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THE HIDDEN (excerpt from current novel)
by knightofcolours at 4/23/2010 2:17:11 PM
Despite the chilly air outside, the girls slid open Wendy’s bedroom window in an effort to hear the argument in the house next door. Evidently Mark Barnette’s parents were getting a divorce. Mr. Barnette had moved out three days ago and Mrs. Barnette was seeking sole custody of 17 year old Mark, otherwise known, to everyone who knew him, as Schroeder. His amazing piano concertos had ceased to be heard filtering through the walls of the house, since the day his dad had moved out. And now this. The sounds of screaming mother and teenage son, unintelligible through the walls and across the short expanse of yard that separated the houses.
Wendy and Celia each pressed an itching ear to the screen window. The loud, muffled shouting was louder now, but still difficult to understand. Suddenly there was the sound of a slammed door, then the squeal of a screen door closing itself. The girls jerked their heads away from the window and looked at each other wide-eyed.
Running through the house to the front window, they peered out between the curtains. Schroeder was on the loose. They could make out through the haze of darkness the harried back of their classmate, blue jeans, white tee shirt, short blonde hair. He was hurrying across the road, clambering over the barbed-wire fence, disappearing into the trees.
“Get your coat!” said Wendy as she rushed back into her room to follow her own advice.
Wendy Allison and Celia Scott rushed through the pine forest, excited, adrenalines rushing in orgasmic frenzy. Neither girl was athletic, both thin and unused to exercise. They were the star singers in Youth Choir at church, not runners. Out of breath, they pushed through clumps of manzanita and low lying scrub oak. Shortly Celia was having doubts about the wisdom of Wendy’s idea of following Schroeder through the woods in the dark, no flash light, no clue. Typical white-girl stupidity, she thought. Wendy had a knack for thinking she should always get involved, save people from whatever calamities they might be inclined to barge into, head-on, by choice. Always out on the courthouse square passing out Christian tracts and witnessing, always trying to save people from their sins and from themselves. In Celia’s opinion, if some idiot wants to go to hell, let him. Maybe this was different. It was Schroeder, after all. The only white guy in school Celia had ever had a crush on. Schroeder… WOW! She felt like Lucy, if Peanuts had been written by an African-American. Lucy, love-struck, moonstruck, out of her mind with infatuation for the hot blonde musician.
The girls crested a low hill and saw, below them, Schroeder walking quickly, mechanically through a meadow. His arms were flailing as he went, and he seemed to be mumbling angrily to himself, or maybe to the universe. They rushed onward, quickened their pace, trying to keep him in view. Neither of them called his name, or tried to let him know that they were there. Wendy was worried about him, and Celia was becoming more and more dubious, on the fringe of becoming angry with Wendy. But it was Schroeder. She had to keep that in mind.
Their quarry disappeared into the pinion pines and junipers again, and the huntresses continued after him. Not far into the trees Schroeder stopped abruptly. The girls stopped, hoping he hadn’t heard them. There seemed to be a faint glow coming up from the ground in front of him. He was staring towards the source of the glow, still, quiet. The glow seemed to be growing brighter. No question, it was growing brighter, illuminating Schroeder and the trees around him. He couldn’t tear his eyes away from whatever it was. Wendy and Celia felt a subtle vibration in the ground. Then Schroeder vanished. Instantly. He was no more.
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