Finding Obsidia

Chapter 1

W hat is that smell?

I don’t smell anything.

I crinkled up my nose as I poked through the locker with the end of my pencil, careful not to touch its contents. Seriously, Nixon, it smells like something died in here.

He shrugged, giving me that famous Nixon smile. So, when did you say you were leaving?

Not until tomorrow morning. I continued to poke and attempted to lift up an old lunch bag from the bottom. Ugh… I think I found the smell. I pulled the sweaty pair of sports socks that were balled up in the corner out of the locker. I tried not to gag as I balanced it on the end of my pencil. How long have these been in here?

Those are my lucky socks. He grabbed them away from me and tossed them back in.

Lucky socks? I raised my eyebrow at him. Since when are you superstitious?

Nixon scowled back at me. Since I started wearing these, we’ve won five games in a row.

That stench had to be from more than five games. I shook my head back at him. They didn’t make you the captain of the basketball team because of your lucky socks.

He leaned in. What are you saying, Lex? The corner of his lips twitched up.

He was so close that my heart sped up, but I did my best to scowl back at him. I’m saying you need to wash your socks.

No way. He slammed his locker door. We have an important game tomorrow night, and since you’re not going to be there to cheer me on, I’m going to need all the luck I can get. This time my heart skipped a beat. Does he think of me as one of his good luck charms?

He turned towards me. Are we still on for tonight?

Of course. My heart fluttered; at this rate I was in real danger of cardiac arrhythmia. I was grateful he was oblivious to the effect he had on me.

Alright, I will see you then. He picked up his backpack. Same time?

Same place. I could no longer suppress my smile.

I’ll catch you later. Coach hates it when I’m late. He turned and walked away, weaving in and out of the thick crowd of kids who were loitering in the halls making last-minute plans for the weekend.

It was hard not to admire how he looked in his jeans as I watched him walk away. I followed him with my eyes, watching him make his way to the gym. But before he could step inside, Courtney Johnston grabbed his arm and pulled him towards her.

Nixon. I could hear her voice through the noise of the crowd, which was a whole octave higher as she spoke to him. Good luck at the game tomorrow. I’ll be there cheering you on.

I rolled my eyes. He doesn’t need luck; he has his socks.

Thanks, Courtney. He nodded back at her, then hesitated for just a moment before opening the doors of the gym. The moment the doors swung closed, Courtney’s giggle rose above the crowd and she turned towards her friends. Just seeing the way she swooned over him made my blood boil.

Hasn’t he figured out that you’re stalking him yet?

I jumped at the sound of his voice. Ian, I scowled back at him. Don’t sneak up on me.

Why don’t you just ask him out? He laughed.

That’s easy for you to say.

It is easy, Lexi. You just walk up to him and say, ‘Nixon, I’ve loved you for the past seven years.’ His voice rose, mimicking mine. ‘Will you go out with me?’ He fluttered his eyelashes and smirked at me.

A few kids nearby turned and looked at us. Keep your voice down, I said, smacking him on the arm.

My brother Ian looked like me; we had the same blue eyes, the same strawberry-blonde hair, and we both stood over six feet tall, but that was where the similarities ended. Ian had somehow managed to inherit my mother’s outgoing personality. He never had any problems fitting in anywhere. And even though he was only a sophomore, I was pretty sure he could have his pick of most of the girls at our school. I, on the other hand, struggled every day to fit in, or at least not to stand out.

I sighed. It’s not me that he has to worry about. It looks like Courtney Johnston has her eye on him.

Courtney, huh. He nodded his head back at me. Nice.

My mood darkened. What’s that supposed to mean? I raised my brow at him.

He tried to cover up his goofy grin. Nothing… it’s just that Courtney is quite… mature for her age.

I rolled my eyes back at him. Oh, Ian. I pushed past him and grabbed my bag from my locker. I was done with this conversation. Don’t you have homework? I asked, changing the subject.

He grinned back at me as he pulled a small book from his bag.

Shakespeare? That’s it? How did he manage to get off so easy?

"Romeo and Juliet. I figure I’ll just watch the movie when I get home."

Slacker, I replied. I loaded my books into my backpack.

Is that all your homework? Ian looked surprised.

Not quite, I have to go pick up my assignment from Mr. Myers. Here, take the keys. I’ll meet you in the car. I heaved my already heavy backpack onto my shoulder.

Ian snatched the keys, and without another word, he was gone. The crowd in the hallways began to thin out as I made my way over to the science classroom. The door was partially closed, and I could see Mr. Myers working at his desk. I hesitated before knocking. I always hated talking to teachers; something about their assumed authority made me feel uncomfortable.

