Day 2 part 2 B.F.
After Jack and I bought the deck of Tarot cards at the bookstore, I changed from my cheer skirt into jeans and Jack took me on a long bike ride for about half an hour. It was beyond awesome! Totally beat a ride in the Porsche with the top down by a mile. My arms around Jack, about forty points of contact between us, his hand drifting down to caress my thigh as he drove us along, sheer bliss! I was snuggled in close to his back, my thighs, stomach and back pressed tight to him, my arms wrapped tight around his upper waist and chest in and endless hug. Yep, heaven.
He'd taken us on a scenic drive so it was just the two of us and the trees and fields, occasionally some water and wildlife. He'd told me he wished he could take me out on the highway where he could really let her get up some speed, but he'd promised my mom to keep to low speeds and traffic, so this would have to do for now.
I didn't mind. We were still zipping along at a pretty good clip. With the wind rushing past, the vibrations of the bike, and my arms around him, leaning with him on the curves, and his hand stroking my leg on occasion, I'd be purring like a kitten if I could. It was still an adrenaline rush, and somehow relaxing too. I'd puzzle out how that worked later.
As the wind whipped his shirt around I tried to looked over his tall shoulder at the road before us, but got distracted by the skin showing between his helmet and his shirt. A small bit of hair flapped in the breeze and I wondered how it would feel to tease the hair at his nape with my fingers, or perhaps, to brush the skin there with a kiss. Then I wondered what he would do if I ever had the courage to be so bold. That got my panties wet, thinking about how he'd had me up against the wall earlier. My hips wiggled against his ass.
He froze solid, then his hand left the handlebars and stoked me from knee to thigh, gripping me in a firm squeeze that made my heart pound, before returning to my knee. He jerked it forward just a bit, as though I wasn't already glued to his back. That made my hips squirm against his ass again. I felt his chest vibrate with a groan and then a chuckle. His hand moved below mine and his hips moved a bit, then his hand rubbed mine, his thumb brushing my knuckles. Then his hand returned to the handlebars for a while.
Eventually we stopped to pick up a couple burgers, fries and cans of soda, then stopped at a park a short walk from the stadium where the game would be that night. I tried to pay for mine but Jack told me "I got it Evie." When I tried to protest Jackson gave me a heated angry look, and I quickly put my wallet away. I wasn't sure why my trying to pay made him so angry, but I didn't feel like arguing just them.
Jack and I sat at a picnic table under some trees in a quiet corner of the park, and he parked his bike beside us. There was still plenty of daylight and we had a good hour before the game. We pulled out our food and ate quickly. I'd convinced him we didn't want to eat and look at the pictures at the same time. He asked if he could just look through all the pictures, getting annoyed when I told him no, not understanding what my problem was. I didn't explain. We didn't talk as we wolfed our food down, our minds very much occupied by our upcoming conversation.
Once we'd finished, he grabbed our trash and got up to toss it in the bin nearby while I pulled out my sketches. I'd marked the ones I wanted to show him. When he sat down, he didn't just sit next to me like before. No, he straddled the bench beside me like he'd done in the quad earlier, but this time, he scooted in close, so that his right thigh was behind me, touching my bum, his right hand came around to rest on the curve of my waist, and his left leg dipped down and under my left leg a little so that it rested on his. His left hand gripped my thigh midway up and hitched my left leg up so it rested on his leg a little more firmly, caressing it at the same time.
My body flooded with heat, that pulse between my legs began pounding again, my panties got moist, my nipples hard, and then he leaned in and sniffed my neck, the hand at my waist tugging me closer. How did he make me feel all this?! Why was it so easy for him?
"Honeysuckle. I love it when you smell sweet for me." His lips said this against my neck and my head tilted helplessly to the side. "Tell me something Evangeline."
"What?" I panted.
"Do you want me right now?" His husky voice growled in my ear as his teeth nipped me there. The question was like a dash of cold water. That answer was obvious wasn't it? Why would he make me say it? What did he want? Was he just hunting for another doe-tag?
Was he just setting me up to be the next conquest? Why would he ask me that? We weren't even dating. I didn't know if Jack was still seeing any other girls, and I'd told him I still hadn't broken up with Brandon so he needed to back-off!
"Why are you teasing me like this?!" My words sounded harshly loud compared with his heated whispers of moments before. "I won't just be another doe tagthat you can brag to your friends about! I told you I won't cheat." My voice broke as I finished, "This feels like cheating!"
