The Magic Rain

Chapter Twelve: "Coming Out" Day

The next day was "coming out" day for the hunky wizard from the Other World, my wonderful "little" Jo-Bri.

"Hey, Shorty," I said as Jo-Bri opened the passenger side door on my "new" car. Okay, it was a twenty-year old Chevy Nova, and it had none of the cache of my Datsun, but heck, as long as it didn’t break down, I was cool with it.

Jo-Bri got in and I could feel the car sink, he was that heavy.

"Watch the shocks," I said, laughing, "I don’t think my dad’ll buy me another car if you wreck this one.

He grimaced. "I’m sorry about your car," he said. "When I met you I had just been hit by a car on the highway and when I saw your car I thought it was a baby version of the ‘animals’ that had attacked me. I was afraid it might hurt you."

I laughed and patted his leg, all sorts of thoughts going through my head as I did so, not least of which was the thrill at having Jo-Bri wanting to protect me, even if it was from a Datsun 510.

"That’s okay, Jo-Bri," I said, "I’m only pulling your chain."

He hesitated, and then smiled. I knew he hadn’t quite gotten that reference. "It means that I’m kidding you," I said.

He nodded. "But why would you ‘kid’ me if it makes me feel bad?" he asked.

I sighed. "You’re right," I finally said. "It’s just… something we do here."

He nodded and didn’t have to say anything else.

My cell phone rang at that moment, saving me from further introspection, thank God. I placed the phone sideways on my dash and pressed the "speaker phone" button. I thought of my mom and dad’s cars that had Bluetooth in them that synched with their cell phones.

"Hey," I said at the phone.

"Hey, Melvin," Linda’s voice came back at me and I grinned. I had forgotten what it was like to be around my friends, after three weeks pining and obsessing over the hunky but obviously unavailable Jo-Bri.

"Hey, Linni," I said. "Say hi to Jo-Bri."

"Hey, Jo-Jo," Lindsay said with that kind of girly energy I could never quite manage the way she could.

I glanced at Jo-Bri and saw that he was smiling. "Hi, Linni," he said. "How are you?"

I winced a bit – Jo-Bri could still sound like an old man sometimes.

"Cool!" Linda shot back, unphazed. "You taking care of my girl?"

"Yes," Jo-Bri said, completely serious, and my heart melted again. Thank God Linda wasn’t here, she’d know immediately what I was feeling.

"Wow," she said, obviously impressed by Jo-Bri’s completely serious answer, "I believe you. Hey, Melvin, we still meeting at Sagan’s?"

"Yup," I said.

"’Kay," she shot back, "Jo-Bri, you gonna' live up to Mel’s hype about you?"

"I hope so," Jo-Bri said, and I could tell he wasn’t sure what he had just responded to. I winced, this time because now he knew that I had spent the previous night telling my friends all about him, like a love struck schoolgirl. I sighed. I was a love struck schoolgirl.

Sagan’s was a small restaurant in downtown Dillon where the high school kids hung out. We got there in a few minutes, and I parked my little Nova away from the other cars, to prevent it from getting any more scratches and dings than it already had – and I had to admit it already had more than its share.

As we entered the small greasy spoon, two large guys were exiting. "Hey, Mel," they said, and I recognized them as members of my high school football team – Mike and Scott. I realized that they were both as big as Jo-Bri was, and almost as hot. Almost.

"Hey," Mike said, "who’s the new dude?"

"Oh," I said, nervous for some reason, "this is Jo-Bri."

Jo-Bri smiled and stuck his hand out. I winced – he was offering the middle-aged guy kind of handshake he must have seen on television. Mike easily turned it into the kind of pretzel ceremony African Americans liked so much, ending with a fist pump. Through it all Jo-Bri stood, watching in confusion but smiling.

Scott reached out and grabbed Jo-Bri’s arm. Jo-Bri frowned and I tensed, not knowing what kind of reaction that kind of unwanted contact might elicit from someone from the Other World.

"Hey," Scott said, "you must play ball, right? You got guns there, bro."

