The Manifestation
Nora sat down on the bleachers, sliding her feet out of the god-awful dress shoes that looked oh so perfect with the gown but did horrible thing to her poor arches. She took a moment to watch all the rest of the couples dancing and having fun. She smiled at the thought of Scott in his tux and glanced toward the bathroom doors waiting for him to come out so they could start dancing again. However, with her attention solely on those doors, she missed Billy walking up to her. He touched her on the shoulder, and she jumped about a foot into the air.
"I'm sorry I scared you."
"Oh, it's okay. I should've been paying attention. Are you having a good time?"
Billy looked at her with a glint in his eye that unsettled Nora more than it should. "Probably not as much fun as Scott's having." He paused to look up and down her body, and Nora felt repulsed, wishing she had worn a less slinky dress. "He's a lucky guy."
Nora tore her eyes away from his and slid further away from him on the bleacher bench. "Thanks, Billy." Billy slid as well; he ended up even closer to her than before. Grabbing her hands, he pulled her toward him so that she was practically sitting on his lap. For a second she was too shocked to move, and that second was all Billy needed. He lowered his head to hers and kissed her deeply.
* * *
Scott walked out of the bathroom and back onto the dance floor, eyes immediately searching for Nora. When he did see her, his heart stopped. Over in the corner, locked in a passionate embrace with a guy he thought was his friend, was the girl he loved. Staggering, he reached out to grab onto the wall, putting his other hand against his chest. Pain, anger, hurt, fear, disgust. Emotions rolled around in his body, threatening to overwhelm him. Soon just the pain and anger were left, and for some reason, the pain was mostly in his eyes. They itched and hurt and watered. And he feared that they were doing that because he was about to start crying.
Unwilling to have anyone see him bawling over Nora, he went back into the bathroom and stumbled blindly into the stall on the end. Locking the door, he leaned against the wall and breathed heavily, trying to get himself under control. It started to work, and he began to think that he would be able to handle going out there and confronting her. Maybe just maybe it wasn't what it looked like.
He rubbed his still aching eyes and reached for the stall's lock. He stopped when he heard a couple of guys enter the bathroom; his stomach dropped when he recognized one of the voices as Billy's. The other, Neal Ganner, was one of his friends that Scott did not know that well. The pain in his eyes and anger in his heart returned even stronger than before as Scott realized they were talking about Nora.
"So why were you guys making out anyway? Isn't she Summers' girl?"
"Well, let's just say...she's ready to move on to a real man."
"So she's ditching him tonight? Man, that's cold."
"What makes you think it started tonight?" Billy laughed and the anger erupted in Scott. He wasn't Scott anymore, he was just pure molten anger and hate. He was about to launch out of the stall and kick the shit out of Billy when wave after wave of needles pierced his eyes. He fell to his knees, crying out. He shut his eyes tightly, hoping that might help but instead it just felt like there was a ton of pressure pounding against the back of his eyelids and bouncing around inside his head. He could barely hear Billy and Neal knocking on the stall door, asking what was wrong. Unable to stand the pressure anymore, he opened his eyes again.
The pain ended almost immediately as the bright red light shot out from his eyes, blasting the stall door and the boys behind it backward into the sinks and wall. They fell to the ground while the beams kept going over them, knocking a hole in the wall, causing the girls in the bathroom next to theirs to shriek in fear. And they weren't the only ones afraid. As the pain reduced every second his eyes were open and releasing the light, Scott's fear grew exponentially. What was happening? Oh my God, I'm hurting people! I gotta stop this. How do I stop this? What the hell is happening?!?! He struggled to close his eyes, afraid of what would happen if that didn't stop it. Closing his eyes was the hardest thing he had to do in a long time. It was like bench pressing 100 pounds, running a mile and taking the ACT's all at the same time. He finally managed it, breathing heavily at the exertion. Shaking, he climbed unsteadily to his feet and listened to the screams around him.
The screams died down as the dance's chaperones pushed their way through the crowd.
"What happened here?"
"Oh my God."
"Somebody call an ambulance"
"Get the kids away!"
"Scott? Scott? What happened? Open your eyes and talk to me, Scott."
"Scott?" That last quiet voice made its way to Scott's ears through the crazy din around him. It was the only voice that made sense, as if everyone else was talking a different language. Nora. At first, he was overjoyed. She was here; she could wrap him up in her arms and soothe him as they tried to figure out what happened to his eyes.
But then the pain and anger and jealousy came flooding back in as he remembered Billy's words, as he saw them kissing in his mind. And his eyes started to itch.
"Get away from me, Nora." It didn't sound like his voice. The anger, the rough edge. It sounded deeper, more like an adult.
"Scott?" He could hear how upset she was and a part of him felt guilty.
"Go. AWAY!"
"Scott." This time it was the principal, and Scott migrated to him, begging for the comfort and strength he heard in Mr. Halvert's voice. He felt Mr. Halvert grab him by the elbow and lead him carefully through the rubble of the bathroom.
The rubble I caused. I did this. Oh, God! Did I hurt anyone?
"Mr. Halvert? Is everyone okay?" This time his voice didn't sound like an adult; it sounded like a scared little boy who was on the verge of collapse.
"I don't know yet, Scott. Don't worry about that right now. Let's just get you to my office. Why don't you open your eyes- it will be easier to walk that way?"
"NO!"
"Okay, okay, Scott. Why not? What happened in there, son?"
"I-I don't know. I don't understand. I don't - I don't - "
"It's okay, Scott. You're going to be fine. Let's just get you into my office." Scott followed the principal down the schools halls, gasping for air like he'd never have enough again. He vaguely heard the sounds of sirens and fresh waves of guilt and fear rolled over him and caused him to stumble in his steps.
