Awkward Stars

Chapter 10

chapter ten

emma montoya

"What do you think you're doing?" My body goes tense and my vision goes white.

A man towering above me has his eyebrows wriggled together and a stern look on his scratched face. Little white scars dot along his forehead and beneath his jaw line. He removes the flashlight from my face and a wave of horror and confusion flushes over me.

I know this man.

This is Reynold Green.

This is Tyler's father.

--//ooo//--

My whole body is sore and I wake up to cool metal and itchy rope surrounding me. I am not where he found me. I am not back in my bedroom. So where am I?

The room is surrounded by mirrors. I can see a dozen reflections of myself, my exhausted, worried self. My hair is tied into a messy bun on top of my head that I do not remember making before and my jeans have a long rip in them. There is a burning sensation in my left shoulder.

"Emma Marie Montoya?" I flinch and the ropes pull tighter, making it slightly more difficult to breath. I now notice a man in front of me, a man who wasn't in the reflections.

"Is all this really necessary?" I ask, ignoring his mention at my full name. He looks nervous.

"Yes Miss Montoya, it is. You are an Awk, therefore dangerous." I lose thought about being brought here, the doctor's conversation, or anything that's going on around me. I focus to this man and I can see him. I can understand his anxiety. He looks at me, his pupils large and covering his hazel eyes. The bags under them are a milky gray and his blonde hair is not visible as it is shaved. He's afraid, you can see it in his cheeks, in his scrunched up throat. Of what?

Of me.

"An Akw?" I say confused. Is that short for--

"Awkward Star, yes," he states, finishing my thoughts.

My first instinct is too ask, "You can read my mind?"

"I believe that's-- that's only fair. If you can read mine, I should be allowed to read yours."

"I can't read your mind," I say with full vulnerability, hoping he hears the pleading and sincerity on my cracking voice.

The ropes pull tighter and as I struggle, it gets worse. There are three wraps around each my wrists and four around my stomach. I feel like a criminal wanted alive or dead, hated across all surfaces.

Maybe that's how they see me.

"Don't lie to me. It's not very smart," he says. I passionately ignore him and study the mirrors.

There is a video camera in the far left-hand corner of the room. It is a murky brown and focuses itself three times, watching my every move. But it's not the camera I'm interested in, it's the reflection. The back of the device is plastered against the mirror a between the real object and its trick-of-the-light double, there is no gap.

"Hey, hey, hey, eyes up here." The man's voice comes alive, but it is not dominant. I shut it out.

Leaning back in my chair, I try to get a corner on the mirror wall. It is an effortless attempt, springing from the fact that we are in the exact middle of the room, so I push back up to the right position.

The badge on the man's chest is engraved with a small name, I notice: Luke. There is red button on the floor under his foot. I glance at it slightly, and if Luke sees it, he doesn't bring it to attention.

I skid my foot against the tile floor to push the chair back slightly.

"Luke," I smile. "Are you being interviewed?"

He is startled by my questions and places a hand on the back of his neck. "I-- I don't have to answer that."

"Of course, of course, I can see it in your mind. You are."

They way he stuttered lead me to believe this was a job interview. They way he talked as though he was reading off a script. His nerves.

"Well, let me go out there and tell Reynold what a wonderful job you're doing."

I get a toe under the table and push it up a little, like a small jump. Then I place my other foot next to it and with a larger shove, I send the table toppling over onto Luke. He doesn't move as the binders, coffee mugs (filled with coffee), and other assorted papers land on top of him.

I throw my body forward, not hoping to land on him, but to land in reach of the button. The impact sends bile up my throat and a rough pain in my stomach, but the red button is right under my hand. I push on it as hard as I can, slamming in foolishly with my restrained fist and trying to break it beneath the chair.

The ropes around me become loose as the button breaks and I rise, rolling out my wrists. I walk over to the mirror as calmly as I can and draw my finger along the mirror, around each corner of the room until a gap grows between my finger and it's reflection.

Now we wait until they come back to arrest me.