Chapter Sixteen

Nicolle met Timmy three years ago, when they were freshmen. He’d moved to Maple Hill High school from Maryland for reasons he’d told her but she could no longer remember, something to do with his father’s absence in his life. He was almost instantly unpopular, possessing an unfortunate blend of unappealing qualities such as being rather tall while also being rather fat, being unattractive, and being annoying. His face was weirdly babyish, his skin the white of a fish’s underbelly; he battled acne and faked intellectualism, claiming scholarly insight into various subjects in an attempt to impress those who would never be impressed. He spoke with that artificial British accent the first time he said Greetings and salutations to Nicolle; he had followed her around ever since. During the past three years he had mimicked her footsteps, disallowed her privacy, and assumed her “best” friendship without justification.

            At some point within the past twenty-four hours, he had awakened an Artistry. As Nicolle’s car moved towards his house question after question came to her:

            Which Artistry did he awaken?

            Would he now join the Chess Club?

            Would he be happy?

            Would he be sad?

            What will everyone else say?

            Will they be excited about all this? Or upset?

            Apparently realizing he had caught Nicolle’s attention, Timmy retracted his request for a phone call and instead told her to come to his house. This frustrated Nicolle; she didn’t want to go to his home but he knew she wouldn’t be able to stay away, not this time.

            As she drove, the sun shining down beautifully over the Savannah countryside, Nicolle picked her phone up from the passenger’s seat where she had laid it, flew through her contacts, and selected Vee. It rang once before she answered.

            “Hello Darling, it eez Vee speaking, howz may I"?”

            “Vee, do you know my friend Timmy? The heavyset one, real tall, really nerdy looking?”

            The phony French thing was dropped, Vee’s tone now puzzled and serious. “Yeah, yeah, what’s up?”

            “He"”

            “Is he harassing you again? What an oaf, I swear, I"”

            “Vee, it’s not that, just listen,” Nicolle said desperately. “He just texted me a few minutes ago. He says he has an Artistry now.”

            Vee gasped; Nicolle heard it easily even over the wind buffeting the car. “How does he even know what an Artistry is? He can’t be telling the truth.”

            “Well, he doesn’t know it by that name, but… he knew my eyes had changed color when it happened. He didn’t know about the true nature of the Chess Club or our Artistries or any of that, just that my eyes were a different color. That’s what his text said, that his eyes had changed color.”

            No, Nicolle thought, his text said his eyes had changed color like mine. Did he… did he develop a Black Artistry too…?

            “It’s theoretically possible that by being near an Artist his chances improved to become an Artist too,” Vee said; now both of them were speaking frantically. “It may be possible. Oh my goodness…”

            “I’m headed over there now to see. I’m almost there, actually… his house is just a minute or two away…”

            “Be careful, Nicolle. In fact, don’t go.”

            “Why?”’

            “We all saw how he was acting around you the other day, he’s crazy"”

            “He isn’t going to hurt me, he… likes me,” Nicolle said uncomfortably. “He’s just lonely and aggravating, he’s not a bad person.”

            “If he has an Artistry he could be dangerous,” she said. “I’m serious. I’m calling Dominic. We’re coming too.”

            Nicolle ran that through her head. “No… don’t come. At least not to his house. He’s going to want this to be personal, between me and him.”

            “We’re still coming. If we have to wait at a good distance or whatever then we’ll do that, but you’d better believe we’re coming.”

            Nicolle was going down a steep hill, the road filled with pot holes and stray pieces of gravel. At the bottom she rounded a corner and saw houses on both sides of the road, as far down as the road went; Timmy’s was the small one on the end, the one with his busted up Chevette parked in the overgrown yard.

            “I’m here, Vee,” Nicolle said. She could feel her heartbeat in her throat.

            “Be careful, Nicolle, I’m serious,” she said. They said goodbye and hung up.

            Nicolle parked beside Timmy’s car and got out. She had only ever been to Timmy’s house once before (despite numerous invitations), to bring him medicine when he was sick and no one else could do it; his mother didn’t have a driver’s license. She walked towards the house " she had an uncomfortable feeling that Timmy was watching her through one of the dark windows " and before she could knock the door swung open.

            “NICOLLE, darling, come in, come in, come in, come in!!”

