I picked up my skateboard and walked through the gates to the community pool. Kids were yelling and laughing. Water drops and melting ice cream, cannon-balls and diving boards- Summer was my favorite time of year.
Naturally, the first thing I did was strip down to my swim shorts and sprint straight to diving board.
“Woo hoo!” I cheered, leaping off the diving board. Water surrounded me as I splashed into the pool. I popped up and gave Ethan a thumbs up. I pulled myself out of the water and jogged over to the snack area. Snatching a dollar from my backpack along the way, I slid into line for the vending machine. After impatiently waiting for a few minutes, I began to feed my dollar into the machine. I quickly pushed “A3”. Bag of regular chips: my go-to snack at the pool. I moved to let the person next to me go, turned around, leaned on the machine…and my heart did a back flip.
With her long bleach-blond hair and big blue eyes, Ashley Gordon was easily the prettiest girl in sixth grade. She wore a pink bikini and sunglasses to hold back her hair, and she was laughing at a joke someone had made. Her eyes flitted to me, and they lit up as she recognized me. Do something, you idiot, I told himself. I grinned nervously and waved. She smiled and, with a little lift of her hand, she waved back. My heart summersaulted.
Then I noticed a guy walk over, sit down next to her, and throw his arm around her. She leaned in and laid her head on her shoulder. I felt myself burning with anger and embarrassment. A boyfriend. Of course she has a boyfriend now. Why didn’t she tell me? I recognized him: Logan Hendrick- the most popular guy in sixth grade. Basically all the girls had a crush on him. No wonder Ashley was with him. I felt something bubble up inside me and fill every part of me. All I wanted to do was hit something-
“Hey, what the heck?” I looked up and saw the guy that was behind me in the vending machine line banging on the screen. The inside light was off, and the numbers weren’t on. “It just turned off.” The guy complained. I looked around quickly and noticed the ice cream cash register guy messing with cash register, confused. It wasn’t working either. The hum of the air conditioning in the life guard lounge was off. Dang it.
“Weird… I got nothing; you should get the maintenance guys.” I said.
“Good idea, man.” He walked off. I quickly jogged over to Ethan. I actually did know what happened. It was banging around in my brain. I held a hand to my head and shut my eyes. I had to get out of here; I had to let the energy out. I forced my eyes back open. The sun hurt. I walked slowly over to Ethan at the chairs.
“Hey lucky dude! You got the last snack from the vending machine. Sucks that it broke-”
“Ethan,” I said quietly. His eyes changed.
“You know dude, we’ve been here for like an hour. Our parents are probably expecting us back. We should get going.” Ethan grabbed our backpacks, waved a few times to some people, and walked out. “Ok, dude, we got to find a field or something.” I nodded, hardly hearing now. Ethan gave me a worried look and spun around in circles. “Ah! Here we go!” He grabbed my arm and ran left. Or was it right? Forward? I was disoriented now. Oh no. Disorientation followed headaches, and preceded…control loss. My vision was going red. I shut my eyes. I felt Ethan shove me forward, and I fell to my knees. Footsteps ran away.
“Let go Zach!” he yelled. I screamed, and felt my body explode. Everything was on fire. And then, slowly, slowly…it faded away. I opened my eyes and fell over in surprise.
“What the…” My eyes were huge.
“Whoa!” Ethan came running over. I was surrounded by a black circle of ash in a small crater. “You absorbed a lot more energy than the vending machine!”
“I think I took everything,” I said softly. Ethan shook his head.
“Come on, man, I wasn’t kidding when I said our parents will be expecting us home. We are lucky that we live in a small town and have this amount of freedom, so let’s get going.” Ethan helped me to my feet.
“Hey dude, thanks for this. For every time.”
“No problem, dude. What are friends for?”
“Most friends don’t have to deal with their friend’s mutant super powers that cause them to absorb the energy out of machines and blow stuff up.”
“Well then I’m special,” he joked. I laughed, grabbed my backpack, and we walked home like absolutely nothing had happened. Just like every time.
