Double Life - Book 1 of the Vaiya Series (6 page)

Pleased, she added, “Great. Just wait a
second while I determine the challengers.”

Once she’d given it some thought, she
assigned all twenty-four people their opponents for the first round
and the tournament began with her merely being a spectator. It
didn’t seem to bother her though.

After five minutes into each game, it was
clear who the best players were as most games were completely
one-sided. Some people, like Valerie Sandler, Coach Sandler’s
middle daughter, and Eddy, played so poorly that they forfeited
before their rival had even won; while others, like Darien and
Kenn, played so skillfully that they had their audience captivated
from the start.

After the first round was over, there were
only twelve people left. After the second, there were only six:
Darien, Jason, Kenn, Samantha, Amanda, and himself.

Hazel assigned teams again. “Jason, you’ll be
challenging Samantha; Darien, you’ll be challenging Ian; and Amanda
you’ll be challenging Kenn. May the best players win!”

As the two ping pong games started
simultaneously, Kenn and Amanda’s game temporarily postponed, Ian
glanced at Darien, who was smiling wistfully.

“Hey, Darien,” Ian murmured, rather confused,
as they hit the ping pong ball back and forth gently. “You’re not
even trying. Do you think I’m too easy for you?”

“Perhaps,” replied Darien indifferently, as
he hit the ball so softly that it just barely slipped over the net.
Ian wasn’t fast enough to get to it. “You’re not bad though.”

Stretching his arm across the table, Ian
scooped up the ball, and refocused, before serving a spin shot to
Darien. But it didn’t catch him off guard, and he returned it with
such ferocity that Ian hit the ping pong ball way off the
table.

The rest of the game went pretty much like
that, with Ian only scoring eleven points. Although in the past
he’d only ever gotten eight points against Darien, this three-point
record did little to salvage his pride. Though he’d always known
Darien to be the better ping pong player, in public it felt more
real. It hurt.

Shaking hands with Darien after he’d lost,
wanting to seem courteous, Ian saw a grin arise on his friend’s
face.

“Three point improvement.” He laughed, as he
tossed his long black hair to the right side of his face. “You’re
getting better.”

“I feel like a loser,” he mumbled, not a bit
amused, as he sat down on an empty bench beside Darien, who waited
for the other match to end. “The other game’s not even halfway done
yet.”

Darien shrugged. “Don’t take it so hard. I
practice every day.”

“Yeah, but it still hurts to lose though.”
Pausing, he shook his head around, irritation in his voice, as he
whispered to his friend, knowing that Hazel would be deeply
offended by his words if she heard them, “You know what, Darien … I
honestly wish we didn’t even have this tournament.”

A grin edged across Darien’s face. “Don’t say
that. If you’d have beaten me, I’m sure you’d have loved it.”

Hating to admit that his friend was right, he
merely shrugged his shoulders, a growing habit of his when he
didn’t want to talk, and muttered, “I’m going upstairs to get a
drink.”

“But there are drinks down here.” Darien
pointed at a large wooden table set up to the left side of the
staircase, which was filled with plastic cups, orange and black
napkins with ghosts on them, plenty of snacks, and pitchers of pink
lemonade, red punch, and water.

“I can see that,” Ian said, distressed, as he
glanced over at the pitchers of waters, “but I need to be alone,
away from the crowds.”

His friend nodded sympathetically.

Hurrying towards the basement stairs, just
wanting to be all by himself, Ian felt a strong hand grab his arm.
Startled, he looked up sharply, gazing disgustedly at Kenn, the
black-haired athletic guy who inconveniently decided to block off
the staircase entrance. He was the last person Ian wanted to meet
right now, especially after such a humiliating defeat by
Darien.

“Good game, Hansen.” Kenn smirked aloofly,
showing several of his white teeth, as he released his tight grip
on Ian’s arm, his face a nice tan as if he’d just been to a tanning
salon.

“Yeah right. I only got 11 points,” Ian
murmured angrily, wondering why Kenn always referred to him by his
last name. It irked him … no, downright frustrated him. It was
extremely unnatural. “That’s hardly a good game.”

