The Year of the Scorpio - Chapter 4

It’s a relatively long walk to Melvin’s house from the Archaic building. I’m hoping that no one will recognize me on our walk back, but I have no such luck.

The second we walk past the small school house, all of the kids rush out to see me. I sigh and stop to talk to them. Melvin stands back, smiling and waving to the couple of kids that waved to him. I’m jealous. Why couldn’t I be the extrinsic who tagged along with the most powerful person on Welloch? I’ve got so much riding on me and he has nothing; no worries.

Finally the teacher comes out and orders them back inside. But before she heads back she makes me promise to stop by the school house in four days after they were done their testing.

“Just come in and talk to them about being a Zodiac.” She explains. “We’ve been talking about the regulars kicking us off of Earth. You would be the perfect person to speak about that.”

“Of course,” I say, smiling at her. She nearly squeals in delight and races back into the school house mumbling about how the kids would be so excited. Once she disappears, the smile falls off of my face.

We continue walking, making our way through the farmlands. There are only five farms on all of Welloch. This is mainly because it is nearly impossible to grow anything from the ground. Even as we walk the path between farms, there are holes in the ground and jagged rocks we must dodge.

The farms eventually give way to the suburbs, where Melvin lives. His house is closer to the city though, so we still have a while to walk.

I’m tired of people recognizing me so I pull up my hood and focus hard to change the color of my eyes. Yes, I can change the color of my eyes. Pretty cool, huh? So now that no one can see my distinct short, black hair with the pink stripe and my blue eyes have turned green, I should be fine. I still have to wear my glasses though. I’m blind without them. But how many people in Welloch wear purple glasses? I bet a lot do.

Now that I look like just another Zodiac, people have stopped being nice to Melvin. I guess when they see him around me they have to be nice because I am who I am. That must be why I never found out that he’s an extrinsic. No one treats him like one when he’s around me and, let’s face it, whenever we’re in the same area we’re together. We’re inseparable.

People keep giving him dirty looks. One person even spits on the ground in front of him. I rush forward, but Melvin holds me back. The person smirks and walks around us as if nothing happened. When I finally calm down, Melvin lets me go.

“Just chill.”

“You’re just going to let someone do that to you?!”

“It happens all of the time,” Melvin says sadly. “I can’t do anything about it. Let’s just go home, okay? Just ignore everyone.” So we walk the rest of the way to Melvin’s house in silence. Plenty of people pass by, but I don’t pay attention to what they do or say to Melvin. I think it’s unfair. I don’t think extrinsics are any different than the rest of us. Sure they were born regulars, but does that really make a difference? They have been blessed by the planets with powers so they are a Zodiac in my book. Melvin was a strong enough regular that the planet Mercury blessed him with the powers of the Gemini. And somewhere in Welloch, he has a Zodiac twin.

The Geminis work as two. The sign is a dual sign which means there’s an opposite of every Gemini. Melvin’s opposite has to be out there somewhere. I’m sure that his opposite will be completely surprised when they learn he is an extrinsic.

We finally reach Melvin’s house. It’s a small shack looking house, much like the rest of the houses in Welloch. Melvin sighs before walking in the door. I feel bad for him. Somehow this place houses four people. Five when I’m over.

“I’m home, Mother.” Melvin calls when we walk in. The powder room is messy, just like every other room in the house. Not that I care, I usually sleep in an alley somewhere. Once I slept on a pile of trash bags. Minus the smell, it was actually pretty comfortable.

The brown wallpaper is peeling off of the walls, revealing a plain, white wall. The carpet beneath our feet is stained with everything from detergent to spaghetti. There are boxes and containers lining the walls and spilling out into the halls. I step over them, careful not to disrupt anything. Melvin’s mother keeps everything a certain way. I don’t want to mess up her system.

“Is Kyra with you?”

“Yes, Mother, Kyra is here!”

Melvin’s mother comes around the corner and practically lights up when she sees me. She has a wide smile on her face and nearly runs to give me a hug. I grimace a little as I hug her, but then I feel guilty because it’s rude.

She’s wearing her cooking apron, no doubt working on dinner; it’s nearly three o’clock. The apron is decorated with splashes of sauces and globs of stuff that I can’t even identify. Her long, red hair is pulled back in a messy ponytail like it always is. And her makeup is disheveled.