Jo-Bri shook his head but before he could say he didn’t carry guns, I laughed a little too loudly. "He’s my little buff guy," I said, grabbing Jo-Bri’s other arm and feeling again the excitement that came from physical contact with him.

"Little?" Scott said, frowning in confusion. "Yeah, right." He nodded at Jo-Bri. "We’re having tryouts this weekend," he said. "Come on out. You look like you’ve maybe played inside back or maybe fullback, right?"

"Right," Jo-Bri said, nodding and smiling without a clue.

"Ten o’clock Saturday," Mike said. "See you there."

I gently pulled Jo-Bri away from the boys who continued through the door and out the restaurant.

"What did I just agree to?" Jo-Bri asked, and I laughed.

"To have your head knocked off," I replied.

Linda was waiting for me at a table in the back of the restaurant with Debbie, Maria and Nancy. I introduced Jo-Bri and saw the looks on their hungry little high school fox faces. They did everything but drool. In fact Debbie actually scooched over and patted the tiny space beside her. "You can sit here if you like, Jo-Bri," she said, and I stared at her in exasperation.

"I’ll sit beside Mel," Jo-Bri said.

I know, I know – but that’s Debbie and it’s just the way she is. She’d give me her kidney on the one hand, and steal my boyfriend on the other hand.

It always amazed me that all of my friends were so pretty, when I was so… well… not. I don’t know why they liked hanging around me except that maybe they liked my not being competition for them. Why they hung around each other I had no idea.

We sat and my friends immediately began performing the kind of no-holds-barred interrogation any group of girls perform on any new hunk on the block that’s plopped down in front of them, and I had, sure enough, plopped a definite hunk down in front of them. Was I nuts? This was like waving steak in front of your pit bull, expecting the animal to behave itself.

I wondered what Jo-Bri would "learn" from this trio of man-hungry sharks.

"So," Linda said, twirling her hair and tilting her head forward and to the side, so that she looked up at Jo-Bri with a wide-eyed, come-hither expression on her maddeningly pretty face. Some friend, though I had to admit I’d seen girls do this kind of thing even when they didn’t intend to actually pursue anything. It was almost as if they were testing the waters or practicing their "craft."

"How do you like it in Dillon?" she finished, and I laughed.

Linda glanced at me, annoyed.

"What?" she asked, exasperated, which only made me laugh even harder, until I realized that Jo-Bri was staring at me, and that my three "friends" were staring alternatively at Jo-Bri and me.

I immediately touched my face to see if I had spittle on it. I wondered if my lipstick was smeared or something. "What?" I asked.

My three friends were frowning at me. "Nothing," they said, almost at once.

I turned to Jo-Bri and was going to ask him the same question, but stopped. He was staring at me in a way that…

"You’re beautiful when you laugh," he said, and I nearly screamed. Not in front of my friends! And even as I silently shouted that, I had the delayed realization of what exactly he had said and how I felt about it.

"Yeah," Debbie said, irritated, "but not so much when she isn’t laughing."

That would have hurt except that it came from Debbie and that was just the way she was.

"She’s beautiful all the time," Jo-Bri said and I wanted to gag him -- and to kiss him. I just couldn’t decide which I wanted to do first.

My girlfriends were still staring at me. I couldn’t understand why Jo-Bri was doing this. Did he think he was protecting me from my friends? Showing me off for some reason? He loved Kawille. Hodon was on his way to destroy us all. What the heck was he doing flirting with me in front of the three prettiest girls in school and making me sit there red as a tomato, saying I was beautiful when everyone knew I wasn’t?

"Hey."

We all looked up. Mike and Scott were there, staring down at us, obviously having changed their minds about leaving. "Let’s do something," Mike said.

I stared. "Uh, like what?"

"Let’s go skinny dipping!" Maria said, giggling.

"No!" I snapped, "we can’t – "

"I’d love that," Jo-Bri said and I desperately searched my memory to see if we’d discussed that particular term during his "schooling." I think I would have remembered if we had.

