Andrea sighed and closed her bedroom door behind her, throwing her school bag onto her bed and then joining it as she fell onto her back to stare up at the ceiling. She had spent another day terrified that the human-furnace was going to show up, no longer feeling safe in the crowd of students all around her, knowing now how powerless they were in comparison to the Hooded Man. With no effort at all, he could make her and himself invisible, and that meant that he could just walk into her school and kill her right there and then, as he could've before Julian showed up. She tried to close her eyes and maybe sleep a little, but sleep had come hard as of late, never something that arrived unless Andrea was dog-tired. The last few days, she had spent most afternoons in her room, working out or dancing to music, trying to exhaust her body so that when night came, Andrea would shut down as soon as her head hit a pillow.
It had worked the first night, but never quite so well after, her mind would not be fooled the same way twice. And so, Andrea opened her eyes and got up from her bed, walking towards the wardrobe in the corner adjacent to the window and the desk beneath it, pulling open the door to dig beyond her socks and find the diary she kept in the back. It had hurt her some to have to stick over some of the pages with new notes, but it was the only way to ensure that if whatever she hid were found, her mother would respect her privacy enough to not read it.
And besides, Andrea thought as she pulled out her sixth-grade diary, if she didn't respect my privacy, she would've definitely read this by now….
She opened to the middle of the book where the new notes began and carried them to the bed to sit down and review. Andrea had, after hours and hours spent trying to find any other solution, come to the conclusion that she was going insane, categorically.
But because that left her with nothing to do but accept her fate and await the inevitable straitjacket and trip to the loony bin, she decided to act as if she wasn't going crazy. That meant that option B was the next best thing, which was that superpowers were real, and far more terrifying than Marvel movies had ever depicted them to be. Andrea was certain that, in addition to being able to spit fire in the non-lyrical sense, her adversary was also able to make people around her not see things, or see what he wanted them to see, which in terms of advantages, left her absolutely fucked.
But then why couldn't he just make me see what he wanted? She wondered, jotting that question down before she, in her everlasting fatigue, would forget it, it would make kidnapping me to feed to the Source all the easier….
He had mentioned that he was using 'the fog', the 'the' made it seem like something that could be done by others, not just himself.
Can I make the fog do things too? She wondered, but that was silly. Andrea had never in her life thought superpowers were real, so her now all of a sudden being able to use it would be impossible even if she could.
She sat there on her bed writing and reviewing and updating her notes, her schoolwork sprawled out in front of her, but it was all for show, just in case her mother walked in. Andrea linked this fog and his fire ability to 'The Source' that he had mentioned, just using context and logic there to put it together, which confirmed her initial idea that these abilities couldn't be from him and him alone, otherwise why would he need her to feed it and not just it come from within himself?
It was a reach, but it was the only one that made sense to her at the moment. Andrea had snorted as she reviewed what she wrote and saw 'Superman?!' written next to the Source. It was her best way of explaining it to what she knew, remembering how in the cartoon, Superman's powers came from the sun, meaning anyone like him (Kryptonian that is) could also have powers just like him. Except in Andrea's case, Kryptonians were Alabaman hicks with shitty dentists and spit fire instead of shooting laser beams out of their eyes. And their sun needed teenage girls to be sacrificed to, instead of just, you know, being a fucking sun.
So, superpowers were real, and came from a source that needed the lives of sixteen-year-old girls to feed, and that people who control the fog can make themselves invisible, or mess with other people's memories? That was as simple as her obviously fracturing mind could make it. Andrea also remembered him speaking Latin before he did anything crazy and supernatural, a skill she had picked up thanks in large part to the fact that she had been hearing her mother say Latin words since she was just a little girl.
Andrea had been too panicked to grasp exactly what he had said but jotted down that fact otherwise. Then there was Julian…. Who was able to see her when nobody else could…?
