Under My Skin

  But when I turn to look, the big black vehicle is gone. I never even saw it leave.

  Marina

  The three of us are on our boards, skating toward Josh's place for pizza. I'm glad that his mom will be there, because we won't be talking about Wildlings.

  I am so screwed. Here I've been hiding this huge secret of mine from Josh and Des for months and as soon as it happens to Josh, he tells us right away. He'll never forgive me for not doing the same.

  But the way Dillon and Josh are always talking about Wildlings being such freaks, I was sure that Josh would hate me if he ever found out. He's never been judgmental about other fringe groups, but he seemed to really buy Dillon's negative viewpoint on this one. Maybe Josh was just humouring Dillon. Friendship can make people go along with some pretty bad stuff.

  And then there's Desmond. Just look at how he's bursting to blather the news about Josh being a Wildling. I only pray that for once in his life, he'll be able to contain himself.

  I know I've really messed up. Damned if you do and damned if you don't. For sure, Josh will see my withholding this secret as a major betrayal. It's beyond ironic how some things can come back and bite you on the butt.

  We wheel around the corner onto Josh's street and see a van from CSFA TV outside his house. We all make a quick stop. Josh looks furious, but Desmond is delighted.

  "Dude, you're already famous," he says, grinning ear to ear.

  "They'd better not be hassling my mom," says Josh, face glowering. "Let's cut through behind the condo over on 9th. Des, maybe you can give us a leg up over the fence."

  Des looks disappointed about not meeting the news team, but heads over to 9th with us. It turns out to be pretty easy to jump the fence. We leave our boards by the back door and head inside.

  Josh's mom meets us out in the back hall.

  "I've been trying to reach you to warn you, honey," she says.

  "Sorry, Mom. I've had my phone turned off. Have they been bugging you?"

  "Not as much as the reporters who've been phoning. I told the first couple to call the police instead of us, but after that, I just stopped answering. Then CSFA showed up. I said 'no comment' and asked them to please leave and contact police for information, but they're still out there. That was smart of you kids to come in through the back. I hope this doesn't last."

  Thankfully, it doesn't. The phone only rings a few more times and the CSFA van pulls away about fifteen minutes later.

  Josh's mom takes the pizza out of the oven, where she'd been keeping it warm, and we all eat a relatively subdued dinner. Even Des is uncharacteristically quiet. Naomi looks exhausted and Josh is not a whole lot better. I guess he had a long night, running around scared and confused in his Wildling shape. I know from personal experience that this is a huge thing to deal with. I only wish I could help him, but I can't take the chance of exposing myself and losing his trust forever.

  After supper I give Des a little kick under the table and shoot him a look. For once, he seems to get it and follows my lead. I tell Josh and his mom that we can't stick around, that I haven't been home since this morning and Mamá will be anxious to hear that Josh is okay. This is all true and I'm glad of the excuse to leave.

  Josh walks us out.

  "Listen guys," he says. "Can we meet at Des's place before school tomorrow? I'm kind of nervous about being alone if some government agent is trying to disappear me or something."

  "We're in, dude," says Desmond, his face brightening. "Any creep tries to take you, I want to personally be there to watch you rip his throat out. I am so dying to see you in action."

  Josh just sighs and pushes Des and me away on our boards. The two of us go rolling down the street.

  Josh

  The next morning, I take my skateboard one street over to pick up Desmond and Marina. Along the way, I check for news vans, black SUVs or skulkers, but I don't see any. The people I do see don't seem out of place. Mrs. Evora is checking her mailbox like she does every morning at this time, even though we all know the mailman doesn't come until just before noon. There's Mr. Steininger walking Judy, his little Boston terrier. A couple of middle school kids are sneaking a smoke at the far end of block.

  When I get to 11th Street, I see Desmond sitting alone on the low wall in front of his house. His backpack is on the pavement by his feet.

  "Where's Marina?" I ask.

