little choking sound. It was actually rather pitiful. Welp. Yeah. Jess was right. This boy was definitely damaged. He needed help.
I reached again for my phone.
Without looking up, still holding his ears for dear life, he yelled at us, "DON'T CALL FOR HELP!"
I looked to Jess and then back to him. Yeah, that wasn't weird at all. I looked down and began to dial 911, when, without warning, Hector jumped up like a coiled spring. At six-foot four, there was a lot of potential energy stored for jumping up, I guessed, because he sprung forward, grabbed the phone out of my hands, and took off running.
"What the Shit?" Jess screamed to no one in particular.
"Hector, Wait!" I yelled, just as his idiot ass was about to run into the street. To my great relief, he paused, mid-step, frozen like a game of red-light greenlight from when we were kids.
"What is the matter with you?" I asked again, "What if a car had been coming?" He didn't respond. "Hector!" I was so frazzled, "Bring me my phone back."
At that, he turned and brought back my phone, extending it out for me to take. He did not look happy.
"What's your boggle, dude?" Jess peered at him like he was some foreign substance in biology.
I didn't want to care but this had become a mystery that needed to be solved, "Are you injured?" I asked cautiously.
There was still no answer.
"Damnit!" I huffed, "Answer me! We are trying to help you." Even if you don't deserve it. I thought.
"I'm not injured," Hector spoke finally, through gritted teeth. "I don't want to answer you. But I can't seem to help myself."
Jess and I looked at each other with raised brows.
"Why don't you want to talk to us?" Jess made a show of looking around, "You see anybody else around here in line to help your ass?"
Hector huffed at her then flopped back down on the ground. "I hate your brain." he muttered.
"Well, that's not sane," I said, looking over at my friend.
"Nope." She popped the p sound and shook her head.
"That's my point," he yelled up at us from the ground. Then grabbed a fist full of fallen leaves...the brown, dry deadfall that constantly littered the woodsy places and crunched them in his fist before flinging them at my feet with a strangled "Arrrrgggg."
"Well, ok, then." I drew back a few feet.
"I think he's on bad drugs," I whispered to Jess.
"Like the bath salts?" Jess whispered back.
"Is that the stuff that made that one dude eat that other dude's face? Like on the news?"
"Think so."
"You can stop whispering," Hector interrupted our hushed conversation with a whisper of his own which gradually grew in volume, "because I can hear you just fine. I can hear everything."
Jess and I just looked at each other before she reached out a slipper-covered toe to nudge his leg, "You take bath salts or what? Cause this sure as shit ain't pot or molly."
"It's not molly, right?" she whispered to me again.
"How would I know?" I had given up on whispering. Molly was supposed to make you all lovey-dovey and stupid, right? That was not this.
"What did you take?" I peered down at Hector, trying to remember everything I could from those DARE packets. The ones that said "say no, or bad things will happen to you" handouts. Was it uppers or downers that made you batshit of this particular variety? I should find out what I could in case he went unconscious before I could call the paramedics. Stupid rich bastards and their drugs. Maybe he did an 8 ball—like a whole one or something.
"I didn't do cocaine." He groaned from the ground. "I didn't take anything."
Jess snorted, "Ok, he just said he didn't do cocaine, but nobody asked him about it. That means he did cocaine." She shrugged at me.
I opened my mouth to reply, but before I could, Hector rose up from the dirt like the undead, sitting and pointing an accusing finger at me, "She thought it. She thought I snorted a whole 8 ball!" He suddenly tumbled back down with an audible "ooomph"
"What the..." I was partly confused about why he was flinging himself around and partly confused about how he was guessing what I thought he took.
Jess looked from him to me.
"I—I did think that." I shrugged.
"Of course you did." Hector glanced up at me. His voice calm again, then added morosely, "I hate everybody's brain."
"Uh..." Jess was speechless.
I looked at the phone in my hand, about to dial 911 again. This was above my paygrade, and whatever mystery lay here was beyond me.
I should have learned from my previous mistake. I should have stayed away from him when I had the phone out. But before I could process what was happening. Before the phone was raised to dial, Hector had reached up and grabbed my wrist with one hand and was holding the phone with the other. Not one to relinquish it lightly a second time, and with him being on the ground, the situation gave me a little bit of leverage. I made a fist with my hand, clutching the phone so we both had a grip on it, and I clutched at his arm with my free hand. He was NOT running off with my cell again! Not if I could help it!
"Let go of me!" I screamed.
I was not prepared when he did as I asked and I landed on my butt for the second time that morning. Hard.
Hector smirked at me.
"Get it together!" I yelled, brushing my hair back from where a mass of it had fallen in my face.
"Stop making me do stuff I don't want to do!" He countered with an equally frustrated tone.
