Chapter 14 "Truth"
It's the best thing - or at least one of the best things to have and to give. Truth is what sets a person free, but there are cases when the truth is better left untold.
- Michael Mules, Journal entry
It was a basic fact that women of all ages became over-tempered over any mistake a man would make, even the smallest of mistakes. Though Tracy had promised to Michael that she wouldn't say a word about his abilities, she wasn't saying a word to him now.
Wendy could understand that she was upset at her brother for not having told her about his abilities, but she would have to eventually let it go.
Over a week had passed since they had been to the therapist and Michael had spent most of his free time going over all the details from the small pieces of the lost memories he had retrieved during his session. Michael would have gone to Dr. Olsen again, only that the first session had cost him almost every cent he had.
This Saturday was one of gloom, as the sky was pale and the wind picked up slowly every hour. Wendy arrived at the Mules home to find Tracy answering the door with a blunt look.
"If you're looking for Mr. Incredible, he's in his room, trying to figure who Horn-Rimmed Glasses is," she said in a grunt. "Or H.R.G if you think that's a mouthful."
"Tracy, you can't stay mad at him. He was too afraid to tell anyone."
The younger girl stared at her in dismay with her mouth open. "You knew the whole time about him being a superhero."
"I just caught him using his abilities," Wendy pointed out to her. "He never confided in me about it."
"He still didn't tell me anyways, and I always went to him with my secrets." Tracy pushed passed her in a sigh.
"Tell Mr. Incredible I went over to Jackie's," Tracy said, walking across the front lawn sidewalk. "He's supposed to be babysitting, but I don't need looking after."
"You know, Mr. Incredible is already taken," Wendy yelled to her as she started down the sidewalk. "We can try and think of a superhero name for him, together. I haven't had any luck by myself."
Tracy just looked back at her with an annoyed look on her face.
That did know better.
Like Wendy had said before, eventually, she would have to get over it.
Wendy walked into the house and went into Michael's bedroom, where he was sitting on his desk, laptop opened, and a stack of papers were sitting next to it. She walked up behind, he turned and said "Hey," very faintly before turning back his gaze to the laptop's screen.
On the screen was a page with sketch drawings of the two men that he had seen, which he had uploaded into the laptop.
"Those are good," she said.
"And it only took that sketch artist Darwin from school three tries," Michael explained. "He said he was just happy to get the practice."
"Where are you posting them?"
"A couple of community message boards that have a lot of people from around the country." The screen changed to a webpage with the two sketches on a message board page.
"Hopefully, we'll get lucky," she said.
"I'm going to do more than this." He grabbed a few of the papers from the stack and handed them to Wendy; they were copies of the drawings and had huge, capitalized writing on it saying: SEARCHING FOR THESE MEN, and in the corner Michael's cell phone number.
"You're really putting a whole lot of effort into this, aren;t you?"
Michael spoke without even looking at Wendy. "Well, these guys have my answers and I'm going to get them, no matter what it takes."
"Just remember, you're graduating in less than three weeks and you have finals coming up," she reminded him. "Don't let this distract you from the rest of your life, Michael."
He still didn't turn to look at her. "I know I have other things to think about, I just need a good start on finding them. I don't want to spend the rest of my life looking over my shoulder and waiting for these them to come and abduct me, again."
Wendy frowned. Taking a good look at Michael, she saw how sunken his eyes were and also noticed his fingers moving with little precision in typing on the keyboard. It didn't look like he had rested at all last night.
She took a hold of his hands, ignoring his angry stare. "Michael, you need to rest. Your eyes are scarlet red. You won't be able to keep looking for these guys if you're exhausted. Come on."
Michael reluctantly allowed her to close his laptop and walk him to his bed. She laid him down gently and eased in next to him as he slowly relaxed on the mattress. She kept him in her arms while whispered soothing words into his ear.
Eventually, Michael fell into a slumber and began snoring. They weren't loud-killing, to her relief. She stayed laying there with him for a long time, just enjoying the state of closeness she felt with him, here, now.
