Jelly Cooper: Alien

I trudge into the shelter of a small ring of trees. Exhausted, I can barely stand, but the other two are invigorated. Must be some kind of opposite energy pulsing between them, energising the two. Like hatred.

I’m not sure I can do this.

“Right,” Agatha is all enthusiasm. “Let’s sit in a circle. We’ll put the thing that Jay’s trying to levitate in the centre and we’ll all concentrate on lifting it.” She shrugs. “Maybe it’ll help. We should start with something small…” she scurries off, scanning the ground.

Rhiannon shakes her head. “I can’t believe you people are for real. She actually believes you, doesn’t she?”

I ignore her. She’ll see soon enough, fingers crossed.

Who am I kidding? This is ridiculous!

Agatha runs back into the clearing, her arms filled with treasures.

“Look what I’ve found,” breathless, she deposits her find on the ground.

“Nice junk, loser.”

Agatha ignores Rhiannon and picks up a tin can. “Exhibit A: an empty can. This is the lightest of the lot, so this is what we’ll start with.”

Placing it back onto the ground, she grabs another item.

“Exhibit B: driftwood.” She weighs it in her hands. “This is surprisingly light, and it’s bigger than the can, so this can go next. Then this funny shaped rock,” she pauses, “and then…me.”

“HA!”

Seeing that Agatha is serious, I sober, a little bit.

“What, I’m supposed to go from an empty can to a fully fledged human being in three easy steps?” I shake my head. “Never going to happen.”

Agatha stares at me with a fixed expression. The one that doesn’t budge, just like her. “You said that you had to do this thing fast, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t be thorough. There’s no point stopping half way.”

“But –

“NO,” Agatha isn’t going to be shaken on this one. “You levitate the can first, then the wood, the rock, and me. We’re wasting time.” She turns to Rhiannon. “Sit down.”

I watch with a smile as Rhiannon lowers herself into a sitting position. Man, does that lady know how to muster disdain. I plonk myself onto the ground with my usual lack of grace. Sand fluffs up all around me.

Agatha places the can in the middle of the triangle then seats herself in the gap. “Now,” she says, “we all look at the can and imagine it lifting off the ground. Jelly, you’ll be doing your thing and we’ll all be trying to help, won’t we Rhiannon?”

“You’re really loving this, aren’t you Scully?”

Agatha pulls a face at Rhiannon, who turns to me and says,

“If you weren’t just as bad, I wouldn’t know how you can suffer hanging around with these defects.”

I push my knuckles into my eyes. I don’t know how much more of this I can take.

“Just look at the damn can, the both of you.”

I ignore them and focus on the can lying crumpled on the patchy grass. I block out every other sight and sound from my mind as I focus in on the can. I hear the sound of my heartbeat as I tune into my own rhythm, letting my breathing slow and deepen. It takes time, but I find my way to the calm place inside of me. The click.

Unaware of anything other than the can, I imagine myself reaching out my hand and picking it up.

“This is so stupid,” Rhiannon whispers.

“Shut up,” Agatha whispers back.

“Like anything’s going to happen.”

“Shut up! Concentrate.”

“This is just so stupid.”

“Rhiannon, if you don’t…”

I hear the whispering, but it’s like I hear the words in a different part of my head; a room with a door that I can pull shut. I close the door and visualise one thing: picking up the can.

Breathe. Concentrate. Breathe. Concentrate. Breathe. Concentrate. Breathe…

My heart beating steady and slow, I breathe out at length and feel something reach out from within me.

Hmm. Interesting. I can see a silvery thread weaving its way through the air towards the can. When I read Rhiannon’s mind, I could only feel the tentacle. Now I’m trying to use it tangibly, I can see it. I wonder if there’s any significance to this, or if anyone else can see it. The thread caresses the can gently with translucent fingers, rocking it back and forth. Concentrating, I push harder. The thread reacts to the silent command and wraps its spidery tendrils around the can, harnessing it in a silver bridle. Smiling, I lift my eyes.

