Sunlight shined through his apartment window and straight into his eyes, forcing Jason Emmett Thomas to groggily labor out from under his white covers. He wasn't used to waking up at 11:00 am on weekdays, but the long and uneventful summer days gave him no reason to get up any earlier. He'd been stuck in his apartment with little to do since school let out in June. He worked part-time but the hours were easy on him.
As he sat up in his bed he looked around his messy room. Cramped and littered with clutter, there were no posters or sentimental items decorating the room, just a bleak white with the bare essentials. He stretched his arms out wide, ready to get dressed and start the day.
He opened the window and felt the sultry summer heat encroach his pores, the rank smell of trash and he could hear the constant buzz of cars in the streets below him. Despite the warm summer of the morning before him he could not forget the dismal news of the night before. Shortly before midnight they'd received a call from overseas: His grandfather had passed away. Of course, this saddened Jason and made his usual boring nights more teary-eyed, however little he knew the man. He'd never spoken to him in his life, but he nonetheless felt bad for his Mom and seeing her sad could never really lift his spirits.
They'd be taking a plane to England tomorrow for the funeral, and though he was excited to go somewhere new he likewise felt ashamed for feeling any excitement at all. His grandpa was dead, he should be mourning, except he couldn't force himself to feel that way.
He stood up and walked to his dresser, digging out his clothes for the day and looking at himself in the mirror, frowning. Somehow he never really liked how he looked, even though it was him that he was looking at. A little taller than average height, lean, long and messy brown hair coupled by his crooked nose made him cringe even after he covered his bare chest with a small black nirvana tee and his legs with jeans just a hair too short.
Despite his uninspiring dress he proudly untucked his necklace that had fallen beneath his tee-shirt. A yellow chain snuggly sunk around his neck holding a golden plate with a green emerald embedded into it. Jason never really cared for flashy clothing but he wore this because it was the only thing his grandparents had ever given him to show their appreciation. He'd been wearing this since he was a child, but ever since then he hadn't seen either his Nan or grandpa who lived so far away in England. It's not that he never wanted to see them, or they see him, but his mother was never willing to burn the cash for a costly flight to Europe.
Regret built up inside of him as he shamefully unclipped the necklace from behind and placed it on his nightstand, rubbing his neck after all the years it had sat there. They were family after all, and the first time he would see his grandpa in his sixteen years of life would be in a wooden box.
His heart felt empty as he contemplated the pangs of regret, stepping into the apartment he shared with his Mom. The rest of it was neat enough, aside from his room of course, but too small for Jason's liking. The kitchen overlayed with the living room, and a singular hallway lead to the bathroom and the two bedrooms. Their building was at least fifty years old and the view outside was nothing but a brick wall but despite this he still liked living here, with his Mom.
After eating a quick breakfast he strolled out into the hallway, locking the door behind him, and headed out onto the street. The traffic was brutal as it always is in the city, and nothing irked him more than the sound of hundreds of running cars sitting idle and honking. He walked down the street, leaving his piss-brown building behind him in the sweaty summer heat.
A swim would be real nice today he thought to himself. And he might just be able to do that, if he could convince Alex to bring him. After a few blocks he approached an impressive tower of new condos. He waited at the foot of the building, gazing up at its height and style, until he was greeted by his best friend: Alexander.
"Hey, what's up man! Long time no see!" Alex and him did their signature hand slap.
"It's been alright," he lied," How was your trip? It must have been fantastic!"
They sat on a metal bench in front of his apartment building while he yapped on about his trip to Croatia for about ten minutes. He was happy for him, he really was, but he couldn't help but feel at least a bit jealous of him; Spending the last three weeks slogging through the dog days of summer, alone, while Alex got to soak in the beaches of the Mediterranean cost line with all his brothers.
"… And Split was the most gorgeous place ever! I wish you were there!" Alex had rambled on as he usually does, leaving Jason half-listening half-zoning out.
"Yeah I wish I was there," he said a bit grumpily," Would you be down to go to your pool?"
