Turmoil

The City of Eyes

Tim

"We're breaking in, " Atlanta is sitting on the forest floor. There is a circle drawn in front of her, with squiggly lines that are supposed to represent something. She has a stick in her hand, and is pointing.

This is the second time in two days, when she comes up with something crazy. I would call it a plan, but a plan needs details, and this has none.

"Tim, you're taking care of the distraction, " she tells me. The distraction part of her plan, I got to admit, is very much ingenious. Atlanta has found a way of working our newly gained fame to reap results. I am coming to the conclusion, that Atlanta Savage is either a mastermind or insane. I haven't decided which yet.

"When you cause the ruckus, " she continues turning to jab her stick at a poorly drawn diagram of the log cabin " Donna leaves, we go in and we get the ice cream, "

Yup. Ice cream. We are following this incredibly erractic and flimsy plan just to get ice cream. Can a mastermind be insane? Because if betting were a rational thing that's where I would be placing mine.

I want to ask her, why ice cream, why this elaborate plan but I think I know. After Phoenix came back from wherever, he barely uttered three words to any of us. And somehow, this whacky plan ties in with making him feel better. Perhaps Atlanta isn't an insane genius. Perhaps there's something else here at play.

Like friendship.

I glance at Lorraine to see if she has figured it out. But her face is drawn, her eyes half hooded in the darkness, and she seems to be barely there. She looks like a brooding princess in the fading light, her hair shimmering to catch the last rays of the evening sun. She's glaring.

I avert my gaze. I have found, over the years, that it's best not to stare at people when they're dealing with personal problems. But I have also found, that one of my many flaws, is indeed, staring with an atypical curiosity. Especially at Lorraine.

For me, people are not just people. They are walking master pieces, and with the strokes of an obscure artist paintbrush these master pieces craftily blocked out the pain that lay beneath the layers of paint.

It was my job to peel the layers down, to see what lay beneath.

"I have the distraction under control, " I tell Atlanta, seeing her staring at me, expecting an answer " I'll keep Donna stalled for as long as possible, "

The buzzing angry hive of voices, is easy to find, even with my abysmal map reading skills. The group quickly comes into view, a whole fleet of girls, flickering through the trees. And just like Atlanta said, they look outraged.

Honestly, when I, or rather my father, signed me up for this camp, I did not expect to be handling a group of furious females, just because of some crazy, whacky plan, that an equally crazy girl had come up with. This was going to take a lot more talking than I usually did, and probably some running too. In fact, I was certain about the running. Never underestimate a girl. Especially one that has just been duped.

They notice me, as soon as I step out into the clearing, a city full of blinking, furious eyes. They turn and fix on me, the faces of the owners of the eyes obscured by the animus that radiates from them. If these eyes were capable of glowing like the lights in a city, I would be blinded.

If I were a man of emotion, and I'm not, I would have been truly daunted.

"You're Tim, " says one of the girls, and her eyes rake up and down my body,taking in my strapping form " that other one, from the group,"

That other one from the group, she says. A spark of indignation rustles within me, but is quelched almost as soon as it lights. That other one, they say, when it was me, after all, who saved Atlanta's sorry butt. And yet, it's Phoenix that they fawn over.

I would have minded, if I actually cared. Too bad that I don't.

"Yeah, I'm the other one, " I say and now all of them are listening to me, glaring at me, and not without suspicion. Silently, I curse Atlanta in my mind, and I wonder, wonder if this is what Donna felt like when she was addressing the crowd of teenagers. And did this feeling of unwelcome scrutiny fade over time, or did it continue to be so uncomfortable? I never want to find out.

I make a mental promise in my mind, I swear a blood bound oath to my brain, that after all of this is over, I will never, ever do anything like this ever again. Ever.

"Well where's Phoenix then? " another one asks and I'm preparing myself mentally now, for the magnitude of the task that has befallen me.

So here's the thing. Atlanta got Phoenix to write out notes to all the love sick girls that had clung to him today, telling them to meet him here, in this clearing, so he could confess his true love for them. Needless to say, when they turned up and found that at least two dozen other girls had received the exact same note, they were more than a little confused. And angry. So ,so angry.

And now, here's the catch.

"Oh he's not coming, " I say, trying to be cool, and add, before this registers with the girls " I wrote the notes. Just want some luv, "

The words feel odd in my mouth, like a foul tasting piece of gum that I had scraped off a desk and put into my mouth. The words that are meant to sound arrogant, now sound like they were delivered by a robot. But when you're a girl who has just been tricked, you hardly stop to notice.

"You did what? " one of them roars, and all the girls that were eyeing each other angrily just seconds ago, now all turn on me.

And I'm drowning. I'm drowning in a sea of slaps and yells and wrathful words. And, I'm proud to say, I'm taking it all very stoically.

When Donna arrives on the scene, the girls are still yelling at me. Loud. Annoyed. And deceived.

Donna takes one look at me and my sorry self and says

"Alright what's going on here? "

And suddenly, there's silence.