Each Tuesday, rather than a POSSIBLY
IRRITATING ESSAY, I'd like to both challenge you and lend a helping hand. I
generate more speculative and teen story ideas than I can ever use. My family
rolls its collective eyes when I say, "Hang on a second! I just have to
write down this idea..." Here, I'll include the initial inspiration
(quote, website, podcast, etc) and then a thought or two that came to mind.
These will simply be seeds -- plant, nurture, fertilize, chemically treat,
irradiate, test or stress them as you see fit. I only ask if you let me know if
anything comes of them.
Yarelis Smits
held up her tablet computer and shouted to the mass of people, “My foster
brother has been missing since yesterday! He’s autistic and he can’t speak! A
friend of his from school saw him in this neighborhood late yesterday,” she stopped
shouting as the crowd had quieted. “Please remember that even though he can’t
speak, Ray Cantú can hear us.”
A girl from
school, a year older than Ray, who was in ninth grade, said, “This is a really
bad neighborhood. What if we can’t find him?”
Yarelis’ heart
felt as if it had stopped in her chest. She looked around the crowd, hoping to
see Dorian. The high school police liaison officer had showed up after most of
the volunteers had arrived, hanging back, supposedly separated from them all,
but still part of them. No one else had noticed him yet.
She was also
pretty sure no one had noticed that he was an android. The only reason Yarelis
knew was because her Mom was a detective with the local peakers – peace keepers
and Yarelis had stumbled across a stray text message that hinted at it. When
she’d asked Mom, who never lied outside of work, she’d admitted it.
So to find her
missing brother, she had a bunch of people she went to school with, and a robot
cop. All she was really missing was her best friend, the mysterious, supposed
reincarnation of the late Turkish singer, Selda Bağcan.
Warm breath
brushed her ear as a voice mimicking a Turkish accent said, “What, you think I
was going to leave you all alone with these insane muggles?”
Yarelis rolled
her eyes, the whole HP phenom was so four decades ago. Jane Eyre – which was
her real, actual name – was the only one Yarelis knew who still read the
things. Except for her, but Yarelis only read them because Jane was her best
friend. That’s what she told everyone, anyway.
The girl shouted
again, “Isn’t it dangerous here?”
“Dangerous for
who?” called a low, bass voice. Yarelis didn’t recognize it and stood on her
tiptoes, scanning the crowd. On the edge opposite Darius, there was movement as
people who had actually heard the voice turned, then parted between the speaker
and Yarelis.
“You’re not from
school,” she said, scowling.
“No, I’m from
the neighborhood.”
“What are you
doing here?”
“You might call
me a vigilante.”
“What? My
brother’s harmless – he’s autistic, mute. He’d never say anything to anyone!”
The man, who
wore a faded, black cowboy hat, pushed up the rim then looked at her intently
from under it. He said, “They say it’s the silent one’s is the most dangerous.”
“He’d never hurt
anyone!”
“Then how do you
explain this?” the man said and pulled his hat off. The blood mixed with his
gray hair had been concealed by the back rim of the hat. “I was on my way here
and he attacked me with a broken board. He...”
“You must have
done something to frighten him, then!” Yarelis cried.
“He ain’t the
one scared here, missy. I am.”
Names: ♀Puerto
Rican, Dutch, ; ♂ Mexican
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