Project Aquarius (The Sensitives Series Book 1) (2 page)
Read Project Aquarius (The Sensitives Series Book 1) Online
Authors: Colleen Jordan
“Noooooooooooo,” he whined. “No Fruity Loops! It’s not Fruity Loops day!”
Drea quickly rushed to his side. She put his prized specimen book back on the granite breakfast bar. Then she picked up the loose pages and stuffed them back in. Drea had learned to minimize the tantrums years ago. Return everything to a predictable normal.
Sammy continued to wail. Deftly, Drea opened the cereal cabinet, grabbed the Chocolate Puffs box and slid it into his periphery. He calmed instantly.
“You want Chocolate Puffs?”
“Yes… yes,” he sniffled. “It’s Monday April 11. Odd numbered day. I eat Chocolate Puffs on odd-numbered days,” he quoted.
“I got it now, Sammy, no worries. It’s okay,” Drea soothed. Her Mom had set her up. It was an odd numbered day; of course it was time for Chocolate Puffs
.
“It’s okay,” he echoed as he returned to flipping through his plant book as though nothing had happened.
Sometimes Drea felt her younger brother was a lethal combination of programmable robot and secret genius. Sammy knew more about plants and fungi than anyone Drea had ever met and he quoted his rote knowledge to anyone who listened.
That reminded her, time to heat his breakfast mushrooms.
“Chocolate Puffs first, then your mushrooms?” she confirmed.
“Yes, please,” he stated in his singsong cartoon voice.
Drea popped the bowl of sliced baby bellas in the microwave, exactly thirty-six seconds. She didn’t know how he did it, eating spongy fungus at every meal. The thought of the texture made her gag.
Sammy’s eyes darted up to double-check that they were being heated to his specifications. His eyes held a slightly vacant expression.
As Sammy wolfed down his warm and slimy fungus, Drea nibbled at a granola bar half-heartedly. The math quiz was totally throwing her off. First the bad dream, now a stomachache.
Nearby, a car beeped.
“C’mon Sammy, I got to go!” she encouraged.
Life had been so much easier since Drea’s best friend Sierra had acquired a car. It was a hand-me-down, but it was better than the alternative. Arriving at the prestigious Phipps Academy in a parent carpool made you less than fungus on the social ladder.
She grabbed her phone from the family charging station and shoved it in her pocket.
Without a word, Sammy slid his specimen book into his green backpack. He put on his green sneakers and green coat and walked to the front door. Then he waited for Drea to open it.
“Dude, you know how to open a door.”
He was so unbelievably stubborn. If it wasn’t part of the routine, it didn’t happen.
Drea pushed the door open. Sammy walked down the slate walkway and stopped at the sidewalk. Then he turned 180 degrees and waited faithfully for the scripted dialogue to begin.
Drea motioned to her friend in the driver’s seat that she needed only one more minute, one more sentence really.
“See you later alligator,” she said as she did every morning.
“After while crocodile,” Sammy quipped with a large grin.
Drea’s brother about-faced rapidly and began to walk the five blocks east and three blocks north to JFK Elementary. Drea knew exactly how many blocks it was because he had told her many times. Approximately 1,135 steps, in case she was wondering.
She watched his form slip past the old maple tree on the edge of Mr. Swinton’s property signifying she was now free from Sammy’s morning routine.
Drea swung into the passenger’s seat of the 1998 Honda and sat with a thunk next to Sierra. “You won’t believe what happened last night,” she said.
“Are you kidding me?!” Sierra exasperated. She looked pale, which was hard to do with ebony hair and copper skin.
“What? I didn’t even say anything yet.”
Drea thought they sometimes shared a brain.
“You had another dream, didn’t you? Tell me you had a water dream like I predicted,” said Sierra while playing with her lip ring.
“Yeah, how’d you know?”
“Cuz I worship the Devil and he tells me things,” Sierra joked, comically stretching her black eyeliner-traced eyes wide.
“Ugh, your parents are ridiculous,” Drea complained. “As if watching
The Exorcist
a dozen times makes you crazy.”
“I think they were more concerned that I looked up how to do an exorcism online.”
“But that was just because of my weird fire demon dream.”
“My point exactly! Everyone knows you’re the crazy one. At least I didn’t have to go get my head examined by scientists at Harvard when I was in kindergarten. Clearly, you’re the one corrupting me,” Sierra said dripping with sarcasm.
Drea laughed along with her friend, but she had an ugly knot in her stomach that gnawed at her insides. On some level was it true? Was she really crazy? Were her dreams really psychotic or dangerous?