Come in, he called out, looking up from the stack of papers he was marking. Miss Mackie. He slid a pile of papers to the corner of his desk as he saw me approach. Here are the class assignments for the next two weeks. And since you’ll be missing next week’s quiz, you can make up your marks by writing a short paper on your trip. Where did you say you were going again?

Oh. I fidgeted with the papers he had handed me. Ellesmere Island. My father’s research group will be taking readings of the seismic activity. Mr. Myers was a science geek, so I figured this would impress him.

Sounds fascinating. I can’t wait to hear about it. His eyes flickered back to the stack of work he still had to finish.

Right, I replied, gathering my things. Thanks again, I called back over my shoulder as I made a quick exit for the door. I shoved my assignments in my bag and hurried through the almost vacant halls. I wanted to swing by the gym before I left and get one last glimpse of Nixon in practice, but decided against it for fear I might run into Courtney and her friends. Instead, I headed out to my car, alone.

I sat on the couch and stared back at the mostly empty computer screen, and watched the cursor blink in sync to the tick of the second hand on my watch. I planned to start on my homework assignment to pass the time, but in truth, it was making time go slower. I re-read the few sentences of my report for Mr. Myers I had written so far.

Ellesmere Island is one of the most remote places on Earth. Its land mass stretches out over 75,000 square miles, making it the tenth largest island in the world. The majority of the island is made up of the Arctic Cordillera mountain range, and is covered by glaciers and ice.

I looked up from my computer screen. Hey Mom, how cold did you say it was going to be there? I called across the room to my mom, who was busy in the kitchen making supper.

She gave me a quick glance before returning all of her attention back to supper, which meant she was trying to think of an answer which would pacify me—she knew how much I hated the cold. It shouldn’t be too bad. A bit below zero… I think. But don’t worry, Hun, we have plenty of gear and it’s all government issue, so you won’t even notice the cold. I promise, she said over the banging of pots. That reminds me, do you have all of your stuff packed yet? We leave first thing in the morning.

I sighed, knowing very well that I had barely packed. I’d put it off as long as I could. Two months ago, when my parents had told me about the trip, I tried to put it off altogether. It was the first time I had the talk with my parents—a desperate attempt to convince them that I was responsible enough to stay by myself for a few weeks. After all, I would be eighteen in only a few short months. That argument was short-lived. There I was, talking about how mature and trustworthy I was, but all she could talk about was how quickly I had grown and what little time I had left at home with them. She ended it off nicely with a small tear forming in the corner of her eye.

That single tear was enough to fill me with guilt. The kind of guilt you feel as a young child when your mother asks if you have eaten the last cookie and you insist that you haven’t. I’ve never been very good with guilt.

I closed up my laptop and headed down the hall to my room, knowing that hanging out with Nixon would be conditional on whether I was packed. I did a mental checklist of all the personal belongings I would need over the next two weeks. Over the years I had become an expert packer. I folded up my clothes as tightly as I could and tried to organize my suitcase somewhat so that nothing would be forgotten. There’s nothing worse than traveling somewhere—especially Ellesmere Island—only to realize you left all of your underwear neatly folded on your dresser. I highly doubted that one of the world’s most remote islands would be likely to have a department store nearby.

After all the clothes were packed, I grabbed my phone, tablet, and everything else I would need to keep myself entertained for two weeks on an isolated island. My parents worked for the Canadian government, which meant we always traveled by private jet, so I didn’t have to worry about my stuff being confiscated by airport security. After running through my list once more, I took my bags out of my room and placed them down by the front door along with the other bags which had begun accumulating there.

Perfect timing, my mom called out from behind me as she finished setting the table.

I walked over to the kitchen to see what my mom had prepared for supper and stifled a groan. Tuna casserole again? I absolutely detested fish, but I couldn’t admit that out loud here on the west coast. Not unless I wanted to be put on some sort of blacklist by the locals. I did the best I could to choke half of it down, then spent the rest of supper just moving the remainder around my plate. On days like this, I would usually sneak over to Nixon’s house later on and see what Judy had cooked for the boys.

Judy, Nixon’s mom, was one of the best cooks I had ever known; I think she could even have made fish taste good. But I wouldn’t dare tell that to my mom, whose cooking was average at best.

After supper, I quickly helped clean up the supper dishes before going back to my room to change into something a little less casual. I ran a brush through my hair and lightly reapplied some mascara and lip-gloss without making it look too noticeable, once again trying to pull off this is how I always look on a Friday night when I am hanging out with my best guy friend look. Satisfied, I stared back at the clock, now convinced that it had actually started ticking counter-clockwise. This was taking too long.

