ZACHARY PILL
Of Monsters and Magic
Written by
“Maine’s Other Author”TM
Tim Greaton
ALSO BY TIM GREATON
From Focus House Publishing
Pheesching Sector
(A sci-fi story)
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The Santa Shop
(Book 1 in the Santa Conspiracy Series)
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The Santa Shop’s Hollywood Ending
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Red Gloves
(Book 2 in the Santa Conspiracy Series)
2012
Under-Heaven
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Zachary Pill, The Dragon at Station End
Trilogy
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Bones in the Tree
(A novella)
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For the Deposit & Two Other Stories
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Dustin Jeckle & Mr. Hydel
(A Dark Story)
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The Shaft & Two Other Stories
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The Halloween Caper
(A supernatural story)
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Heroes With Fangs
2012
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Zachary Pill
Of Monsters and Magic
(Book 1 in The Zachary Pill series)
TIM GREATON
This is a work of fiction. The names and the characters are fictional. Any resemblance to living or dead individuals or to actual places or events is purely coincidental.
ZACHARY PILL, OF MONSTERS AND MAGIC
Copyright 2012 by Tim Greaton.
The Zachary Pill (series) Copyright 2011 by Tim Greaton
Published by Focus House Publishing
Smashwords Edition
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, including digital or audio sampling, internet display or download, or any other form of digital or physical display or transfer, excepting only brief excerpts for use in a literary review, without expressed written permission from the author. Original species, realms, and mechanisms of magic are all under the exclusive ownership of the author.
“Maine’s Other Author”™ is a trademark of Focus House Publishing.
Published by Focus House Publishing.
Cover design by Wizards Prism Art & Media.
Zachary Pill
Of Monsters and Magic
(Book 1 in The Zachary Pill series)
TIM GREATON
Focus House Publishing
Wilton, Maine
DEDICATION
To Joan my beautiful wife and to my three amazing children, who were all so patient during my thousands of writing hours, I can barely find words to express my love and thanks.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
To my sister Tiffany, who read so many versions of this story her head must still be spinning—Without your continued help, I’m not sure I could finish another work.
To Marilyn Nulman—I will always appreciate your storytelling expertise and friendship.
To the Saco Middle School of Saco, Maine and its Literary Specialist Patricia Martin-Evans—Thanks for introducing me to the four students who became my central focus group.
And to those four (now much-older) students, Tyler Cadorette, Maggie Evans, Abby Farrington, and Andrew Lemoine—Thank you so much for your feedback which has made this a dramatically better story. I would not be surprised to find a novelist or four emerge from within your very talented ranks.
Zachary Pill
Of Monsters and Magic
“Zach, hurry!” came his father’s voice, barely audible over the harsh sounds all around them. Surprisingly strong for a small man, his father dragged him by the good arm through the doorway.
“Get into the bathroom!”
Zachary ducked as a bat with blood red eyes hurtled past his head. It made a sickening splatter as it struck someplace in the bedroom behind him.
“Enough!” Zachary’s father shouted in a voice so loud it made Zachary’s ears hurt. Another bat bounced off the hallway wall and hurtled toward them, but his father chanted something and a bolt of blue light burst out of the wand and struck it in mid-flight.
Though he was temporarily blinded from the flash, Zachary heard the bat fall in a wet thump on the hallway floor not far from him. The air was filled with the sickly smell of charred flesh. He felt his father’s hands thrust him into the bathroom and he heard the door pulled shut.
“Lock it!” his father ordered.
Ashamed to be leaving his father alone with the bats but having no choice, Zachary groped along the door and forced his trembling fingers to turn the lock. Then, he backed away until his cast struck the towel rack on the back wall. Pain vibrated through his arm. He fought the need to scream, but couldn’t stop his breath, which came and went in great gasps. The windowless bathroom was pitch black. In an attempt to hear over the sound of his own sobs, Zachary clamped his good hand over his mouth.
“Krage, I’m done with this!” his father bellowed.
Simultaneously, a flash framed the bathroom door with blinding blue light. Then everything went black again. Something heavy thumped against the door. Zachary feared for the worst.
“Dad?” he whispered. Then more loudly, “Dad?”
There was another explosion of glass, maybe from his father’s bedroom. The crashing and banging sounds grew louder and reverberated from all over the apartment. Suddenly, another flash of blue light left spots swimming in Zachary’s eyes. Something about the following darkness was different this time, though. It was the silence. No crashing, no wind, nothing. Zachary could hear his own heart beating in his ears.
Wishing that magic really did exist, Zachary Pill kept smashing the Billy Timkin voodoo doll he had made from a white hand towel until its blue toothpaste eyes and mouth were smudged beyond recognition. When the bar of soap fell out of the Billy doll’s head, he glanced up at the mirror to see his bruised cheek and swollen lip.
“I never did anything to him,” he muttered.
He made a fist and debated whether to put the doll back together again and give it another good couple of whacks.
Why can’t I be more like Uncle Ned?
He pulled up his tee-shirt sleeve up and made a muscle, but the pathetic little rise at the top of his arm depressed him. He sighed and let his arms drop back to his sides. No way would his uncle let someone get away with what Billy had done to him. Anyone that touched Uncle Ned would have been the one with bruises―or worse.
Disgusted, Zachary ran a wet comb through his offensive hair and managed to push a few stray cowlicks back where they belonged. He smacked the comb against his skull. Why did his hair have to be such a weird color!
“Snot hair!” he muttered.
“What hair?” a voice asked from the open bathroom doorway.
Zachary’s face turned red. He wished his father hadn’t heard that.
“That’s what Billy Timkin called me yesterday, just before he started hitting me.”
“Maybe you heard it wrong.”
“No, he definitely said ‘snot hair.’” Zachary already regretted telling his father.
“Then what happened?”
“I told him to shut up, so he punched me.” He left out the part about trying to punch Billy back―twice. Half the students in the cafeteria had laughed when he missed both times. By today, the whole school would be talking about it.
