Over the following several months, the more and more Brian's parents – or at least his mother -discouraged so much as a friendship with Kelly. Well, if his mother could have had her way, he wouldn't have any friends.
And so as Brian struggled with crossing the line with Kelly between friend and girlfriend; his mother took him to a psychologist. Yes, a psychologist.
Dr. Albert "Al" Mendengle was a thirty-some child psychologist. Apparently, He was a quite good friend of his mother.
_________________________________________________________
"Excuse me?" Dr. Mendengle questioned, not quite believing what his client was asking for.
"Oh, you must have some sort of anti-emotion drug." Marsha Tandon inquired; her voice in a low seductive tone.
"I'm sorry, but I don't…." Mendengle replied, his voice trailing off.
A heavy sigh was heard; the pouting type Brian had heard used so many times on his father.
He was in the waiting room, His head pressed against the wall. She has stayed a few minutes afterward to 'give the nice doctor some information'. Brain snorted at that thought. He had figured his parents marriage was bad, but not nearly this bad…
Another sigh was heard from the room, this one louder.
Disgusted, Brian got up and left.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ __ _ __ _ _ _ _
Mendengle's Office was a few blocks out of the downtown area, and about an equal distance from the mall.
He chose the mall.
Lost in thought, he slowly wandered down the street alone, only vaguely aware of the occasional glance given by passers-by.
Before long, he reached the mall. He entered through one of the less crowded side doors. Aimlessly strolling around, he caught sight of Kelly.
She was with a small group of her friends, standing outside of a trendy boutique. They were all giggling about something.
Confidently, He strode forward towards her. She had her back to him, but one of her friends noticed him. Her friend pointed and looking confused, Kelly turned around. She smiled when she saw him, a smile that he gladly returned.
Once he was close enough, he said a casual 'hey' t Kelly and a nod towards her friends.
He saw two of her friends' immediately whisper. Brian didn't care though, and he silently prayed that Kelly didn't either. Brian was used to the whispers; the occasion wary looks.
Before long, the conversation turned into a long, uncomfortable silence. Members of the group began leaving one by one. Kelly spoke up, excusing both of them.
The two began walking in the opposite direction of where her friends had stood. Turning around, Brian could see a few of them were still there, and still whispering.
He narrowed his eyes before returning his focus to Kelly.
She seemed distant, distracted. The following silence was almost too much for him.
"Did I do something wrong?" He finally asked.
Kelly stopped walking and looked up at him, taking his hands in hers. 'What?" She managed to ask.
With his shoulder, Brian gestured back in the direction they had come. Kelly understood what he meant. "Oh, no…no, it wasn't anything you did…." She said quietly, her voice trailing off.
Getting annoyed, Brian guessed it. "Is it over you-know-what?" He asked, referring to his pending mutation. Or just lack of perfection – depending on how you looked at it.
Kelly bit her lip. "It doesn't matter." She said, shrugging. With that she dropped his hands and began walking again. Brian fell back into step besides her.
"Are you sure that it doesn't matter?" He persisted. 'Because you're acting like it does,' Brian added in thought.
Kelly sighed, but said nothing.
They walked together for a few minutes, both refraining from speech. "Look," Kelly began. "I…I have to go." She stated quickly before turning and leaving.
Brian stared at her departing form, confused.
She had always been his friend, one of the few people that didn't make a big deal over his genes. And she had remained a solid friend over the last few moths when things had been 'heating up'. But now, now she was a mystery. He was without best friend and girlfriend, and he prayed it was only temporary.
Drifting back to reality, he checked his watch for the time.
"Crap," He muttered, before taking off running.
___________________________________________________________________
Twenty minutes later, a sweating and shortly breathed Brian came bounding up the sidewalk in front of his house. As he had feared, both of his parents were home. He had hoped to beat his mother home, to not have to deal with ditching her at the doctors. Too late for that though.
Quietly, he opened the whitewashed door, and slip inside. He could hear his parent's voices drifting out of the kitchen. They seemed angry over something; but then of course, there was always some new crisis between home and work and back again.
Slowly, with precision, Brian carefully chose his steps towards the stairs. The house's old style wood flooring was known to creak and groan with one misstep. He had learned this the hard way many times prior. As he walked, he passed the long hallway mirror, catching sight of his reflecting. He was drenched in sweat, his cheeks were bright red in color. His hair spiked up every-which-way. A thought drifted through his head. Any of his classmates, no matter how un-athletic they were- would be in better shape than he was. 'It's all in the genes,' He reminded himself once again.
He managed to get to the stairs and up the first few in perfect silence. Then it happened. Distracted, he stepped down a bit too hard and a high pitched creak loudly resulted. Cringing, Brian paused, trying to tell if his parents had heard.
Either they did and didn't care, or they were too involved in their conversation to notice.
After a few moments, Brian let out the deep breath he hadn't realized he was holding. He then proceeded to make his way back up the stairs.
Feeling quite accomplished, he entered his room and plopped into his computer chair, giving it a slight spin. Automatically, he logged in to check his email. Looking through the list of junk mails, he noticed an address he hadn't seen in a while. Julie, the mutant girl from New York—whom he had met online – had sent a message. He hadn't heard from her in moths; her last message saying 'everything was hectic', had led him to believe she didn't get online much anywhere.