Rhiannon shrieks and scrabbles to her feet. “Holy shit! I thought you were kidding. What’s going on? What’s she doing?”

“Rhiannon?” Agatha breathes, her eyes locked on the can.

“Uh-huh.”

“Shut up and sit down.”

She does.

The can rises into the air. It tilts from side to side, revolving in mid air like a circus trapeze artist.

“Are we doing that?” Rhiannon breathes.

Agatha rolls her eyes. “No, idiot. She is.”

I tilt my head and the can pitches to the left. I nod and the can bobs up and down in the air.

“This is awesome,” Agatha whispers, jumping to her feet. “Really awesome.”

I stand up and the can climbs higher into the air and bobs expectantly, waiting.

“Agatha, sit back down. I want to try something.”

I hold out my arms and the can spins around me. Everything else blurs into a mosaic of swirls and colours. Only the can remains clear, spinning though the air faster and faster. It circles me like a moon.

Spinning to a stop, I pause, letting the can still.

“Agatha. Catch.”

With one toss of my head, I send the can sweeping through the air.

Agatha reaches out, fumbling as she tries to make the catch. The can twists in her fingers and falls to the floor. She looks up, stricken.

I can’t help laughing. “It’s not a problem, Agatha.” My eyes lock onto the can and I lift it until it hovers in front of her.

Hmm. I can spin it and throw it. What else?

Sucking in a short breath, I reel it in, letting it rest inches in front of my face. I stare at it for a while, then I will the can to flatten. In a hail of squeaking and crunching, it forms into a rough, bumpy, disk.

“Okey dokey,” I whisper under my breath. Spinning on my heel, I yank my head to the left and send it spinning through the air. As it gathers speed, a rumbling noise swells in my head. I push harder and launch it towards the furthest tree trunk in sight. It impales the bark and hangs there, buried deep.

I walk towards the tree. With no surprise, I see that the can is firmly embedded in the trunk. I turn back to face the others and I shrug.

“I can run if I need to. I can read people’s thoughts, for what good it’ll do me, and I can fight back if I have to.” I smile.

Agatha, I notice with irritation, is frowning.

“What?”

“You are getting the hang of this a bit quick, don’t you think?”

Here we go.

“I know this may seem strange,” I say, not expecting Agatha to understand, “but it feels right. It’s like second nature.” I lift my shoulders. “I just know what to do. It’s like those people who have never played piano or guitar before and they can just play, straightaway, without any lessons or anything, you know?”

“Ooh, I’ve got a cousin like that,” Rhiannon gushes. “When he was six, he got a toy drum set and he could just play it, right from the start. His parents were amazed. They…”

She stops, embarrassed.

Amused, I nod.

“That’s the sort of thing I’m talking about. I can’t really explain it. Anyhow, you should be pleased that I’m such a fast learner. We don’t have that much time, remember.”

“Woah up there. What’s all this ‘we’ business?” Rhiannon splutters. “I’m not a part of your freaky little gang. I’m here against my will.”

She can’t get the words out quick enough, can she? Witch.

Oh well, she does have a point I suppose.

Agatha ignores her, so I follow her lead and do the same. “You’re right, I guess,” she says.

“Good,” I check my watch. “Time’s ticking on and we don’t want to get stuck here. I’m going to skip the other stuff and move on to you, Ag, if you don’t mind.”

Agatha pales. Her eyes flit to the can. I chuckle.

“Calm down, it won’t be anything like that, I promise.”

“OK,” she nods, nervous. “Shall I sit, or stand?”

“Stand. Rhiannon, you stand by her side, just in case.”

“Just in case?” Agatha yelps. “What do you mean, just in case?”

I smile wickedly. “Kidding! This’ll be a piece of cake, you’ll see. Relax. Now, be still.”

I stare into Agatha’s eyes and conjure the deep pounding rhythm of my heartbeat. I focus and block out everything except the pair of scared violet eyes staring back at me. I focus, I breathe, I reach.