            Timmy’s mother held the door open wide and her smile even wider. Nicolle had met Dorothy only a few times, each time hearing the same exact things: How sweet of you to be friends with Timmy, he’s not such a bad kid, I tell ya his heart is full of sunshine, his papa left us in such a rut, ya know. Gosh, you’re so unbelievably pretty, Timmy talks about you all the time, I personally want to thank you for asking him to the dance even if, bless her soul, your aunt passed away the night of it and you couldn’t go. And may I say, Timmy told me what you said to him, about the beauty of his smile, and it makes my heart warm to think that at last someone else notices it, too. I’ve been waiting for so long for Timmy to meet his Juliet…

            Nicolle wondered what life must have been like for Timmy, growing up with her. Dorothy loved him like Sylvia would never love Nicolle, but her hyper-optimism, Nicolle thought, did not give Timmy the mental equipment to deal with the hardships of his life.

            “Hi Miss Stoker,” Nicolle said, trying to smile, sort of. “I’ve come to see Timmy.”

            To that, Nicolle cringed to see, Dorothy seemed to ascend to a whole new level of happiness, eyes brightening and smile exploding. But them she theatrically added, poked out lip and all: “He’s got the throw-ups, though, and he doesn’t like me to watch when he’s throwing up, so he’s hiding out in his room. Betcha a hill of beans he’ll want to see you, though.”

            They walked into the house; Nicolle saw the porcelain knickknacks, the embroidery pieces, the decorative plates, the doll collection, and felt a little claustrophobic. She was both shocked and uncomfortable to see a certain piece of paper hanging on the fridge: a book report she and Timmy had been paired on a full year ago, a big ‘A’ written on the front.

Dorothy tiptoed " once again, with the theatricality of a cartoon character " to Timmy’s cracked bedroom door and knocked gently.

            “Timmy,” she whispered. “Timmy, baby, are you awake? Nicolle Darling is here, and she came all this way to see you.” She turned back to Nicolle and smiled.

            From the other side of the door he said, “Send her in.”

            Nicolle took a deep breath, walked passed Dorothy, and stepped into the bedroom. There were no lights on; the blinds were turned inward to prevent light.

            “No-closed-doors-when-girls-are-over,” Dorothy said in a sing-song voice, happy as could be; Nicolle doubted this rule had ever been implemented before. Then his mother disappeared back to the living room. Nicolle " with the Chess Club’s secrecy rule in mind " pushed the door as closed as it could be without doing so fully. Then she turned to Timmy.

            He was standing at the window, his back to her, his huge form dark and hard to make out. His room wasn’t messy but it wasn’t clean; his bed was made but there were clothes all over the floor, and his computer desk was filled with various snacks and drinks. Several posters that Nicolle couldn’t make out hung on his wall, probably of elves and fantasy stuff.

            “Hey Timmy,” she said. “You… you said that your eyes changed color?”

            After a moment " British accent momentarily forgotten " he said, “Yes.” Neither of them said anything for a second, then Timmy asked: “Do you know anything about it? Why it would happen…? What it means…?”

            “No,” Nicolle said, swallowing.

            Suddenly the blinds opened, Timmy turning them himself, and some sunlight came through; he spun around slowly and looked right at her, his face unsmiling. His eyes were as Yellow as sunflower petals.

            “You’re lying,” he said.

            No I’m not. Nicolle nearly said it and stopped.

            His eyes were piercing her like a needle.

            Elyse’s eyes were comforting and warm, an amber color. Timmy’s were bright and jarring, accusing, angry.

            An Artist of the Yellow. Nicolle was not a liar by nature, but occasionally white lies were required to keep Timmy from getting too upset. Bigger lies were required to protect the secrecy of the Chess Club. Such attempts would now be futile; Timmy would never again be lied to.

            “I don’t know what, or why, or how,” Timmy said, heaving deep breaths, “but I can do things now. I know where people are… I felt you arriving in your car when you got near the house next door. I know when someone’s lying. Like you just did to me. And"”

            “Timmy, you"”

            “"AND I know it has to do with the fact that my eyes changed color overnight, I know it. Your eyes changed color too. Don’t look away from me! Do you have special abilities now because your eyes changed color?”

            Nicolle swallowed. “N-no.”

            “Liar. Liar. And everybody in your treasured Chess Club, is that why they hide their eyes, are they like this too?”

