Psychic Misfit

Chapter 12

Bargaining and Striking a Deal

“K – Kimmy?” I stutter. A smug grin crosses her face. “Or should I say Kimberly F. Dolce?” Her eyes rise in mock surprise.

“My, my – we are perceptive aren’t we?” she says, her Texan drawl clipped and neat. I find myself sinking further onto the bed.

“How – why? I don’t get why you were – I mean, why did you bug the phone? How did you know?”

“Oh, we didn’t”

“Then – then why did you bug the phone?” My brain is scrambled and it’s taking all of my strength just to string a sentence together. Kimmy walks towards me and I find myself moving backwards on the bed. She lets out a short laugh at my discomfort. It sounds deeper than her usual high pitched smashing glass giggle.

“We bugged the phone to catch your brother in the act. He’s been a naughty boy you know, drug dealing and everything. Tut, tut. You, well you were just a bit of luck, a goldmine actually. You should really try and keep your conversations more private Laura, especially when you have a condition as – delicate as yours”

I stare at her, speechless. How could I have been so stupid? For someone with such a high IQ I am incredibly, incredibly dumb. A random thought suddenly enters my head.

“Where’s Jake?” I can’t hide the panic from my voice, and Kimmy – Kimberly – seems to notice it.

“Well, you see Laura, this is where it gets interesting!” she laughs again at my wide-eyed discomfort. It takes all of my self-control not to punch her. A thought suddenly occurs to me. I can escape! The fire exit is right outside the bedroom window; I could punch Kimmy around a bit and then run for the window. Better still, I can use my new ‘mind warp’ thingy to get her to let me go. Why did I not think of this before?

“We have Jake under custody,” all thoughts of escape leave my mind in a wild rush as what Kimmy is saying sinks in. “He’s in the special unit and he could go to jail for a long, long time. The death sentence maybe”

“All for a bit of drug dealing?” I don’t know the American Justice system very well, but that seems a little harsh.

“Well, I’m sure we could find a few murders to pin on him,” Kimmy says conspiratorially. My eyes widen and my mouth opens and closes wordlessly.

“You wouldn’t, you – you can’t! You’re the FBI!”

“We’re above the law,” Kimmy says smugly.

“So let me guess, you want me to go in quietly in exchange for my brothers freedom?”

“Spot on,” Kimmy chimes annoyingly. I grit my teeth.

“I don’t think so. Me and Jake aren’t really that close,” I lie, hoping that she won’t recall all the times I’ve came to Jake for help and advice.

“Oh really, well isn’t it funny that after a fight with your Mom,” my head shoots up, “your first port of call would be with your brother rather than a friend?” I look at the carpet feeling slightly defeated. Wait, she should know that I and May-Anna aren’t talking, but she hasn’t made any mention of it. Maybe . . .

“And don’t even think about using that new trick of yours on me, the one you pulled on my colleagues in the park. If I return to HQ without you, they’ll definitely pin a murder on your brother, and that means death sentence”.

“I was just going to ask if I could make a phone call to my best friend,” I say innocently.

“I don’t think so Laura. You’ll tell her that you’re being kidnapped by the evil FBI or something,” Damn. Brainwave . . .

“Its just that, I always ring her at this time, if I don’t ring her she’ll get suspicious and call my Mom, who’ll ring here and when she doesn’t get any reply she’ll probably drag her drug-addled body to the police station or something. And even if she doesn’t, if I don’t show up at school tomorrow my social workers going to get involved. I’ll just ring May-Anna and tell her I won’t be in school tomorrow. Although I’ll have to make it sound as normal as possible so that she doesn’t get suspicious, I mean, I’ll have to talk to her about my homework and stuff. You can supervise, make sure there’s no funny business, I’m just trying to reduce the trouble for you here”

Kimmy’s eyes narrow suspiciously. “What's in this for you?” she asks.

“I just don’t want my friend to worry about me, and I especially don’t want my social worker to get involved. I’ll ask May-Anna to forge a note at school for me,” I say as seriously as I can. Kimmy’s brow furrows as she considers the pros and cons of allowing me to use the phone. The pro’s must outweigh the con’s as the next thing she say’s is,

“Go ahead. But no funny business!”

“No funny business,” I swear with a solemn frown. I pick up the phone and dial May-Anna’s number. I have no idea if this is going to work. I don’t even have a fully formulated secret message in my head; I’m going to have to work it out as I go along. I basically know that I’m going to tell her about the FBI and that she has to help me. Right, simple.

“Hello?” a gruff voice asks from the other side of the phone, I was so deep in my thoughts that I hadn’t realised the phone had stopped ringing.