I grabbed my phone and sketchpad and made my way to the back door. Mom, Dad, I’m leaving now. I paused, waiting for a response.

Okay, Hun, don’t be too late. We have an early start tomorrow, she shouted from the other room, over the evening news that both my parents were watching. It was their nightly ritual. The door banged behind me, and I ran down the stairs, pausing for a moment to check if there were any lights on at Nixon’s house. His bedroom was dark, but there were lights on in the kitchen, which meant he was still eating supper.

Maybe Ian is right… I am a stalker.

I walked down the sidewalk and through the back gate, which led to the grassy field behind our house. When I got to the familiar oak tree, I reached around and started climbing the sturdy ladder to the small weathered tree house. The sky was turning to dusk, and the room had a dark, damp feel to it. Flipping on the single lamp that stood in the corner, I flopped myself down on one of the beanbag chairs that occupied the room. I threw my earbuds in and felt my nerves instantly calm. This was my happy place.

Chapter 2

It was my happy place for two reasons. First, it belonged to Nixon, and second, it was the first place on Pender Island where I felt like I was starting to belong.

Nixon and his dad had built the treehouse when Nixon was eight. They built it together the summer before his dad was killed in a boating accident. Nixon didn’t talk about it much, and I never asked.

My family moved to Pender Island when I was ten. Before that, we lived in the suburbs just outside of Sacramento, California. My parents worked in one of the biggest seismology labs in the USA, but when a recession hit, the government cut back on all research funding, and both my parents found themselves out of a job. Back then, I remember a lot of late-night arguments and suppers that consisted of beans and toast.

Our saving grace was Uncle Tom—my mom’s older brother. Although I couldn’t appreciate it then, he had stepped in and pulled our family out of inevitable bankruptcy. Uncle Tom was a data analyst, who worked for the Canadian National Geological Society as the head in his department. I suppose it shouldn’t have come as a surprise that as soon as he found out about my parents’ sudden job availability, he didn’t hesitate to recruit them. As we packed up our belongings and prepared to leave the only home I had ever known, as well as my best friend Rachelle, I’d done my best to suffer in silence.

Pender Island, though beautiful, had never really felt like home.

The day we moved here was the day I met Judy Greene. With a plate of cookies, and five-year-old Josh clinging to her pant leg, the sweet, brown-haired, blue-eyed lady knocked on the door and introduced herself to us as our new neighbor. She got excited when she met me and told me that she had another son who was my age. Though she promised to send him over to introduce himself, I never did end up meeting him until a few months after school started.

The day I finally met Nixon started out like every other day on Pender—pure agony. Being at school was agony, but so was coming home. I had grown tired of my parents’ daily interrogations. Did you meet anyone interesting, who did you sit with at lunch, are the kids being nice to you? At some point, I had to start making things up. After months of this, I decided to do what any kid would do to survive such interrogation. Run away.

Which is what I would have done if I’d had the courage. My bags were packed, and I’d saved my allowance until I had what I thought would be enough to buy me a bus ticket back to California. In reality, I probably had only fifteen dollars, but it didn’t matter. I didn’t get much further than the field behind our house.

It was in that field, hidden in the tall grass, that my life changed. That was the moment I saw a boy my age emerge out the back gate of Judy Greene’s house.

He had dirty blonde hair, blue eyes, and was slightly shorter than me. I recognized him from a few of my classes at school, but he always sat in the back and kept to himself—sort of like me. He hesitated for a moment as he saw me sitting on top of my suitcase in the tall grass, with my arms around my knees. I stared back at him with puffy red eyes. At first, I thought he would just walk past and allow me to suffer in silence. But when he got halfway across the field, he stopped. There was something about the way I looked—maybe it was the familiarity of my suffering—that made him turn back to me. He held his hand out and offered me the only thing that could change my mind: half of his Snickers bar. I’ve never turned down chocolate. He invited me here, to his tree house, and the rest was history.

These four walls of the cramped, weathered treehouse had become one of the reasons I made it through the week. Nixon is the other.

I cranked my music, pulled out my sketchpad, and began to draw. As always, I got lost; I didn’t even notice him watching me.

My heart jumped as he sat down in the chair beside me. Nixon. I turned off the music and stashed my art. How long have you been here?

His lips twitched up in a smile. Not long.

My eyes moved to the two items he was holding. What did you bring?

He leaned over and handed me a bag. My stomach filled with gratitude at the sight—Judy’s beef on a bun. Thank you, Judy! I sighed as I unwrapped the sandwich and began sinking my teeth in it, savoring every bite.