His father squeezed his shoulder and gently moved his chin closer to the light for a better look at his bruises.
“I don’t understand why the school won’t do something about that kid.”
The principal might have done something if she’d been called, but his father wasn’t the type to argue, even to defend his own son. Besides, none of the kids who witnessed the fight had admitted to seeing anything, so it was his word against Billy’s, again.
“You could have walked away,” his father suggested.
“Everyone at school already thinks I’m a freak. I’d rather get beat up than be a coward.” Zachary didn’t bother to add that Stephanie Travis had been there. It figured that the first time he really stood up to Billy, he got beat up in front of the girl he liked.
“So, getting hit was better than getting away?” his father asked.
“Uncle Ned wouldn’t have run,” Zachary countered.
His father fell silent. Small and rail thin, he wasn’t built for fighting. Zachary had never seen him stand up to anyone, not even the old woman with the poodle in the apartment across the hall. Zachary loved his father but hated the thought that he was growing up to be just like him. Like father, like son, they were both cowards.
“You can stay home if you want,” his father offered.
Zachary shook his head. “I have finals.”
“There’s still a week of school to make them up, Zach.”
“No, I’ll be okay.”
The truth was that for the last two weeks Zachary had been trying to crank up enough courage to ask Stephanie to the end-of-year dance. Of course, he had been trying to ask her out all year, and so far had only managed to say ‘hi’ once in the hallway. But her smile that day had been worth it. He took one more glance at his black and blue cheek in the mirror. Maybe she’d have sympathy for his injuries.
A guy can hope.
“I should call the school,” his father said as left their fourteenth floor apartment and entered the elevator, “and make them stop that kid from picking on you.” His left eyelid was twitching, not a good sign. Next his face would turn pale.
“It’s okay, Dad, really. School gets out next week.”
“As long as you’re sure,” his father breathed. His eyelid had already returned to normal. This was the same man who had been known to throw sour milk away rather than confront someone at the store. One time they had gone without cable TV for several weeks because he hadn’t dared to complain. It wasn’t until someone in the adjoining apartment had a similar problem that it got fixed.
“A new salon opened just a couple of blocks away,” his father offered.
“We already tried,” Zachary said.
“But we haven’t tried the new salon.”
Zachary shrugged and hoped his father would forget about it. The only thing more embarrassing than having green hair was having a bunch of hairdressers say how weird it was that it couldn’t be dyed.
When they stepped off the elevator, Zachary hurried out the front lobby doors and jogged to the bus stop at the corner. He got there as the last of the herd was getting on the bus and followed a tall girl with curly black hair down the narrow aisle. There were only a few quiet snickers as he made his way to the back and settled into a seat beside a much younger boy who examined his bruised face for only a second before darting his eyes back out the window.
Zachary watched the passing storefronts and tried to imagine how he was going to ask Stephanie Travis out, but every plan he came up with seemed lamer than the one before. His mother would have known what to say. He touched his lip. She might also have used makeup to cover up his embarrassing injuries. He pictured her sitting beside him, long green hair cascading in soft curls around her delicate face, slender arm draped comfortingly around his shoulders. He forced the fantasy away knowing she could get caught in his head like video game music. Ten minutes later, when the bus pulled into the school circle, he still hadn’t formed a single idea of how to ask Stephanie to the dance. To make matters worse, Billy Timkin was standing outside the bus, ready to give him a morning beating.
Billy smirked and his friends made a couple of rude remarks about his bruises, but miraculously they let him walk unmolested up the stairs.
“Meet any good fists lately?” he heard one of them say just before he walked into the school. But he ignored the comment and, just then, saw Stephanie Travis walking toward her homeroom class.
“I can do this,” he told himself as he hurried to catch up, but the closer he got the heavier his shoes became. His stomach felt like he’d eaten a live goldfish and his body trembled with fear. He opened his mouth to call out.
“Steph…,” he croaked, but somehow the rest of her name got stuck in his throat.
What’s wrong with me?
It didn’t matter, though, because she never looked back before disappearing into her homeroom. Like a robot with a rundown battery, Zachary came to a stop in the middle of the hallway. Several students bumped him as they moved past.
Coward! Coward! Coward!
How could he have screwed up such a perfect chance? He couldn’t fight. He couldn’t ask girls out on dates. What could he do? But he already knew the answer to that: he could grow up to be just like his father and avoid confrontation at all costs. He could cross the street or hide behind doors rather than face a single argument or disagreement. Zachary was fated to become just like his dad, and the thought of Stephanie going to the dance with someone else because of it made him furious.
Feeling like a total failure, Zachary turned and trudged back towards the Team C hallway. A number of kids in his first two classes laughed and made fun of his bruises from the botched fight the day before, but he hardly noticed because couldn’t get the image of Stephanie Travis disappearing into her homeroom out of his mind.
“She was right there,” he muttered to himself on the way out of third period gym. The last to leave, he had been pulled aside by Coach Winton who was worried that he might have gotten his injuries during dodge ball the day before. When Zachary assured the heavyset man that his bruises had nothing to do with gym class, the coach had dismissed him with no more sympathy than an exterminator might have given a wounded mouse. At least his job was safe.
Now Stephanie will probably go to the dance with that track kid who keeps passing her notes in English class. Why couldn’t I talk to her?
“Who needs a ball,” he heard someone say as he reached the first landing in the stairwell.
Zachary stopped. At the top of the stairs, four familiar boys were surrounding a shorter, plump kid he didn’t recognize—a sixth-grader probably. Laughing, the older boys kept pushing the kid back and forth like an oversized hockey puck.
Zachary felt his stomach cramp. He was so sick of the scared feeling that he wanted to scream! Everything in his life was crappy because of fear. He might already have had a date with Stephanie if he hadn’t been too scared to ask. He might also have won that fight with Billy if he hadn’t been too scared to learn how to fight and stand up for himself in the last few years.