            Nicolle said nothing, afraid to speak. He nodded grimly.

            “As good as a confession,” he said. “You’ve been lying to me, to everybody this whole time. I thought I was your friend, I thought you were the one person that actually wanted to be my friend, and you’ve been lying to me.”

            “What choice did I have?!” Nicolle retorted. “It has to be kept a secret!”

            “Are we even friends, Nicolle?”

            “We won’t be much longer if you keep grilling me like this.”

            “So you can say something that’s true. Are we friends?!”

            “We were closer before I joined the Chess Club. We were both much happier together then.”

            It was true, all true, and never did she have to actually address his question. To her relief he seemed a little appeased by her words, sensing the truth in them and allowing them to assuage his pain. She had, in a sense, lied to him again by misleading him; she feared what he would do if he learned the full truth. Apparently, from what Nicolle could gather, he lacked Elyse’s Artistry of sensing the emotions of others. For this Nicolle was grateful.

            His posture relaxing a bit, Timmy sat down on his bed and sighed; Nicolle remained standing by the door.

            “So what is this?” His eyes were impossible to not stare at. “Do you know?”

            Nicolle took a deep breath and, reluctantly, almost painfully, she nodded. Vee’s words from long ago, from that computer conversation, returned to her; Nicolle felt oddly veteran, now teaching what at one time she did not understand.

            “I can’t say much at the moment, it’s against the rules. But I will say that people like us are

            I’m about to change his life forever, right here, he’s never going to forget this moment

            called Artists.”

            “Artists?” He repeated; Nicolle had expected his next words to be more bitterness, more anger, but the mere fact that she was sharing with him

            like a friend would

            had calmed him considerably. In fact, when he began again, his excitement was beginning to grow. “That sounds so… cool.”

            “You are an Artist of the Yellow,” she said, not meeting his eyes. “I am an Artist of the Black.”

            “Are you freaking serious?! That’s what we’re called? What kick-A titles! Artist of the Yellow?! Oh man!”

            He rose from the bed and began pacing, a wide smile on his face. Nicolle’s anxiety was abating, replaced by a fear of what all would come from this.

            “Yes,” she said. “Your Artistry is the essence of emotion. You can affect and detect the inner psyche of a person, and stuff like that.”

            “I can harness the power of one’s heart,” he said to himself, and that British accent was back so strong it was as if he were in a Shakespearean play, the drama thick and nauseating. “Poetic justice. At an end are the days of my oppression. Henceforth I will be observed as powerful, as impenetrable; my Yellow Eyes will be known to all, to my allies as beacons of triumph, to my enemies as omens of defeat. I"”

            “That’s not going to work, Timmy,” Nicolle said, cutting off his monologue. “You can’t let your eyes been known to all, or whatever. They must be kept a secret.”

            “And who, may I inquire, established this law?”

            Nicolle paused, just staring at him, knowing what his response would be to this. “The Chess Club.”

            Timmy smiled a soft, small grin, shocking her; she had expected wild scoffing, not a controlled response. This was a newer confident side to him she had never before seen.

“No, Nicolle. No one will have dominion over me now. My life is my own. I will not be bullied again.”

            “We don’t want to bully you, Timmy,” Nicolle said; his eyes narrowed to slits, and she thought it was the word we that did that. “We are… are… what’s the word, what did Dominic call it… we are governors of Artistries, keeping people from misusing their power and stuff.”

            “Who bestowed that authority on Dominic to be a governor of anything? Our birthrights allow us to govern our own selves but not the lives of others. I deny the Chess Club’s claim to power. I’ll do as I please.”

            Suddenly the bedroom door opened and Dorothy poked her head inside. She waggled her finger at them playfully, to say no no, children.

            “Nuh uh uh, what did Mama say about closing the"”

            Timmy looked directly at her. “Leave us.”

            Dorothy’s eyes lost their smile; in fact, her entire face became entirely expressionless. She didn’t look angry, sad, or disappointed… she didn’t even seem to notice her son’s new eye color. She merely obeyed, walking away and out of sight. Something about Timmy’s words and her abrupt withdrawal seemed off to Nicolle…

            … had that been an Artistry? Did he command her to leave and she just… do it?

            Timmy turned back to her and, again, smiled. “You’re my best friend, Nicolle. I cherish what we have together. But I must refuse. I will not meet with the Chess Club, nor will I wear the sunglasses that distinguish them.”