"Yes!" Linda said, and before I could say anything else in objection she somehow corralled us all and shoved us out from behind the table and out the door of Sagan’s.

Mike and Scott were grinning wickedly. Why was I allowing this, I wondered? I knew why the boys wanted to do it, and I suspected the girls wanted to do it so that they could show off their hot bodies to Jo-Bri. But me? I was a rail. No hips, skinny legs… flat as a board…

Oh my God, I was going to be naked in front of Jo-Bri! Worse, I was going to be naked in front of him at the same time that Linda, Debbie and Maria were going to be naked in front of him.

Just shoot me now, I thought miserably. No, not just miserably… in horror!

* * *

Swinn Lake was just outside of town.

Mike and Scott drove one car, while the three girls somehow piled into my car with me in order to be with Jo-Bri. I could tell that Mike and Scott were really ticked off but what could they say? I worried that Jo-Bri might inadvertently be making enemies, at a time when he needed all the friends he could get.

I was scared out of my wits, but somehow managed to drive all the way to the lake without getting into an accident.

We pulled up and I had barely stopped before Linda, Debbie and Maria leapt out of the car.

I’m not sure Mike’s car had actually stopped before he and Scott were not just out of the car but stripping off their clothing.

I stared out the windshield as Mike and Scott both got naked, followed very closely by Linda, Debbie and Maria.

They were beautiful, I had to admit as I sat there with my hands making imprints in the steering wheel. All five of them were just… beautiful, as they leapt into the lake, screaming and shouting.

"Oh," Jo-Bri said. "So that’s skinny dipping."

I turned to him. "Yeah. I guess we didn’t cover that, huh?"

He studied my face. "You’re very uncomfortable with this."

I nodded, my eyebrows knitted, my stomach doing flip-flops.

"We can drive off," Jo-Bri said.

I shook my head and took a deep breath. "I’d never hear the end of it," I said.

"Is it because you don’t want to make them feel bad?" he asked.

I turned to stare at him, anger boiling up inside. That was a mean joke.

He stared back, awaiting an answer. He didn’t look mean at all. Just… gorgeous.

"What?" I asked, confused.

"You are so much more beautiful than they are, that maybe I thought you wouldn’t want to make them feel bad. Especially in front of me."

I stared. And stared. He waited. And waited. "Okay," I finally snapped, "what the hell are you doing?"

He frowned. "What do you mean?" he asked, then said, "Oh."

"Yeah," I snapped back, "Oh."

He stared in amazement at me. "You don’t really know, do you?"

"Know what, for Christ’s sakes?" I said sharply.

"How beautiful you are."

I actually felt pain in my chest. I was having trouble breathing. "Don’t," I said, panting now.

"What’s wrong?" he said, sounding genuinely concerned.

"Don’t make fun of me," I said, no longer angry, just out of breath, feeling the pain right where my heart was. "It hurts, okay?"

He hesitated, then leaned forward and my eyes got really big as he kept on leaning and suddenly he was kissing me and my world became like a tornado, reality just spinning around in a dizzying whirl. If I had been standing, I would have been staggering, reeling.

And suddenly my arms were around him, pulling him tighter against me, frantic, my blood seeming to boil, and I couldn’t get enough of this strange magic boy.

Then suddenly I remembered and still I pulled him against me, fighting against my own desires until finally I found the strength to push him away.

I sat there, panting, gasping really, and staring at him. He stared back, and I could tell he was as affected as I was.

How had this happened?

"Kawille," I said and I saw the change come over his face.

"I’m sorry," I immediately said. "It’s just that – "

He nodded. "It’s okay," he said, with that lovable accent.

He then got out of the car and started stripping off his clothing. I watched in amazement as he became naked right in front of my eyes. I don’t know if he was any better built than Mike and Scott. After all, they were as big as he was and athletes. But the fact that he was the boy I’d fallen in love with, made his huge, muscular body nearly irresistible.

And I’d just thrown him back like he was an undersized fish. I felt dizzy, and a little ill.

He ran down to the water. Linda, Maria and Debbie screamed upon seeing him.

