Gates of Eden: Starter Library Page 4

  “I don’t have any power,” I gasped. “I don’t know what you’re talking about…”

  I think you do…

  The girl rotated her extended fist and the roots responded, squeezing my ribcage tighter.

  Take control… You are in control… You don’t need to be a victim of your circumstances any longer. Seize your destiny!

  A tingle settled into my chest and expanded across my torso, settling across my brow. What was happening to me? I managed to force a deep inhale as I suffocated and released a desperate shout, praying someone—anyone—could hear me…

  “Help!”

  As I screamed, a bright-green glow consumed my vision, overtaking the red glow emanating from the girl in black.

  I felt the tree roots loosen and retreat into the ground. I collapsed, panting for air. Before I could get back to my feet, the girl in black extended her hand and struck forcefully against my chest. Another red glow, this time emanating from the figure’s palm, shot directly into my chest, forcing a deep inhale.

  Awaken!

  The tingle I’d felt before, in my chest and on my brow, now consumed my whole body. It felt like when your leg falls asleep, but now the pins-and-needles sensation consumed every part of me. I tried to turn. I tried to run, but my legs wouldn’t respond to my intentions.

  Again, she approached me.

  Do not fight this. Come with me.

  The girl in black now pressed her body against mine. Lifting her dark veil slightly, her hand moved from my face to the back of my head, pulling me in. I felt her breath against my cheek.

  “You want this,” she whispered, now speaking audibly. “You need this.”

  “Who are you?” I asked, somehow calmer now than before. “What do you want from me?”

  “You think I want something from you? You have nothing you could give me. I want to give something to you.”

  “Give me what?”

  “Power, Elijah. Control. Freedom. Consider it a birthday present. For too long, you have been prey to the torments of this cruel world. Now is your chance to overcome it all. To make the world bend its knee to you.”

  “I… I don’t want anything like that… I’m not interested…”

  Again she drew nearer to me, her parted lips only inches from mine. I could feel her breath as her hand gripped my hair, holding me close. “But you do, Elijah. You want it all. And I can give it to you. You no longer need to be a slave to destiny. You can master it, rule over your destiny. You can take control… if you will just follow me, join me.”

  “I can’t… I won’t… None of this makes any sense…”

  “Maybe not today, but soon… Your power is now fully awake. You cannot deny it. You cannot resist it. You can feel it now. It feels good; you know you want more of it. You can’t control this without me… You need me. You want me…”

  “No, I don’t even know you…”

  “But you do.”

  The shrouded figure took a step back. She retrieved a staff from within her robes and extended it overhead. As she swirled the staff, red and gold energies encircled her frame… and she was gone. The seduction of her touch, her breath, still consumed me. It felt like she was still here, still haunting me, still tugging at me at some place deep within my soul. I looked around, illuminating the path with my phone’s light. The trail was bare, the ground disturbed from the encounter, but the tree roots had retreated into the soil. I didn’t see her anywhere. It seemed like she was gone, but I couldn’t shake the allure of her touch, the desire I felt for her at my most basic level. Even so, I was terrified by her. My conscience screamed at me to resist my feelings, even as my body relished in them.

  I tried to set my feet back upon the trail, to head home. I could hardly move. Exhaustion overtook me. All I could think about was going home… somewhere safe… somewhere far from the girl in black. My breaths became short and quick, and my chest tightened. The tingle I felt when the dark figure had touched me consumed me again. A bright light, green and gold, swirled together around me. Dizziness overtook me, everything around me blurring out of focus. My heart thumped rapidly as everything around me faded to black.

  Part Two: The Wadsworth Legacy

  4. By the Trees

  I AWOKE IN my bedroom, back at the Harley residence. How did I get back? Was all that just a dream? No, it couldn’t be. It was too real. But how else could I explain being back in my bed?

  I glanced at the clock.

  Shit!

  Tyler knocked on my bedroom door. “Dude, you up? We have to leave in like ten minutes.”

  Triple shit!

  “Yeah, hold on. Be right there,” I shouted as I struggled to find a pair of clean pants from the unfolded—but clean—laundry heap piled inside my closet. I quickly got dressed, slapped a little hair paste on my head to tame the mane, and jolted out the door.