            “You have to,” Nicolle said. “If you don’t meet with the Chess Club you’ll have to face them sooner or later.”

            “Then I will face them.”

            “All of them? Dominic? Vee? Elijah? Jackson, Darius, Brook, Elyse, Peter… myself… you’re going to face all of us?”

            “I will do what I must.”

            “We’re more powerful than you. We’ve been Artists longer. You can’t run forever.”

            “I won’t run to begin with.”

            Nicolle did not like the way this conversation had gone. Perhaps she’d chosen her words wrong; she knew that making Timmy feel as if he needed to defend himself would not be the way to go.

            “Look, Timmy… please hear me out. I want what’s best for you, and nobody is going to bully you anymore, especially not in the Chess Club. I care about your well-being. Just sleep on it and talk to me about it soon.”

            “I will talk to you as I always have, as a dear friend,” he said. Clasping his hands in front of him with an air of sage-like wisdom, he ended with: “But the Chess Club? Let them try to control me. Let them try.”

           

            “What do you sense?”

            Elyse’s eyes closed and she seemed to be concentrating. She was having to do this from farther away than usual; they were parked almost three hundred yards away from the house Nicolle had gone into. Vee had respected her friend’s wishes to ‘go it alone’ but that did not mean she had to like it.

            “Fear on one side, but not a whole lot of it. The other one’s a little harder to taste… bitterness, excitement… love… anger…”

            “Good grief,” Dominic said from the passenger’s seat. “That guy’s got some inner conflict, doesn’t he?”

            “I hate this,” Vee said, elbows rested on the two front seats, hanging in between them. “I hate this, I hate this…”

            “I don’t think she’s in much danger,” Elyse said, gripping the steering wheel tight. “I know he’s a new Artist and all, and may not have full control over his power, but I think he cares for Nicolle a great deal.”

            “I know that,” Vee said, looking at the small house at the end of the road, at Nicolle’s dented little car parked out front. “But I’ve heard his thoughts too, like the other day, when he took her glasses off. Dom’s right, he’s very conflicted. Very confused. Like an animal backed into a corner.”

            “Okay, one of them’s on the move,” Elyse said. “Walking fairly briskly… coming to the front door…”

            Everyone watched closely; the front door opened and Nicolle walked out at a quick pace. She got into her car and was backing out in seconds, driving towards them. Vee caught a glimpse of her thoughts as she passed by them.

            … follow me. I don’t want to talk this close to his…

            She got the gist. “Follow her, Elyse.”

           

            About five miles from Timmy’s house Nicolle pulled into a wooded park and turned off the engine. The place was entirely vacant of other people and was sufficiently distant from Timmy’s new Yellow Artistry radar. On top of that, if Timmy surprised her and left the house by car, the gravel parking lot was hidden from the road by a line of trees. He may sense people sitting out there but he would have no way

that I know of

to tell who it was.

            Nicolle got out and walked over to a cold stone bench and picnic table covered in fallen leaves. She sat and waited for her friends to arrive, her brain like a beehive of thoughts, buzzing wildly over the day’s revelations. Had anyone else in the school " well, mostly anyone " developed an Artistry she probably would have been thrilled. But not Timmy. She didn’t hate him, but he was not someone she wanted to hang around… he was extremely needy, annoying, and overall unpleasant. The idea of him hanging out in Room 44 with her was about as appealing as eating a slab of road kill.

            The PT Cruiser pulled up and stopped, Elyse, Dominic, and Vee getting out and walking over to Nicolle; no one wore sunglasses due to the emptiness of the park. They were asking questions before they were even sat down.

            “What’s his Artistry?” Elyse asked.

            “What did he say, did he do anything?” Vee asked.

            “Does he know the truth now about the Club?” Dominic asked.

            “He knows now, for the most part,” Nicolle said. All three of them sat across from her on the stone bench, watching closely for her answer. “There’s no doubt. He’s an Artist now.”

            “Incredible,” Elyse said.

“What’s his Artistry?” Vee was not as optimistic as Elyse; she looked a little stressed, actually. “Please tell me he’s not a Blue, that boy has no business in other people’s heads.”

            “No, he’s not,” Nicolle said. Looking at Elyse she said, “Timmy has your Artistry. He’s an Artist of the Yellow.”