It also felt really good but that was beside the point. I'd had more than I could handle and I'd reached the breaking point, literally. I scooted away from him, taking my leg back, but there wasn't much more bench left so I stopped before I fell off on my ass.
His face was tense and a muscle jumped in his jaw. He lifted his hands and said, "You got it Peekon." He scooted back a few inches and patted the bench, inviting me wordlessly to come back where I'd been.
I did but I stared at my hands picking at my fingernails to avoid his gaze. Then I realized I should be doing something. Right. Sketches. I turned around to my bag which he'd put behind me by his leg. I pulled out the folder of the sketches I wanted to show Jack.
I'd decided against showing him any sketches of the Red Witch. Those just felt too personal somehow, and there were ten of them since I dreamed of her nearly every night. She was filled with evil and her scenes were far too grotesque. The glee on her face as she toyed with her victims disgusted me. I'd drawn them to get them out of my brain so they wouldn't stain it. I didn't want anyone to misinterpret why I'd drawn them or how I felt about them or what they meant. I hated the witch. I don't know why I hadn't burned the sketches of her to ash once they were down on paper.
Jack looked at the bogeymen sketches.
The first showed people staring at the sun shining at night.
The second was a mirror sketch showing the same people's eyes running with pus, bodies mutated, brains rotted.
The third showed the same people from the first sketch biting and drinking blood from people they'd found, now their skin looked like crinkled paper bags, and oozing rancid slime.
The fourth page showed the bitten people had turned into bogeymen now too, mostly only recognizable by their clothes.
In the fifth sketch showed people standing behind a thick line of salt, some throwing salt while the bogeymen cringed, others shooting bogeymen.
"What do you call these things?" he asked.
"I call them bogeymen." I said softly, feeling really insecure about my crazy being all out and on display in front of him. I'd wrapped my arms around one bent knee and laid my chin on it. I really didn't like these guys.
"Their skin looks like a wrinkled paper bag." His voice was filled with disgust.
I mmmed in agreement.
"Tell me about the timeline here. The first picture shows a sun, but your sketch the other day showed the full moon." He looked at me, giving me his full attention. He really took me seriously. That felt amazing.
"First comes the full moon, then a storm rolls in, Thunder, lightening and rain. Next the storm clears and you'll see the northern lights. They'll be hypnotic. When that happens, I don't know how long you'll have. Maybe seconds, maybe a minute. I just don't know. But you've got to be in the cellar by then Jack." He nodded that he understood, his face serious. I took a shaky breath. After that I'm not sure if the fire comes and then the sun, or the sun and then the fire. Either way, if you're still outside, you're dead."
He looked at me, his gaze contemplative. "What?" I asked.
"How long have you seen these things?" He tapped the papers.
"Oh, the dreams, a long time, the visions, not quite so long."
"Hmm." He tapped the papers and asked, "So where're the rest?"
I was afraid he'd ask that. "Oh, um…that's it."
He looked at me in disbelief. "You're telling me that's all the sketches you've got?"
"That's all the ones I have left to show you, yes."
"There's others you won't show me or there's others that you don't have anymore?"
It was times like this that it scared me how perceptive Jackson was. I'd been getting visions since a little after Christmas last school year. In the spring, they'd gotten so bad I had begun failing my classes because I couldn't pay attention in school, the visions were so bad. I'd had to train myself to brazen out the day, pretending everything was normal, when all around me, chaos and death seemed to rage. I had drawn those visions and the nightmares I'd had. There had been three and a half sketchbooks full. Mom had found them. Evidence used to convict me. Then they'd been destroyed. Since I'd not drawn all summer or the week at home before school, I'd only been drawing for five days. Not much time for many sketches but I'd been productive with my time in school and my lack of sleep.
I closed my book and put it away, ignoring the question. Any answer I gave would give him far too much information and there was no way in hell I was telling him where I'd been last summer or giving him any clues that would lead him to figure that out. "I don't want to talk about it, and I need you to promise me that this won't get back to my mother, that you won't tell Clotile or anyone about this, not unless you have to in order to keep them safe."
He was obviously irritated with my lack of further disclosure, but he said roughly, "Evie, I already swore, you can trust me."
I nodded, believing him. "Thank you Jack."
He walked me to the game, leaving me at the restroom so I could change back into my skirt. The want in his eyes was obvious, but we couldn't indulge.
During the game Clotile came by to say hi briefly, but most of the time she was doing her own cheering in the stands in a rather skimpy outfit herself, which consisted of a tube top and a mini skirt. Brandon found himself so distracted by this he missed a few plays. I was told by at least two friends that if I wanted to keep him, I needed to play my V card. Since I had no intention of doing either one, this didn't bother me all that much.