Silver arms shoot from my chest. They fly through the air towards Agatha. She giggles as the invisible bands wrap themselves around her arms and legs. The moment I’m sure that Agatha is secure, I raise my eyes.

Nothing happens.

I feel a flutter of unease in my stomach and I flip it aside. I can do this. Piece of cake. I push harder.

The air surrounding Agatha starts to tremble and vibrate and glow.

“Jelly?”

“Stay calm, Agatha. Everything’s OK – OK?”

“I’m getting warm!”

“It’s OK, Ag. Just give me one more minute.”

Blowing out my cheeks, I lift my head. My eyes drill into Agatha’s. She starts to rise, but makes slow and shaky progress.

Come on…come on.

Agatha floats slowly back to earth. NO – I can do this. I CAN!

I concentrate harder, my whole body shaking with effort and frustration. Agatha inches higher into the air. Sweat breaks out on my forehead. This isn’t going to beat me. No way. I can do this. I can do this!

I can’t do this!

Agatha drops slowly to the ground and looks at me with big wide eyes. I let all of my breath out and realise that I’m doomed. No one is going to come and rescue me and all of my loved ones are in danger. The pounding in my heart grown stronger. It accelerates until nothing else remains.

And suddenly, I get it.

My muscles relax and I close my eyes.

I see Agatha, floating a couple of inches above the ground. I picture her floating higher.

Agatha squeals.

“Jelly, open your eyes. What are you doing? Open your eyes!”

I smile, eyes still shut.

“Shhh. It’s fine, I promise. Trust me.”

In my mind’s eye I see Rhiannon, staring, mouth open. I imagine her next to Agatha and up she goes. I smile at her yelled protest. I picture them bobbing up and down, one after the other.

Rhiannon yelps and I snigger.

Oh, come on! Of course I’m going to have fun with this. Never look a gift horse in the mouth is what my mother would say.

“Hey, cut it out,” Agatha calls, her voice wavering as she travels through the air.

Smiling, I set them back on terra firma. I open my eyes and know that they are gleaming.

“Oh, wow. This is so strange,” I whisper.

Agatha, disgruntled at the whole bobbing up and down thing, brushes twigs and leaves from her skirt.

“Really? I thought that all of this was second nature to you. What could possibly be so strange?”

“Now, now,” I soothe. “Don’t get upset.”

Agatha sniffs and for one surreal moment, reminds me of Rhiannon.

“What’s so strange, then?” she finally asks, pretending not to be that interested.

“It’s getting easier. At first, I couldn’t manage it, but then something clicked and it wasn’t a problem anymore. It was easy. Really, really easy. Easy peasy. Waaaaaaaaaay too easy.”

I turn to Agatha, prickles of fear crawling up my spine. I don’t know if it’s the aftershock of being attacked by the Hunter in broad daylight, or exhaustion catching up with me, but it’s all too much. I’m fourteen, for crying out loud, and until a couple of days ago I was a prickly teenage girl. Girl – not alien. GIRL!

I snag my bottom lip between my teeth and look around, seeing Agatha and Rhiannon properly for the first time since grabbing them from school. Oh God, I grabbed them from school. I took them. I brought them here, with me, when a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a thing from outer space is after me, coming for me, going to kill me, going to rip out my insides, going to tear out my heart, going to wrap his hands around my throat and squeeze and squeeze and never let go until all of the breath is out of my body and my eyes almost pop out of my head and my tongue is going to be fat and purple and oh God, oh God, oh God.

“Is she crying?”

“Rhiannon, leave it.”

“Oh my God, she is – she’s crying!”

I fall to the floor.

Humphrey strides into the clearing.

“SHUT UP!”

He kneels next to me, scattering sand in my lap.

Thank God. And what is with my friends scattering sand in my lap?

I roll over and put my head on his knees. “There’s something wrong with me Humphrey.”

“There’s nothing wrong with you, Jelly.” He rubs my back. “Well, obvious alien thing aside.”