  "She sent me a text around five this morning that just said 'surf's up.' I'm sure she copied you."

  "I left my phone off. I don't know if they can find out my cell number, but I don't want to get calls from reporters. The phone at the house started ringing again first thing this morning."

  "The price of fame."

  "Ha ha. So why were you awake at five?"

  "I wasn't. I got that from the date-stamp, dude. Anyway, she was leaving to catch a few waves and you know what that means."

  I nod. "She could blow off the whole morning."

  "Yeah. Or ..." His voice drops lower. "Maybe that's just a cover-up. Maybe your men in black have grabbed her and right now she's in some little room being grilled about you."

  "Not funny, Des."

  "Come on. It's not like it's ever going to happen."

  "We don't know that."

  "Man, you have got to lighten up," he says. When I give him a sour look, he adds, "So have you seen any of them around this morning?"

  I shake my head.

  He gets up and swings his backpack to his shoulder.

  "You know," he says, "they're not always going to be wearing black suits and driving SUVs. They could be anybody. We totally need to check for new kids at school today—you know, like on TV, where they're dressed like us but you know they're really like thirty-something."

  "Thanks for adding to my paranoia."

  He laughs. "When did you get so easy to rag on? And I haven't even started on your new taste in music. Hannah Montana? Really?"

  I don't bother to answer. I know he's right. Since all of this started, it is easy to get a rise out of me. But I'm pretty sure my fears are justified.

  I'm not the most popular guy at school, but I'm not a complete misfit, either. Like most kids, I just blend in, and part of that is knowing your limits. Like, I don't try to hang out with the jocks because that would put me on their radar and not in a good way. We're talking head-down-the-toilet-bowl, a slushie in the face and other crap like that. I don't hang with the stoners because I don't do drugs and I don't need them deciding I'm a narc. And I really don't mess with any of the gangs—Mexican or black. The gangs don't show their colours at school, but everybody knows who they are. Get on their radar and your problems will most likely be solved with a knife or a gun.

  I'm expecting a little notoriety from having been on the news and all. In school, gossip runs as fast as wildfires in the hills when the Santa Ana winds are blowing. People who know me are going to want details. Those who don't are going to stare, pretending they don't care but eager for whatever information they can pick up all the same.

  Bobby White doesn't fit into either category, but he still pushes off the railing he's leaning against and approaches us as Desmond and I head for the front door. He's a tall black kid with a quarter-inch of fuzz covering his skull and reflective shades that hide his eyes as they show our own reflections. He doesn't say anything, just points at me and then jerks a thumb toward some picnic tables under the palm and eucalyptus trees.

  I know who's sitting there, butt on the table, feet on the seat. He's there every day. It says Theodore Washington on his school records, but everybody knows him as Chaingang. He's the biggest guy in school—maybe two hundred and fifty pounds on a six-foot-two frame—and maybe the oldest, since a couple of the years that the rest of us spent learning calculus and Shakespeare and cutting up frogs in bio, he spent in jail. Juvie, but it's still jail.

  His brother heads up the Ocean Avenue Crips. The story is, he took the rap on a drug bust so that his brother wouldn't do adult time at the penitentiary. Nobody
knows why he came back to school after serving his time. Not that he actually attends classes. He spends most of the day sitting where he is now, doing I don't know what, and I don't want to know. Except now he wants to talk to me.

  Reluctantly, I head over to where he's sitting. Desmond starts to fall in step beside me, except Bobby lays the flat of his hand against Desmond's chest, stopping him.

  "Just the brother," Bobby says.

  I'd laugh if I wasn't so scared.

  The thing is, I may be half black but I'm not from the 'hood. I'm less gangster than any of those white kids from the Valley with hip hop and rap booming from their cars, throwing down signs and swagger. I'm the one with some colour to my skin that runs deeper than a light suntan and they're trying to live the ghetto life.

  I don't want to do this. What if Chaingang's decided he wants to jump me into the Ocean Avers? How do I say no? Do I even get to say no?