"I didn't make you do anything, weirdo." What a psycho!
"You didn't?" He looked confused and at my annoyance, completely unconcerned about me calling him names. "It sure felt like you made me do stuff." He gestured vaguely to my phone, "I didn't want to give your phone back or talk to you or anything..." He trailed off, staring at nothing for a moment, and then his eyes lit up, and his eyebrows shot up to his hairline, "Oh my God! You're a bruja!"
"What?" Jess and I yelped at the same time. I knew we should have taken Spanish instead of French, but we both decided the trip to Paris offered in French 3 was worth it. But now, here we were, Floridians with little knowledge of a language many of our neighbors spoke. Well, I mean, we could yell a few Spanish obscenities while driving. And knew not to let people call us puta, and how to tell them to kiss our ass. And of course, how to order at our favorite Cuban deli, but what Hector was babbling about now... this word was new."
"Witch!" He pointed at me accusingly again, "I should have known! It all makes sense now! You cursed me! Mal de ojo!"
Jess and I burst out laughing. I couldn't help myself. I shouldn't have laughed at him. I knew it was rude to laugh at a guy tripping balls on drugs or whatever, but damn. This was gold. I should have maybe filmed it.
"Stop laughing!" he demanded, "Admit what you did! You cursed me to hear the thoughts of everybody so I would know the truth."
I stopped laughing. Had he just said, "hear thoughts?"
"Well, it worked! I learned my lesson! I want you to turn it off—now. I want my brain back to myself, please. Make it stop!"
Now I was freaked. And it was time to get the hell out of there. But before I even tried, Hector lunged forward and grabbed both my legs.
Holy hell...he knew I was leaving!
Impulsively, I flailed my arms and legs to try and shimmy away from him. He was being so creepy.
"You have to do something!" He kept looking at me, making me nauseous. This was a person I despised but who, at the moment, actually stirred both my pity and not the least bit of fear.
"Hector, stop." It came out as a whisper. Barely audible.
To my surprise, he did. He made a choked sound and brought his hands up to his face, then drew his knees in close like before, a closed-in, child-like position.
Jess glanced at me and shook her head.
"Hector, look at me." I tried to keep my voice reassuring like I was talking to a child or a dumb animal. Looking at him all scrunched up, I just tried to pretend he was somebody else. Some random overgrown ten-year-old we found looking all lost and dejected. "It's going to be OK." I assured him. "Whatever is going on with you, you're going to be alright."
"Y-Yeah?" He looked at me with what I can only call childishly hopeful eyes.
How could I promise him this? I swallowed a lump in my throat and did anyway. "Yeah. Sure. Absolutely!" I nodded my head for emphasis.
"Will you make it so I stop hearing what other people think?"
"Uh... I don't know if I can do that." I answered honestly.
"But you did it to start with...didn't you?"
I shook my head. "No."
He let out a huff through his nose. Maybe it was half a laugh. "I just woke up..." he started, his coffee-colored eyes boring into mine, "and everybody in my house was thinking so loud...ya know?"
I did not know. But I nodded.
"Everywhere I went. It wouldn't stop, and it kept getting worse. Worse and worse and worse." He put his hands next to his ears again but stopped himself, still staring straight at me like I had some mystical answer to his problem.
"What do I do?" He took a deep breath, "I tried to run away from all the people everywhere, and I ended up..." he glanced for a second to the smashed-up Porsche, then back to me, "running into you!"
"I see." I nodded again. This was some next-level mess. Some Walmart-level mess. Either that or Hector was hearing voices which I was not...
"What happened at Walmart?" Hector interrupted my train of thought.
"Magic," Jess answered for me, joining me on the ground, sitting crossed-legged, peering at Hector, seeming to really look at him for the first time.
"You were both thinking about it." Hector said, interest in his voice. He scooted closer to us, something I did not care for. My face probably showed my displeasure, but I was still curious.
"We were?" I asked, looking at Jess.
"Yeah." He said his voice getting excited, "It's hard to follow both your brains at once. You have busy brains, but you were trying to decide if I was losing my mind or if this was like Walmart. Both of you." He pointed back and forth. "Both."
"Hmmm," Jess hummed.
"Well, this is more of that then." I heaved a sigh.
"It was a bruja at Walmart who started all this?" Hector's face was horrified.
"No." I shook my head, and a leaf fluttered down. "At least I don't think so. I mean... some bizarre stuff occurred. We were told it was magic."
"But we're only going with that terminology because we got nothing else to go on," Jess added helpfully.
Hector's mouth formed an O, and he nodded as if this was perfectly reasonable. Maybe it was given that we were sitting by the side of the road discussing mind reading.