Once he was safely sitting in one of the chairs in Mr. Halvert's office, the principal left him to hurry back to the gym. Scott was left by himself, and he had never felt so helpless. Virtually blind out of fear of what would happen if he opened his eyes again, he sat in the office and tried to determine what happened. Deep down, though, he already knew.
I'm a mutant. He had read enough about them, even though the mutant gene wasn't apparently that common. And he knew how much some people feared them. Will they be afraid of me too? But he already knew the answer to that one, too. They were already afraid of him. They should be. Look at what I did in there. And with my eyes. Will I ever be able to open them again? Will I ever be able to see again? What am I going to do??
As possible scenario after possible scenario raced through his brain, he started thinking more and more about his foster parents. Were they afraid of mutants too? Would they hate him and kick him out? Even if they didn't, how could he inflict this on them? They didn't deserve it. He wasn't their real son.
What if he didn't have a chance? What if the police came into the office in the next minute and locked him up for the rest of his life. A danger to society. And he was dangerous. What if he had hurt someone? What if he killed someone?
It was too much to handle. He had to get out. Get out before the police came to arrest him, get out before his foster parents kicked him out, get out before Nora told him that she was cheating on him and dumping him and could never date a mutant. He had to get away from this life and start a new one. How he was going to do that he didn't know, especially since he was, for all intents and purposes, blind. But he had to try. He wanted to get away before they threw him away.
Vaulting himself out of his chair, he walked slowly across the room, arms stretched out in front of him to protect himself from running into anything. He made it to the door without bumping into anything major. He stopped at the door, not breathing and trying to listen for sounds of anyone walking toward the door. It was hard to tell since his heart was beating so hard it was impossible to hear anything else. He decided to take a chance and eased the door open, slid outside and closed it quickly behind him. Pausing, he gathered his thoughts as he tried to figure out what to do next.
I can't go home. They'll look for me there. But how can I just leave without saying goodbye to Sandra.
But what if she doesn't want anything to do with me...
Scott's mouth went dry as he started to remember Bob talking about mutants. He never said anything bad, but Scott knew he was afraid of them. Sandra never talked about it, but what if she felt the same way.
What if they turn me in?
His fear made the decision for him. He wasn't going to go home. But since a boy in a tux would certainly attract attention, he needed new clothes. Fortunately for him, he had left his gym bag in his locker on Friday. He quickly scanned his memory's map of the school to figure out the best way to his locker from the principal's office without going near the gym. Moving as quickly as he dared, one hand lightly trailing along the wall on his right, he stole through the silent school. Reaching the desired hall, he felt along the wall until he reached the bank of lockers that his was in.
First...second...third locker from the right. Here we go.
Scott almost started crying when he reached his locker. Not out of relief, but out of sheer frustration.
How the HELL am I supposed to open my locker when I can't look at the numbers. Great, Scott. That's real smart thinking, boy.
He stood there for a few seconds, unsure of what to do. They'd notice him missing pretty soon, and his locker was probably one of the places they'd look for him. Should he leave in his tux or was there some other way to get different clothes?
Wait. There was a way. Could he do it? It was the only way to get his shorts from out of the locker. Resolved to do it and get out of there as fast as he could, he knelt down with his right shoulder flat up against the locker door next to his. He found the combination lock with his finger and drew a line from it to his eye. Resting his ear against the locker so that his eye was in line with where the lock was, he carefully moved his hand away from the lock. Taking a deep breath, he sent a prayer up that this would work and slowly, cautiously cracked his eye open.
The force of the beam escaping was not as great this time, but it still knocked him backwards. He instinctively closed his eye, noticing that that wasn't as hard this time either. He quickly pulled himself up from his position, sprawled on the floor on his butt, and reached out to feel if it had worked. The lock and handle were no longer on his locker, and he could only assume that they were both embedded in the wall across the hallway. Expecting that people would have heard the blast, he grabbed the gym bag out of his locker and ran in the opposite direction from his locker as fast as he could. The entire time he was suppressing the idea that had treacherously snuck into his head that this mutation, besides making him effectively blind, could actually prove useful in some ways.
Making it to the back door, he ran out into the cold night. He stumbled and tripped almost half a dozen times as he ran across the open field. Expecting to hear voices of police officers and school officials to call out to him to stop at any moment, he ran with much less caution than he would have liked, given his state. Running straight into branches, he sighed with relief when he reached the wooded area on the edge of the field. He figured he could go into the forest a little ways to catch his breath and change. He tried to go in as straight a line as possible so he would know which direction to get out - right, toward the highway.
When he had walked for about ten minutes, he threw his gym bag to the ground and stepped out of his shoes. He knelt down on the ground to open the bag, not caring that he was getting the slacks dirty. It's not like he'd be turning it in to get the deposit back anyway. Rummaging through the bag, he found his shorts and socks. He pulled those on and shrugged out of his coat, tie and shirt, leaving only the white undershirt on. He rummaged around to see what else was in the bag. Tennis shoes - easier to travel in than the dress shoes he had just taken off. Deodorant - that will come in handy, as would the comb underneath it. Not wanting to take too much stuff along, he decided to leave the tux behind and stuffed the rest back into the duffel bag. Grabbing his wallet from out of the pants, he tried to remember how much money was in it.
Hmmm. Thirty bucks, I think. And Bob's credit card for "emergencies." While this would definitely be considered one, the police would probably trace it. And who knows if Bob would still want me to use it now that I'm a mutant. So not that much money... Oh well, I guess I'll just have to make it last as long as I can.
He threw the wallet into the bag with the rest of his stuff, thought longingly about his trusty car waiting for him in the parking lot, took a deep breath and headed out of the woods. Headed toward a new, uncertain life.