Jo-Bri leapt into the water and began swimming.

I hesitated, then came out of the car and began undressing as if walking to my own execution. Please, I silently begged my friends, just don’t laugh at me.

Naked, I walked toward the water.

Mike was the first one to notice, and I winced, waiting for the smart aleck remark. It didn’t come. Instead he gawked at me, and I felt myself turn beet red, from naked head to naked toe.

"Scott," Mike said, staring intensely at me.

Scott glanced at Mike, and then followed his gaze to me. He stared.

They didn’t say a word as I walked into the water, sighing in relief as the water finally came up to my chin.

I then realized that my three girlfriends were also staring at me.

"Damn," Linda said, "you’re hot, girl."

"Damn," Mike agreed, still staring at me even though he could no longer see anything.

"Damn," Scott agreed.

I couldn’t be bothered with their mocking me, so I stared past them and saw that Jo-Bri had swum far out into the lake.

I hesitated, and then started swimming.

"Hey, Mel!" Linda called after me, but I was swimming now as quickly as I could.

"Nice ass!" Mike called as I swam past him and Scott.

"Thanks!" I called back, laughing now at the silliness of it all. Here I was, naked, with two of the sexiest guys in school, and all I could think of was catching up to some strange boy who claimed to be a wizard from another world.

"Can I come with you?" Scott asked.

Not in a pig’s eye, I thought, and kept on swimming.

I didn’t catch up to Jo-Bri until I pulled myself up on the opposite shore, probably more than quarter of a mile away.

I was exhausted. I don’t think I’d ever swam that far in my whole life.

Jo-Bri was squatting down on the beach, head in his hands. I stopped several yards away from him, amazed at seeing him there, naked, so close.

I suddenly became self-conscious and moved my hands to cover certain parts of me.

At that moment he looked up at me and I froze like a deer in headlights. A naked deer in headlights.

He stared at me with such intensity that I actually grew a little afraid.

Then a single tear rolled down his cheek and I melted.

"Don’t," he said.

"Don’t what?" I answered.

"Cover yourself up."

Fear jolted through me.

He continued staring at me and slowly, oh so slowly, I let my arms fall back down to my sides. His sorrow, etched on his young face, changed into something that looked like hunger – raw, frightening, hypnotic hunger and the reason I knew what he was feeling was that I was feeling it too.

That’s when I heard the scream.

We both turned at the same time, Jo-Bri standing as he did so, to face the shore on the opposite side of the lake -- where Mike, Scott and the girls were. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Jo-Bri standing there in his naked magnificence and my stomach did a flip-flop, the hunger inside me flaring even stronger.

I felt my feet leave the ground and screamed. I realized that Jo-Bri had scooped me into his arms, and I threw my arms around his neck, feeling his hard, naked body against mine.

I was torn between mortification and desire.

Then there was flash of light and everything went black, but only for a moment. When my vision cleared, I realized that I was back on the other shore of the lake, and Jo-Bri was dropped me from his arms.

Linda, Debbie and Maria were screaming their lungs out.

I landed on my feet and Jo-Bri said only one word to me: "Run."

His face was set in an expression of grim determination that looked almost like anger.

He turned away from me and I saw it then – the reason for the girls’ continuing screams.

A horribly disfigured man was staggering down the beach toward the five figures in the water.

Jo-Bri raised his hands and spoke a calm command in another language, and the disfigured man staggered backward.

"Run!" he shouted at the five people in the water, who looked as though they might be in shock.

The girls were still screaming but the boys suddenly broke free of their stasis and grabbed the girls, dragging them out of the water back onto shore.

The girls did not want to come back onshore for the simple reason that it put them closer to the disfigured man down the beach who shouted something incomprehensible and suddenly the world turned into fire.

I felt myself flying through the air, even as I somehow heard Jo-Bri scream something, presumably in response to the monstrous figure down the beach.

I felt the air knocked out of my body as I grunted upon impact with the beach. I then felt someone grab my hand and realized that Mike was dragging me to my feet, and suddenly I was draped over his shoulder, all the while incredibly aware that we were all naked.