“But seriously, about your dream… Did you check your phone yet?” Sierra prompted, interrupting Drea’s anxious thoughts.
In all the hustle to get Sammy out the door, Drea had forgotten to turn her phone on. She reached into her pocket and clicked the button that prompted the musical startup noise.
The first text message from Sierra was time stamped 6 a.m.
In my dream I drowned
There were three more texts.
I’m really freaked out right now
Call me when you wake up
I saw you in my dream
“Same,” Drea reported. She was stunned to hear that something so similar had happened to Sierra. “You saw me in your dream?”
“Yeah, it was like I was in your recurring water nightmare, the one you’ve described to me a thousand times. In this one, I was swimming in the lake by your family’s summer cabin in New Hampshire. I dove under and all of a sudden I couldn’t tell which way was up. The water was black and thick like tar and squeezed my lungs. I couldn’t breathe and I was sure I was going to die. Then the water became unexpectedly clear and I saw the tip of your red Converse sneakers. We were in the hallway of the Academy. Everything was underwater and I saw you swim by a row of yellow lockers. I called out to you, but the strong current pushed you into a classroom. Then everything went black.”
Drea’s mouth hung agape. It was the same dream, from a different perspective.
She managed to whisper, “Read the blog.”
Sierra pulled it up on her phone screen. A minute later Drea’s BFF started the car without a word. Then she backed out of the drive in silence.
Drea couldn’t wait any longer, “Well, what does it mean?”
“It means you are a Dreamwalker like I’ve been telling you.”
“That’s crazy stuff from sci-fi movies. That isn’t a real thing that people can do.”
Drea loved to talk about the paranormal, but if she had a superpower she would’ve known by now.
“Well you can do it. And so can I. We’re sensitive to that kind of stuff,” Sierra insisted.
“But what does it mean? You and I hung out in a nightmare together. So what? We both got creeped out. So what? I seriously doubt that it means a tsunami is going to hit Boston.”
“I told you what I think it means. You’re a Dreamwalker. But if you want to know so badly, pull a card.”
Consulting the tarot was Sierra’s solution for everything. Drea reached into her best friend’s backpack and pulled out a small purple velvet bag that contained a thick deck of cards.
“I’m a little busy dodging Massholes at the moment. Go ahead. You pull one.”
Drea shuffled the deck as she had seen Sierra do hundreds of times. She closed her eyes and thought about the dream, asking repeatedly in her mind,
What does it mean
? Strangely, she felt the cards grow warmer in her hands. And then, as if guided to the answer she stopped shuffling and turned over the top card. Major Arcana number XX, Judgment. The word alone sent chills down Drea’s spine.
Then she saw it.
“Oh, my God!”
Drea dropped the card as though it could burn a hole in her hand. The car swerved. Drea forced the rest of the deck back in the velvet bag and shoved the whole thing inside her backpack. She was completely freaked out.
Sierra asked frantically, “What? Are you okay? What card did you pull?” as she white-knuckled the wheel.
Drea couldn’t find the words to tell her friend what she had seen. It was just a stupid image created by an artist to represent the idea of tarot. It didn’t mean anything.
“Drea? What card was it? Why are you so freaked out? Tarot can’t hurt you. We’ve talked about this a million times.”
Drea’s hands were shaking. She reached onto the floor mat, picked up the solitary card, and handed it to Sierra.
“Judgment. So what?” Sierra said not getting it.
“Look in the background,” Drea directed. She knew it wasn’t smart for Sierra to take her eyes off the road, but she had to see it herself.
“Oh, holy hell! There’s a tidal wave.”
“Yup. Creepy, right? It’s coming at the unsuspecting people in the front.”
“Don’t be so literal. The Academy is like ten miles from the harbor. It doesn’t mean that a tidal wave is literally coming to get us.”
“It doesn’t?”
“No, the Judgment card traditionally means rebirth or a new beginning. The slate wiped clean.”
Drea detected a strain in Sierra’s voice. She didn’t buy it. “Okay… So how does that apply to our dreams?”
“I’m not sure yet. We’ll have to wait and see,” Sierra said noncommittally.
“I don’t know… I can’t shake the bad feeling,” Drea admitted.
“I’m creeped out too, but the tarot doesn’t lie. Sometimes it tells you what you don’t want to hear, but it doesn’t lie. Besides, you had no problem accepting what the cards said when you asked if Matt liked you,” she teased.
“Shut up.”
