SHADOW BOXING
*Gideon*
“If this is my punishment for hurting them,
then what’s yours for hurting me back?
Answer me, Karma!”
Melody Manful
“How have you stopped going to Earth?” Valoel asked the very moment I appeared inside my room.
“I haven’t stopped. I’m only taking a break,” I lied. I didn’t want to go to Earth anymore, especially if my presence frightened Abigail. I didn’t understand why she was scared of me.
“Well, I heard it’s because of Abigail,” Valoel said.
“Well you heard wrong, because Abigail is just annoying, reckless, conceited, a pain, and…” I paused, “and she waited until I said something stupid, and then she walked in and said she wanted to ask me to the dance. I tried telling her I didn’t mean what I said, but she won’t listen!” I felt frustrated.
“If you called her stupid, then why are you mad?” she asked.
“I’m angry at her because she’s just a stupid human who…who is…carelessly clumsy, smart, beautiful and… when she lets her hair fall on her face because she’s shy, or when she—” I screamed, suddenly falling to my knees in pain.
“Gideon,” Valoel rushed over to me.
I tried to shake her off. “Something’s—something’s wrong with me.” I tried to stand. “Maybe I’m sick.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Gideon. Angels don’t get sick.” Valoel pulled me to my feet.
“There must be something wrong with me because I can’t get her out of my mind.” Abigail invaded every thought in my head. “Abigail is everywhere, and I feel…angry that she heard me calling her stupid.” I pulled myself free from Valoel. “What’s wrong with me?”
“There’s nothing wrong with you. You’re just experiencing new feelings.”
“New feelings?” That was her theory? “I can feel hate and anger. What more is there? There must be something else wrong with me.”
“There’s nothing wrong with you, Gideon!” Valoel shouted. “You’re just…” She hesitated.
“What’s wrong with me, Val?” I asked. “What?”
“Gideon, you’re in love with Abigail.”
The next thing I knew, an invisible force forcibly hurled me straight through the wall. I crashed down below, plummeting at least twenty feet. I had no idea why hearing Valoel say I was in love with Abigail inflicted such pain. I blinked up at the dark sky and realized no one had pushed me; I had pushed myself.
“No!” That made no sense. “No, I can’t—I don’t even know what—I do not love her!” I found a little strength and stood.
Valoel thought I was in love with Abigail? What the hell gave her that stupid idea?
“I know you don’t believe me, but you’re not sick. You’re in love.”
“Stop saying that!” I yelled. “I hate her. I still want to kill her, so you’re wrong.” I paused in agony. “I don’t love her. That’s impossible. I can’t feel anything but hate.”
“Then why are you in pain?” Valoel pointed at the broken side of the house.
“Because I’m angry, weak, and hungry,” I tried to compose myself.
“Hello?” Both Valoel and I started at the sound of Tristan’s voice.
What the hell was he doing in my house?
I snapped my fingers and found myself in the living room. Valoel appeared right beside Tristan, who stood there looking around him.
I walked toward him to shove him hard. I made a fist, but I didn’t even hit Tristan because he vanished right through my hand. The next thing I knew, Valoel was standing with him behind me.
“I know you and I are from opposing sides,” Tristan said. “And I shouldn’t be here, but Abigail wants answers, and I’m afraid if she doesn’t get them, she might search too far and expose us.”
“You’re right. You shouldn’t be here. If you’re worried about our exposure, then you take care of it,” I said. If Abigail wanted answers, why did she ask me to leave?
“I didn’t mean for things to turn out this way,” he said sadly. “I know why she’s scared of you, too,” Tristan whispered. “I imprinted a nightmare in her head to make her stay away from you, but I can see it didn’t work. All I can say is I’m sorry.” And everyone said he was nice!
Sorry? Sorry wasn’t going to fix this!
“I know,” Tristan said, and I stared confusedly at him.
Know what? What the hell was he talking about?
“I know sorry doesn’t fix this.”
Tristan was reading my thoughts? Instantly, I appeared beside him.
“How did you do that?” I asked, now so close to him that I saw my reflection in his eyes.
“Do what? I just…” The truth of what was happening seemed to dawn on him that very moment. He looked confused, scared even.
You answered my thoughts. How did you do that?
I don’t know how. I just heard you as if you spoke, he responded in my head.
Heard me?
“And you just answered my thought.” He was quick to notice that part. He had answered my thought, and I in turn answered his.
“What’s going on?” I took a step away from him. “Something is wrong here, and whatever it is, I don’t like it.”
“Wait.” Valoel looked from Tristan to me. “Are you two hearing each other’s thoughts?”
Tristan nodded, and then Valoel’s expression changed from shock to pain.
“This isn’t good,” she whispered to herself. “This is just what I was afraid of.” She looked back to Tristan and then to me again. We stared at her in confusion. “Sorry, just thinking out loud.”
“Do you feel that?” I asked Tristan, hoping he didn’t know what I was talking about.
“Yeah.”
I felt confused, sad, and somewhat uneasy, a feeling I knew wasn’t mine, but Tristan’s.
“It’s like the first time we met when we were both four,” Tristan said. “I felt everything you felt. Why are you so sad?”
“Stop creeping me out!” I shouted. It was bad enough that we could hear each other’s thoughts and feel each other’s emotions, but now he was concerned, too?
“I don’t know what’s happening to us,” Tristan murmured.
Join the club, freak.
“Even when you don’t speak out loud, your thoughts still hurt.”
“This is really bad. It’s bad enough that I have to endure you—now I have to hear your rainbows and unicorns thoughts, too. Could this day get any worse?” I felt as if I could combust into flames because of my body’s rising temperature.
“Valoel, do you know why this is happening?” Tristan asked.
“I…no. Maybe the king—your father—will know?” she asked. She sounded scared, too. Valoel had never looked or sounded like that.
“I’ll go and ask King Daligo, and then my parents,” Tristan said. “Please don’t visit Abigail while I’m gone.” He looked straight at me. Like I cared what he wanted. I’d visit Abigail if I wanted.
Valoel seems to think I’m in love with her. I’m not visiting her anytime soon, I thought.
“I won’t take long, and I’m sure you can hold off not seeing her until I get back,” Tristan said, as if he didn’t hear what I had thought.
“Wait, you didn’t hear what I just thought?” How could he hear my thoughts one minute and not the next?
No, did you think something?
Yes, I did.
“Maybe you didn’t want me to hear it?”
You are a moron.
“I heard that.”
“Good. And I won’t be visiting Abigail because I’m going with you,” I told him. The sooner we got rid of whatever was happening to us, the better. “I don’t like you, and the thought of you in my head makes me sick.”
“I’ll just wait here,” Valoel said cheerlessly as Tristan snapped his fingers and we disappeared into the darkness.