Lumas - Chapter 1

A month later

Lumas grunted as he pushed his way through the bustling crowd of bustling students no doubt on their way to their bustling classes. At times like these, he felt that the school, in its design, was made for football players and sumo wrestlers who could easily push their way to class, not skinny, small, bespectacled teenagers like himself who were constantly shoved around by the huge crowd. He wished that this wasn’t the first day of school, rather hoping that he and the school could skip to the middle of the school year. Where people know where they are headed and feel no desire to converse with dear friends that they haven’t seen for a span of months. He again pondered the possibility that they might travel to the future when he finally stumbled upon his own classroom. He rolled his eyes before entering. Yet another year here. Cheers to the first day of school.

Upon entering the classroom, he found, as he had expected, Jake grinning lazily at a group of people, laughing with them while his arm draped over the chair next to him. What he did not expect was a petite, blond, mildly attractive girl nearly glaring at him intently from when he opened the door to when he casually and nervously sat in his chair. He looked at her as if to say “What could I have possibly done to offend you when I don’t even know you?”

As if this message had indeed served its telepathic purpose, she blinked and smiled sheepishly. “Sorry. It’s just that… Have we met before?”

Lumas shook his head. “Sorry, no. This is the first time we’ve met, I believe.”

“Oh, of course. You just look familiar.”

“Ah.”

“Yes.” Perhaps to dissipate the awkwardness that was rapidly growing between them, the blond thrust her hand out to Lumas. “My name’s Anne, by the way. Anne Berkley.”

Lumas shook her hand and said, “I’m Lumas. Lumas Stipling.”

Jake, evidently having listened to this particularly exciting conversation, casually called out from across the room, “But feel free to call him Lummy. Or Lumstip. Or Lump Stick, since it certainly sounds close enough.”

Sending a glare to Jake and the other laughing classmates, then smiling sheepishly at a now sniggering Anne, Lumas waved his hand at Jake’s direction. “Please excuse my friend, Jake. I’m sure the concept of tact will grow on him someday. Call me Lumas. Just Lumas, nothing more, nothing less. No y’s, p’s, or sticks."

Still shaking slightly in laughter, Anne said, “Okay. Lumas it is. But, still. Lumas? It’s an interesting name. To say the least.”

He responded only with a shrug, reclining lazily in his chair. Five minutes later, roughly fifteen minutes after school had started, their teacher finally entered the room. “Alright class,” he said in a shaky, timid voice. “Let’s get started. Now, my name is Mr. Shire, and I will be your electronics teacher for this year. You’ll get to know me as I’ll get to know you over the year, and I hope we can have a good year.”

As it turned out, the class learned that Shire was a slight man who enjoyed wringing his hands together and rapidly unplugging equipment as if to relieve stress. Lumas had previously heard that his hair migrated from his face to his head and back in accordance to the changing of the seasons; so far, he was sporting obviously dyed and possibly Rogaine-d hair on his head, with a few stubbles along his cheeks and chin. After he finished explaining the basic requirements of the class, Shire quietly crept around the students as they fiddled with gizmos and gadgets, looking over their shoulders as they prodded the strange machinery. The students quickly learned that Shire was something like a magician, appearing out of thin air behind them, making less noise than a whisper of wind makes.

“This,” he would say as a student jumped half a foot in surprise, “is a transistor. Do you see the prongs? The purpose of these is…” And so on.

Lumas absentmindedly turned a – he looked at the label – a resistor in his hands, the two ends lightly pricking his hands. This was a throw away class. Everyone knew it. Lumas knew it because it was already apparent that Shire, though he seemed to love his various gizmos and equipment, he didn’t seem to have the social skills necessary to be able to aptly teach the class. Anne knew because that happened to be the only class available for her schedule when she walked into the school with one class mysteriously missing from her schedule. Jake knew it because, unlike Lumas or Anne, he was a senior and had sought and found the easiest class he could get. Fortunately, no one except for Lumas had walked in actually expecting to learn in the class, and even he was hoping for a class in which he could do homework from other classes. He was just slightly upset that Shire had the ability to appear instantly and would prevent him from doing his usual slackerly activities.

