Discovery (23 page)

“Oh,” Grace whispered. She turned her back to Ben and hid her face in her hands.

It was déjà vu for Ben as he watched Grace's tears hit the grass below. His second rejection of her felt worse than the first and Ben did not want to relive this high school scene again.

Grace swallowed hard and shook her head. “I'm sorry … I shouldn't have. These last few days … I just thought … I mean … well … maybe your feelings for me had … had changed.” She took deep breaths as she spoke, as if she was trying to hold it all in.

Ben gently placed his hands on her shoulders and turned her around to face him. “My feelings haven't changed.” He tried to look into her eyes but she kept her head down.

“It's okay. Don't worry about it,” she shook her head and sighed. She stared intently at the ground below, as if trying to suck the tears back into her eyes. “We … we can forget this ever happened.”

“No, Gracie, it's not that. You … you don't understand!” Ben shook his head and stepped away from her, now trying to get as much distance between them as possible. “My feelings have never changed. I … I love you. I've always loved you. But I'm your Guardian. I'm not the Chosen One. I'm not supposed to love you!” His words came out like bullets from a machine gun.

Grace looked up at him, her eyes wide with tears pouring down her face. “You … you love me?”

Ben's eyes locked onto hers. “Yes.”

“You love me,” Grace exhaled as the words slowly sunk in.

“Yes, sweetie, but there is nothing I can do about it so forget I ever said anything.” Ben's chest felt tight. It hurt.

“I don't understand. What do you mean there is nothing you can do about it?” Grace spoke slowly as if she were speaking a new language for the first time. “Why? Why can't you love me?”

“I told you. I'm not the Chosen One.” Ben's chest tightened even more as if all the air had been sucked out of the clearing. He could not even smell the lilacs now.

“What are you talking about? What's a Chosen One?” It was obvious that Grace's mood was swinging in the wrong direction again and that she didn't care. She seemed tired of not understanding.

Ben tried to take a deep breath but he couldn't find any air. “It's a
who
.”

“What?”

“The Chosen One. He's a
who
not a
what
. The Chosen One is who the Council has picked to marry you … to have children with so you can continue the Powers. It's who you're supposed to be with and it's
not
me.”

Grace paled and clutched her stomach with both arms. “Marry? Who … who is it?”

Ben looked away, trying to catch his breath. All the air was finally gone and his chest was paralyzed with pain. Where did all the air go?

“Ben? I said who is it?” Grace's voice escalated but her arms remained clenched around her waist.

“Tom!” Ben spurted out with what felt like his last breath, his eyes flipping back and boring into Grace in that same instance. “Your Chosen One is Tom!” he yelled.

Grace slumped, almost doubling over. She looked around the clearing but her eyes did not focus. For a moment, Ben thought she was going to pass out, but then her glassy eyes bored into him. “But what if I … ? I mean, Tom's nice and all … but I … I don't want Tom. I want
you
! I love
you
!”

Ben shook his head. “It doesn't matter what you want. It doesn't matter what I want. And love has nothing to do with any of this. You're the last of your family … of
the
Family. If you and Tom don't … get together, then that's it. No more Powers, no more Council, no more anything.”

Grace bent over more, still clutching her stomach. Her breaths were rapid and erratic. “All a lie,” she panted. “Whole life a lie.” Her breath was shallow now. “A stupid waste of a lie. Just part of some stupid secret arranged marriage for some stupid secret world I don't care anything about.” She straightened up and started to stumble around the clearing. “Take me back. I want to go back home. I need to get out of here!” Grace frantically looked around for a way out of the clearing but all she could see were the blasted lilacs blurring in a circle.

Ben was still shaking his head. “Grace, you know I can't do that. The Anti-Powers, they'll — ”

“Okay! Okay! Then just take me to Dave's. And then … and then you just leave me alone!”

In an instant, Ben and Grace were standing on Dave's front porch. Grace burst through the cabin's screen door, purposefully smashing it back into Ben's face. She marched straight back to the guest room and slammed the bedroom door without a word to her hosts who were seated on one of the overstuffed couches in the living room.