I hiccup and he chuckles. I peek up at him.

“I can’t do this without you.”

He looks at me back.

“I know.”

Humphrey smiles and ruffles my hair.

“Good,” I say, wiping away the last of the tears. “Because I need you. You were right, though, when you said all that stuff. Every word of it was true.”

“I know.”

“When did you get here anyway?” I ask.

He shrugs. “Just then. I walked through the bushes and saw you crying on the floor.” He tilts his head at Rhiannon. “What did the She-Witch do to you?”

“As if!” I squeal and Humphrey winks at me.

“I heard that,” Rhiannon grumbles, but we ignore her.

I grab Humphrey’s hand and haul myself to my feet. I shake the last of the sand from my clothes and wipe the snot from my nose.

“Wanna see something really cool?”

Humphrey smiles and the part of myself that was about to be lost turns around and looks back over its shoulder.

I take one deep breath and nod to myself, once. Time to play the game and get this thing done.

An hour later, knackered but happy, I lie on the ground with my two best friends. Humphrey shakes his head for the seventh or eighth time, a massive grin on his face.

I grin back. “It’s not a bad perk, is it?”

Agatha rolls over onto her front and cradles her head in her hands. She squints at Humphrey.

“What did Rhiannon say to you back there at the bus stop?”

Rhiannon, who hasn’t bothered with us at all for the past hour (apart a smug “look who’s back” thrown at me just after Humphrey’s arrival), lifts her head at the sound of her name.

“Just leave me out of it, OK?”

Agatha throws a twig at Humphrey.

“Tell us, come on. You had a go at Jelly for keeping secrets, so you’ll be a hypocrite if you keep it to yourself.”

Hmm, there’s logic there somewhere.

“Can’t we just go home? There’s not much left that Jelly can levitate.”

Rhiannon sounds bored rather than urgent, but even I’m starting to wonder what was said during their little conflab.

“Come on Humph. Agatha does have a point.”

Humphrey raises his head and displays an impressive double chin as he looks over at the unusually quiet cheerleader.

“Rhiannon?”

She shrugs.

“Whatever. I don’t imagine for one second that the get-along-gang keeps secrets from each other, so go ahead, knock yourselves out.” She sits up and gets to her feet, brushing sand from her skirt. “I’m going for a walk.”

With three pairs of eyes trained on her back, she strides out of the clearing.

I whistle a low whistle.

“What was up with that?”

“Who knows what goes on in a cheerleader’s head?” says Agatha. “Not me, for sure. So,” she says, flopping onto her back, “tell us, Humph.”

Humphrey picks a blade of grass and sticks it between his teeth.

“She said lots of things that I ignored, like how ‘pathetic’ I was being and how I was such a big ’loser’. Humphrey makes an ‘L’ shape on his forehead with his thumb and forefinger and I burst out laughing. Sounds like Rhiannon.

“She was getting me really mad,” Humphrey says, rolling the grass over his teeth. “Then she said that I was the worst excuse for a best friend that she’d ever seen and it’s no wonder there are only three of us”.

My laughter dies. Humphrey’s eyes swivel in my direction.

“It stings when she’s right, doesn’t it?” he says.

“Like no pain I’ve known,” I reply.

Twigs snap underfoot as Rhiannon returns. Faced with three pairs of inquiring eyes, her face turns pink.

“Just thought you’d want to know that we’ve missed the tide.”

Shit.

We tear through the shrubbery towards the runway, arriving on the beach amidst collective groans of dismay. While we’ve been chatting, the sea has stealthily crept back to claim the land.

“How do we get out of this, oh magic one?”

“That’s really funny Rhiannon, not to mention helpful. Thanks.”

Agatha, who can manage two strokes and a bubble before sinking, is very pale. I squeeze her hand.

“It’s OK, Ag.”

“How can it be OK? We’re going to starve to death if we stay here and we’re going to drown if we go out there,” she gestures at the sea.

“No,” Humphrey shakes his head. “We’ll die of thirst before we starve.”