            Her eyes widened. “Really? Wow… I’ve been used to being the only Yellow all this time, it’s going to be odd having another in the Chess Club. Fun, maybe, though.”

            “I don’t expect there to be much fun,” Nicolle said.

            “Why?” Dominic asked.

            “Because he hates us,” Vee answered, having read Nicolle’s mind. Her eyes remained locked on Nicolle’s face, still perusing her thoughts. “Holy poly, Dominic… he hates us. Very badly.”

            “Even before I developed my Artistry I knew he didn’t like the Chess Club,” Nicolle said. “He’s been bullied forever, as far as I can tell, and he sees the Chess Club as the highest on the totem pole. The most popular of the popular. In his eyes it’s a ‘natural enemies’ sort of thing.”

            “But it’s more than that, from what I can tell,” Vee said. “He hates us even worse because he thinks we’re… what… stealing you from him?”

            Nicolle nodded. “I never really confirmed being his friend, it’s just that I alone never really told him to buzz off when he started following me around. After a few years he assumed we had this super-powerful bond and now that I’ve been around him less due to the Chess Club he’s become jealous.”

            “Really jealous,” Elyse interjected. “That much shone through in his emotions clearly.”

            “He can’t not join the Chess Club,” Dominic said. “He has no choice. I’ve never seen someone not want to join, but when it comes down to it their decision isn’t really taken into consideration. We can’t have Artistry-powered teenagers walking around the school without some kind of authority keeping them in check, we just can’t.”

            “He was adamant,” Nicolle said. “He will not listen to us. His actual words were"”

            “’I will not meet the Chess Club,” Vee said, taking the words from Nicolle’s mind. “I deny the Chess Club’s claim to power, I’ll do as I please.’ What a complete idiot, how can he think those things!”

            “He’s mistaken if he thinks he can do as he pleases,” Dominic said, his fist curled tightly. “We will talk to him.”

            “How? He will never come to Room 44 like I did,” Nicolle said. A part of her was happy about that.

            “I have a plan,” he said.

 

            It was five o’clock, some four hours or so since Nicolle had left. Timmy had not moved during that time, instead staying in his room contemplating things. His life. His friend. His enemies. His “Artistry”, as she had called it.

            A few times he even said it aloud: “Timothy Stoker… Artist of the Yellow.” The words tasted like lightning, and didn’t it feel right? He had always dreamed, wondered, and wished about latent abilities in his bloodstream, the possibility that he was a descendant of a powerful someone, perhaps King Arthur, and that a day would come when he would level up and rouse those hidden powers, thereby ceasing oppression and pain. That day had come. And also quite welcoming; Nicolle, too, possessed a version of this power.

            He had experimented with his gifts. What he had come to recognize as his radar extended only so far as about fifty yards, but he was confident that time would increase that. Within that fifty yards he could detect even the slightest movement of psyches… squirrels flitting up trees, his mother cleaning in the living room, birds suddenly swooping into his radar and then out of it; at one point, he was enthralled to discover, he sensed two of his neighbors having sex; concentrating hard enough even gave him a blocky kind of understanding of what they were doing, like spying on them with heat goggles, not giving facial details but the outlines of their bodies. That was enough for Timmy.

            Even more useful was the ability to detect lies. He had experimented with this also by watching some television, calling his aunt Gerda, and listening to neighbors talk in their front yards from his window. What he discovered was that he couldn’t detect lies if the person was not right in front of him (such as with television or over the phone) or if he couldn’t understand what the person was saying (such as the distant voices of neighbors). His mother lied very seldom so she wasn’t much of an experiment there, but she was useful in his last experiment.

            Mind control.

            This was his weakest ability so far; he wasn’t very good at it. He attempted to control his mother’s mind ten times: six times she was not affected at all, asking him sweetly why he was commanding her to do stuff; two times she seemed affected some, such as halfway completing the task before returning to her own agenda; two times she seemed affected completely, doing what he said without question. This did not work on animals; he suspected it was because they didn’t understand the English language. In any case, it was very exciting.

            Timmy was planning his eleventh experiment " commanding the boy walking down the street to do something, maybe a cartwheel " when his cell phone vibrated. It was the only person who had ever texted him: Nicolle.