“You told her about Tom,” said Dave. It was a statement, not a question.

“I had to.” Ben stood at the fireplace with his back to his hosts, looking out the window.

“You did the right thing,” Petra nodded her head.

“I know,” Ben sighed. He continued to stare out the window. Dark clouds hovered outside as if tied to Grace's mood. “Looks like rain.”

“Yeah, Petra saw it earlier. We've already rescheduled the ballgame to tomorrow.”

“Good,” Ben sighed. “Maybe she won't be mad at me by then.”

Dave shook his head. “I wouldn't count on that, son.”

Cooper watched a rarely seen Mercedes pull up to the gas pump and instantly knew its occupants were not locals. The driver and passenger exited the silver car but neither went over to the pump for gas. Instead, they both crossed the gravel parking lot and headed directly toward the store. They walked in synchronized strides that reminded Cooper of a German soldier's goosestep, not so much in the way they marched, but more so in the smooth evenness of their step. The older, more brutish driver held the store's front door open for the passenger who was leaner but no less muscular in form.

“Coop, my man!” The passenger's fake smile reminded Cooper of a used car salesman who had not yet made this month's sales quota.

“Yeah? Can I hep ya?” Cooper's old memory failed him every now and then so he had learned to feign recognition with his customers until it was sufficiently jogged by subsequent conversation.

“Well, sir, we certainly hope so,” the brutish driver grinned.

There was something about the driver's emerald eyes that made Cooper uneasy. He stood behind the checkout counter and instinctively placed his hand on the cash register.

“We're not here to rob you, old man,” the driver laughed.

“Well, it don't look like yer here fer gas,” Cooper half-grinned, pointing to the gas pump outside.

“No. No, you're right about that. You see, we need some directions,” the passenger said as he leaned over the counter.

Cooper's uneasiness had moved into the outright uncomfortable range and his hands started shaking behind his back. “Whar … whar ya' goin'?”

The passenger grinned and stared deep into Cooper's eyes. “To the Misfit community,” he said matter-of-factly.

Cooper's heart pounded and his eyes instinctively darted to the front door.

“Andrew, he thinks he can make a run for it. Isn't that funny?” the passenger laughed.

Andrew moved to stand in the middle of the doorway. He crossed his arms over his chest, his broad shoulders touching each side of the doorframe. “Yeah. Funny.”

“Now, Cooper,” the passenger continued, his eyes boring into the old man, “I know you know what I'm talking about and, as long as you cooperate, we'll all get along just fine. So, why don't you give me those directions? Now.”

As those green eyes bored into him, Cooper began to feel strangely relaxed. His slumping back leaned against the wall behind him and his head wobbled on his neck like a golf ball balancing on a toothpick. “Yer an Anti-Power,” he mumbled. “What're ya … what're ya doing to me?”

“Gregory, your power is too much for that old man,” Andrew yelled to the passenger. “You're going to make him pass out! Get those directions first!”

“Oh calm down, he's fine,” Gregory yelled back over his shoulder, his eyes never leaving Cooper's.

Even in his relaxed state, Cooper tried very hard not to think of the directional landmarks to the Misfit community. He did not know if either of these boys could read minds, but he did not want to take any chances.

“Old man, I'm waiting,” Gregory's voice deepened. “And I don't have time to wait.” Without taking his eyes off Cooper, Gregory's right arm extended straight out to the side and then swung around to stop right in front of Cooper's face. In the instant of that movement, a glass display case sitting on the corner of the counter shattered and a large, bone-handled hunting knife flew out of the rack. The levitating knife followed the motion of Gregory's arm until it stopped right at the base of Cooper's throat. The knife edged a little too close and nicked the old man's protruding Adam's apple. Blood slowly seeped from the wound and dripped down Cooper's scrawny neck. “Well?” Gregory raised his eyebrows.

“I … I don't know what yer talking ‘bout,” Cooper stammered. Beads of sweat started to form on his upper lip and forehead.

“Andrew,” Gregory calmly called to his brother, his eyes still intent on Cooper's.

