Into the Shadows (3 page)

Paivi looked a bit sheepish.

“It does still happen sometimes,” she said
quietly.

“Why didn’t you tell us honey?” asked Mrs. Anderson,
sounding concerned.

“That’s why, that tone in your voice. I didn’t want
to worry you.” She played with her piece of cake, not quite able to
take another bite. “You were so worried and upset when I trashed my
room, I just didn’t want to make it worse. And besides, it was just
little things that moved around, not like the time you’re talking
about.”

“Wait a minute!” sputtered Torsten, sitting forward
in his chair and nearly dropping his plate and fork onto the dark
hardwood floor. “Let me get this straight. That time when your room
was destroyed and everything was smashed to bits, you, YOU did
that?”

“Yes Tor, you have to understand, you were so young,
we couldn’t just tell you the truth. We had trouble with it, and we
were grownups!” responded Mrs. Anderson.

“You told me it was a crazed squirrel that came in
through the window!” he said sulkily, setting down his plate and
folding his arms as he sank back into the couch, pouting.

“That’s right,” Mr. Anderson chuckled. “I forgot
about the crazed squirrel!”

“I was always afraid he’d come back and attack me in
my sleep!” Torsten softened a little, letting out a giggle.

The memory even brought a laugh out of Paivi and her
mother.

“Okay, so here’s my first question,” said Paivi.
“Can Tor do anything,” she paused, turning towards him. “Do you
have dreams or can you move stuff?”

“Not that I know of! I wish!” said Torsten. “Why
can’t I do the same things as Paivi, Mom and Dad?”

“You might someday,” began Mr. Anderson. “Our
families have a long history of these special abilities. Both of
our families have what are called Seers. A Seer is someone who
receives visions of the future. As far as we know, they can’t be
controlled. Your mother and I see things in our dreams also. As for
you, Tor, some people take a little longer to discover their
abilities. But it is also possible that you will never develop
any.”

“Nice. Figures, Paivi gets all of the cool stuff,”
whined Torsten.

“Look, it’s not like I wanted this stuff. Some of
the things I’ve seen,” she paused, seeing the image of Mrs. Brown
and the burning car, “I wish I never had — they were awful.”

Paivi shivered, a chill spilling down her spine. She
set down what was left of her cake and pulled her knees in,
wrapping her arms around them.

“So what,” said Torsten, irritated. “Then you can
just do something about it if you don’t like what you see.”

“No,” said Mr. Anderson. “As a Seer, you have to
follow one rule – you cannot interfere with what you see.”

“Well, that’s stupid!” said Torsten. “What’s the
point of being able to see the future if you can’t do anything
about it?”

“This rule goes back to ancient times,” replied Mrs.
Anderson. “This is what my mother told me. Let’s say in Mrs.
Brown’s case that you had told her to stay home that day. The event
may have still occurred, but then it could affect someone else’s
life in turn. Someone may have taken Mrs. Brown’s place that day,
maybe a young girl riding with her parents or someone’s
grandfather. It is not for us to choose who lives and dies. That is
way too much responsibility for one person to have. Besides, if you
did get involved, you would begin to obsess over your visions,
frantically trying to save everyone you know. Everyone’s story has
a different ending and unfortunately we aren’t the writers, just
the readers. There are some visions that can change. The event may
not occur because the people involved alter the outcome of the
situation — they make different choices. It’s not that the vision
you had was wrong; it could be that it was just one option. If we
were to get involved, we could disrupt it somehow, upset the
balance.”

“So, Dad, if you can do this too, do you use it to
catch bad guys while you are at work?” asked Paivi.

“It may help to know who I’m looking for, but we
still have to have evidence. I can’t just run around rounding up
criminals with no case against them. People would get suspicious.
They would wonder where I had gotten my information,” Mr. Anderson
said.

“Why would anyone care?” asked Paivi. “You’re just
trying to help people.”

