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“Troubling Gifts”



**~Chapter Three- Powers Unknown~**



Kevin peeks in the crack of the doorway of A.J.’s suite. Quietly, he slips in followed by Nick. The dark room showed a figure under the white thin cotton sheets sleeping calmly. Nick eyes the sleeping A.J. and sits on the edge of the bed. Kevin moves steadily over to the bedside and places his hand on A.J.’s forehead.



“He doesn’t have a fever, I hope he doesn’t catch what we have.” Kevin whispers softly.



Nick runs his fingers through his blond locks which tonight lied in lazily across his head. “Well, let’s go before he gets pissed off. You know he hates it when we wake him up.” Nick whispers tip-toeing to the front to door to leave.



“Ok, fine.” Kevin whispers, walking away from the bedside a few inches before his watch got caught in something. “Uh oh.” Kevin mutters angrily.



“What!” Nick whispers loudly. “Oh man, you’re gonna get it when J gets up.”



Kevin shushes Nick, “Shut up and help me out!” Kevin whispers angrily, tugging on the watch that is stuck around A.J.’s gold chain which tonight, A.J. has around on his neck.



Nick holding in his laughter, pries the watch that was embedded on A.J.’s gold chain. After a few minutes of fighting with the expensive jewelry, the watch is freed from the necklace without A.J. ever moving or waking up.



“Man, we’re lucky!” Nick states smiling, pulling the watch away from the chain and heading out the door. As Kevin and Nick exit the room, they don’t notice A.J. raising his arm from out of the covers. Suddenly a loud crash was heard, surprising both of the men at the door. Kevin turns around and sees a glass vase, floating in the air and suddenly comes careening towards his direction.



“Oh man!” Nick shouts as both men duck down from the crashing vase that slams and breaks inches above them on the wall. Glass shards shatters on the carpet quietly. The shrill sound awakens a bleary eyed A.J.



After a few seconds, A.J. focuses his soft sleepy chocolate eyes on his friends and sits up in the bed. “What the hell are doing in my room?” His raspy voice states, breaking the eerie silence that befallen the room.



“I wanted to see if you’re ok. I was concerned that after Howie’s little problem that you might have caught his flu.” Kevin states quietly, the emerald eyes comforting the brown ones staring at him.



A.J. smiles and in a playful childish voice responds, “Daddy, I’m ok, see. I didn’t get sicky.”



At this, Nick laughs softly as Kevin stares at Nick angrily, “Don’t encourage him, Nick.”



Nick shrugs his shoulders and heads out the room waiting for Kevin.



“Hold up, Kev. Howie didn’t have the flu. I mean he’s not sick, you and I know this. What’s the real reason you came in here? Don’t lie about the flu thing, you’re a bad lair anyway.” Asks a curious A.J. as he crawls over to the edge of the bed, throwing his legs over the edge of the bed.



“It’s well, it’s just that a few minutes before I woke up and went to the bathroom. The problem is…” Kevin states suddenly interrupted by A.J. laughing.



“Bro, I don’t want to know about the whole bathroom ordeal. What you and toilet do is between ya two.” A.J. states holding in more laughter.



Kevin takes a deep breath and rolls his eyes, “Can I finish? This is serious Alex. Stop joking around.”



A.J. throws his arms in the air in defeat, “Sorry, my back. Continue.” He states with amusement in his eyes.



Kevin tells A.J. in clear detail about the red lasers that came shooting from his eyes, breaking the bathroom mirror. “It’s insane. It’s like I’m losing it. This can’t be real, but then something is up with Nick too.” Kevin states, fear evident in his voice.



“Man this is freaky. Nicky what happened?” A.J. asks nervously, eyeing the young blond sitting on the white carpet beside the bed.



“I woke up with fire in my bed!” Nick says, explaining what he saw when he had gotten up.



“What! You saw a flame just appear beside you on the bed, burning and the fire never touched you! How can that be? I mean you said the fire was burning for a good few minutes, how can you not feel the flames on your skin?” A.J. states drawing out confused looks from the other two.



“I don’t know! The flames never touched me. I can’t explain it!” Nick states frustrated, as he picks off some of the lint from the carpet.



A.J. sighs, “K, so you two can do magic tricks, couldn’t we have talked about this in the morning.” He rolls his eyes to one of his pillows to settle down for sleep.



Kevin shoves the digital clock into A.J.’s face, the red glowing numbers showing three am on it. “It is morning and we’re gonna talk about this now!” Kevin states irritated.



A.J. sighs, closing his eyes as he lies down, placing his head back on the pillow. “I hate you guys.” A.J. mutters annoyed, a small smile playing on his lips.



Nick sighs smiling, “The feelings mutual, but something happened with you and you didn’t realize it.”



A.J. twirls his fingers in the air to express his excitement, sarcastically he responds, “ Woo Hoo, why I would love to hear what you have to tell me Nicky?”