“Hey.” Still halfway stuck in his reverie, Lumas quickly turned to the direction of the voice and saw Anne staring up at him. “What’s your schedule?” she asked, handing him her schedule. “Let’s compare.”

They found that they would be in each others’ company in a mere few hours for English. Anne smiled pleasantly at that, and Lumas felt eyes boring holes in the back of his head. “I’m glad to see that I won’t be completely alone during this year. That’s slightly relieving,” Anne said, still smiling and apparently ignoring Lumas’ discomfort as he squirmed under that menacing glare he just knew was behind him.

Not wanting to appear rude, he grunted in agreement. “Are you new here or something?”

“Yeah. We just moved here.”

“Ah.” All his life he had never known anyone from outside his little sphere, and now there was someone who was. He felt questions bubbling up from his chest. “So, um, uh, do you, erm, like it here?” Of all the questions, it’s the one about here? Oh, smooth. Very, very smooth.

“Oh, it’s really nice,” she said. “It’s kind of different from my hometown, but the people here are really cool.” She began to rock back and forth on her heels. “Like, back at home, we –”

Ring. Ring. Whatever it was that she was going to say – was ­saying, actually – was unintelligible as the drone of packing bags, rustling clothes, and clopping footsteps swarmed around Lumas’ ears. Anne didn’t seem to notice; Lumas nodded and smiled as he slung his own bag over his shoulder and watched her lips move to form soundless words. He lifted his hand in a small wave goodbye when he caught parts of what she was saying:

“Seen… like you… my dreams.” With that, she returned his wave, and, at the door, began walking in the opposite direction of him, leaving Lumas in a state of slight confusion.

-----

Lumas was quite aware that Jake had been in possession of his driver’s license for slightly over a year. The only thing it showed him was the complete incompetence of the local police force in enforcing traffic laws because it almost seemed as if Jake had taken it upon himself to break every single one on a daily basis. What was worse, Jake had taken it upon himself to personally drive Lumas to and from school until he could obtain his own driver’s license.

Now it felt as if Lumas was being forced by an invisible presence to voluntarily slide into the passenger’s seat of Jake’s car. He had not felt the need to risk his life over the summer, so it was the first time he had entered the vehicle for several months, but dammit, he just knew that Jake had not improved over that span of time.

Jake leaned against the car, on hand on his hip and one leg crossed over the other. “You know,” he drawled as Lumas resigned himself to his fate with a small sigh, “you aren’t dying when you enter my car. Geez, looking at you, you’d think you were headed to the gallows or something.”

“I am,” Lumas replied once Jake got into the car and started the ignition. “You’re a terrible driver.”

“I’m an excellent driver,” Jake countered. He paused for a second. “I just have no regard for the rules of the road,” he admitted. He perilously backed out of the parking lot.

“And with your lack of regard, how in the world can you even think to consider yourself a ‘good driver’?”

“I’ve never been in a car accident, have I? Plus, no tickets. How do you explain that?”

“The police must be blind. There’s no way you could – was that a red light?”

“Why, yes. Yes it was.”

“We just ran a red light at sixty-five miles per hour in a thirty-five mile per hour zone?”

“Seventy, actually. I’ve slowed down a little.”

“You know, it’s amazing that we’re still alive.”

“Praise the Lord.”

in an attempt to distract himself from the constant threat to his life, Lumas found himself thinking back to that electronics class, where Anne had said those peculiar words, “Seen… like you… my dreams.” Lumas, using logic, had concluded that she had said, “I’ve seen someone who looks like you in my dreams,” give or take a few words.

It wasn’t as if that was just a terribly weird thing to say; Lumas had been subject to much stranger. However, he felt pretty confident that what he had read was true: That, during dreams, the dreamer only conjures faces from his or her memories. He had found that Anne had grown up in Swarington, a rather upbeat, if not well known, place in Colorado. He, a native Georgian, had never traveled further westward that Alabama; Anne, before now, had never been more east than Illinois. Therefore, it was impossible to even fathom her meeting him before this day. So, how could she recognize his face from her dreams? Lumas couldn’t shake the eerie, supernatural undertone behind everything.

As if reading his mind, Jake said, while swerving dangerously into another lane, “So, what do you think of that girl in the electronics class. What was her name? Anne?”