“Last week when the cards said that he sees you for who you really are, even though you two couldn’t be more different...”
Drea looked at the floor. It was true. She did accept the cards’ meanings when they were in line with her beliefs. She knew that made her a hypocrite.
They sat in silence until Sierra pulled into the school lot and parked her sad busted Honda next to a shiny blue Audi.
“Speak of the Devil,” Sierra said.
There he was, tall utter beauty in his signature purple skinny jeans. Matt Williams tossed his hair out of his eyes and smiled. He nodded his head slightly to acknowledge Drea’s presence as he climbed out of his brand new Audi. Drea grinned back sheepishly. In return, his eyes seemed to linger a little too long on her lips.
“I don’t see what you see in him,” Sierra said bursting the beautiful moment.
Suddenly, the window glass seemed too thin and Drea felt exposed. She turned away with an awkward jerk.
“Welcome back to Earth,” Sierra teased.
Drea swiveled back around, but Matt had already jogged ahead to meet up with his friends. “I… just…” Looking at his athletic form made Drea’s vocabulary turn to pig dung. “He… makes my heart beat faster. I just... He’s really… yummy… I love him.”
“You love how he makes you feel. I’m telling you, he’s hiding something from you. I don’t trust him.”
They watched through the glass as Matt laughed and high-fived a pack of popular seniors.
“You don’t trust anybody, Sierra. I, however, am a devout believer in the power of love!” Drea announced with one hand over her heart and the other hand pointed toward the sky, in a purposefully dramatic gesture.
“You’re crazy is what you are. The good kind of crazy, I swear.” Sierra opened the driver’s side door. “I’ll see you in Mr. Murray’s. I’m going to swing by the cafe for a quick breakfast. Hope it will help with the quiz. Brain food.”
“I don’t think a bacon egg and cheese is brain food,” Drea teased.
She slammed the passenger door and walked in the opposite direction, away from her best friend.
CHAPTER TWO
The school parking lot was old and in desperate need of repair. Sammy had to take a specific route, doubling back and side-wandering to make it to the front door unscathed.
1,001. 1,002. 1,003. Oh, no! The tip of his left shoe had brushed a piece of grass that was sticking through a slit in the asphalt. Sammy paused and tapped the crack seven times with his non-offending right foot. Heel. Toe. Heel. Toe. Heel. Toe. Heel. Seven was a magical number in nature and the seven taps undid his perpetrated crime. That was the rule.
Sammy’s mind contained many rules about the world. The rules kept him safe when routine could not. Like the counting rule. 1,004. 1,005. 1,006.
Sammy’s autism made him count things. He was two and a half when the counting started. Counting toys, lining them up, counting ceiling tiles, counting blades of grass in the yard. Counting was fun, counting was soothing, and most importantly counting was predictable.
1,018. 1,019. 1,020. A car honked and Sammy clamped his hands over his ears. He had to keep the sound out. He pressed his palms firmly against his head. Sammy hated when unpredictable sounds happened on the walk to school. He hated all unpredictable things like rain… and construction… and vacations… and conversations with other people…
He froze in the middle of the parking lot and let the sound wash over him.
“Get out of the way!” a parent yelled out the window of an old station wagon, as she swerved around him. “What are you doing?!?”
Sammy could not answer that question. Don’t talk to strangers. That was Mom and Dad’s rule. Sammy included the Don’t Talk to Strangers Rule in the Walking to School Routine, even though he did not see the difference between known adults and unknown adults. He followed the rules and the rules kept him safe.
When it was quiet for a moment in the parking lot, Sammy uncovered his ears and started to move again. 1,021. 1,022. 1,023.
Sammy was happy that Mom and Dad had allowed him to start walking to school alone when he turned ten years old. He loved to spend time with his plant friends during the Walking to School Routine. Even in a big city there were common medicinal weeds like mint, lavender, and dandelion to pick. Sammy liked plants better than people. They were alive, but they were a lot less confusing.
Sammy bent down, picked a dandelion, and shoved it in his pocket. He broke open the stem and felt the pulpy slime on his fingers. He liked the way it felt on the inside. It was cool and softer than his pocket. He felt relieved. That was how his special brain worked. Plants relieved him. 1,032. 1,033.
Adults were always concerned about his autism. But Sammy felt he had a friend, a part of his mind that was organized and predictable and made sense of the world, a lifelong companion. What they called autism, he knew was his strength. And it was the only way he knew. He did the same thing day after day and that kept him safe.