Alex twiddled his thumbs," I don't know… It's supposed to be residents only."
"Come on, nobody will know! Who's gonna come around checking?"
Reluctantly, Alex agreed to use the pool. They fitted themselves with bathing suits and were splashing away in the community pool in no time. It being a weekday and only noon, they had the whole thing to themselves and Jason was relieved to be out of the summer heat. They played with a volleyball, trying to keep it up in the air for as long as they could.
"I can't believe we're about to start Junior year," Alex said while setting the ball in the air.
He set it back to him," Yeah it should be fun, not sure if I should bother with swim team again this year."
Alex stopped and caught the ball mid-air, his olive skin reflecting gracefully in the sun. He gave him a disgusted look," What? Why would you do that? You're a great swimmer!"
He swished his arms around in the water uncomfortably," Yeah I know I am but I don't want to put up with the team for another two years."
"No, we need you on the team, we won't win anything without you dude," Alex urged him concernedly.
Jason snickered timidly. He hated when people lied to him. Alex was the only freshman to be on the varsity swim team in our grade, and was probably on the way to setting school records at this point. They wouldn't even notice if Jason left.
He'd always been taller, stronger and more athletic than him, not to mention better-looking and sociable. And nobody on the team bothered him because of it, no one called him jiggle-nose Jason. Again, envy crept into him, Why can't they respect me like they do him?
Though he had always been secretly jealous of his friend, he couldn't show it to him. Alex had always stuck up for him and supported him, through thick and thin.
"What have you been up to this summer anyways?" Alex asked.
They continued to set the ball back and forth to each other," I've been working at this grocery store and besides that I've been doing nothing." He didn't try and hide the truth, that this summer had possibly been his worst in a long time. Stuck alone in an apartment by day or otherwise in a miserable run-down grocery store made for an unstimulated summer, to say the least.
After playing for some more time the warm day turned cold once they heard the sliding door to the apartment complex open.
Jason whipped his head around and groaned. The three goons from his swim team that he was just complaining about stood in the door frame, in their bathing suits ready to swim.
"Yoo, is that jiggle-nose?" Andrew Levitt shouted as he strode across the concrete towards the edge of the pool," With Alexander, whats up man?"
"Hey, we're chilling here," Alex gave a friendly smile and subtle nod.
His cronies Bryce and Wade walked up behind him and began to take their shirts off to get into the water. Burly and large, the two were hardly made for swimming but still swam nonetheless, possibly to stay in shape for the football off-season.
Jason tried to ignore them and continued playing volleyball with Alex, but they no longer spoke, anxious and aware of the boys jumping into the pool behind them.
He had forgotten that Andrew lived in this apartment, and he hadn't even contemplated the possibility that he'd run into him here. He was one of the main reasons that he wanted to quit the swim team. They weren't even good swimmers, that just showed up to practices and meets, didn't work hard, and seemed to solely exist to harass Jason at every turn. Andrew came up with the name 'Jiggle-nose Jason,' freshman year once he'd seen his long crooked nose during a nosebleed, and ever since people seemed to hop on the name calling bandwagon.
"Lets play a game," Andrew swam up in between them and caught the ball.
Jason loathed his sneering face, a stupid smile under his sunken eyes. "Lets play football!"
"Who plays football in a pool?" Jason asked miserably.
"We do," Bryce shouldered past him from behind.
"Three on two," Andrew declared," Loser has to skinny dip.
Alex sat up on the edge of the pool," That's unfair. We've been here for a while so we're gonna get going soon anyways."
The two oafs Bryce and Wade stood in the water on either side of him, grinning stupidly as Andrew sighed," Whatever." Then he chucked the ball straight at Jason's face.
WHAM! The ball smacked him straight in the nose," CHRIST, What the hell?" It really wasn't that painful but the disrespect made Jason revel with fury.
Bryce and Wade stood standing in the water, laughing, and Andrew was bent over so far his head nearly touched the water.
"What was that for?" Alex stood, angry, but hesitant to jump back in.
