Several years ago, same school, same playground, same time . . .
"Eek!" Alice shrieked and then pulled at her long hair. "Leave me alone!"
She yelled at empty space slightly above her height.
The nearby teacher on watch duty heard saw Alice and hesitated to approach. All the other kids noticed and whispered among themselves.
"She's at it again."
"Mommy says stay away from her because she's weird."
"My dad told me the same thing, and that she's a bad influence."
"I wish I could stay away from her, but we're in the same class."
"I think she's haunted."
"My parents think she's just crazy."
Needless to say, they all stayed as far away from her as they could. All of them except one boy who didn't hesitate to run up to the lone girl and slap the invisible thing that bothered her.
"You heard the girl!" Jackie Li shouted. "Leave her alone!"
And then he turned to Alice to ask if she was okay.
Alice stared at him, dumbfounded, before hesitantly answering with a nod.
Jackie beamed before turning his gaze back to Alice's bully. "Don't you know it's mean to pull someone's hair?"
Silence followed for a while before Alice spoke up.
"You . . . You can see them?"
Jackie looked at her, blinked and tilted his head one side. "See what?"
"You know . . . " Alice said. She pointed skyward. "Them."
"You mean the tiny little monsters?" Jackie looked up and squinted before returning his gaze back to Alice. He shook his head, "No."
Alice's face fell and she quickly turned away. She was about to run but then stopped.
"Wait, you said you can't see them, right?"
Jackie nodded. "Right."
"Then how do you know they're tiny?"
"If it was something bigger, they'd be pulling a bunch more of your hair," Jackie said. "I figured they'd be as big as pixies like on TV. I think there were like . . . three? Because your hair got split three ways."
"There are five," Alice corrected him. "Two of them just pointed and laughed."
"So you really can see invisible monsters?" Jackie asked. "Like everyone else was saying?"
Alice instantly regretted speaking up. She looked away, but hesitantly, she nodded.
"That's so cool!"
Alice looked up at Jackie in surprise. "Really?"
Jackie nodded. "That's like a magical superpower, like you got special eyes like those people in TV and movies, the ones that can see ghosts and fairies, and stuff. What are the monsters like? Are they all mean? Or are there good monsters too?"
"Well . . ."
**********
Present day . . .
Jackie peeked out from behind the streetlight. Up ahead was the man in the brown suit.
Although Taylor denied seeing Alice at the Gathering, she did not deny the Gathering happened on Saturday, the same day Alice disappeared. That was enough to further convince Jackie that the two events were connected. He wished he could get more answers about the Gathering, but he thought it best not to push his luck. Just when he thought he had reached a dead end, that man appeared and reminded him of Alice.
That was when he was struck with a wild, almost crazy (well, definitely crazy) idea. What if, Jackie thought, the Gathering was look for people who could see invisible things?
It'd make sense. The way he was swatting at invisible bugs, that man in the brown suit probably had the same special eyes that Alice has. Most people, Jackie knew from experience, would be scared away from such a person. But Taylor had enthusiastically tried to get him to join the Gathering. That meant he was exactly the kind of guy the Gathering was looking for, same as Alice.
There was probably a message on the flyer that only people with special eyes could see, Jackie surmised. And whatever was on that invisible message definitely piqued Alice's curiosity, something that would have tugged at the heart strings of people like her.
In that case, the man in the brown suit was the key Jackie needed to finally get close to the Gathering, to get closer to finding Alice.
Deep down, Jackie knew that it was a long shot, that he was grasping at straws and guessing based on some strange behavior he observed for a minute (a few seconds, really) from a complete stranger he had never seen before. But if it meant finding Alice, this amateur sleuth would leave no stone unturned.
For an old guy, he sure got legs of steel, Jackie thought. His own legs felt like they were on fire, and he could barely stand. He had to hold onto the streetlight to stop himself from sinking to the ground.