 

            I’m sorry if anything I said today upset you or put you on edge. There is much more about Artistries that I’d like to tell you, if you’d like to meet me. I’m at Boulder Bridges right now… would you come? I know you don’t want to wear sunglasses, but for now I ask that you please do. For me.

 

            Timmy knew Boulder Bridges; it was a park about twenty miles away, a place famed for its beautiful rocky landscape amidst lush forest. He had once attended a Renaissance Fair there.

            Timmy didn’t own any sunglasses, all he had were his normal glasses. He did, however, own some 3-D glasses from the last movie he’d gone to see. For Nicolle, he dug them out from under his bed, put them on, and left.

            Empowered, and for the first time ever. Timmy couldn’t help but smile. Timmy, Artist of the Yellow.

 

            “He texted me back,” Nicolle said, walking up to Vee and Elyse. “He’s coming.”

            “Good,” Elyse said. “From the way you talked about him hating us I was afraid he may not come.”

            “Not me,” Vee said, arms crossed, auburn hair blowing in the wind. “The moment Nicolle said please please please I knew he’d be here.”

            They were already at Boulder Bridges; it was closed but the only thing keeping them out was a sign; as an Artist Nicolle couldn’t help but feel that, if the worst happened and they were caught, one of them would have the Artistry to spring them free. Dominic had left them for a short while, teleporting away in a flash, meaning he had to have returned to either Room 44 or his bedroom. Nicolle expected the bedroom; he would want to tell Elijah first.

            “I don’t see this going well,” Nicolle said. “I’m sorry, I just don’t.”

            “Whether it does or it doesn’t, we have a duty as the Chess Club,” Vee said, throwing acorns at a nearby tree. She stopped and looked at Nicolle. “I think if you play your part well enough, though, it’ll be fine.”

            Nicolle kept her mouth shut, but still… she didn’t like it. Her part required her to say and do things she would never volunteer for normally, but Dominic had nearly begged her. With all of her heart she wished that Timmy Stoker had never developed an Artistry.

            “Something I wanted to talk to you about, Elyse,” Nicolle said. “What all abilities do you have?”

            Elyse put her hand to her chin and looked to the sky, thinking. “Well… I’m pretty nifty in the kitchen. And I can juggle, some, and"”

            “No, no, no,” Nicolle said, returning the just kidding smile Elyse gave her. “You know, Artistries.”

            “Well, let’s see… I can detect lies. I can sense the exact mood of a person. I know where everyone is for about two-hundred, two-hundred-and-fifty yards or so. I can influence the mood of a person somewhat"”

            “How somewhat?” Nicolle asked. “Like… how strong?”

            Elyse shook her head. “Not terribly so. Why?”

            “Timmy lacks your ability to sense other’s emotions, I think,” she said. “And he doesn’t seem to be able to sense where others are as far as you can"”

            “Wouldn’t expect him too,” Elyse said. “I could only sense half of what I can now when I started. It can grow.”

            “But the main thing that concerns me is something he did earlier,” Nicolle continued. “He commanded his mother to go away and she did.”

            Vee turned her attention to Nicolle; Elyse at first looked confused, then troubled.

            “You mean something like mind control?” Elyse asked.

            “Is that possible?” Vee asked, walking over.

            “Theoretically, I guess. But I’ve never been able to do it, not even close.”

            “Well, that’s what it seemed like he did,” Nicolle said.

Suddenly Vee’s phone jingled.

            “Dom,” she said, and she answered it. “Hey. Who all did you get? We’re already here, we’re just waiting on you... yeah, he replied, he’s on his way…”

            “How exciting,” Elyse said. “What an Artistry, to be able to control someone’s mind…”

            Exciting for you maybe, sure. But you’re not the one that Timmy Stoker has been crushing on for forever… or the one that’s been bullying him for years…

            After a moment Vee hung up the phone and returned to them. “They’re on their way.”

            Nicolle felt her phone vibrate and looked at it. Timmy had texted her.

            “He’s about ten minutes away,” she said. “He’s asking me which parking lot I’m parked in so he’ll know where to go.”

            “Okay,” Vee said. “It’s time, then, peeps.”

 

            Timmy felt like a king.

            The journey to Boulder Bridges was fraught with discovery, excitement, and joyous speculation about the future. He sensed others as he drove, seeing their outlines in their houses through the walls of their homes; children sneaking kisses in the bushes, a woman on the toilet, a man behind a house peeking through a neighbor’s window. Hiding was futile as long as the hiding was done inside Timmy’s range of sensing the locations of others. At one point he literally punched the ceiling of his car in uncontainable happiness.