What was he so scared about? What could possibly be worse than his current life? Maybe it was time he took a lesson from his Uncle Ned who had probably never taken grief from anyone in his whole life. Maybe it was time for someone else in the Pill family to stand up for himself!
Because they were still busy pushing the helpless younger boy back and forth, none of the bullies had yet noticed Zachary. He forced his stomach to unclench, took a deep breath and climbed a couple of stairs. Hoping he sounded braver than he felt, Zachary spoke up.
“Leave him a-alone.”
The largest of the boys glanced down, and for the briefest second Zachary thought he saw fear in the dark-haired boy’s eyes, but then his wide face split into a grin.
“Look, guys,” Billy Timkin, said. “It’s our buddy…, snot hair.”
The taller blond boy to Billy’s right was Jason Kelly, and though he didn’t look nearly as rugged as Billy, he had a similar reputation as a bully. Zachary didn’t know the names of the other two skinny boys, but he had seen them skulking around with Billy at various times.
All four boys glared down at him.
The sixth grader gave Zachary a thankful glance and raced away. It was a big school, and he didn’t slow down until long after his footsteps could no longer be heard. At least he would be safe.
Too bad I can’t say the same.
Billy and his three friends moved to form a vicious, sneering wall at the top of the stairs, making Zachary realize—too late—that he probably should have gone to the top of the stairs before interfering. As it was, he was trapped.
“I need to get to math class,” he said.
“You weren’t in a hurry a minute ago,” Billy pointed out.
By that time, Zachary’s stomach had cramped into such a tight ball that he was glad he hadn’t eaten much for breakfast. His heart yammered like a scooter engine and he could feel tiny beats of pain in his bruised cheek and lip. He wanted to run, needed to run, but a brave little voice in his head kept telling him to hold his ground. As he stared at the small army above him, he began to hate that little voice.
“I need to take my math final,” Zachary said, surprised that his voice did not crack.
“D’you hear that?” Billy said. “Grass head needs to go somewhere.”
“Too late, slate,” Jason said.
Billy smacked his taller friend in the arm. “That didn’t make sense. What’s ‘slate’?”
“It rhymes with late,” Jason said lamely.
Zachary forced a trembling leg to step upward.
“Looks like you’ll be missing that class,” one of the skinny boys said.
“Yeah,” Billy said, “don’t think you’ll be making it.”
Zachary looked from one angry face to another. He doubted there was any way out of this, and he was rapidly realizing what a huge mistake he had made. His entire body started to quake.
“I’m sorry,” he said softly. “Now, can I please go?”
The four boys—as one—shook their heads, and Billy rubbed his thick hands together. “No such luck, chump.”
Trying to remember some of the fighting stories his Uncle Ned had told him over the years, Zachary let his book bag drop to the stairs. His uncle had once said that if you had to fight, it was best to surprise your opponent by attacking first. But how could Zachary surprise four boys who already knew he was there? Besides, surprise or not, it didn’t seem likely he could win against four of them. After all, he didn’t have his uncle’s fighting experience or built-like-a-truck muscles.
More and more, Zachary regretted his decision.
At that moment, his father’s advice to “walk away” was making a lot more sense, especially considering neither his classmates nor Stephanie Travis were in the stairway to see him run off. But where could he run to? Billy and his friends had him completely blocked. Maybe with more headroom, he could have jumped over their heads, but what if they grabbed his feet?
“Bet you wished you minded your own business now, snot hair,” Billy taunted.
Zachary’s stomach was so tight it hurt. He considered racing back down to the gym, but Coach Winton always locked those doors between classes. No, it was going to take more than jumping or running to get him out of this. Maybe there was another way.
His voice quavering, Zachary said, “You too scared to fight me alone, Billy?”
Billy’s gaze settled on Zachary’s bruised cheek and lip, and he gave a cruel smile.
“I already beat you pretty good yesterday, snot top. Today, I think I’ll share. Why should I be the only one to have fun?”
Zachary forced breath in and out of his leaden lungs and shifted his gaze to the tallest boy. He lifted his arms and made two awkward fists.
“Come on, Jason. Just you and me then.”
“Good try, grass head,” Billy said, “but now we’re all mad.”
In unison, all four boys moved down one step.
Zachary backed down one.
Jason Kelly was punching one hand with the other, surely not a sign of someone who intended to hang back from the fight. The two skinny boys didn’t look quite as ready, but even if they only held Zachary down, it would be bad. To lose a fight against one person would hurt. To lose a fight against two people would probably hurt twice as much. But, Zachary figured, losing against four people might cripple him for life. The brave voice in his head had long since disappeared. Given half a chance, he would happily have bolted for safety.
He backed down three more steps and grabbed the railing with both hands.
The wall of boys descended one stair closer.
He waited. They descended another stair.
One more, he told himself.
The bullies took another step down, and just as they did Zachary leapt over the railing. Sailing down, he landed painfully on the concrete floor. Nothing seemed broken so he stood and sprinted toward the doors to the gym.
Just as he had feared, they wouldn’t budge.
Coach Winton had started locking the gym doors a couple of months before because someone had spray-painted “YOUR BALLS ARE GETTING OLD” all across the basketball court floor. Zachary pulled at the doors again, but neither of them would budge. He was trapped.
“You’re not getting away, Pill!” Billy hollered.
He rushed down the stairs, careened around the lower landing and lunged his heavy body straight at Zachary. Zachary dodged to one side and managed to knock the bigger boy’s first punch with his elbow. Not surprisingly, Jason also rushed down to join the battle. The blond boy tried to grab his shirt, but Zachary had a new plan. He took three huge steps and jumped as hard as he could. As though there were springs under his shoes, he flew twice his height into the air and grabbed the steel railing halfway up the stairway.
“See that!” someone hollered, “he really is a freak!”
