On the Verge (A Charmed Life Book 1) (6 page)

“I'll figure you out later,” she muttered sullenly.  “I am not ready for this tonight.  I need a good night's sleep.”

She curled up in her bed, pulled the blankets over her, and let out a deep sigh as she tried to go to sleep.  She let out a small smile as Nameless curled up on the pillow next to her, one tiny paw resting on Tracy's shoulder, as every other night.  “I'm so glad you're here,” she murmured to the cat.  “Something normal and peaceful.”

She thought it'd take a long time to fall asleep, but the exhaustion kicked her quickly into a fitful slumber.

“Poor thing,” said Nameless softly, standing up to lick her face lightly as she slept.  “But you'll be all right.”

Tracy slowly stirred from her slumber with the impression that it had been a very long night.  She had vague memories of waking up and going back to sleep, uncertain how much of it was real, and how much of it was the terribly frustrating dream of being awake and trying to sleep.

Her nose wrinkled as a truly foul stench insinuated itself upon her consciousness, the coughing fit bringing her to struggle with her tightly wrapped blankets as she came fully awake.  Something, somewhere, was scorched, and her brain relegated the latter part of last night to the same realm that dreams go, ignoring it for the moment to remind her that in her distraction, she had never taken the pot of soup off the stove.

Half falling out of bed, Tracy stumbled a moment before her body caught up with her intent, her knees slow to support her weight.  She caught herself with a hand on the corner of her dresser as Nameless let out an annoyed yowl and hiss.  Recovering quickly, she ignored Nameless and hurried to the kitchen, finding the soup to be completely ruined.  It had reduced itself to a brown-orange goo taking up half as much pot as it should have, the higher sides of the pot caked with burnt remains of the soup as it had receded and simmered away over the night.

“Oh,
come on
!” Tracy cried in frustration, the minor mistake and wasted food just heightening the stress she had been feeling last night.  Besides, that was a good recipe, and had come out nicely.  Sighing, she turned off the stove to let the 'soup' cool a bit, pulling out a pair of paper grocery bags and three plastic grocery bags, lining them all inside each other so she could pour, scoop, and scrape the sludge into it without worrying about the bottom of the bag giving out.

Hoping that she hadn't ruined her good soup pot, she set it in the sink and filled it with water to soak.  She threw on a pair of jeans and tucked her nightshirt into the waist, then slipped her feet into a pair of slippers.  Closing up the top of the layered bags, she made her quick way out back to the dumpster, glad that everyone was still asleep.  Normally, she would never head out of the apartment looking as much of a mess as she was, but she really needed to get this stuff out of her apartment so she could start getting rid of the stink.

She hated the dumpster.  It always smelled like rot and filth and disease, a truly horrible funk that always assaulted her nose.  Holding her breath as much as possible, she threw the bag into the dumpster with a sickening splat and the clanking of metal and glass as the trash already in the dumpster shifted around from the impact.

A sudden impression of being watched struck her, and she spun around nervously, her hands up defensively before her.  No one was there, and she quietly murmured, “Just my imagination,” to herself, only half believing it as she stepped back inside, keeping a wary eye up and down the alley.

When she got back inside, she went right to the sink, scrubbing down at the caked on, burnt soup.  She got off a good layer, then refilled the pot with more soap and water to soak some more.

“Ugh,” she groaned softly, her nose wrinkling lightly as she considered the wretched smell throughout the apartment.  One by one, she opened every window in the apartment, then remembered to turn off the heat.  The cold infiltrated the apartment rapidly behind her, and the living room was chilly once more when she got back there.  She went back to the sink and took another layer off the burnt soup, then filled it up for yet another soak.

She then took a smaller pot and filled it up most of the way with water, then added a cup or so of vinegar to the mixture.  She turned the stove on low, so that the watered vinegar would slowly heat up and disperse through the kitchen and apartment.  It would stink for a little bit, but the vinegar scent would go away, taking the burnt smell with it, and on the low temperature the pot wouldn't run out before she got back from class.

