Matt hops up the stairs two at a time, bouncing on the landing as I catch up.
"So, how did your date with 'redhead' Ashlyn go?" I cringe when he grins stupidly. "On a first date? That's not even a date that's…you're a whore."
His shoulders slump. "You know, not everyone has to be as big a prude as you are."
I snort. "If I'm a prude then you must accept the title of 'salacious pervert'. Move it."
I smack him on the butt, successfully startling him. He skips up the remaining stairs to the open door emanating noise. Down the hall there are boxes spilling out of another room as a student stubbornly tries to pack during the festivities.
Matt puts an arm around me as we enter the epicenter of insanity, and leads me to a table supporting a vibrant metropolis of alcohol with a suburb of Solo cups and shot glasses. A large aluminum keg squats beneath it like a dormant, subterranean monster.
"I'm kind of in limbo at the moment." Matt sorts through the forest of bottlenecks. "Mom told me to come home, but Dad's telling me I can't. He's been bitching because the apartment got broken into and he thinks I gave the key to one of my friends."
"That's happening all over, what makes him thinks your friends would do that?"
He lifts a bottle, sniffs the lip, and puts it back. "He means mutants. I could have no mutant friends, but that's who he would mean."
No matter how I try to rationalize what I hear, Matt's dad sounds more and more like an asshole. Finding a jar of maraschinos, Matt flips off the loosened cap.
"Larry's got a pal with a beach bungalow on the island, so we're gonna spend the summer catching waves." He grins around a cherry.
When Matt says 'the island' he means the Hamptons. Not the rest of Long Island, just the Hamptons. I've even been lectured on how Westhampton does not count as one of the Hamptons.
"Do you trust 'Larry's pal'?" I ask, refusing a cherry.
He sets the jar down without the lid. "I trust him not to be some crazy serial killer, yah."
A whoop goes up and everyone present takes a shot. Abruptly, Ashlyn squeezes between me and Matt, drapes his arm over her shoulder, and gives me a predatory look. The blonde, Melissa, appears on his other arm with a bottle of tequila in hand, but clearly ate the worm a while ago. She smiles, but though she's looking at me I know she has no idea where she is.
Matt and Ashlyn talk about dancing, but there's no room in hear for anything other than hypnotic moshing. Some girl in a 'Blink If You'd Do Me' shirt splashes beer over her alligator stilettos and starts to cry. Ashlyn rolls her eyes and lights a cigarette. "God, you're all toddlers."
I give Matt a look. His eyebrows rise; oblivious.
Someone coughs on the cigarette smoke, and alcohol magically appears in Matt's hand again. The moment Ashlyn is preoccupied, I confiscate the beer and kiss his stubbled cheek. Armed thus, I start taking whatever liquid he's handed and pour it in. He doesn't object.
Melissa starts dancing on a dilapidated pool table, reminiscent of blue-haired Lyndsay, only far more graphic. When the group of guys around the table starts chanting for her to strip, I take Matt by the arm and pull him to the opposite side of the room. She's not going to make the night. I don't think that guy over in the corner is either. He might already be dead. Someone's immediately got a marker handy, laughing as though an unconscious reveler at a college binge party is a rare occurrence.
"Check his pulse," I shout, hardly capable of crossing the packed room myself within the realm of physics.
"That'll get it done," replies a male voice behind me. An average guy with black hair and a burgeoning beard steps next to me, Solo cup in hand. "Abe is a Neanderthal. I'm Jacob."
I shake his hand when he offers it, the formality feeling out of place. "Amy."
He raises an eyebrow and his cup at Matt who's got his back to me at the moment. "You came with him? You…don't really seem his type."
"You know him well then?" I shout.
"I live here," he shouts back. "Can't sleep, might as well drink." He gives a sardonic smile and a toast.
At the measly snack bar set up in the corner there is an eddy of human beings lost from the flow of the crowd. I take up residence here, leaning on the counter with my cup of death. Chip crumbs, ranch, and a dusty residue I can only describe as the lovechild of dried cannabis and shrooms coats the surface of the counter.
Ashlyn appears next to me out of nowhere, leaning over the counter as though she's looking for something to eat. Without changing her expression or even making eye contact, she puts her hand in my face.
"See my ring? It's from Turkey."
"I saw that in Wal-Mart once," I say, making sure to look anywhere but.
"My family went on vacation to Europe for Christmas." She shrugs. "Yeah, my dad's a diplomat."
"I'm so sorry." I tip over my cup on the already filthy counter. "I have to go refill this."
"Are you sleeping with Matt?" Her eyes finally meet mine.
I choke on a horrified laugh. "You haven't even known him a week."
"So I should just let you sleep with him, is that you're saying?"
I notice the empty cup in my hand. "I am not drunk enough for this conversation."
She takes a step forward, and I notice now how dilated her pupils are. She reaches for a fistful of my hair, but her arm passes right through me. Her face goes tight. She reaches for me again, phases again, and becomes frantic. This isn't fun to watch. Leaving her to her misfortunes, I go see if Matt has any more alcohol to confiscate.
"I hate females." Ace takes away his shot and throws it back.
"I don't mean to alarm you," Jacob leans in confidentially, "but I think you've inherited the gene."
She laughs harder than she should, and Jacob smiles.
Matt takes the glass and pulls her away from the table. "Let's go."
What are you doing?
"I'm gonna dance with you."
With Jealous McPhee in the room?
"Can you, stop talking in my head? It's freaking me out."
You thought I was flirting with him.
"He's too old for you anyway."
She starts laughing again and pinches his arm. "I wasn't flirting, I hate men."
"You hate too much."
"Maybe you love too much."