Seeing both Billy and Jason grasping for his legs below, Zachary swung his feet up over the railing. Unfortunately, one of the skinny boys was already there, and even though bangs covered both his eyes he didn’t have any problem seeing Zachary’s feet and shoving them back out into the open air. At the same time, the other skinny boy began prying Zachary’s fingers from the railing.
Zachary gritted his teeth and held on for as long as he could, but his grip finally failed.
Four voices laughed as he fell downward.
Twisting to land facing his adversaries, Zachary accidentally kneed Jason in the face on the way down. The tall blond boy screamed, but Zachary had no attention to spare for him because as he hit the floor, Billy’s large boot arced straight for his chest. He scrambled backwards and barely avoided getting his ribs broken. Billy tried to kick him a second time, but Zachary was better prepared and managed to dodge to the side. He looked up, hoping to get past the two high level guards, but one of the skinny boys had already moved to the top of the stairway while the other stayed in the middle. He was trapped.
“Get down here, you cowards,” Billy called up to two boys on the stairs, but neither of them moved.
Damn!
Zachary dodged another of Billy’s awkward kicks but wasn’t quite able to duck the follow-up punch. The bigger boy’s knuckles slammed into the side of his nose.
White hot pain exploded behind his eyes!
Trying to imitate his Uncle Ned, Zackary took a ragged breath and attempted to shake off the pain. No single punch would ever have stopped his uncle; it would only have made him angrier. Zachary made two fists and ducked another of Billy’s jabs, one aimed at the side of his head. Though Zachary didn’t know the first thing about karate, he did know how to kick. Ignoring the blood running from his nose down into his mouth, Zachary leapt up on one foot and kicked out with the other. His sneaker caught Billy solidly in the chest. Like air from a bottle rocket, the breath whooshed from Billy’s lungs as the heavyset boy tumbled backward into the concrete wall.
The big boy recovered quickly, though, and charged. Zachary fended him off with a standing kick, but this time the Billy managed to get hold of his sneaker before it drove into his chest. Billy shoved upward just as Jason stooped down behind Zachary. The combined tag-team move sent Zachary pitching backwards. He tried to brace his arms behind him for the fall, which might have worked if Billy hadn’t chosen that exact moment to jump on top of him. The added weight drove against the already awkward angle of Zachary’s left arm. Pain and arm bones exploded simultaneously as Zachary’s head smashed against the concrete floor. The resulting crack echoed like a gunshot through his head.
Dazed, he felt Jason crawl out from under him. He wanted to cry out as the movement jarred his shattered arm, but he refused to scream. He held it in! He would never give Billy the satisfaction. Never!
He had trouble breathing and tried to roll Billy off from him, but the larger boy was like a train lying across his chest. The pain in his crushed arm was unbelievable and getting worse by the second. Red and white dots swam across his vision. He coughed and felt blood backing up from his nose into his throat. Gagging, he sensed consciousness slipping away.
Is this how it feels to die?
As Billy Timkin rolled to his feet, Zachary’s broken bones grated together like two branches in a storm. New waves of pain brought him back to full consciousness. He drew several gasping breaths and blinked tears away as Jason rushed up the stairs, blood raining from his nose. Billy stood wobbling at the foot of the stairs.
“See you next time, snot hair,” he said. Then he rubbed the back of his head, and limped to join his three friends. In moments, all four disappeared from Zachary’s view. He could hear them hobbling through the hallway somewhere above him.
As quickly as that, the fight was over.
Zachary braced himself with his good right arm and tried to sit up. White hot agony shot from his broken arm straight to his throbbing skull. Gasping, he tried to imagine that his mother would meet him at the nurse’s office if only he could get to his feet. But not even the sheer agony of his injuries could wash away the cruel fact: it had been two years.
She was never coming back.
Feeling like the butt of a cruel and terrible joke, Zachary slumped to the floor. Broken bones ground together as great wracking sobs reverberated off the concrete walls of the stairwell. Zachary Pill the Coward had just become…the World’s Biggest Crybaby.
The class bell had already rung by the time Zachary Pill made his aching way through the empty halls to Nurse Jacobs’ office. Alarmed, she wiped the blood from his nose and put his arm in a temporary sling. When asked what happened, Zach told her that he was protecting another student from bullies when he was beat up. He knew from experience that naming Billy Timkin and his gang would only lead to the school siding with the other kids. After checking the throbbing lump at the back of his head, she picked up the phone.
“You need to come to my office right away,” she said to whoever was on the other end of the line. “It’s the Pill boy.”
Zachary knew he was in trouble when, two minutes later, Vice Principal Galloway entered the room. Large and imposing, he was dressed in a white shirt & blue tie.
“You look like you’ve had a rough morning,” he said.
Zachary chose to stare at the floor rather than answer. He knew nothing he said would satisfy the Vice Principal, and his arm and head hurt too much to argue.
The big man had a brief whispered conversation with Nurse Jacobs, during which his foot tapped impatiently. His eyes dripped with disappointment as his size thirteen feet crossed the room to where he picked up the phone and dialed a number from a file he held in his thick, clamp-like hand.
“Mr. Pill?” he said, his voice firm and commanding.
Zachary couldn’t hear the other end of the conversation.
“This is Peter Galloway, Vice Principal of East Boston Junior High School. Yes, Zachary has gotten into a bit of trouble again. This time his arm has been broken, and Nurse Jacobs fears he may have a concussion. It’s her opinion that we should get him over to Mass General’s Emergency Room right awa—”
Mr. Galloway paused for a moment then glanced toward Zachary.
“I’m not sure you understand, Mr. Pill. It’s not just his broken arm.” He turned away and lowered his voice, but Zachary could still hear him. “Your son’s nose might be broken, and he’s got a large lump on the back of his head. I don’t believe waiting is an option.”
There was another pause and whatever was said caused Mr. Galloway’s broad shoulders to stiffen. He turned and glared at Zachary.
