Bright Star (8 page)

*

Jackson vaulted from his very birth into the future through a tight bundle of memories. He remembered catching Rush holding thunderclouds in his hands when they were boys in the backyard. He remembered Rush touching his own broken leg after a nasty fall from his bike and standing up to ride again. More Shifts came to him, and more. He saw the seven Shifts in the last seven months he’d managed to witness and Rush had taken away from him.

In a matter of seconds, Jackson Rush discovered his brother Jacob Rush.

His throat tightened, his tongue thickened. He knew
his
brother, and suddenly life made sense. It frightened him, but finally made so much sense. One expects for the day the sun finally shines light on all of life’s mysteries to be a good day.

“You…” Jackson rasped as he searched his brother’s face. He knew this face, had always known it. But now…

Rush didn’t say anything right off. Instead, he started to sit down on the edge of roof. He ran a hand over his face. In seconds, the brothers had been transported. They were standing on the roof of their building. Rush stared out at the night sky still illuminated by a giant moon.

“You do this so effortlessly. How have you managed to keep this a secret for so long?” Jackson intoned astonishment in his voice.

Rush frowned and closed his eyes. It was as if he was concentrating on an answer. Nothing came.

“How did you manage to avoid the Service? No. Forget the Service for now. Mom… Dad?” Rush didn’t answer. “And what is it Rush? Where does it end? How much High Energy do you have? What you’ve done… what I’ve seen you do… Rush, no one can do that. No one. Not even me.
No one
.”

Rush still seemed unable to find the words to answer. Instead, he looked at his brother and stated plainly, with fatigue, “I gave you back your memories for one reason and one reason only.”

“Why?” Jackson was barely audible. His brother sat on the ledge, the electrified sky behind him.

“So you will believe what I have to tell you about her.”

Jackson didn’t understand, but he certainly knew who “her” was. “Bright Star?”

“That name,” Rush mumbled, shaking his head. He rubbed hard at his eyes.

“I know. Isn’t it a little funny?”

“No, Jackson, it isn’t. She… she…” Rush’s face crumpled. He appeared to struggle for an adequate explanation but ended completely inarticulate. “She’s bad. I mean, not bad. But… bad.”

Jackson chuckled for a moment. Then he sobered. Rush wasn’t kidding. “You mean like the Devil bad?”

“No,” Rush answered.

“You mean like she sleeps around bad?”

“No,” Rush repeated.

“What? I mean, she cheats on her taxes, she steals, she murdered someone? What kind of bad?”

“None of those things. All of those things. Worse.” Rush returned.

“Or did she do something as fucked up as spend her whole life stealing the memories from those closest to her?”

Rush did not respond, but neither did he cower or apologize. He just seemed to wait for Jackson to reign in his anger.

“How could you do this to me?” Jackson’s voice quaked.

“I had to.” Rush told him.

“You didn’t. I know now. I know everything now, and the world hasn’t come to an end. You could have told me. You could have left my head alone. I would never have done this to you.”

“I know,” Rush dipped his chin and spoke quietly, “You are a good person, Jackson. I know you wouldn’t do what I did, but I only wanted to protect you.”

“From what?”

“From me,” Rush responded, his voice so quiet.

“Show me.” Jackson breathed. When Rush only shook his head, he made a new request. “Then show me Bright Star.” If Rush wanted him to know exactly what it was that made Bright Star bad, he could use his power to show him.

“No,” Rush shook his head again. “You don’t need to see what I see.”

“Rush, you’ve done this to me since I was a kid. I’m an adult. I’m a member of the Service. I’m precocial. What could you possibly be protecting me from?”

Rush gave a lopsided smile. It was at once benevolent, sad and condescending. Jackson knew then that his brother would still try to protect him. Rush was stubborn to the end and would never allow Jackson to know what he knew.

Suddenly, another memory burrowed its way back inside his mind. It was of his mother. Jackson paused. He’d thought that none of those were left. She stood in the kitchen carefully cutting through a foam board. Rush was sitting at the kitchen table drawing. Jackson had been standing next to her studiously taking direction but leaning in too close. His full-scale model of the solar system was due the next day. Janie hummed and laughed, telling him stories about the planets, as she worked with the knife until it slipped and nearly sliced Jackson on the arm. At first, he didn’t understand why Rush would have bothered to take away that memory. Then, comprehension dawned on him. Rush hadn’t taken it, only given it back.

That knife would have cut him very badly had he been a regular little boy. But at that point, before he’d started training for the Service, his mother hadn’t understood how far his Talent ran. She hadn’t known that she couldn’t hurt him. No. In the last minute, she had used a Shift to deflect the knife. Rush had never even looked up from what he’d been doing. Rush hadn’t saved him that time. His mother had.

“Did you know?” Jackson demanded.

“Know what?” Rush asked truly bewildered.

“Know about Mom?”

Rush had started to turn away but he slowed his movements. His eyes focused on Jackson’s as he grasped for his brother’s memory. “I had a good idea.”

“You never said anything.”