Their trip had been a surprisingly long and far one. They had gone from the edge of Chinatown all the way deep into the southwest side of the city, at a less densely populated district known to locals and tourists to be where independent artisans did business. At this time of year, customer traffic was slow so there were scarcely any people about, save a few stragglers on a whim. Much of the brightly colored buildings had become golden against the light of the setting sun.
Throughout their journey, Jackie never let the man out of his sight. And the more he watched the man, the more convinced he was that the man had the same sort of special eyes that Alice had. Sometimes, the man would make abrupt stops where there were no obstacles, shied away from empty space as if it were an intimidating thug, and once again swung his hand about as if to shoo away bugs when none could be seen, even with binoculars (something Jackie always kept handy in case he needed it, but never had a use for until now). Those were all things that Jackie observed Alice doing quite frequently, despite her efforts to hide them.
Upon reaching a white coffee shop building with black wood frames, the man made a turn into the alley. Without stopping to wonder why the man would go in there, Jackie followed. He peeked into the alleyway just in time to see the man make another turn and rushed after him but then screeched to a halt when he found the man standing in front of him, glaring with his arms folded over his chest.
"Just what do you think you're doing, young man?"
Jackie was at a loss for words. He frantically looked right and left while stammering, "I-I, w-well . . ."
Come on, Jackie, he told himself. Get it together! The whole point of tailing him was to get the chance to talk! Now you got that chance, so talk!
But that was easier said than done. Jackie wasn't exactly the kind of guy who could strike up a conversation with a random stranger at a moment's notice. It took mustering up some guts to get him to talk with customers at the grocery store he worked at.
Fortunately, the man just quietly waited. He was either more patient than he looked, or he enjoyed watching Jackie nervously squirm. Either way, he allowed time to pass for Jackie to take some deep breaths and get his thoughts straight, which the boy did poorly.
"H-hi. My name's Jackie Li. You can probably tell from the lanyard sticking out of my pocket, but I'm a student at Colbert High School. I'm a bit of a comic book nerd, but I also watch cooking videos online. There's this one chef that knows how to make the most mouthwatering chicken dishes on the whole wide internet. Oh! And I like video games, but who doesn't these days? Am I right? But you probably don't care about that. I can tell by your face and the way you're growling like a rottweiler."
"Just get to the point!" the man snapped.
"Okay, okay, okay! Now, I know how it looks, but I promise you it's not for anything bad. I just wanted to talk to you and ask you a few questions."
"What sort of questions?" the man asked steely.
"Well . . . " Jackie hesitated for a moment but then grabbed some resolve. "Okay. No use beating around the bush. I'm investigating the Gathering and would like to know everything you can tell me about them."
"Why?" asked the man. "Are you looking to join them?"
Jackie fibbed, or at least tried to, shoulders hunched, back crooked and eyes rolled up. "Yes?"
No need to say how that went.
"Just stick to the truth, kid."
"My friend's gone missing and I think the Gathering had something to do with it."
"I see." The man went noticeably slack, but he maintained a stern frown. "But you know if you want to find out more about the Gathering, all you got to do is go to one of their meetings, right? You could just grab a flyer that'll tell you when and where those guys hang out. That Taylor girl would be happy to give you one. Why go to the trouble of stalking me?"
"I wasn't stalking," Jackie protested. "I was just following you wherever you were going while observing your every move."
The man stared at him in disbelief. "That is the very definition of stalking!"
"Oh. Then I guess I was stalking you."
"Ugh!" The man rubbed his temples with a groan. "Look, kid, just go home. If your friend's in trouble, just go to the police and let them handle it."
But Jackie was determined not to leave emptyhanded at this point.
"Since we're already here and all, why not tell me where the next Gathering's gonna be?"
Instead of answering Jackie's question, however, the man said, "Kid, if the Gathering's really bad news like you say, then you should be staying away from them. Hell, I was never interested in going to their meeting anyway."