  The loose control I've had over my heightened senses starts to unravel. I can hear too much—all the kids hanging around in front of the school, laughing and talking. Music from portable MP3 docks and car stereos. The traffic going by. I smell the sour stink of my own fear. I feel a spark of that weird nervous energy that went through me before I changed, but I rein it in. The last thing I need is to have the mountain lion running wild here at school.

  But then I'm standing in front of Chaingang and I think having access to something like the mountain lion's not such a bad thing. Chaingang hasn't said word one, but he doesn't need to. Never mind his reputation. This close up, he seems huge—thick with muscles, head shaved, shades hiding his eyes. I find myself staring at his hands. They're so big I'm sure he could pop my head like a pimple.

  I try to shake off a zingy feeling in my head that I attribute to nerves and an overload of sensory input, but I can't seem to tone it down.

  He takes off his shades and studies me for a moment.

  "I hear you've got a surf band going," he finally says.

  All I can do is stare at him, trying to process this weird moment. Chaingang Washington wants to talk to me about surf music?

  "Um—yeah," I manage to get out.

  "You guys any good?"

  I shrug. "We just play in the garage."

  He nods. "Gotta start somewhere."

  What alternate universe have I stumbled into? I know how odd this sounds, but standing around shooting the breeze with Chaingang is light-years stranger than finding out I've got a mountain lion sitting inside me, just waiting to jump out of my skin.

  "I didn't know you were into surf," I say.

  "Not so much. I like to feel the bass thumping in my chest with homeboys throwing down their rhymes."

  "So why ...?"

  "I just wanted to tell you I've got your back. I expect you plan to play it cool. Keep a low profile. And that's good. That's smart. But the shit goes down. I'll do what I can."

  This makes even less sense than making small talk about music.

  "You—I mean …"

  He grins, but it doesn't feel very comforting.

  "Look, I know how you're letting it ride. Mountain lion? Never happened. But you can't play a playa. You understand what I'm saying?"

  "Not really."

  "I'm saying I know what you are. Once you settle into your skin and get used to your new world, you'll see. You won't be able to not tell who's got an animal under his skin. It's the smell mostly, but there's also a little something that goes ping in here." He taps a big finger against his temple.

  I give a slow nod. "So, you're a—" Wildling, too, I'm about to finish, but he cuts me off.

  "One more kid doing his time in this shit-ass school. Just like you."

  I nod again. He doesn't want to talk about it.

  "Can I ask you a question?" I say.

  "Shoot."

  "Why?"

  "Why what?"

  "Why do you have my back?"

  "This thing we have," he says. "Nobody knows what it is yet, you follow me?"

  I nod.

  "The solo profile plays just fine, so long as there aren't any problems. But I think there's going to come times when we need something that the people in our lives can't give us. They don't know what it's like—not the way we do. Say the Feds come down on you or me, what are we going to do? Call in our gang? Your friends—are they going to be able to do anything?" He shakes his head. "So if we don't have a Wildling gang, we at least need some alliances, right?"

  "I guess ..."

  "It's all new to you," he says. "I get it. Don't worry. We're not going to have meetings or hang or anything. But you need a helping hand, you got it. That's all I'm saying."

  "And if you need ..."

  I let the sentence trail off because what's he ever going to need my help for? But he nods.

  "Works both ways, bro. If you want it."

  I'm about to ask, do I really have a choice here? Except, while he's hard to read and I totally don't see what I could ever do for him, I get that it is my choice. If I want to, I can just walk away. But this really is a new world I'm in and who knows what lies ahead. Having a guy like Chaingang in my corner could make all the difference and it's not like he's asking me to push dope for him.

  "I—thanks," I say.

  The hint of a smile touches the corner of his mouth.

  "Don't worry so much," he says. "Keep your head down and you'll be fine. I changed a week before that kid who turned into the hawk on the video and nobody's the wiser."

  "I won't tell anyone."