It would bother me more if she didn’t always look like this. She’s basically a single mother, with her husband always on Earth, who has to raise twins and an extrinsic son. Melvin is adopted. Did I mention that? Well, he is. It’s quite easy to figure out seeing as his mother is the palest woman on the planet and Melvin’s skin is darker than the dirt.

“It’s so nice to see you!” Melvin’s mother squeals. I raise my eyebrows at Melvin over her shoulder. He shrugs and chuckles a little. I roll my eyes at him.

“It’s nice to see you too, Mrs. Canestro.”

“Please, call me Lalan.” She says, pulling away from me. “Are you hungry, Kyra? I’m working on dinner, but you can steal some of the bread we’re going to have with the spaghetti.” I politely decline, but Lalan won’t have anything of it. She drags me into the kitchen and breaks off a piece of the loaf of bread on the counter.

“Melvin, dear, won’t you go make sure your sisters are doing fine?” Lalan doesn’t wait to see him go before turning back to the food on the stove. Melvin nods and beckons for me to follow him. I couldn’t be more relieved. Lalan is a wonderful person, but she could talk anyone’s ear off. And I’m just not in the mood to talk about my life right now.

The stairs are crooked and I have to be extra careful climbing them. Melvin is used to them and takes them two at a time. I don’t see how he can do it. I nearly twist my ankle walking up one step.

When I reach the landing, Melvin has disappeared. Luckily I remember which room is the twins’. I head into their room and find Melvin on the floor, playing with dolls. I laugh and lean against the door frame.

“What,” Melvin says. “You’ve never seen an older brother playing dolls with his sisters?” I just shake my head and laugh. The twins just had their third birthday a couple of months ago. I remember the party; small, quiet, plenty of cake and ice cream.

One of the twins, Quinn, grabs my hand and pulls me over to where they’re playing. I pick up a doll with green hair (I’d rather not know how its hair turned green) and walked it over to Quinn’s doll. She giggles and starts talking in some gibberish language that I haven’t gotten used to yet. I just smile and nod.

We play until Lalan calls us all down for dinner. Melvin picks up Quinn. I’m not a particularly strong person so I just take the other twin by the hand. Her name is Eliza. Unlike her sister Quinn, Eliza has long hair reaching almost halfway down her back. Quinn keeps her hair short like a boy.

Dinner is laid out on the table when we get downstairs. It’s a delicious dinner of spaghetti, soup, and bread. Even thought the table only sits four, Lalan has squeezed an extra chair in on the corner so I sit with them. I have very little space to move at all, but I don’t mind. A free meal is a free meal. And I already consider Melvin my big brother, so this is like my family.

We spend almost two hours at the dinner table. The twins finished their dinner in close to twenty minutes and then fussed for another ten minutes. Lalan had to take them upstairs and get them ready for bed. Melvin and I didn’t mind. It’s a great opportunity to talk about things without Lalan overhearing. Not that we don’t trust her, it’s just that some things are best kept secret.

We talk for another hour before the conversation turns to the Melvin being an extrinsic.

“So what’s it like, being one of them?” I ask tentatively. I’m not sure how comfortable he is talking about it all. He looks at me curiously like he doesn’t understand the question, but then sighs and looks down at the table.

“To be honest, I don’t remember much,” he answers. “I mean, I remember a lot about Earth, but we go there often so it’s probably just recent memories.”

“Well, do you remember when you changed?”

Melvin shook his head. “The thing about being an extrinsic is that you don’t remember anything about your previous life. It’s like someone snaps their fingers and you’re starting your life all over.”

“So how did you find Lalan?” I ask. This is all too interesting for me and I really want to know everything about Melvin’s life.

“Well, the first few nights spent on Welloch were tough,” Melvin explains. “I was only eleven years old and I didn’t know anyone. Everyone knew I was an extrinsic; they could sense it or something. And to make everything worse, I had no idea where I was.” He tells me about how he spent the first night here asking people if they had a place for him to sleep. No one would give him the time of day, but there was a woman who gave him a blanket and pillow. So he spent three days sleeping on the streets.

There was one night he spent sleeping in an alley with a bunch of other extrinsic kids. One of the kids got in an argument and one thing led to another and they got in a fight. Melvin ended up getting knocked out. He woke up on Lalan’s couch.