Julian, who had twice now appeared, and with said appearance made the Hooded Man disappear…
Julian, who had also mentioned that the man wore a hood, even though Andrea had never brought up the hooded feature once in their conversation prior….
She became enraged with herself for not calling him out there and then, but she had been so relieved to be saved that Andrea had let him slide.
Holy shit! The thought was crazy enough to make her almost cuss out loud, is Julian secretly stopping the Hooded Man?!
Andrea got up from her bed, annoyed…. and excited…. but mostly annoyed at everything happening around her. She was excited, for Julian was real, the fog had not removed him from her mother or Kaala's memories, and if he was real, then everything else was as well. That meant that she was not in fact losing her mind, yeah, and that superpowers are real, and fueled by teenage girls!
But of course, it was still a reach. Just because Julian was real did not mean that everything else wasn't a figment of her imagination also. He could've just been so hot that her mind had to focus on him and all his hunky glory.
"Fuck this!" She finally said, tired of the bullshit that had somehow surrounded her as of late. Andrea opened her door and marched towards her mother's office to get the answers she sorely needed but stopped at the door.
Julian was a super powered freak, probably just as strong if not stronger than the Hooded Man, considering the fact that the fog did not affect him and the Hooded Man ran off twice whenever Julian entered the situation. It would also explain him not instantly dismissing her as crazy as well. So that much, so long as she was no longer considering herself clinically insane, was clear. But it did not mean that her mother could be involved either, just because she was lying about her relationship with Mr Nerva. Andrea had assumed that their connection, Julian's and Momma's, was due to some long and distant past, but no. Julian shot his shot and had it batted down, simple as that. That was a good enough explanation, her mother was a beautiful woman, and Andrea had seen her swerve men a hundred times before, even Andre, who she seemed to like…. But Andrea was not all the way convinced.
"I'm going to have to be clever about this…" she muttered to herself, taking a deep breath before knocking on the door, "Hey Momma, mind if I pick your brain a bit?"
Her mother looked up at her, her glasses on and her expression seemingly relieved to have an excuse to take an unplanned break, "Sure thing, Baby. Come here and take a seat."
Andrea closed the door, which made no sense really considering that no one else lived with them, before taking a seat across from her mother.
"So, I've been thinking about…. Sources."
Her mother raised an eyebrow at her, "Oookay, and what about them?"
"Like," Andrea formulated her words once over before just going for it, "I'm having a little issue with this history essay. So, I was wondering how one can naturally but also academically…. feed the source into the essay…."
She watched for her mother's reaction, which was blank for a moment before she took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes, "Andrea, baby, I don't think I quite understand what you mean."
Andrea nodded her head and decided to press on, "Yeah, I know. It's just that, I'm writing an essay on the effects the fog of war can have on soldiers, and I was wondering how to use the source to explain the fog."
Andrea watched her mother closely as she sat there, her expression something altogether unreadable, "Hmmm…. Well, it depends on the type of source, Andrea. If it's a quote then the best way would be to take the portion of it most relevant to your topic, for instance, and best relate it to the point you're trying to make. But again, you're being unnecessarily vague."
Andrea snapped her fingers, "Thank you! That was what I'd thought, but when I asked Mr Nerva about this earlier when I saw him, he started talking…. Weird."
And there it was, a moment, a split second of giveaway that solidified what Andrea had always known deep down. Her mother knew Julian, and it was not just from work.
"Weird…. How?"
Andrea got up from her seat, her shoulders rising and falling, "I don't know, I could barely understand him. Said something about 'needing Latin to use the Source' or some other trash he was going on about. I think he was coming from a legal perspective, you know, he is a court clerk after all. Anyways, thanks for the advice, Momma, I'll leave you to it."
Her mother strained a smile into appearing, "Sure thing, Andy Baby."
Andrea closed the door behind her and risked listening in by pressing her ear against the door, unable to hear the specifics, only that her mother was on the phone with somebody and sounded especially furious.