A glance at the time made her sigh.  If she didn't hurry up, she was going to be late.  She walked back to her room and paused at the bathroom door, looking in at the charm bracelet laying there on the counter, an intruder in her life, unexpected, unreal, but solid.

Air … scents were air.  Could that bracelet … Her apartment …

No.  That was ridiculous.

She went to her bedroom and pulled her gym bag out of the closet, filling it with her keiko gi and her smaller toiletries bag.

“I'll be back,” she said to Nameless, tossing the bag's strap over her shoulder.  “I need focus of mind.”

Tracy was very quiet as she sat on the bus, caught up on her own thoughts.  Normally she would have enjoyed people-watching, seeing all the assorted different folk that were riding with her, making up stories about who they were and what they were doing, but today her thoughts turned inwards and back to last night, though they skittered away every time they approached the worst of it.

She very nearly missed her stop, and it was only because the driver recognized her and reminded her that she got off at the right place.  “Thanks, Gus!” she called as she hopped off, the bus door creaking loudly as it shut behind her.

It was a business area, with rows of bland glass-fronted stone buildings lining a cracked and slightly heaving sidewalk.  A few blocks away the road opened up and gained a green median, but here the street was rather tight, without even parking spaces along it.  Some people might have thought it somewhat run down, but Tracy knew many of the people around here, and knew that it had character and a strong community.  The central intersection still had cobblestones from a past era, and behind these bland store fronts were hidden decades-old buildings with some very nice internal architecture.

She walked down the street, her blue and white gym bag slung over her shoulder, breathing in the fresh air.  It held a hint of something, something she hadn't smelled for months.  Was that Spring?  She hoped it wasn't her imagination, but the day seemed downright pleasant, warm enough so that she opened up the front of her puffy jacket and let the air in.  There was that faint scent of energy that seemed to sing that Spring was right around the corner, and it helped to lift her frazzled spirits.  By the time she left class, the day would likely have warmed up enough that she could go without the coat, though it'd be a little chilly.

After two blocks, she reached the building she was looking for.  Unimpressive to look at, its sign was a bland black-and-white plaque that simply read “Aikido,” alongside some kanji which she assumed also said “Aikido.” Several small plants lined the window, including a few bonsai.  She opened up the door and climbed the four stairs up into the raised store area, breathing deeply of the incense and greenery and richly polished wood that rushed to greet her senses like a welcoming friend.

The stairs were worn in the center, faded, though the corners of the stairs still bore most of the rich polish of years ago.  The window sill upon which the plants rested also was old, cracks showing along the grain here and there, but it was richly polished and sealed to protect against splinters.  The front area was very cramped, no more than a token presence walled off from the rest of the school with folding dividers painted with stereotypical Chinese landscapes.  A few simple wooden chairs and some magazines and martial arts supply catalogs were piled on the one end table along with two small wooden chairs.

Tracy walked past it with a happy sigh, feeling safe and secure for the first time since the previous night.  “Hello!” she called, raising her voice a little bit so it would carry into the back.  She was always the first one here - with the bus schedule as it was, she either came half an hour early or half an hour late, but she didn't mind having the extra time to focus herself and practice.

“Hello, Tracy,” the deep voice of Grandmaster Lee called back, rich and pleasant and comforting.  Tracy followed the sound of his voice past the practice area, circling around the floor pads already laid out.  It wasn't a very large school, and they didn't have a lot of room, so this front area had to take many uses.  This room held the definite scent of sweat and hard work, and her reflection looked back at her as she glanced in the fully mirrored wall, marred only by the two divisions between the three mirrors and the broken corner where someone had accidentally hit it with a staff during an exhibition.

She went past the main room to Grandmaster Lee's office, where Grandmaster Lee was working on some paperwork.  He stood and bowed to her, and she bowed back.  “Shichidan,” she said, respectfully.

Grandmaster Lee's bright white smile seemed to take up more of his chubby, dark face than should be physically or biologically possible, and his black scalp showed only a hint of the stubble that revealed his head was shaved, not bald.  One would never guess, looking at his face, that he was in perfect physical condition and an incredible martial artist - but occasionally his wraparound jacket came open during class, when demonstrating a throw or a fall, and Tracy knew that his body was very lithely muscled underneath.  “Jukyu,” he responded in kind, and then as always: “Is this the day you will finally accept the test for First Dan?”