Thanks, Dad, Zachary thought. Of all the times for his father to grow a backbone, why must it have been when he was beat up and bloody in front of this man? Zachary felt certain he was going to throw up. He tried to focus instead on the pain in his shattered arm, and the throbbing in his nose and the back of his head. He felt like a crash-test dummy from one of the car commercials.
Mr. Galloway held the phone out to Zachary. It looked like a toy in his huge grip.
“Your father would like to speak with you.”
Awkwardly, Zachary tried to get to his feet but winced as his broken arm jiggled like hamburger in its sling. Mr. Galloway motioned for Zachary to sit as he and his enormous feet brought the cordless phone to Zachary. It even hurt to move his good right arm as Zachary accepted the phone and held it up to his ear.
“Dad?”
“I told you not to fight,” his father said. Though he wasn’t yelling, Zachary instantly recognized a tint of anger in his voice. His father never got angry.
“Billy and his friends were picking on a little kid. I tried to stop them…I mean, I did stop them, but―”
“This is serious, Zach. The school wants me to meet you at the hospital.”
Anger flashed across Zachary’s mind. He sat there battered and broken, and all his father could think about was the inconvenience of taking time off from work.
“Fine. I won’t go―”
“Just listen, Zach. There are things you don’t know, and one of them is that you can’t go to a normal hospital. Not ever!”
Thinking the crack to his head must have been worse than it felt—which would have been really bad—he tried to fathom why he couldn’t go to the hospital? Weren’t they for everyone? He knew a lot of kids that had been, some many times. Confused, he glanced toward the vice principal and Nurse Jacobs who were whispering back and forth, neither looking particularly happy, neither likely to be impressed if he gave in to the urge and vomited all over her floor.
Swallowing and trying to convince his stomach to calm down, he said, “I don’t understand.”
“Zach, you have to trust me. I’m leaving the office to get you right now, but this is very important: don’t let the nurse touch you again! And, no matter what happens, don’t let them put you in an ambulance! I will be there in less than twenty minutes. Okay?”
Zachary nodded. Then, remembering his father couldn’t see him, said, “Yeah, okay. Want to talk to Vice Principal Galloway again?”
“No,” his father said then added, “and stay away from plants, Zach.”
“Plants?”
“Just stay away from any flowers, trees—whatever—inside or outside the school. Okay?”
Zachary felt like he’d been trampled by at least two elephants. So why was his father worried about plants? But his body hurt too much to talk anymore.
“Okay.”
“Good.” His father hung up.
“Zachary,” Vice Principal Galloway said, “since we can’t call an ambulance, Nurse Jacobs would like to give you a closer examination?”
Though his stomach writhed like he’d eaten a grass snake, Zachary shook his head “no.”
“I’m sorry,” the vice principal said. He wasn’t used to people disagreeing with him.
“I don’t want to be examined again,” Zachary said. He swallowed hard.
“This is my school, Zachary,” Vice Principal Galloway warned, “and I wasn’t asking.”
“No,” Zachary said, no longer sure if his stomach wanted to heave from pain or fear of the huge brute in the shirt and tie. His need to vomit and the throbbing pains in his arm and head made it hard to focus. How had things gotten so out of control? Suddenly, he remembered the crazy warning his father had given him. His eyes scanned the room. The only plant in the room was a drooping spider plant that he sensed needed water. It was two seats away.
Vice Principal Galloway whispered to Nurse Jacobs again. She glanced toward Zachary and shook her head.
“It’s his choice.”
Judging from his narrowed eyes, Vice Principal Galloway would happily have thrown Zachary into an ambulance or even directly onto an operating table. But, instead, the huge man paced the room, making Zachary wish his father would get there soon. He used his right hand to hold his knees together, because for some reason they had begun to quake.
The next fifteen minutes were spent in silence, except for the few occasions when Vice Principal Galloway stopped pacing long enough to ask Zachary about the fight. Zachary tried to explain that he’d helped a younger boy get away from bullies, but when the vice principal’s eyebrows rose in disbelief, Zachary fell silent. The throbbing in his head made it hard to concentrate, and he refused to make the effort for someone who was never going to believe him anyway. Besides, if they got caught, Billy and his friends would ultimately blame it on him and—four against one—the school would believe them, as had always happened in the past.
His body aching all over, Zachary tried several times to close his eyes but each time had an odd compulsion to get up and touch the spider plant in the corner. Eerily, it was as if the plant were calling to him. His room at home was filled with plants, and he had always had a knack in caring for them. But this was something different. It seemed to him as though the spider plant was actually trying to communicate with him. He even imagined its long slender leaves were reaching out to him.
Knowing he must be going crazy, Zachary rubbed his eyes and gasped from the pain of accidentally touching his swollen nose. He then shifted in his seat so he couldn’t see the potted plant out of the corner of his eye, but his pain-filled mind could still sense it calling to him, inviting him to touch its leaves, to enjoy the peaceful state of just being. He had a vision of himself sitting in a pot of soil, luxuriating in the warm sunlight that shone through the window. As a plant, he could sense the frenetic nature of humans and the ongoing suffering caused by incessant movement, but to Zachary in his little pot those concerns would be distant; peace and tranquility could be his if only he would join with the little plant. All he had to do was reach his hand—
Suddenly, Zachary realized he had risen to his feet and was about to take a step toward the spider plant in the corner.
“Are you okay?” Vice Principal Galloway asked from where he had sat in a chair on the other side of the room. There was genuine concern in his voice.
Zachary glanced warily at the spider plant and eased back into his seat. How could his father have known? And, apparently having been right about plants, could he also be right about the dangers of a hospital? Come to think of it, Zachary didn’t remember ever being in a hospital. As a matter of fact, he couldn’t remember ever having been sick or even hurt…at least not until the bruises Billy had inflicted on him the day before. But that couldn’t be right. Kids got sick all the time. They got colds, flus, sore throats. But, sitting there, a swollen mass of bruises, Zachary couldn’t remember ever having had a single illness.