“Oh, hello Mr. Kenwood. Is May-Anna there?” I ask in my best ‘I Am a Positive Influence on Your Daughter’ voice.

“Is that Laura?” he asks.

“Um, yeah”

“Oh, well May-Anna is a bit upset at the moment; I don’t think she’ll be accepting calls from anyone,” May-Anna’s father says flatly in a pretty rehearsed voice. In other words, she’s told her dad that she doesn’t want to talk to me.

“Look Mr Kenwood, it’s really important,” I see Kimmy narrow her eyes. “Can you tell her its about our English essay on that book by . . . by um, C.S Lewis, the Fandango Bus Institute – its really important that you tell her which book it is, there's two essays but this ones the most important”. I silently pray that Kimmy isn’t a C.S Lewis fan.

“Um, Ok,” he answers in a confused voice, “I’ll try and get her”.

“Appreciated,” I say in a rather saccharine voice. I smile at Kimmy and wink, showing that I’m not scared of her, even though I slightly am.

Okay, even though I totally am.

“Laura?” May-Anna answers, her voice breathless. I have a celebration inwardly as I realise that May-Anna got the message.

“Hey May-Anna, its ME”, I say, trying to sound non-committal

“Was this some kind of ploy to get me on the phone? Because that is just so wrong Laura! Have you not heard of the boy who cried wolf? Because . . .”

“I bought a new note pad yesterday; don’t you think that Pads are fab? This one is especially good, it’s got a place to put dates and events, and it’s practically like a diary!”

“Oh God, this is serious isn’t it?”

“I need help on THE Fandango Bus Institute essay. I’VE BEEN stuck on it, and it’s TAKING me for ever, so yeah, it is pretty serious"

“What? Oh God, me too. WHAT do you think IS HAPPENING in the book?” she says in an anxious voice, obviously concentrating on scribbling down the words I’m emphasising.

“I don’t know but it’s really BUGGING ME. AND that KID in English distracted me when my English teacher told us what to write because he NAPPED the whole way through it and snored really loud. And then his friend started laughing and THEY were TRYing to annoy me I’m sure of it”. To me, this felt really obvious, I hoped that Kimmy wasn’t completely following the conversation and that my subtle emphasis was subtle enough for her not to understand, but still definite for May-Anna to pick up.

“Yeah, jerks. They should GO jump off a cliff ONto a sharp pencil”. ‘Go on’. I nodded and continued, mapping more of my message out into my head. I was surprised at how easily this was coming from me, how I knew exactly what to say. Thinking on my feet, me – who woulda thunk it?

“So I’m stuck, all I know is that it’s set UNDERGROUND BY a waste disposal FACILITY AND the main characters WERE AN animal race before THEY’RE infected with the radiation poisoning and they turn inTO cannibalistic rats that GET their thrills from eating each other.” Where the hell did that come from? There's a silence on the other end.

“Um, yeah. That writer had a really warped imagination”. I feel like laughing out loud. May-Anna is acting a little like herself again. Kimmy is staring at me with one eyebrow raised. Okay, so that wasn’t the most conventional storyline ever, in fact, I don’t even think it was a storyline; I have no idea where it came from.

“He’s called C.S Lewis May-Anna” I said, unable to resist. May-Anna laughed out loud on the other end of the wire. “So, CAN YOU HELP ME?”

“I’ll really try, I promise. Sorry I was such a bitch today,” May-Anna’s voice sounds a little choked up and I can feel my own throat constrict.

“Forget about it, it was my fault. Oh, and I won’t be in tomorrow, can you forge me a note?”

“Okay, I’ll sort your essay problem out as well, I promise”

“Scouts honour?”

“Scouts super honour”

“Ha, ha. I’m sorry about what I said, I don’t think your ambition is boring, its just because mine is so unrealistic that I guess I was a little . . . jealous”

“Don’t speak like that,” May-Anna says stubbornly, and I can tell that she’s been crying a little. “It’s not like you”

“Yeah I know, well, I guess I’ll have to go. Good luck on figuring out that essay”

“Bye Laura,” May-Anna sobs, and I put the phone down before I start crying.

Kimmy stands up off the bed and stretches.

“About time,” she groans in her unfamiliar voice, “You took your sweet little time”

“We always talk for a long time on the phone,” I say truthfully.

“Well, are you quite finished?” she asks impatiently.

“Quite”

“Let’s go then”. I follow Kimmy out of the room and into the stairwell, all the way down until we reach the front door, where a black Ford Mondeo is waiting for us. I just hope that Kimmy gets my message soon, which is something along the lines of:

“I’ve been kidnapped by the FBI and they’re taking me to an underground facility. Try and get help. They were bugging me.”