Thoughts. What are they? Which ones are mine, which ones are other? And who? Who is thinking?
"Orange juice would be really good right now" "Damn, look at that girl's ass" "It hurts so much, but I don't want people to see." "I'm going to do it today, they are going to remember."
That last one jarred her, the malice. But who? She looked around. There were maybe 100 or more kids in the Polton Hall High School lunch room. Thousands of thoughts, but this one was different.
It all started happening when she was twelve. Her parents grew concerned as she grew distant. She wasn't about to talk to them, considering she now knew they were only staying together for her and that her father was already seeing someone else.
She looked around the room, usually there was a feeling of distance, but the malice in this one overwhelmed the entire cafeteria. She tried to shake it off. Maybe some orange juice would help.She headed to the vending machine a freshman boy was currently using. He fiddled with his change a bit before putting it in the slot and selecting his item of choice, orange juice.
"I hope my mom isn't really sick" "I just want to go home and play my game" "They are dead, all dead"
There it was again, she quickly turned and scanned the room. No one out of the ordinary. She purchased her orange juice and sat down at an empty table.
Later that day she sat at her desk in English writing a paper when her pencil broke.
"I need a pencil"
She reached into her bag just as the boy next to her reached into his. In a moment of synchronicity they both produced a pencil. She noticed he already had a sharpened pencil laying on his desk "My thoughts or theirs?" The boy looked over, a quizzical look in his eyes.
“If it’s my thoughts, my thoughts in theirs. What am I? Do I control everything? Is the malice mine?”
She had been bullied. Just recently a group of girls had circled around her and called her no-name. She was quiet, different, and weird. It hurt because it was true. She was no body. But was that enough for her to hate? Did she have that deep down? Was it coming out in the thoughts of others?
She knew where they grouped in 5th period. That is where she would do it if she were to. She had no plan to, but something urged her to check it out. The girls were exactly where she knew they would be. She walked past, trying to hide within a group and then hid around the corner. She watched, waiting.
“I gotta do it, they hurt me”
This time she could pin point the direction. The boy, the one with the orange juice was headed down the hall. His body looked tense, his lips tight, and his eyes cold and emotionless. He was approaching the girls in a way that that wasn’t direct, but would allow for him to pass just to the right.
“Pull it out and jab, easy. I got this”
She had to stop this somehow. “Is he doing this for me?” she wondered. “I have to, I have to forgive.”
“They are people, they are people too,” they thought together. “We are young. This is nothing. We all have potential, we can all change. I can’t do this. I won’t do this.”
The deadness in the boy’s eyes softened as thought snapping out of a trance. He picked up his pace and quickly passed down the hall and out of view. Her malice would not manifest itself that day.
It took some time, but she realized she didn’t read the thoughts of others, she created them. Somehow even her subconscious impulses were realized in those around her. Lewelyn, in many ways, was all people and one. She was a god.