A sneer broke forth on his unwelcoming face,
as his voice grew sterner, his words even more insulting. “You’re
right. It’s pathetic,” he conceded all too eagerly. “But don’t let
it get to you, Hansen. Not everyone’s a winner.”

Shocked, Ian stood in profound horror as
Kenn’s words, like brutal whips, pierced his heart, completely
demoralizing him. He suddenly felt as if he weren’t good at
anything and had no talents; he felt as if he had no friends and
were a complete loser. This feeling made him lash out at Kenn.
“Yeah, and so what?” snapped Ian, after a lengthy pause, rage
seething from his eyes. “I still did way better than average.”

Kenn only stared at him, eerie darkness in
his cruel eyes, a wintry chill in his voice. “If Shayla hadn’t let
you win, you wouldn’t have even made it past round one.”

“I disagree,” said Ian, desperately trying to
keep his cool. “It seemed like she gave it her all.”

But Kenn’s coal black eyes lowered into
narrow slits like a serpent’s, as his voice turned into a ghostly
whisper: “She gave you nothing.”

Anger flashed across Ian’s face, even as
goose bumps spread across his body at Kenn’s creepy tone. “So why’d
she let me win?” he asked, gritting his teeth together, not even
caring to argue the point as it hadn’t helped any last time. “Tell
me that.”

Like a dark warrior, gaze steady and
unflinching, Kenn twisted his mouth into a diabolical smile.
“Because she doesn’t want to see you cry.”

And with those words, Kenn headed over to the
ping pong table where Amanda was impatiently awaiting him, somehow
instantly converting his wicked smile into a pleasant one and his
shadowy face into a bright one.

Nauseated over Kenn’s cruelty and
deceitfulness, Ian dashed up the basement stairs, not wanting to
spend another moment here. Fortunately, everyone was so absorbed in
the ping pong game that they failed to notice his departure. That,
however, offered him little consolation.

Reaching the top of the stairs, rage swirling
through his heart, Ian passed through a large kitchen, and, not
seeing anyone else around him, took a long drink from the faucet.
Thirst quenched, he then hurried into the foyer and decided that
the best way to recover from this humiliating experience was to
head upstairs to check out the exercise room that Hazel had
suggested he explore, and to stay there until he regained his
composure.

Without any further thoughts, he glanced
around him, noticing no one, and then made his move and began to
climb the stairs at a brisk pace, passing by the angel statue and
the potted plants, his heart still racing. He felt mortified. When
he’d lost against Darien, he’d lost a part of himself. Kenn rubbing
it in afterwards had only made things far worse. Now he was certain
that Kenn not only held a grudge against him, but also utterly
hated him. And the worst thing about it was he still couldn’t
figure out why.

Climbing up higher, forcing Kenn’s demeaning
words out of his mind, Ian reflected back to his conversation
earlier that day with Coach Sandler and knew one thing … there was
no way he could help him out now. If he did badly in front of all
those spectators, he would rather die. Far better to never join
than to lose and embarrass the whole team. He could only imagine
Kenn’s words for him then, and Kenn would definitely have words for
him, as Kenn was one of the seven runners on the coach’s team.

Embittered, he opened the door to the
exercise room, and, once safely inside, closed the door for
privacy, somewhat surprised that the lights were already on. It was
a spacious place, a full-fledged workout room. There were
treadmills, weight sets, benches, jump ropes, exercise bikes,
dumbbells, and weights of different sizes stacked on racks next to
the wall to the right of him. Hazel’s dad sure must be in shape, as
he couldn’t imagine Hazel spending much time in here, at least not
on the weight benches. Not that she was weak; it just seemed
strange to picture her lifting weights. If she did anything in
here, it was probably the exercise bike or the various jump ropes
that took up her time.

Curling a ten-pound weight with ease and then
setting it back down onto its appropriate rack, he saw a small
skateboard ramp in an adjacent room through a pair of sliding glass
doors. The room branched off into several hallways and likely lead
to many other rooms.

But Ian wasn’t interested; seeing the
skateboard ramp rekindled his bad feelings for Skyler, working his
emotions into a whirlwind.

Though it was clearly Skyler’s own fault for
breaking his ankle, Skyler had blamed Eddy for his foolish
accident. And then, as if that weren’t enough, Skyler had further
decided to punish Eddy by even going so far as to give him the
silent treatment.