All these strange thoughts ran through his mind as he sat silently across from the unusually quiet vice principal and the concerned nurse. Zachary didn’t want to look at either of them but also didn’t dare to look toward the spider plant again, so he stared down at his hands. The one sticking out of his sling had started to turn deep purple, giving him the distinct impression it might soon be black if something wasn’t done soon. Had his father made a mistake by not letting them call him an ambulance?
Just then, Zachary heard his father’s distinctive fast footsteps coming down the hall, the quick pace he guessed coming from a career in sales, always hurrying from one appointment to another. As a young child, Zachary often had to run just to keep up unless his mother slowed everyone enough for his little legs to walk at a comfortable gait. Missing her more than ever, Zachary wondered when thoughts of his mother would finally stop haunting him.
When the elder Pill finally burst through the nurse’s office door, his eyes locked on Zachary.
“Are you alright?”
“Been better,” Zachary replied.
“How could you people let something like this happen?” his father said, turning forcefully toward Vice Principal Galloway.
The tall muscular man, who Zachary thought could probably have lifted a car if he had a mind to do it, looked directly into his father’s eyes from his seated position.
“We can’t control students every minute of every day, Mr. Pill. And, in this case, we don’t even know what happened because your son doesn’t seem to want to discuss it. I did overhear him tell you that ‘Billy’ was involved. I assume that’s the same Billy Timkin he fought with yesterday?”
“My son didn’t start either of those fights.” There was a steely edge to his father’s voice that Zachary had never heard before.
Getting to his feet, Mr. Galloway towered over everyone in the room, including Zachary’s father who was an inch shorter than Zachary.
“No matter who started it, Mr. Pill,” he said, “these altercations must stop. You will need to discuss this with Principal Coldwell before your son can reenter the premises.”
“Are you saying my son is being expelled for getting picked on?”
His pain forgotten for the moment, Zachary listened intently. He had never seen his father like this. What had happened to the meek and mild man he had lived with his whole life?
“With all due respect, Mr. Pill,” Vice Principal Galloway said, “this is the second time in two days that your son has been in the middle of problems like these.”
Zachary was proud of what his father did next. He stabbed a finger up at the much bigger man’s nose.
“You’re right,” Roger Pill said, “but my son has been the victim, not the bully! How many times has Zachary told you and your staff about problems only to have you believe the other kids? I think it’s time this school screwed its head on straight and realized what’s really going on here. I’ve sold you people a lot of office supplies over the years, and there’s always a line of students in the Principal’s office. It’s like a hotbed of…of…bad students!”
So, Zachary’s father wasn’t exactly quick with words—but it was amazing to hear him talk back to anyone, forget a man twice his size! By this time, Vice Principal Galloway’s face had turned bright red. He looked like an overfilled water balloon ready to explode. Nurse Jacobs stepped between him and Zachary’s father.
“All this talking won’t heal this young man’s injuries,” she quipped. “Zachary needs to see a physician right away!”
His father’s eyes moved from the vice principal to Zachary’s swollen nose and sling-held arm. “You’re right,” he said with finality. “Mr. Galloway, we’ll discuss this at another time.”
“Take it up with Principal Coldwell,” the big man said. He walked rapidly from the room, his heavy footsteps as angry as his last expression, and disappeared down the hall. Roger Pill nodded to the nurse and turned to lead Zachary out into the hall.
“I expect to get a call from either your son’s doctor or a hospital this afternoon, Mr. Pill,” the nurse said. “Otherwise, I’ll be forced to report this to the Child Welfare Department.”
Zachary’s father nodded.
“Someone will call,” he said then led Zachary down the hallway and out the front doors to the parking lot. “Stay off the grass,” he said to Zachary, “and don’t go near the trees.”
Alarmed by the strange thoughts he’d been having about the spider plant, Zachary did as asked. He followed his father to the white company car but suddenly felt dizzy when they reached it. His vision had grown blurry.
“You okay?” his father asked, using a surprisingly strong grip around his waist and on his good shoulder.
“I don’t think so,” Zachary answered honestly. If it weren’t for his father’s support, he felt certain he would have fallen over. The throbbing in his head had gotten worse, and his broken arm felt like a thousand tiny soldiers were beating on it with hammers and swords. His body swayed to one side, but he couldn’t stop it. His father somehow held him upright while opening the car door and easing him onto the front seat.
“Hang in there, son. Just hang in there. We’ll be in Chicago soon.”
Chicago? Zachary thought through a pain-clouded mind. Isn’t that a long way from Boston?
What happened next Zachary wasn’t entirely sure. His father seemed to suddenly become a racecar driver, dodging from one lane to the next, zooming through dozens of intersections, not seeming to worry whether the traffic lights were green or red. Dozens of cars screeched and slid at odd angles outside Zachary’s window as they soared through intersections. Gripping the dashboard with his one good hand, Zachary tried to make sense of their mad dash through the streets of Boston. He had almost convinced himself that it was all a nightmare when he began to hear sirens, lots of them. Shifting painfully to look out the side mirror, he could see at least four flashing blue police cars rushing up on them from behind. But his father wasn’t making it easy. Their car cornered violently every few blocks and several times Zachary felt certain they were going to flip over. His seatbelt and grip on the dashboard were the only things that kept him from smashing like a pinball into the windshield and against the door beside him. By this time, the city scenery was flashing past so quickly he had lost all sense of time or direction. All he knew for certain was that each skid or pothole rammed the bones in his arm together like branches in a hurricane, and each time it sent shards of pain straight to his brain.