He opened the message, finding that it had been sent out to apparently everyone on her contact list, and was only a jumble of letters. It was as if someone had just smacked the keyboard and sent it.
It was odd, but Brian just brushed it off. He'd smacked his keyboard plenty of times.
At dinner that night no one spoke of the Doctor or of Brian's leaving. He assumed his mother didn't want to take any chances. Or perhaps he was just paranoid, and the interaction had been perfectly harmless. Although, he seriously doubted the latter.
___________________________________________________________________________
The following day, Brian invited Kelly over to study. She gladly said yes- but then of course, no one was around except for them.
The walk to his house was all small talk, gossip you could call it. The exchanging what they each knew on the topic of who was going with whom to the upcoming dance.
They laid out their textbooks and papers all over the table; in the same manner of his parents.
The two spent the next several hours studying. First History, a quick Biology review, and they were just starting English when his parents got home.
They both separately acknowledged the 'nice, innocent' interaction between their son and his 'nice little friend'.
His mother began working on dinner, cordially inviting Kelly to stay – to which she accepted. His father began laying out papers on the leftover space of kitchen counter.
"Ok, what's iambic pentameter?" Brian quizzed Kelly. In a few days they were having a literature test on Shakespeare, so they both wanted to be prepared.
Kelly took a moment guessing. Finally though, she gave up. "Let me see," She said, gesturing to the study guide Brian held.
With a smile, Brian handed it over to her. Except, instead of the study guide, he held a colorfully piece of paper with seven words scrawled on it, along with a hastily drawn heart on the side.
It read: DANCE? FRIDAY… TWO WEEKS…. U AND ME?
Kelly's Jaw dropped. "Oh…Oh…Ohmigosh, Yes!" She was finally able to screech. Brian shushed her, gesturing for her to be quiet and then gestured towards the kitchen.
Kelly nodded, grinning. She gave Brian a tight hug. Brian smiled.
A loud knock came at the door. Kelly immediately withdrew from Brian as they heard Robert coming out to answer the door.
Brian leaned over to the side and caught a glimpse out the window.
What he saw nearly made his heart stop. Through the rain, Police Vehicles visibly surrounded the front of their house. Their house.
Getting a vague idea what was going on, He breathed and "Oh no."
Kelly cocked her head. "What?" She questioned.
He brought his finger up to his lips, signaling for quiet.
He heard his father open the door.
"Sir, are you Robert G Tandon?" He heard a distinctly deep male voice asked.
Slowly, his father replied yes, and asked if there was anything he could help them with.
"We're looking for your son, Brian." Deep voice explained.
Robert was obviously thrown off. "My…son? Why?" He questioned.
A rustling of papers was heard.
"This can not be legal." Robert declared, outraged.
"I'm sorry sir. We have direct orders to put your son in custody. We can assure you that this is very temporary."
Marsha, noticing her husband's absence emerged from the kitchen and headed towards the door. "Honey, is everything all right?" She asked, coming to stand next to her husband.
"Ma'am, everything is fine. We have a warrant out to put your son in temporary custody.
"What?" She exclaimed.
Robert tried to calm her. "Shhh, honey it's all right. They just want to take Brian in for a few days." He said in a hushed voice.
"No! Why? They can't do that!" She protested.
"I'm sorry ma'am, but we'll use force if we have to." Deep voice stated.
Brian turned back to Kelly, who was also hearing all this.
She wore a frightened look upon her face. "Brian," She whispered.
He grabbed her hands. "I…I love you." He stuttered, giving her a quick kiss that was a mere fraction of his many fantasies but still one he would never forget.
He stood up. He could see the tears welling in her eyes. "I'll be back." He told her. He wasn't sure if he was trying to convince her or really just himself.
He mouthed another quick 'I love you', before his parents and a policeman—to whom he assumed the deep voice belonged too-- came up behind him.
"Brian," His mother started.
"I heard." He stated. She enveloped him in a hug, beginning to cry. When she finally let go, he moved to his father. His father gave him a gruff hug. "You'll be back before you know it," He said.
Brian nodded.
The policeman cuffed him, and led his outside.
Once outside, Brian could see police vehicles did not only surround their yard, but the lawn itself was dotted with snipers and other members of the police force. All had guns and were trained to shoot.
"C'mon boys, this one's harmless." The policeman holding him said loudly.
Brian was gruffly pushed into the nearest car. Turning to gaze back on his home, he could see his parent's silhouettes illuminated in the doorway. His father had his arm wrapped around his wife's shoulders. His mother was leaning on him, probably crying.
Brian saw Kelly push her way out from behind them. As the car began to move away, she ran after it. Her long red hair flying out behind her and her sandals loudly clacking on the pavement, he gave here a feeble wave. He didn't know if she noticed.
She did stop though, knowing it was a lost cause. She stood pitifully in the heavy rain, her long hair soaked and out of place, same as her clothes. Her eyeliner had also run, leaving behind what looked like dark black tear-trails.
But not that Brian could see, for by now he was long gone.