“That comes to the most important part of the
discussion. People who don’t have this ability wouldn’t understand
that we are special and not just a bunch of freaks. For centuries
our ancestors had to carry the knowledge of these gifts in complete
secrecy. Before the Middle Ages, people with special abilities were
respected and trusted,” said Mr. Anderson. “There were magicians,
sorcerers or viziers on every royal court. You know, Grandpa
Anderson did a family tree a few years back and found that we had
some very interesting relatives. He claims that Merlin Ambrosius,
the Sorcerer of King Arthur’s court, was a second cousin, twice
removed. He also discovered relatives who lost their lives during
the Spanish Inquisition and even a great-great-great aunt that died
in the Salem Witch Trials here in the U.S. If they didn’t agree
that they were receiving visions from God, they were put to death
as witches. Those with special abilities who believed God spoke
through them became powerful within the church. Many of them are
saints we know today.”

“Huh, so saints were really just people like me.
Interesting,” Paivi said. “But how awful for the others; why didn’t
these people get together and do something about it?”

“Well, we aren’t superheroes honey!” chuckled Mrs.
Anderson. “And there are not huge numbers of people like us. They
were split up pretty far and wide back then, it was nearly
impossible for them to contact each other. They were forced to keep
their secrets in order to survive. Some families moved near others
they knew, but that was dangerous as well. It was difficult to
trust anyone. Now times are different. We might still keep a
distance from others, but they make themselves known to us, and us
to them.”

“Wait!” shouted Torsten. “There are more people like
this in St. Andrew? Who are they? Do we know them?”

“That is our secret to keep,” said Mrs. Anderson.
“We can’t allow information like that to be passed to children.
It’s our choice to tell you about all of this, but it’s not fair
for us to put others into jeopardy by naming names.”

“Well, how do you know who they are then? I thought
you all tried to keep separated from each other,” asked Paivi.

“There is a way to tell about the others, a sign,
but you can only see it if you know what you are looking for. When
you are eighteen and an adult, we will explain it to you. But until
then, mum’s the word,” said Mrs. Anderson.

“And the others, can we all do the same things?”
Paivi had a million questions running through her mind.

“Some, but it’s possible that there are abilities
out there that we have never seen or heard of yet. Being that we
have to keep it all to ourselves, we can never be sure what others
are capable of, or for that matter, what they are doing with it,”
answered Mr. Anderson, laying his empty cake plate on the wooden
coffee table.

“We chose to make use of our abilities only for good
things, but others may not make the same choices. These things can
be dangerous. For instance, those ‘Illusionists’ that perform in
Las Vegas and make those television shows doing their street magic
are putting us all in jeopardy. They think they have everyone
convinced that it’s just entertainment. All so they can make a
quick buck and hang out with their Hollywood friends. It’s such a
great risk to us all,” said Mrs. Anderson with a hint of
disapproval.

Paivi thought of the locket in its velvet-lined box.
She had an urge to put it on. “And the locket? I know everyone was
here earlier, so you couldn’t really say much, but do you know any
more about it, really?”

“No, my mother told me when she gave it to me that
if I ever needed something, it would be there for me. But in thirty
years, I’ve never noticed it do anything. I think she was just
trying to give me a romantic story to make the locket more special.
Anyways, it’s pretty.” The carved wooden clock on the mantel chimed
once. “Oh, I didn’t realize how late it was getting!”

Mrs. Anderson jumped up from the couch, grabbing her
plate and an empty glass from the coffee table. She put her things
in the kitchen and turned back to her children, giving them both a
big hug as they rose from the couch. “Now don’t forget to put your
dishes in the dishwasher! Let’s get to bed!”

It took Paivi a long time to fall asleep that night.
Her mind felt full, and trying to close her eyes felt like trying
to shut the doors on an over-stuffed garage. She pulled back the
curtain, staring out the window at the full moon floating in the
starry sky. The moonlight turned the street in front of the house
into a river of silver. She begged sleep to come, and as dawn
brightened on the horizon, with Mr. Teddy Bear in her arms, Paivi
finally drifted off to sleep.

