The dingy walls looked as if they hadn’t been washed in decades. Most of the dirt was plastered with eroded tape that once held educational posters from years past, only to be replaced by new ones peppered throughout the halls. Yet none of this seemed to distract my presence from the banter that would ensue. As much as the name-calling, vicious taunting, and snarls contributed to my vulnerable insecurities, the disgusted stares from girls frightened me the most—as if I had the plague. I knew right then I was going to be their designated target for the rest of the school year. Though I tried painfully hard not to let them see that it bothered me, inside I was broken, even angry at times with my parents, because they didn’t make any effort to clothe us better. It wasn’t their fault, though, and my anger toward them was unjust.
I didn’t have many clothes, but I always seemed to have a dress for special occasions, which I would begrudgingly wear to please my mother. I absolutely hate wearing dresses. I find it cumbersome to pose like a statuette for others, restraining myself from getting dirty, or, God forbid, sitting with my legs uncrossed.
One time, when I was eight, I was invited to Shelly Baskins’s birthday party. I was among girls whose social status was indicative of their behavior. They all seemed so comfortable in their lavishly extravagant dresses, while I awkwardly wore my homemade attire.
Before opening presents, we all gathered outside, where the backyard resembled more of an enchanted forest than your typical half-maintained lawn. I had to restrain myself from naturally wanting to squat and pee behind a bush like I did when I was out hunting. Now, I normally use indoor plumbing when convenient, but when I’m in the woods, nothing feels quite as natural as relieving yourself among nature. I restrained myself from doing that, of course, for the courtesy of others.
Shelly Baskins—I really hated that girl. Okay, hate is a strong word, but I badly wanted to spit in her food, if not on her smug face. She was the rich girl at my school who would undoubtedly let you know it. If you weren’t part of her circle of friends, you were teased, taunted, and ridiculed unmercifully. I was invited only because my mother and Shelly’s mom knew each other, and Shelly had a crush on Gabe, but I know it tore her up inside to have to invite me just to see Gabe. Really, eight years old and having a crush on a boy. I thought boys were disgusting at that age. What made her so special?
This was the same person who purposefully spilled grape juice on my white blouse at the Christmas pageant, the one who slowly dripped candle wax in my hair, leaving it virtually unmanageable for a week.
Oh, I absolutely detested Shelly, with her insufferable childish pranks, but I felt sorry for her at the same time. Six months later, her mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer. As angry as I was about her menacing hatred toward me, seeing her cry uncontrollably at school over her mother’s fate changed my heart for her. I knew what it was like to have someone very dear to you become ill and helpless. In that instant, I forgave her for all that she had done to me. After that day, we never spoke again.
I’m usually fishing, hunting, practicing martial arts, or playing sports while other girls worship their nails with fancy polish, or prancing around like Disney princesses until someone notices them. I try hard to hide my figure, not flaunt it in a constricted dress.
I may be a little rough around the edges, but I’m not oblivious to the fact that I’m still a girl. In fact, I’ve unfortunately developed physically much faster than the other girls my age. Some call it a blessing, while I see it as a curse. I don’t need boys gawking at me for approval, nor do I see them as equals, intellectually speaking, of course.
I don’t hate guys—in fact, if the right one does exist, I’ll snatch him up in a heartbeat. I just don’t see the need to drool over knuckle-dragging Neanderthals who want to pry into more than just my thoughts. My body is sacred, and it should be treated as so. I’m not at all afraid of guys; I can handle them just fine. It’s the catty girls I detest, and they don’t seem to mind teasing you and giving you a complex until you develop an eating disorder. Girls can be absolutely cruel to one another. I can only imagine what my brother must have gone through with his personal bullies.
My brother is frail and meek. He is the kind of person who will help you out when you least expect it and never expect anything in return. When he is being picked on, he retracts quickly and recoils with kindness out of defense. He’s a bit delusional about his peers. He tries hard to see the good in them and somehow change their ill will toward him without dispute. Even though I agree with him, it doesn’t come as natural to me. I guess people like him and Grace are badly needed in this world if it’s to survive.
