The Elements

I was supposed to the responsible one. I mean, Lucas is far from responsible. And Lucy is, well, she’s small. So, yes, I was supposed to be the responsible one. But, whatever I did could’ve been called irresponsible by even Lucas. And you should see Lucas’ room. The question is how could I be so irresponsible? So, I sat on the couch with a blanket wrapped around my shoulder and water dripping on it from my hair. The place where I’d sat on the couch was wet already. Dad was on his phone, talking to someone about his new plan or whatever. Mom was trying to make Lucy stop crying by going to and fro and making weird faces (which actually led to Lucy crying even harder). Lucas was, as usual, doing what he always does, whatever the case may be, that is, playing on his PSP (how’d he get that out?). Tess just kept on sleeping beside the couch. I wish I was that carefree. But the worst things were the glances that I was getting from mom and dad. I was just sitting on the couch, sobbing silently, like Miss. Feeling Guilty. The water had ultimately stopped after flooding our house for an hour at most. The stairs were all wet and so were most of the places in our house, except for this tiny portion of the drawing room. Well, it wasn’t a tiny portion, since our drawing room’s huge, but in comparison to our entire house, it’s small. I’d seen the kitchen – it was overflowing with water. Thank god all the electronic stuff and my books had been taken out and arranged on shelves. Only a few of the cardboard boxes were out, which I hoped contained clothes. Well, the plus side is, they all got a free wash. Then suddenly, the bell rang. Dad got off his phone and said, ‘That must be the plumber,’ and rushed out to open the door. And, to my utter surprise (and disgust, because he was the one responsible for drilling such a crazy idea into my head. Well, not literally, but he was guilty), in came Mr. Jake and a couple of people I didn’t know. He was wearing a shirt with a brown coat and a pair of khaki trousers, his usual dress as a teacher in our school. One was a blonde lady, wearing an overall, and her hair tucked into a cap. She was also holding a tool box. The other two were fat guys, wearing the same overall and caps, and they looked like twins. They both had brown matted hair and a flat sideburn. And with that impish smile and brown eyes, they looked like those two little fat guys in Alice in Wonderland, only they weren’t bald. Anyways, so Mr. Jake shook my dad’s hand and said, ‘Hello, Mr. Harrison. I’m Jake Russell. Here are the plumbers.’ Mr. Jake looked like as if he’d just got up from sleep. My dad said, looking astonished (since, in New York, if we called the plumbers, they replied a week later), ‘Oh. Yea. Um, the incident is kind of bizarre.’ Mr. Jake glanced at me and said, ‘It isn’t that shocking.’ ‘Has this happened before?’ Before Mr. Jake could answer, Lucas looked up at him from the couch and said, ‘Didn’t I see ya with Linda yesterday, outside the eatery?’ My dad looked at me and then Mr. Jake and said, ‘What?’ I said, ‘Mr. Jake is my English teacher. I had to ask him about my homework.’ My mom went, looking shocked, ‘They give homework here on the first day of school?’ Mr. Jake smiled and said, ‘Yes. We do. Very tough teachers.’ Lucas just kept staring at Mr. Jake with narrowed eyes and said, ‘So, like, you’re a plumber and a teacher?’ Mr. Jake just smiled and said, ‘Yes. And I’m also a mechanic.’ Lucas just smiled and said, ‘Cool.’ My dad showed Mr. Jake all the places where the taps broke, which was almost everywhere around the house, while I dried myself with a new dry towel. It was almost six-thirty then. My school started from seven-thirty. Mom found me a dry t-shirt and a pair of dry capris, while the plumbers worked around. By the look on their faces, I could say that the incident had shocked them. I put on my dry clothes. Mom had found Lucas a dry t-shirt and a pair of track pants. He wore that to school. No breakfast at home for us. Dad didn’t drive us to school, and we had to take the bus. But I got a seat beside Lucas (which another girl had offered to him). When I got off at our school, we went to the café and asked for something to eat. But extra food meant extra money, so we had to pay for that. After breakfast, Lucas told me that everything would be all right and that I possibly couldn’t have broken off all the taps of our house. But I knew the truth. The real truth. And it was me who’d broken all the taps. I just knew it. As I was going to my locker, I saw that Mr. Jake was standing there. Uh-oh. I tried to turn around, but he’d already seen me. He said, ‘Linda, I’d like to talk to you.’ And I was like, Seriously? On top of all that I’d been through in the past 24-hours? Now this is real torture. I tried to stay calm as Mr. Jake placed his coffee mug on the table and arranged the papers in his hand. Then he placed them on the table and turned to me. Before he could even open his mouth I started blabbering, ‘Look, I’m really, really sorry. I know that whatever I’d done was stupid, but I didn’t mean to blow off all the taps of our house, you know. I was just—’ But he cut me off saying, ‘The incident is really hilarious, if you ask me.’ Saying this, he gave a hearty laugh. But I was dumbstruck. ‘So… it’s all cool?’ I asked. He got on a straight face and said, ‘Of course not! You brought in so much pressure of water that all the taps of your house blew off. The incident was stupid, of course, but it also showed something brilliant on your part – curiosity. Curiosity is really important for an element, and not all elements have this quality.’ I got confused. ‘So… is it all cool or not?’ He said, ‘It’s all cool. For now. But I must teach you. And I will.’ I blinked, ‘I’m sorry?’ He said, ‘To use your powers, that is. I will teach you to use your powers.’ Now, this sounded ridiculous. ‘Look, Mr. Jake, I’m, really, really grateful, that you wanna teach me how to use these, um, freakish powers. But, uh, I was thinking about getting rid of them.’ Now, he looked mad. And Mad Mr. Jake equals to Not Good. ‘Getting rid of them?’ he repeated. ‘Uh, yea.’ Then I took out Aqua the necklace from my pocket and said, giving it to him, ‘Here, take it. It’s yours anyways.’ ‘You’re not serious, are you?’ ‘I am. Really. I wanna get rid of them. So, have it and free me of them.’ ‘But that’s not possible. Giving me the necklace won’t free you of your powers. It’s there and will always stay there, within you, till you feed the Aqua. The Aqua chose you. You must save the water. Or else every living thing will die, including you.’ ‘Um, first of all, Aqua wouldn’t be so stupid as to choose me. Secondly, I think Aqua won’t let itself die. It’ll choose someone else once it sees that I’m not gonna take those powers. So, here, have it.’ He took the necklace and said, ‘You’ve gotta take it Linda. It’s you. Once the Aqua chooses someone, it doesn’t let go. You’ll either save life on earth or let all living things die. It’s on you.’ I was kinda tensed inside, but I didn’t let it show outside. I just turned around and got ready to leave, when Mr. Jake again said, ‘And, oh yea, Acid Lady, I mean, Ivy, won’t leave you. She’ll keep following you till you kill her. And without this, you can’t kill her, till you’re trained well.’ I turned around looking mad and said, ‘Look, man – I mean, sir – once I tell her that I don’t have the freaking necklace, she’ll let me go. It’s on you, now. Not me.’ Saying this, I left the room. But stupid me, since I had English class with Mr. Jake only right then. The bell rang and people started pouring in as soon as I came out. I said, ‘Ugghh…’ But Jose came up to me and said, ‘Hey, Lin. Where’re you going? Come on.’ And I went in. Again. Against my will.