Revelations
Marcus came to school earlier than usual the next morning, hoping to see the professor in the corridor before class. His backpack was heavy, and the orb on the cover of the book was pushing against his spine. He couldn’t wait to show it to the professor, but he wasn’t anywhere to be found. After a boring hour and a half of math and an even less productive hour of biology, Marcus went to the school cafeteria for his lunch break.
Sitting alone at a small table by the far wall of the room was Professor Adams. He was reading the local newspaper, drinking the last few sips from his coffee cup. Marcus walked over to the table and sat down in the empty chair opposite to him. Marcus moved the cup a few inches to make room for the mysterious, empty book. He hadn’t even opened the backpack before the professor was questioning his behavior.
“What are you doing, Lee?” The professor looked confused while folding the newspaper. “Have you come to explain why you skipped my class yesterday? Well, speak!” His gaze was set on Marcus, watching as he took out the book and put it on the table. The symbol lit up the wall and the eyes of the people in the cafeteria turned to see what was going on at their table. The Professor’s eyes and mouth were wide open, but it didn’t take him long before coming to his senses.
“Put that book down immediately, this is not the time or place for this discussion,” The professor held his palm over the glowing orb, covering the light it was emitting. His eyes were looking straight into Marcus’s. Marcus carefully broke the eye contact, took the book from under Professor Adams’s hand and put it back in his backpack. He saw the eyes in the cafeteria turn back to their lunches. He turned his back to the professor’s. There was a smile on the professor’s lips, a smile that Marcus hadn’t seen before. A mysterious smile, and somehow Marcus knew that the professor had information about the book. They both leaned back into their chairs.
“What are your plans for this evening?” The professor returned to his academic, stone-cold face and picked up the newspaper again.
“I’ll be writing that essay for History you’ve made us write.” Marcus had no intention of actually following through with this claim.
“In other words, you’re free?” the professor looked at Marcus over his rimless glasses.
“How do you mean, ‘free’?” Marcus wasn’t sure what the professor was after.
“Well, not ‘free’ in a general sense. I meant ‘free’ as in ‘available for a social gathering’. You could call it a party, a celebration” the professor was not behaving as he usually did during class. He was always strict and stiff, standing still during his lectures, sitting quietly while drinking his coffee, so the thought of going with him to a party and seeing his teacher perform silly dance moves was amusing to Marcus. He snickered at the professor:
“A party? Who are we celebrating?” Professor Adams corrected his glasses and the mystifying smile grew back to his lips. He leaned forward and whispered slyly:
“You, Marcus. I’ll pick you up at seven.”
Marcus’s couldn’t help himself, he started laughing. He rested his face in his hands, trying to stop thinking about candid camera shows; he could have sworn that the professor was pulling his leg. It didn’t take a minute until he was prepared to try and pick up the conversation again. He looked up to where the Professor had been sitting, but he was already gone, nowhere to be seen in the cafeteria. Left on the table was the empty coffee cup.
The sudden party-invitation-disappearance act of the Professor puzzled Marcus for the remainder of the day. He didn’t have anything to eat in the cafeteria, and during gym class he got hit in the face with a basketball. When he was walking home, he almost walked into the Indian gift shop on impulse, but noticed his mistake just in time to keep walking by. When he got home and came in through the front door, his mother asked how his day at school had been; his response was a mentally exhausted “Yeah.”
To Marcus’s own surprise, the digital clock on his desk soon showed half passed six, and the essay on the Second World War under his pencil was finished. He had written for four hours straight. Nine pages of perfectly organized facts about the madness and terror that had swept across the world was the result of his work. It was the longest piece he had ever written. He noticed how his stomach was growling, and it wasn’t really a surprise; he hadn’t eaten anything during the day. He would try to find something to eat before the professor came to pick him up.
He pulled his backpack with the book still inside it over his shoulder before tiptoeing down the stairs. He checked on his mother in the living room, and as expected, Jane was already boozed to sleep on the couch, with some Discovery Channel special about chimpanzees showing on the muted television. Marcus picked up the remote, turned off the TV and pulled a blanket over his mother’s bare feet. Back to the search for food.
In the fridge, he found some leftovers from the previous day, but he didn’t have time to put the slice of pizza in the microwave before hearing a car horn on the driveway. He was worried that the noise might wake his mother, so he hurried to the front door, slipped into his shoes and carefully opened and closed the door behind him.
The car that was parked with its headlights facing the house was not a particularly pretty sight. It was brown all over, and Marcus couldn’t determine whether it was a paint job or just rust. In the driver seat, Professor Adams was gesturing Marcus to hurry, and so he did. Soon they were driving south, out of Toledo.