  I almost forgot it was my birthday. Whoever that was… that girl in black… she knew it. It must’ve been midnight exactly, in fact, when I encountered her on the trail. If it even happened… I tried to push the thoughts from my mind. Whoever that was, whatever she was, wanted me for something. And it didn’t sound like anything good. And she did something to me. I felt normal. I wanted to forget it, like a bad dream. So that’s what I tried to do.

  Usually Tyler would drive to school and I would drive us home. Tyler and I shared a car, a joint gift from the Harley parentals two years before. A 1993 cherry red Ford Escort. For no apparent reason, it had a spoiler over the hatchback. As a low-budget economy car, I imagine it suffered from an inferiority complex. The spoiler was its way of expressing its secret dreams of becoming a sports car… someday… when it grew up. Apparently its previous owners didn’t drive much. The car was old, but it only had something in the neighborhood of sixty-thousand miles on it when we got it. Not bad for a car manufactured before I was born. Some would call it a junker. I preferred to call it a classic.

  Being a late-April baby, I was always one of the youngest in my class. That meant in sophomore year, nearly all my classmates were driving before I was. This year, as Tyler was sure to point out, it meant I was among the last who could vote. I let him own those bragging rights without contest. I might be the most geekishly geek of all the geeks that ever geeked… but Tyler was the king of the nerds. Lay your pocket protectors before his royal throne.

  There is a difference between a “geek” and a “nerd.” Geeks, like myself, get into things like Star Wars, The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, and World of Warcraft. Nerds are turned on by things like calculators. And caring about voting on a non-election year.

  As was our daily routine, we made our way down Skinker Boulevard and pulled up beside Emilie’s apartment. The car was a two-door coup, meaning I had to get out and slide the passenger seat forward so Emilie could climb into the back. Thus, getting the door for her was dictated by necessity rather than chivalry. That didn’t mean I couldn’t claim the action as romantic.

  Emilie emerged from the front door of the apartment complex, backpack over both shoulders, her violin in her left hand and a gift bag in her right. I had already prepared for her arrival: door open, seat in forward-slid position.

  “My lady,” I said as I gestured toward the cramped back seat of the hatchback.

  “Such a gentleman!” she sarcastically exclaimed as she handed me the gift bag, tossed her violin and book bag in the seat, and performed something like a yoga vinyasa as she managed to somehow manipulate her body into position.

  I examined the gift bag. The “Amazing” Spider-Man was printed on the front. “Ems, you shouldn’t have!”

  She smiled at my cliché. “Happy birthday, Bear!”

  I took the gift bag into my lap as I slid the seat back into place and buckled myself into the passenger seat. Why not sit in back with the lady? You try getting into the back seat of an early nineties Escort coupe. Besides, this was our routine. And this wasn’t a date. We weren’t a couple, either, and the more time passed the more it seemed
unlikely we ever would be. It was just another day at school.

  “Open it!”

  “Okay, okay!” I reached into the bag and pulled out a black t-shirt. Across the chest in bold letters, it said, WISE, just atop a picture of a donkey. I laughed. “Emilie, you know me too well!”

  Tyler snuck a glance at the shirt while attempting to keep an eye on the road. He shook his head. “Better to be a wise ass than a dumb ass, I suppose.”

  “Damn straight!” I agreed.

  “Put it on!” Emilie insisted.

  “Now?”

  “Yes!”

  I shrugged. Slipping the shoulder strap of my seat belt behind my back, I managed, awkwardly, to change shirts. “Ta-da!”

  “Yay, it fits!” Emilie exclaimed.

  “It sure does fit,” Tyler added.

  “Yeah, you’re just jealous that my ass is wiser than yours,” I said.

  “Yeah, your ass is a regular Socrates.”

  “More like Yoda. The force is strong with my ass.”

  “No arguments here,” Tyler said as he tossed me an unwrapped gift card. “Happy birthday, dork.”

  “Kaldi's?”

  “Kaldi's!” we all exclaimed in unison.