"How do we stop it?" Hector leaned forward, looking at Jess now, "The blond guy at Walmart said what again?"
I drew back and made a face at him. How had he seen Gabe in my mind? I'd only thought about him for a fraction of a second.
"It's important to get my brain back all to myself," Hector huffed at me.
"That dude said you could save the world by getting some do-dad from your father and I think maybe it's worth listening to him," Hector said thoughtfully, before adding, "even if he does use way too much hair gel. I mean... I'm a fan of looking good, but that dude took his styling tips from a nineties boy band or some damn thing. How could you think he was cute?" He looked at me accusatorily.
" Who I think is cute is not your business and it's not important, either. What's important is that the cute boy from Walmart was wrong. Totally off-base and a nutbar. My dad is as likely to have some killer, magical apocalypse-causing object as he is to secretly be the King of England. It's just not possible."
"Isn't it?" Hector looks at us both. "We should at least go look for it. Ask your dad some questions. Something."
I laughed, but it fell flat. Some crickets chirped in the brush. NONE of this made sense. "There is nothing to look for." I rolled my eyes.
"Gimme that guy's number," Hector demanded, "Imma call him."
"No!" I batted the hand away that stretched out to me.
"Jess and I are going home now." I stood up. "You seem somewhat saner."
"I feel somewhat saner."
"Excellent." I nodded, dusting off my shorts and legs as best as I could. I was filthy from sitting in the dirt like an idiot, and there was nothing to really be done about that now. I huffed at the sight of my braces and shoes. What a shit show. I shook a leaf off my sneaker.
"We can't just leave him here." I looked up to see Jess gesturing emphatically to Hector and his wreck of a car.
I couldn't see why not. I just shrugged. Not my monkey, not my problem.
"I'm not a monkey," Hector huffed, standing up himself, "and I'm nobody's problem."
"Ugh!" Jess now threw her arms up, "Who called you a monkey?"
"She did," Hector nodded in my direction, "In her brain."
"Yes. Yes, of course!" If Jess's eyes rolled any farther, they would have slung out of her head. "Because you read minds, and magic is a thing now."
She muttered some profanity before turning her frustration back on me, "Raina! We are not leaving this looney bird here. He's a danger to himself and others."
"Well, he ain't coming with us."
"Damn straight," Hector agreed. "And you two are NOT calling the cops on me either!"
I gestured to his trashed car. "Like they won't stop when they see that?"
"Ok. Yeah. Well..." He faltered for only a moment, "That's an issue. But if they take me to jail or a hospital, I'll be surrounded by so many people! I'll feel too much again. I can't have that many people in my head at once!" His eyes looked panicked.
"Well, let's call your folks." I heaved a sigh
"There's nobody to call!" He looked at me with wide eyes.
"You are not an orphan, Hector." I put my hands on my hips for emphasis.
"No." He huffed, "But my mom's gone on a cruise, and my dad drove to Ocala this morning. He won't be back today."
"You got a brother, right?" Jess offered
"Dante is at Florida State. He took summer courses." Hector looked dejected.
"So, can't leave you here, and you got no people." Jess looked pointedly at me.
Ugh. I knew Jess was socially responsible but when did she become Mother freakin' Teresa? I looked from her to Hector, "So what? You expect us to take you from the scene of an accident?" I put my hands on my hips, "Just drive you home, I suppose?"
"I don't expect you to take me anywhere." Hector was getting angry, "I said I wasn't your problem. I'm nobody's problem. I'm just going to walk out into the woods and hope nobody comes near me."
"That's some bullshit." Jess glared at him. Then spoke to me, "Who's to say he won't hear a bunch of hikers or bikers and go berserk again and run into the road and get hit by a car? It would be on us 'cause we left him here. He needs supervision."
I huffed. My mom was a nurse. She was working a shift now, but Dad would possibly help watch him. Neither of them were going to believe the whole magical mystery tour I'd been on this morning. "Fine. Get in the car, Hector." I pointed to my old Explorer. I couldn't believe I was doing this.
"I don't want to!" Hector protested, even as he walked toward my vehicle, "How are you making me do this?"
"Do what?" I asked wearily as we all trudged back to the vehicle. God, I hope it still cranked up.
"Go get in your car," he answered.
"I dunno Hector." What was he even talking about? Babysitting a mind reader was too much work.
"Well, let's get on with this!" Hector barked from the back seat where he had plopped his ungrateful butt, "What kind of sound system does this bucket of bolts have anyway?"
Aaaaand.... Just like that... any good feeling I might have had at doing charity and taking care of one of God's wayward children was gone. Calling my pretty girl a bucket of bolts? Hector was trash. I got in the front seat and put her into gear without a word as Jess told Hector to "sit back and shut it." This was going to be a long ride.