1,045. 1,046. Sammy was almost at the front door of the school. It was always 1,072 steps to the door, and another 63 to his classroom. A total of 1,135 meant the morning was successful.
Sammy opened the heavy door to the lobby of JFK Elementary. Everything inside was painted in soothing brown tones. Dark brown door, light brown walls, dark brown trim. Sammy liked his school. The brown colors reminded him of nature.
1,079. 1,080. He made it a few steps past the lobby and froze. Right in front of him was a disaster! There was a large puddle of watery ick surrounded by orange cones. The janitor had blocked off a significant section of the hall. Sabotage!
Sammy was stuck at 1,081. He stood still and let the rush of morning students flow around him.
“Watch it kid!” spat a fifth grader.
Sammy would have to take at least nine steps out of the way to get around the roadblock. It would mess everything up. But similarly, he couldn’t jump over. That broke his rules. It deviated from the routine too much and would be greatly upsetting.
***
While he was frozen in the hall, he was called a sped twice before his teacher Mrs. M came to greet him. “Good morning, Sammy. Everything okay?” she asked.
No. No. No. This was all wrong. First, walk down the hall to 1,135, then arrive at the classroom, put bag and coat away, then say ‘good morning’ to Mrs. M. This was out of order. This was all wrong. Sammy was freaking out without a trace of evidence on his face.
He stared ahead blankly.
“Sammy? You okay? What’s going on buddy?” the teacher prodded.
Everything was off. Today was going to be a bad day. Sammy’s breathing quickened and his fists tightened. No. No. No. Stop world. Stop. Go back to normal.
Sammy closed his eyes. That made everything worse. Sounds were louder: the shuffling of feet, the squeak of the floor, yelling of children, Mrs. M’s voice. Then it happened. And it was irreparable.
The bell rang. The sound penetrated Sammy’s skull, piercing his brain. He dropped to the floor and put his hands over his ears. He began to wail, create his own noise to drown out the infiltrating sound. Sammy had developed this technique years ago. Add to the sound; sing with it, until it goes away. Crouched on the floor, screaming, Sammy felt better than he had a minute ago. Things had started to reorganize.
Then without warning Mrs. M grabbed Sammy by the arm and dragged him back to his feet. His right hand slipped off his ear, altering the air pressure. His ear popped and pain shot down his jaw in an electrical surge.
In an instant, the teacher had a firm grip on his arm and was dragging him toward the classroom.
“Noooooooo!” screeched Sammy. “No, Mrs. M! Stop! You’re ruining everything!”
But she didn’t stop. Sammy’s body fought back, squirming, drooling, yelling. And he had lost count! The world was spinning. His mind was telling him everything was wrong.
The teacher half-carried, half-dragged him all the way to the classroom. Then the motion stopped.
Mrs. M said calmly, “When you’re ready please join us at your desk.”
She walked away.
When he opened his eyes a few minutes later, Sammy was two feet inside the classroom door by the coatroom. All the other students were seated at their desks doing their morning work. Sammy’s body was calm and motionless, but his mind was still racing.
Sammy took time to acclimate.
The other aides and classroom staff smiled at him as they walked by, helping other students settle in for the day. Sammy had learned that a smile was a positive sign of greeting and friendship, but he would never understand it. In the animal world, bearing teeth was a threat. He made no effort to smile back.
He looked down at his feet. The familiar blue patterned carpet stared back. Diamonds and triangles. Triangles within diamonds. He fit his feet inside two large diamonds. Blue socks inside green sneakers on blue carpet. It was orderly. His feet were contained. Still. Safe.
Sammy suddenly remembered that he had stopped counting at 1,081. That meant he had only 54 steps left to get to the blue carpet. He had only missed 54 steps.
He sighed. That thought reset his brain. He was inside the classroom now. He had reached 1,135, so he was free from the counting.
It was time for the rest of the morning routine.
He walked into the coatroom, hung up his green coat and stowed his green bag. Once at his study cubby, Sammy donned his ruby red noise-reducing headphones. He wore them all the time at school. The headphones kept him safe from the ringing bells, the buzzing lights, and the general loudness of the school. His special headphones allowed him to listen to his teachers and aides without the background cacophony.
With headphones on, Sammy sat on his blue plastic chair. He liked his chair. There were red chairs in his classroom too. Sometimes the teacher made a mistake and put a red chair at his desk. That was another thing that set Sammy off. He needed his blue chair. It matched his socks and the carpet. Sammy always wore blue socks. Blue socks with green shoes. Blue chair plus blue carpet plus blue socks equals peace.