  Kaldi’s Coffeehouse was an almost daily routine for us. It wasn’t exactly on the way to school, but it was only a few blocks away from Emilie’s apartment. It was a minor detour well worth taking. Kaldi’s Coffee was to St. Louis what Starbucks was to Seattle, before it went global. Though, “coffee” was a bit of a misnomer. What they served was the nectar of the gods. Rich. Bold. Strong. Kaldi’s was also our favorite hangout. It was one of those places that just made you feel cultured. Civilized. In a chaotic world, you needed places like that. Not to mention, after the night I’d had I needed the caffeine.

  We wouldn’t have time to linger today, though. Tyler found the closest parking spot and I ran in. Moments later I emerged with a tray of three paper cups filled with liquid divinity. Grande-size. Always grande-size. I gestured the sign of the cross over the cups and distributed them. Emilie and Tyler each expressed their reverent, “Amens,” and took their first sips. I followed suit. It was turning out to be a fine birthday.

  Coffee cups securely placed in our respective cupholders, Tyler pulled away and toward the interstate. Silence had overtaken the car. We had our coffee. I put my cup to my lips, praying we wouldn’t hit a pothole mid-sip. My mind returned to the previous night’s events. Who was she? I had never met someone so… alluring but repulsive all at the same time. Her touch felt just like the touch at the zoo several years earlier. It must have been her. And the things she did… the things she said… the things she said about me. I returned my coffee cup back to the cupholder. I tried to clear my mind, to forget about what had happened. I allowed my mind to drift into a state of hypnotic inattentiveness as the pitiful rumble of the Escort’s accelerating engine signaled our entrance into the fast lane. I allowed my eyelids to fall for a moment. So tired… Then it happened.

  BANG!

  The car next to us had blown a tire, slamming into the guardrail. The driver over-corrected. It was headed straight for us. Based on its trajectory, the out-of-control vehicle would slam into our passenger door in milliseconds. There is no feeling worse than seeing an accident about to occur, knowing you’re about to be struck… hard… and that there’s nothing you can do to stop it. Fear. Adrenaline. Panic. I instinctively raised my arm, bracing for inevitable impact.

  Instead, I felt a tingle across my brow.

  A blinding green glow filled the car.

  Suddenly an oak tree shot up, sprouting from somewhere beneath the pavement, intercepting the impact.

  Another BANG.

  The incoming car crashed into the tree.

  Tyler slammed his brakes.

  “Elijah…”—he was struggling to speak through his rapid breathing—“your eyes… Holy shit.”

  “Bear?”

  I turned toward Emilie.

  “Bear… they are glowing. Green.”

  I checked the vanity mirror. Yup. Glowing. I looked out the window at the giant oak, now growing out of the middle lane of I-64. What used to be a nice-looking Prius was now wrapped around the trunk. The driver was standing outside, holding his neck. I checked my coffee cup. It hadn’t spilled. Priorities.

  “Oh… thank God,” I said as I began to lose consciousness.

  I must not have been out long. Probably only a few seconds. Emilie and Tyler were slapping my face, trying to startle me back to awareness. Ouch. It worked.

  “I’m fine, guys…”

  I heard Emilie exhale a sigh of relief.

  “Dude…How did you… Your eyes… And dude… a freaking tree is in the middle of the highway!”

  I looked out the window. I prayed I wouldn’t see the girl in black out there. I had a hunch… a feeling that she was nearby. I dismissed it as paranoia. Cars were lining up on the shoulders. Several bystanders were holding up their phones, taking pictures. Others were honking their horns, trying to squeeze past the congestion as if a tree in the middle of the highway was a regular occurrence during morning rush-hour.

  I took a sip of my coffee. Nothing like a little dose of normalcy to clear my mind. “Tyler, we should probably get moving…” I urged him, more afraid that the girl in black was about to show up than anything else.

  “We witnessed an accident. We’re supposed to…”

  “Who cares?” Emilie interrupted. “What we’re supposed to do sort of becomes irrelevant when our friend is spawning ginormous oak trees in the middle of the highway.”

  “But the guy in the accident… His insurance company…”

  “Tyler,” Emilie cut him off, “Nationwide might be on my side, but I highly doubt that their comprehensive policy extends to the paranormal. What are you going to tell the cops, anyway? ‘My freak of a friend here summoned the tree?’”