I could feel his eyes on me. What? I asked as I took another bite.

A smile broke across his face. It’s almost as though your parents don’t feed you.

Tuna casserole, I said, rolling my eyes in between bites. If you can even call that food.

Nixon had fallen victim to my mother’s cooking on more than one occasion. Tuna casserole again? I was wondering what that smell lingering in the neighborhood was. His deep chuckle filled the small room and my heart fluttered. It was so easy being around Nixon. Why couldn’t everything be this easy?

Don’t forget to tell your mom how much I love her, I added as I finished the last bite.

Nixon stared in amazement—he hadn’t said a word as he watched me devour my gift—before handing me the second item he was holding. It was his pick this week for our traditional Friday night movie. "Guardians of the Galaxy?" I questioned him, trying to not sound too disappointed.

Don’t worry, you’ll love it. It has a love story at the very end. He gave me another Nixon smile, the one that showed the dimple on his left cheek.

Alright. I sighed and nodded back with a smile. It really didn’t matter what movie he brought; it was never the movie I came to see. Just being here, spending time with him was enough. At least for now.

I leaned over to the Blu-ray player and slid the disc in. As we waited in silence, my thoughts jumped back to Courtney Johnston. The sound of her giggling at him rang through my mind. I wondered if he would hang out with her while I was gone. So much could happen in two weeks, and I began to wonder if he secretly liked her. Now I’m being paranoid. Just ask him.

Hey, Nixon. I could feel my heart begin to race, but I needed to know. Two weeks would seem like an eternity to sit around and speculate.

Ya? he said, looking back at me.

I was just wondering… I paused, feeling my face grow flush in anticipation. Uhh… well if I would be able to borrow your English notes when I get back. You know, I just don’t want to fall too far behind. I was such a coward.

He gave me a weird look. Sure. He could tell I was holding back.

I turned away and gave all of my attention back to the movie that had started playing, but inside I was dying. What was wrong with me? I wiped my sweaty palms on my pants and kept my eyes glued on the TV, even though I could still feel him looking at me.

The evening went by too fast, as it always did, and we walked back to our yards to the sound of the crickets in the dark. There was that silent pause in the darkness, but instead of turning to leave, I threw my arms around his neck in an awkward hug. I'll see you in two weeks, I whispered in his ear, feeling his warmth against the cool night air. I held my breath in anticipation of his reaction.

He stepped back, caught off guard by the sudden embrace. I’ll be here, he said, his tone unreadable.

Well, it wasn’t a complete rejection. My heart raced as I contemplated his words, hoping that deep down they had more meaning. As he walked towards his house, he called back to me, Have a safe trip, Lex.

His words echoed in my ear. I turned back to my house, and stopped to watch him disappear through the door. Goodbye, Nixon, I whispered into the darkness of the night.

Chapter 3

My tired eyes begged me to close them as I awoke to my early morning alarm. Sluggish, I pulled myself out of bed, knowing full well that if I didn’t get a move on, Mom would start up with her usual frantic harping. I threw on some clothes and entered the quiet chaos which always accompanied the mornings of a trip. We’d done this so many times before, that it didn’t take long before we were in the car on the way to the airport.

As usual, we were the last to arrive. We took our seats just as the pilot had finished up with the final announcements before takeoff. I found my spot in the seat across from Jenny. She looked like she was sleeping, her seat reclined back, her eyes closed, and her hands resting on the book that was folded up on her lap. But her lips formed into a slight smile the moment she felt me sit down in the chair beside her.

Jenny was my parents’ colleague. We met the first time Ian and I had accompanied our parents for a work trip. She was short with spiky gray hair, but what she lacked in height she made up in personality. I wasn’t quite sure how old she was, but I imagined she would’ve had grandchildren my age if she had ever ended up having kids of her own. The first day we met, she had taken me under her wing. She was what made these trips bearable.

I pulled my phone out of my bag and glanced at my empty messages.

You know, if you look at it long enough, eventually it will ring.

Her voice startled me. I looked over at Jenny, whose eyes were now open, staring at me through her thick black-framed glasses.

Are you expecting a call from somebody special? I saw the amusement build in her eyes.

My cheeks began to burn red. No, I said as I turned my phone off and shoved it back into my bag.

Did you bring it? Jenny wasn’t much for small talk, which was what I liked most about her.

The plane started to take off, and I felt that flutter in my stomach as we began to defy gravity. Of course. I rooted around my bag and pulled out the tattered deck of cards. It was the same deck we had used the day Jenny taught me to play poker the first time, and she always insisted I bring it. I suppose she was superstitious, like