            He would never be the same. This “Artistry” would light a fire in his life that would forever burn.

            He was tempted to stop and try his mind control abilities on passersby but refrained; he had a date to keep, a date set by Nicolle herself. And Boulder Bridges was a beautiful location, a beautiful place for a golden memory to form. What would she say when he got there? He expected to learn more about this entire thing, and maybe… he hoped… she would now be able to truly be with him again, and they could hang out some more.

            He pulled up into the Boulder Bridges gravel parking lot and stopped. Only Nicolle’s car was there, which was perfection… he didn’t want anyone else around, certainly not the bloody Chess Club. He also noticed that the place was closed; that meant that they would have utter privacy, no worries of hikers interrupting their get-together.

            Timmy tried to walk slowly and confidently but his anticipation pushed him to move rather quickly. The entrance was obviously closed; he struggled for a moment to climb over the waist-high gate before opting to go under it instead, forcing his overweight body onto the ground and squeezing through. He hoped no one saw; it wasn’t a very king-like moment.

            He continued into the park, tree-tall boulders on both sides of the path, bridges connecting some of them on the top in case anyone had climbed and wanted to move between them. The nature of Boulder Bridges " the high, rocky terrain " kept him from seeing long distances ahead, but he felt her, saw her outline through the rocks about sixty yards ahead of him. His heart rate picked up.

            Just before he moved into her line of sight he edited his walk, his facial expression, his entire demeanor; he rounded a corner and saw her, standing in a clearing of soft grass; she jumped, apparently not having heard his approach. He smiled gently at her and raised a calming hand.

            “Be not afraid,” he said. “It’s only me, your friend.”

            Nicolle nodded and " nervously " smiled back. “I just didn’t know you were here yet. Thanks for coming.”

            “No, Nicolle… no.” He removed the 3-D glasses with the sophisticated swagger of celebrity. Her eyes widened at the sight of his own. “It is you who has my thanks. I have dreamed of this day"”

            They were all there; he suddenly felt them. How had they arrived without his sensing it first?! To Nicolle’s left and right were two tall boulders covered in pine trees; he saw their outlines behind the trees on both sides. Hiding. Listening.

            “In any case,” Nicolle started, but he stopped her with a quickly risen hand, like the command of a sergeant.

            “STEP OUT!” Timmy yelled angrily. “I KNOW YOU’RE THERE! YOU CAN’T HIDE FROM ME!!”

            Out they came, sunglasses clad, some from the left, some from the right, Timmy’s head tilted back to watch them high above; Nicolle did not turn to look at them but kept watching Timmy, implying that she knew this would happen, that they would appear. His fist tightened to the point of pain.

            Bridges connected all of the boulders that surrounded the clearing; they spread out among those bridges, some on the one directly above Nicolle, others on the bridges to Timmy’s left and right. He felt his blood pressure rise even further; they were making a perimeter, trapping him in.

            The three on the bridge above Nicolle suddenly vanished and reappeared beside her; Timmy yelped without meaning to, the shock of such a sight scaring him; he forced himself to compose as best as he could, however, not wanting to be seen as weak. But he was learning more about the phenomenon known as the Artistry. Apparently some could utilize and influence the space-time grid and assert teleportation.

            He knew the ones that had joined Nicolle on the ground. Elijah Beaumont was one, standing to her left; he was not unaware that she seemed particularly moved by his close proximity. To her right was the girl Vivian van Valen; he’d seen her around Nicolle a lot lately. And standing in front of Nicolle was Elijah Beaumont’s brother, Dominic Beaumont, who looked to have a place of authority in the group.

            “Hello Timmy Stoker,” Dominic Beaumont said in the silence. “You are in the presence of the Chess Club. It is my duty, as president of the Chess Club, to inform you that you are currently under the Seal of the King’s"”

            “Be silent,” Timmy said, his anger showing despite his forced calm. Vivian van Valen’s face grew livid; Elijah Beaumont’s eyebrows lowered. “I won’t have a word of it.”

            Dominic Beaumont allowed Timmy to finish before, taking a deep breath, he said, “It is my duty to inform you that you are under the Seal of the King’s Safety. What you learn here can’t be repeated to anyone else.”