Paivi was up before her alarm, both nervous
and excited about the first day of high school. She got ready
quickly and made her way down to grab a bowl of cereal before
heading out to the bus stop. She stepped around bags and people in
the aisle, finally finding a seat near the middle of the bus. Being
the first day back, no one had found older kids to ride to school
with just yet. There was no air conditioning on the bus, just a
hot, humid rush of air through all of the open windows, which
caused Paivi to rethink her wardrobe choice. Her new jeans were
sticking to her legs. She just kept reminding herself that the
school would be like a meat locker, so it would pay off in the
end.

The bus joined the queue in the driveway in front of
the school, pulling slowly forward, and opened the doors to allow
their passengers to exit. Paivi took the steps slowly. It would be
extremely embarrassing to fall down the stairs in front of the
whole school. Not quite the impression she was going for. She
stepped off the bus into a throng of students and was shuffled
towards the courtyard, where everyone split off into their own
groups. Some students continued on, filtering through the front
doors and into the cafeteria.

Paivi decided to stay outside to see if she could
find Michaela or any of the other girls. They had all come on
different buses. She waved and greeted a few kids she remembered
from junior high, but kept walking. She found a spot along the
concrete wall and sat for a minute, taking in her surroundings.

St. Andrew High School was a very uninteresting
looking building. The original school had been built in 1872 and
was an imposing building of brick and stone that resembled a
castle. As St. Andrew grew, the building became too small, and the
new St. Andrew High School was built down the street. It opened in
1971, apparently when no one had any sort of creativity regarding
architecture and design. The school was large and boxy, like
someone had just gone and glued some rectangles together. The
building was covered in red brick and the only good thing about it
was the fact that it had large windows that looked out onto a
forest preserve.

“Hey P!” Paivi heard a familiar voice behind her.
She spun around and saw Michaela and Paulina walking towards
her.

“Can you believe it’s our first day!” squealed
Michaela rubbing her hands together. “Just think of all the new
boys. And OLDER boys! Nice!”

The three of them turned to see a large group of
boys looking in their direction. When they noticed they had been
caught, they quickly looked away, shouting at each other and
laughing. There was one boy that caught Paivi’s eye. He looked
right at her, unblinking. His cold stare made her slightly
uncomfortable. He held her gaze a moment longer and then broke it,
turning back to his friends.

“Oooo!” said Michaela, teasing Paivi as she nudged
her in the ribs with her elbow. “It looks like somebody’s got a
thing for you, P! Nice job! The first bell hasn’t even rung
yet!”

Paivi let out a nervous laugh as the bell rang and
the throng of students moved in a giant wave, carrying them all
towards the door.

The day was a mixture of feelings. It was exciting
to see old friends after months apart, which resulted in large
groups of screaming and hugging girls. There was also tension as
they checked out the new students, possible friends and enemies
that they hadn’t met yet. They attempted to size each other up
without appearing obvious. The classes themselves were the dullest
part of the day, more so for the fact that every teacher spent the
period ‘getting to know’ their new students by playing cheesy
ice-breaker games and going over never-ending lists of classroom
rules. In each class they collected book after book until they were
teetering precariously through the hallways, hoping to make it to
their lockers before their backs gave out.

Paivi stumbled into her sixth period class balancing
a pile of books and notebooks and collapsed into the nearest open
seat. The desk was old and not quite level, and when she dropped
her pile onto it, everything proceeded to slide onto the floor with
a loud crash.

She looked at the heap of books and paper, put her
hand to her head and sighed loudly. She bent down, stacking the
items one by one on the desk.

“Looks like you might want to invest in a backpack,
unless you happen to turn into the Incredible Hulk during passing
periods,” said an unfamiliar voice dryly, as a hand reached down
from the desk across the aisle and began picking up a few of her
books.

“Uh, yeah, thanks. I left it in my locker. I just
didn’t think we would get so much stuff already!” She slammed the
last book onto the pile, and finally looked up. The owner of the
voice across the aisle handed Paivi her things stacked neatly,
which she set next to her sloppy pile, hoping to avoid a repeat
performance.