Flow and Crash - Rain Lewis Book 1

Chapter 4

It had to be the most unfair thing in the world. Having these crazy powers and not being able to show anybody. Tez would freak out, and Jay would probably try to study me, but Mamma swore me to secrecy about them. To never use my gifts for anything beside fighting the Spirit of Fire. Which I was still unsure of what that meant. It's not like I'd see people walking around, covered in fire, trashing buildings or something. Mamma said I should trust my instincts, but I couldn't deny some of my instincts led me toward making Mike Kessel's huge-as-hell water bottle explode,or make Mrs. Carlton's coffee drill a hole through the bottom of her cup.

Not gonna lie, I did use the powers to get to and from school a lot quicker. Whenever there was a puddle, or a trickle from a drain pipe, or even some water in the gutter, as I stepped on it I propelled myself off like I was running on a trampoline. I had to stop myself from making it look like I was leaping like Super Mario, but if I kept my weight and momentum forward I got a huge burst of speed. It was tricky to handle corners, but I'd find a way if I kept at it. Miss Tarrio, the science teacher, would probably be impressed if she knew.

With all the running I was doing I hadn't caught the bus in over a week.Which worked out well, as Tez had taken to walking with Angie and members of Bonfires these days, and Tez was the only reason I caught the bus that didn't relate to getting to school on time. They were everywhere lately, even some of the old students, who ran with some pretty rough crews, wound up joining. My first thought was, with a name like Bonfires, they could be part of this Spirit of Fire, but it just didn't seem likely.The more of them around there were the fewer fights broke out of dumb stuff.

Like a few days ago, Kenny Mayhew was about to lay Stoney Hamilton out for stepping on his new kicks but before voices even got raised Angie stepped in and Auntie talked them into not acting like complete fools. That wasn't all, there was even less litter about the place,and maybe I was dreaming, but the cafeteria food even started tasting better. Still, for all that good stuff Bonfires brought with them, it made the sketchier side of things look all the more apparent.

The more Bonfires Pins I saw on people there were just and many rocking the Red, Green, and Silver safety pins on their gear. Every piece of graffiti washed away more tags would be there to replace it in another part of the school. Whenever a fight did break out, you could bet some punk wearing Three Pins would be in or around it. I'd never seen my school like this before. It was always considered one of the rougher districts, but it wasn't exactly ghetto. A lot of nice stuff happened here, right along with some straight up trash. Why, then, did it feel like a gang war was about to break out at any moment?

"So rise the forces in nature and in ourselves? What's that from?" Jay asked swirling the last of his drink around in the bottom of his can. It would've been such a trip if I just jolted it a little, to startle him. I looked down at what I'd been writing. I didn't recognize the words at all. Jay continued. "It's Greek, right? "Forces of Nature and Man?" Plato, or something?"

"Nah,just some stuff I read in a book at home. I thought it looked cool."I quickly closed the book. Not like it was a lie or anything, there were a lot of books in my house, but just as Mamma told me not to talk about having powers she also told me not to mention the giant book she'd shown me either. I'd asked her if I could borrow it, to read it (and wished I had a camera phone so I could look at the artwork more) but she'd outright refused.

Instead my mind had been remembering glimpses of words from it, and my hands apparently did the rest. I'd stopped myself from recreating the images I saw on the pages. Whenever I tried the painting of the fire snapped me right back in place, like Mamma was right over my shoulder and ready to twist my ear if I tried anything. I gave Jay a kindly smile, as if I hadn't been writing anything at all and was waiting for him to finish saying what he was talking about.