Lightning Strikes Twice: Part 11

So here’s something odd that happened today. Someone sent me an email addressed to Nick. Not the Nick in the story, but some Nick who has the same last name I do and appears to go to college somewhere in California.

I have no idea what’s up with that.

To me, it seems obvious that this is a web serial and not a personal blog. I can’t imagine that anyone who read very far could confuse this for reality–especially not someone with a doctorate.

The email appears to be a note from one of his profs.

Seriously.

Vaughn seemed tired and a little punchy on the way back. He stumbled as we walked up the hill to the gate and then again on the way down the hill to the school’s tennis courts. Tennis being a spring sport, the courts were empty.

As we walked toward the soccer fields and the entrance to the gym, he seemed unable to stop talking.

“I’m in a position to do some good in the world now,” he said, “and change things. I know who sold me drugs. I bet I could find out where they live. I’d collect evidence and bring them, you know—KER-POW—zapped unconscious to the police. I’d just have to get a costume. Leather would be cool, but I wear leather a lot of the time anyway so that wouldn’t be much of a disguise… And a name… I’ll need a name…”

Daniel gets this way when he overuses his abilities too. Well, not precisely this way. Daniel gets quiet and falls asleep a lot.

I felt tired myself. We had done around four miles, most of it running. That’s not a massive distance, but it counts.

We stepped into the gym to find the volleyball team just finishing practice. A couple girls were still practicing serves, but most of them were standing and talking.

Cassie stood in one of the bigger groups, laughing loudly with girls I recognized, but couldn’t name. As I shut the door, she waved and half-ran over to us. “Hey Nick, Vaughn. Have a good run?”

Unlike anyone else in the room she didn’t look tired at all.

She smiled at me, living temporarily in a happy world where Vaughn and I walking in together meant that we’d had a long talk and were now best friends forever.

Vaughn barely seemed to notice her. He leaned against the wall. “White Lightning,” he said, “That’s a cool name. I could go with that.”

“I’m pretty sure ‘White Lightning’ is synonym for moonshine,” I said.

“No way? That’d piss off my mom. Not that that’s hard.”

Cassie said, “Is he drunk?”

Vaughn laughed. “I am not drunk. Just tired. And I mean bone tired.”

He sat down on the floor.

“He really isn’t drunk,” I said, “but a few things happened during the run that we probably shouldn’t talk about here.”

She glanced toward the rest of the volleyball team. Most of them were leaving for the locker room. A few still stood talking next to the bleachers.

“Tell you what, I’ve got my mom’s car. I’ll drive you home.”

“That would take care of everything,” I said. “Um… You want to help me get him over to the guy’s lockers?”

Vaughn head lay on his chest. He had fallen asleep.

“Only if I don’t have to go in. The boys’ locker room reeks. Do you any of you guys ever wash your uniforms or do you just keep them there for the season?”

I decided to take that as a rhetorical question and started to pull Vaughn up by his right arm. Cassie took the other arm, and to be honest, did most of the work. Not that that should surprise anyone.

Vaughn woke up enough to get himself into the locker room. We showered and changed into clothes. While I rearranged my locker, it occurred to me that Cassie was right about the smell. The reason’s not hard to explain.

I leave my sweats there all week and take them home to be washed on Friday. I’m sure I’m not the only one. In fact I’m pretty sure some people leave their stuff longer.

Don’t judge me.

I pulled my backpack out of my locker and put the SIM cards into the front pocket along with the pictures.

Vaughn already had his jacket on and had one strap of his backpack over his shoulder.

“So,” he said, “rumor says you and Cassie are going out.”

“Where did anyone get that idea?”

“I heard it from Kayla first, but she’s not the only one who says it. I’d wondered myself. I’ve never seen you together before this year and this year you’re talking in the hall. You’re having lunch. You’re riding home from school together… Everything but PDA.”

“No.”

Which goes to show that the school rumor machine is pretty much full of it. Last time I heard anything about Cassie in school, the rumor was that she was a lesbian. Bearing in mind that that rumor goes out about all female athletes that are any good and every female phys ed teacher, I didn’t pay any attention to it.

It made me wonder if anyone bothered to try to reconcile contradictory rumors or if these things just washed ashore like waves on the beach and disappeared.

“I’ll bet you can think of one other reason we might be hanging out,” I told him.

Vaughn looked puzzled for a second, but then said, “Oh, duh. I’m a moron.”

I grabbed my backpack and we walked out of the locker room. Cassie was waiting for us in the hall. We walked quietly down the hall, out of the school and out to the parking lot.

Cassie’s mom has a late model blue sedan. It looks distinctly like a mom-mobile–as in clean, has a tissue box, a trash receptacle,  and doesn’t have bags of fast food garbage on the floor or the seats.

Once we shut the doors she said, “OK, what have you got for me?”

I pulled out the photos and the SIM cards.

I told her everything.

16 thoughts on “Lightning Strikes Twice: Part 11”

  1. I’m concerned about this poor kid, the real Nick who didn’t get his email…..

    And Vaughn got really strong, really fast!

  2. I did what I could. I replied to the email and suggested that the prof try to contact the person some other way. Outside of that, there’s not much I can do. Comically, the “Nick Zoetewey” that the prof was trying to contact pretty much has to be a relative.

    I don’t know the Zoeteweys in California particularly well, but basically any Zoetewey in the US or Canada is a relative of mine.

    About Vaughn: True. I wanted to show him becoming powerful in a way that’s quick/frightening. I’m honestly not sure if I should have stretched people’s view of that out more. Anyway, there’s still a little more to go with regards to his abilities.

  3. Comically, many of the plot related issues opened here are still being dealt with later on… It’s just that now it’s pretty clear what people are dealing with.

    Though even yet not completely clear.

  4. Jim, I love your ability to switch gears. After the previous X-Files type episode, we have this one that is so slice-of-life.

    “Only if I don’t have to go in. It reeks…”

    Oh, btw, I ran Cross-Country myself in high-school and college, and the way you describe Nick’s life is an athlete; hell, I almost weep in recognition.

    A few eps back, “It’s not like the X-C team gets a lot of press…”

    “It seems to me being an X-C Coach is a bit of a blow-off job.”

    That quote about how EVERY halfway good female athlete gets dubbed a lesbian….

    Check, Check, and mega-Check.

    Two words, movie deal!

  5. Just found out about this webnovel a few hours ago. Loving it so fa. But damn do I have a lot of catching up to do.

  6. I found this site from Worm and bookmarked it a while ago, and boy, is a great story so far!
    As Farmerbob1 said trying to not binge is hard!

  7. Lightning strikes twice, ten times!

    Anyways, I like the lighthearted writing, even if nobody is getting punched in the face. I like too know how the characters think.

    1. It’s not a massive distance if you’ve been training regularly. If you don’t train at all (or you’ve been training for a different sport), then it’s pretty miserable.

      When I was in high school, track started before swimming ended and so I’d start doing long distance running at 5 mile runs after no running for months. I was in great shape overall, but my legs were very sore.

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