“No.” Rush leaned back against the wall. There were dark smudges under his eyes. Stubble shadowed his jaw. There were beads of perspiration on his upper lip. He slid down the wall to the floor with his knees bent in front of him.

“What’s wrong with you?”

“Please make her leave.”

For an instant, the new memory still fresh, Jackson believed Rush to be talking about their mother. But he wasn’t. Jackson took in the sight of his brother who wore fatigue and frustration like a badge. Rush’s appearance was as he saw it normally, but Jackson remembered what he really looked like. He was again amazed by what he had missed over the years. He couldn’t process it. He couldn’t. Instead, he focused again on the issue at hand.

“Please tell me why.”

The woman of discussion appeared in the doorway to the roof. Her bright blue eyes glowed and she smelled like fresh gardenias as she walked past Jackson. She squatted in front of Rush with her arms around her knees. They were eye to eye. “I’ve searched the world over and now I’ve found you, love,” she sang softly. Rush said nothing but returned her unwavering gaze. “Jacob Rush, I am your servant.”

“Really?” Rush asked dryly. Jackson almost identified a smirk on his lips. “Then tell my brother why you’re here and why I want you gone.”

Bright Star stood and approached Jackson with careful steps. She followed Rush’s direction. “Your brother has been given a very beautiful gift.”

“Yes,” Jackson stated just as dryly in a voice much like his brother’s. “I know. He reminded me of it just moments ago.”

“Yes,” she agreed with a soft nod. “You saw what he has done in this world so far. His Talent is more than just the power you have seen. Silly little Shifts that change a room, light a match, bend a spoon. He has the power of life. But it’s much, much more than that.”

“Again, I say, I’m aware.”

“No, Jackson, I’m afraid you don’t understand.”

“But—”

“Leave it alone, Jackson,” Rush said, standing. “Leave it alone. I thought I wanted her to tell you, but I don’t. I didn’t realize how… Never mind. I’m going to bed. You can sit out here all night if you want, Jacks, but I’m going to bed.” At the doorway, he added, “And, Jackson, I want her gone in the morning.”

He went back into the building. Jackson noticed that his brother did not look the same as he had just moments before: he had reverted to his natural form. Gone were the bags under his eyes, the washed out complexion, and the emaciated physique. They were replaced by a lean yet muscled body with its tall frame, toasted bronze skin, and those entrancing black eyes. Apparently, there was no point in hiding now or ever again.

Resident

When Rush woke up the next morning, there was a pain between his shoulder blades. The pain was sharp and cleared the fog in his brain. Without concern for hiding his High Energy, he growled.
Why is she still here?
He inserted the question directly into Jackson’s dreams and woke him up.

“She wouldn’t leave.” Even to his own ears, Jackson’s silently uttered reason sounded pathetic.

Make her leave
, Rush demanded.

“Why won’t you?” Jackson shot back. Then abruptly, the mental path was cut. Only with it gone did Jackson realize that he and Rush had always used a mental path to talk to each other. Never before had he thought anything of it. It hadn’t occurred to him that this indicated Talent in Rush. He had only accepted it. It was a part of the manipulation he learned of the night before.

Jackson couldn’t think of that anymore. Perhaps, if his memories had shown his brother being anything but honorable, or if he had seen even one act of aggression, one indulgence in vice or one time when his brother had not worked to protect their family, then Jackson would have been able to give rise to his anger. But he couldn’t because Rush had done nothing; nothing short of protect him his entire life. His brother had demonstrated a care and concern for him that was even stronger than the care and concern Jackson had displayed for others in the Service. Jackson’s brother was noble. There was not and would never be an argument to the contrary.

Jackson reached for the mental link again, but this time the mental path had been cut neatly. His brother had shut him out just like that. Jackson tried to open the line of communication again, but found he could not. He tried harder. His brow creased, his heart raced, the hair at his nape stood on end. His nose started to bleed. He stopped.

The door to his room opened and Rush entered carrying a towel. He threw it at his brother who pressed the soft material to his face. “You shouldn’t have done that,” Rush told him.

Jackson offered silence as he tilted his head back and applied pressure to his nose.

Finally, after he was sure the bleeding was subsiding, Rush told him, “You have to put her out.”

“Why?”

“Because she has to go,” Rush answered as if that was explanation enough.

“Rush.” Jackson sat, checked the towel, and pressed it back to his face. “Why?

“You don’t understand.”

“And I won’t understand if you don’t answer the damn question!” Jackson returned. He didn’t like puzzles. He had never liked puzzles. He didn’t like delays. He didn’t like for the people around him to keep secrets. It was rare that anyone could keep anything from him, but when they did... Talking around this subject was only making his patience wear thin. “Why does she have to go? And when you answer, try not to be cryptic.”

“I can’t tell you why,” Rush told him with muscles straining in his neck. “But I can tell you that she is trouble.”

“You don’t even know her.”

“Jackson, trust me when I tell you
I know her,
” Rush argued. Then in a softer tone, he added. “You know about me now. You have your memories back. You know I have certain… Talent… and…”