The Gateway Through Which They Came (4 page)

I stride past her to the kitchen, leaving her standing in the living room as I pick my way through the fridge. I’m not by any means hungry, but I force myself to act normal, despite how abnormal I feel at the moment. On the bottom shelf rests a plate of chicken and rice with a side of broccoli, wrapped with plastic. It’s little things like this that I love about my mother. No matter how upset she is, she’ll never send me to bed without dinner, or leave me to fend for myself.

I close the fridge and find her watching me from the entryway, her expression not so much angry as sad. I never stop to think what it’s like for her to see me become so independent. Sometimes I wonder if she realizes she’s holding on too tight.

“Thanks,” I say, raising the plate slightly in the air. My cheeks burn with shame for disappointing her, and my skin is still clammy from my confrontation with Redhead. I don’t think I’ll ever get that image she showed me out of my head. “I’m sorry for disrespecting you. I promise to call next time, okay?”

Mom eyes me for a minute, her tense shoulders beginning to ease. I can tell she’s contemplating how far she wants to take this argument, weighing her options. Knowing her, she won’t let it ruin her night.

She proves me right when she takes a deep breath and says, “Okay.”

A gentle smile softens her features as her fingers continue to pinch tight around her trusty cross. It’s an annoying habit of hers. I imagine she prays each time she holds it, especially at times when she finds herself under stress. Being that she’s a single mom, she’s practically rubbed the gold plating off at this rate.

I smile back, and hope to myself she’ll let this go.

Before I remove the plastic from the plate, she asks in that concerned tone I know so well: “So, you weren’t with her?”

The plate slips from my grasp, and slams hard against the counter before I could stop it. I’m amazed it didn’t crack in half by the impact.

I can’t bring myself to look her in the eyes, afraid of saying something I’ll regret. With my back to her, and my heart sinking into my stomach, I say, “I told you, Mom, she’s gone. I haven’t talked to her since she left.” The thought of Koren is still raw after what Linda told me earlier today.

Mom doesn’t respond right away, as if absorbing my words.

She knows how much it hurts when she mentions Koren. She doesn’t mean anything by it, but it’s more her worried-mother-concerned-about-her-son-hanging-out-with-a-troublesome-girl kind of a thing. Koren Banks and her parents picked up and left without a word before the end of the previous school year. One day she was there, chewing on her pencil in the desk beside me like she always did when she was lost in thought. Her bright blue eyes focused on the calculation on the white board, the heel of her foot tapping silently under the table, each tap like a number in her head.

These were little things not many would notice when it came to Koren, but me, I noticed everything. Every nervous tic, every perfect flaw, every expression. If you grew up with her the way I did, you’d notice these things, too. But before I knew it, she was gone. No warning, no explanation. Just an empty desk that kept with it the small engraving of her initials in the upper right hand corner.
K.M.B.
Those three initials were the only thing left of the girl I couldn’t possibly forget.

I can sense my mother hovering behind me. Her fragile hand grips my shoulder, which sags under her touch. It takes everything in me not to pull away, or to let her see the pained expression on my face.

Mom doesn’t approve of Koren. The truth is: Mom used to be close friends with her parents. They’d all known each other since they were in high school. Our moms were pregnant at the same time. Damn near gave birth together. It was like they’d planned it out perfectly. That’s how close they were, but one day that all changed. Koren’s dad changed. He distanced himself from everyone, forcing his wife and daughter to do the same. One day they were the family we spent every Saturday with for fifteen years. The next, they’d become shadows. Lifeless. Resistant to human interaction.

Koren was the last of her family to let go. And when she did, they left town completely. It only made my mom believe nothing good could result from my affection for a girl whose life had become a mystery. There were too many secrets forming when before there were none. Something strange happened with Koren’s family, I just don’t know what.

The fresh scent of Mom’s ginger perfume wafts into my nostrils as she puts her arms around me. She may not approve of Koren, but she also doesn’t like seeing my heart break. It’s what I call The Mom Radar kicking in, wanting to take it all away. As much as I try to play it tough, I admit it feels good to be held.

I hang my head low as she pulls me in tight. “It’s probably for the best, Aiden,” she says.

The words are like a dagger to the heart. And maybe she’s right, but I sure hope she’s wrong.

The mention of Koren puts a damper on my already complicated evening. Mom is kind enough to rewrap my dinner and store it away until I find myself hungry again. Whenever that’ll be. Right now, food is the last thing on my mind.

It’s been a challenge hiding what I am from her. From everyone, for that matter. Well, apart from my best friend, Trevor, and my mentor, Father Martin. Being a Gateway isn’t the kind of thing you can tell people about. Hell, even I didn’t understand it at first. It’s safe to say I was a little freaked out being the ripe age of ten and passing over my first Bleeder. But even before that, I’d always seen them. Ever present lost souls. I convinced myself it was my imagination. Imaginary friends and whatnot. Even Mom explained it as such. Of course I told her. What kid wouldn’t? When you’re seeing strange people no one else can, you can’t help but think there’s something very wrong there. But Mom made it seem like it was the most normal thing in the world.