Matt chuckles harshly.
"Your girlfriend's high." Ace looks up at him. "Thought you should know."
She takes the only unopened bottle left on the drink table, scowls when frat boys jostle her to get at the keg, and pops the cap off without an opener.
Immediately Matt reaches for her hand and flicks the cap out of her palm. She takes a long drink as he watches the jagged cut rapidly disappear. Mildly shocked, he looks up. Ace stares back unmoved.
"Did you forget? We're not normal, Mattie."
Outside I take long, cooling breaths of fresh air. "That was a pretty good party."
"You hated it."
I wave my hand then try to brush a stain off my shirt. "So, I'll see you later?"
"Are you kidding? We're going surfing together." He leans in unexpectedly and gives me a very sweet kiss on the cheek. "You take care."
I take a leisurely second to observe him; such an attractive kid, even with lipstick on his neck and pot on his breath. I give his hand a squeeze. "Ashlyn is a jealous freak."
"Can't be worse than Whitney." He scrunches his brow. "But I hear you."
Everyone in the neighboring dorms is fast asleep- exhausted from finals and preparing to head home and face their parents. I leave my sweater open in the warm night, the corners flapping back and forth as I walk. The path back to my usual jump point is dappled with lights from the dorms, but otherwise very obscure. Besides, they're all so stoned and smashed they wouldn't believe their-
A noise comes from the trees and I stop mid step. Telepathy discerns six minds in the copse, and a light breeze favoring my direction tells that all are male adults and one is mutant. I scoff at myself for being so easily startled and keep walking. I wonder if it's the same mutant I smelled at the party tonight. There was too much going on for me to focus, but the scent is vaguely familiar-
I stop walking.
There's a grunt followed by sounds of a struggle. A click, a blow, and I divert my course just as a man falls into the dim light at the edge of the tree line.
Pyro.
He tries getting up quickly. There's blood on his face, one leg won't hold him up, and he keeps clicking something in his gloved hands while baring his teeth. The other men break the tree line, push him back down, and begin beating him.
I deepen my voice. "Hey."
Three men look up and in that second Pyro gets his device working again. The men ignite and begin flailing. One manages to jump back unharmed, but Pyro has him in his sights as he staggers upright.
It takes less concentration than usual to put out the flames with a layer of ice, but not before a fire alarm is pulled in the nearest building. Gasping, the men stagger, and Pyro's palms light up again as he advances. I put out my hand to freeze his gloves when two of the men, armed with knives, hastily tackle him from behind. Kerosene spurts from the tears in his sleeves.
The attackers aren't scaring easily. As the alarm trills on, doors start opening, and even as I rush into the fight I'm not fast enough.
One gunshot and the shrieking starts. John Allerdyce is dropped in the dirt as the men disperse among the trees. John tries to get up, making me believe for a moment that the shot missed. But as I kneel down beside him this hope shatters.
Blood gushes from his head and he now lies still. His eyes are rolling back and forth in their sockets, and his lips are open like a fish. I tear off my sweater, ball it up, and press it carefully against his matted hair, wishing I had a better plan. People are yelling into cell phones, at each other, at nothing.
"Ace?" shouts Matt somewhere.
"Get an ambulance," I shout back.
I try to make John comfortable, and lift his head and shoulders into my lap. I look for the bullet hoping maybe there's an easy way to take it out before remembering whatever damage I do won't simply heal. There's a cut on his lip, and his nose is bloody and broken. He's trying to talk, guttural noises escaping from his open mouth.
"I'm getting you out of this, I swear you're going to be-" I bite my tongue so hard I taste metal, eyes clouding up with salt. Why? The gas lines were severed, the fire was out, and he couldn't even run. Why?
All he has left are his thoughts, hazy whispers to violent shouts. Every black thing he's ever conjured is being sucked down, down, down. But I listen, carefully, for his last words, his final rants at a world that for him was always destruction and chaos. It pains me to see through his eyes, but now the world will never feel the burden of that viewpoint. His rage fizzles as the blood slows, and all that's left is ice cold fear. The remnant embers of his consciousness mingle with mine, inciting disorder.
Sirens can finally be heard and my heart eerily beats twice fast as his stutters its last. By the time footsteps start beating my way, his mind is gone and blood is pounding between my ears. Heat radiates throughout my body as I lay John down and walk into the trees. A human scent permeates my nostrils- singed hair and sweat.
A warm shiver crawls through me.
The chain link fence caught on their clothes and cut their hands, but now there's a mile between them and the university. The five of them keep pace through alleys and delivery bays, sticking to the shadows. One of them sees a camera over a delivery entrance, but doesn't register it.
Suddenly he feels a sharp pain, clutches his chest, and falls to the ground. Unaware, the others keep running. It isn't until the fifth man hears the lone echo of his footsteps that he slows down, looks back, and sees no one following him. An aura trembles in the corner of his eye and he blinks. The alley is silent. Heart racing, throat tight, he sprints harder than he ever has.
Two strong hands take hold of his shoulders and jerk him backwards. Stumbling, he manages to keep his balance and spin around. No one's there. He watches as the air materializes into the mutant girl who put out the fires, and hastily draws his weapon.
"What the fuck did you do?" He aims at her face. "Where the fuck did you come from?"
Gradually, his elbow bends, arm rises, and the cooled muzzle presses startlingly against his own temple. Terrified, he tries to pull it away, even attempting to force it with his other hand. A cottony sensation tells him that part of his mind is no longer his own. Panic mounting, he shouts as hard as he can, but no sound comes out.
In all this time the girl hasn't moved or spoken. Now slowly she raises two fingers to her temple. They twitch.
The gun fires.