"Jiggle-nose needed fixing, look how much better he looks now!"
He gripped his nose sorely, and anger coarsed through his veins. Andrew picked the ball back up and was ready to chuck it a second time when suddenly the ball's seams began to turn a scaly green. The green lines on the ball now looked like ropes almost, and began to move, slithering and hissing around Andrew's arm, who looked up at the snake in terror.
Wailing and flinging his arms like a manic, Andrew flung the snake off of his hands before it could sink its teeth into his face, but it only managed to land on the other end of the pool, right next to Bryce. Frozen like a deer caught in headlights, the oaf stared at it confusedly.
"SNAKE, GET OUT OF THE POOL!" A great frenzy of screams and splashes followed, as the snake popped its head out of the surface and scoped the scene curiously, as if it didn't know why it was the cause of so much trouble.
Now as if he understood the threat, Bryce scrambled away from the snake as it coiled in an arch, searching for a target.
His mind flooded in confusion, causing him to slowly back to the edge of the pool. He'd seen a ball turn into a snake in mere seconds. Could it have been inside the ball and broken out? He quickly pushed these thoughts aside as he hauled himself out of the pool, Alex giving him a hand.
The other three kids had made their way out of the pool at the same time he did and clustered together opposite them, bewildered. The snake faced them and hissed, curling through the water and slithering towards the edge, resting its face on the concrete.
It was a big snake alright. Fully uncoiled, it would stretch at least six feet long with a flat head and fangs that could pierce skin like a knife through butter. It's tongue flickered only a couple feet away from Andrew's bare toe.
Curling together in fear, the three gaped as the snake sat next to them hissing and slowly raising its head up, ready to strike.
"WHAT THE HELL IS THIS!" Andrew shoved Bryce aside to get out of the way, fleeing towards the sliding door while Wade and Bryce sullied a few steps behind him. He looked back at the snake that now climbed out of the pool, slithering towards the door, intent on killing him. Jason caught a glimpse of the terror on Andrew's brutish face before he reached the interior of the building and slammed the sliding door shut, trapping Bryce and Wade in the pool area with the snake. Through the glass he could see Andrew riddled with fear, bolting down the hallway, out of sight.
The snake, not interested in the two boys left for dead, slithered off into the grass disappearing into the yard beyond the pool. Bryce and Wade tripped over themselves opening and getting through the door, dripping wet and slipping on the concrete all the while.
They stood silent for a few moments, Jason wondering where in God's name the snake could have slithered off to. Alex stood next to him, his mouth hanging open and voice shaky," Did you see that? It just turned into a snake, like magic."
Jason nodded his head, totally perplexed as to how in the world that happened. He got the strange feeling however, that the snake almost seemed to be doing him a favor. An absurd ally it may have been, but it got rid of Andrew Levitt and his friends, which he had desperately wanted.
He snuck around the edge of the pool, keeping his eyes on the trees beyond the pool that the snake slithered into, in case it decided to come back. He grabbed his towel off the lounge chair and began to dry off," It looked like it was about to kill him, Andrew."
Alex had come behind him and grabbed another towel," Yeah… That's just about the strangest thing I've ever seen. How did that happen? And where'd the volleyball go?"
For the rest of the day that's the only thing that he could think of in his head. How did that happen? Him and Alex both saw the ball just change into a snake instantaneously. For once in his life he had no idea what or who he could consult to confirm something, because this was just too strictly out of the box.
He said his farewells to his friend Alex. They were a bit rushed and distracted, both still trying to regurgitate what had just happened, so none of it was too sad. Although his vacation had just ended Jason would now be going somewhere else, an evil trick of time.
Overcome by what happened, he couldn't get it out of his mind as he walked the streets aimlessly for a bit. He was used to walking without a destination in mind, passing by hundreds of people and buildings and events happening in the city gave him good space to think.
The more time that he walked and thought the more convinced Jason was that he must have not been paying attention to the ball enough. Granted, he was just hit in the head with that same ball, surely he wasn't thinking clearly, the snake may have just snuck up to the pool and clung onto Andrew's arm when he wasn't looking.