“Stop calling me that, A.J.” Nick states getting annoyed.



Kevin sighs and mutters a small profanity under his breath, “Can you two behave like adults now? A.J. you lifted your arm and you somehow threw that broken vase over there.”



A.J. asks confused, “What? NO way! It’s not like I have telekinesis dude. Please go to sleep, ya two are bugging out. And you woke me up from my beauty sleep.”



Nick mutters quietly, “Looks like you’ll be sleeping for a long time then, cause one gotta be beautiful to get that kind of sleep right?”



A.J. flips his middle finger to him and points to the door, “Out now! And enough of the whole magic thing, K.” As he throws a pillow at Nick head.



Nick narrowly misses the pillow and laughs flipping both of his middle fingers to A.J. as he backs out the room all the while Kevin tells him to stop that and leaves the room.



Kevin laughs and pushes Nick and himself out the door, closing the hotel door behind them.



A.J. closes his eyes shortly after they left but the thoughts of what they said, lingered in his mind. ‘Telekinesis. Please what were they sniffing to say that?’ But then again, how did the vase broke? If the guys weren’t in the room yet. None of that made sense and A.J. falls into a fitful sleep as the thoughts hounded his dreams. Hopefully in the morning, things can be explained in clear detail and the guys were probably playing a joke on him. But somehow his heart was telling him something else.

~*~



Brian wakes up, his blue eyes blinded by the bright light of the glowing sun. He gets up and gets dressed in denim jeans and a white striped shirt and heads out to meet the others downstairs. He gets into the elevator and steps out to the lobby. To his surprise, everyone in the group was already there. Surprised, Brian glanced at his watch. He was five minutes early until they had to meet, yet he was the last one down today. He pinched himself to make sure this is all real.



“Yup, Rok, we’re here before you. And for the first time ever, it seems you’re not the early one this morning.” Howie states laughing as the others join in. He tugs on his black t-shirt and rubs his hands on gray cargo pants.



“Man, maybe my watch stopped or something. How are you all here before me? This sucks. I don’t like being the late one.” Brian states with a confused look on his face.



Nick laughs and runs his fingers through his blond spikes, patting Brian’s shoulder gently. “Well, it happens to the best of us at times, Rok.” At this statement everyone bursts out laughing.



Brian looks at his cousin and noticed that something is up. “Kev. Are you ok? What happened?” Brian asks quietly, approaching Kevin who’s sitting on a soft black sofa in the lobby.



“It’s nothing, I’ll tell ya later, we’re gonna be late for rehearsal now.” Kevin whispers, concealing the fear in his voice. He fingers the pockets of his brown leather jacket and tugs on his beige sweater beneath it. He rubs his hands on his black pants and heads to the glass doors.



“What are you hiding Kevin?” Brian states seriously, crossing his arms over his chest.



Kevin stares back at him, “Nothin’ let’s go!” And with that walks to the awaiting jeep at the back of the hotel. Brian sighs and runs his fingers through his sandy blond hair.



“Don’t worry about. Look Howie is fine. His little flu thingy must have passed already. Kevin was just worried about him and A.J.” Nick states smiling, his blue eyes shining.



Brian lets a small smile cross his face to conceal the concern that overtakes him suddenly.



All through the rehearsal, Brian knew something was up, everyone seemed quiet, a little too quiet. Words were rarely said from any of the guys and that bugged Brian out. Finally the silence was too much for Brian and he crosses over to Nick, who’s sitting on the edge of the stage swinging his legs, softly.



“Nick, what’s up with everyone?” Brian states annoyed, his eyes scanning the dark blue denim and white tight t-shirt worn by Nick.



Nick shrugs his shoulder, “Hmm, I don’t know. I guess we don’t have much to say today.”



“Yeah right, tonight’s the concert. We usually get all giddy and hyped, but something’s up. I mean ya all quiet and stuff. And you don’t seem to be excited about tonight. That’s not like you and the others at all. You’re hiding something. Tell me!” Brian states, kneeling down next to Nick and gazes at the large arena: where rows and rows of vacant seats were getting cleaned and prepared for tonight’s concert.



“Tell me something, Brian, do you think a person can have some kind of power mentally?” Nick asks curiously, staring at Brian.



Brian drew confused look on his face. “Just tell me, I have no idea what you’re talking about?”



Nick sighs and goes into detail about last night’s events with him, Kevin and A.J. “And I think Howie can do stuff too.” Nick states finishing the story.



Brian stares at Nick confused, “I know you have a big imagination, but this doesn’t make any sense. Besides where did you get this idea about the powers?”



Nick shakes his head frustrated, “See, I knew you wouldn’t believe me. Tell me Brian, what other explanation can there be! We tried being logical and reasonable about this whole thing but we got no answers. What about Howie? You saw it didn’t you. Everyone else saw the electricity shooting out of Howie hands the other day. Come on! Tell me what other reason can there be!” Nick cries out frustrated.



