HSMTMTS: The Core Four

18

EJ's POV

I drive up to my house and walk towards the door.  As my hand reaches out, I stop, I don't know what's gonna happen when I walk in, and for some reason, I'm afraid.  Afraid of what I'll say, afraid of how this will all play out.  I guess I should do what Mr.  Mazarra says, I should just talk it out with them.

I turn the knob walk in.  Ashlyn, Uncle Dennis, and aunt Debby.  As soon as I walk in, they all look over at me, and I'm thinking of walking back out again.

"How are you, sweetie?"  Aunt Debby asks.

"Good" I mumble, leaving out the part where Ricky helped me through a panic attack.  There was a moment of uncomfortable silence.  "You said you wanted to talk?"  I turn to Uncle Dennis.  He grabs my shoulder and sits me on the couch next to Ashlyn.  And there was another moment of uncomfortable silence.

"Listen, Eej, I know you're upset, but I know you still have questions, so please just ask them."

As much as I didn't wanna admit it, he was right, I did have a lot of questions.  I just didn't know which one to ask first, so I stay silent for a minute deciding what to say.

"Did you try and tell them not to go in?"  I ask, my voice cracks, and tears threaten to spill from my eye. 

"I did try, son. I tried all I could, I told them they wouldn't be able to make it out, but they went anyway, they were able to save most of them, but they just-"

"Couldn't save themselves" I whisper, I feel a tear slipping down my face.

Uncle Dennis crouches down back to my level, he grabs my shoulder and I look up at him.  "Everytime I look at you, I see your dad," he says, his voice shakes and I see tears forming in his eyes.  

"You do?"  I ask.

"Yes, you act so much like him.  You're confident and ambitious like him, you both give people alot of sass.  But most importantly, you both think of people first, your dad would always try to make people feel better, he could always put a smile on people's faces.  And that's what's you do" he says with a smile, making me smile back.

"Were they thinking of me, at least?"  I ask.

"EJ, of course, they were.  You were their only son.  They loved you so much" Aunt Debby says rubbing my back.

I wipe my eyes with my sleeve, but it's no use, then my hand starts phasing again and it can't stop.  I just give up and drop my head, letting the tears run down my face.

"Oh, EJ" Ashlyn says, she wraps her arms around me and I lean on her.  Aunt Debby places her hand on top of mine, finally getting it to stop phasing.  Ashlyn rubs circles around my arm and shushes me as I hold on to her tightly.

"Wait here, I have something for you," Uncle Dennis says before going upstairs.  He comes back down with a box.  He digs in and hands me this dark brown journal.  "What is it?"  I ask.

"It's a journal, I used it to write down your parents powers, their weaknesses, and all the test I ran on them."

I flip through the pages, remembering all the powers my apparent parents had.  "What's that/"  Ashlyn asked, holding up a black ring box. 

"It's for EJ, it's from both of them, she wanted you to have it," Aunt Debby says.  I take the box and open it, it was a red ring.  If it didn't have a red gem in the middle, you could mistake it for a red lantern ring.  I pick up the ring and play with it around my finger, now I have something that connects me to both of them. 

Uncle Dennis smiles at me, he goes into the box and takes out a VHS tape.  He walks over to the TV and turns it on, making the screen turn blue.  He puts in the VHS tape and puts it in.  He sits down next to me.