EXISTENCE: Recovery

CHAPTER 6: Blood Drawn

Rym sighed. She looked over to Nadia, who had her head down, her hat lying next to her backpack. She looked back to the teacher, who was offering nothing but well-wishes and what she was saying was "summer advice." She looked over to the empty desk beside her and turned her thoughts toward Adam. What was he up to now? She pulled out her phone and looked through the recent messages. She hit Adam's name and took a look at the timestamp of the last message. The screen read 3/14. The message itself read "I'll be fine."

She sighed. Would things be how they were between the two? She recalled the night before, when Adam tearfully apologized to her. 

He's not fooling anybody.

She raised her hand, getting the teacher's attention.

"Yes, Rym?"

Rym lowered her hand. "May I use the restroom, please?"

The teacher sighed. "Go on, then."

Rym slowly got up off her chair and made her way to the door. She closed it softly behind her and walked on down the hallway, and stopped when she saw two kids standing by the courtyard doors, talking. One she immediately recognized to be Andre, the other, however, was unfamiliar to her, but he had blonde hair and fair skin. She made no notice of it and resumed her walk. She cut herself short when she heard the end of a spoken sentence.

"...and Adam's the one we need to keep safe?"

The blonde haired boy nodded. "Those bullies will likely try to get a jump on him, especially since it's the last day of school."

Rym quickly hid behind one of the lockers.

Andre gave the boy a thoughtful look. "Now, I don't know him all too well, but he doesn't seem like the type of kid to have haters. If anything I bet you he's got fans. Bitches too."

Rym turned red. 

Virgil chuckled to himself. "You'd be surprised. I've known him for a while so I can assure you, some don't take too kindly to him."

Suddenly, Rym felt a strong surge of energy in the hall. She looked around, wondering where it could have come from, but noted that it was still just the two boys in the hall.

"Now, Andre, was it? Don't you have a class to get to?" 

Andre jumped back a little bit. "Shit, you're right! The teacher's gonna be pissed at me!" He quickly started for the other side of the hall, and turned his head back. "I'll try to help you, man!"

Virgil offered a small wave in response, and watched as Andre took off. He leaned back on one of the hallway pillars. "So, are you planning on coming out to meet me face to face?"

Rym stayed silent. Who was he calling out?

"I'm talking about you, hiding behind those lockers. Don't think I didn't notice that energy of yours. You're not doing a very good job of masking it."

Rym walked out from her hiding spot. "You're not...talking about me, are you?"

Virgil turned his head back to face her. "You're the only other person here. Why else would I have flared up my energy the way I did? You felt it, didn't you?"

"I...did, yes." Rym looked confused. "But you seem to have the wrong idea about me - I don't have powers like you do."

Virgil raised an eyebrow. "And yet you were absolutely noticeable the moment you entered the hallway. You can't have energy and not have powers of your own, yeah? That doesn't make sense."

Rym grew annoyed. "And yet here I am telling you, I don't have any powers of my own! I can just...feel these things, that's all." She thought back to the time she told Adam his father was still alive. "I'm still not sure why."