"COME ON! ABSOLUTELY NO SLEEPING!"
Naomi sprung forward to the jerk of an unapologetic hand pushing her awake. She blinked viciously.
Her eyes snapped to Lia first, probably because the other girl was hovering over her, fangs excitedly snapped into the flesh of her own bottom lip. "We've got people to upset and rules to break. There's no time for sleep."
Naomi squeezed her eyes shut before blinking them open again, albeit struggling against the light. "W-what?" she muttered groggily.
"Today, Naomi dearest, will be your first day doing a run with us." Naomi perked up and Lia lit up like a Christmas tree. She continued, leaning in after each sentence until she was too close for comfort, "There will be danger. There will be fun. But most importantly, there will be a reckoning." She let her words hang for a moment, like a strained hand over a cliff. Then she spoke again, "So, get dressed! We're hitting the road in twenty."
Shaking the drowsiness away Naomi briefly forced her brain into processing all that she was hearing. She paused and looked up again at Lia. "Wait, where are we going?"
"Now that," Lia pointed a mischievous finger and stood up, "is a surprise, my love."
Naomi's brows furrowed. Lia stepped off into the rest of the open space where everyone was on their feet, zipping up hoodies and throwing items into their duffel bags. They were doing it again. Transforming into a high functioning group— a gang— rather than their usual instantaneous selves. They made the switch look so easy. In ballet, Naomi couldn't help but recall., you were either one or the other all the time. Never both. Never different. Always the same. "You are so dramatic."
That came from Chyna who was shaking a spray can and testing it on a blank sheet of paper over and over. "We're going to an art show, Naomi."
Now, Naomi stood up out of her sleeping bag. As she did, the memories from last night came rushing into her mind and her eyes helplessly found Saint. Cairo was showing him something on the IPad, tapping away at it and whispering under his breath. Naomi wondered if he had forced sleep as much as she did last night. If he had never wanted the night to end as much as she did. If he had wanted to pull her up again and share more secrets as much as she did. She wiped her face, hoping her expressions hadn't betrayed her and responded, "An art display? Why?"
The paint suddenly blasted from the nozzle. Destruction splattering on the paper. Chyna smiled at her creation.
"This city is finally acknowledging us," another voice came. "It would be rude to not at least show up," Sully said a little seriously. The boy's face was solemn...before grinning wildly with Lia.
Their smiles were contagious enough to excite her. Naomi grinned and finger combed her clumped hair. Cairo came up to her next and outstretched the IPad. Naomi didn't hide the fact that her eyes travelled inquisitively from his fingers all the way up his arm and to his face. She raised an eyebrow at his stoic features and pulled her head back. But before she could question him he shoved it into her chest. "Just. Read. It."
Tongue in cheek, Naomi suppressed the groan of pain insisting release from her and instead grabbed the device. She sucked in a breath. Quickly blinking, she saw that the screen was pulled up to a tweet. From the mayor of Riverside. About them.
'The Menace Must Be Stopped. Riverside's recent plague known as 'The Guise' has done nothing but cause the town thousands in public vandalism and destruction to public property. But perhaps worst of all, they continue to infect the youthful minds of Riverside. More to come at my press conference tomorrow.' Attached to the tweet was a hyperlink.
"He's trying to make it out as if we're ruining this city when we're the only ones trying to actually save it. Today, we're going to the venue where he's holding his his little press conference and we're shifting the narrative back on our side."
"How?" Naomi asked.
"With this." Suddenly, something was flying across the room straight at her. On instinct, she grabbed it before it could hit her and felt the coolness of it in her hands. It was a can of spray paint. "The old fashioned way," Saint finished. Maybe it was just her mind playing tricks but the way he smiled at her, he must have been thinking about last night too. "I hope they televise it," his smirk grew when he added, "live."
Naomi smiled back but a small part of her told her that it was not for the same reasons.
She quickly grabbed her stuffed backpack from a corner and ducked into the storage room. She replaced what she needed to and sunk her feet into the only pair of sneakers she had thought to pack. There was no mirror, but she nodded at herself anyway. For a split second, she almost took her hair up into a sloppy ponytail, but her fingers relaxed and she decided against it. Instead, she reached into her bag and pulled out the stolen lioness mask. She ran her palm over its features and her heart hammered inside her chest. Breathe. She pulled the door open.
In the hallway, everyone had some sort of bag strapped to them as they came near her. Chyna handed her one. Naomi tested its weight. "What's in it?"
Without turning around, Chyna told her, "TNT sticks." There was a brief pause. Cairo chuckled audibly. Chyna turned around finally and smiled. "It's paint, Naomi. Relax," she said comfortingly.
But, she was. And that fact might have been a little more frightening.
Sully grabbed her hand, pulling her into their small crowd before slipping his monkey mask over his face. "Let's go, let's go" he chanted. Naomi laughed and let the smaller boy carry her away.
The rest of The Guise slipped on their masks and jogged up the stairs one by one, surfacing in the crowded tent. It was weird being a back out into the real world. The moon, Naomi hoped, hadn't told the sun any of her new secrets but she still couldn't help but squirm in guilt. Naomi followed Chyna's back out into the open and only then was she able to realize just how early the time was. The sun was only barely grazing clouds.
And just like that, she was waking at abysmal times again in Riverside, except now the air felt warmer and there was no need for tip-toeing afraid that something somewhere would fumble and shatter. She had already broken everything. Grounding the pieces under the soles of her feet would at least make the shattered shards something beautiful before the wind carried it off. They quickly made their way over to the shed where the Tiger unlocked it and they all grabbed their individual bikes. He wheeled over to Naomi and patted for her to get on. "Get "Now's probably a good time to put that thing on by the way," the Tiger said to her, pointing an index finger at the mask she was holding.