  “Okay, point taken.”

  “Tyler, I don’t know what’s happening to me,” I cut in. “I’m a little freaked out by it. The last thing I want is cops, reporters, and God knows who else trying to figure it out for me. Drive—please!”

  “I agree, let’s get out of here,” Emilie insisted.

  “Okay, okay…” Tyler squeezed through the traffic jam and managed to get us to school without further incident, botanical or otherwise.

  As I stood up to get out of the car, a wave of exhaustion hit me. It felt like I had gone days without sleep. Actually, between the night spent raiding before midterms and last night, I had gone days without. But this was more than that. This was the exhaustion I felt yesterday just before fainting in class. It’s what I’d felt last night just before everything went black.

  Whatever it was I’d done had taken a lot out of me. I took a sip of my coffee. Somehow, I managed to retain consciousness. I’m telling you, this coffee was friggin’ amazing. I slung my backpack over my shoulders and grasped my coffee cup with both hands. Emilie and Tyler followed suit as we made our way to the school doors.

  The day started out like any other. Emilie went to orchestra, where she had owned first chair violin as long as she’d played in school. Not that I was an expert or anything, but in my totally biased opinion she could hang with some of the best violinists in the world. When she played, everyone noticed.

  Tyler started his day with some kind of statistics class.

  I went to Home Ec.

  I was one of two guys in a class full of girls. And the other guy was openly gay.

  It was strategic scheduling.

  Don’t hate cuz I got game.

  Not that I was playing the game. Emilie was the only girl who really attracted my interest, but I did appreciate the scenery. Again: 18, male, hormones. Blame biology. It’s science.

  In the interest of an honest and full disclosure, I was really trying to shake off my crush on Emilie. What better way than to surround myself with other females? Maybe a replacement crush would emerge. So far, no such luck. Emilie remained the one�
��the only one—I could picture in my future.

  As I walked in, conversation was buzzing. The latest gossip, most likely. Get that many girls in one room, and it’s par for the course. Then I heard what they were saying…

  In an age of smart phones, word travels fast.

  Apparently, my oak tree incident had already made Twitter… Instagram… Facebook… and God knows what else.

  “Total hoax. Trees don’t just appear like that…”

  “But there were pictures! Didn’t you see the pictures?”

  “And five minutes later, the tree just disappears? That’s impossible.”

  “Wait,” I interjected, “it disappeared?”

  They more or less ignored my question. Apparently the tree had vanished, somehow, after I’d left. No sense trying to understand how. Heck, I didn’t even understand how I’d summoned the thing to begin with. I was sort of relieved. I mean, if the tree disappeared there wouldn’t be any scientists looking into it. The news reports would probably stop without anything new to report. Eventually it would be written off as either a hoax, or an unsolved mystery.

  “Aliens!” one girl insisted. “Aliens are the only explanation.”

  The other girls laughed it off.

  “Photoshop, clearly,” One of them suggested.

  “Seriously?” alien girl questioned. “So far, I’ve seen eight different pictures. Eight! All from different angles and different phones. You mean to suggest that all of them were photoshopped in the last half-hour? Aliens are far more plausible….”

  The first-period bell rang. Phones were all powered off—school policy. Fortunately, my assigned Home Ec partner, Joni Campbell, hadn’t engaged in the gossipy speculations concerning the tree incident. Joni was the “new girl” who had transferred in mid-senior year. She moved from somewhere in way-down-south in Dixie, and if you ever heard her talk, you’d know it. It was more than her accent. The southern-belle quality was manifest in her mannerisms as well. She always addressed the teachers as “sir” or “ma’am.” The novelty of it all, perhaps, explained how she had so quickly charmed virtually every unattached male—and some who had girlfriends already—in the senior class. Not to mention, her near-flawless appearance was head-turning. Long, blond curls draped down her back. If her baby blue eyes didn’t draw you in, it was hard to ignore her full lips, always red. She never wore too much makeup. Her figure was well proportioned, toned but curvy. Joni was a classic beauty whose appearance exceeded her eighteen years.