Agatha moans.

Surveying the length of the water, I scan the far away beach, screwing up my eyes against the sun. Satisfied that the cove at the end of the beach is unpopulated, I turn back to the others.

“Keep calm and if you feel sick, close your eyes.”

“Oh dear,” mumbles Humphrey.

“Here we go,” I breathe. Closing my eyes, I imagine myself stood beside my friends. Seeing Rhiannon stood a little way off, I reach out to her and feel the familiar thudding in my head. Mercury threads slither their way towards the cheerleader and wrap themselves around her body like a harness, lifting and carrying her towards the rest of us, her feet bobbing inches above the ground. I entwine us all in the same silvery thread and we rise, as one, to hover alongside Rhiannon.

I imagine us all speeding our way across the water and feel a tugging in the pit of my stomach. Wind rushes at my face and my hair streams out behind me as I fly through the air. Hearing the others gasp and squeal, I open my eyes and take a peek at their grinning faces. I laugh out loud as we zip along.

We reach the beach in seconds and, reluctantly, I slow our flight and drop us onto the warm sand. Humphrey rushes forward and gives me a massive hug.

“That was amazing! Just like flying,” he spins me round, “oh wow, that was so cool.”

“Put me down, stupid,” I giggle, secretly pleased. Things are falling into place, I can feel it. Getting back my breath and my balance after all that dizzying spinning, I scan the cliff tops just to make sure that no one saw us.

Someone did.

A figure stands silhouetted on the cliff top. He watches us and, despite the heat of the day, goosebumps race across my skin.

Oh-oh.

The others haven’t seen him and I want to keep it that way. I squint against the sunlight. The light is so bright behind the figure that I can’t make out his face. I take a step closer to the cliffs and he retreats backwards until he’s out of sight.

I shiver, my earlier joy replaced by a dark, unnamed fear. Someone saw our flight across the water.

Again with the ‘oh-oh’.

“What now?”

“Hmm? Sorry, what?”

Rhiannon repeats her question, mouthing the words with exaggerated care. Despite sinking spirits, I smile. Some things never change.

“What. Now. Oh. Blessed. One.”

Yeah. Ignore that.

“Well, we can’t go back to school and it’s too early to go home. Anyone got any suggestions?”

“We can’t go to my house, my mother’s home,” Agatha says, sounding apologetic.

Humphrey shakes his head. “My dad’s home. He’ll be in all day. Sorry.”

I shrug. “I’m in the same boat. Mum only works mornings, then she picks Molly up from school. She’ll be home by now.”

I turn to Rhiannon.

“What about your place?”

“erm….”

She blushes as we stare at her.

“I…um…I suppose that…erm, we could go back to mine. Go back to my house, I mean.”

Agatha is about to ruin it by speaking, so I give her the ‘we’ll talk later’ look and turn to Rhiannon. “If you’re sure that is. What about Ricky?”

Rhiannon scuffs the ground with the toe of her shoe. “He’s staying with friends after school. He won’t be back tonight.”

Still not quite believing what I’m about to do, I nod, flash her a smile, and say,

“OK then, we’re good to go. Lead the way.”

Rhiannon turns and, after a moment’s hesitation, heads off down the beach.

“You can explain what’s going on with you and her later,” Agatha whispers from somewhere behind my left shoulder.

“Oh come on Agatha, don’t you want to see the inside of the Miles mansion?”

Agatha pretty much runs after Rhiannon.

Humphrey flashes me a wicked grin and nods his head at the cheerleader. “She’s your frenemy!”

“Take it back or lose a tooth.”

Humphrey just laughs and I hear him sing ‘Jelly’s got a frenemy, Jelly’s got a frenemy’ over and over in his head.

“Owwwwwwww! Humphrey! I don’t want a bloody frenemy and certainly not one with hair like that! How do I stop it?”

“Too late!” he says with far too much relish and, tucking my hand in his, pulls me along the sandy beach toward another round of surprises.