“Good morning Sammy, glad you could join us.”
“Good morning, Mr. B,” Sammy greeted his aide.
Sometimes Sammy got distracted and sometimes it took him a long time to recover after an interruption in the routine. Mr. B was a nice guy, who was there to keep him on track. That was his job.
“It’s time to do your schedule,” Mr. B prompted.
Sammy already knew this, but it was comforting to hear. He reached into the zippered pouch that held his icons. Icons were pictures with words that helped Sammy to organize his day. He learned best from pictures. Words sometimes got in the way when he was overwhelmed.
Sammy picked out the icons for Monday: music, recess, writing, etc. He stuck the Monday icon onto the Velcro, under the month icon. APRIL was written out in all caps, with a small illustration of an umbrella next to it. This bothered Sammy, as it hadn’t rained yet in the month of April. He was looking for the number 11 in the pile when Mrs. M said, “Okay class, time for Circle Time.”
No. No. Not again. Sammy hadn’t caught up. He had to complete his schedule before Circle Time. He had to finish or his whole day would be in the wrong order. He started to work faster. He stuck the Circle Time icon onto his schedule, then writing, then music. He worked at a feverish pace, dropping a few pictures on the floor, creating more chaos.
Mr. B intervened, “Sammy? Did you hear Mrs. M? Time for Circle Time.”
No. No. He couldn’t find the right icon for Math. His hands shook in protest. No. No. Then he dumped all the pictures on the floor. A complete mess. No control.
“Sammy, it’s time to go to Circle Time.”
He looked over at his classmates who were dragging their chairs to the middle of the room, forming a circle. His breath quickened. He had to work faster.
“We can do this later, bud. Now it’s time for Circle Time. We will do your schedule after.”
“No!” Sammy yelled.
A few classmates turned to look. Mr. B gently placed his hand on Sammy’s shoulder. It felt like a burning hot coal.
“Let go of me!” Sammy shouted.
“Calm down. Everything is okay Sammy. It’s Circle Time.”
Somewhere inside, Sammy knew Mr. B was trying to help, but it didn’t feel that way. He was the one making everything wrong, interrupting the routine.
“Sammy, let’s go.”
Mr. B started to drag the chair toward the circle, Sammy still on it. The movement made Sammy’s head spin. The chair made his guts grind together. Everything was wrong. Even the air touching his skin hurt.
“No!” he screamed.
Sammy tried to stop the movement of the chair. He stuck his foot out wildly, trying to grip on to anything. His foot swung out and made contact with Mr. B’s shins. He didn’t mean to kick him. He just needed the motion to stop. Mr. B reached out for him. Sammy blocked the movement with his arms.
“I need some help. He’s kicking and hitting!” said Mr. B into the walkie-talkie.
No he wasn’t. He just needed to finish his schedule. One of the other aides ran over to answer Mr. B’s call for assistance. The movement startled Sammy. The big man rushed toward Sammy so he stuck both legs out to stop him. The aide tripped and fell over Sammy’s legs.
Mr. B yelled, “We’ve got a Code S. Code S!” into the walkie.
No. No. Not Code S. Sammy didn’t mean to. Please. Several adults ran over to Sammy. He dropped to the ground, abandoning his blue seat of safety. Crouching and covering his ears would save him now. He started to yell. His mouth was in charge.
“No! No! My schedule! Nooooooooooo.”
He was crying.
The aides lifted him up, which disoriented him. They hooked their arms underneath his and escorted him out of the classroom. He was dragged backwards. Sammy couldn’t plant his feet on the ground. He felt like he was flying and he hated flying. His legs struck out wildly. His body was out of control.
“Please no! My schedule!” he wailed.
“Sammy,” Mr. B panted, “there is no kicking or hitting in our classroom.”
“I wasn’t.”
“If you hit and kick, you go to seclusion. You know the rules.”
The staff stopped in front of the narrowest door in the hallway. It was formerly a janitorial closet. They opened the door and gently placed Sammy inside. He went limp on the cushioned floor.
As Mr. B closed the door he said, “You have ten minutes. If you still aren’t calm in ten minutes, you’ll have ten more. Make the right choice, kiddo.” Then he smiled like an angry badger.
When the large door shut, Sammy felt relieved. Truthfully, he liked the seclusion room. It was like a cozy cocoon. Padded walls, soundproofing. It was the cone of silence Sammy craved most of the time. It relaxed him instantly. And there would be no more hitting and kicking because the adults had stopped asking him to do things he couldn’t do.