“Yes.” Lumas fidgeted in his seat, plucking at his belt loops with his thumbs and index fingers. He did not enjoy talking about anybody, especially girls, to Jake. The sandy-blond-haired senior often poked his nose in places where Lumas felt he had no reason or right to prod.

A simple affirmation of her name and existence was not enough to sate Jake’s curiosity. “And?” he asked impatiently. “What did you two talk about?”

“Jake, we talked for, like, ten minutes at most. We talked about our schedule and where she was from. That’s it.” Lumas began to peer out of the windshield, hoping in sheer desperation that his house wasn’t as far away as it seemed.

Jake shot a wild smirk and wink to Lumas. “Really? Well, it certainly seemed like she enjoyed it.”

Lumas returned the smirk with a glare. “You know, common small talk is not the same as ostentatious flirtation, and if she happens to smile, it does not have to be linked to any desire towards me. Get your head out of the gutter.”

“Oh, surely, surely,” Jake agreed. Lumas couldn’t tell if he was being sarcastic. “So, I’ll take this to mean that you aren’t interested in her?”

“At this point, no.”

“Hmm.” Jake tapped his fingers against the steering wheel, appearing to be deep in thought. The two friends did not speak for the remainder of the car ride.

After an interminable period of time, they arrived at Lumas’ house. The two said their goodbyes, and Lumas treaded his lawn to reach the front door.

It wasn’t a large house, by any means, but it comfortably held Lumas and his parents, with his brother dwelling in the basement of the house. The bluish gray house, with its red door, was no different from any house next to it, or, indeed, in any of the neighborhoods around it. The people in the area encouraged conformity, and so it was certainly confused as to why Lumas and his family chose to stay there.

Lumas opened the door and was welcomed by clutter. Junk mail that had accumulated during the past few weeks teetered precariously on a nearby ottoman, which they had moved to the front hallway for that purpose. Open magazines lay unceremoniously on the floor, as if someone had just been reading them, but had abandoned them to finish other things.

A clank, then a clop, was heard from the kitchen. Lumas peered warily into the room from the doorway. “Lucas?” he called hesitantly.

The head of his brother popped into the doorway. “Heya, Lummy!” he said, grinning as he twirled a wooden spoon in his hands. “How was school? Did you immerse yourself into the positively charged ocean of knowledge, soaking up all that you could in as short of a time as eight hours?”

“If by that you mean ‘did I learn things?’ then the answer is yes.” He passed Lucas to stare at the pot that was currently cooking something that smelled – and admittedly looked – quite appetizing. “What are you cooking?”

“Le poulet au jus avec des petite carottes.”

“What?”

“Chicken and carrots simmering in a savory juice.”

“Ah. It smells good.” Taking another look at the dish, he finally set his book bag down in the living room and took out some homework. “What did you do today?”

“Why, I delved into the worlds of Reader’s Digest, National Geographic, and Everyday with Rachel Ray! I soaked in the knowledge as a sponge would water. In doing so, I have expanded my horizons far beyond what they…” Lumas let his mind wander as his brother prattled on.

Really, he was amazed that his brother and he were related. They didn’t even look alike. Lucas had his father’s attributes: a strong jaw, sharp, angular facial features, large coal eyes, and equally dark hair, which he grew long and was currently tied into a loose ponytail. Lumas, taking after his mother, had a much softer, rounder face, narrower hazel eyes, and short, chocolate-brown hair. The older had a muscular build; the younger, a much slighter build.

However, each looked like one parent, but acted like the other. While Lucas bubbled over with enthusiasm on everything, Lumas usually kept his personal thoughts and opinions private. As a result, Lucas was their mother’s favorite, and Lumas was their father’s.

Lumas began to do the little homework that he had. Lucas continued to run around the kitchen, adding a pinch or a speck of this and that to his bubbling concoction, still babbling on about meaningless drivel. Of course, their parents would come home and ask about their days. Lucas would serve his dish, and the entire family would praise it (he could almost hear his mother: “The chicken is simply divine, dear. You must tell me your recipe!”), then the remainder of the evening would be spent on homework and conversations with Jake over the phone before going to bed. Everything was so dreadfully normal about it, so why did Lumas feel as if everything had changed?