Julian…
She ascended the stairs to her room slowly, her head spinning as everything in her life that she had thought that she knew was absolutely falling apart. Superpowers and fogs and hooded men being dragons on the down low…. It was all beginning to get too much. Worse yet, her mother was somehow part of all this craziness. Andrea was still unsure of how, but she knew that it involved Julian Nerva, whose entrance into their lives had coincidentally, but not coincidentally, coincided with the emergence of all this bullshit and wacky craziness that Andrea was now caught up in.
She laid down on her bed and stared up into the ceiling, wondering if she had been anywhere else but at Remi's on that Saturday night, maybe her life wouldn't be as fucked up as it was now. Andrea turned and curled into a ball and felt herself begin to sob, realizing that she would now have to live a life never knowing if some other person with superpowers would show up and make everyone who ever knew her forget about her, and take her away to be fed.
Andrea resolved to tell her mother tomorrow when she got back from school, certain that if she did not, the heaviness of it all would crush her. Her sobs began to quiet down as she drifted off into a heavy sleep. At least in her dreams, she was a normal girl again, with an attorney mother and a small but close group of friends that Andrea had always loved, but now cherished all the more, now knowing that they could be taken away from her in an instant.
She came downstairs to find her mother sipping her coffee with a bowl of cereal next to her, staring out the window by the sink with her back towards Andrea.
"Morning Momma." She said, daring to come closer despite her nerves to give her a quick peck on the cheek, "Hope you slept alright."
"Not a wink." Her mother said as she dumped out the rest of her coffee into the sink and rinsed it away down the drain, "Andrea…. Now that you've slept on it, maybe you can tell me more on what Julian had told you."
Andrea was on the tips of her toes, leaning to fetch a box of Captain Crunch at the top of the cabinet before pouring some of it into her cereal, "Like I said, Momma, he was going on about some Latin garbage. Whatever sense it made to him was lost on me. If I do remember anything that does make sense, I promise to tell you."
Her mother turned, and Andrea could now see the full extent of her injury. Her eyes were sunken by fatigue, and the skin around them was darkened. Her hair, usually well kempt even at its most curly and freed, was now stray and disheveled, as if she had been struck by lightning or something. Her mother had always looked amazing for her age, to the point that some people would go so far as to assume that she was her older sister. But now, Antonina Bordeaux looked every bit of her thirty-seven years old, and the sight of it made Andrea sick with guilt.
"You promise?" her mother whispered, and Andrea nodded her head, "I promise."
Her mother opened up and stretched out her long arms, beckoning Andrea to receive a hug that she did not quite deserve, wrapping her up and kissing her on the forehead, "I have never known you for a liar, Andrea Bordeaux, and so I don't have a reason to doubt you. But words, especially promises, are powerful…. Never forget that."
Andrea nodded her head, "Yes ma'am."
She finished her cereal as quickly as possible, keeping up appearance rather than actually being hungry, before departing for school less the guilt consumed her, and she broke down crying again. Andrea waved at Jenna and her little boy, Devon, before turning to the corner to find her uber waiting, opening the door and entering it to greet the driver. She felt her phone buzz and pulled it out to see a message from Kaala, 'U been down the whole week, so Briar n Austin have arranged a day out into the Quarter, if u're down….'
Andrea was tempted to say yes and at least have something in her life to look forward to, but that was not possible…. Words are powerful….
She had promised her mother that she would tell her more, and she had resolved herself to tell her mother the truth about it, all of it, and that could not wait or be put off any longer, no matter how much Andrea wished to just be young and carefree again.
'Can't.' She almost sent the message but looked over her recent chat history and saw that she had been spamming one word replies as of late, and realizing it made her already sickening guilt worse, 'Have something to do at Bordeaux. But tomorrow, I'm all ur's babe!' Andrea even went so far as to put a heart emoji before sending the text. She was relieved to see the heart emoji returned to her and decided to put her phone away.
