Abilities

The peaceful house on the back of the lake had changed over the last twenty years. The living room furniture was replaced. Everything, except William’s favorite chair, was switched out. The TV was bigger and flatter. The kitchen table was bigger. The checkered tile in the kitchen was replaced with a dark burgundy wood flooring with a urethane finish. The house looked identical on the outside, but on the inside, it was like William had an entirely different home.

The doorbell rang. The house was otherwise silent and the chime of the bell echoed throughout the house. It rang again.

William poked his head outside of the bathroom. He aged well and was a wiser man in his mid-forties. His right cheek was lathered in shaving cream. He wiped his face clean and threw the towel over the shower curtain. His fresh goatee was beginning to gray over. On his walk to the front door, he fastened the remaining buttons on his shirt. He flipped the lock and pulled the door open.

A young woman stood on the front porch. She looked out into the Ohio landscaping and turned to William. She couldn’t have been older than twenty-five. She had black hair that was pinned up. Her outfit was a simple “I love pink” sweatshirt with black sweat pants.

“Hi,” William started. “Can I help you?”

“Hi. Are you Mr. Wehde?” she asked.

“Yeah, what can I do for you?”

“I’m an old high school friend of Mitchel’s.”

“Oh,” William sounded unsure.

“Is he here by any chance? I just moved back into town and would love to see him.”

“He’s actually not.”

“Damn. Ok, well, do you know what time he’ll be back?”

“Umm December. He’s studying in Italy for his final semester.”

“Well, that’s too bad. I was hoping to catch him. I won’t be home for much longer. I went to school on the west coast and haven’t been back home since high school.”

“I’m sorry, would you like to come in?” he sympathized.

“No, thank you. Can you do me a favor, though?” William nodded to her question. “Next time you talk to Mitchel, can you not mention me stopping by? Hopefully I can surprise him another time.”

“Sure thing.”

“Ok, great. Thanks a lot Mr. Wehde. Take care,” she said.

William watched this lively girl walk off to her car like a rowdy cheerleader. She waved as she walked around the hood of her car to the door. She started the engine and leaned to the windshield. She waved one last time and backed the car out of the driveway.

William closed the door. He shook off the awkward encounter between him and the strange girl and headed into the kitchen. The picture of him and Melissa that once hung on the wall was still there. Underneath it was a picture of William and his son, Mitchel, at his high school graduation.

William opened the refrigerator door. At one point, the bottom shelf occupied nothing but beer. Bud Light. Rolling Rock. Fosters. All of William’s favorites were inside. This new black refrigerator had no bottles of any type of alcohol. The bottom shelf was divided between bottles of water and plastic containers of fresh fruit.

He grabbed a bottle of water and a package of Smoked Turkey Breast slices and one of Pepper Jack cheese. He dropped the food on the counter and opened the upper cabinet. He grabbed a loaf of white bread and undid the twisty tie.

The phone rang, but he was locked in a battle of trying to open the cheese package. The phone rang again. William looked over the kitchen from left to right, but the phone wasn’t in there. He rushed into the living room to get to the phone before it went to the answering machine. He checked between the cushions of the couch and of his favorite chair. Entering the living room, he dashed past the phone. It was on the shelf where his son’s picture was and he almost tripped over his feet stopping to answer the phone.

“Hello?” William answered.

“William?” asked an Irish voice.

“Gazet? What are you doing? We agreed you wouldn’t call here,” said a panicked father.

“I’m sorry, but I thought this was important.”

“What if Mitchel had answered?”

“He’s not there, William,” Gazet said like he already knew.

“No, he’s not.”

There was a silence between the two. They hadn’t spoken in some time, and hadn’t seen each other since the week Mitchel was born. They promised that it would be best not to contact each other hoping that by keeping Gazet and Brick away would help in stopping his powers from manifesting.

“What’s so important that you finally call me up after twenty years?” asked William.

“I was in a car accident about a month ago,” Gazet began. He was still lying in the very same hospital bed. He could finally breathe normally without the restrain of a neck brace, but his leg was still wrapped in a thick cast. The neck brace he wore for days after the accident was gone, but his leg was heavily wrapped in a hard, thick brace. “I’ve been stuck in the hospital since then and I’ve been having dreams.”

“I’m sorry to hear that, but you’ll have to excuse me if I’m not entirely sympathetic with you. Does any of this have to do with me?” he asked sternly.

“Yes. They haven’t been dreams, William. They’ve been visions. I’ve had visions of the past. Visions where I’m having lunch with my sister, or the very car accident I was in. I’ve seen the future, too.”

“What’d you see, Gazet?” asked William. Gazet had gotten his full attention because he knew that Gazet wouldn’t have called if one of his visions didn’t have something to do him or Mitchel. When the two were thrust together after Gazet’s first vision of him, William learned to listen to Gazet when he talked about his visions. “Did you see Mitchel? What happens?”

“No. I haven’t seen Mitchel.”

“Did you see his brother?”

“No, it wasn’t that either.”

“What was it, Gazet?” William had grown impatient.

“I saw you, William,” Gazet lowered the phone to collect his thoughts. William held his breath awaiting Gazet’s vision. After a deep breath he continued, “I don’t know where and I don’t know when, but I saw you in the middle of the woods in the middle of the night…dying. Someone is going to kill you.”