He is one of the smartest fourteen-year-old kids I know, excuse me, now fifteen. He will never admit it because of his humble nature, but his gift is surely that of intelligence. He tested off the charts during an IQ test when he was ten years old. Periodically, my brother saw a specialist to monitor his mental and behavioral growth when he was younger.
Gabe had a condition when he was born. The swelling on his brain was considered life threatening, and the doctors told my parents that he
would unlikely survive the first year of his life. I don’t know why, but my mother never told us until his motor skills and general IQ were first tested. His level of intelligence at that time clearly enticed doctors and specialists to evaluate him daily. It wasn’t until my mother insisted that he was left alone after a month of prodding.
Gabe often felt sick and depressed every time he was taken to the specialists. I think deep inside he pretended to be sick and non-responsive during that month just so he could be back at home. He would purposefully fail tests to avoid being a lab rat for the rest of his young years. Smart as he is, he is still a boy at heart.
I, on the other hand, have deep-seated anger toward anyone who pushes my brother around. I’m not as forgiving as Gabe, though the humbling experiences in my life have greatly changed that. I know revenge is something we were taught to avoid, but I’m strong enough to defend myself and do whatever is necessary to protect my family, especially my bullied brother. Though we’re twins, I still feel like a big sister.
I was taught by the best in combat training from Uncle Finnegan, who was a former Special Ops leader, but martial arts has changed the way I defend myself.
When Finnegan stayed with us those three years before our parents died, he taught me and Gabe the essentials of survival. Though it may have seemed a bit nonsensical for our age, I never once questioned our time together.
I think Gabe was actually more helpful to Finnegan than Finnegan was to him. Finnegan always had a knack for encouraging our gifts, and Gabe’s certainly never went unnoticed. Finnegan was always impressed by some of the technological advances in Gabe’s inventions, and he would almost demand that Gabe show off some of his gadgets to his special teams’ coordinator. But Gabe was extremely protective of his inventions, and because he didn’t have a patent on any of them, he kept them to himself.
He still invents today, but not with the same passion he had before. I believe it’s his way of coping with the loss of our parents.
I’ve seen what Gabe can do. It’s not only impressive; it’s a joy watching someone practice what they were gifted to do. Talent shouldn’t be wasted, and if I could just figure out what mine is, I’d be more than happy to pursue it. I do recognize some of my gifts, but I don’t necessarily know how I would ever use them for a career. I’m excellent with knives, archery, hand-to-hand combat, and just about any kind of hand gun, most of which I learned from Finnegan. Not that I’m
trying to boast about my skills, I just feel quite confident about them and it comes natural to me, just like physics comes naturally to Gabe.
An eight year old playing with throwing knives probably isn’t ideal, but it was the childhood I had come to know. I know my parents wouldn’t have approved of Finnegan teaching me such things, but it’s what I was good at. I would practice every day out in the woods, far enough away so my mother wouldn’t suspect anything. Finnegan and I kept it our little secret. That’s just how he bonded with me. Parental guidance wasn’t his strong suit, but I guess being in the military most of your life and having no kids blinds you to common sense.
Although my mother didn’t have a clue about all the weapons Finnegan exposed me to at an early age, she was very grateful for his presence while my father was away most of the time working. Regardless of the paternal detachment I may have had growing up, it was Finnegan who taught me the fundamentals of self-sufficiency. I don’t begrudge my father for not being around. I realized how hard he worked to keep our family surviving, but it would have been nice to be around him more while I was young.
Finnegan taught me very well about the art of warfare, how to be invisible to my enemies, and sly enough to be virtually unseen to the deadliest killer. This is probably why I didn’t play with dolls all that much as a kid, or have tea parties with the neighborhood girls, because of Finnegan’s nonsensical way of living vicariously through me, as if I was the son he always wanted. I guess he noticed right away that I had the potential to be an efficient and effective hunter. He taught me how to hunt for food and not sport. I’m absolutely opposed to sport hunting. The idea carries no sensible purpose, and I detest the very thought of it. I knew of several hunters in town who took pleasure in killing for the fun of it, and I was all too eager to let Finnegan know about it. When I was eight years old, Finnegan showed me and Gabe how to counter such scum.