  "Oh, I know you won't."

  The words are mild. His eyes are the same. But I realize we've just made a pact that I'd better never screw up.

  "So if Wildlings can sense each other," I say, "what stops them from outing each other?"

  "Nothing except for the blowback—knowing they'll be outed, too. But I hear the Feds are looking to get themselves some tame Wildlings and then we'll all be in trouble."

  I find myself wanting to ask him what kind of animal he can change into, but he's already made it clear this conversation's not going there. But that's not the only thing I'm curious about.

  "Can I ask you something else?" I say.

  "Go for it."

  "Why'd you come back to school?"

  He chuckles. "To get my paper, just like everybody else."

  "But you don't attend classes."

  "Don't need to. I had a lot of free time in juvie. Some I spent seeing to business, but I got studying done, too. People think I'm on a fast track to nowhere and maybe I am, when you look at the big picture. But you know what? I'm still going to ace my finals and, at the end of the year, I'll be walking onstage with the rest of them. They're going to see that a brother can stay on top of their game as well as his own."

  "Sweet."

  "Yeah, but that's me. You've still got to put in the time."

  He holds out his fist. I hesitate a moment, then bump mine against his. The difference in size looks absurd, but he doesn't seem to notice.

  "Hang loose, Josh," he says.

  The shades go back on and I realize I've been dismissed.

  "What the hell was that all about?" Desmond says in a low voice as we head for our lockers to put away our boards.

  I can't really tell him, not without also telling him that Chaingang's a Wildling just like me, but I'm not going to be the one to out him.

  I settle for, "He wanted to know how our band's doing."

  "Seriously?"

  I shrug. "I guess there's a part of him that digs surf music."

  "That so doesn't scan."

  "What can I say?"

  He nods. "You know everybody's watching you, right?"

  I do. But I figure it won't last. By lunchtime, some new drama will have come along and I'll be old news.

  Except it does last. The morning drags on and no one treats me the same. It's not just the other kids. Even the teachers seem … I don't want to say wary, but they treat me differently. Maybe they're just concerned because of what I went
through—and by that I mean the news reports that said I was chased out of the house by a mountain lion—but they don't seem comfortable having me in their class.

  Dillon catches me in the hall. He's not much taller than me but he's got the longest fingers I've ever seen. He can do a seven-fret stretch like nobody I know.

  "Josh, is it true?" he says under his breath, looking around as if we're about to be jumped. "Did one of those goddamn freaks really come right into your house?"

  "I'll tell you about it later. Got to get to history."

  "Yeah, but—"

  "It's cool," I tell him. "Really."

  I clap him lightly on the back as we part.

  I don't know how I'm going to handle things with Dillon from now on. This is such a drag. I love jamming in the music room with the guy, but he's so down on Wildlings that I don't think I'm going to want to spend much time in his company.

  Just before last period in the morning, Ms. Chandra, the guidance counsellor, stops me in the hall to assure me that she's here for me if I need to talk about my "ordeal." Instead of telling her that all this attention is the real ordeal, I nod and say thanks before I move on to my class. I know I just need to get through this, but I'm starting to wish I'd waited another day before coming back to school.

  I spend a lot of time staring out windows, looking for black SUVs and men in suits. All I see is a lone CSFA van. I was surprised there wasn't one outside the house again this morning, but they probably realized it might be easier to get hold of me here.

  Or maybe I'm just being paranoid and it has nothing to do with me. Could be they finally have some real news to cover around here.

  "Now I know what animals in the zoo feel like," I say to Desmond at lunch.

  "Why's that?" Marina slides into a seat beside me as she asks the question.

  "I feel like I'm on display," I tell her. "Everybody's watching me and wondering."

  "You can't blame them," she says. "You're the new celebrity buzz."

  I have to smile when I see her. Her hair's still damp from the ocean and she's got that glow she always gets when she's been out on her board. She looks so relaxed I wish I'd gone to the beach with her this morning.