Brian gulps, shaking his head. “I don’t wanna believe it. If you have that fire power, then what’s my power? Huh?” Shouts Brian annoyed. “You know as well as I do that people can’t do those things. Howie got a little shocked, that’s all. It’s not a big deal. He’s ok now, didn’t you see him laughing and dancing? He’s singing great, like he always does, he’s fine, nothing is bothering him.”



Nick gulps, “Have you asked him how he’s doing? You know he plays off things like nothing is bothering him. But I know he’s not fine. Look at him Brian, tell me, if he looks ok.”



Brian sighs and gazes his blue eyes over to the tan complexion face of Howie. Howie, who’s normally laughing during rehearsal, is sitting in the corner with his head on his knees today. “So, he’s a little tired today. Sleep wasn’t easy with all the commotion you did last night.”



“What is it gonna take for you to believe that something is really wrong with us. I say we all go to the doctor now and find out the problem. If we’re going through some sort of outword depression, I need to know.” Kevin states: leaning over Brian, eyeing his younger cousin cautiously.



Brian shrugs his shoulders, “Depression? Fine, I mean, you guys don’t feel well, let’s talk with a doctor about this. Cause if all of you guys caught something, we gotta cancel or postpone tonight’s concert.”



The others nod and begin gathering stuff, putting on their gym backs and back packs.



Brian heads down one of the aisles backstage and crashes into a middle age woman who works with the planning of concerts. The fluorescent lights shine down on her caramel complexion as she heads the opposite way towards Brian. He was about to wave to her but was stun with what happened next. The woman, who’s black hair had some few strands of grayish white was tied up in a bun. She’s in a black blouse and red long skirt. The woman of average height suddenly after the collision with Brian falls, crashing to the cement pavement, not moving. Her brown eyes stare blankly back at Brian as he touches her face gently. He reached for her wrist to find no pulse. Nothing, she’s not breathing. Brian thinks to himself scared as his heart begins banging in his chest. He takes deep breaths and begins to shout for help. Two security guards arrived quickly along with the other four members of the group. One of the security guards found she died and called for ambulance.



“Sir, this woman died of heart attack.” One of the security guards replied.



Brian bit his lower lip nervously watching the guards carry the dead woman away to the arriving paramedics. Nick stands near Brian and pokes Brian with his elbow. “You know something, don’t you?” Nick whispers softly.



Brian shakes his head, “N, no, why would you say that?”



“Because you looked like you had something to do with the woman’s death.” A.J. states concerned.



Kevin pats Brian’s shoulder and shouts at A.J., “Why would you say that? How dare you accuse him of killing anyone. You heard the guard, she died of a heart attack, not cause Brian had anything to do with it.”



A.J. looks alarmed, “No, that’s not what I meant; I mean if we really have something wrong with us, like that magic crap you all insisted we possess, then maybe Brian has a power that deals with death.” A.J. stuttered at the end of the statement, backing away from the four glaring men. He stares at his black tank top and black cargo pants and gulps nervously.



Howie sighs, “I think Nick could be right on this one.”



“Whoa, care to repeat that again? Blondie over here, right for once in his life. No way, I can’t believe it.” A.J. states smiling at Nick.



Brian stands there shaking violently, he cries out suddenly, “You think I have something to do with that woman’s death. I never touched her! She bumped into me and then she fell dead on the floor.”



A.J. did a low whistle and shakes his head, “Maybe you can touch people and they die in your hands.”



“That’s enough!” Kevin interrupts him. “I don’t wanna hear another word from your mouth A.J.! How dare you say that to him! You apologize to him now. We end this discussion now! We’ll get the answers we need soon. So if you don’t have anything to say not pertaining to this whole magic thing, then don’t bother talking.” Kevin states angrily, gently pulling Brian outside the arena to get into the black jeep taking them to a nearby doctor. The others follow behind, confused and upset.



“Wow, Kevin went all daddy on us again.” Nick grumbles.



Howie smiles, running his fingers through his short brown wavy hair: “He’s scared Nick, about all of this. How will you respond to such a thing like this?” He asks gently, as a gentle breeze filters the sunny sky outside.



“I think I’m responding quite while.” Nick states seriously.



Howie smiles, “He’s worried about all of us, that’s why he’s like that. As of this power thing, it’s too far fetch. That’s like in fairy tales and stuff.”



“And in comics” added A.J. smiling.



“What if they find nothing wrong with us? Then what?” Nick asks softly.



Howie pats Nick shoulder, “They have to! People don’t do things like this, it’s not normal is it?” Howie states to comfort Nick. Yet in his mind, he knew that something is wrong and a simple medication won’t be able to care for their special disease.

~**~



**~TO BE CONTINUED…~**