            “Says who?” Timmy asked.

            “Says us,” Vivian van Valen said.

            “Your Chess Club has no authority over me. I came here to talk to Nicolle. All of you can go away. All of you will go away.”

            Laughter suddenly came from Timmy’s upper-left, which seemed to shock everyone; it was the black boy named Darius. The other jock, the one who had mocked him days before, smiled alongside him.

            “We’ve got a live one, guys!” he cheered.

            “STOP MAKING FUN OF ME!” Timmy yelled, and he forced it out with power, as he had when he’d told his mother to leave him alone; Darius stopped laughing with the suddenness of an eye blink; the jock beside him looked on confused, not understanding why his friend would actually comply. Everyone in the clearing watched on in silence.

           

            “Was that an Artistry?” Vee whispered to Nicolle.

            Nicolle heard her but couldn’t nod; this entire thing, all of it, meeting Timmy in the woods, the encircling of the Chess Club, all of it left her feeling nauseous.

            “I will NOT be subject to the whims of another EVER AGAIN!!” Timmy screamed, his fury slopping over like an overfilled glass. “No one, not even the bloody CHESS CLUB will tell me what to do!”

            “We’re not interested in giving you commands,” Dominic said in a raised voice so Timmy could hear him across the clearing. “We don’t want to tell you what to do or make fun of you. But Artists are"”

            “You’re all LIARS!”

            “Timmy, let him finish!” Nicolle pleaded; Timmy’s expression of anger remained but his mouth closed. Dominic " exasperatedly " continued.

            “Artists are powerful. You know that now, Artists can either do tremendous good or tremendous bad. Power like that needs to be governed, it can’t be left to do whatever it wants.”

            “Power like this can’t be governed,” Timmy said.

            “Perhaps,” Dominic conceded. “But we have to try. Answer me this, Timmy… what if Anthony and Clay, the two that attacked you in the lunchroom the other day, turned into Artists tonight? Would you not want their abilities to be governed to some extent?”

            Everyone seemed to expect Timmy to explode again. But he said nothing.

            “We have no interest in controlling you or making fun of you,” Dominic said, shooting a less-than-happy glance at Jackson and Darius. “We simply have a set of rules that we need all Artists to follow or we would have chaos.”

            “I have no intention of causing chaos,” Timmy said. “I merely want order.”

            “We want the exact same thing,” Dominic said.

            Nicolle was distracted by a faint buzzing sound to her left; facing downward she glanced over to see what it could be. Elijah’s pocket was shaking from the vibration of the phone he ignored.

            “Your kind has been part of those that have attempted to oppress me,” Timmy said.

            “If that’s true, then I apologize. But as of today you can be part of this Chess Club, and all of that will stop.”

            “I’m not doing it,” Timmy said calmly. “I won’t join the Chess Club. I won’t cause chaos and I won’t hand out your secrets, but I refuse to be part of such a group.”

            Dominic sighed and, as she expected him to, he turned to look at her, as if saying now it’s your line. Vee sensed Nicolle’s unease and gave her a sympathetic look as she stepped forward.

            “Timmy,” she said; his entire body language changed as she took the stage, relaxing and even looking hopeful. “In the Chess Club we usually have new members stay close by another member for two weeks or so to ensure that everything goes smoothly.” She stalled, not wanting to move forward. “Typically we try to pair members up with someone of the same Artistry… that would be Elyse Robinson, for you.”

            Timmy looked up to Elyse on the bridge above him; she removed her glasses to reveal sultry amber eyes, which he regarded with an expression Nicolle couldn’t read.

            “…but… because we are friends,” Nicolle said, closing her eyes to avoid his expression. “It would be best if I was your guide for those two weeks instead of another. We would be together a fair bit so I could make sure you learn everything you need to learn.”

            She opened her eyes and looked at him. Gone was the anger, the hurt, the anxiety. He looked a little shocked.

            “But I can only be your partner,” Nicolle said painfully, “if you observe the rules of the Chess Club entirely.”

            He didn’t have to say a word. She knew his answer. His eyes were full of the same look he’d had the day she’d confided to him about her Black Eyes, the look that said they were buddies and pals and secret keepers together. Only now those eyes were Yellow.

            He smiled. And then he nodded.