"You ready?" Novahk calls from his window, while I flash him with my mobile from mine. Its twelve at night and I already have butterflies in my stomach, both from apprehension and sneaking out at night coupled with the fact that Novahk would be with me tonight.
I sneak downstairs trying to make as less sound as possible. Mom's room is in the opposite direction of the alarm but still one can never be too sure. I tiptoe to the door, and hear if anybody is awake, mom walking towards me in a bath-robe or something. But there's no noise except from the constant hum that refrigerators gives away, the only thing in our house still awake.
The garage door opens and I have to take a second to find it. My old mountain bike. It seems ages ago that I had last ridden it, back when Emily had still not got her car back in freshman year. Hen on her sixteenth b'day when her dad had gifted her the Prius all the bike rides around the town pretty much came to a full stop.
The seat is dusty and I can tell the wheels dont have much air left in them. I punch in the alarm code, now changed, thanks to yours truly, the garage door glides open without any glitch.
I look back at the open door leading to the house one last time before I drag my bike out into the night. Even though I am in atleast here layes of clothings, the cold find its way inside. The cold, humid-y weather of Northfield has the cpabilty to do that.
It takes a moment for me to notice who as usual is clad all in black, almost blending into the shadow is house casts. No windows have light sin them in our neighbourhood. Everybody has gone to sleep ours ago.
"You ready?" Novahk asks breathing the fog out.
"Just one thing. I don't know how much air..." Novahk holds out the air-pumper. "Don't worry. Got you all covered." Even those words are enough to make me feel al warm from inside. There is something really wrong with my mechanisms. But when I reach my hand to take it from him, he shakes his head, pointing back at his house. "On the enxt sreet." He whispers though there's no living person awake to hear him anyways.
I balance my bike sideways and Novahk does the same till we are in the next lane where Novahk parks his bike and then takes mine, our hands coming into contact in the process, shooting stars in my nerve.
He carefully places the bike on a grassy area and sets the air-pumper beneath the ground so that air can flow freely to it and without much effort. But even then it taken fifteen minutes to blow out both the tires to their original size.
He then tastes both the tires and satisfied with the result, rubs his dirty hand on his jeans and tosses the pumper into a hedge nearby. "We'll pick it up on the way back. Where we are going we need our hands free."
We bike, Novahk slightly infront of me showing the way. 'So where are your friends Calvin Harris and " I feel asligh apprehension rising in my throat. What if tis is some sort of rave he's taking me too. I should have asked him to be more clear wth me before. But I trust him, even now as I continue to paddle with him, mimicking his movements on the cycle. Cycling, like swimming or reading, you never forget but when you're out of practice it sometimes becomes a bit tougher now that the road has turned from firm gravel to rocky splinters. We are enar the docking area of the river. The river here is relalys hallow et soe tourist cruises, whatever we have left of them anyways and shipping services still works.
"They don't know about this place," he says.
"I saw them, atleast it was someone on a bike. I thought it was Caleb. That first day when you came to my room he picked you up that day didn't he?" He chuckles without any humor.
"No that day was different because I want to forget, just some time alone. They don't know what I do on other days though," he says sighing quietly. "Nobody knows," he turns back to look at me. "Until now."
Why me? I want to ask but I don't find the courage. Finally when all the big shipping craters come into view, with a big stadium headlight casing its orangish beams comes to views Novahk says, "Now we walk on foot."
"How far is it?" I ask. I don't understand this place. It's dark and eerie and there's low rustling noises of dead trees and stones under our feet
"Do you trust me, Covalho?" he asks tangling his fingers in mine. When he's doing that, when we are skin to skin and his voice is as sincere as it can get how can't I not. "I do."
"Do you know why I brought you here today?" he asks and I shake my head. If only I had the slightest clue.
It's some sort of warehouse and it's so dark here the only light comes from the moon which is reflected on the dirty and broken glass panes covering the entire building. There are machines with big, metallic pipes attached to it and a stair that goes through it right to the top. This used to be a plastic factory until it was closed down in the recession. Now it's an abandoned shiphouse building. The cool, river air fans itself inside the building, it must be just on the other side of it.
Novahk takes the stair two at a time and I am right behind up. Once on the top, novahk gazes down at the flat planes and the dark misty river beyond it. Standing shoulder to shoulder I realize just how tall he actually is, and though he looks really skinny, he is warm as ever. Without letting go of my hand he speaks.
"You are me atleast what I want to be. You are unafraid and you are unapologetic. I admire you for that and I wish I could be more like that, more like you, brave enough to stand up to the world." I shake my head, can't he see what I truly am.
"I am none of those things Novahk. I am definitely not brave."
"No, you are," there is so much pain in his voice and his eyes. "you show the world what you are fully. There's no hiding. There's no secret. Me," he gives a bark of laughter. "nobody know the first thing about me. Not even my best friends. I am not Novahk McAllister. I am just an idea of who that boy is. Nobody knows who I truly am."
I put my finger under his warm chine moving his face towards me. "I know. I know all of you. I know you as the bravest, kindest boy I have ever see. Who is willing to go any distance just to get his brother's bird, who saves a man from his death and above all the boy who showed me the courage to find out the truth I have been running from all these months."
He shakes his head. "Not like you Krishna. Never like you."