Andrew left the doorway and walked behind the counter. He grabbed Cooper's thin arms from behind his back and pulled them around to the counter, slapping the old man's palms down flat on the smooth surface in front of him.

“Maybe this will jog your memory,” Gregory smiled. He raised his hand up and sliced it through the air directly in front of Cooper's face. With that movement, the levitating knife suddenly pushed off Cooper's throat and slammed down across his right hand, swiftly and simultaneously chopping off four fingers.

“Aaww!” Cooper screamed, bile rising into his throat from the pain.

This process slowly continued for the next few hours and, for the first time in his long, quiet life, Cooper gave directions to the Misfit Community, one landmark at a time. One landmark for each body part lost until the old man had no more body parts to lose.

• • •

Grace slept for fifteen hours that night and still did not want to get out of bed the next day. She was embarrassed to have silently stormed through the house in front of her hosts the night before but her embarrassment was outweighed by the anger she still felt toward Ben. All the secrets he had kept from her, all the lies he had told her, and he had still let her try to kiss him in the middle of that stupid clearing. That stupid, lilac-filled clearing where he let her lips touch him, where he let her arms wrap around him, where he let her love him.

Again.

Grace pulled the covers over her head and decided she was never going to leave that bed.

“Knock, knock.” Petra's singsong voice sailed through the air as she cracked the door and peeked her head through. “Your Majesty? Are you up?”

Grace hesitated, as if her silence would make her invisible. But then she remembered Petra's sporadic visions of the future and Dave's occasional views of the past and realized that she could not make herself invisible. Not here. Not anywhere. Ever again.

“Yes, Petra, I'm up,” Grace said, slowly sitting up in the bed.

“Did you sleep well?” Petra asked as she reached over the bed to open the only window's curtains.

“Where's Ben?” asked Grace, ignoring Petra's stupid question. Of course, she didn't sleep well.

“He and Dave have already headed to the ball field. You've slept almost until game time!”

“Couldn't I just skip the game? No offense but I'm not really in the mood for … for all that Powers stuff today.”

Petra stood a little straighter at the end of the bed. “Miss Grace, I understand if you feel a little overwhelmed right now. Ben's mother felt the same way the first time she visited us. But, honestly dear, Ben instructed me to bring you to the ball game and … well … he is your Guardian and all … and … well … I kind of have to do what he says right now. Even if you are who you are.” Petra tried to smile when she spoke as if that would make the words easier for Grace to swallow.

“You know I'm getting a little tired of all these rules,” Grace sighed, more to herself than to Petra, as she got out of bed.

Petra was already heading out the door when she stopped and turned around. Her eyes were stern when she said, “Yes, dear. But all these rules are keeping you alive.” Petra then softly closed the door behind her and left Grace alone with her thoughts.

Grace's face developed a permanent scowl as she got dressed and she could not find any incentive for it to go away that day. Not in breakfast, not in Petra's lyrical voice, not even in the scenic walk she and Petra took to the ball field after breakfast.

“Sun's out.” Petra interrupted Grace's foul mood. “Lofty will be playing his best today. Should be a fun game to watch.”

“Lofty? Oh, yeah. That flying guy,” Grace mumbled. Yesterday's rain had erased the dust from the road so Grace cleanly shuffled her feet a little when she walked. She was in no hurry to see the game. Or Ben.

“You know he can't help what he is, Your Highness.”

“What?” Grace wished Petra's visions were working. Her hostess could have seen that she was in no mood to talk right now.

“Ben. He did not choose to be your Guardian any more than Tom chose to be the Chosen One.”

“He's my best friend. He should have told me about Tom.”

“Yes, he's your best friend and he would have told you if he could. But he has to live by the Council's code, remember? If telling a human about the Powers could be punishable by death, can you imagine what's going to happen now that he's told you about Tom? About who you
really
are?” Petra paused and gathered her thoughts before she calmly continued. “Please don't think me disrespectful, Your Highness, but you don't seem to appreciate how much trouble he's in with the Council for telling you everything he has. Between the Council and the Anti-Powers, that poor guy really is getting it from all sides.”