We would set trip wires along the tree line of the back bank where most of the deer would stroll. This was the only creek in the area that wasn’t dry. Finnegan knew exactly where the poachers would set up for the best line of sight to the deer. He was always one step ahead of them.
We set up decoys in that line of sight, just across the creek. They looked incredibly real, and no one would ever know the difference. When the hunters came to the spot that Finnegan said they would, it was all too easy to deceive those rednecks. After shots were fired, striking the decoys down, the idiots quickly ran toward their kill, half-drunk of course, tripping the lines we set. From there it was too hilarious not
to laugh, yet I restrained myself by covering my mouth with my shirt so we weren’t heard.
The tripped wires gave way to a large, rotting branch as our counter weight that was slightly supported by a steel rod. When the lines were pulled by the hunters’ feet, the steel flung out like a cannon shot, leaving the half-ton branch falling with force and pulling a net, camouflaged with leaves, up in the air with our prey. The hunters became the hunted, and I reveled in every minute of it. My sides delightfully hurt from the laughter, seeing beards and butt cracks pressed tightly against the hanging mesh. That was probably the last time I ever laughed that hard with enjoyment.
Before Finnegan was deployed, he left me with his mentor and good friend, Henry Matsuda, to make sure I continued with my martial arts training. I guess he knew something I didn’t, but nevertheless, I greatly enjoyed it, and I have been training ever since three to four times a week. Henry is a very understanding teacher when it comes to managing time, but when we are training, he unremittingly pushes me to the point of exhaustion. While it wears me out, I crave enough of it to come back for more—it’s an addiction. Not only does it make me stronger, it keeps me from drowning further into depression after the death of my parents. I train, while Gabe invents. This gives us the needed skills to mask our internal pain.
It’s been nearly five years since we’ve seen Finnegan. Apparently, he was needed for a highly classified special ops arrangement, but we never heard from him again. Not a single letter, call, or visit. No one knew where he was, and the government never shed any light on the subject. I could only conclude one of two things: his location and status was top secret and kept hidden from kin, or he was dead. As much as I wanted to believe the former, I heavily considered the later as reality. That’s about the time when the unrest started here in America.
It’s 2053 in the year of our Lord, and much has changed in our nation’s capital in the last six years. The providence of our democracy has diminished, and yet they glean it to be well preserved. Our precious government has weakened our country, empowering other nations to take strong measures in changing the very foundation it was built on. The freedom that we as a people who have shed our blood for, struggled to maintain, and even waged war in an effort to keep its existence no longer stands strong.
The deep roots holding this country together have been poisoned by greed, power, and the governing evil that prevents us from making civil choices. We have become a nation that heavily depends on others
to stay afloat in this economical downfall. Ever since the great quakes shook the Earth four years ago, killing hundreds of millions across the world, including our very own nation, it has destroyed any selfless desire to recoup. With the San Andreas Fault collapse leaving most of California completely under water, killing nearly seventeen million people, and the New Madrid fault line scarring the central part of the country, killing more than eleven million, America has experienced a catastrophic economic collapse.
Cash no longer exists and has been replaced by credits, a government-designed monetary system that allows us to earn points based on the contributions we provide to the federal government. The CCD, Central Credits Distribution, which is networked throughout the entire nation, automatically deposits funds to your identification card based on salary or hourly pay from your job. Much in that aspect works the same as it had before— you work and you get paid, except with credit points. When these points are added to our identification cards, the government evaluates each individual, knowing what each person is worth to them.
They keep close tabs on anyone they feel is suspicious for what they are buying, or, more importantly, where they buy it. The freedom we thought we had has vanished. Unfortunately, many people are still convinced, naïve, delusional, or just plain brainwashed that the government is looking out for our every need. I guess the only freedom we have left is whether or not we blindly accept it.