Heroes

Chapter 7. Passing time

It had been a few days since I'd made my deal with Nate. I hadn't told anyone what I'd seen. I was going to keep to my word and, in case he didn't, make him keep to his. I didn't want to tell him my plan until I was 100% certain that it would work. Right now, I wasn't sure. But as I was sitting there pondering, I felt a light tap on my shoulder. I turned around, but saw no one there. Slightly puzzled, I went back to my thoughts, but there came another tap. This time I turned around quicker, hoping to catch whoever it was. But again, there was no one there. Instead, I heard incessant laughing on my right and suddenly, Jack appeared beside me, laughing like an absolute maniac.
"Oh my God, Mark, your face!" He had to stop talking, he was laughing too much. I just sat there with no expression on my face, looking up at him while he struggled to calm down.
"Are you gonna do this often?" I asked.
"No, no. You were just so distracted with something that I felt as though I could mess with you." He said all this between breaths; he was almost panting to get his breathing back to normal.
"Oh that actually hurt," He said now, sitting down opposite me.
"I'm glad my stupidity makes you laugh," I replied, then looked back at the table.
"So, what are you thinking about? You always seem to be thinking lately."
"What? Oh. Nothing much. Just...small stuff. Nothing that concerns you."
"O...K..."
He looked at me weirdly, then stood up again and walked back over to his own cell.

I tossed and turned all the next night trying to sleep. My body was tired but my brain wasn't. It was too full of thoughts; thoughts I had been trying to suppress. Things from my childhood had crept back up on me, images of my parents, our house, their faces as they sent me away because I was different. Finally, I lay on my back and stared up at the ceiling. But I saw something on there that gave me even more to think about. 7 words written on the stone ceiling that read: "YoU DONt kNow whaT wEVe BEen tHRouGh". I had never noticed those words there before. I didn't know what who had been through? I didn't know if those words had been there before, or if they were new. All I knew was that I had another thing on my mind and another mystery to solve.