“I had my fair share of imaginary friends at your age,” she’d said. “Don’t worry, sweetie. They’re harmless.”

Right. Harmless.

Maybe if I’d been more open about what they looked like, she would have had a different reaction. I’m sure of it. But I didn’t want to scare her. I’d seen enough movies and TV shows where kids witnessed strange things and their parents sent them away. I didn’t want that. Being away from my mother would only make what I was dealing with even worse. I needed her to remain clueless. It was the only way to keep everything as normal as it could be, considering.

Bleeders never asked much of me then. I was only a kid. A kid who could see them. Sometimes they were a little bloody, but they were conscious of this, trying their best to hide their wounds. I wasn’t blind. Even though I knew I should be frightened, I wasn’t. It’s like another part of me knew it was gonna be okay. An energy, or third party of sorts, that comforted me. Calmed my fears. But around my tenth birthday, that’s when they really started showing up. That’s when the hum, my Bleeder Bat Signal, came to play—beckoning them from God knows how far.

I’ll never forget my first Bleeder. Selena. A mother of two. A nurse. Happily married. She had it all, until a car crash left her bleeding internally. You’d think as a nurse who’d saved so many lives that someone would’ve done the same for her. They didn’t. Or rather, they couldn’t. The damage had already been done.

When she found me, a child, and told me her story—how the hum led her to me—I cried so hard. I’d never cried like that before. And as she sat on the tire swing outside our old house, crying along with me, all I could think to do was hug her. To take her in and wipe it all away. All her pain. All her fear. I can still remember her cold arms wrapped around my shoulders, her cheek resting along the top of my head, her tears soaking into my hair. And just like that, the Gateway took her in. Absorbed her into me like a towel soaking up water. My arms still reached for her, my blood running cold. It wasn’t until I woke up hours later in my bed, my mother frantic, that I knew. I’d sent her somewhere. Far away. A part of her still lingered with me. They all do in some way. But I felt her peace. Her happiness. She was free.

Since then, being a Gateway is all I’ve ever known. I live and breathe it. Until tonight. Tonight for the first time in my life, the Gateway is foreign to me. An unknown entity that has become a stranger. Like an old friend that has grown and changed, leaving you behind.

When did it grow apart from me? When did it become something I didn’t understand?

After what happened tonight with Redhead, nothing makes sense. My brain feels like it’s been filled with enough helium to make my head spin, and popped by the overwhelming pressure. So much has happened at once, and I’m left laying on my bed, throwing a plush basketball in the air, hoping for some kind of magical answer to my problem. One thing I know for sure is no one can know what happened tonight with Redhead. Not Trevor. Not even Father Martin.

Father Martin’s been my mentor, if that’s what you want to call it, since the day he found me splayed out on the ground—skin iced over, heart beating unnaturally—after Christmas Mass about seven years ago. I don’t know if it’s because he thought I was a gift from God, or he found what I could do fascinating, but I’m damn thankful he found me when he did. I was a mess. It’s not every day a local priest approaches you, dropping knowledge about Gateways and such. So you can imagine how quickly I took to him when he broached the subject. He’s taught me everything I need to know about controlling my gift, but despite everything he’s told me, he never covered this.

If there’s one person who can explain to me what the hell is going on, it’s
him
. The man Redhead showed me before I… whatever I did. Whatever
she
did to me, he’s the answer to all of this. It has to be him who told her my name, told her I was nothing to fear. But why fear me?

Well, besides that whole flaming-touch-of-doom thing.

All the years I’ve been doing this, I’ve never actually hurt anyone. Tonight is the first time I’ve inflicted that kind of pain on a Bleeder. If anything,
I
was the only one who experienced discomfort each time they walked through me. And I’ve passed enough Bleeders to know the difference. No Bleeder has ever reacted the way Redhead did when I’ve touched them. So, why now? Why can I suddenly disintegrate a Bleeder with nothing but a touch? Unless her being a Dark One is the answer. Not that that is any closer to making sense.

The plush ball I’ve been absently throwing in the air smacks against my nose, snapping me from my thoughts. Chills trickle down my arms as the image of the cloaked man and the echo of Redhead’s screams invade my mind. It’s a sound I hope to never hear again. Knowing that I was the source makes me sick. I have to find this guy before I harm anyone else, before that surge of energy rips through me again.

The monster—or whatever it is—inside of me that fed upon the energy of a Dark One is too strong to contain. I’m not positive it’s something I can fight myself. For those few seconds, the power of it was more intense than anything I’d ever felt before. And knowing now what lay dormant in my blood frightens me. I fear what would happen if that thing found its way out.

Despite how much I refuse to believe the truth—that something harmful could come from my gift—the thing inside of me has to go.

Because no matter what I keep telling myself, I can’t help but admit that a small part of me liked it.