The day went by as most had that last week, Andrea sat at a desk of one of her many classes, gazing out the window to make sure that her enemy, the Hooded Man, did not choose today of all days to finally stop messing around and end it.
It was times like these that she had wished that she had somehow taken down Julian's number, to contact him should the worst come to pass. Andrea would spend most of the forty-five-minute-long lesson in her head, with either a teacher's question or the school bell pulling her out of it.
"You running out on us?" She heard Austin's deep voice call out to her, turning around to see his pretty and angular face looking down at her, that cheeky smile of his blinding her like a ray of the sunlight through an opened curtain.
"Yep," she said, returning the smile, "Can't be going out with the captain of the baseball team after they blew it in the ninth inning the other day."
Austin feigned hurt, "Damn Andy! You woke up and decided to choose violence, huh?"
She shrugged, "It be like that, nothing personal kiddo. Just got an image to maintain."
"Well, we have a game this weekend. Say, if I hit a homerun, you come out with us after the game. Derek's parents are out of town, and I'd really like it if you came to the party."
Andrea internally did a dance, but tried to play it cool on the outside, "Hmmm…. What you batting this season?"
His smile grew, "A buck above four hundred. A down season, I know."
"Aight then, you have yourself a deal."
He shook her hand before kissing the back of it, igniting Andrea's cheeks as he walked away, having had the audacity to be so dreamy.
Kaala spooked her with her laugh, "Is this what you've been hiding from us?" she wiggled her caterpillar eyebrows, "Mr. Baseball-Player?"
Andrea gasped, "That's Captain Mr. Baseball-Player to you, Ms. Unathletic."
Kaala laughed again and hugged her fiercely as if it were the first time they had seen each other that day, despite having greeted each other and sat next to one another at lunch, "I'm glad you're feeling more yourself, Andy." She said, her smile a genuine show of warmth, "Life isn't quite the same without you and your terrible, and I mean terrible, jokes. I'm actually sad without them."
"Hi Actually Sad Without Them, I'm Andrea."
Kaala laughed until she snorted, "Terrible. Walk me to Bio?"
Andrea looped her arm through Kaala's and the two started walking down the hallway, "I'd walk you anywhere."
"Even down the aisle?"
"And replace me as the love of your life? I'd sooner walk you into traffic."
The day picked up from there, and the normality of it all had done her heart a world of good. By the time she had said goodbye to her friends and got into the uber to head to her mother's practice, Andrea felt ready and rejuvenated.
Tell Momma, get her to get Julian to come and kill the Hooded Man, marry Julian's younger and more better-looking brother, Simple! She thought. The plan was simply airtight.
Phone still in hand, she started to type, 'On the way Ma, will—'
"Hello there, Lil Spitfire."
The voice was one that felt like a hand had her spine in a vice-like grip.
Andrea tried to open the doors, but they were locked, and so she decided to bang her fists against the window to call for help. He laughed at her attempts, "Come now, ya know I ain't gon' let anyone just come in here 'n interfere in our lil rematch."
Andrea ignored him as she tried to kick the window out with both her feet, over and over again.
He sighed and turned, wearing shades and a Rangers hat, "Aight then lil lady, you got two choices before ya. Either stop behavin' all borin' n frantic like, or I bind ya up real nice 'n good like I did the last time, 'n get this over 'n done with in an exhale, ya privy?"
Andrea kick one last time in defiance before sitting back up straight, "One request."
He grinned at her, looking like a perverted crack fiend at a strip club, "For a pretty gal like yourself? Anythin'."
"Go ahead and kill yourself!"
"Welp, almost anythin'."
Andrea gritted her teeth, trying not to give into the fear she could feel lurking beneath the surface of her rage, "Drive, I don't want to do this outside of my school."
He grinned one last time before turning back around, "See? Now ya bein' reasonable. Ain't see why you 'n I can't be friends."
She said nothing as the car began to move, turning onto the road and heading into town as if it were any other ordinary uber.