Just about to become infuriated with Skyler,
he abruptly stopped himself and wisely reflected over the
situation. Though Skyler was definitely in the wrong and had been
unusually cruel to his friend, nothing good could come from
dwelling on his bad attitude--he was sure of that--for if he kept
thinking negatively, he’d be up here for the rest of the party
trying to snap out of his bad mood. Besides, with Eddy’s shameful
action towards Alan earlier, it seemed that Eddy deserved having
Skyler mad at him.

With those thoughts in mind, his rage towards
Skyler rapidly declining, Ian moved deeper into the weight room,
scanning for anything interesting, anything unusual, when he
spotted a small hallway in the very back of the room that had an
old stone staircase on its right.

Curiosity penetrating into his heart, he
suddenly felt a deep urge to find out where it led.

Before he’d even gone two feet though,
Hazel’s words rushed into his mind like a Mercedes Benz, answering
his question, as he realized that the staircase undoubtedly led to
the attic, the place that Hazel had said was supposedly
haunted.

Gripped with a sudden burning interest, Ian
was determined to either prove the previous owner of this house
wrong or else have an exciting story to tell Hazel. Either way
though, he couldn’t lose--this was going to be a fun
experience.

Smiling, as he imagined how amusing it would
be if he actually did heard a noise in the attic, he bolted through
the hallway, his adrenaline rising, and then turned right, climbing
quickly up the dimly lit staircase.

After climbing up nearly fifteen steps,
brushing his way through large cobwebs, he finally reached the top
and gazed at the old wooden door in front of him. So this was it.
This was the attic.

Feeling strangely unsettled, he reached out
his hand and gripped the doorknob rather confidently, just wanting
to get a glimpse inside so as to get rid of his anxiety. However,
what he felt only intensified his fear. Not only was the doorknob
unnaturally cold to his touch, it was also very dirty from the dust
that had accumulated on it. It felt like something out of a murder
mystery.

Shuddering at that last thought, Ian
hesitated to open the door, intimidation creeping through him like
a spider, as he questioned whether this was really such a great
idea after all. One thing was sure, though--nobody had been in this
room for a long time, and that definitely made him
uncomfortable.

Putting his ear up to the door to listen for
any noises, he waited in silence for something, anything
ghost-like, morbid, or bone-chilling. When he’d been listening for
over a minute though, and had heard nothing, he chastised himself,
feeling extremely foolish. For somebody who wasn’t superstitious,
he sure wasn’t living up to his title.

Annoyed by his childish fear, he wasted no
more time and pushed open the creaky wooden door, wiping his left
hand on his jeans to get off the dust, while anxiously peering
inside the room. His eyes immediately fastened themselves onto the
many large towering bookshelves scattered throughout the room as a
damp, musty smell swept into his nostrils.

As his nose twitched at the unpleasant odor,
he breathed a sigh of relief. Though it looked as if nobody had
been in here for decades, the place looked just like an old private
library. It was nothing like the horrid image he’d had in his mind
of dangling nooses, rattling skeletons, werewolf statues, and
grotesque paintings.

Confidence awakened, he cautiously took one
step into the room. Then another. Before long, he found himself
gazing outside of the only window in the old library, a
wooden-framed circular opening that shed the faintest light into
this dark place, the only other light coming into this room being
the dim lights from the staircase. And the lighting wasn’t likely
going to change, as there were no light switches anywhere in the
room, at least from what he could see.

Peering out the window, only slightly
unnerved by the dull lighting, he saw many lit-up pine trees
shimmering with white and orange lights below him. Fascinated, he
stared at them through the pouring rain; they were beautiful.

After half a minute, he eventually took his
eyes off the dazzling lights and scanned further, his eyes falling
on Kenn’s shiny black Ford Fusion. Instantly his mind spun back
into a state of wrath, Kenn being at the focal point of his
vengeful thoughts.

Lost in a wild state of imagining various
ways of getting even with Kenn, he was suddenly thrown back to
reality, as a purple lightning bolt tore across the night sky like
a jaguar on a hunt, causing him to jump back reflexively and crash
into a writing table, knocking over a rusty metal jar of pens and
pencils.