Nodding, Naomi finally put it on.
She exhaled.
Immediately, she was reborn.
*
With the Guise, Riverside seemed indefinitely smaller. Despite the fact that they were only on bicycles and in reality their speed couldn't have been that much, they treated Riverside like it was a communal skate park and not a metropolitan city.
The Tiger curved them up the sidewalk, his bike jumping with them every time they rode over a crack or city debris. There were still parts of the Lioness that vividly remembered the dangers of riding a bicycle but she did not murmur. The danger of it pulsed through her like adrenaline. Perhaps, she might have been afraid if she was being pushed closer and closer to the edge, but all that had already happened. Now, she was free-falling.
The Lioness' hands found the Tiger's waist and she gripped onto him as he plopped them off of the sidewalk and back into the road, speeding up to the Bunny, who was giggling under her mask and going beside the Bull whose face was turned toward the horizon in front of him.
"You're liking this," he commented over the breeze.
"It's much more carefree than anything I've ever done," she admitted too loudly, not as tame as the Tiger's voice. But that was because it seemed easy to say, as if all of her consequences could be left behind with the tire tracks skidded on the sidewalk.
Saint, the Tiger, paused momentarily. "Oh, Naomi," his tone held warning, yet invitation, "I think you've found your line of work."
When the Lioness glanced behind her, she saw the Guise, just a few inches off speeding like their lives depended on it, but beyond them were the people of Riverside. She hadn't realized before, but every person they came to pass followed them with their eyes. People stopped, cars slowed, cameras flashed. Riverside gazed in amazement after them, but the Lioness along with the other wild animals just kept moving, their attention in the opposite direction and leaving Riverside behind.
They only zipped by a few more buildings, all production and plastic, before finally slowing outside a low one with paling paint. The roof looked rotten from the inside out and the banner spanning across the outside 'A People Unshackled From Their Past' was beginning to catch dust and cobwebs. They skidded to a halt. The Fox tutted and set forth her right hand, her pink nail polish hinting to a dark purple under the dusk of Riverside. "Welcome one and all to the pristine Riverside African-American Historical Society."
There were no sounds, not even the faintest hint of a breeze as they took in the underwhelming block of cement. the Tiger added, "Where black history is nestled in the roaches crawling up artifacts and paintings."
"And rats scamper under the floorboards," came the Lioness.
They looked only a second longer before the Monkey said, "Let's rain hell." They adjusted their masks and left their bicycles around the corner of the building then ran to the front door altogether. The Bull unsheathed two metallic sticks and picked the clock in only a few seconds. A trick, he said, that they should all master because he's getting tired of doing it all the time.
They went inside quickly and shut the door behind them. The Lioness waited for someone to flip the light switch but that never came. Instead, a single stream of yellow light shot out onto a wall. It helped to illuminate the rest of them and the Lioness saw the Monkey handing out flashlights to everyone. As she took hers she asked, "Is there no electricity either?"
"No there is," came the sly Fox said.
She waited for a further explanation but none came until the Bull huffed. Then he explained, "If the lights are on people outside will be able to see through the windows. We don't want to draw any attention." She nodded.
Slowly, they spread throughout the room, glancing tiny beams of light onto whatever their eyes caught. For the new Lioness, she mostly saw paintings of women with head-wraps catching water and villages of only children laughing despite their ribs protruding from their skin.
"Alright," roared the Tiger, "Let's make our own art shall we?" He took out a spray paint can and moved to the nearest empty wall. He shook it and began with wide arcs. The rest of them all grasped their own weapons and began slicing and dicing the walls.
The Fox came close to her. "Aren't you going to start?"
She stared at the painting in front of her. This one held the black and white portrait image of a little boy staring accusingly into the viewer's eyes, tears building in his gaze. "I don't even know what to write, or draw."
The Fox pushed Naomi aside, to an empty space. "We're not destroying the beautiful art here. We're making our own." She put both her hands on her shoulders and looked past the Lioness mask and to the girl underneath. "This building holds some of the most profound art in Riverside History. Stories. Experiences. Troubles. But they treat it as if it's nothing. They leave everything in here, the blood and sweat and tears of all these people, to rot. And they do not care. They only want to use it now as a tool in their rhetoric. Make it look as if they care about us, but they don't," she breathed, "How does that make you feel?"
"Like-"
The Fox shushed her. "Don't tell me. Show me." She placed a can in her hand and turned her to the wall. Over her shoulder, she whispered again, "Show me."
Naomi grit her teeth. Held her breath. Then pounced.
The wall begged for mercy under her ferocious attacks of truth.
Author's Note
So so so so sorry I'm a day late, readers. It is exam season and it is rough. I'm thinking of switching up the update schedule to every other week so follow me for more details if I announce that.
This week's dedication really can't go to anyone else but -stuckies because she has read I think ALL of my books and she always votes and leaves the nicest comments. Makes. My. Whole. Day. Ilysm thank you for not getting tired of me yet! Remember, if you vote and comment, the next dedication could very well be you!
So, Naomi is, well, changing. What do you guys think about this new change? What do you think Naomi put on the wall? What about The Guise- good influence or bad influence? Remember, nothing is as it seems!
IN THE NEXT CHAPTER...
It sort of reminded Naomi of the world she and Ben had in his equipment store when sadness swelled and desperation dripped, except with the Guise those things didn't exist. Pride flourished and ecstasy exploded. A bad thought could not exist without being immediately outed like a food rushing after a match...