This was how she wished it was more often, but because of everything that had occurred to her boyfriend, this simple joy of comfort just wasn't in the cards for the two of them that often.
"Tracy isn't your brother going to get mad at you."
Tracy eyed her friend Jackie with an eyebrow raised. The two of them were sitting on the floor of Bridgette's bedroom, eating out of her box of sweets that she kept under her bed to keep her parents from knowing about it.
"What do you mean?" she asked.
"Well, you left the house without saying anything," Jackie pointed out. She always had the bad habit of speaking out inconvenient truths.
"I told his girlfriend I was leaving, didn't I?" Jackie crooked her head. She apparently noticed the emphasize on the word girlfriend.
"Are you just upset that he has a girlfriend and spends more time with her than he does with you now?" she asked her.
That speaking uncomfortable truth of Jackie could only slightly annoy Tracy so much. She growled at her friend, low pitched, which got her to become a little frightened and turn away to reach for another chocolate kiss.
Her jealous of that girl, Wendy; she wanted to laugh, but a voice in her head said not to laugh at the truth.
When Michael had gotten his abilities, the first thing he should have done was written to her about them. Even though she wouldn't have believed it until he had shown them to her in person, she should have been his first confident.
There was a knock on the door and Jackie quickly gathered all the small candy wrappers that were laying on the floor, placed them in the box and slid them under the bed mere seconds after the knock on her door.
"Girls, how is everything?" Her mother said from the other side of the door.
"Yeah, everything's fine," Jackie answered in a flush.
The door opened and her mother's popped her head in. "Dinner is ready. Tracy, I think you should head home. Your parents probably have dinner ready, too."
"Right." Tracy stood, saying goodbye to Jackie and her mother and left the bedroom.
With any luck, Michael was too distracted with finding his horn-rimmed glasses, or his new girl toy to even notice she was gone..
Maybe I should cut him some slack. The thought made her sigh in frustration. How would she have acted if she had discovered she had super powers? She couldn't really answer that.
As Tracy slowly walked down the street, she didn't notice that a car was steadily droving a short distance behind her.
Michael awoke with a warm comfort over his entire body. He carefully turned himself over on his bed to faced a sleeping Wendy. It felt him as if moments like these were rare for them. Maybe he was letting his search for H.R.G. distract him from the rest of his life.
Her eyes stuttered open and her mouth formed into a hazy a smirk.
"Thanks for finally getting me to sleep," he whispered.
"It's a good thing that your parents haven't walked in on this," Wendy said. "Though I guess they could have walked in on worse."
"Want to risk it?"
She smacked him lightly on his cheek.
"I was just kidding," they laughed together, enjoying the blissful moment of humor. "Beside with Tracy here-"
"-Oh I forgot to tell you, she left for her friend's house when I got here," Wendy told him.
"What!" Michael jumped from his bed and rushed to the door. "She's not supposed to go over to her friends when our parents are out."
He rushed out of his bedroom and ran for the front door, but when he swung it open he sighed in a huff of relief - Tracy had just been reaching for the door when he had gotten it.
"Tracy, you know better than to go out when mom and dad aren't home!" he shouted at her.
"Relax, I'm fine and your friend made sure I got home alright," she said, waving her hand to push him away.
"Wait-what friend?"
"Your friend, the girl who was in the car," she explained. "She said she would follow me in her car until I got to the house, and she told me to tell you that she hopes you're doing better after she gave you those marks on your neck."
Silence fell. Michael looked over to Wendy, who just appeared at the bottom of the stairs, looking wide-eyed with her mouth opened, as she had heard what Tracy said.
Michael took Tracy in his arms, and ignored her objective growls towards him. Tracy looked from Wendy to her brother in confusion. "What is it?"
There was now a cold shiver running up Michael's spine. He needed to find these people as soon as possible.
Honesty is a double dagger. Depending on what each one is, it can heal us, protect us, relieve, and hurt us. Probably, what's important that it's a truth you want to have.
- Michael Mules, Journal entry
To Be Continued