But snakes, in the city? He'd never seen one in his life and this was a BIG one. Nothing made sense, things don't just happen to appear out of nowhere. He convinced himself of this, that he was seeing it wrong, that it must have just crawled up from behind him and latched onto his arm. That the volleyball must have just been knocked into the trees and out of sight amidst all the chaos…
Anyways, after wondering for a while, he had an idea to go to the library and see if he could find out anything about snakes in the city. He spent a few hours sitting at a desk going through different books on reptiles, and he did find out that snakes come up through toilets every now and then, slithering through the sewers and into the pipes of peoples apartments.
It was definitely within the realm of possibilities.
Reassured, he started heading home for dinner and the strange story slowly left his mind.
He pushed open the unlocked door to his apartment to find his mother hunched over the stove, chicken in the frying pan and still fitted in her white chef's uniform.
"Hey Mom," He shut the door behind him.
She looked up from the stove, and she gave him the tight excited smile that she always had on whenever he came home," Hi Jason, how was your day?"
"Weird," he went over to the sofa and sat down on it," Alex got back from Croatia."
"Wow, that sounds beautiful! I always wanted to go there," he could hear her setting up the kitchen table behind him.
He opened up the book he was reading about snakes and kept skimming through it, hoping he'd see a word or two that would convince him of what he believed.
After some time he was called to the dinner table and they began to eat. They sat across from one another at their circular wooden table, eating the plain food silently. A wonderful chef, one of the things he loved most about his mother was her cooking. She knew his favorite foods and had mastered them years ago, and never failed to deliver a quality meal. Of course, today's chicken and broccoli felt rather plain and dry. Usually when their meals were like this his mother had a lot on her mind.
He looked at her, her jet black hair was in a bob cut and was neatly filed around her head: One of the distinctions about her that he had not inherited. She looked back at him with her soft brown eyes," I got the tickets for tomorrow, we'll be flying out early in the morning."
Jason poked at his chicken shamefully," I'm glad we finally got tickets to see our beloved family after all these years."
His mother's pale pointy face sulked in the light," I would have gotten them years ago if international tickets weren't so expensive."
"Well It's really just great that we only happened to stop and visit my grandfather after he died."
She didn't say anything for a few moments, a part of her agreed with him," I know I know," she put her fork down and tears swelled in her eyes," I should have planned visits years ago."
Frustrated, he really wanted to ask her why but even though he was ashamed at not having visited he knew his mother must have had her reasons from staying away for all these years. He'd ask someday but he really couldn't stand to see her crying like this and didn't really want to make things worst.
They both finished their meals and sat in silence for a few moments.
"I got you a few presents today," his mother told him shyly.
He perked his head up and watched her stand, leaving her empty plate and going to her handbag on the counter. She dug around and pulled out a plastic container with a creamy rich chocolate cake slice from her restaurant," This is the exciting one." She put it down on the table and slid it over to him, then she went to the closet in the hallway that held all their coats, shoes and jackets, and pulled out a black suit, neatly fitted into his size with a pair of black dress shoes," I was able to get a suit fitted for you at the tailors after work, it's about time you have something nice to wear."
He'd never worn a suit in his life and was beyond pleased to have one for the funeral," Wow it looks really nice, thanks."
She tucked the suit back into the closet and as she sat back down at the table he felt his anger relinquish. She was the only family that really mattered to him, and the only person he could truly rely on; He couldn't stay mad at her even if he wanted to.
He packed his bags that night with as much clothes as he could. They'd only bought one way tickets in their haste, and though he knew he'd have to return in a few weeks most likely, the totality of the one way ticket made it feel as he'd be leaving this place for good. He fastened his grandfather's necklace back around his neck before taking a last look at the bleak walls. Clutching it in one hand while laying on his bed, he fell asleep, wondering whether he'd miss his old apartment building and his closet of a bedroom. I'll be back here soon enough he thought, before dozing off.
He did not know it but he would be gone for quite a while.