"You know why I come here? It's only half because of my dad. The other half is because I have this twisted thinking that since I can't do anything at home to help my mom standing here ruining him in this way actually does some good, but who am I fooling? He hasn't stopped hurting her whenever he can. It's just wishful thinking on my part. And I stand there, being defenseless while mom and my little brother suffer at home and I can't do anything to help them."
I remember Novahk's mom so pale standing on the doorway. I remember Adam's face, white as ghost when he knew his father was near. Nobody should be afraid in their own homes. Atleast in homes we are supposed to feel safe, away from all harm. I cannot even begin to wrap my head around this all.
"What is this place?" I urge him. "What does it have anything to do with your dad?"
"You know my grandfather used to be a very powerful person around here right?" I nod. I know my dad once told how McAllister's were the family who basically founded the whole town. "Well my father was left shit rich by grandpa. And he takes all of these in it to gain more and more power for himself. Do you know he's going to leave force next year and run for election. I stare at him in horror.
"And if mom had any hope to get out of the marriage then it would be completely over. So here I stand trying to make sure that never happens, that the doors on my mom never closes. By finding out any link, anything that can expose him for what he really is. Only then my mom can have a chance of surviving this." His voice breaks halfway and I pull him into me, his head in my hair and his tears flowing down freely on my jacket.
"Someday when I wake up I don't even expect mom to be alive. I would just sit quietly on my bed and roll over and sleep there till the sun came up and I thought everything was going to be okay. And it was ten times worse when Adam came along, every moment I am out of house, I am thinking what will happen to my brother. The monster has not hurt him till now but it's only a matter of time before he does. And what will I do then? I will just sit there helplessly while he tore him apart just like he did to, and left me feeling nothing except bitenrnees and an empty, hollow ting, just a charade for the world.
"A perfect fucking golden puppet. And if I do anything against that, he would just hurt my mom. Hurt her so bad that I wouldn't be able to remove that memories for years, in my head imprinted permanently."
"And you know why the loud music blares so late at night? That's because they are curtains on my father' s sins. Everything he does behind closed doors, the songs which masks it are also the only signal to the outside world as a cry for help, if only somebody would have willing ears to listen to it."
"Oh Novahk," I say pushing my arms around him and hugging him as tightly as I can. He hugs me back. It's like he's stuck inside a storm and clinging to me for support "And then one day I remember when he beat her so bad that my mom had blood in her mouth but he wouldn't take her to the doctor or even feed her anything, and I finally went to their bedroom, which was strictly off limit." His voice breaks again. "I saw her lying on the bed, went to her to offer her fruits she saw me at the door and she flinched. She thought I was my dad. Since I already look like him who is to say I won't turn out like him too. Even my own mother was afraid of me."
"Nobody hates you Novahk. It's all just a misunderstanding. Your mother loves you and so do all the rest of the people, at school everywhere, even me." He stops momentarily and looks upto me. His eyes are flowing river of confusion and something else, a spark.
"What's there to love?" he asks.
"What's not to love?" I ask back. Can't he see it? Can't he see what he really is like, without being partial to his faults.
"I am so helpless and confused I don't even know what to do. It's so frustrating sometimes I want to tear my hair out. I-I don't know what's inside, all I can see is darkness, how can you say you like me when you haven't seen all of me?"
"You brought me here to see all of you. And now I have seen all of it," I remind him.
"No not like this. You don't understand what I am, you don't see it like I wanted you to see it. the reason I brought you here." He messes his hair up, stepping away from, letting the cold air come between us. He pulls something out of his jacket and jerks it and then sprays it on the wide stained wall in front of us.
I step closer to see what it is and then gasp. It's a graffiti with the words Braveheart written and colours red and green surrounding it. I know the word, I have heard it somewhere in some context, but I don't remember it now, there's only a nagging at the back of my mind. But importantly, this also means-
Novahk is the vandal. As the realization finally sinks in, I gasp and at that sound Novahk glances at me, his eyes hooded. "Now do you see? I am not a good person. I am not the person you and the others want to be.
"Why?" I ask. This, is not what I was expecting, definitely not what I was expecting. With Novahk you never know, that's what they say at school but would they ever think Novahk's doing this
"I just want to get a happy future for my mother, she at least deserves that after living with that man for twenty years. And for that I can go to any extent." His hand is in a fist and his expression determined.
"It's illegal is what it is," my tone is harsher than I need it to be and Novahk flinches. "I don't think you would have understood it."
"No what I don't understand is why are you doing this? Why are you playing with fire? Is this because of your dad. How's that going to help your mom?" I ask. This does not make any sense. I didn't think Novahk, the big daredevil he was would play with fire. He's mature and responsible, even though he can be a big prankster sometimes, he takes responsibility for it and except for some of the made up stories all his actions seem to vouch for that.
"I can't explain everything now. But this, what I am doing, I took a huge risk bringing you here. This one of the least secure building you see but you have to promise me Krishna, you won't say anything about this to anybody. This needs to be a secret between us."
"If this is such a secret then why am I here?" I ask. He looks confused for a second, "I wanted to show this to you Kris. This was not in my plan. You were not in my plan. But like there are some things, that we can never take into our calculation of life. You are my unexpected. You exploded in my life and nothing's the same as before. Nothing except this. This has to stay the way that is."
Before I can reply there is a loud noise, like somebody breaking open the door downstairs and then there's lot of flashlights, their beams crisscrossing each other. "Whoever is up there. Freeze."