What did bother me was a vision of a shimmering girl in the top left of the stands in the light of the nearly full moon. She had a long braid of hair that shone the palest white blond over her shoulder that hung nearly to her waist and was carrying a bow and arrows. An archer? Was she another card? I really needed to study that Tarot deck after Mom went to sleep tonight. I was tired of being clueless when these people showed up!
That night, after the game, I told Mom I wanted to take a walk outside for a bit before bed. Wind down after the game and all. I've always loved nature and taking walks so this was nothing new. Tonight I walked down the drive a ways keeping near the cane fields, near the soldiers.
My head and face started tingling, and then hurting. Everything faded away. I squeezed my eyes shut. That really hurt!
When I opened them again, I was standing in a windowless room, with bean bags on a tiled floor and Star Wars posters on the walls. A basement playroom? Then I spied the cryptic boy, standing just before me! He stood tall before me, though not quite as tall as Jack did, and was far leaner. He was boyishly handsome and something in me felt oddly affectionate toward him in spite of the pain I was in.
"You must prepare, Evie," he said.
The bubbly sensation I usually experienced now felt more like a migraine, as if this vision were being shot into my skull with a nail gun. "I'm trying! I went off my meds. I'm trying to figure out these dreams and visions. I think you're supposed to be the fool card, right? Do you have a name?" My hands were at my head and I winced.
He looked proud of me! He smiled, grinning widely and crossed his arms over his chest. "I'm Matthew Mat Zero Matto. I am the Fool Card."
"If it's all the same to you, I'd rather call you Matthew. You don't look like a fool to me. Why am I dreaming of the cards from the Tarot deck?"
"Major Arcana. Allies, Foes."
"You said I'm your friend. That makes you my ally, right?" I was having trouble concentrating through the pain.
"I'll never kill you Empress. You're my only friend."
I breathed a sigh of relief. That was both comforting, and kind of sad. Why didn't he have any other friends? "Matthew, why does it hurt so much?"
The pain decreased from I want to pass out intense to I have a nail in my head pain. Matthew's smile turned to a frown. "Not want to hurt you. Never want to hurt you."
"Thanks, Matthew. I don't want to hurt you either. But what about Death? He said he wanted to run me through with his sword. That makes him my foe?"
"You are the card Death covets."
That wasn't exactly a straight answer. Was he a foe or wasn't he? "He said I had much to atone for. What did I do?"
"Death covets you." Matthew examined his hand. This was going nowhere.
"Are there any cards who are my foes. For sure? Definitely?"
"Yes! Bad cards. Kill the bad cards."
"So some cards are good cards, some cards are bad cards, and some cards are just…it depends on who they ally with at the time?"
"Empress is learning."
"Then I need to know who the bad cards are. Can you tell me that? Can you show me those?"
"You will learn them in time."
My head was killing me! Was any of this real?
"Matthew, are you real? Is any of this real?"
"Yes."
"If you're real, do you live in the world right now? Where do you live? Do you go to school? Do you have a last name, a phone number? So I can call you and not have a screaming headache when we're talking?"
The pressure in my head eased by a fraction. "Only way I can talk to you.," he said gravely.
"And the red witch?" I demanded "Why do I dream about her? What card is she? How can she control plants?" That was the extent of our similarities, that we could both control plants.
I was good and she was evil. Period. I'd be Glinda the Good Witch of plants – all peace, love, and unity with them – and she would be our hated scourge.
Death himself said that I was all about life – and the witch was clearly all about death.
"Red witch?" Matthew frowned. "Ah, she arises. We'll deal with her when the time comes."
"Deal with her? You mean fight her?"
"She's strong. You are not. Yet."
"Are you real?" I asked again. "Where are you?"
The vision wavered, then changed to a time when he was in a backyard, at a barbecue with other kids, but they wouldn't talk to him. So he wandered off, standing all alone as a rocket blasted off in the distance.
"Rocket? Oh, you do exist! And you're in Houston! Or Florida?"
Then I clearly saw the T-shirt he'd worn. HUNTSVILLE SPACE CAMP. My eyes watered. He was real! He was so real my grin about split my face as he came into view and my arms flung high around his neck. He was real. I wasn't crazy! I stepped back and grabbed his shoulders.
"I want to call you! What's your last name? Your phone number? Please!? I'll call you right now I swear!"
"You are my only friend…. am I your friend?" He looked so young at that moment. And vulnerable.