She shook her head.  “I don't think so, Shichidan,” she replied.  Then she realized he would understand, perhaps could help.  “Actually, I was hoping I could talk to you about … something related.  I can't deal with this myself.”

“Tracy,” he murmured, his smile not disappearing, but at least receding a bit to acknowledge the seriousness of her request.  “I'd be honored to listen.”

Tracy sat down in front of his desk, taking a couple breaths as he waited patiently for her.  Thankfully, he didn't stare at her while waiting, but instead busied himself stacking up his paperwork and pushing it to the side.  Finally, she started.  “I got in a fight last night.”

Grandmaster Lee let out a soft 'ah' of understanding and stopped organizing his desk.

“No,” Tracy corrected herself, “I was attacked.  There were four of them,” Tracy paused, then continued.  “I just …” She stopped talking, trying to figure out how to say it.  “I froze up.” She took a deep breath and sighed.  “Someone saved me, and I just stood there unable to do anything.  And when he came up to me …”

She stopped again, her head bowing as she let herself replay the scene in her mind in its entirety for the first time.  “I put him in an arm lock.  I was this close to breaking his elbow.  I just panicked, and it happened.”

“It-it's just,” stammered Tracy, glancing up at Grandmaster Lee again, nervous about his reaction.  “I couldn't do anything about the four guys who wanted to hurt me, but the one guy who helped me … I hurt him! And what if I had done it wrong and I had injured his elbow? How can I let myself have this sort of power?”

She sighed, not meeting the grandmaster's eyes.  “That's why I've been holding off entering the Dan for so many months,” Tracy went on.  “I can break someone's elbow with barely any pressure at all! If I go into the Dan, I'll start learning the moves where, if I do it wrong, I'll kill someone!”

Grandmaster Lee nodded sagely, his smile all the way gone now in favor of a much more somber mien.  “A lot of us have gone through that.  You're not the only one to have this concern.” He pondered for a moment longer.  “Look up there,” he said, gesturing towards a black and white photograph larger than any of the others on the wall.  “Who is that?”

“That's the Osensei, Shichidan.  He founded Aikido.”

“Correct,” Grandmaster Lee confirmed.  “And why did he found Aikido?”

Despite knowing the answer immediately, Tracy took a few moments to make sure she was wording it correctly, thinking about it instead of answering by rote.  “Because he wanted a martial art that reflected his spiritual beliefs of love and compassion, even to one's enemy.  With the perfect Aikido technique, one turns aside aggression so that neither the receiver nor the aggressor is harmed.”

“Fairly accurate,” replied the Grandmaster.  “And that's what the Dans are about.  It's not about the moves you know, it's beyond the techniques - it's about control.  Dans are about progressing in control - do you have the control to trade up your white belt for a black belt? As you learn more, yes, you learn techniques that could be used to kill - but you also learn the control that keeps you from having to take that option if you don't need to.”

Tracy nodded, somewhat reassured.  “There's more,” she murmured, hesitantly.  “It's also … that is, I can … I might be able to do other things, too.  Things that are kind of strong.”  How could she explain without sounding insane?

Grandmaster Lee shook his head.  “It doesn't matter, Tracy.  It's just power, and any power is a tool, able to attack or defend, able to hurt or to heal.”

Tracy blinked.  “Heal?” she asked.  “What do you mean? Heal how?”

“Not in the sense of medicine,” he replied, “But consider, for instance, a young man with a hard life, who robs the store to get money for food.  He's desperate.  The police have the power - and they defend with their power to protect the public, but that power can also be used to heal, if they give him the motivation or means to escape his hard life.”

“Aikido is the same way,” Grandmaster Lee continued.  “It is a way of protecting yourself and the people you care about, but it is also a healing art.  By preventing injury, both to yourself and to your opponent, you help to show your respect for their life, and provide an opening to end not just a fight, but to heal whatever prompted the fight.  Of course, not all aggressors can or will respond to that, but it is the ideal we follow.”