“Hang on, Zach!” his father said as they careened around one particularly tight corner. For a moment, the car tilted up on only two tires, but came back down as they fishtailed and straightened out again. The pain in Zachary’s arm made his teeth grind. Disbelieving, he stared in the side-view mirror as two police cars slid off the road behind them. One rolled upside down onto the sidewalk, pieces of wood and other debris exploding from the porch it struck, and the other slamming through a store window. Just then his father rounded another corner, hiding the accidents from view. After several more violent turns that forced Zachary to dig his feet into the floorboards and grip the dashboard like an emergency handle, they squealed to a stop in front of a cemetery gate. The sound of sirens seemed to have fallen behind.
“Danielson & Derek Memorial Park,” read a large black & white plaque on one of the cemetery’s iron gates.
Zachary had the fleeting fear that he was dying, but who ever heard of dying from a broken arm? Then there was also the damage done to his nose and the back of his head. Even then, he couldn’t be dying, could he? He tried to rub the painful pins and needles under his sling, but just touching the swollen flesh was agonizing. Car chases and injuries obviously didn’t mix very well. He fought back tears that had been threatening to come ever since they left the school and yearned for his mother to appear. He would happily have curled into her lap until the pain went away. Before Zachary could shake the thoughts of his mother, an elderly man appeared on his father’s side of the car. He wore a black suit with a bow tie and a hat that reminded Zachary of limousine drivers he’d seen on TV. As his father rolled down his window, Zachary realized the sirens were getting louder!
“Better make it quick, Mr. Pill,” the elderly man said. He tipped his hat and peered in at Zachary. His smile displayed dozens of gold-covered teeth.
Zachary was both fascinated and repulsed at the same time.
“Where can we catch a ride today?” his father asked. “We have to get to Gefarg’s.”
Confused, Zachary struggled to understand. Why would anyone catch a ride in a graveyard? Were there bus stops or car pools at a cemetery? And why had his father been in such a mad rush that he was willing to get arrested?
“Try the Verra Family tomb at the north corner,” the doorman said. “And you might want to step on it. They’re right behind you.”
Suddenly, the large metal gates hinged inward, and his father gunned his engine. A second later they were soaring dangerously fast through the narrow cemetery roads. Zachary glanced back in time to see what looked like dozens of blue lights flashing at the gates that had already closed again. Multiple sirens pierced the air.
They were going to be arrested!
Beautiful lawns and trimmed shrubbery blurred past as they zoomed along the tombstone-lined roads. Zachary’s arm ached miserably and his head felt even worse. In one way, he was glad they were going too fast to read the names on the tombstones because he had an irrational fear that “Zachary Pill” might be imprinted on one of them.
After a harrowing series of zigzagging turns, they finally came to a jerking halt on the grass behind a stone mausoleum, his father’s apparent attempt to hide their car. Even though the sirens were growing louder, Zachary glanced all around and couldn’t see any signs of blue lights. He turned to ask what they were doing—just in time to receive a puff of white powder in the face.
His eyelids slid shut.
Zachary vaguely remembered being carried up a set of stairs, but when he came to full consciousness he was slouched low in the back seat of a car. His nose, arm and the back of his head all throbbed with agony. He could hear raucous sounds of traffic and looked past his father’s head to see tall buildings moving past the windows. Pushing himself painfully to an upright position, he could see gray curls cascaded down from under a bright red baseball cap in the front seat. A certificate with a picture of a smiling older man hung next to the driver’s sun visor. They were in a cab. Remembering the hair-raising journey from the school to the cemetery, Zachary thought it was probably wise his father wasn’t driving.
“You’re awake,” his dad said.
Zachary grunted. Realizing he had been drooling, he wiped his mouth. “What happened?”
“’Guess I’m a little rusty with the sleeping powder,” his father told him. “How do you feel?”
“Like my skull’s filled with bulldozers.” Even as he said it, he felt his neck bending with the weight of his own head. He forced it upright. All his muscles felt tired. “Sleeping powd―”
“Right here is good,” his father said, interrupting him. He leaned toward the driver. “Drop us right here.”
“Sure,” came the driver’s deep voice. He stopped the car and turned to wink at Zachary, his yellowed smile splitting several days of beard growth. He held out his hand so Zachary’s father could stuff several bills into it. “Thank you for riding with me.”
“Keep the change,” his father said.
He helped Zachary out of the car and barely had time to shut the door before the orange taxi zoomed away. Zachary’s arm throbbed painfully. He tried to adjust his sling, but that only made it worse. They were standing on a busy sidewalk in a part of Boston he didn’t recognize. Dozens of people stood in line several businesses down. Zachary glanced up at the sign that read: “CHICAGO DAN’S ICE CREAM SHOPPE.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“We’re at the clinic,” his father said, pointing across the street at a two-story, narrow brick building with a long stairway that ended at a double set of tall doors. Above the doors hung a poorly painted, crooked sign: “CHICAGO SPECIAL CLINI—”
“What’s a clini?” Zachary asked.
“Should be clinic,” his father said. “The sign is broken.”
Zachary squinted and realized his father was right. The jagged end of the sign looked almost as if a giant mouth had chomped it. The rest of the letters had been painted in red with long drips scattered throughout. Zachary shivered at the thought of going into such a dumpy-looking doctor’s office.
“There has to be someplace better than this,” he said.
“This is the only safe option, Zach. It’s Gefarg’s clinic.”
“Gefarg?”
“Some people call him Doctor Gefarg,” his father said, “but his kind is better at killing than healing.”
Along with a large group of other people in the crosswalk, Zachary had been about to follow his father across the street, but he stopped.
“What do you mean by ‘killing?’”
His father glanced around. Zachary knew they were attracting attention and might actually get run over if they didn’t finish crossing, but he wasn’t taking another step until he understood what his father meant. Yes, it was true his body ached terribly but, last he knew, pain was a heck of a lot better than death.
His father gripped him firmly, and painfully, by the right arm and started to pull him across the busy intersection. The cluster of people they had started crossing with was nearly to the other side. The expression on his father’s face suggested he wasn’t expected any argument.