"Absolutely Matthew! I need your number. My head is hurting so bad so let me memorize your number and let me go so I can call you alright?" I was talking quick because my head was absolutely killing me and I was glad to talk to him again and know he was real but I needed to end this conversation like, ten minutes ago. Even though all this information was, I knew, utterly priceless, and I was understanding less than half of it.
He smiled and he looked so cute it was adorable. The vision wavered to the Huntsville Space Camp application. Full name, address and phone number.BINGO! I repeated the numbers over and over and over again, at least twelve times. I finally yelled out, "I've got it Matthew!" Then the cane fields and my oyster-shell drive reappeared and I pulled out my cell from my pocket, punching in the digits and praying I got them right. I grabbed a nearby stalk for strength as I listened to the phone ring.
I wasn't crazy, the people in my visions were real, and I had a new friend to call!
It was just after midnight. Matthew's Mom had answered the phone.
"Hello this is Rachael Dixon."
"Hello, this is Evangeline Green. I'm sorry to call so late, but Matthew asked me to call him and he's my friend so I thought it was important that I call. We don't have to talk long if it's too late, but I need to talk to him for a moment if that's alright."
"Oh! Um, are you sure you have the right number?"
"I'm very sure, Mrs. Dixon. If you put Matthew on the phone, I promise he knows me and is expecting my call. Tell him it's Evie."
"Evie?!" She sounded utterly shocked.
I felt the need to be cautious. "That's right."
"He says your name sometimes, talks to an Evie, when no one's here."
"Please, Mrs. Dixon. Please put Matthew on."
"Alright Evie. I'm going to listen in on the other line. This had better not be a prank."
"I swear it's not."
She put down the phone and went to get him, while I waited, biting my nails.
"Evie, you called me."
I laughed with relief. "I promised I would! It's so good to talk to you! This way I mean."
"You have much to prepare for."
"Yeah, got it. So if I understood you right when you were talking to me on Wednesday, you were saying it's the night of the full moon right? Which means you're saying Sunday night is the night. Is that what you were trying to tell me?"
"Full moon. Tomorrow is the eve of the beginning."
She let out a heavy breath. "Ok. Reading you loud and clear Matthew. Mrs. Dixon, are you there?"
"Yes Evie."
"Can I call Matthew again tomorrow morning? I realize it's late and I don't want to be a bother."
"Yes, I guess that would be alright, but how do you know Matthew?"
"Well, Matthew gave me his number, and asked me to call him. He has a…um…special way of talking to me I guess you could say. We just, understand each other. Tonight I heard him better than I usually do. I'm…learning to listen better. He's not always easy to understand, and he sees things in a unique way, but I'm glad he's my friend."
—-
That night I dreamed of a general who had two twin children, a boy and a girl. The children were teens about my age who had vacant eyes and matching tattoos. The three of them led an army. They were like locusts. The teens had a tent and took men and women into the tent who left it altered: beaten and broken. Before the end I heard the words, "We will love you, in our own way." Anyone who loved, they broke somehow.
I awoke with a start, creeped out and disgusted. I grabbed my sketchbook from between the mattresses and my backpack, stealing to the bathroom to draw, locking the door. I drew the general in the top center of the page, and the twins below him to either side with their quote at the bottom of the page. I also made notes about the huge army, the broken and beaten women, and the army consuming everything and everyone in it's path. No men left. No women left. It was as though they had no will of their own anymore. I drew the strange tattoo. It's curves and oddities, wondering what it could mean.
Then I flipped through the tarot deck trying to match the cards to the picture I'd drawn. Lovers. We will Love you, in our own way. The Lovers. Ugh. Twisted. Utterly wrong. Bad card.
At the bottom I wrote "The Lovers." At the top I wrote "Bad card." Then I found El Diablo and I wrote "Bad card." on him too." On Death I wrote, "Covets Empress" Then I looked up 'covets' just to cover all my bases.
Covet: yearn to possess or have
synonyms: desire, yearn for, crave, have one's heart set on, want, wish for, long for, hanker after/for, thirst for.
I rocked back on my ass stunned. Death wanted me? He told me that he wanted to run his sword through me, that I had much to atone for, so I'd done something to seriously hurt him, but I'd never met the guy before so that couldn't be right.
He wanted me, coveted me…Both desired and despised me? I thought back to that scene in the sugar cane where he'd taken off his metal gloves andreached for me. That scene took on new meaning now. New goal next time I saw him: get him to take off that helmet.
This was a really strange and weird scenario. Totally perplexed, I packed and hid everything away and got back in bed.