Undeterred, Jackie replied, "That's a good idea. You better tell me where the Gathering's supposed to hang out, so I know what places to avoid."
Exasperated, the man groaned and looked up at the sky, as if to ask the angels above, "Why me?"
And then, more sternly, he told Jackie, "Go home."
But Jackie refused to give up. "Not until you tell me where the Gathering's going to be."
"You want to know where Gathering meets up that badly?"
Jackie nodded.
The man held up the flyer he got from Taylor. "Here. There's your answer. Take it and leave me alone."
Jackie took one look at the flyer and then said, "No thanks. It'd be easier if you just told me the time and address."
"We're done here."
The man turned to walk away. But before he could leave, Jackie called out and shouted, "I know you can see them!"
The man instantly froze. He didn't turn around, but he was surely listening. Jackie pressed on.
"I know you can see the invisible monsters. Like I said earlier, I watched your every move. A lot of your habits matched up with Alice's. She could see the monsters too. Only people with special eyes like hers can see the time and address on the flyers. Since you're the only other person I know with special eyes, you're the only one who can help me find her. Please, just give me the address to the Gathering."
Silence reigned for who knows how long. It could've just been a few seconds, but for Jackie, it may as well have been an hour or more. The silence broke as it was sure to, but not in the way that Jackie wanted.
"You need your eyes checked, son. That and your head."
And then he walked away, leaving Jackie all alone, frozen and disappointed.
**********
The man in the brown suit marched down a long and narrow path littered all over with bits of trash between rows of black-stained backside walls. He tried to ignore the vomit-inducing smells and what he called annoying buzzing at his ears.
"That was cold, don't you think?"
"Heh heh heh heh heh! I like."
"I don't. It'd be more amusing if he told the kid and sent him to an early grave. A really early grave."
"Ooh! That would be more amusing!"
The hoarse, whispery, hissy voices belonged to what looked like three tattered, black rags free-floating around the man's head. With their shredded edges trailing behind them, they looked like fish with long tailfins dancing around in water.
Jackie was indeed correct. The man COULD see invisible monsters, but he preferred to call them pests because that was what they were to him: annoying pests that would never leave him alone.
Acting as if the talking, flying rags weren't there, the man continued walking. A few feet away was the alleys' exit.
"But you know," said one, "that boy's very smart. He figured out you got special eyes just from a little bit of observation."
"Well, he does have a friend with the same kind of eyes," said another.
"HAD a friend with the same kind of eyes," the third corrected the second. "She's missing. Probably in heaps of trouble. Heh heh heh!"
"That Gathering's bad news, after all," said the first. "You said so yourself."
The man continued to ignore the flying rags.
"But you don't know HOW BAD they really are. They're really bad. Really, really, REALLY bad."
"Oh, they can't be that bad. Not YET! Anyway."
"Yes. They haven't done anything yet. But soon. They got plans. Bad plans. DEATHLY bad plans."
The man's muscles stiffened, but he quickly recovered and kept up his march. But he was not quick enough, and the rags noticed.
One flew up to his face.
"Interested?" it asked mockingly. "You're interested, aren't you? You must be dying to know what it is the Gathering's up to. I could tell you for a little something-something."
Finally, the man could pretend no longer, and he growled to the flying rag, "Get out of my face or get salt in yours."
The instant he pulled out his saltshaker, the rags bolted. They flew back deeper into the alley, but not before firing one last shot at the man.
"Fine! Be that way! But don't say I didn't warn you! Whatever's going to happen to that kid will be on your shoulders! And I guarantee: It. Will. Be. NASTY!"
The man scoffed as the pests disappeared along with fading cackles. "Pfft! Whatever. Not like I'll ever see him again."
With that vocal self-affirmation of belief, he emerged from the alley using his hand to shield his eyes from the sun, stepping into a sunny street full of bright boutiques and fanciful cafes, and to a future that would betray his expectations.
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