I fought against Mike’s hold on me, which only caused both of us to tumble to the sand. I immediately rolled to my feet, just in time to see the ground disappear beneath Jo-Bri’s feet and him fall out of sight.

"No!" I screamed, and leapt to one side to avoid Mike grabbing my hand again.

A huge wave appeared out of nowhere, striking the monstrous figure down the beach and suddenly Jo-Bri appeared right beside me.

"You’re beautiful naked!" he shouted at me with incongruous intensity.

"What the hell – " Mike began.

"Get the girls out of here!" Jo-Bri shouted at him.

Mike hesitated. "You need help!" he shouted back.

"I need you to save the girls!" Jo-Bri said, and then suddenly threw his hands up and the world became a massive whiteout.

When my vision cleared again, I saw that Jo-Bri was gone again and I glanced frantically around.

Mike reached for me and I glanced at him with what must have been one hell of a frightening stare, because he backed away, then turned and ran for his car.

Jo-Bri was back down the beach, nearer to the disfigured man, and they were shouting at each other, and all around them there appeared to be a lighting storm or fireworks display.

"Mel!" Linda screamed at me, and I glanced back to see that they were piling into Mike’s car, still naked but with clothes in hand. I waved them on, and then turned back.

Jo-Bri stood alone on the beach. The disfigured man lay motionless on the sand, a few yards away.

Mike had started his car and was pulling away, but now I heard him stop the vehicle.

Jo-Bri walked toward the prone figure. I suddenly found myself running as fast as my naked little legs could carry me.

It took me only seconds to get down to the beach by Jo-Bri’s side. He held a hand up behind him and I stopped in my tracks, unquestioning. I stood there, panting, as he resumed walking toward the man who lay on the sand, grotesque and unmoving.

Jo-Bri stopped, staring down at the man, then said, just loud enough for me to hear: "He’s dead."

I brought a hand to my mouth and gasped.

Dead. I had never seen anyone dead before, much less someone who had been killed right in front of my eyes. While skinny-dipping. With the boy I loved.

I heard someone run up from behind and glanced behind to see Mike and Scott stop a couple of feet behind me.

Mike was holding several articles of clothing in his hands and as he reached toward me I saw that in one hand he held my clothing.

I smiled briefly in gratitude and we began to dress – me, Mike and Scott. By the time we were finished, the girls had arrived. They were already dressed, having done so by the car, I assumed.

I turned back to Jo-Bri who was dressed now too, Scott has brought him his clothes.

It was as if we were all in shock, because none of us spoke during the entire procedure of putting our clothes back on, even though a man lay dead and mutilated a few feet from us.

"What happened?" Mike finally asked.

"My God," Linda exclaimed, staring at the dead man.

Mike immediately put his arm around her shoulders and she began to sob.

"I think we need to go home," I said, and then added, "My home, I mean."

Jo-Bri nodded.

"We can explain there," he said.

"Who is he?" I asked, afraid of the answer.

"Who are you?" Scott blurted out, staring at Jo-Bri.

"He’s our hero," I said, then felt foolish for saying it, even if it was true.

Jo-Bri bent and carefully put the dead man over one thick shoulder and easily stood with the man’s weight. He turned and saw us staring at him in horror.

"We can’t leave him here," he said simply.

We stepped aside and Jo-Bri walked by us.

I fell in step beside him and felt the others do the same behind me.

"You’re going to put a dead man into my car?" I asked.

"I’d offer to drive," Jo-Bri said grimly, "but I don’t think my theoretical knowledge of cars is enough to guarantee I won’t drive into oncoming traffic.”

"I’ll drive," I said, not feeling anywhere near as confident as I sounded. "Are you going to put him in – “?

"The trunk," he finished my sentence for me.

I nodded. "Won’t he smell?" I asked, thinking about driving home with a dead boy in my trunk.

"Not if we hurry."

I glanced at him. He was in control. Earlier that had turned me on. Now it just made me frightened – for him.