“Son, you and I are in a lot of trouble right now, and there’ll be plenty of time to discuss this. But if we don’t get you taken care of, your body could―something terrible could happen. We have no choice but to trust Gefarg. I don’t like it either, but he’s the only one that can help you. We have to do this.”
“What’s wrong with a normal hospital?”
“It’s just that if anyone finds out what you are—what we are—it will be bad. It’s bad enough that Gefarg will find out we’re still around.”
Zachary found it hard to think past the pounding ache of his nose and the back of his head. He felt unsteady on his feet. A large bus roared through the intersection beside them, leaving a strong diesel odor behind. No other vehicles were moving.
“What’s so different about us?”
His father gently gripped him around the waist and steadied him. “I promise we’ll talk about all of this, son, but the lights are about to change and we have to get out of the street. Trust me on this, okay?”
Zachary nodded and touched the top of his tender head. He knew he was probably imagining it but it felt as though his skull had grown taller. How had a simple school fight left him in such terrible straits? Ignoring the drivers that honked and shouted at them, he allowed his father to lead him the rest of the way across the street, up a set of chipped granite stairs and through the tall double doors of the clinic. He swayed against his father as they stood in a dim entryway where a muscular man in a stained security uniform directed them through another set of double doors on their left which opened into a large waiting room.
The banks of bright fluorescent lights were almost blinding after coming from the dimly lit entryway. Apparently much cleaner inside than out, the placed smelled pleasantly of lemons with a mild disinfectant. The cafeteria janitors at Zachary’s school could definitely have learned a few tricks from whoever kept the place so spotless and shiny. Even though the place was crowded with people, the chrome arms and legs of the furniture shone like mirrored surfaces and the white walls were immaculate. Even the white floor had a shine so deep that Zachary could see everyone on the other side of the room clearly reflected in its polished surface. All manner of people crowded the seats that lined every side and filled the middle of the sparkling clean room. Directly in front of them were two service windows, and two women in white nurses outfits were giving instructions and handing out clipboards to everyone who approached. Zachary and his father stood at the back of the shortest line, but there were still six or seven people in front of them.
“Why don’t you find a seat and rest,” his father suggested.
Still dizzy, Zachary nodded and moved across the room to the only two open seats he could see. Just as he got there, a young brunette girl, maybe around nine years old, slid into one seat and draped her legs over the second.
“These be taken, wizard,” she said.
It was a weird comment, especially since she had no other fantasy playmates in view, but Zachary shrugged. Most little kids were weird. He looked toward his father, who was focused on the line in front of him, then turned back to the girl and smiled.
“Maybe I could sit until your family gets here,” he suggested.
“You’d best not smite me amongst these many eyes!” the thin girl said fiercely.
She seemed genuinely afraid of him, but not enough to remove her legs from the spare seat. She continued to glare with an I’ll-die-for-this-chair look, so rather than argue he scanned the room a second time, shook his head and moved back beside his father.
“No seats,” he said.
Feeling dizzy, he leaned against his father’s back. Fortunately, the line was moving quickly and in less than five minutes they were standing before one of the service windows. Either the floors inside the booth were high or their nurse was quite tall, because even in her seat they had to look up at her. Without glancing away from her computer screen, she slid one of the clipboards with paper forms though the open window.
“I’m Nurse Nightshade,” she said. “Please fill out both sides of the form with all the proper information, including species, world of origin, and whether or not your ailment is Terrain or other. Then in the last few lines describe what seems to be the problem. Any questions?”
Zachary expected to see a smile—species and world of origin―but she hadn’t even looked their way and seemed entirely serious. This was turning out to be a really strange place.
“My name is Roger Pill,” Zachary’s said quietly.
Nurse Nightshade’s dark eyes bolted from the computer screen to stare at him. Zachary couldn’t help noticing several of the nearby patients and even the nurse in the next window had also turned to look. His father turned to look at half a dozen pairs of eyes now watching them.
“What’s going on?” he whispered angrily through the open window. “What has Gefarg been telling you people?”
The tall nurse put her finger to her lips and gestured toward the white door beside them. Zachary and his father shuffled sideways as Nurse Nightshade closed her service window and came to open the door and wave them inside her office. Zachary had been right; she stood at least two feet taller than him, and her shoulders were as wide as Uncle Ned’s. Not the sort of nurse you wanted to make angry.
“Mr. Pill,” Nurse Nightshade said sternly, “a lot of people have been looking for you, especially since Merlin died.”
“I know,” he said. “But how did they recognize my name?”
That got Zachary’s attention.
Is our last name a fake?
Nurse Nightshade pursed her lips. “People around this clinic know more than you think, Mr. Pill,” she said, “and that’s usually more than they should. Either way, what’s done is done. I’m very pleased to see you’re okay. I feared Merlin might have been the last of your kind on this side of the corridors.”
Corridors?
“I was hoping that’s what everyone would think,” Roger Pill said.
“Fate usually won’t allow us to hide from our destiny,” Nurse Nightshade said. Oddly, she stared at Zachary as she said it. Her voice softened. “You probably don’t remember me, young man, but I was your nurse fourteen years ago.”
“When I was born?” Zachary said.
“Yes, when you were born. Your mother was so excited and anxious to meet you that day.”
“She was, wasn’t she,” his father agreed. The words seemed to catch in his throat. He recovered his composure, however, and said, “I’m surprised you remember.”
“I remember all the important things.”
The nurse’s eyes flicked up and down Zachary’s young frame. Then she smiled, warm and friendly, as though she had known him for years, which—even though Zachary couldn’t remember it—she had. Zachary couldn’t quite say why, but in that moment he instantly liked this burly woman. She reached out and ruffled his hair.
“Nice shade of green,” she said, “just like your mother’s.”
He smiled. He couldn’t remember anyone outside his family ever complimenting his hair before. Most people didn’t like it. Come to think of it, he didn’t really like it either.
“So what happened to you?” she asked, her eyes examining his nose and then settling on his sling.
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