“She never let me leave,” he says. “And she’s been a wonderful mother.”

I don’t know what to say. Melvin’s story makes me uncomfortable. The first time he ever stepped foot on this planet, he didn’t know anything. I have been here from the beginning. I was on the first shuttle off of Earth. The second we landed, my parents dragged me off to the mansion that had been built for us.

I have never known struggle. I have never been in want. But Melvin has struggled and even now doesn’t have everything he wants. And I feel like I don’t belong.

Suddenly I wish that I had never agreed to come here. I wish I was out wandering the streets like I do every night. This isn’t where I belong. I shouldn’t be in the same house as Melvin. This life isn’t meant for me.

Melvin yawns and asks if I’m ready to go to sleep. I nod and get up from the table. We clean up the dishes and wipe up as much grime off of the table as possible. It’s still a mess, but Melvin claims that it’s always that way so I leave it.

I follow him upstairs and slip into the bathroom. After locking the door behind me, I stand in front of the mirror. The pink streak in my hair suddenly looks sinister. I claw at it, hoping that it will come out. But it won’t. I know that. It’s there to stay. It has become my mark, the way that everyone knows that I am a Maurey.

This pink needs to go. I refuse to be recognized as a royal, someone so closely related to the Archaic. Someone so closely related to those who want to dispose of the regulars.

I straighten up when someone knocks on the door. I open the door to see Melvin standing there with a towel and washcloth.

“Thought you might want to take a shower,” he says. “I’ll set up the bed for you.” He disappears down the hall. I quickly shut the door and fall to the ground. The tears come before I can stop them.

For once, I’m not crying for myself; I’m crying for Melvin and the life he has to live. Sure I’ve been to his house before, but it all seems worse now that I know he’s an extrinsic. Out of all of the families to adopt him, did it have to be the Canestros? I know that there are richer families out there, ones who have a clean, orderly house.

But Lalan is the best parent a kid could ask for. I don’t remember much about my parents, seeing as they died when I was only seven years old, but I do know that they never treated me as well as Lalan treats her kids.

I let myself cry until all of the tears are gone. Then I get up and take a shower, washing away all of the guilt I have about getting to live a better life than Melvin. The first seven years of my life were better than the past six years will ever be for him. And it hurts me to think about it.

I wrap myself in the towel and walk down to Melvin’s room. There’s a pile of clothes sitting on the purple sheets of his bed. He picks up the clothes and offers them to me.

“Lalan thought you might want some new clothes,” he blushes when he hands them to me and turns back to rearranging the bed. He must be embarrassed that Lalan is giving me her clothes. I know I am. She doesn’t need to do that. But after seeing that she gave me a black tank top and cargo pants, I’m happy. I love cargo pants. I go to the bathroom to change and then head back to Melvin’s room.

“You really don’t have to give me the bed,” I say, watching him lay out a sleeping bag on the floor. “I can sleep on the floor. It’s your house anyway.” Melvin just shakes his head and tells me to go to sleep. I roll my eyes, tell him goodnight, and close my eyes.

But sleep never comes. No matter how tight I squeeze my eyes shut, no matter how much I try to think of something boring, sleep never comes. I’m too preoccupied thinking about what Macey had said.

Phillip is planning something. And we’d like to know what it is.

Of course Phillip is planning something. So am I. But I’m not about to tell the Archaic about our plan to overthrow them. If I told them, they could stop us. And I know that Macey knows we’re planning something like that. How could she not? She’s the leader of the Archaic and has spies in every part of Welloch.

I toss and turn for hours, Melvin’s snores not helping the fact that I can’t sleep. Around three o’clock in the morning, I get up and slide my shoes on. Without a sound, I climb out the window and jump to the ground. Actually, I more float to the ground then anything. With my ability to slow time, the ground gets closer at an alarmingly slow rate. It’s pretty cool.

A gust of wind blows by, making me shiver. I wish I had brought a jacket. It may have been summer time, but the nights get really cold here.

When I jumped down here, I had no idea where I was going to go. All I knew was that I needed to go somewhere. So I head off in the direction of the Scorpio sector.

Hey, if you’ve got no where to go, why not sneak around to observe your enemy?